Persons find themselves made for higher Objects than what this World presents and have a Consciousness of their own Eternity nothing can effectually compose the tumultuary Rovings of that Mind but the Assurances of an Immortality and of such an Immortality only which the Christian hopes for Without this all the Notions of the Phylosophers and Sentences of the Moralists signifie little Death can never be vanquish'd by such weak Charms but would be still too hard for their Principles too strong for their Resolutions they must Sorrow even as those that have no Hope So that the best of them pass'd off the Stage rather in an obstinate vain-glorious Humour than in any true Satisfaction or Triumph But now the Christian has a far better Provision made him for besides the Helps and Considerations he has in common with the Phylosophers which he may serve himself of when he pleases his Religion offers him such Supports as are sufficient to repress all inordinate Passions and compose our Minds into a steady Frame It assures us of the reality of a Divine Providence in the Managery of things here below that whatever Affliction Loss or Calamity befalls us was so Ordered by an over-ruling Providence This was a Truth which the Gentile World either absolutely denyed or however was not so well satisfied in as to make any true Use of their Adversities or to be Patient under them But now we know that Affliction springs not out of the dust nor trouble out of the ground that nothing falls upon us without the Knowledge and Permission of our Heavenly Father who still designs our Welfare by all the severe Methods and Dispensations he exercises towards us and therefore the Thoughts of this must needs render us more Calm and Sedate at such times than those who can spy out nothing of Divine Wisdom and Goodness but look upon all their Crosses as the Effects either of an ill Chance or an inevitable Fate But more especially doth it relieve our Thoughts by giving us so great an Assurance of a happy State hereafter that not only the Soul but the Body too shall live for ever that the whole Man shall be perfectly and entirely raised and Death at last be swallowed up in Victory therefore those that were Dead are said in my Text only to be asleep and if we sleep we shall do well as the Disciples said of Lazarus It is only a resting for a while in our Dormitories but we shall as certainly awake in the Morning as ever we lay down And this we are ascertain'd of First By many full and clear Testimonies in the Scripture of whose Divine Authority we have so many undoubted Proofs Here we are plainly told that the Hour is coming in which all that are in the Graves shall bear and shall come forth they that have done good unto the Resurrection of life Hear it is said that when our earthly house of this tabernacle shall be dissolved we have a building of God an house not made with hands eternal in the Heavens Here 't is promised that this Corruptible must put on Incorruption and this Mortal must put on Immortality Nay here in the Context we have a more particular Description of the Manner thereof and in what Order it shall be Secondly But more especially are we secur'd hereof by the Resurrection of our Blessed Saviour therefore St. Paul makes use of this Argument to excite in us these Hopes as in the Verse after my Text For if we believe that Jesus dyed and rose again even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him As if he had said If once your Faith will carry you so far as to believe your Lord's Resurrection you need never doubt your own this being a Matter of Fact surpasses all the Arguments that could be drawn from any other Topick whatsoever For our Saviour dying in a Humane Capacity and being raised again does clearly evince that we who are of the same Nature are capable of a like Restauration This indeed is a sensible Experiment of the possibity of a Resurrection but now that which was thus shewn to be possible is made also certain to us from the Relation that is between Christ and us as he is the Head and we are his Members and so shall be made Partakers of the like Condition with him So our Apostle elsewhere 2 Cor. 4. 14. Knowing this that he who raised up the Lord Jesus shall raise us up also by Jesus of which we have have an Earnest by the Spirit he hath given us So our Apostle again Rom. 8. 11. If the spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by the spirit that dwelleth in you So that by this Triumphant Action chiefly it is that our Lord has brought Life and Immortality to light brought those Mysteries to a full View which before lay hid under Types and Figures or were only faintly apprehended by Natural Reason And to give us a further Assurance of the thing He manifested his Power before for at his Death the Graves were opened and many bodies of Saints which slept arose and came out of their Graves after his Resurrection and appear'd to many intimating by that Release of some few Prisoners made then what a general Goal-delivery there should be when he comes at last in his Glory And now upon a Review of all this shall the Christian sorrow like those that have no Hope Shall he not be able to part with a Pious Friend or Relation but must he lament him as if lost for ever How easily rather may he at such a time triumph