Receptacles of the Dead might be suffered to be quiet for ever and the Bodies that rest there to remain there for ever if we do not expect the same Body to be raised And as the Body was the Servant of Photii Bibliotheca S. Nilt Oratio Prima Secunda in Patch p. 1528 c. the Soul in good or evil actions * Si quidem Sola Anima praeclaras edidit Officii Actiones Jola eriam Coronetur Sin autem Corpus quoque partem sustinuerit Certaminum coronetur etiam Anima unà cum ipso Corpore Hoc enim justum aquum Convenicntissimum est Isid Pelus lib. 4. Epist 201. He that did good or evil in one Body is not to be Rewarded or Punished in another for that other Body would not be a part of the whole Our present bodies are the Members of Christ and the Temples of the Holy Ghost and he will not suffer them Eternally to be lost What words can more plainly express that it is the same body for substance than the putting on of Incorruption and Immortality declaring that the Corruptible Mortal Body that is laid in the Grave is that which shall be Immortal and Incorruptible This has been the common opinion of Christians in all Ages Upon this account the Primitive Christians were so careful of the Bodies of their deceased Friends manifesting their belief that their Souls should meet these Bodies again On this account their Pagan Adversaries to show their spite and malice when they had burnt their bodies to ashes scattered their dust in the Air or had thrown them into Rivers that if it were possible they might deprive them of all hopes of a Resurrection and make it impossible Some of them triumph'd saying Now let us see whether they can rise again whether their God can help them or deliver them out of our * See more of this in Dr. More 's Mystery of Godliness l. 6. c. 4. With Dr. Beaumont's Observations thereon And Dr. Bury's Naked Gospel Part. 1. Chap. 11. With Mr. Nichols's Answer hands SECT II. But though the bodies shall then for Substance be the same with those we now have yet the modes and qualities of them will be so altered that they will be quite another kind of bodies than those we have for the present In reference to this Expected Change the Apostle saith in this Chapter ver 7. That we walk by Faith not by Sight We do not yet know what our Happy State by that Change will be but in another place he doth more particularly speak of it and more distinctly viz. 1 Cor. 15.42 43 44. 1. That our vile bodies Sown in Dishonour shall be Raised in Glory shall be made Glorious like the Glorious Body of Christ Phil. 3.21 That which is sown in dishonour shall be raised in Glory and bear the Image of the Heavenly Adam Shall be like the Glorious Body of Christ in Perfection of Parts even in External form and figure and it may be stature too But for certain how vile and mean soever the matter of these bodies now be however they may corrupt and putrifie in the Grave they shall come forth in a bright and beautiful form Compared to which the most Exquisite Beauty is but Darkness and Deformity For the Righteous shall shine as the Sun in the Firmament of their Father Matth. 13.43 As the Stars of Heaven differ from a Clod of Earth or a Carrion in the Ditch so will their Glorified Bodies from this Earthly House The very activity sprightfulness and joy of their Glorified Souls will make their faces shine and give the Countenance an amiable Air. Yea Solomen in all his Glory was not arrayed like one of these Children of the Resurrection glittering with Heavenly brightness and deck'd with Light as with a Garment The beams of Christ's Glory who is the Sun of Righteousness shall reflect a Lustre upon them besides what shall be transmitted from their Glorified Souls Our Lord gave a Specimen of this at his Transfiguration and his Glorified Body is to be the Pattern of ours His face did then shine as the Sun Matt. 17.2 the Substance remaining there was a Glorious Appearance For he had the same Lineaments in Tabor as at the foot of the Mount otherwise Peter could not have distinguished him from Moses and Elias * Mr. Charnock of Christ's Exaltation Vol. 2. P. 1093. But his Body now in Heaven doth more excel in Glory that Body he had on Earth than the Glory of the Sun surpasses that of a Glow-worm not only from the Glory of his Soul but of his Divinity shining through it What a wonderful Change must pass on the bodies of the Glorified Saints to make them capable of beholding this Glory of Christ when a little Glimpse of it on Mount Tabor was more than a Mortal Eye could bear it cast Peter into an Exstasie Our Lord forbad his Disciples to speak of the Glory of his Transfiguration till after he was Risen from the Dead but now is willing and hath commanded it should be spoken of all the World over that our thoughts and apprehensions may be raised to consider that Glory which this did but imperfectly shadow and represent For if before his Resurrection and Ascension the Human Nature of Christ had such a Glory how much more in Heaven and we shall be like him Moses on the Mount did so shine that the People were afraid to come near him and he was forced to cast a Vail upon his Face One ray of Christs Glory on the Holy Martyr Stephen made his Countenance shine with an Angelical Lustre And when he shall appear we shall be like him he will then be admired of all them that believe We shall be like him who is the Blessed and only Potentate the King of Kings and Lord of Lords who alone hath Immortality dwelling in that Light which no man can approach unto whom no man hath seen or can see 1 Tim 6.15 16. 