we digress a little But tho' what it delivers be somewhat beside our professed Scope yet the Benefit I hope will make amends for the Deviation it being a kind of Apology for the Christian Religion or a short Vindication of it from the contemptuous Obloquy of Evil Men. The Inference is this How egregious is the Folly and Rashness of those who decry Religion as vain and unprofitable So degenerate are some and so far sunk below the Raised Dignity of their Reasonable Nature that they mock and cavil at true Religion as if it were an empty and fruitless thing and attended with no considerable Advantage * Job 21.15 What is the ALMIGHTY that we should serve Him and what Profit should we have if we should Pray unto Him was the Language of the Dissolute in Job's Days †Mal. 3.14 It is vain to serve GOD and what Profit is it that we have kept His Ordinances said some Impious and Blasphemous Jews in the Prophet Malachy's Time And Men of such vile and ungodly Principles seem to be sprung up in too great Plenty amongst us For how many are there that dispute or deny all Rewards of Righteousness And as for such as in Faith and Hope of the same addict themselves to Virtuous and Holy Living they slight and despise them and vilify and reproach them especially if they be a little stricter than ordinary and their Zeal flies above the Common Pitch Then they censure and condemn them for downright Ideots for People of no Sense of no Reason and of no Judgment that dote upon Shadows and feed upon Fancies and fill their Expectations with impossible things But let such know that themselves are mistaken and grievously misled and as for the Sons of Virtue and Goodness whom they are pleas'd thus to Scorn and Deride they are the wisest and happiest of all Mortals For as upon surest Grounds they look for infinite future Retribution so they are sensible of present Recompence The Psalmist speaks of this where he says in keeping GOD's Commandments there is great Reward Psal 19.11 Not there shall be Reward for keeping them hereafter in Heaven but there is Reward in keeping them here upon Earth And this Reward is ample as well as certain * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a great Emolument or Recompence And what the Sacred Writer thus positively asserts the faithful Christain feels true in himself He does not only hope for Remuneration to come but He actually finds it in his present Enjoyment And as it is great in many Respects so a great part of it lies in those excellent Comforts which descending from above do strangely delight Him And that this Reward must consist of these Comforts is clear from hence because otherwise no great Reward can here come to Men in keeping GOD's Commands Yea instead of great Reward or of any Reward their very keeping of His Precepts may expose them as it hath done Martyrs to the worst Sufferings and Deaths And for any to say that GOD makes Temporal or Worldly Blessings a great Reward to such as keep His Commandments would be perfect Non-sense For the greatest of those are not only really little in themselves but much less still in the Esteem of good Christians So that 't is necessary that the great Reward mention'd by the Psalmist should be made up of Joys or Comforts from Heaven And truly were the worst but well acquainted with it by being made throughly sensible of it they could never stick at owning it to be great And from the sense of its greatness they would immediately alter their opinion of Christianity and no longer blame its most zealous Professors for taking much pains as they now think they do in pursuing nothing Indeed so long as Men choose to rest in Sin and are unwilling Captives to domineering Lusts and the base and sinful Pleasures of the Body 't is impossible they should enjoy the Comforts of the SPIRIT I am confident rather let them say what they will and make what fair shew they can that they mostly lie as it were upon a painful Rack There hainous Guilt unless they be stupid or quite insensate will certainly be attended with secret Torment and will raise such fears and horrors within as they shall no way be able to suppress There may as well be Rest in the Sea when 't is tossed with Winds as true Peace to that Soul which perisheth in Sin For the Wicked are like the troubled Sea when it cannot Rest and to them there is no Peace saith GOD Isai 57.20 21. But let them abandon Vice and betake them to Virtuous and Religious Courses and they shall soon perceive an happy Change Then the mouth of Conscience shall quickly be stopped and her hideous Clamours shall all be quieted and the bloodly Scourge wherewith she chastiseth them shall be wound up and laid aside and inward Peace and Applause of Mind shall exceedingly refresh them Then they shall be visited with Joys from on high and the Light of GOD's Countenance shall shine into their Hearts and the Beams of His Favour shall dilate their Spirits and the Influence of Heaven shall sweetly replenish their expanded Souls In a word then the great JEHOVAH will love them and delight in them and lifting them up into Communion with Himself will ravish them with high and strong Consolations With such Consolations as can proceed from nothing but His propitious Presence and the favourable Illapses of that divine Paraclete who is the Comforter of GOD's Elect. Let none doubt of the Truth of this Let none question but there are such excellent Comforts as these If your own Experience hath not discover'd them yet do but perform your respective Duties in answer to the several Obligations upon you and that will lead you directly to them Then you shall soon find that extraordinary Sweetness is treasur'd up for the Righteous A Sweetness surpassing our corporal Delights and the fullest Gratifications of all lower Appetites And well it may as being indeed no other than Angelic Satisfactions which from the Face of GOD are shed down into the Hearts of pious Men. Some refined Heathens priz'd Tranquility of Mind at such a Rate that they accounted it no less than the chiefest good Thus Epicurus taught that Happiness consists in Pleasure Meaning that Pleasure which springs up and spreads through Virtuous Livers and is the pure Result of that Harmony and Agreement which there is betwixt Virtue and the rational part of them that practise it Tho' some mistaking him have thought he plac'd it in gross Delights and so have condemn'd Him for a notorious Sensualist and a Patron of vile and shameful Voluptuousness And as this was * Note IV. Epicurus's Opinion so it was the Judgment of many other great and noble Philosophers Now when there were some Ethnic Sages who thought so highly of inward Peace or mental Pleasure which moral Integrity brought along with it how unreasonable is it that
consists of it which is injurious to us there 's so little cause why we should Mourn that we have reason to neglect it and industriously decline it and to do all we can to defend our selves from it I answer This Charge of Melancholy upon holy Mourning runs too high and seems to come from the unexperienc'd Divine Love is the usual source from whence that flows and therefore it is light and soft and pleasant and does not too much fret nor grate the Spirit with anxious and corroding Trouble Rejoyce evermore is S. Paul's Direction to the Thessalonians which plainly shows that Christians may in some measure rejoyce even when they mourn Otherwise the Duties would be inconsistent and Heaven must require such Performances as are incompatible The Prophet also tells us of GOD's reviving the hearts of the Contrite Isa 57.15 Which is farther Assurance that the tears let fall in holy Mourning GOD shall turn into Spiritual Cordials When our Hearts are wounded with Sacred compunction He 'l certainly chear us under the same by mingling Divine Consolations with it And where ever those Consolations dwell there can be no room for any settled Melancholy Dejection We have heard likewise from the Mouth of the HOLY GHOST that they who sow in Tears shall reap in Joy And tho they receive not their whole Crop on Earth yet their blessed Harvest begins here and pleasant are the First Fruits which they gather even those they gather as I may say in a rainy-day For believe it there 's * Dulciores sunt lachrymae plorantium quam gaudia Theatrorum Aug. more sweetness in or after a few Tears spent in Holy Mourning than in all the empty frothy mirth which this World affords Tho' in that Exercise we be disguised as it were with seeming sadness yet under the vizard of that Grief which we wear upon our Faces some degree of Joy may lie hid in our hearts For real Joy is no such Enemy to nor does it stand at such a Distance from Religious Sorrow as some imagine †Res severa est verum gaudium True Joy is a grave and serious and severe thing and often spreads briskly through our Souls when they are in a Mourning frame And there 's Reason for it For as godly Sorrow contracts and lessens our Opinion of this World and eclipses the Beauties and Glories of it wrapping them up in Darkness and a Cloud so at the same time it sets a Lustre on divine Excellencies and quickens and dilates our Apprehensions of them and renders them very estimable with us Yea it draws aside the Curtain betwixt GOD and us and opens a Window towards Heaven for us letting in the Light of his Countenance upon us and the refreshing Gleams of His ravishing Love under the bright displays and lively sense of which we cannot but rejoice even when holy Tears trickle down our Cheeks In a word our solemn Mournings and our sacred Comforts are seldom far or long asunder But in case they be not actually Blended or in competent measures happily complicated or twin'd together then at little intervals or distances they will not fail by alternate Vicissitudes to succeed each other Whoever therefore make a lasting uneasy Grief an Ingredient into sacred Mourning or think it compounded of harsh vexatious raking Melancholy do but calumniate and reproach it and declare themselves Perfect strangers to it For did they but throughly understand the Duty by being practically acquainted with it they could never pass such a Censure upon it Thirdly It may be objected against holy Mourning that it disparages Religion Of such a Constitution is true Christianity and so circumstantiated that wherever it is heartily receiv'd and practis'd it will commonly be productive of divine Tranquility and a solemn Chearfulness For 1st It restrains from all wilful Sins And so it saves us from those troubles both of Mind and Body which naturally and judicially pursue such Impieties 2ly It fits us to be GOD's Habitations and consecrates us into Temples for the HOLY GHOST And where GOD and His SPIRIT are pleased to reside what chearfulness may not their Presence produce 3ly Two chief Perfections of the Christian Religion are Patience and Contentedness And they that are furnisht with those excellent Graces are not only fortifi'd against Perplexity but fairly disposed to an Heavenly Lightsomness 4ly Two special Fruits of the Blessed SPIRIT which usually grow where Religion thrives are Peace and Joy Gal. 5.22 And what Souls can be sad where they flourish 5ly As the HOLY JESUS by a principal Apostle hath given it in charge to all His true Proselytes ever to rejoice in Him and to ingeminate the Precept to inforce the Duty rejoice in the LORD alway and again I say rejoice So one great End why the holiest Order of Men in His Church was at first set up and ever since continu'd was that they might be helpers of His Peoples Joy 2 Cor. 1.24 So that put these several things together and impossible it is but Christianity must minister to Peace and Joy or rather in part be made up of the same But then if it be thus how very inagreeable and disparaging to it must Mourning be And therefore why do you press it at such a rate For so earnestly do you urge it and so vehemently do you labour to perswade us to it as if you would have us all turn Heraclitus's and spend our Days in pensive Sadness As if we were forthwith to betake us to mopish Cells to cloister up our selves in Darkness and Solitariness and to keep the Muffler of Grief continually on our Faces Or in one Word as if none could be happy but they whose cheeks are furrowed with their Tears and whose handcherchiefs are never from their dripping Eyes If this be a necessary Christian Duty 't is a very comfortless one and will little credit it or encourage any to undertake it Nay to speak the plain Truth it seems to cross it and to be directly opposite to the very Temper or Genius of it I answer The Objection is perverse and captious There is a season for every thing as the great Master of Wisdom observed Eccles. 