Selected quad for the lemma: soul_n
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A92748
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Funeral sermon at the interrment of the very great and noble Charles late Earl of Southeske who died at his castle of Leuchars in the shire of Fife, upon the 9th. of August. And was interr'd at his burial-place near his house of Kinnaird in the shire of Angus, upon the 4th. of October 1699. By R.S. D.D.
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Scott, Robert, D.D.
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1699
(1699)
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Wing S2081; ESTC R229815
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16,859
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28
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all the Deliberation and Digestedness a very little time before his Death as he used to do in the time of his Health with all Demonstration of Kindness taking by the Hand all that were about him committing them to God Pardoning and praying for all his Enemies and heartily Blessing his Hopeful Son One Passage did very much instruct the Christian Magnaminity al 's wel as Moral Fortitude of his Mind when the Surprize of a very excuseable Passion made his Dearest and truely Noble Consort break out in some kind deep Resentments at her Thoughts of his parting from the World He thus expressed himself as with a Challenge Why should not I resign my Soul unto God at His pleasure All the Greatness and Wealth and numerous Circumstances of Temporal Felicity were not so much as in his View The seriousness of his Devotions al 's well as the Fortitude of his Mind left no place for such low and mean Thoughts To this add a singular Instance of that orderly and digested Regard which he payed to God all that Night over before it pleased God to call him out of this Mortal Life As oft as Prayers were offered for him the returns of which were very frequent and that most Just and Righteous Conclusion of our Requests in the Words of our Blessed Lord and Saviours form of Prayer which rectifies all our undigested Thoughts sounded in his Ears he pulled off the thin Covering of his Head with which he was abundantly discovered when it was upon him and with the profundest Devotion joyned in the Petitions thereof Here is a Chain of Virtues made mention of before you hanging about this Great and Noble Personage Virtues have always their proper Lustre where ever they are to be found but set forth a greater deal of Beauty and Glory when made Conspicuous by so high a Station like Pallas or Minerva sitting upon a Triumphal Arch and commanding the profoundest Regard from all their Votaries passing by them upon the common Level of the Earth O! What Obligations ly upon Great Men to be Virtuous provocking to Imitation the Multitudes of such as stand upon a lower Ground considerably reforming the World putting common Debauchry Dissolutness of Life to the Blush And by so doing greatly advancing the Kingdom of God But to live this Digression I say here is a Chain of Virtues Meekness and Humility Twins of Paradise fit for the Fellowship of Jesus and meet to enter into the Societies of the Blessed without which they cannot abide in these Regions of true Felicity more than Lucifer in Heaven or Adam in the Garden of Eden Justice Charity the two profitable Hand-maids of Human Society Ministering to the present Exigences of his lower World without which neither could the Poor Subsist nor the Rich be Happy Again here are Prudence Fortitude and Temperance The Philosophers have left us little to say of these only they Treat them likeways with respect to this Life and the constituting and carrying on of a Temporal Happiness and summum bonum under the Sun But in the other World our Prudence shall be swallowed up of a perfected Wisdom whereof it is but a Spice or Syre Fortitude shall lose it self in a fearless and inconcussible State And Temperance shall surrender its Dominion to a total Exemption from the use of the Creature To all these add Pure and Holy Devotion and this is a lasting Tribut payable to our Great Lord and Maker as in this World so in that which is to come And now with this Climax or Chain of Virtues in their different Positions and Gradations in their proper Exercises and Operations did our Great and Noble Friend and Fellow Christian shew himself forth in the World Having them so closs hanging about him and knit unto him that so long as he was capable of Communion with Us and the common Union of Soul and Body was allowed to subsist they shined forth with a Meridian Brightness Only the last of these as most becoming his Business of appearing before God seemed in the last place totally to possess his Soul and to shew forth a great work of God upon his Heart making him to breath forth a total Abnegation and cheerful Dereliction of all the enjoyments of this Life And in this manner did he spend his Time in the approaches of Death as he had done for a considerable time before having also received the Holy Eucharist from the Hand of one who was Worthy and had right to Celebrat and Administer it Thus did he in the strength of a firm Mind and in the returns of continual Devotions wait for the coming of his Lord uttering these Words and never any after them Into thy Hands O Lord I ecommend my Spirit Thus this Noble and Excellent Personage with this upright Job whose Patience in a most lively manner he transcribed as in the course of his Life where he wanted not singular enough tryals so most Eminently in his last Fatal Sickness was brought unto Death and to the House Appointed for all Living What was Great and Noble about Him either in the Extract or Alliances of his Family where there wants no Ground enough to Celebrat his Greatness we cannot so much consider the Subject of a Funeral as the work of a Pencil And therefore recommends you to his Escutcheon where you will find the Ensigns Armorial of the Noblest and Greatest Families of this Nation Or if there were any Faults or Failings in his Life As what Man liveth and finneth not that is as little my Business What I have already said of Him seems to speak Him more than a Penitent even a Favorite of Heaven and yet boasting of no Attainments but in the wonted Humility of his Soul throwing himself intirely upon the Merits of the Blessed Jesus the only true and solid Plea of the best of Christians And here we shall leave Him where we hope to be found in the day of our Appearrance And what now remains but the last Duty of his Noble and Honourable Blood Friends To commit his Body to the Dust since his Spirit is returned to God who gave it And Blessed are the Dead which Die in the Lord from henceforth for they rest from their Labours and their Works do follow them FINIS