over Death and cry out Where is thy Sting O Grave where is thy Victory Where are all your Trophies the Body indeed you have seized on but that is only a Sacred Depositum committed to your Trust for a time you must make a faithful Restitution of it e're long the Victory truly is ours and God hath given it us through our Lord Jesus Christ By the help of this single Consideration how often hath Death been triumph'd over by the Primitive Christians who have been so transported with the thoughts hereof that they have been eager to quit this dull Mortality before they were call'd and to press upon those Eternal Mansions before they had compleated their Probation-ship here below and yet we have the same Arguments for the truth hereof as they and may have as strong Evidences for our Title However if our Faith cannot inspirit our Resolutions so high yet sure it will be sufficient to moderate our Grief to restrain the Inordinacy of our Passions for our deceased Friends especially when they are such as sleep in Jesus such who are not so much departed from us as gone before us have the Priviledge to go a little the sooner to take Possession of that Glorious Inheritance where they joyfully
lamentation as he is worthy lest thou be evil spoken of Eccles 38. 17. Solomon tells us there is a Time to Mourn and a Time to Weep as well as for other Actions and that every thing is beautiful in its season therefore none so fit for this as the Loss of our Friends When God forbad Ezekiel to Mourn for his dead Wife and to omit those Expressions of Sorrow which were then in use the People were presently amaz'd at this thing and therefore came to him and said Wilt thou not tell us what these things are to us that thou dost so Ezek. 24. 29. They concluded God had some further meaning by this unusual Behaviour of his Prophet as it fell out afterwards or else at such a time especially he would never have forbore to Cover his Lips or Eat the Bread of Men. 4. Sometimes God intends the Death of Friends as Tokens of his Displeasure and therefore our Griefs are not only allowable but highly requisite too for in all the Punishment which he inflicts his Design is to make us sensible of the stroke and to humble us under the weight of the Affliction if it doth not this God misses of the End of his Correction and by such a Security and Unconcernedness we do heighten his Displeasure When therefore he takes away such as are our greatest Stay and Support the Delight of our Eyes the Joy of our Hearts the Staff of our Age or such who were Publick Blessings to the Neighbourhood where they were skilful to advise and ready to assist then sure the Almighty calls for Mourning and Lamentation and expects we should take Notice of his Hand therefore the Prophet upbraids the Jews with their gross Stupidity that the Righteous should perish and no Man lay it to Heart none moved at it none troubled for it when it was design'd as a publick Calamity Isa 57. 1. Upon these Accounts it must be Confess'd that there is a certain Measure of Sorrow allowed the Christian at the Death of his Friends Humanity requires it and Religion does indulge it 2. The next thing arising from the Words is that Excessive or Immoderate Sorrow be the Loss in this kind never so heavy is much unbecoming the Christian and very unsuitable to that Belief which he professes This is expressed I would not have you sorrow like those that have no hope i.e. like such who either deny the Immortality of the Soul and scoff at the Resurrection of the Body who thought the Grave made an everlasting separation between them and their Friends and when the fatal stroke was once given the Spirit vanished as the soft ayre and there was not possibility of a return or else doubted of a Future State No wonder to see such indulge their Passions to the utmost but the Christian who has such great Assurances of a Future Being betrays his Weakness and disparages his Religion if he suffer his Griefs to exceed the Bounds of Prudence and Moderation Now by this immoderate Sorrow I mean that which is unreasonable as to the Duration and Continuance or to the measures and degrees thereof 1. That which offends as to the Duration is when too great a share of our Time is laid out this way when like some fond Persons we consume Years in those unprofitable Complaints and refuse to be comforted because our Friends are not Some Time indeed must be allotted those tender Passions Custom and Decency will exact some and the Worth or Nearness of the Decased will require more but to spend our days in Trouble and our years in Vanity because that hath happened to thy Friend which must e're long befall thy self to whom 't was as natural to dye as to be born is not only foolish in it self but injurious to thy own Quiet and displeasing to Heaven Much more advis'd was the Method that David took who when his sick Child dyed arose from the Earth washed and anointed himself and changed his Apparel upon this Consideration Wherefore should I now afflict my self can I bring him back again I shall go to him but he shall not return to me 2 Sam. 12. 23. 