confidence waite for it and when it comes bid it welcome as our friend that comes to free our soul out of the prison of the body the sole impediment of it's perfection and to open the doore to let us into a better world and into a better life Thus of the Person to whom he makes his suit The Lord. 2. Now we are to consider of the Act Take away my soule How doth the Lord take away souls Not by annihilation or reducing them to nothing as at the first Creation Nor by laying them a sleep together with their bodies till the Resurrection the Opinion of the Arabians Nor by a Metempsuchosis transmitting them into some other body to informe them Nor by fixing them as Starrs in the Firmament Nor by sending them into purgatory as the Papists teach But thou that gavest it me take it unto thy self either by thine own immediate power and grace who art a Spirit and the God of the spirits of all flesh or by the Ministery of thy good Angells let them be ready to receive it at the parting of it out of my body as they did the soul of Lazarus and to carry it up to rest and glory Thus Lord take away my soule From hence note first That our souls are immortall they dye not with the body but when the body at the dissolution returns to the earth from whence it was taken the soul returns to God that gave it All the expressions of holy men dying imports as much Lord Jesus receive my spirit saith St. Stephen Father into thy hands I commend my spirit saith our Saviour Lord take away soul saith our Prophet all expressing their faith in this truth That their souls were immortal Feare not them that can kill the body and are not able to kill the soul saith our Saviour So then the soul cannot be killed Our blessed Lord disputing with the Sadduces concerning the Resurrection Mat. 22. tells them out of the Scriptures That God was the God of Abraham the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob who were dead and buried a thousand years before and from thence concludeth the immortality of the soul inasmuch as God was not the God of who dead but of the living ver 32. their spirits did never dye their souls were still alive and in being and he was their God Vses First It is of Use to quiet our spirits and to satisfie our minds sometimes troubled upon the consideration of the perplexities of Providence in the cross dispensation of evill and good to the good and the evill here in this world the unravelling of this Clue of the souls immortality from the beginning to the end will guide us through this Labyrinth so that in the end we shall say The wayes of the Lord are right when a day shall come when it shall be said to the Epicures of this world which have had their portion in this life as in Luke 16.25 Sonne Rentember you have had your pleasure in your life time and my servants received pain now they are comforted and you are tormented 2. This Meditation is of Use to comfort and to confirme us against the fear of death either our own or our friends inasmuch as beleeving in the Lord me shall live though we dye And he that liveth and beleeveth in him shall never dye eternally Indeed we shall not dye at all totally for though we lay down our bodies into the earth to sleep yet our spirits shall not dye at all but being delivered from the burden of the flesh shall live with the Lord and be translated into a state of joy and feliâ—ity Et meliore sui parte superstesâ— erit The better part is still living and therefore the Scripture will hardly call it a death but a Sleep a Change a Dissolution a Departure a Translation 3. It is of use for the contempt of this world in which we have no surer footing and of the best things of this world of which we have no better hold nor longer enjoyment but for this short uncertain life 4. This Meditation of the immortality of the soul is of speciall use to teach and to admonish to prepare and to provide for that our future condition to lay up for our selves treasure in Heaven that we may have something to take to when we come into the other world when we shall leave this and all that we have in it behind us to make us friends of the Mammon of iniquity that when time comes they may receive us into the everlasting habitations to lay here a good soundation against the time to come that seeing our fouls are immortall and shall have an eternall being it may be in well being that seeing they shall live eternally it may be in bliss and happiness now is the time to provide for it O how miscrable will be the condition of those souls which having lost their time here when this life is ended shall be swallowed up into eternity and all that while shall live in woe and misery in pain and torment easeless endless and remediless How much better had it been for such if they had never been born Or being born that their souls had dyed with their bodies or living after them there had been some period of time wherein they might have been extinguished But when they must so continue for ever That the worme shall never dye nor the fire never goe out that they shall continue in torment to all eternity Who can conceive the misery of it That word eternity into what a deep bottomeless gulfe doth it swallow up the mind that thinks upon it Great wonder it is and a miracle indeed that a point of such great importance and high concernment should be no more heeded and regarded Some live as if they had no souls at all or if they have any that they are but as the souls of bruits which perish with their bodies