Selected quad for the lemma: death_n
Text snippets containing the quad
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B08795
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Animadversions upon a fatal period, or, A brief discourse concerning the present state of the body, and the future state of the soul by Tho. Collard.
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Collard, Tho.
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1678
(1678)
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Wing C5102A; ESTC R174032
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31,547
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104
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making the one a blind for the better execution of the other as if all the love and mercy he expresses all the passionate invitations he makes were only to mock and delude us And as several ills saith the most judicious and ever to be admir'd Author of the Causes of the Decay of Christian Piety are hereby countenanced and authoriz'd so is all Virtue in general discouraged and disheartned these benumb us in our Christian course substract that spirit and vigour which should carry us through the weary stages of duty indeed they cut the very sinews of Industry baffle and make ridiculous all purposes of Labour the Ministers Preaching and the Peoples Hearing and Doing for what should invite a man to strive for that from which he knows he is either irreversibly precluded or else so infallibly ascertain'd of that his negligence cannot defeat him GOD has given us Rules of Life which upon the severest Penalties he requires us to study and practise and we divert from these and make it our business to trace his Counsels We are gazing at the Stars to read our Destiny and look not to our feet and by that negligence experiment the worst fate they could have portended for I think we may say our wild Phancies about Gods Decrees have in event reprobated more than those Decrees upon which they are so willing to charge their ruine and have bid fair to the damning of many whom those left salvable We often forget our Calling by contemplating our Predestination and let the Opinion of our Fate be at once the Encouragement and Excuse of our sloth than which nothing can more evacuate the purpose and design of our Christianity which Divines have truly defin'd to be not a contemplative but active Science THE Almighty interrogates the house of Israel Why will ye die and tells them in the subsequent Verse I have no pleasure in the death of him that dieth wherefore turn your selves and live ye Yet some bold Inquisitors into Gods Decrees and hidden Counsels dream That his secret Will is of a very distant nature to his revealed Et Deus ita terminum seu horam mortis homini praefinierit decreto absoluto ut hâc ipsâ horâ non aliâ hoc ipso mortis genere quo homo moritur non alio mori illum simpliciter absoluteque sit necessarium and that the Soul likewise is liable to the same fatality That Myriads do what they can are from Gods eternal and immutable purpose ordain'd for death and endless misery and a very few Favourites only in comparison of the rest do what they will are predestin'd to life and immortal Glory This wounds the Credit both of the Divines and the Physicians of their Proselytes and Patients and by the clearest consequence makes the former Cheats and the later Fools But whether true or no we come now to consider THE Question here Why will ye die and the Protestation I have no pleasure in the death of him that dieth may clear Gods ways of being either cruel or unequal and evidently demonstrate the Almighty's Philanthropy and his high resentment of the ruine and Perdition either of Body or Soul And first concerning the present State of the Body The present state of the Body THE Protoplast had he continued in his integrity as he might for God gave him sufficient power to stand and did not withdraw the least degree of his Grace or infuse into him any secret impulse or motion whereby he might deviate from that sacred station in which he was plac'd he had been free from death but having once eaten the prohibited fruit 't was necessary by Gods Decree but not before that Death should arrest him for it for the immutable Creator had said That in the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die Gen. 2. 17. So that we may not before the Fall altho it be true since term death with Socinus to be naturae sequela per se For as by Adam Sin enter'd into the world so death by sin Rom. 5. 12. And as it follows so death passed upon all men for that all have sinned that is All meer men that were after born were sinners born after the image and likeness of Adam that was now a sinner and had begotten no Child in his innocence Sinful men then we are all and die once we must by reason of our Fore-father's Apostasie 'T is true we read that Lazarus and others being raised from the dead without controversie died twice but the Author St. Paul doubtless of the Hebâ— Chap. 9. 27. speaks of the natural Law whereby it is appointed unto all ordinarily once to die so that 't is not opposite to this truth because others have died twice which by an extraordinary manner happen'd only to a few And as for those that shall be found alive at the second and sudden coming of Christ they shall be changed in a moment and in the twinckling of an eye which mutation or change shall be to them instead of death 'T is then most apparent that 't is ordinarily appointed unto men once to die and then certainly to come to judgment to be punished or rewarded according to their actions Rom. 14. 10. 2 Cor. 5. 10. OUR brittle and terrestrial Bodies we all grant must be dissolved for our Bounds are set and our lives limited within such a number of years beyond which by the ordinary course of nature we cannot pass but our Days are not so strictly and fatally limited and determin'd as if neither God nor man could extend or shorten them The fifteen years added to Hezekiah's days assure us of Gods power to prolong the life of man and Reason Experience and all History both sacred and prophane proclaim his power to shorten it And thousands of Examples too sadly evince how expert and indefatigable many are in putting a Period to their own and other mens days in the midst and prime of their strength and splendor A man may destroy himâ—eâ—â— his Friend Neighbour or Enemy before he hath seen thirty years that otherwise might have seen threescore And therefore a fatal Period in the judgment of all considering men is no less than a Stoical Astrological and Mahometan Dream or at best but a popular Error as our immortal Dr. Hammond terms it in his Postscript of new Light AND we likewise confess That God does know and may foretel the very time manner and place of any mans death but 't is a simple Logician and a giddy and hot-braind Christian that from Gods Predictions and Revelations of the period of some mens lives as of Aaron Pashur Hophni and Phineas and of the holy Jesus will hence infer as W. C. most irrationally doth that therefore the very moment the very kind tho it be self-murther and place of every mans death are fatally and absolutely decreed and appointed I shall transcribe our famous Preacher's very expressions and words which indeed would have sounded better from the mouth