2. There will be a change of these bodies in respect of Spirituality It is sown a Natural body and raised a Spiritual one The grossness and Feculency that now adheres to it shall be purged off Not Spiritual in opposition to Corporeal that is a Contradiction but in oppositition to Natural of a Spiritual Nature in opposition to this infirm flesh a body raised to the highest degree of Excellence as near the Angelical State as a body can be brought It is called our House from Heaven 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not an House that is to descend from Heaven to us but that is of an Heavenly Nature all of a Peice with Heaven So Purified as to be Assimilated to the Heavenly Region where we are to dwell for ever The first Man was of the Earth Earthly the second Man is the Lord from Heaven And from each of them we partake of an answerable Nature As is the Earthly such are they that are
Earthly even all of us in our fleshly State having earthly bodies from an earthly Adam and natural bodies from the natural Adam And as is the Henvenly such are they that are Heavenly For Christ will make them like himself and as he hath an Heavenly Spiritual body and not an Earthly Natural body so shall his Members have that they may be like him And as we have born the Image of the Earthly in having a Natural Fleshly body we shall also bear the Image of the Heavenly Adam in having a Spiritual Body not needing the use of Meats or Drinks or any of the refreshments or pleasures of the animal Life or be imployed in any of those Acts whereby the body is now denominated Natural and suited to this Earthly State But our bodies shall then be Spiritual suited to the Life that Angels and Saints live in Heaven every way greatly refined and the Activity of our Spirits improved without the defects and infirmities of flesh and blood shall be invested with Caelestial Qualities depending wholly on the Soul and yielding ready obedience and conformity to its desires and motions executing all its Commands with pleasure and Dispatch Yea the imployment and operations of the body shall be raised above those in the present state as much as the Imployment of a King exceeds that of a Scullion This Spiritual Body one represents by Organized Light as a torch or wood that looseth its drossy and foggy qualities when heightened into a pure flame or minerals heightened into Spirits 3. The Bodies of the Saints shall be changed from weak and passive into Active and Powerful Bodies Sown in Weakness but raised in Power They are now dull and sluggish but then they shall be nimble and active like the Body of Christ that at his Ascension into Heaven being done in one day moved many thousands of Miles in an hour the distance between the highest Heavens and this Earth being computed to be some hundred millions of Miles They shall be raised with Angelical Agility and Strength He that is weak among them shall be as David he that is as David shall be as an Angel of God moving without difficulty and without weariness Now we often find the Body cannot keep Peace with the Soul the Flesh is weak when the Spirit is willing but it shall be raised in Power It is now liable to Diseases and Passions can do little and suffers much but no Diseases or Infirmities shall hereafter hinder its motions or impair its Health A glorified Body will move without weariness and fast without hunger and wake for ever without need of refreshment Herein there will be a suitableness to the Activity of a glorified Soul and without this they could not bear the weight of the Heavenly Glory Besides they are to indure to all Eternity without reparation by meat and drink and fleep 4. They shall be Incorruptible and Immortal It is sown in Corruption it is raised in Incorruption This mortal shall put on Immortality They shall dye no more but live for ever Therefore the day of the Resurrection is called the Redemption of our Bodies They shall not be liable to be put out of tune by infirmities and pains and numberless diseases as now which often make Life it selfe a Burden They shall be Immortal without needing that Labour by day or sleep by night which now we bestow to supply their Necessities and repair their decays and prevent Death Now the Body has the seeds of Mortality and Corruption but shall then be refined from all such Principles There shall not be a tendency to Death in the nature and constitution of the Body such will be the glorious Change that they cannot dye any more 20. Luk. 36. They that were raised by Christ when on Earth they dyed again their second Life was no more exempt from death than their First But at the Resurrection Mortality shall be swallowed up of Life it shall lose its power and force for ever CHAP. VII Inferences of Truth and Duty from the preceding Discourse The Soul doth not perish when the Body dies The Felicity of the Soul is what we principally desire Our Faith should be consirmed in the Believing Expectation of this Glorious Change Our