and well were it with them if they did so they live as if they never thought to dye and dye as if they never thought to rise again they have no hope in their death nor any care of their immortall soules ever after To these I say no more but this Lord have mercy upon their poor miserable soules they will have time enough hereafter when it is too late to see their error and to repent of this their stupidity and security Secondly Note here the holy and heavenly expressions of the Saints and Servants of the Lord at their departure out of this life O Lord I have waited for thy salvation saith the Patriarke Jacob upon his death bed Gen. 49.18 Lord now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace said old Simeon Luke 2.29 for mine eyes have seen thy salvation Saint Stephen the holy Martyr with these words breath'd out his soule Lord Jesus receive my spirit Acts 7.59 Our Lord himselfe upon the Cross giving up the ghost with these words breath'd his last Father into thy hands I commend
my spirit Luke 23.46 in sense the same with the Prophet in the Text Lord take away my soule With such holy expressions as these did holy Men dying take their leave of the World and breathe out their spirits I could instance in many more Bishops Martyrs Confessors and other holy men and Women dying some in my own hearing others in the hearing of other Men and recorded in the stories of their Lives and Deaths with the gratious expressions utter'd by them in their death-beds in words full of faith full of hope full of comfort much to the edification of all that were present and it is a great advantage to be present with such men at such a time for then are they most serious then are their soules loosing from the prison of their bodies and are prominentes as it were looking out before they take their flight then have they clearer Vision of things then they had before when they were in the close prison of their bodies the light breaks in at the chinks and at the doores and windows opening to let out the soule then have many of the Saints had rare Discoveries and Revelations by which they have Prophesied of things to come and the words of dying men are much to be heeded and regarded But if you would have the Lord to draw neer unto you in these wayes when you are dying you must draw neer to God in his wayes while you are living You must acquaint your selfe with God and be at peace with him as Eliphas speaks in Job cap. 22.21 you must live in communion with him you must call upon his Name prayse him and give him thanks worship him and doe his will then will he own you and be mercifull to you at that time and draw neer unto you and have a care of your soule that it shall not miscarry but he himselfe will take it away But secondly If you would have the Lord to take away your soule you must keep your soul with all diligence and preserve it pure and undefiled that the Lord may own it and accept it and place it among the holy souls of his Saints and his redeemed ones The Lord our God is a holy God of pure eyes which cannot behold any thing that is impure but with indignation and there is nothing more odious to him then sinne and corruption nor which renders us more abominable in his sight Compared therefore to Leprosie to the Leopards spots to menstruous pollution If therefore our souls shall be presented unto him stained with sinne polluted with uncleanness defiled with spirituall leprosie of corruption spotted with noysome lusts and pleasures Will the Lord look at them will he own them will he accept them Can we desire the Lord or hope that he will take away such souls or imploy his good Angels to fetch them as he did to receive the soule of Lazarus and carry it into Abraham's bosome No there are other soule-gatherers ready to take away such souls even those which were imployed to fetch away the soule of the covetous rich Man in the Gospel Luke 12.20 If we would have the Lord to take away our souls we must present them pure unto him without spot and blameless They must be wash't cleane in the blood of the Lambe and cleansed by the sanctifying vertue of the holy Ghost our Consciences the highest faculty of the soule Must be purged from dead works to serve the living God We must purge our selves from all filthiness of flesh and spirit and grow up in true holiness in the feare of the Lord The Place which our souls are to goe to it holy the Company holy the exercises holy and so must our souls be also that they may be suitable to all the rest and then the Lord will take away our souls and place them amongst them in joy happiness and glory Thus of The Act. The Object followes My soule 2. Branch The soule is the spirituall part of Man the principall and essentiall part whereof Man doth consist the fountaine of life sense and motion which by the spirits vitall naturall animall the souls cursitors running into all the parts of the body actuates and informes it and useth it as an Organ or Instrument whereby to performe it's severall operations This soule of man is pretious in these seven respects First In respect of the Fountaine of it it proceeds originally from the immediate breathing of God himselfe For when God had made Man of the dust of the earth he breath'd into him the breath of life and Man became a living soul Gen. 2.7 Secondly In respect of the rare faculties of it the Understanding the Will the Memory the Affections Reason Judgement Wisedome Knowledge Conscience the highest of all the rest