3.1 And amongst the rest there 's a time to weep and a time to mourn and that 's my meaning and all that I contend for Now and then we should weep and mourn but not set our selves to do nothing else To do that incessantly is the Damned's Fate and would ill become the Children of GOD. Yet to Mourn at times will make us Blessed as most of what hath been here advanc'd may serve to prove But then that which helps to make us Blessed as it can never blemish our Persons in the least so neither can it give any disrepute to that noble Religion whereof it is a Branch Some are ready to think and venture to affirm there shall be godly sorrow in Heaven * See Mr. Manton's Exposition on James 4th v. 9th Because there
displaced let them never be disappointed Absolve me from my sins assure me of Thy Love and fill me with thy Graces which may fit me for Thy Glory Pity my Infirmities pardon my Imperfections Hear my Prayers and grant me my Requests Bless preserve and govern me while I live and when I die take me O GOD and Father to Thy self where Thou knowest I would fain be for ever And all for the sake of my LORD JESUS CHRIST to whom with Thy Self and ever Blessed SPIRIT three most Divine Adorable PERSONS and one infinitely Glorious and most Perfect GOD be all Love and Honour and Obedience World without End Amen Amen Ejaculations to be used on Mourning-Days THE Blessing of the ALMIGHTY rest upon me the Grace and Comfort of the HOLY SPIRIT support and sanctify me and the Mercy of GOD in the Bloud of JESUS save me from the dreadful Wrath to come and Crown me with Glory everlasting Amen LORD pity my Soul and pardon my Sins strengthen my Graces and assure me of Thy Favour let me always please Thee in religious Duties and never offend Thee by any Miscarriages Amen Make me vigilant and circumspect in my Life that so my Death may be safe and blessed and a sweet and happy Passage to Thy Self Amen Gracious GOD I desire to love Thee and nothing but Thee or at least nothing in comparison of Thee My dear GOD in Mercy grant me but this one desire and as for all other deny them as Thou pleasest Amen Cause me O LORD to be tender of thine Honour and zealous for Thy Glory painful in Thy Service and sorrowful for my Sins while I live and when I die translate me I beseech Thee into Thy Kingdom and Presence where I may dwell in Rest and Peace in the Heighth of Joy and the Fulness of divine and heavenly Pleasure for evermore Amen Do good in Thy good pleasure unto Sion build Thou the Walls O blessed LORD of Thy Jerusalem Amen Have Mercy upon all Jews Turks Infidels and Hereticks and so fetch them home unto Thy Self O GOD as that they may be saved at the last Amen Create in the sinful People of this Land such new and contrite Hearts O LORD as that they may forthwith turn from all their Sins and through thy Mercy obtain forgiveness of the same Amen LORD I cannot live without Thee LORD I cannot die without Thee O Thou who art the GOD of my Life be Thou my GOD and Guide unto Death Amen NOTES NOTE I. Pag. 7. FOR there the Agency is direct without the dull Help or Mediation of Organs and wherever the Soul is toucht immediately she must be mov'd more forcibly And this may probably give much strength to Temptations I mean to Satanical ones or such as the Devil assaults us with For He being a Spirit for that Reason tho' his actings upon us be secret and invisible yet they may be exceeding strong and powerful For spiritual Beings are capable of nearer mutual Unions than material ones Because things corporeal touch but superficially and join only in their outsides whereas Penetrability being a Property of Spirits they can easily pervade or run through one another mingling their very Substances together And thus 't is like the Tempter deals with us He may not only make use of our Blood and our Spirits and the Humors of our Bodies to imprint and fasten his Temptations upon us but moreover may insinuate himself to our very Souls and so by most inward presential Applications strongly incline us to that which is evil Thus we sometimes find by uneasy Experience that our Minds are held close to sinful Objects even against our Wills and when we would fain break loose and turn our Fancies another way they are kept intent even by reluctant Animadversion upon Motives to Naughtiness Now what could thus far force our Minds and keep them fixt in such unvoluntary postures or dispositions but the great Enemy of our Souls And how can we conceive he should do it so well as by his own striking through them by unperceiv'd Penetration For so he may impregnate his pernicious Motions with the fiercest vigour and raise them to the highest degrees of Strength by conveying himself into us together with them Yea some Temptations are so extravagant and unreasonable so base and malicious and so much against Religion and the Christian Temper as those to atheistical and blasphemous Thoughts and the like that methinks they could never break in upon us if Satan himself were not there already to help them to enter nor could they ever continue so long with us nor press so mightily as they do upon our Souls if he were not intimately joined to us to maintain and uphold them in so high a force But then since he can tempt us so powerfully by virtue of his Spirituality which qualifies him for nearest accesses to us and conjunctions with us we should be so wise as to keep our selves always by holy living in GOD's favour and custody that so the utmost of our Adversary's fury and violence may never be able to prevail against us And as evil Spirits may tempt Men as abovesaid by insinuating into them so according to the Number and Malice of those Spirits in any loose Persons will their Temptations and their Sins be And therefore the HOLY GHOST speaking of one whose Mat. 12.45 last State was to be worse than his first gives this account of the sad Cause of that dismal Effect that seven Devils worse than that which actuated him before Were gotten into him And for the like reason Mary Magdalen was so scandalously guilty of carnal impurities even because seven Devils or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 unclean Spirits as the Gospel terms them were in her as Tempters to that sort of Lewdness For so many were cast out of her by the SON of GOD S. Mark 16.9 Yet still we must allow that there is some difference betwixt the Persons thus tempted by Devils and those that are down-right possessed of them For in the first Case evil Spirits apply themselves only to our Souls and that with intention and endeavour to stimulate and urge them on to Sin But in the latter Case they seem to settle in the Body and to take up their Residence in that designing some way or other to be injurious to it And the Injuries they do it of this Nature are commonly very visible or apparent and are mostly done one of these ways Either by vitiating its Organs and so hindring its Functions or hurting its Faculties or its Senses Thus we read of one that was dumb by the Devil 's possessing him Mat. 9.32 And of another that was deaf and dumb upon the same account Mar. 9.25 Or by offering ruder Violences to it As casting it into Mar. 9.22 the Fire or casting it into the Water Or tearing it inwardly or Luk. 9.39 bruising it outwardly or Luk. 13.11 putting it into some distorted or disfiguring Posture and keeping it in the
will be in vain To this agrees the Doctrine of that Great Man the Son of Sirach He that washeth himself after the touching of a dead body if he touch it again what availeth his washing So it is with a Man that fasteth for his Sins and goeth again and doth the same Who will hear his Prayer or what doth his humbling profit him Ecclus. 34.25 26. One Request now concludes the Preface That they who use this Book and find Benefit by it would not only give Glory to GOD for it to whom alone it wholly belongs But also that they would Remember its unworthy Composer in their daily Prayers especially on the days of their Devout and Solemn Addresses to Heaven ☞ That the plain Reader might meet with no Difficulties to stop or hinder Him in the perusing this Treatise some few things not altogether so obvious and easy as the Rest are taken out of his way by being thrown back in the Quality of Notes to the End of the Book THE Holy Mourner c. CHAPTER I. The Usefulness of our Faculties and Passions What Religious Mourning is Two Sorts of it Publick and Private The two Kinds of Private Mourning with the respective Branches of them AS GOD hath given us a lofty Nature and endued that Nature with excellent Faculties So He designs those Faculties for worthy Ends. He intends them not only for Ornament but Use and by them means to make us better as well as higher than other Creatures Thus He gave us an Understanding that we might know Himself as well as other things A Will that we might chuse our Duty as well as other Advantages A Memory that we may treasure up Divine as well as other Truths that so within our selves we might not only have Matter to entertain our Thoughts profitably but also be competently furnish'd with some good Principles from whence to take the measures of our Practice And if we look more downward into the Frame of our Being we shall see that our Passions tho' much inferior to the mentioned Faculties were contrived by the all-wise GOD Who made them for our very Souls Improvement For when He put them into us it was that they might be instrumental to our heavenly and eternal as well as to our temporal and secular Interests Love for instance He planted in us to fix our Hearts immoveably on Himself and to carry them out in Desires towards Him with all the Force