affections and Conversation should be Suitable SECT I. First Let us not then imagin the State of the Dead to be a State of Non-existence or Annihilation that the Soul perishes with the Body and that we are without Hope of its Resurection Whereas when our Soul passes into a state of Rest and Joy with Christ our Flesh rests in Hope that these Bodys shall be raised and reunited to their glorious Souls We are to pass through the Valley of Death to a Blessed Life This is the Desire and Hope of all the Followers of Christ And these very Desires of a blessed Life beyond the Grave will prove the Certainty of it We must have strange Thoughts of the infinitely wise and holy God and of his Love and Goodness to imagin he should give his Creatures such a Knowledge of himself that makes them desire more even a Desire to know and love and injoy him perpetually and yet never intend an eternal Communication of himself answerable to those Desires Can we think the blessed God would deceive and mock those that desire to seek and please him by inabling them to aspire after a Happiness in his presence and by giving them a Capacity for it And then to frustrate and disappoint his own work Can we think that God would excite their Desires after another and a better state and yet never admit them to it Can we imagin that God would raise their Desires from sin and this World to himself and Heaven and that these shall never be answered in a happy Issue Shall the very Sanctification of our Nature prepare for our Torment and help to make us miserable Will the God of Love and Grace inable us by his Grace to hunger and thirst after Righteousness and after the blessed vision of his Face in Glory and yet never design our Satisfaction The more any partake of the divine Image we find that they groan and long the more earnestly after another sort of Happiness than is here to be had after another State and Life than now they enjoy And may we not conclude that such a State there is The natural Desire of Happiness in all mankind will do much to prove that there is such a thing But the holy Desires of the Sanctified influenced by the spirit of Grace will much more prove it That spirit of Christ that hath inabled thee to long and pray for a more perfect State that has conquered thy vain Desires after earthly things and raised them to seek the Knowledge and Love and Fruition of God That Spirit is the Witness of Christ in thy Soul that there is such a State after Death and that thou shalt share in the Blessedness of it He hath framed and wrought and fitted
ordinary cases may be supposed to equal or exceed the Pains of Death And who knows the divine Supports that may make our Dissolution easie yet many a Mother has Courage and Patience by the Hopes of Life and of a living Child when all these Sorrows shall be soon forgotten And shall the Knowledge and Expectation of Heaven and Eternal Life be less powerful to influence thy Soul against the Fear of Death How many have been inabled to conquer the Fear of Death and been displeased with their Friends that talked of their Recovery as hopeful and have told them that such Discourse was not pleasing they had rather dye and be with Christ Is it thy Usefullness to Relations and Friends or to the Interest of Christ in this World that makes thee unwilling Think a little Are you fitter to Judge and determine of that than he Can he not do his own Work without thee Consider therefore Christians you that know you cannot have an House above without pulling down this earthly Tabernacle you that know you cannot get to Heaven but by dying and pretend to be related to the heavenly Country Are you desirous of nothing better than the Fruits of this Earth What a contempt of God and Christ What a gratification of the Devil what a contradiction to your belief and hope does this Backwardness carry with it yea a contradiction to the very End and Design of all Religion which is a dead and vain infignificant and trifling thing if it refer not to a blessed Eternity beyond the Grave and if it bring us not to desire and chuse it as our End You especially who are Old Disciples and have been long in the School of Christ should consider this You know you must ere long lay down this Tabernacle and be uncloathed you profess to hope shortly to enter into the World of Joy What a shame is it that your Sight is no clearer your Perception no quicker your Apprehensions no higher your Desires no stronger as to this expected Blessedness after Death though you are sensible you draw nearer to the things believed and hoped for and that within a little while you expect the Promises will have a full Performance as to you that you are almost there where Faith shall pass into Sight and Love You are almost ready to take your place in Glory where Millions are gone before you O how is it that you are no more Joyfully affected with these Hopes How is it that your Thoughts are so doubtful your Desires so sluggish That this Body and this present World is so unduely loved even though the pleasure of sensible things be almost gone though bodily Infirmities and Pains make this present Dwelling uneasie For they require your Patience and call aloud to you to hasten your work to set loose and prepare to come away God