considered in both the parts of it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the one The Treasure the other The Soules Controuller c. Thirdly In respect of the immortality of it it dyes not with the body but being taken out of the body is preserv'd unto Eternity Fourthly In respect of the Image of God once stampt upon it which though miserably defac't since by the fall yet not so utterly raz'd out but there are goodly lineaments of that Image yet left upon it Neither is it so irrecoverable but that by the spirit of grace and the grace of sanctification it may be so repaired and renewed as that the soule may be and is said still Thereby to be made partaker of the Divine Nature 2 Peter 1.4 not in the substance of the Deity but in holiness and righteousness wisedome knowledge goodness love and light which are as the beames of the Image of God shining upon it Fifthly In respect of the purchase of it It is the price of blood not of Bulls and Goats but of the Divine blood of Jesus Christ our Redeemer 1 Peter 1.19 Sixthly The pretiousness of souls may appear by the pains and cost that Satan and his Instruments will be at to gaine a soule they will compass Sea and Land to gaine a soule give a Kingdome for a soule Mat. 4.8 All the Kingdoms of the world with the glory of them Omnia haec tibi dabo All these things will I give thee if thou wilt fall down and worship me ver 9. Seventhly By the great care that Almighty God hath taken to preserve souls and to save them from perishing he hath given his Word to direct them his Ministers to instruct them his Sacraments to confirme them his Spirit to guide them and his Angels to guard them and all this to preserve them and to save them from perishing In all these respects it appears that souls are pretious Our blessed Lord which well knew the price of souls lays one soule in one ballance and the whole world in the other against it and upon the tryall tells us That one soule weighs downe the whole world in the other scale What shall it profit a Man to win the whole
from the time of it's first being in him whether by Creation or by infusion or by traduction generation I dispute not nor of the praeexistence of it before an Opinion that hath great Patrons too especially among the Philosophers the Gymnosophists of Egypt the Brachmans of India the Magi of Persia and the Jewish Cabalists and among them some Christians also Origen for one but I wave that dispute too But I date my discourse from the souls first being in the body from that beginning it passes it's immortality under three conditions or a three-fold estate every one of them different from other The first is the state of the foule during the time of it's being in the body which it doth actuate and informe The second is the state of it between the time of the separation of it from the body by dissolution and there union of it again with the body at the Resurrection the day of Judgement And the third is from that day to Eternity and for ever after That these three states of the soule are different one from the other is evident enough Of the first of these we have experience in this life while our souls are in our bodies which are given unto us to actuate and informe them and to use them as Organs or Instruments for glorifying God by them and doing good Glorifie God in your bodies and in your spirits for they are his 1 Cor. 6.20 this is done by giving up the faculties of the one and the parts of the other Not as members of unrighteousness to unrighteousness but as instruments of righteousness unto holiness and accordingly as we have so done shall we give an account unto God in the day of account For we must all appear before the judgement seat of Christ to render an account for the things done in the body whether they be good or evill 1 Cor. 5.15 Therefore now is the time of working now is the time of doing our selves good now is the time of laying a good foundation for the time to come now is the time of laying up that which may be for the furtherance of our account then now in this first estate of the soule while it is in the body must we provide for the well-being of it in the second estate and in the third and to Eternity Now as this first estate of the soule in the body is different from the second estate of it as it is separated from the body so is that second estate of it out of the body different from the third estate of it when it shall be re-united to the body again and put into that estate in which it shall remain for ever and to all Eternity It is the generall Opinion of men but withall a generall mistake That as soon as ever the soule is separated from the body it passes immediately into that estate either of joy glory or of misery and torment in which it shall remain for ever without any alteration True it is That at the separation of the soule from the body there is a particular judgement passes upon it by which it is made known to it what shall become of it Eternally and is presently put into the beginnings either of the one or the other and into a state previous to that third estate in which it is to remain for ever without alteration but that either the souls of wicked men are immediately upon their separation from the body cast into that extremity of misery and torment which is prepared for them Or that the souls of the just doe then pass into that heigth of joy and glory which God hath prepared for them I doe confidently deny and shall prove the contrary in both