and Vigour and Vehemence which that Sweet and Powerful Principle has Fear to awe our Minds into Seriousness and so to balast them as to keep them steady that they being tossed with no Lightness or Folly we may be kept from all Loosness and Sin Hope to draw us to true Religion and not only to induce us to it but to encourage us in it while lively Expectation of its future Rewards carries us through all its present Difficulties enabling us with Laudable Patience and Zeal to perform both its active and passive Duties Joy to enliven and elevate our Spirits that so besides zealous Patience and Constancy we may persist in our Duties with Alacrity and Pleasure For where Joy intermingles with the Offices of Religion it abates or takes off the uneasiness of them and turns them into real and high Delight To mention no more even Grief it self as mean a Passion as men think it and as bitter and irksome as it seems to be is of singular use to the Sincere Christian and serves him in his best and noblest concerns with an happy Efficacy Tho' to instance in what Particulars it does it would be to anticipate the Matter of this Treatise in the Sequel of which they will Sufficiently appear At present therefore we note but this much That Grief is eminently serviceable to good Christians as it ministers to holy or religious Mourning and is an essential or constituent Part of the same This will be evident if we do but consider what religious Mourning is And that I think may not improperly be thus described It is a blessed Work of the HOLY GHOST whereby we grieve heartily upon some spiritual account It is a work of the HOLY GHOST Nor can it be otherwise For where a plentiful Effusion of HIM is promised we find holy Mourning in the true Church to be an immediate Fruit of it I will pour upon the house of David and upon the Inhabitants of Jerusalem the SPIRIT says GOD Zech. 12.10 And then it follows in the next Verse in that Day there shall be a great Mourning To Mourn as Men is incident to all and indeed inevitable As Nature hath given us Power to do it So our Circumstances give us Occasion enough here in this State of Mortality and Misery But to Mourn as Christians is quite another thing Religious Sorrow grows at no time upon the Stock of mere Nature tho' never so well cultivated by Virtuous Education That no where flows with any laudable Stream but where the HOLY GHOST first opens the Springs He bloweth with His Wind and the Waters flow Psal 147.18 St. Jerom from a literal turns the Text to an Allegorical Sense and by the Wind understands the Spirit of GOD. But then the Waters which by His means flow are no other than those of pious Tears which cannot flow unless He causes them to do it And therefore by the Way we have no Reason to think that divine Comforts are either the Sole or the Chief Indication of the Good SPIRIT 's kind and propitious presence Godly Sorrow is as clear a Symptom and assure a Proof of the HOLY GHOST's resting upon us or residing in us as the most refreshing Joys can be And therefore as humble Acknowledgments should be made to GOD and as hearty Praises rendred to Him for the one as for the other The Cloudy Pillar was as evident a Token of GOD's Providential Care of the Jews and of His special Residence with them as the Pillar of Fire tho' all know it was not so bright a one And tho' the SPIRIT 's Consolations are a more lightsome Sign of His Descent upon us yet holy Mourning must be as plain a Mark of his gracious Presence as being as much an Effect of His favourable Influence And then It is a blessed Work of His. Blessed in the entire Capacity of it For as it is wrought in us by a blessed Cause the breathing of this Glorious SPIRIT we speak of and as it is of a blessed Nature being a lamenting of our Wandrings from and Actings against the Laws and Interests of Righteousness So it hath a most blessed Tendency For it tends directly to the purging our of Sin to the purifying of the Soul to the making us upright and holy upon Earth and happy in the Kingdom of Heaven for ever We farther describe it to be a Grieving heartily As there can be no Mourning where there is no Grieving so on the other side where the Mourning is holy the Grief will be hearty There are two
Plenty they fill her with such solid Pleasure and Sweetness as never can result from external Injoyments The choicest of that sort of Contentments in comparison to these are but slight and superficial but frothy and insipid things For the same Reason that holy Sorrows are the heartiest as hath been * Chap. I. noted holy Comforts will and must be the sweetest upon Earth even because as they are seated in the Soul so they are raised by the profound and mighty Workings of the SPIRIT of GOD. And where He is active in a Soul on purpose to comfort it what an Heaven of Sweetness must He produce in it It was the Sweetness of these Comforts that made St. Austin cry out in a kind of rapturous Surprise or in a Pang of Admiration when he felt Himself happily incircled with them †Nescio in quam dulcedinem me duces Domine O LORD I know not into what sweetness Thou wilt lead me It was the Sweetness of these Comforts that made St. Jerom profess with a Solemn Appeal to ALMIGHTY GOD that he thought he convers'd with Quires of Angels * Testor DEUM post Hebdomadarum Jejunia visus sum mihi inter ipsa agmina Angelorum versari I take GOD to witness that after my keeping the Lenten Fast I seemed to be conversant with Throngs of Angels It was the Sweetness of these Comforts that hath so fortifi'd and animated some pious Christians that in confidence of their Pardon and Salvation they have Scorn'd and Triumph'd over the Devil and His Angels and in their Languishing Sickness and under near and sensible Approaches of Death have even mockt and derided the Powers of Darkness and challenged and dared them to do their Worst It was the Sweetness of these Comforts that hath privileg'd some with a desirable Euthanasy or easy Death And not only with an easy but most blessed and hapyy one Exalting their Souls to such Excess of Rapture as their frail Bodies were unable to endure they have broken in pieces as it were just as we see Glasses crack and fly through the Strength of Spirits contained in them Farther yet such is the Sweetness of these Comforts that 't is really inutterable And therefore St. Peter says of the Saints of his time that they rejoyced †〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 Pet. 1.8 with Joy unspeakable All the Rhetoric in the World and all the Orators who use that Rhetoric cannot fully express the delicious Sweetness which holy Comforts derive to good Men. Don't think therefore that I am here going about to explain the native Sweetness of these Comforts or that I am attempting to give in an exact Account of it For when Heaven tells us it is unspeakable that must needs be a Task impossible As we noted even now insufferable is the torment of a wounded Spirit And one Reason may be because the Wounds are made in it by the force of Spirits Either by GOD Himself touching them with the finger of his heavy wrath which no poor Creature is able to endure * Psal 76.7 Who may stand in thy Sight when thou art angry or else by Devils the Ministers of His Severity For whenever GOD gives up sinners to them by withdrawing the care of their Guardian Angels to whose watchful Tutelage or Custody they were committed or by removing any other Defence of His Providence whereby they were protected they immediately assault them with dreadful Violence and in the Heat of their Malice lay on such furious Strokes upon them as poor Mortals are not able to stand under As in time of temptation they tickle Mens minds with Thoughts of Pleasure which wind and draw them to evil Inclinations not easy to be resisted and which indanger their falling into Deadly sin So in time of Desertion they Strike mens Consciences with such dismal Terrors as that being unable to sustain the terrible concussions they sink into horror and raging despair And if the wrath of GOD or of His revengefull Ministers can make such direful Impressions on our Spirits as wound them with Pains beyond all manner of Patience well may His comforts infused by His SPIRIT affect us with Pleasures which for Sweetness shall exceed all measure of Apprehension For such Comforts wrought in us by such a Comforter must needs enter deep enter very deep into our Souls They will pierce to the very Root of their Being and to the center of their Life and flow in upon them with most exquisite Sweetness With such a Sweetness that as it can come from none but GOD so it will draw us most powerfully after Him And were it not for the Luggage of these earthly Bodies which weigh us down it would not fail when it is strong upon us to snatch us hence and carry us up into the glorious Place above O Blessed Creatures they that are favoured with the injoyment of such sweet Comforts Yet that solemn Mourners are sensible of them I dare confidently appeal to themselves to say When ye have withdrawn from the World betaking you to your Chambers or entring into your Closets hath not your FATHER who seeth in secret visited you there Hath He not visited you with sweet Consolations in the midst of your closest mournful Privacies Yea hath He not so visited you as to fill your Hearts with consolatory Sweetness And so hath He filled you many times as that you have been overflowed with it So overflowed as that you have Sunk in it as it were or have been swallowed up by it And then forgetting the World and forgetting your selves like to Angels in their heavenly Extasies ye have perceived nothing but divine Delights And tho' these be Heighths to which all Mourners do not ascend and to which the same holy Mourners cannot at all times attain yet I doubt not but their own Experience being witness their Mournings do commonly lift them up to very raised Comforts Even to such Comforts as are attended with Sublime and inlivening Sweetness tho' some degrees below the highest of all For let me ask when thou hast spent a Day in religious Mourning how hast Thou found thy self after it at night Hast thou not felt a grave Lightsomness in thy Spirit and a serious Gladness in thy Mind and a most pleasant Joy lie glowing at thine Heart And was not the Gratification arising from thence such for Sweetness as no Worldly things did ever afford thee When thou hast spent several Days or it may be some Weeks in the worthiest civil Imployments or Recreations hast thou met with any thing in them so grateful as this or hast thou perceived any such satisfaction after them or can any like it be derived from them But then when the Comforts which here rest upon Mourners are so incomparably Sweet must they not contribute to their being Blessed in this present state In way of Corollary I add but this When the Christian that is constant to his Mourning-days and accustom'd on those
