Selected quad for the lemma: life_n
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A51401
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A sermon preached at the funeral of the Right Honourable Roger Earl of Orrery, who dyed the 16th of October, at Castle-Martyr, and was buried at Youghall in Ireland the 18th of the same month, in the year 1679 by Thomas Morris, M.A. ...
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Morris, Thomas, M.A.
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1681
(1681)
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Wing M2812; ESTC R16333
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20,753
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48
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in the words of the Text will yield us some relief in this matter Indeed considering all his Vertues and Accomplishments how pious a Christian he was how loving a Husband how careful and tender a Father how loyal a Subject how faithful a Friend how wise and vigilant a Statesman how good a Patriot of his Country how kind and just a Neighbour how charitable to the poor how noble a Master in his Family how ingenious and learned a Person in his discourses and converse and in a word how great a Lover of all Vertue and Goodness and Hater of all Vice and Impiety in all which he was so eminent that though he hath left behind him many Peers in his honours yet 't is to be feared few in his vertues considering I say all these things in him we might have reason never to have lest grieving and lamenting our loss of so excellent a Person But considering withal from what great pains and labours he now rests and what future evils he may be taken away from and to what an happy state of bliss he is now advanced where he doubtless enjoys the comfortable fruits of the good works he hath done though we have indeed lost one of the Pillars and Patriots of our Country and one of our best Friends yet we have reason humbly to acquiesce in the good will and Providence of God lest by our overmuch grief and sorrow we shew that we repine at what God hath done distrust his good Providence and envy the happiness of our noble Friend an happiness which a voice from Heaven declares they are possessed of that dye as he did saying Blessed are the dead that dye in the Lord the very hearing of which methinks is enough to quiet and calm the most tumultuating passion upon this account And now that we may see we are not deluded in this matter with vain shadows and appearances of comfort I shall lead you to the considerations of those things in this noble Person which from what hath been said will appear to be a great relief to us this way And to let pass those many things that might be said of him in all which should I be particular I shall be thought to compose a Volume rather than a Sermon all that I shall say shall be only what will be pertinent to our present comfort which I shall digest into this following order shewing 1. What reason we have to believe this noble Person dyed in the Lord and consequently is blessed 2. What labours he now rests from 3. What good works of his follow and entertain him with unspeakable joys 1. That this noble Person died in the Lord these things following sufficiently declare viz. His Faith his Repentance and his sincere obedience to all Gods Commandments First His Faith For as he was by Baptism initiated in the true Faith so he continued firm and stedfast in it to the end He believed with all his heart and soul as he would often phrase it all the truths of Gods Word and would often declare He expected salvation in and through none else but Jesus Christ alone because he would say Acts 4.12 there is none other name under Heaven given among men whereby we must be saved And this Faith of his was not an idle speculative Faith but truly active and working which he would often say was the only true saving Faith for it made him severe against all vice and impiety and a lover of all vertue and goodness it made him also employ the utmost of his great Parts in the rigorous defence of all those religious truths which he believed Gods Word contained against all the incroaching errours of all Parties and this not only in his common Discourses but sometimes with his Pen too neither did his Faith make him a talkative Christian only but it influenced all his actions also so that his whole life seemed to be but one continued Argument of his firm belief Secondly His Repentance He did not only believe but with tears often lamented and repented of all the sins he could charge himself with which though they were not many for he generally led too strict a life to be guilty of very many yet those that he was guilty of through surprize anguish of his Distemper or frailty he had so tender a Conscience that he was immediately sensible of them and would with tears in his eyes heartily beg God's pardon for them and by many expressions testifie how much grieved he was for offending God but by a sinful word as all that were near him can abundantly witness And this his sorrow for sin which wrought this repentance in him never to be repented of made him watch and pray and zealous against those sins he had been any time through frailty guilty of all which are sound marks of unfeigned repentance if we will believe what the Apostle says concerning the fruits and effects of godly sorrow in 2 Cor. 7.10 11. Thirdly His sincere obedience his sound faith and unfeigned repentance could not chuse but bring forth the saving fruits of obedience in his life and conversation Hence it came to pass that he was truly zealous in his life for the honour of God and Religion which zeal of his enkindled in him an holy indignation against the common crying sins of the Age viz. drunkenness whoredom prophane swearing and cursing oppression schism atheism c. For which abominations he would say The Land mourns and God will certainly visit Besides all this it made him most religiously devout in all the Duties and Services of publick and private Worship it made him frequent in good and edifying discourses and in heavenly ejaculations and prayers and that even amidst his greatest pains it made him charitable to the poor humble and modest temperate and sober just and peaceable forgetful and forgiving of injuries and in a word it made him do all things that Christ had commanded him not out of any bye and sinister ends but in pure obedience to Gods will and out of a respect to God's Glory and his own souls salvation Now what do all these things else but testifie that he lived and dyed in the Lord For they who being baptized into the true Faith live and dye in it repenting of all their sins and obeying sincerely all Gods Commandments are the persons who from what hath been said appears dye in the Lord and then this noble Person who so dyed must needs be blessed as such in the Text are declared to be Having therefore now this assurance of the blessed state this noble Person now is in let us next take a view of the Particulars wherein it consists and therefore 2. We next come to consider the great labours he now refts from And here we shall find That besides those labours and evils which 't is common to all that dye in the Lord to rest from as from sin and the troubles and horrours of it from crosses and afflictions c.