the parts of it And first for the souls of wicked men that they are not upon their separation from the body cast into that extremity of torment which is prepared for them I prove by an Argument à Majori thus The very Devills themselves are not yet cast into that extremity of torment that they are condemned unto Therefore the souls of wicked men are not immediately upon their separation cast into those torments The Consequence of this Argument is clear for no man will judge the state of wicked men to be worse then the state of Devills The Antecedent I prove by two clear testimonies of Scripture The first out of St. Mat. 8.29 where those fierce Devills which had possessed two men among the Gergesens seeing Christ comming towards them are stricken with terror at his presence and cry out What have we to doe with thee Jesus thou Sonne of God Art thou come to torment us before the time They knew they were condemn'd to torment but there was a time set when they should be cast into it but that time was not yet come and therefore seeing him comming towards them they cry out against him as if he came to antedate their misery by casting them into it before the time Art thou come to torment us before the time The other proofe is both a confirmation of the truth in hand and an illustration of this Text It is in the Epistle of Jude ver 6. The Angels also which kept not their first estate but left their own habitation he hath reserved in chains of darkness unto the Judgement of the great day where you have the time when they shall be cast into that extremity of torment unto which they are condemned at the judgement of the great day and the estate that they are in in the mean time they are reserv'd in chains of darkness the chains noting the safe keeping and securing of them that thus can no ways make their escape And the darkness noting their dismall and uncomfortable condition all that while They are reserv'd in chains of darkness unto the Judgement of the great day an expression borrowed from the state of condemned prisoners which after they are condemn'd are secured in chains or fetters and cast into the dungeon and there reserved unto the day of Execution And this is a sufficient proofe of the truth of this assertion in the first part of it as touching the souls of wicked men That the state of their souls from the day of their separation from their bodies untill the day of Judgement is not the same that it shall be after that day though it be a woefull estate too as will farther appear in the sequel of this discourse We are now to make good this Proposition in the other part of it Concerning the souls of the just that they enter not presently upon their dissolution into the fullness of joy and glory intended them and prepared for them And for that I alledge Rev. 6.9.10.11 where at the opening of the fifth Seale St. John sees under the Altar the souls of them that were killed for the Word of God and for the testimony which they maintained And they cryed with a loud voyce saying How long Lord how long holy and
the will of God 2. The second follows and 't is this That it is not enough to doe the will of God Opere operato but they must doe it as it should be done or els it will never reach to the Satis est in the Text Now this Satis est hath respect to two things in doing the will of God First The manner of doing it Secondly The extent of it The first requires that it be done well The second that it be done home they both are included in the Word Zealous I have been Zealous for the Lord God of Hosts Zeale is a vehement affection composed of Love and Anger and Actions flowing from these two are ever done in earnest they are done home and throughly and so ought we to doe all things that we doe for God The Opus operatum the work done will not serve the turne but it must be rightly qualified in all the circumstances of it and done in a right manner If we love the Lord our God we must love him with all our heart with all our soule with all our mind and with all our strength If we serve him we must serve him with reverence and godly seare If we worship him we must worship him in Spirit and in Truth Luther said well That God loves Advers rather then Verbs the manner of doing more then the work done the will more then the deed the mind more then the matter we must not serve God negligently nor we must not serve him by halves either of these make our obedience fall short of Elijah's Satis est in the Text To say we beleeve in God we love God and we feare God and not to obey him to shew our faith by our works and our fear by our worship Non satis est it is not enough but to our faith to joyne our obedience and to our fear to joyne our worship and to our love our care to keep his Commandements Satis est it is enough To profess that we know God to confess his Name to draw neer unto him with our lips and in all outward deportment to have a forme of godliness Non satis est it is not enough but to know God in Christ reconciling the world unto himselfe to draw neer unto him with our hearts and dearest affections and with the forme of godliness to shew forth the power of it Satis est it is enough To cry Lord Lord as in the Gospel and Templum Domini Templum Domini The Temple of the Lord The Temple of the Lord as the Jews did in Jeremy Non satis est it is not enough but to doe the will of our Father which is in Heaven and in his Temple to speak of his Honour and to worship him aright Satis est it is enough