must call to mind that as this Blessedness also is the Offspring of Comforts so are they of Mourning And therefore as we would be blest in such Comforts as shall free us from extravagant Fears when we dye or as shall turn our Fears into Desires of Death we must live holy Mourners CHAP. XIV The Tenth Motive to Mourning in General being the Seventh Branch of that Blessedness which springs from the Comforts annexed to Mourning They sweeten our Life by conducing to our Health and by bettering the Temper of our Minds as well as the Habit of our Bodies THat holy Comforts are blessedly useful and beneficial to our Souls what hath been said on the foregoing Heads does sufficiently prove But then they have a benign and blessed Influence on our Bodies too Nor is it at all strange that those Comforts which are no other than the sweetness of Heaven in our Spirits should sweetly affect the bodily Part of our Beings For while the Spirit and the Flesh continue in this state of vital Union as what is agreeable to the Flesh or Body is frequently pleasing to the Soul or Spirit so on the contrary what is highly delightful to the Spirit will often be recreative to the corporeal fleshly Part of us A most excellent Man who knew this in himself hath transmitted his happy Experience to us in the infallible Book * Psal 84.2 My heart and my Flesh says he rejoice in the Living GOD. Where by the Heart cannot be meant that musculous piece of Flesh in the middle Region of the Body properly so called for then the Expression would have been tautological and might as well have run thus My Flesh and my Flesh rejoyce in the living GOD. But by it we are to understand the Mind or the Soul which is the Source of Understanding and of all Sense and the Spring of all Thoughts Desires and Actions But then this informs us that when Joy or Comfort descends upon the Soul it snatches the Body into Sympathy with it For here it is said of the Heart and the Flesh at once * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they have rejoyced or they have broken out into †To 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 usurpatur etiam de dolore sed praecipuè de gaudio cum 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ☊ conjunctum ut hic significat ovationem c. Pol. Synop. Jubilations or Ovations in which excessive Joys do commonly shew and naturally spend themselves Not that divine Joy affects the Body no farther than just the visible Gesture or the audible Voice in which it sometimes runs out or discharges it self for the Body hath its share as well in the sweet Passion as in those Expressions of it As it is said of the Soul and Body both 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so the Septuagint well renders the Hebrew they have exulted tho' the Soul in strictness cannot leap for joy but must leave that chiefly for the Body to do so the Body cannot strictly rejoyce neither but must leave that principally to the Soul Yet as when the Body leaps for joy the Soul must have a Perception of that Exultancy so when the Soul rejoyces for Comfort the Body hath some sense shall I say or shares in the effects of that heavenly Gladness The holy Psalmist cries out Psal 63.1 My Soul thirsteth for Thee ‖ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 my Flesh longeth for Thee Whence it is plain that when the good Soul is carri'd with passionate and thirsting Desires after GOD her very Flesh at the same time pines and languishes through their Eagerness and Ardency as if that were capable of divine Longings too So when the Soul is ravisht with transporting Joys the fleshly Body it wears rejoyceth with her according to its measures It is affected I mean with the Blessed Passion Which rising at first from a spiritual Motion begun in the Soul does yet terminate in the Body which is the Instrument of Passions and by causing grateful Motions there which return upon the Soul in way of Sensation she is thereby pleased with reflected Delights Now when holy Comforts that descend upon the Soul do thus influence the Body its partaking of them may be a means to keep it in a regular state and to sweeten Life by preserving of Health The Scripture seems to insinuate as much Psal 118.15 The voice of Joy and * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 omnimodam salutem significat tam 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 quam 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Health is in the dwellings of the Righteous Where by Joy a great †Interiora gaudia August Man understands the inward Joys of righteous Livers And as they have cause to lift up their Voice in praising GOD for those Joys so many times they have cause to do it likewise for that Health which is the Fruit or Product of them For the HOLY GHOST may not only signify here that the Righteous have more Joy and Health than others to praise GOD for but also that their Health may be derived from their Joy And in the Third of the Proverbs Solomon suggests something like this For there he tells us that Wisdom or true Religion ‖ Ver. 18. is a tree of Life to them that lay hold upon her That is it is like * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the tree of Lives which GOD planted in the midst of Paradise And that we know was to keep Man from Sickness as well as from Death and so not only to prolong his Life but to preserve his Health And as we find in the same Chapter also to fear the LORD and depart from evil which is Wisdom or Religion in other Terms * Ver. 8. shall be Health to the Navel and Marrow to the Bones A good Evidence that where-ever true Religion dwells in Men in the due Course or just Order of things it will have Health for its Inmate Unless GOD for great Reasons best known to Himself shall please to order it otherwise But then we must enquire whence is this Or how comes it to be thus Why should Religion in the Soul conduce to Healthfulness in the Body The making out this is the Scope of that Point which we are upon and Solomon hath done it to our hand I mean where he declares that the ways of Wisdom are ways of Pleasantness and that all her paths are Peace Prov. 3.17 That virtuous Livers by being virtuous have great Advantages of Health on their side beyond others who are loose and vitious in the World cannot be denied For their Piety and Purity their Self-denial and Sobriety their meek or dispassionate Temper and the Like besides that they entitle them to the Blessing of Heaven do effectually secure them from those Disorders of Mind and Distempers of Body which the contrary Evils naturally breed in them or bring upon them And then they as certainly prevent those dreadful Visitations which as often come down judicially from above and are
as being nearer to the common Sentient and so to the Soul her self Now let us but suppose and the Supposition is very easy that the Blessed SPIRIT can so influence the Soul and so possess her with ravishing Delights which we call Comforts as wholly to take her up and divert her from attending to what the Body suffers and this must be one mighty Alleviation of pain if not a perfect Exclusion or Cure of it For what better Anodyne can there be than an absolute inanimadversion or non-reflection upon Evil than a compleat alienation or entire abstraction of the Mind from what should trouble it And then let us but suppose also as well we may that the same good SPIRIT can imprint such delicate Motions upon the curious Fibres of all the Nerves in the Brain as shall produce strong divine Joys and Pleasures and that these fine Motions may be so brisk and vigorous as to continue in spite of all contrary Impressions tho' never so forcible made by any Violence on other parts of the Filaments of those Nerves and the great Work we speak of is intelligibly done upon the holy Sufferers For thus we may readily and fairly apprehend how all sense of Pain should be drowned in them and how their Souls might swim in deep Consolations when their Bodies were sinking under the Executioner's hands Not that we suppose tho that the SPIRIT 's influence upon Martyrs was ever so strong and vigorous as to leave no room or occasion for their Faith Love Patience and the like divine Graces to act in for their better Support and Comfort NOTE VI. Pag. 169. AND the Chief Reasons of it are Two First Because the evil Spirit with whom they are in Covenant may be delighted with the Steams of humane Blood And for a like reason they haunt Church-yards more than other Places and appear most frequently where the Dead are interred So Origen tells Celsus pretty often how the Daemons were gratifi'd with the Steams of those bloody Sacrifices which were offered to them and how they were greedily desirous of them Which he calls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the lickorishness of Carnal Devils And that they are strangely desirous of the Blood of Mankind and delighted with it is evident from the Complaints which the Devil us'd to make amongst his Devotoes in America For oftentimes when he appeared to them he would tell them he was thirsty meaning for Peoples Blood And then his Priests would urge their Kings to offer up store of Captives to their Gods lest poor things they should die for want of refreshment And as when they had no Captives they would go out on purpose to fight and take some so when they had plenty they would offer them most freely killing them as Victims sometimes by hundreds in a Day To which we may add those 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Mactations of Men wherein Multitudes of old were sadly sacrific'd to heathen Deities And if the reekings of dead or dying Sacrifices were so grateful to them without all question the Nidours or Fumes exhaled from the Veins of People alive must be far more pleasing For being of an hotter and finer nature they may well yield them a brisker and more relishing Flavour Secondly Evil Spirits suck of those Wretches whom they draw into hellish Compacts with them that they may have opportunity of corrupting them by transfusing a pernicious Venom into them Of tincturing their Bodies with so vile a Malignity as will help to numm and stupify their Souls in their moral Capacity As shall fill them with Darkness and Blindness and Dulness and Deadness to all that is good and at the same time dispose them to every evil thing to which they shall think fit to excite and instigate them As to Anger Envy Malice Revenge the basest Obscenities and most barbarous Cruelties And when wicked Fiends by their noxious Breathings into People do so poyson their Souls as to pervert their Bodies no wonder that the HOLY GHOST who still countermines the Wicked One in all his Workings should by His Inspirations I mean His consolatory ones not only most heavenly affect our Souls but withal derive an healthful Temper to our Bodies And let me add by these Consolations our Bodies may be so raised and improved as in some measure perhaps to advance towards the Adamical Crasis or Original Constitution They may approach as near as readily they can do to that excellent Temper which the Protoplasts at first were happy in Whereby it may sometimes happen tho' but seldom that they may not only attain to perfect Health which otherwise they might not have acquired but possibly may rise a step higher and gain such a balsamic Quality to themselves as may inable them to preserve Health in others and also such an healing