Selected quad for the lemma: death_n
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A67564
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The Christians victory over death a sermon at the funeral of the Most Honourable George Duke of Albemarle, &c. : in the Collegiate Church of S. Peter, Westminster, on the XXXth of April M.DC.LXX / by Seth, Lord Bishop of Sarum.
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Ward, Seth, 1617-1689.
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1670
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Wing W818; ESTC R12260
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16,635
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40
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and heroical designs to raise them above all worldly things and bring them to a Rational contempt of Death And this is that Theory which Christ hath delivered concerning the state of the Vitâ functi But Secondly Christ hath not only delivered but he hath also assured the world of the truth of this Theory He confirmed the truth of his Doctrine the Divinity of his precepts the certainty of the Rewards and punishments of the world to come the infallible performance of his promises and his threatnings Not by giving the world a set and series of imaginary principles of vain Philosophy and Science falsly so called engendring strifes and everlasting disputations Not by bare Assertions and confident Repetitions only as did the Epicureans of old And as is the manner of some in our daies who have taken up their principles amongst our selves Not by Phantastical obscure Ratiocinations concerning Numbers Vehicles 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the like But by evidences plain and convincing by proofs sensible and experimental partcularly accommodate to the eviction of the truth of the matter in question and to the conviction of all mankind By raising Lazarus and others from the dead he at once gave an experiment of the immortality of the Soul and of the Resurrection of the body of the capacity of eternal Rewards and Punishments Of all his Doctrines he gave infallible sensible undeniable proof by the purity of his Precepts The Sanctity of his Life The Testimony and witness of his Death By fulfilling all the Prophesies concerning him By his Predictions and his Miracles By a thousand several instances of supernatural Wisdom and Power By his glorious Resurrection his Visible Ascension By sending down the Holy Ghost on the Apostles By enabling his Disciples and his Followers to work Signs and Wonders in one word by innumerable Arguments Thus the Captain of our Salvation the Author and Finisher of our Faith hath cleared the Foundation and Principle of Heroic Actions in exhibiting to the World the Grounds and Causes of a just and rational contempt of Death ANd now blessed be his Holy Name who by his Grace applying those Principles to the hearts of the Professors of Christianity is pleased in all Ages to raise up Christian Heroes for a Testimony to the energy of his eternal Gospel And in particular Blessed be his Name who in our Time and in our Nation hath been pleased to raise up that Great and most Honourable Person the Illustrious GEORGE Duke of ALBEMARLE that Great and most eminent and uniform despiser of Death That Glorious Performer of Heroic Actions Concerning whom I am obliged though very briefly and scantly to speak His Country the source of many Gallant men His Extraction from a generous ancient eminent Family His early Addiction to Arms the School wherein he was trained the degrees by which he ascended His youthful essays His virile Performances both at Sea and Land in Forreign Countrys in England Ireland Scotland All memorable and such as will be great in Story shall not detain you The little which I intend to speak shall take its Epocha from that time when God was pleased to raise him up to be our Deliverer to call him forth and show him openly upon the Theater of the World making him a spectacle to Angels and to men Since this time if we shall well consider him in every Circumstance I conceive I may without flattery or partiality pronounce 1. That a greater Action hath not been performed than that of the Restauration 2. That a greater Person than He concerning whom we are speaking hath not bâ—â—n produced in many Generations And these are the two things which I shall propose to your Observation To enter into the places of Rhetorick and to expatiate in a formal Panegyrick were to violate your patience and offend the manes of him to whom we perform this parentation He was a man Great of Performance little of Speech no lover of wast words or fine composed Orations but a great Affecter of what was short and plain easie and inaffected In compliance with this Character of him I shall briefly and plainly intreat you to consider That for a man to exert an Heroical performance two things are requisite 1. There must be the exercise of Vertue Prudence Fortitude Iustice Temperance and their subordinate vertues in an eminent manner And 2. There must be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 something divine and extraordinary An eminent opportunity an Object Arduous and Honourable And a Success that may have in it an evidence of something supernatural Consider how all these Circumstances were combined and constellate in that marvellous work of the Restauration 2. Moreover seeing that Honor est in honor ante and lies in the Apprehension of Spectators who alwaies have one eye on the prosperity as well as an anothâ—◠〈◊〉 the merit of a person And who do not give a final Judgment ante obitum supremaque funera Therefore to estimate the greatness of this Person I shall intreat you to consider 2. The perseverance of his vertue 3. The Felicity wherewith it was attended 1. For the Glory of the Restauration The greatest advantage of Honour with God and Man which can befall a Military Person is not to slay his thousands or his millions but to be made a Repairer of the Breaches of his Country and a Restorer of paths to dwell in For this there must be Opportunity if there be no breaches there can be no repairer For this God gave him Opportunity How great alas were the Breaches how gaping how desperate were the Wounds of these sinful miserable Nations Hell had broke loose upon us and Confusion had obtained and held a Dominion of 20 years The Flower of our Nobility Gentry c. cut off by the Sword of the Rebellious How were the mighty fallen I may not stand to make a gradation of our miseries Quanquam animus meminisse horret Yet I must repeat it the King and the Priest the best of Kings a most excellent Prelate fell under the Swords rather under the Axes of an impious Rebellion The Sun was turned into Darkness the Moon into bloud the Stars thrown from their Orbs. Our Religion abolished our Foundations overturned our Laws abrogated The Government of Church and State dissolved the Governours Banished imprisoned murdered Instead of Religion Atheism and Infidelity Fanatick Rage and wild Enthusiasm Instead of Liberty and property the voice of Sequestrations and Plunders Decimations Transportation Imprisonment were heard in the Land Our Kings and our Princes were among the Gentiles the Law was no more the Prophets received no Vision from the Lord. How often did his Majesty attempt a Restitution How often was he disappointed He came to his Own but his Own received him not they said This is the Heir Come let us Kill him and the Inheritance shall be ours God permitted them to fill up the measure of their Iniquities to baffle every attempt for a Restitution He suffered them