To make our boast of God and of his Law to heare every day a Sermon to know the Mistery of the Gospel to have a mouth full of Scripture ready at all times to throw at an adversary in dispute or discourse Non satis est it is not enough but to know the truth as it is in Jesus to receive the truth with the love of the truth to answer the end of the Evangelicall Law which is Love out of a pure heart a good Conscience and Faith unfeigned Satis est it is enough To bring multitudes of sacrifices and oblations unto the Lord to stretch out our hands before him and to make many Prayers Non satis est it is not enough but to wash us to make us cleane to take away the evill of our works from before his eyes to cease to doe evill and learne to doe well Satis est it is enough To come before the Lord with thousands of Rams and ten thousand Rivers of Oyle to give the fruit of my body for the sin of my soule Micha 6.6.7 Non satis est it is not enough but to doe Judgement to love Mercy and to walk humbly before the Lord Satis est it is enough To conclude this point to be admitted into the visible Church to be matriculated into it by Baptisme to live in a professed subjection to the Gospel of Christ to come to Church to heare Sermons to sit out the Service and at the appointed times to receive the Sacrament of the Lords Supper though this be more then we can gaine of many among you Non satis est it is not enough but to make it our care all the dayes of our life to make good the Covenant which we made in our Baptisme to become Members of the invisible Church incorporated into it and united unto it by the bonds of faith and of the spirit to express the power of the Word Sacraments and Spirit working by them in a constant holy walking before the Lord as becomes the Members of that holy Society Satis est it is enough And so we have made good the second Inference drawn out of Elijah's third Satis est in reference to what he had done Satis Feci I have done enough But stay a little before we take our leave of this Satis est it is necessary we should answer an Objection that lyes in our way and must be removed before we can proceed any further Obj. Quid audio What is that I heare Satis feci I have done enough Who can say so be he a Prophet be he an Apostle an Evangelist be he the holiest of Saints that ever lived can he say of himselfe Satis feci I have done enough Is there a Satis in our obedience unto which we may arrive and then say It is enough Our Saviour tells us That when we have done all that we can we are unprofitable servants How then can any say It is enough or I have done enough Sol. To this I answer by a double distinction First thus There is a Satis ad Justificationem and there is a Satis ad Testificationem there is a Satis as to Justification and there is a Satis as to Testification As to the former there is no man can say He hath done enough Enter not into judgement with thy servant O Lord for in thy sight shall no man living be justified Psal 143.2 But as to the later there is a Satis ad testificationem to testification that is To testifie the truth of our faith the sincerity of our obedience and the uprightness of our hearts in the Service of God When Abraham was so ready upon Gods command to offer up his Sonne Isaac in sacrifice to him as to bring him to Mount Moriah there to build an Altar to lay the Wood in order upon it and binde his Sonne to the Wood to take the Knife in his hand and to stretch forth his hand to Slay him God staies his hand bids him hold his hand proceed no further Satis est It is enough for now I know that thou lovest me seeing thou hast not refused to offer up thine onely Sonne in sacrifice to me at my
command Gen. 22. Here 's a Satis ad testificationem enough to testifie his love and obedience and so though none of Gods Saints and servants can reach to a Satis in reference to justification yet as to the testification of the soundness of their faith the sincerity of their obedience and the uprightness of their hearts in his Service there is a Satis which they may reach to and of which God himselfe will testifie and say Satis est It is enough The second distinction in Answer to this Objection is this There is another two-fold Satis First Satis ad perfectionem Secondly Satis ad acceptationem First enough In reference to perfection And Secondly enough In reference to acceptation As to the former Nunquam satis est we can never arrive enough as to perfection Our Saviour hath set us a Coppy that we can never come neer Mat 6. Be you perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect Alas our highest perfection is to acknowledge our imperfection and the best of us all when we have done our best to acknowledge We are unprofitable servants To confess with the Centurion Domine non sum dignus O Lord I am not worthy the least of thy mercies and with the Publican to pray Lord be mercifull to me a sinner so that if we look at perfection Nunquam satis est we shall never arrive to that degree or height of obedience as to say Nunc satis est It is now enough But if we look at acceptation blessed be God there is a Satis whereunto the Saints and servants of Almighty God may and doe arrive even in this life through the mercy of God and the indulgence of our Heavenly Father which where he sees a willing mind accepts of the will for the deed and of what we can doe instead of what we should doe which accepts according that a man hath and not according to that he hath not