Virtue as may inable them to restore Health to those about them that are commonly or continually with them I mean by salutary Perspirations or sanative Effluvia's which stream plentifully from them For as the Bodies of Men in high Distempers are so full of morbific Virulence or Malignity in themselves as to breathe out such store of contagious Emissions as will infect others with the like Diseases so they that are arrived at this excellent Temper and delicate Complexion of Body which sends forth these salutiferous and medicinal Exhalations may secretly and unperceivably derive Health as well as preserve it to those Persons with whom they frequently or constantly converse NOTE VII Pag. 292. COncerning this Mark there are several Opinions Some think 't was a Letter out of the Name Jehovah stampt upon his Forehead Others that it was a fierce and furious and truculent Aspect arising from the Checks and Gripes of his clamorous and tormenting Conscience And truly a wounded and accusing Conscience does often change the very Looks of people blasting the pleasant Air of their Faces where the Guilt is much inferior to Cain's Others think it was a constant trembling of all his Members especially of his Head join'd with a lamentable dejection of Countenance and so the Fathers conceive it to be And that Expression Gen. 4.12 insinuates as much a Fugitive and Vagabond shalt thou be The Hebrew words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signify moved and agitated to which the Greek ones 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 answer tossed and discomposed Intimating that he was subject to strange kind of Motions and Agitations in his Body the judicial Effects of GOD's Malediction upon him for his Fratricide And the appearance of these tremulous Motions about him did import or rather indicate so much terror and trouble in himself and imprint so much Awe and Dread upon others that they durst not do by him as he did by his poor Brother lest by contracting the same Guilt they should incurr the same dismal Punishment FINIS THE CONTENTS CHAPTER I. THE Usefulness of our Faculties and Passions What Religious Mourning is Two Sorts of it Public and Private The two Kinds of Private Mourning
Reasons for it The Nature of those things which occasion it and the Power of that Being which excites to it First The Nature of those things which occasion it Things of highest concern must be most affecting But Spiritual things concern us most highly and consequently they must affect us most deeply And of that sort only are those things which occasion holy Mourning they are either Spiritual in themselves or else have Relation to such as are so Not but that Temporal Accidents may be extreamly afflictive to good people and make strong Impressions of Grief upon them Yea some of them may assault them so rudely and shock them so terribly as to disturb them more and make wider Breaches in their Peace and Patience than most spiritual considerations usually do But then Spiritual Evils which are really deplorable sink deeper into them and sit closer upon them and call for Mourning and cause it too when those boisterous Storms of bigger sorrow which Temporal calamities raised in them are quite over and so perfectly gone as to return no more For tho' Worldly Misfortunes do sometimes ruffle us with mighty Violence yet the great discomposures which they give us for the most part do in time settle and are seldom lasting Whereas Spiritual Sorrows which are less raging are more durable and by their long continuance shew that they are deeply rooted in the Heart and have taken a more full Possession of it Thus we oft see the Passions even of well-grown Christians strangely tumultuating and at the Deaths of some of their Friends or Relations transporting them beyond the Bounds of Decency and Moderation Yet the same good people in a few Months or Years after their Departure are freed from these furious Transports of Grief and can think and talk of the dear deceased Ones without a Sigh or a Tear But then these very Persons can frequently be passionate for GOD and their Souls and to their dying Days at times can weep liberally for their Follies and their Sins And this plainly argues that pious Sorrow hath a deeper Place in the Heart and faster hold of it than the other and that dwelling constantly there whenever it flows it must proceed from thence So that in short Civil Mourning and Sacred differ as much in themselves as a Shower and a Spring or as a sudden Land-flood and a setled River And in reference to the Heart they differ as much as a Stranger in an House does from the Owner or Inhabitant For the One as a troublesome and unwelcome Guest does now and then come and lodge in it the Other as the Proprietor or Occupant of it resides continually there and is always ready to issue thence as Occasions shall happen to call it forth And these Occasional Provocations being of great Force by being as hath been said of a Spiritual Nature religious Mourning must needs be hearty especially when in the pious Heart it is so throughly and so deeply grounded Secondly Religious Mourning must be hearty because a powerful Being excites unto it And what that mighty Being is our Description of Holy Mourning shews as it makes it a Work of the HOLY GHOST Outward Objects act upon the Senses they have no other way to come at the Soul yet how violently they strike and how vehemently they affect every one of us feel But when one Spirit acts upon another the Action in reason must be * Note I. stronger And so how can religious Mourning be otherwise than hearty when the good Soul is at once both stirred up to it and actuated in it by the SPIRIT of GOD Who by his gracious Operations disposes her to and assists her in that pious Exercise Lastly We describe holy Mourning to be a grieving upon some Spiritual account For as it takes its Rise from Spiritual Principles and as it tends directly to Spiritual Ends so its Process all-a-long is upon Spiritual Grounds or Considerations Tho' it be exprest in natural Passion and there most evidently where it runs so high as to reach to Tears yet that Passion is raised and set on work with Respect to and by the Force of things that are Supernatural and Divine It fares with us in Mourning much as it does in Singing The same Organs serve as well for a Common Sonnet as for a Church Anthem yet in the Cases there is considerable Difference For in the one there is Music only in the Voice and to the Ears of Men Whereas in the other there is Melody †Eph. 5.19 in the Heart made unto the LORD So the same Passion is Used in holy Mourning that is Employed in ordinary Grieving But yet there is great Difference betwixt them for the one Commences upon low Accounts relating to this present earthly State the other proceeds upon more refined and elevated Considerations belonging to the spiritual and coelestial Life As for the Sorts of religious Mourning they are Two Public and Private Public is when a City People Church or Nation are ingaged in it Private is of Two Kinds For it relates to others or else to our selves As it relates to others it hath respect to their Miseries or to their Impieties If it respects their Miseries it is matter of Sympathy If it respects their Impieties it is matter of Charity As it relates to our selves it hath respect either to our Sufferings or to our Duties or to our Sins If it respects our Sufferings it is pious affliction If it respects our Duties it is a piece of Zeal If it respects our Sins it is a part of Repentance We shall speak to it briefly in both its Sorts and in the respective Branches springing from each of them Tho' our Design is chiefly to promote Mourning for Sin and mourning for it in Private CHAP. II. Public Mourning when to be used By whom to be appointed The Practice of it ancient It s great Success noted in the Ninevites which encourages us to it when injoyned PUblick Mourning is properly to be undertaken upon Public Accounts That is when the Sins of a People are grown loud and high and Judgments or Calamities by reason of them are heavy upon them or like to be so Then is the season of Public Mourning as being of singular Use to remove those Judgments or avert them by procuring Pardon for such provoking Sins as were the Cause or might be the sad Occasion of them As for the Ordering or Appointing this sort of Mourning it belongs to the Magistrates Their Office and Care it is to call the People that are under them to it and to put them upon it where they find it needful to be done For Supreme Magistrates being * Ultriusque tabulae custodes Keepers of both the Tables of the Law they are firmly obliged to take care of Religion as well as of Political or State-affairs And so whenever they apprehend Religious Fasting and Mourning to be necessary they are bound to Command their Subjects to the same that are
Discourse which perswades to Holy Mourning from the Blessedness that arises from the Comforts annexed to it is grounded upon the Second Beatitude let none surmise that it is at all improperly built upon it as if by Mourning there Mourning for Sin to which our Discourse especially leads were not meant For tho' Grotius and some others from or with him restrain it to Mourning in Adversity or under Affliction which is one very good and approvable Sense that we not only allow but use it in where we urge to Mourning in General yet learned Expositors do commonly understand it of Mourning for Sin Lugentes peccata vel sua vel aliena Mourning for Sins either their own or other Mens Pol. Synop. in loc S. Chrysostom also interprets it of Mourning for Sins and so does S. Jerome S. Ambrose Cyril Hilary Lyra Brugensis Spanhemius Piscator Maldonate c. not to omit the English Annotations Mourning we are upon For as Poverty in Spirit or Lowliness of Mind is set before it so Meekness and eager desire of Righteousness Mercifulness and Purity in Heart the Pacific Temper and patient Sufferance of Persecution and Martyrdom are put after it And when the Adorable Author of our Faith and Religion being just laying the Ground-work of the same made Holy Mourning a chief piece in the Superstructure of it and placed it high amongst the aforesaid Excellencies indispensably necessary to the Christian Life as to make it almost the very first of them this may convince us that it is as good and needful as other choice pieces of that divine Religion which He hath taught us and consequently as pleasing and acceptable unto GOD. And is not this great ACCEPTABLENESS of it another Obligation to Holy Mourning Is it not a mighty and should it not be an â—rresistible Motive to the Exercise CHAP. VI. A Third Motive to Holy Mourning in General It entitles us to divine Comforts in this Life As appears from the Nature of GOD from the Word the Office and the Disposition of CHRIST and from the Mission of the HOLY GHOST OUR precarious manner of existing in the World does sufficiently evince that we are not Authors of our own Beings but that we had them Originally from GOD who is the Source or Fountain of all Essence both to Himself and to all Creatures And we being wholly derived from Him