3. When the keepers of the house shall tremble and the strong Men shall bow themselves Is it Nimbleness and Agility Use it not to be swift to shed innocent blood to execute evil offices with wicked Men but to be quick in the measures of thy duty to God thy Neighbour and thy Self I will run the way of thy Commandments satih the Psalmist when thou hast enlarged my Heart Because the same evil days come when the Almond Tree shall flourish and the Grashopper shall become a burden And in the withered stalk of Old Age thy joynts shall deny their Offices Is it Beauty Use not this as a snare to thy own or thy neighbours Soul to become a Trap in the hand of the unclean Spirit but further to set off the virtues of the mind as an Emerauld in pure Gold or as Solomon terms Words fitly spoken Prov. xxv 11. As Aples of Gold in Pictures of Silver Because these evil days also come upon thee when these that look out at the Windows wax dim The most sparkling Eyes shall become Dull and Lifeless They shall move no more in the Head or entice into the works of Darkness but in a little their Imperial Seat shall become the Windows of a Lizard or a loathsom Toad Such is the End and Exit that all the powers of the Body do make at Death and in the house of the Grave So likeways it is with all the natural endowments of the Mind as existing in Conjunction with the Body as I have already said and as acting upon temporal Beeings and Objects Profound searches and nimble Wit and Facetious Humour and all evanish Psal cxlvi v. 4. When his Breath goeth out and he returneth to his Dust in that very day his thoughts perish So III. It is with all the great Acts and Conquests of a Mans Life We have heard of the House which Solomon built 1 King 10. v. 4 5. And of the Ascent by which he went up to the House of God admired by the Southern Queen for the Temple it was ordered by a Greater Architect We have heard of the great Babel which Nebuchadnezzar built and of the Tower and Cities of Nimrod Of the Conquests of Alexander and of the great Atchievements of all both Roman Emperors and Hero's And whatever may be the fullest Extent of Mens Acquests or the most beautiful Ornaments of their Habitations from all these doth Death make a total and final Separation even from all the Enjoyments of this Life And which is yet of far greater Importance The Second Serious Thought which I offer to you That they are concluded under an Irreversible State and Condition of Felicity or Misery in another World As the Tree fallcth so it lyeth and as Death leaveth so Judgment findeth This is the Import of all that Doctrine which our Blessed Lord Saviour delivered when he was in the World and of all these Parables by which he represented the State of another Life As in that of the Sheep and the Goats Mat. 25. How plain are the Words And he said to these upon his Right Hand Come ye Blessed of my Father inherit the Kingdom prepared for you from the Foundation of the World Again to those upon the left Hand Depart from Me ye Cursed into Everlasting Fire prepared for the Devil and his Angels And in the Conclusion of all and these went into Everlast Punishment but the Righteous into Life Eternal So in that Parable of Dives and Lazarus Luk 15. There is made mention of a great Gulf betwixt the two and declared to be Impassible so that the one cannot come to the other Pray for what is all this but to tell us of an Irreversible State as of Bless and Glory to the One so of Misery and Sorrow to the Other and that without End or Period And as this was the Doctrine of the Blessed Jesus so of all his Servants the Apostles in their time and under the Trust put into their Hands Rom 2.6 Who will render to every Man according to his Works and so forward in the 7 8 9 10 Verses To them who by patient Continuance in Well-doing seek for Glory and Honour and Immortality Eternal Life But unto them that are Contentious and do not obey the Truth but obey Unrighteousness Indignation and Wrath Tribulation and Anguish upon every Soul of Man that doth Evil of the Jew first and also of the Gentile But Glory Honour and Peace c. And now if it be so whence hath arisen the new Doctrine of some of our late Discanters upon the State of another Life who quite Annihilat the Punishments of the Wicked to the great Encouragement and Increase of Atheism and Irreligion Nay though there were no revealed Religion owned amongst Men as these New and Dark Tapers would have it who take the Boldness to set themselves in the Light of the Sun which is a Supposition so contrary to all the Motives of Credibility the History of our Saviours Life Death Resurrection and Doctrine doth give us the plain Analogy and Proportion betwixt Him and all the Types and Prophecies which have been concerning him throwout the whole Jewish Dispensation the Confession of Enemies both Jews and Heathens and the Acknowledgment of Devils themselves That a Man may alsewel deny every thing that he hath not seen though never so convincingly instructed Which were a Practice so absurd that the whole Learned World should run to his Condemnation Far less ground of Certainty do Men acquiesce in and rest upon in other Matters which concern not Religion No Body denies a Hector and an Achilles a Pompey and an Alexander And it is much they deny not a Julius Caesar because an Augustus is made mention of in the New Testament But I say supposing all this only absit Blasphemia yet if we own the Beeing of a God which none amongst all the new sprung spawn of Deists or Demi-Atheists hath yet denied then we must own Him among all the rest of His excellent Attributes to be purely Just and Righteous But how shall He be so if He have not reserved Rewards and Punishments for another Life while in this we see prosperous Villany set before our Eyes throughout all the Ages of the World and the most excellent Virtues groaning under the heaviest Oppressions So that we may easily stumble upon the stumbling Block of the holy Prophet Ps 73. passim throughout the same I was envious at the Foolish when I saw the Prosperity of the Wicked They have no Bands in their Death neither are they in trouble as other Men. And further is he led unto the very brink of Atheism In vain have I cleansed my Heart and washed my hands in Iunocency for I am Plagued and Chastned every Morning But immediately he pulls in the Roynes amd gives himself the Check from the 15. Vers and downward When I sought to know this it was too Painful for me Until I went into the Sanctuary of God