A SERMON Preached at the FUNERAL OF THE RIGHT HONOURABLE ROGER EARL of ORRERY WHO Dyed the 16th of October at Castle-Martyr and was Buried at Youghall in Ireland the 18th of the same Month in the Year 1679. By THOMAS MORRIS M. A. His Lordships Domestick Chaplain LONDON Printed by J. M. for John Wickins at the White-Hart over against St Dunstans Church 1681. TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE MARGARET Countess Dowager OF ORRERY May it please your Ladiship THE high esteem I have for the extraordinary worth of my Deceased Patron hath I confess such an influence on me that I cannot but think my self obliged to do him all the honour and service I can now he is Dead as well as when he was Living And I should think my self unjust as well as ungrateful should I not lay hold on all opportunities to do it However I must also say that I am so conscious of my own Defects that I should have been willing these following Meditations on the sad occasion of his Death should have lain only in Private hands had not your Ladiship exprest a a willingness to have them more publick Not that I have any design to avoid or suppress the Publication of your Noble Lords worth whose Memory I shall always honour but that I fear my weak endeavours will rather Eclipse than render it Illustrious But your Ladiships Commands having superseded all excuse I dare not be backward in paying this my last duty to him in doing which though my Expressions have been short of his Due yet I have hopes my zeal will Apologize for that defect which however illy expressed I am sure is hearty and real I have not the vanity to think that by what I have said either in the Sermon or Character I have added any thing to your Ladiships Comfort or knowledge since as to the first I am sure your Ladiship is no such stranger to Christianity as to be destitute of those good grounds it affords for that purpose And as to the second it would be a great piece of impudence in me to think your Ladyship should not know and retain a livelier Idea of this your Noble Lord than what in my rude draught I have represented All therefore that I have done will serve more to inform others than your Ladiship who as they come hereby to be acquainted with the admirable Excellencies of one more of the worlds most Famous Worthies so in the perusing and considering what is here said of him they may be further provoked to follow his steps Since therefore this unpolisht piece must by your Ladiships order come abroad I cannot but take the confidence to crave your Ladiships pardon for as well as Patronage of it which by reason of its meanness I confess is as unworthy of the latter as it stands in need of the former Hoping that though I have not drawn things so well to the life as they have deserved yet my endeavours that way may be accepted because in them I have chiefly aim'd to give a testimony to the world of the great Honour and Esteem I have for the memory of the Deceased and also to shew how much I am Right Honourable Your Ladiships most obedient most faithful and most humble Servant in Christ Jesus Thomas Morris A SERMON Preached at the Funeral of the Right Honourable ROGER EARL of ORRERY REVELATIONS xiv 13. And I heard a voice from Heaven saying unto me write blessed are the dead which dye in the Lord from henceforth yea saith the spirit that they may rest from their labours and their works do follow them SUCH and so many are the troubles and afflictions which by divine appointment Christians are likely to meet with in this vale of tears that had they hopes of no other happiness than what in this world they partake of they would be of all men the most miserable Insomuch that even Death it self which Nature shrinks at and abhors would be desired by them though not as a door that opens to an happy state yet as a period to all their calamities and sorrows as well as their beings But there is no such bad news for sound and sincere Christians they are happy even in their very Afflictions which they are assured from Gods spirit will work for them an exceeding and eternal weight of Glory 2 Cor. 4.17 They are so far from being without the hopes of enjoying a more blissful state than here they are in that they only of all men in the world have the most sure and certain hope that way For Jesus Christ the Eternal Son of God hath by his precious death and sufferings procured for those that are his sincere followers all things that may conduce to their felicity He being the Saviour of all men 1 Tim. 4.10 2 Tim. 1.10 especially of them that believe 'T is He that hath brought Life and Immortality to light through the Gospel Which they Rom. 2.7 who by patient continuance in well doing seek for Coloss 2.14 shall undoubtedly enjoy 'T is in a word he that hath blotted out the hand-writing of Ordinances that condenm'd us And having taken away our Sins and nail'd them to his Cross hath thereby disarmed Death of his sharpest sting so that now of a King of Terrors he is become the sweet harbinger of bliss and peace to all that live and dye in Christ 'T is therefore an utter mistake to think that sound and sincere Christians though grievously afflicted here are in an hopeless condition on the contrary 't is Infidels and Hpyocrites are so they who will not have Christ reign in their hearts but rather a beastly lust they who do not and will not strive to conform their lives to Gods holy precepts these indeed as long as they continue in their hypocrisie unbelief and disobedience are of all men the most miserable for they can have no solid hopes of any other happiness but that low mean and pitiful one that in this world only is to be enjoyed and Death is so far from being a friend to them that the very thought thereof terrifies them and marrs all their pleasant enjoyments and when it does draw near to execute its fatal Office upon them it comes arm'd with its most dreadful sting and opens upon them a floodgate of Vengeance and Misery This is their portion But now on the contrary the truly godly have infinite reason to look upon Death as their reconciled friend through Jesus Christ it being through him now made but an happy manumission of their pious souls from the labours and drudgeries they underwent in the flesh and a sending of those Immortal Beings into those regions of rest and bliss where the enjoyment of Gods presence together with the sense of all those good things which through grace they have been enabled to do in the body will be an eternal solace and refreshment to them And the evidence we have for the certainty of this future bliss is so