we must of Necessity depend upon Him And this our Entire dependance upon Him must give Him absolute Dominion over us And so whatever He signifies to be His Will in reference to us we are indispensably obliged most heartily to Comply with according to our several Measures and Capacities And as every such Compliance with regard to His Sovereignty is an instance of our Duty so His Goodness hath made it an instrument of our Happiness For when at any time we yield Obedience to His MAJESTY He hath not only promised to accept it Himself but moreover to recompence it graciously unto us And as we shall have Reward for every Piece of Obedience so we shall not miss of one for Holy Mourning provided we be but faithful in the Performance And truly a most excellent Reward it shall be as consisting of Divine COMFORTS from above And that they shall attend upon Holy Mourning as a fair Remuneration of it in this present Life we have good Assurance For there are many irrefragable Arguments to prove it tho' I shall name but these that follow 1. The Nature of GOD. 2. The Word the Office and Disposition of CHRIST And 3. The Mission of the HOLY GHOST First The Nature of GOD. As we have learnt already out of Isai 57.15 the Holy Mourner is GOD's Habitation And where He dwells who is the GOD of all Comfort what Consolations can be wanting Divine Comforts do as naturally and necessarily attend His gracious Presence as radiant Brightness does the Body of the Sun And that we know where-ever it goes casts a Sphere of glorious Light about it and is able to make even Noon-day it self where before there was darkest Midnight Nor is GOD where thus present the Cause of these Comforts naturally only but if we may use the Distinction intentionally too by seconding the Efficacy of His Nature in the Case by the Power of His Will and so making the Comforts he sheds down upon His Servants to be the Issues of his Kindness as well as of his Residence And accordingly He proclaims in the cited Text that the very End of His abode with the Humble and Contrite is to revive their Hearts and to revive their Spirits The Consequence of which is as Happy as Obvious for the Beams of GOD's Favour being darted into Mourners by a double Efficacy that of His Nature and His Will at once they must needs enter with a double Force and so chear good Souls both with the sweeter and the stronger Influence The certain Consequence of which again will be that Men may as well freeze in the midst of Fire as holy Mourners can be destitute of divine Comforts I mean ordinarily tho' for some special and extraordinary Reasons GOD sometimes may yea often does suspend and withdraw his Comforts from them But then I say the Dispensaton must be lookt upon as extraordinary and will be different from and contrary to the usual Methods of His Procedure and the Common Measures of his Dealings with Mourners And yet they need not be troubled at it neither For however GOD may withhold His Consolations from them for a Time they are sure notwithstanding to enjoy them at last And even that intermediate want which they feel shall be better to them some way or other than the Fruition of them could have been Secondly That Holy Mourners shall be comforted we have farther Assurance from the Word the Office and the Disposition of CHRIST His Word to our purpose is most Express and Memorable For 't is that which He spake in the Days of His Flesh when He preacht the best Sermon that ever was heard * Mat. 5.4 Blessed are they that mourn for they shall be comforted So that true Spiritual Mourning entitles those that are serious in it to true Spiritual Comforts It must minister effectually to them and it can do no otherwise our SAVIOUR having said it Did He ever break His Word to His Proselytes Was He ever guilty of the Least Inconstancy Are not all the Promises in Him * Heb. 1.20 Yea and in Him Amen Where-ever He is pleased then to assert a thing so plainly Where-ever He is pleased to promise it so positively as He does that Mourners shall be comforted there is no colour for doubting or questioning it in the Least as coming from the very Truth it self And besides His Word we have the Mediatory Office of the LORD JESUS to ascertain divine Comforts to holy Mourners An Account of part of this Office is set down in the Beginning of the 61st of Isaiah Some Learned Expositors and Grotious for one would
SPIRIT pronounces Him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the very same I do not say He is the same in Misery for the Passive part of His great Work for us was over long since His Blessed Self declared that †Joh. 19.30 finisht when He was giving up the Ghost And as for those His Sufferings they shall never be repeated For being sufficient for ever when they were once endured because of their Value they need not be reiterated But then we may consider that by His Intercession His Sufferings are perpetually represented to GOD in our behalf and by His Word the Benefits of them are annuntiated and by His SPIRIT the Efficacy of them is applied according to out Worthiness and Capacity of receiving them And so as much Virtue is derivable from His Passion to our Souls every Day and Hour we live as if to this Minute He were hanging and dying on the meritorious Cross And as the Power and Profit of JESUS's Sufferings are the same to us tho' the Pain of them be ceased as to Him so He Himself is the very same that ever He was The same in Patience the same in Pity the same in Kindness and GOD-like Benevolence to the Sons of Men. But then He having such a fixt Philanthropy and such flaming Love to the Souls of Men how shall He refuse or how can He forbear to impart his Comforts to Holy Mourners Especially when it will cost Him no more to do it than barely to permit them to spring out of Himself who is a most Blessed and inexhaustible Fountain of them Nor is it only easy to Him but matter of delight for in it He not only follows the Duct of His Nature but takes as great Pleasure in dispensing Comforts as we find Benefit in receiving them from Him Now the true and happy Case being this the LORD CHRIST having given His Word that Mourners shall be Comforted and it being His Office to see it done and the very Disposition or Bent of His Nature leading Him to do it and the Work ministring to His Satisfaction as well as to our Interest it must not only be unlikely but quite impossible for Him to withhold divine Comforts from Mourners Unless as hath been hinted there be great and wise Reasons known to Himself why He should do it Thirdly Holy Mourners are sure of Comforts from the Mission of the HOLY GHOST into the World That He came down upon Earth and that when He did so GOD sent Him from Heaven we all know But then in what Quality or Capacity under what Notion or Character upon what Business or to what End did He come from above That Himself hath taught us by the Pen of Saint John He came as a Comforter And so that Lofty Evangelist stiles Him * Joh. 14.16 26.15.26.16.7 more than once intimating that all divine Comforts are deriv'd from Him as indeed they are And therefore divine Joy the same thing with divine Comfort is expressly said to be a Fruit of the SPIRIT Gal. 5.22 And to be Joy in the HOLY GHOST Rom. 14.17 And to be Joy of the HOLY GHOST 1 Thess 1.6 And as these Joys and Comforts are Anticipations of those above and Praelibations or Foretasts of the Happiness to come they with other things there meant are said to be the Earnest of the SPIRIT 2 Cor. 1.22 and the First-fruits of the SPIRIT Rom. 8.23 And all because they are wrought in us or descend upon us by the Spirit 's secret tho' most sensible Operations Now this infinitely Glorious and Gracious SPIRIT being pleased to take such an humble Flight to come down into these inferior Regions so unsuitable to Him and unworthy of Him and the Design of His marvellous Condescention being not only to visit but to comfort Men can any imagine that He should either forget or neglect His Work Or if He comforts others is it likely that He should over-look Holy Mourners They rather of all People ought to be first and most regarded by Him For as they need Comforts more than others so that Necessity is occasion'd or brought upon them by Himself all pious Mourning being but * See Chap. I. a work of His. That considered He is tied to comfort all Holy Mourners by an indissoluble Band of His own making And let none surmise that He will ever offer to break loose from it For to hinder that there is in Him an Impediment both essential and invincible What it is we find in †V. 10. For there He is called the good SPIRIT And that being infallibly true it implies Him possess'd of an answerable Principle And this granted if He had not been sent to comfort Mourners they might have expected it from His meer Temper and in case He should omit to do it in Kindness they might almost challenge it of Him in Justice What good Man could bring Trouble to any and not support them under it And can the good Spirit cast down into Mourning and not comfort His dejected For Him to do that will be but pure Equity as it is for Him that makes Wounds to dress and heal them And so in plain Terms the HOLY GHOST can no more refuse comforting of Mourners than a Being of most Perfect and Infinite Goodness can be guilty of that which is a sort of Injustice as well as Unkindness Now must not Holy Mourners be certain of Comforts when they are thus strangely secured to them For every Person we see in the Blessed TRINITY and all of them at once are jointly and severally ingag'd to dispense Celestial Comforts to all such The FATHER upon Account of His Nature The SON upon Account of His Word and Office and the HOLY GHOST upon Account of His Designation and Mission to the Work And then besides the mentioned Obligations upon each of them they are every one spontaneously inclin'd to do it Yet what hath been twice already suggested must here again be once more remembred That Holy Mourners shall be comforted provided it be best for them and that there be no weighty Reasons why they should be barred and hindred from it For such may the Tempers or Conditions of some be that even divine Comforts may be dangerous to them And so Heaven may be forc'd to keep them short of those Comforts lest instead of advantaging they should greatly injure them For Christian Perfections how incomparable was St. Paul Yet * 2 Cor. 12.7 a Thorn in the Flesh a Messenger of Satan was sent to buffet him lest he should be exalted above Measure And if such a one as he could not be trusted with abundance of Revelations without so severe a Curb upon his towring Spirit we may easily apprehend that divine Comforts may often times be of perillous Consequence to ordinary Christians tho' holy Mourners And therefore by the way if it should prove thy Lot to Mourn at any time without Light and no Beam of Comfort should shine into thy Soul be not