2. As our Sorrows may be faulty as to their Continuance so may they be as to the Measures and Degrees thereof they may soon exceed the Bounds of a Christian Behaviour and this is when they vent themselves in loud Outcries and Exclamations in passionate Expressions and oblique Reflections upon God's Administration of things in publishing our Calamities to all that are near us and tiring them with our Complaints Or when it is so outragious as to drive us to foolish and indecent Carriages as was the manner of the Heathens who us'd to make lamentable Howlings for their Dead to besmear their Faces to cut their own Flesh and sometimes to slay their Beasts or their Slaves to accompany the Ghosts of their Deceased Friends Or again when we are so intent upon our Loss as wholly to neglect our own Affairs when in a sullen discontented Mood we regard neither our selves nor any Concern of Life and refuse to partake of any of those Mercies Providence has bless'd us with because we are cross'd in this as if we could not testify our Affections unless we did sacrifice our Health and Enjoyment our Peace and Comfort to the Memory of those who neither regarded what we did nor received any advantage by these supererogatory Works of ours And therefore St. Jerom deservedly reproved the Religious Paula because at the Death of any of her Children the greatness of her Sorrow brought her even to the Brink of the Grave Take no heaviness to Heart says the wise Jew drive it away and remember the last end forget it not for there is no turning again thou shalt not do him good but hurt thy self Eccle. 38. 20 21. As if he had said let the Contemplation of thy own Mortality make thee to spare thy self you are shortly to submit to the same Fate and therefore reserve some Pity for your self and be not so Extravagant in the bemoaning of those who are either Blessed and so need it not or past a Recovery and so deserve it not Some Losses 't is confess'd may make a deeper Impression than other according to the Worth of the Person the nearness of the Relation or the need we had of his Assistance in such Cases quicker and deeper Resentments may be allowed but be it as afflictive as we can imagine it will not justifie the Christian to exceed the Bounds of Decency he must not sorrow as those that have no hope For 1. Such Sorrows are useless and unprofitable and therefore not fit Business for a Christian to be employed in long who has Work of far greater Importance before him such designs to bring about that he can spare but little leisure for Trifles or afford to consume his Time and Strength in that which is impertinent unattainable If my Friend was Good and Virtuous he is already possess'd of a far greater
measure of Happiness than what this World could bestow and there remains in a joyful Expectation of a fuller Bliss at the Restitution of his Body And therefore why such Outcries and Direful Complaints for the Departure of that Soul which is now Triumphing glad it hath got loose from a vain troublesome wicked World and you grieve it was a Prisoner here no longer If such Blessed Spirits did behold those Scenes of Sorrow which are usually acted here below they would pity our mistaken Zeal and be ready to bespeak their Mourners as our Saviour did the Women which followed him to his Crucifixion Weep not for me but for your selves and your Relations that survive we are happy and have pass'd those Calamities which you that remain in the Body must still conflict with If again the Person we vent our Sighs and Complaints for was vain and useless liv'd Vicious and Ungodly and dyed without giving any tolerable Hopes of a sincere Repentance he is gone to his place neither our Tears nor our Pennances are of any Efficacy for the remitting of his Punishment or for bringing him back to live over another Life to correct the Errours of the former it costs more to redeem their Souls so that we must be forc'd to let that alone for ever And indeed those that are such are unworthy of our Sorrows how Intimate or Dear soever they have been before they cannot much deserve our Pity who did not deserve it at the Hands of our Merciful Father Thus David is said to be comforted within a while after the Death of his Son Amnon though the circumstances thereof were lamentable enough possibly upon the Consideration of his being so Lewd and Dissolute a Person and therefore not deserving to be the Subject of any long continued Sorrow and we find 't is put down among the Punishments of such that The memory of the wicked shall rot so that in both respects such inordinate Griefs are useless and insignificant 2. They are likewise selfish and therefore unbecoming a Christian who is to be acted by higher Principles Self-love is usually at the bottom of those excessive Sorrows whatever pretences of Kindness we make to them for those violent Passions are seldom exercised but when our own Interest is concern'd and therefore such complain not so much that their Friend is gone as that they are left that they are deprived of his Society and of those Comforts they received thereby Or that they must now despair of those Helps and Assistances they expected from him and so 't is not properly their Friend's Absence but their own Evils and Inconveniencies which they deplore for with such the Remembrance soonest goes off when they are supplied with Comforts and Assistances elsewhere If I say the Cause of such extream Passions were search'd into they would usually be found to resolve into this at the