stinging of a worm that dies not and the tormenting rage of a Fire that never shall be quenched In either of these Cases in the Figurative Language of the Scripture which speaks of Death as of a Person it may be properly asfirmed That Death is too hard for such a man that it gets the victory and holds the Dominion over him But if on the other side the state of a man be advanced and bettered by his Dissolution So that upon good Consideration it be desirable to him to be Dissolved If when Death shall have done its utmost the Essential part of man The Man that is in Man shall be surviving surviving in joy unspeakable to be compleated in a Glorious Resurrection to be continued and increased to all Eternity Then he who doth not perish by the hand of Death nor is thrown by it into a state of infelicity but passes through death into endless Life this man is properly victorious over Death Now this is the Effect and Summary of the Gospel to this every part of it one way or other doth relate it every where assures us that this is the condition of every true believer Whosoever believeth in him shall not perish i. e. shall not cease to be much less do worse but have everlasting Life viz. he hath the victory over Death Secondly Again for the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The whole series of this affair is per omnia Causarum genera from the first occasion of the difference to the last performance of the Victory abundantly delivered in the Gospel This tells us that by the Law sin entered into the World and death by sin i. e. death temporal and death eternal So that the sting of death is sin or the Consequent of sin and the strength of sin is the Law It tells us that death reigned over all in as much as all men had sinned That by the Law no flesh could be justified though it was in its nature holy just and good Yet it was become the ministry of condemnation That to take away the strength of sin which is the Law God sent his Son made under the Law to redeem them that were under the Law that to disarm death by taking away the sting thereof He who knew no sin was made sin That sin might not reign in us and death might no more have the Dominion over us That we might not be under the Law but under Grace He humbled himself to Death even the Death of the Cross. There He his own self bare our sins in his own body There he abolished in his flesh the Law of Commandments slaying the enmity thereof There He blotted out the hand-writing and took it out of the way nailing it to his Cross. There he died that by his death he might destroy him that had the power of death even the Devil There he spoyled Principalities and Powers 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 â— ostentavit eos triumphing over them in it Thus Christ the Captain of our Salvation obtained the Victory over death and hell obtained it for himself and for all his faithful Souldiers and followers Thus all of them have certitudinem objecti Every true believer is victorious over death in truth and in rei veritate But every one hath not in this life certitudinem subjecti This is not a general Interest to which men are entitled by Christianity but a special Grace and priviledge dispensed according to the peculiar prerogative of Gods Will and Pleasure Though Christianity and a just power of Contemning Death may be reciprocal yet Christianity and the actual exercise of the contempt of Death do not by necessity evince one another There are Children of light which walk in darkness working out their Salvation with perpetual fears and tremblings There are on the other side some that having no Charity are yet so far transported as to give their Bodys to be burned There is a way that seemeth right unto a man but the end thereof are the paths of death So that the second Observation is limited and particular viz II. Through Christ it is given to some Believers to attain in this life to a settled contempt of death and enabling them to triumph over it This was the Case of St. Paul in the Text and the Case of many others He giveth us the victory saith St. Paul To clear this Observation I ought to shew how Christians come to obtain this priviledge 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by and through Christ. To perform this fully it would be requisite to lay before you the Doctrines of the Merits of Christ and of the Grace of God and of the Application of them by Believers But being restrained by the occasion I shall only endeavour to shew that Christ and He indeed alone hath given his followers such a System of principles as is apt and able to bring them to a Rational contempt of Death Now this he hath done 1. By the Theory which he hath left the World concerning the State of the Vitâ functi or Deceased 2. By the assurance which he hath given the World of the truth of that Theory No other Theory supposing it to be true is in its nature able and apt to bring men to this heroic state No other dissenting Theory is or can be true Annihilation and misery Nature abhors and the only ground of a rational Contempt of death is a just expectation to advance and better a mans estate by dying This expectation arises only from a good Conscience To reduce a man to a good habit of Conscience nothing is powerful enough beside the powers of the World to come a right understanding and a deep Consideration of the Peâ—sonal Rewards and Punishments of the World to come Now the true Theory concerning Personal Rewards and â—unishments was first of all clearly delivered to the World by our Lord Iesus Christ For 1. He it is that hath cleared the personal capacity of the rewards of the World to come 2. He it is who hath delivered plainly and clearly the Administration of the Rewards themselves 3. Christ has cleared the Capacity of personal rewards and this he hath done by his Doctâ—ine concerning 1. The Immortality of the Soul and 2. Of the Resurrection of the body First For the Immortality of the Soul Although the simple Apprehension of spiritual Beings The judging things contrary to the representation of sense as in the distance and magnitude of the Sun Moon and Stars The forming universal Prâ—positions The Reasoning and Reflecting power of men The strugling betwixt the Sensual and Intellectual part of man The Lashes of Conscience in Wicked men always forecasting gâ—ievous things Although these and many other indications of Nature do evince that there is in living men something incorporeal and immortal And although beside and above these Indicaâ—ions there are many passage in the Law and the â—rophets from whence the immortality of