disquieted be not at all discouraged by it Tho thy circumstance be uneasy Thou maist yet be happy and much the happier for this Disappointment GOD sees what Thou discernest not and the lowring Providence shall never hurt Thee 'T is only out of kindness that He keeps Thee in the Dark and so Thou shalt find it to be in the Event For however He may hide His Face for a while and draw a Thin cloud betwixt Himself and Holy Mourners He will not hold them long in such a gloomy State not one minute longer than till they are Qualifi'd to receive Consolations and Benefit by them When that 's once done He 'll quickly unveil His Blessed Countenance and by the bright Displays of its affecting Glories warm their Hearts with Supernatural Gladness And should their Melancholy State chance to be more chronical or lasting than they look for yet let none impute its Protraction or Continuance to GOD's unkindess For so indulgent is He to his dear Children that He loves not to detain any thing from them which they need or desire in case it were better to impart it to them When Mourners particularly are destitute of His Comforts and complain that they want them and pine and languish for the injoyment of them 't is only some unhappy Indisposition of their own that causes Him to withhold them and were but that removed they should not live one Hour without them Could GOD but find that the Comforts they wish would not be pernicious or could He perceive they would bd profitable to them they should be forthwith blessedly replenish'd with them Then the Load of Anguish which damps their Minds and the Burthen of Terror which oppresses their Souls and the Weight of Heaviness which sinks their Spirits should immediately be taken off and out of their Grief and Fear and Trouble they should soon emerge and rise into Angelic Triumphs and Delights CHAP. VII A Fourth Motive to Mourning in General the present divine Comforts which attend it yield Blessedness Four beatifying Properties of them they are Sweet Glorious Strong and Secure Which contain the first Branch of Holy Mourners Beatitude ALthough Holy Mourning be a needful Duty yet we must not think it is injoined for it self then it would be a melancholy and irksom Imployment When GOD invites to that He intends we should meet with somewhat more than Sorrow for He hath so ordered it as we have made appear that it shall minister to our Spiritual Comfort If holy Tears flow sometimes plentifully out of our Eyes He hath taken care that His divine Consolations with reference to those Tears shall flush exuberantly into our Souls Which made a * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrysost great Man cry out If thou wouldst be comforted then grieve And who would not plunge to the Bottom of holy Grief to be raised up to such lofty Delights But then this is not all Holy Mourners are not only sure of present Comforts but such Comforts shall attend their Mourning as will make them Blessed according to the Doctrine of our dearest LORD in His Sermon on the Mount Blessed are they that Mourn for they shall be Comforted Where by Blessedness is not meant the inestimable Habits of Virtue and Righteousness which throughly rectify and improve our Nature and exalt it in its best and noblest Capacities and so qualify us to be Blessed But the remunerative and pleasurable Delights of Blessedness which lie in or result from the lively sense or free injoyment of divine Satisfactions descending from above And if upon this Head of the Blessedness of Spiritual Comforts I be somewhat prolix let me not be thought tedious For it is a grand Incentive to the Work we recommend and one of the main Springs which must give motion to us in it and then keep up and continue the same For Holy Mourning the truth is may seem an heavy Task to all such as are unacquainted with it The very Look or Idea of it is sufficient to fright and drive them from it Something therefore had need be done to reconcile and win all Strangers to the Work And what can be more proper than to open and unfold the blessed Comforts annexed to it and so to exhibit Some of those fair Advantages which are concomitants of the same That therefore I shall endeavour to do tho' I spend a great part of this Book upon it Look what Wages is to the Labourer or Pay to the Souldier or Gain to the Trader and the very same is the Blessedness of divine Comforts to the holy Mourner a most mighty Inducement or cogent Attractive to draw him to the exercise of godly Sorrow Now the first Branch of Blessedness which accrues to Holy Mourners from their Present Comforts grows out of the PROPERTIES of their Comforts And the Principal of those PROPERTIES are these Four 1. They are Sweet 2. They are Glorious 3. They are Strong 4. They are Secure The first Property of Holy Mourners Comforts which contributes to their Blessedness is that they are Sweet And so very sweet are they that they far surpass all Bodily Delights The Church acknowledgeth this Sweetness and makes Proclamation of it Cant. 2.3 I sate down under His Shadow and His Fruit was sweet to my Tast As the Shadow of CHRIST His Shelter or Protection is highly grateful to His People so His Fruit is as sweet to them And what is that Fruit but the Fruit of the SPIRIT one sort of which is Joy or Comfort Gal. 5.22 A Fruit so deliciously sweet that none can excel it save that which the Blessed Tast above As for Pleasures of Sense they must not compare they are not to be nam'd with it When they rise highest they are but flat when they run clearest they are but Dregs and when we take our fullest Injoyment of them we find Trouble in them or a Sting after them The pleasantest Gratifications that we here meet with are but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 bitter-sweets and the loftiest Transports of our sensual Joys are either allay'd with sadness or quickly sink into it One that perfectly knew this delivers it as plainly speaking the same thing tho' in different Words Even in Laughter the Heart is sorrowful and the end of that mirth is heaviness Prov. 14.13 But divine Comfort is of another strain That shines upon us without dazling our Eyes lifts us up on high without turning our Heads and contains such a true and thorough Sweetness in it as utterly excludes all mixture of Sowrness Well therefore might I say as I just now did and I say it again because it is Truth its Sweetness is such as sets it above all Bodily delights So bitter are the Pangs of a troubled Mind that Solomon insinuates they are unsupportable a wounded Spirit who can bear Prov. 18.14 But be they never so grievous and intolerable Spiritual Comforts are as delightful Where they rise to any heighth in the Soul or flow into her in any good
Soul is athirst for GOD yea even for the living GOD when shall I come to appear before the Presence of GOD Psal 42.1 2. Which pathetic Expressions tho' in their primary Aspect they look to GOD's Presence in the Sanctuary yet they may extend to His Presence in Heaven as well And so they show the vehemently transported Passions of a Soul ravish'd with Comforts from GOD and languishing with eager and importunate Desires of the Body's Dissolution that so she might be carri'd up hence to an everlasting Participation of more of those Comforts And therefore here we must note that none desire Death merely for it self nor can they in reason do it as being destructive to their Nature For the Nature of Man we know consists in the Vital Union of Soul and Body But Death divides these two and very rudely tears them asunder And who can desire such contra-natural Violence should ever befal them for its own sake a Violence that separates those essential Principles whereof they are compounded and so brings with it the present Ruin of their Persons The Law of Self-preservation in the animate World is universal and so must be in force among Rational Beings and can never be rooted out where Humanity grows For us therefore to desire what is fatal to us merely for its self must be nothing less than to put off our own Nature and to be what we are not even while we continue what we are which is perfect nonsense and manifest contradiction and a thing most unpracticable because impossible And then besides there is a farther malignity in Death which makes it that it cannot be desirable for its self For it is not only an enemy to Man as it demolishes his Body and breaks his vital Frame to pieces but also as it contains malediction in it For it is the cursed fruit of Adam's sin and so carries with it the bitterness of a penal severity it being justly inflicted as a punishment of Disobedience But tho' none can desire Death for it self yet we may desire it upon other Accounts particularly upon account of Divine Comforts And here let me add these Desires * Note that what follows is spoken only of eminent Christians and but of some of them neither in some eminent Christians are strangely vehement and importunate They grow so high and they run so strong that they are fain to give vent to them in Solemn Expressions For sometimes they sigh and sometimes they weep and sometimes they are ready to fret and be half discontented and sometimes to repine and be holily impatient that they cannot dye They are fit to cry out and that very often O Death where art thou thus long Why comest thou so slowly Mend thy pace and make more haste that so thine hand which others fear may lead my weary Soul to Heaven They wonder what shift those famous Men made who liv'd so long in the Primitive World and should they be condemned to the Like Abode upon Earth they would think it an hard and most cruel Sentence They rejoice exceedingly upon their own account that the Life of Man is so very much shortned and next to the Mercy of dying at all they reckon it a choice one that they dye so soon And as short as the Thread of Life is now made they grudge it should run out to its utmost Length but are willing rather to have it cut off betimes that so they may be happy in a speedier Dismission Whereas others quarrel with Time for its Swiftness and angrily wish that its Wings were clipt for flying so fast they cry out 't is slow and blame it that it does not mend its Pace For if they must be old before they depart they would be so quickly that they might the sooner be gone They hope for Death every Year they look for it every Month and they long for it every Day If they envy not the Saints that dye young they are hugely pleas'd with their happy Lot and had it been in their choice how very contentedly would they have been of their Number So very desirous are they to dye that they can scarce hear of one desperately Sick but they are ready to grieve that it is not their case So very desirous are they to dye that when they hear of one dead or see him carri'd to his Grave they are ready to cry out O that I had gone in his stead and that he had staid in my Room So very desirous are they to dye that high Distempers do but chear their Spirits and tho' through weakness of Body their countenance may droop yet their Souls even then rejoice and triumph and are vested with Robes of Light and Gladness So very desirous are they to dye that when dangerous Sickness wears off again and fair Possibilities of Life return the Sense of this makes them dumpish and heavy and is matter of Trouble and Affliction to them Now how Divine Comforts may stir up such eager desires of Death is obvious and easy enough to