And so this rubb being removed we pass to the third Inference which is this That thus to have so done the will of God will be our greatest comfort in an evill day when we shall stand in most need of it Hezekiah found it so when the Message came to him by the Prophet Isay from the Lord That he should set his house in order for he must dye O Lord remember I have walked before thee with an upright and a perfect heart and have done that which was good in thy sight Isay 38.1 3. Nehemiah found it so who having done worthily for the people of God in obteining Commission from the King of Persia for the redeeming of the Jews out of the Babylonish Captivity and building the Walls of Jerusalem often comforts himselfe with the remembrance of it Nehemiah 13.14 Remember me O my God in this and blot not out the kindness that I have shewed to thy house And verse the 22. Remember me O my God concerning this also and pardon me according to thy great mercy And again verse 31. Remember me O my God in goodness Indeed he needed not have put God in mind to remember him the Lord would have remembred him and his kindness shewed to his people though he should forget it God is not unfaithfull that he should forget the labour and love shewed unto his Saints We see in Matthew 25 how he did remember it when they had forgotten it that shewed it ver 42.43 When I was hungry you gave me to eate when I was thirsty you gave me to drink when I was naked you cloathed me sick and in prison you visited me and ministred unto me this they had forgotten and therefore asked Lord when saw we thee hungrty or thirsty or naked or sick and in prison and ministred unto thee he remembred it when they had forgotten it and doth not onely remember it but reward it too and now they finde the comfort of it With such a remembrance doth Saint Paul comforts himselfe 2 Tim. 4.7 I have fought the good fight I have finished my course I have kept the faith Henceforth is layd up for me a crowne of righteousness He was not afraid to sing out his Cupio dissolvi I desire to be dissolved Nor our Prophet in the Text to make it his suite to the Lord To take away his soule when he remembred how zealous he had been for the Lord God of Hosts while he was in the body The very Heathens were sensible of this and it was a great incitement to them to justice and honesty and all morall vertue Conscientia benè acta vitae multorumque benefactorum recordatio jucundissima est The Conscience of a life well spent and the remembrance of much good done in his life time O what a Cordiall it is to an old man a dying man And so is the contrary the remembrance of a life ill spent and of much evill done in a mans life time as great a corrasive at such a time Thou writest bitter things against me and makest me to possess the sins of my youth saith Jâ—b cap. 12.25 and he none of the worst of men Beloved there will come a time when Conscience awakened and enlightened will be serious with us in calling us to account for things done in our life time how we have spent our life our time and our Talents what good we have done with them ever since we came into the world And what a sad account is this when a man can give no better account to God nor his own Conscience but thus That he hath lived upon earth forty or fifty or sixty or seventy years or more to doe nothing but eate and drink and sleep and play or worse and spent his life Aut nihil agendo in doing nothing Aut aliud agendo in doing things impertinent which is as good as nothing Aut malè agendo or in doing evill which is worse then nothing and now is going out of the world before ever he hath thought of his errand wherefore he came into it If this be not to be an unprofitable servant what is and what his doome is we have heard and may reade Matthew 25. Beloved Let this Meditation teach us wisedom so to lay out our selves while we live in this world so to improve our time and our Talents as that we may be able to give some account of them to God and to our own Consciences so to live that we need not be afraid to dye to be doing some good here in our life time the remembrance whereof may yeeld us comfort in our sickness and hope in our death so to lay out our selves in this world that we may have somewhat to take to in the other world when we shall leave this and all that we have in it and so shall we be great gainers by the change And so we have done with this third Inference also deduc'd out of the Prophets third Satis est It is enough spoken in reference to what he had done Satis feci I
sweet is theâ—r membrance of thee to the soule that lives in bitterness I doe not think the Lord did impute it for sin to Job or Jeremy that they were so weary of their bitter Lives and did so often wish That their change might come Or that King Edward the sixth did sin when in his death bedsickness he prayd so earnestly Lord take me out of this wretched World Nor Dr. Hamond who under the tortures of the Stone whereof he dyed was so often heard to say Lord make hast though I doubt not but in all these there was implyed a tacit submission to the will of God Thirdly That a man may be taken away frâ—m the evill to come This was a mercy promised to Josiah upon his humiliation 2 Kings 22.19.20 as it was the misery of his surviving Sonne Zedekiah to see the evill which his Father was taken from and to suffer in it Wise men fore-see evill to come in the causes of it and in the â—ore-runners of it And the Lord mentions it as a mercy That