last whereas true Christian Sorrow has less of Noise and Pomp in it is more even and temperate and arises from other Considerations 3. Such immoderate Griefs very often proceed from a murmuring and discontented Spirit which must never be allowed the Christian be the Affliction never so severe they argue a Repining at the Dispensations of Providence Hence it is that those who give their Passions so much Liberty seldom forbear venting themselves in unhandsome Reflections upon the Divine Providence Or however secretly tax it of Injustice or Partiality in the managing of Affairs here below 4. They do manifestly betray a great defect in our Faith that we are not so fully convinc'd of the certainty of a future Being as we ought that we give but too slight a Credit to what the Scripture has in such a case propos'd as the chief Support and therefore we sorrow as those that have no hope for were we firmly perswaded of an Immortality afterwards and the immediate Happiness of those that sleep in Jesus with how calm and compos'd a Mind should we bear the Loss It is for those to fill the Air with Shrieks and Lamentations that used to give their Aeternum Vale to the Ashes of their Friends But the Pious Christian by the help of his Faith can easily view Eternity on the other side the Grave for indeed he alone partakes of those glorious Hopes those great Assurances which can render him truly Triumphant at such a time This brings me to the last Proposition viz. Thirdly That a right Understanding and due Consideration of what the Gospel offers in such cases is the most effectual Method for suppressing all those inordinate Passions This St. Paul intimates by these Words I would not have you ignorant Brethren concering those that are asleep as if he had said Had you but clear Apprehensions of what the Christian Religion delivers concerning the State of your deceased Friends your Griefs would never be so excessive you would never behave your selves in so indecent so despairing a manner as those poor Gentiles do with whom you converse who have not as yet embraced the Doctrine of our Saviour for as they are without God so they are without Hope in the World And now what that great Catholicon or universal Remedy is which the Gospel proposes as the chief Support the Apostle delivers in the Verses after For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again even so them also which sleep in Jesus shall God bring with him For the Lord himself shall descend from Heaven with a shout with the Voice of the Arch-Angel and with the Trump of God and the dead in Christ shall rise first then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the Clouds to meet the Lord in the Air and so shall we ever be with the Lord. This is a brief Description of the Christian's Hope the great Foundation upon which all his Comforts are built and indeed nothing below this can vanquish the fears of Death or scatter all those black and melancholly Thoughts that are apt to seize us either at our own or our Friend 's approaching Fate And now the certainty of this is to be fetch'd only from the Gospel never had the World so full a Demonstration of these important Truths 'till our Saviour came and brought Life and Immortality to light All besides might be truly said to be without hope for though they might make some imperfect Guesses at a future State by the Light of Reason yet their Notions were so obscure and their Opinions about if so various that they could neither satisfie themselves nor others about a Matter of so great Concernment But whatever they might think of the Soul yet the Resurrection of the Body was a thing quite beyond their Reach and Comprehension and indeed contrary to the Principles of their Philosophy the compleat Knowledge of this was purely the Effect of the Gospel Manifestation so that the utmost their Fancies could extend to was but a partial imperfect Happiness in respect of what the Christian is assur'd of
But alas the Generality went not so far the common Cry with them was much like the Arguings of those Fools in the Book of Wisdom Chap. 2. Our life is short and tedious and in the death of man there is no remedy neither was there any man known to have returned from the Grave for we are born at all adventure and we shall be hereafter as though we bad never been for the breath in our nostrils is as smoak and a little spark in the moving of our heart which being extinguish'd our body shall be turned into ashes and our spirit shall vanish as the soft Air Our time is a very shadow that passeth away and after our End there is no returning for it is fast sealed so that no man cometh again Thus it was with them and truly it was little otherwise with their Grave and Learned Philosophers though they made such great Flourishes and some of them talk'd loftily about the Joys of the separate Soul yet they were so extravagant in their Fancies and some of them so inconsistent with themselves when they had Occasion to discourse on this Subject that we may easily imagine they were at a Loss and not much satisfied themselves in that which they taught the common People to believe Insomuch that Socrates who was as great an Instance of Virtue and Learning as the Gentile World could produce yet towards the latter End of his Life plainly confesses his