hath made you weary of this World and makes you often cry for divine Assistance and Grace He hath given you to know by experience that He alone must be the Portion of your Souls his Favour alone your Life and Heaven or nothing your happiness You find that the Hope of Heaven is your only Comfort For such as you to be unwilling to dye who by Age and Weakness have one soot in Heaven already is most inexcusable You have found that your Souls are usually worst when your Bodys have been best and when the Body is in the best State it is usually worst with the Soul should it not therefore be your care when the outward Man is decaying that the inward Man should be aspiring after God and grow better Has this vile and corruptible Flesh been so much your Friend that you are loth to be uncloathed What Entertainment have you had in this World that you should be so loth to leave it Have your Fears and Cares and Sorrows by reason of the Body been so delightful that you would not that they should have an end that you do not groan to be cloathed upon with an House from Heaven Methinks as every Pain and Ache and Trouble and Sickness should mind the wicked of their eternal Sorrows so the bodily Infirmities Decays and Sickness of good Men should raise their Desire to be with Christ O What a shame is it as to All of us that we no more desire and groan to be delivered when there is so glorious and blessed a State in view before us That the Thoughts of these things are so cold and seldom Our heavenly Affections so low and weak What can be the reason but that we look upon the heavenly Glory as at the distance of many Years to come if at all we believe and expect it But this is shameful to those that profess by Death to expect a freedom from all the incumberances of Flesh and Blood of bodily Passions and Appetites and of all the present Temptations of sensuality who expect that our Time of Sinning and Suffering shall shortly end together when we shall be released from all the sad Accidents of Mortality and this vile and corruptible Body be raised in Glory Shameful indeed for us who believe a blessed State so near when there shall be nothing from within nor from without ever more to intercept hinder or abate our compleat Felicity who look for the Light of Gods eternal Favour to shine upon us and the plentiful pleasant Streams of eternal Goodness flowing from God and the Lamb to make our delight and Joy perfect and everlasting And yet we do not as we ought desire and long to be Partakers of this blessed State CHAP. X. Our Holy Friends Departed obtain their Desires by Dying this should moderate our funeral Sorrows A short Account of the Exemplary Character of Mrs. Mary Dootle with some Passages of her last Sickness The Conclusion SECT I. Lastly HOW should all this moderate our Sorrow for the death of our holy Friends and Relations whose earthly House is pulled down to enjoy a Heavenly one Who groaned and waited and longed for that Disolution which we unduely Mourn for Who are pleased with that Translation and Removal which we bewail It is but what they desired and long have waited for They are now pleased in the Happy Change of their old Earthly Dwelling for a Building of God not made with Hands eternal in the Heavens They are uncloathed to be Cloathed upon Let us not then mourn for their Advancement to that Happy State which they earnestly aspired after and which we our selves should live in the Joyful Expectation of Let us rejoyce rather that they have finished their Course that their Souls are gone to Christ That their Bodys shall rest in their Graves for a Time and hereafter arise in Glory Let us think where our deceased holy Friends now are what they See and know and do and enjoy what the State and Life and Company and Employment above is and how much better it is with them now than when they were with us on Earth They have received
the End of their Faith and Hope and so attained their desire in the present Salvation of their Souls and they have Assurance too as to their Bodies That hereafter they shall be raised and changed and made like the glorious Body of Christ SECT II. Let us thus think in particular of our Good Friend Mrs. Doolittle who hath put off this Earthly Tabernacle and is entered into the glorious Assembly of the Friends af Christ above What I shall say of her is not meerly to comply with Custom concerning the Dead but in hopes to edifie and Instruct the Living I Know there be some who disgust the publishing of any particular Passages of our departed Friends how Imitable an Praile worthy soever But it is the Fluttery and Falshood often used on such Occasions concerning those whose Character will not bear a Commendation that is the Cause But I fear no such Censube as to what I shall now say concoming Her whose Death and Funeral brings me here and gives another Place this day to my Reverend Brother than this where he is wont to be God will not be displeased that we should Honour those whom he hath Honoured with eminent Grace The Memory of the Righteous shall be blessed And how shall others be perswaded to follow the most Laudable Patterns if we conceal particulars At least the Surviving Relations Friends and Acquaintance may be edified and assisted by it in their Duty