he will take them away from those evills and they may without sin Pray for that mercy Isay 57.1 Fourthly That they may be freed from the burden of the flesh and the bondage of corruption inherint in it that Ground Ivie in the Wall which will never be pluckt out root and branch till the Wall be thrown down It was under the sense of this that St. Paul cryes out Rom. 7.24 O wretched man that I am who shall deliver me from the body of this death this will never be done but by the death of this body Fifthly In extremity of old age when a man becomes a burden to himselfe and others when he is fallen into those years of which David saith His life is nothing but labour and sorrow and the years of which he shall say I have no pleasure in them when not onely his body grows weak but his mind also and his intellectuall faculties faile his understanding weak his apprehension dull his memory unfaithfull his affections Childish and he becomes unserviceable not able to doe that good which he hath done and should doe when a man becomes thus superannuate he may doubtless without sin make it his suite to Almighty God To take away his soule Vse This Meditation is usefull to comfort and to confirme us against the feare of death either of our selves or our friends why should we make that the object of our feare which others have made the object of their hope and desire Holy men wise men good men men that have had a great interest in the world have been willing to lay down all and to leave all and made it their suite that they might dye in assurance of a change for a better life To help us to pass through this Gulfe with comfort and courage weigh well but these two things 1. What a world we leave behind us the Terminus à quo 2. What a world we have before us the Terminus ad quem And these two considerations will make the passage through that medium easie First For the Terminus à quo the world we leave behind us a very sink of sin a duâ—ghill of uncleanness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The whole World lyes in wickedness as St. John speaks nothing in it but sinne and sorrow and travaile and trouble and malice and mischief and that which may well make any wise man out of love with it and even weary of it The best things in it which men make most account of have been weighed to our hands by the wisest of the Sonnes of Men and upon the tryall found To be lighter then vanity it selfe not onely vanity but vexation of spirit For first They are all transitory Secondly They are not all satisfactory Thirdly All imbitter'd with so many cross Ingredients that there is no true contentment in them nor true comfort to be taken out of them We could shew you examples of the greatest of men Kings Emperours Lords of the world such as have had as much of the glory of it and all other worldly good in it as the world could give or lend yet have seen so farr into the vanity and emptiness of it as to despise it to lay down all and take themselves unto a private and monasticall life which is a death to the world and the shaddow of death it selfe Secondly For the Terminus ad quem Consider what a world in dying we are going to it would require a world of time and words to describe it the best description of it is to describe it to be such for the transcendency of the glory of it as that it cannot be described For neither hath the eye seen nor the eare heard nor can the heart of Man comprehend the great things that God hath prepared for them that love him 1 Cor. 2.9 St. Paul shaddows it out in part Heb. 12.22 where he shows the happiness of the Church militant in their communion with the Church triumphant thus But you are come to Mount Sion and to the City of the living God the Caelestiall Jerusalem and to the company of inâ—numerable Angels And to the Assembly and Congregation of the first borne whose names are Written in Heaven and to God the Judge of all and to the spirits of just Men made perfect And to Jesus the Mediatour of the new Testament and to the blood of sprinkling which speaketh better things then the blood of Abel Here 's a description in part of the Place and Society which we shall goe to when we shall come to be joyned with the Church triumphant in glory now be you well assured that all things els there are suitable to these which must needs render it transcendently joyous and glorious O! if we could but draw the Curtaine of Heaven and look in the Sanctum Sanctorum to see the joy and glory that is there we would never care for this world more the most pretious things in it would be despised in our eyes our whole life would be nothing but a Cupio dissolvi esse cum Christo I desire to be dissolved and to be with Christ and we would long for the time when the Lord would take away our soul that we might be translated thither I reade of one Cleombrotus that hearing Plato discoursing of the immortality of the soul and the happines of the other life to come Threw himself headlong off from a high Rock to quit himself of this life that so he might enter into that other life that Plato so much commended And if a Heathen man could be so sensible of advantaging himself by his change into the other life upon those weak grounds which Plato's Philosophy could give as to hasten his own death upon the hope of it Surely we that are Christians and have better grounds to build our faith and hope upon then any Plato's Philosophy could give may with much more Comfort think on Death with much more hope and