Ignorance in this thing for when he came to plead his cause before his Judges and largely discourses of the Happy State of good Men hereafter at last frankly owns that he could be content 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to dye over and over was he but assured of the reality of what he had so often asserted and afterwards receiving his Sentence concludes his Apology in this doubtful manner I am now leaving the World 't is your Lot to live and mine to dye but whether of us two shall fare the better i.e. whether there be any Existence on the other side the Grave 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is unknown to all but God alone so little Confidence had that great Man even at such a time when he should have been constant to his former Reasonings and magnified his own Philosophy Hence we may safely affirm of a great part of them what the Author of the Book of Wisdom says that As for the Mysteries of God they know them not neither hoped they for the wages of Righteousness nor discern'd a Reward for blameless Souls And now being thus wavering in their Minds and unfix'd as to their Resolutions about an Immortality what was there left to fortifie them against the fears of Dying Nature is apt to startle at the thoughts of a Dissolution even then when it is assured it serves but as a Passage to that Life which shall never end but when it looks upon it as the utmost Period of their Being as that which crumbles them into Dust without any possibility of a return what Reflections can be more dismal or amazing And therefore to prepare themselves the better for the fatal stroak they invented many pretty Apothegms and Paradoxes furnished themselves with some Common Topicks or Witty Sayings that so they might have some Relief against their own or their Friends Departure But alas they are all of them but poor Receipts in respect of that Sovereign Antidote which the Gospel prescribes To instance in some of their choicest Sometimes they would say that Death was the unavoidable Fate of all Mankind that there was no resisting the Power of it they saw that wise Men dyed as well as Fools and therefore it was their Prudence not to be concern'd at that which no ways could be avoided Again It was a common Calamity we every day meet with Remembrances of Mortality and should such thoughts discompose us our Life would be a continual Vexation Sometimes they would use this little Sophistry That Death cannot hurt us because when that is we are not and when we are that is absent so is a thing that does not at all belong to us and if perhaps there be any pain at the last Separation of the Soul from the Body yet afterwards we shall not grieve at what we had endur'd a little before This was the great Retreat Epicurus and his Followers betook themselves to Sometimes they would argue after this Rate That we are dead already as to so much of our Life which is past and gone for so much as we live so much we dye being dead to the day past and that which we usually call Death is but our last Death and therefore as we did not fear our former Death why should we that which is to come Another little Hold they had was That they were admitted into Life upon this Condition that they should give place to others as the former Generation did to them and therefore a piece of Injustice to be unwilling to go off the Stage when their Work was done Others would Comfort themselves after this manner That Death was a desirable thing seeing there were so many Troubles and Disasters that did attend us for it was no more than Solutio omnium Dolorum The easying and disburthening us of all our Cares and Fears the letting us loose from an Infirm Body and a Tormenting World and laying us up in that quiet secure state wherein we were before we had a Being This is Seneca's last Refuge For tho' he sometimes seems to intimate a Belief of a Future State yet he is quickly off again very inconstant as to his Resolutions in that Point and makes use of this as the chief Prescription to allay our Fears and Moderate our Griefs Some in the last place soar'd higher and would solace themselves with the Thoughts of the Soul 's enjoying by Death a true Freedom and Liberty of its being received into pleasant delightful Mansions and there partaking for a vast Tract of Time of such Enjoyments as were more suitable to its Nature This was the Opinion of the Platonists but their Fancies in this kind were so Extravagant their Notions generally so Obscure and their Discourses so Romantick that it may very well be question'd whether they had those great Transports when they were about to exchange this Prison of the Body for those Airy Vehicles they so much talk'd of Nay such as profess'd most to own the Incorruptible Nature of the Soul and stedfastly to believe a Future State yet supposed such various Transmigrations and Shiftings of the Soul from one Body to another as must needs be an abatement of its Happiness because by such alterations it should soon lose all Knowledge both of its Friends and it self too These were the cheif Prescriptions the Moralists made use of but alas how slight and feeble are they in respect of that Lively Hope the Christian is possess'd of with what Courage and Constancy such Notions might inspire them I know not but certainly where