be thus long or thus short SO the Metaph. tell us Quae Deus praescit non possunt non evenire sic habent necessitatem fiendi Idque propter infallibilitatem praescientiae divinae Res enim sic dicuntur necessariae non nisi per connexionem ad aliud hoc est praescientiam divinam Loquendo autem de rebus in se spectatis quae praesciuntur remota connexione ad praescientiam divinam non omnes res sunt necessariae quae necessit as est consequentis Sunt enim multa in mundo casualia fortuita libera quae omnia in se spectata non necessaria sed contingentia sunt Fiunt proculdubio cuncta ait Boet. quae futur a Deus praenoscit sed eorum quaedam proficiscuntur de libero quae quamvis eveniant tamen propriam naturam non amittunt sed priusquam fierent etiam non evenire potuissent AND says the other Causae naturales morales suos habent effectus in vita hominis conservanda Deus igitur illas in constituendo termino vitae ut omniscius respexit ita tamen ut eas uhi velit inhibere possit Natural and moral Causes as wholsom food air water continency temperance c. have their effects and operations in preserving mans Life and God in terminating and setting Boundaries to mans Life as he is Omniscient and foresees all things hath an eye and respect to these yet so that he can put a Stop to those natural and moral Causes can inhibit them as in his infinite wisdom he sees fit As for Example God sees that such a man living and doing thus and thus will according to the ordinary course of nature certainly live thus long suppose fifty sixty seventy years yet God may cause that this man that might live thus long shall dye much sooner as at twenty or thirty So God in his mercy may shorten the days of many righteous men take them away from the evil to come or in his justice cut off the wicked that according to the strength of nature and the set bounds thereof might have liv'd much longer Yea Job himself is against a fatal Period and therefore we cannot imagine if he intended it in the 14 Chap. he would have contradicted both himself and it in the 21 Chap. 19 20 21. ver God layeth up his iniquity for his children he rewardeth him and he shall know it His eyes shall see his destruction and he shall drink of the wrath of the Almighty For what pleasure hath he in his house after him when the number of his months are cut off in the midst W. C. being now forc'd from his strong Hold which he thought invincible 't will be his wisest way to address himself to the Alchoran where he may find more kindness and need not fear a second repulse NEITHER may mens lives be shorten'd only but also extended whereof we have a pregnant example in the 2 Kings 20. beg For God plainly signified to Hezekiah that he should dye of that very distemper he then labour'd under for he was come to the set Bounds beyond which he could not pass except Omnipotency be pleased to remove them farther So ver 1. Hezekiah was sick unto death and the Prophet Isaiah came and said to him Thus saith the Lord Set thy house in order for thou shalt dye and not live Yet the immutable Creator that decrees mutability as the learned Dr. Jackson words it and whose promises and menaces are not absolute but conditional hearing his Prayers and seeing his tears remov'd the Boundary recover'd him with a lump of figs to demonstrate the use and necessity of means and added to his Life fifteen years And therefore W. C's Gloss is very prodigious and Enthusiastick pag. 8. The fifteen years added to Hezekiah 's Life were added to Hezekiah 's date not to Gods Hezekiah looked upon himself as a dead man that he should dye of that very sickness and good reason seeing God told him so and so in all likelihood did his best Physiciaâ—s for he was sick of the Plague but both he and they were deceiv'd for God in his unchangeable purpose had appointed fifteen years more to Hezekiah 's Life STRANGE indeed For we find in the Chapter no such learned Cheats and Pick-pockets as all Physitians are supposing a fatal Period nor the least shadow of such an interpretation for God himself said by the mouth of his Prophet I have heard thy Prayer and I will add unto thy days fifteen years and I will deliver thee and this City c. And as a sign that God himself would effect this and did not prevaricate a Miracle is wrought he brought the shadow the Sun ten degrees backward by which it had gon down in the dial of Ahaz But were the former Paraphrase true God himself made and the Prophet told a Lie and was deceiv'd as well as Hezekiah and his Physicians and the words should not run The Lord will or did really add to Hezekiah's days fifteen years but Hezekiah the Prophet the Physicians with all the Nobles and Courtiers not well understanding this infinitely Soul-concerning Point viz. a Fatal Period were so simple and credulous as to believe that God had miraculously extended Hezekiah's Life and who can think otherwise that reads and believes this sacred History Whereas God had absolutely decreed from eternity or in his unchangeable purpose appointed there is not the least difference in the Phrases that Hezekiah should live fifteen years longer which being not expir'd 't was impossible for the Plague or for God himself to put an end to his days A feeble and impotent God that can neither extend nor shorten the Lives of his Creatures 'T is wonderful to see that one petty Distinction in Mans date but not in Gods should be of such mighty force as to enervate so many plain Texts of Scripture as have been and may be produc'd for the prolonging and shortning of mans Life and to make them speak quite contrary even to become like a Nose of Wax to turn either to this side or that to prove truth to be falshood and falshood truth Should I be troubled with such an airy and Atheistical Whimsie as to affirm with some of the ancient Peripateticks and Ethnicks That the World is eternal tho Aristotle himself doubted 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And against it is objected Gen. 1. 1. In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth Ergo Mundus non fuit ab aeterno I shall most humbly crave W. C's leave borrow his almighty distinction and answer very magisterially as he did to the Lords adding to Hezekiah's days fifteen years 'T is true in mans date viz. in the date and account of Moses Aaron and their Bigots the World had a beginning but in Gods date 't was eternal for God in his unchangeable purpose had appointed it from Eternity Such stuff as this will pass for superfine Doctrine for powerful Preaching and sublime Raptures with