upon such Providences And I have the less to apprehend of Cavil or Objection in the present Case because what I shall mention is from such Hands as there can be no Doubt of the Truth of what I shall say and very many of you here will readily yield a concurrent Testimony SECT III. It shall be under three Heads First her personal Piety or her general Character as a Christian Secondly her Relative Religion or concerning her in the several Relations wherein she stood as faithfully discharging the Duties of them Thirdly Her Christian Deportment under bodily Infirmities and Sickness with some more remarkable Passages in this her last Sickness before she put off this earthly Tabernacle First as to her Personal Piety and general Character as a Christian That she was truly Serious and Religious in her Youth and so esteemed and judged abone forty years agoe was the ground of her being chosen by her Husband as the Companion of his Life And God continued her to him in much Mercy for about nine and thirty years being pleased by her to build up his House to such a Degree as not many Instances in City or Country can be given of the like That out of his own Family there was not one Solemn Funeral in Thirty nine or forty years except of two Children in the Month and one newly wean'd and none at all in the space of five and twenty years Let God have the Glory and let Thankfulness to heaven be mixed with your mourning by this Reflection I have many witnesses amongst you who were acquainted with her serious Piety and they who knew her best had abundant proof of her secret Converse with God and dayly retirement for Meditation and Prayer and this very often early in the Morning Which is Imitable by all of us and one of the best Evidences of Unfeigned Real Living Religion in the Power of it I do not understand and I like it not the worse that she pretended to high flights of Confidence and Assurance which few attain or preserve very long and I fear many deceive themselves by somewhat that is not of God under that Name Yet when she had any Darkness as to her Spiritual State when she was sensible of the weakness of her Love to Christ and Lamented it He who on all accounts was fittest to assist her endeavoured to let her know the Truth of that Grace by distinguishing of a threefold Love to Christ a Delighting Love a Desiring Love and a Mourning Love telling her that tho she had not the former of these to her Comfort she could not deny or disown the two latter And this helped to give her Satisfaction and support concerning the Tryal of her State She added Judiciously the Night before she died I look to Sincerity and uprightness of Heart as a ground of Comfort but I do not put them in the room of Christ my only Saviour Several years agoe she read much in the practical Writings of Mr. Isaac Ambrose particularly concerning Eternity which made a very great Impression on her Mind so as that she trembled under the Apprehension lest she should come short of that Blessed Eternity there described However under her Doubts and Fears when the free Grace of God in Christ was discoursed of she could comfortably say why then may not such a one as I be accepted by free Grace in Christ and hope to be capable of Blessedness in Heaven as well as others this is a Faithful Saying worthy of all acceptation that Christ came into the World to save Sinners of whom I am Chief This she did and could say from her very Soul and appeal therein to the Omniscient Searcher of Hearts and this was her Encouragement and Joy that she could Say it I have resigned my self to God in Covenant again and again I Bless the Lord who hath enabled me to devote and give up my self to be his Lord I am thine Accept and Save me And at another Time she was able to say I have had that Converse with God and Communion with him that I would not part with for the whole World This is more than many who are Sincere attain unto For tho some real Christians have great Refreshments and support by Communication of Light and Strength and Joy upon a sick and Death Bed as if the Light of Glory shined into them and they had the beginning of Heaven here yet many others may want this when they come to die and Experience little of these exuberant Joys through their whole Course For God exercises Prerogative in the Dispensation of his Comforts at that and at other Times Therefore the Judgment we should make of Persons must rather be grounded on their general Course of Life than on their particular frame in Sickness or toward the approach of Death Some times by reason of the disorder of the Blood and Spirits the Holiest servants of God may be either Lumpish and Melancholy or else Feverish and Phrenetcal sometimes through the Temptations of the Devil they may be unsetled in their Minds or through Dissertion speak uncomfortably to those about them They may afflict themselves with dispairing Thoughts and leave the World under inward Darkness Their agonies in death may be without any sence of Comfort and yet they may be accepted with God and pass to eternal Glory because we shall not be Judged according to that particular Iustant of Death but according to the general Course of our Life However it is observed in most cases that God does speak peace to upright