apprehend As for Death it self we have already hinted it is no more desirable to the very best than to any else nor is there any Reason why it should be so Pain and Sickness which usher it in and the Coffin and the Grave which follow after it if considered in themselves are as little pleasing to them as to others But then this is confessedly true on all hands that when we have once tasted what is rarely sweet 't is natural for us to desire more of it and where we are sensible most of it is there we are most desirous to be Now the Comforts of GOD which descend from Heaven being so incomparably sweet and pleasant they inflame us with Desires of removing thither And tho' our Way lies through the Gates of Death yet our burning Desires make us earnest to pass them that so we may exchange these imperfect Measures of delicious Comforts for the Entire Fulness and Immensity of them The little Draughts we drink of them here enrage our Appetites after the Fountain from whence they spring The slender Rivulets which run through us now make us thirst insatiably after that Ocean from whence they flow Those single Rays which strike us at present as through a crevise make us long incessantly to ascend into the clear and open Light and to sit under the Gleams of that Eternal Sun whose consolatory Glories shall irradiate our Souls and delight and satisfy them to everlasting Ages Thus the sweet foretasts of future Satisfactions make us greedy of dying that we may be finally settled in the Possession of them And who can deny this to be a piece of true Blessedness All must dye and most are afraid of Death and many fear it immoderately they therefore that fear it not at all but are lifted up so far above Fears that they earnestly Desire it must needs be reputed signally Blessed and which is more must really be so But then here we
the sad Revenges of divine Justice upon the Dissolute and Licentious as they are natural Effects of their being so And farther as the wisest of Men we see hath told us they that walk on in the ways of Wisdom that are regular and persevering in the several Duties and progressive in the noble Perfections of Religion shall not fail to meet with Pleasantness and Peace With such Peace and Pleasantness as come from GOD and fill the Soul with inexplicable Comforts And these Comforts as little as some think it may be good and great Instruments of Health unto us As where the Body is well and strong they help to confirm it in that State so where it happens to be weak and low they raise and mend its Constitution They put a spring of new Life as it were into the Soul which excites most pleasing Motions in the Body even such as serve to inliven and invigorate it For as raking Grief does not only fret and imbitter the Mind but withal casts a sad Damp upon the Body and deadens the liveliness of those inward Motions on which its Health depends and by which it is conserved so heavenly Comforts where they are often and liberally imparted do ordinarily produce the contrary Effects They quicken the Spirits where they move too slowly and help the Bloud to circulate more freely and nimbly where 't is subject to Stagnancy and by taking off the sharpness and sowreness of them they insensibly sweeten and rectify both By peculiar Motions which they put them into they alter the Figures of their disordered Particles and so better the Mass or Substance of them with more Ease and Efficacy than the best Physic can possibly do And the Bloud and Spirits being thus corrected and the Ferments of the Body made light and soft and smooth and unctuous the Wheels of Nature will by this means be freed from cumbersome Cloggs and Entanglements within and in case no Violence happens from without may run on a great way in a regular Course And thus not only Life is prolonged as Length of Days is in Wisdom's right Hand Prov. 3.16 but that Life is made more happy because the Person injoying it is made more healthful And therefore we are taught by an incomparable Writer that the Fear of the LORD which maketh Peace or produceth Comforts where it dwells does thereby make perfect health to flourish Ecclus. 1.18 Nor can it seem strange that holy Comforts should thus conduce to Health if we do but remember what wonderful Effects they have had upon Martyrs turning their dying Pangs into rapturous Pleasures as was * Chap. 11. But then the Martyrs Comforts are there said more than once to be extraordinary ones and so much above those we here speak of noted above And another Instance may abate the strangeness of the thing As 't is commonly said Witches are †Note VI. suckt by their Familiars And to this end as we may reasonably suppose that thereby they might taint and disorder their Bodies And when Distemper of Body proceeds from the influence of wicked Spirits well may Healthfulness be an Effect of the Comforts of the HOLY GHOST And divine Comforts being such Preservatives and Restoratives of Health upon this Account they must be Blessed Things Health being necessary to our present Happiness For as he that would be wise must first put off Folly and as he that would be virtuous must first throw off Vice so they that would be Happy must first be Healthful Else in spite of all Rules and Principles of Stoicism a sickly Body will disquiet the Soul and a pained Body will disturb the Mind and Trouble and Unquietness in the Soul and Mind will soon convince all Persons concern'd that if they would build up Felicity to themselves they must lay its Foundation in Ease and Indolence However * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Diog. Laer. in Anaxar pounce the Sack of Anaxarchus for Anaxarchus thou dost not strike were big words in that Abderite's Mouth when cruel Nicocreon was braying him in a Mortar and might express a stout and resolute Humour yet they were as far from rendring the Sufferer happy as the Thumpings he endured were from rendring him easy Nor do heavenly Comforts conduce more to mending the Habit of our Bodies than they do to bettering the Temper of our Minds For as Pleasures that are sensual and impure do sink and soften and emasculate the Spirit as they fill it with pensive Solicitude and fretful Anxiety to find that it is fallen below it self and inslav'd to things unworthy of its Dignity so where it is ravisht with the Comforts of Heaven and nobly transported with frequent Returns or Iterations of them it will rise by Degrees into a very delicate and desirable Frame So that if before we were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 tart and waspish and peevish and passionate these in time will work a thorow and an excellent Change in us They will cool our Heat and quench our Fury and rebate the sharpness and fierceness of our Disposition and polish the Ruggedness and Unevenness of our Minds and take off the Bitterness and Sowreness of our Nature and so make us not only to be easy in our selves but obliging to others And to have our Passions thus curbed and tamed in us and all Harshness and Roughness thus taken out of us and to become moderate and well composed in our selves and meek and mild and pleasing unto all must needs be a great Improvement of our Temper And as this Improvement sweetens our Life which how it should do it the meanest Capacities can apprehend it must add considerably to our Blessedness upon Earth But then as we would live sweetly in this present World as we would have our Souls blessed with Health of Body and good Temper of Mind let us heartily take up Religious Mourning from which will result those holy Comforts that are productive of the same CHAP. XV. The Eleventh Motive to Mourning in General being the Eighth Branch of that Blessedness which springs up from the Comfort annexed to Mourning They supply us with noblest Delights in this Life when those that are less generous fail and forsake us Which they do by acquainting us farther with GOD and by inflaming us with Love to the LORD JESUS CHRIST IN our declining Years as our Strength decays so other natural Abilities and Perfections which depend upon it flag and decay with it Particularly our Faculties grow dull and our Appetites grow down our Pleasures wear off and by degrees wear out and the sinking Body so depresses the Soul that Men dye to most of their corporal Satisfactions even while they live But here the Force of holy Comforts again is blessedly felt this being a chief Juncture wherein they exert it For when in these our Declensions they dwell plentifully with us they are an inexhaustible Spring of rich and high Complacencies They do not only fill us with great Thoughts and
is great and so is the Love of a Mother to her Child and so is the Love of a Man to his faithful Friend But all are short of true Love to JESUS And that they must be so we are well assured by the Word from Heaven For that informs us that as it is the first and great Command and so our prime and chief Duty to love the LORD so it tells us at what Rate we must do it even with all our Heart and with all our Soul and with all our Mind Mat. 22.37 Our Love to Him must be raised to an higher Pitch than what it stands in to any thing else And there 's Reason for it For in that its Elevation or Superiority in that its Pre-eminence above or Prevalence over all other Affections lies the very Sincerity or Essence of it So that to love CHRIST no better than other Things or Persons is indeed not to Love Him at all not at all duly and so not at all acceptably And the same Word tells us that Love to CHRIST is such for Ardency as many Waters cannot quench nor Flouds drown Cant. 8.7 And again it tells us of true Lovers of Him that they are sick of Love to Him Cant. 2.5 A plain case that Love to CHRIST is a Passion so strong and that the Fits of it in some are so violent and high that they affect them with a kind of Sickness The Expression came from the HOLY GHOST and believe it there is nothing Hyperbolical in it No Rhetorical Strain or Figurative Scheme of Speech Nothing Catachrestical or Improper What it affirms is literally true without Flourish There are thousands of eminent Christians in the Church whose Affections to JESUS are so vigorous whose Desires of Him are so vehement whose Longings after Him are so earnest that they bring perfect Qualms over their Hearts and make them quite sick of Love to His MAJESTY And where a pure Mind is carri'd out in so powerful a Love to an Object that is infinitely perfect and glorious let Reason judge how inconceivably delightful its Actings must be O LOVE * O Amor quid te Appellam nescio dulcem an asperum suavem an injucundum Ita enim utroque plenus es ut utrumque esse videaris Salvian Epist 1. said a good Man of old I know not what to call thee good or evil delicious or troublesome sweet or unpleasant For so full of both thou art that thou seemest to be both And most true is this of our kindest Love to one another It is at best but a Miscellaneous thing A Compound made up of two Ingredients some satisfaction and much uneasiness But Love to CHRIST is of quite another Nature He that feels that divine Passion finds nothing in it but divine Pleasure His Mind is full of Peace his Soul dwells at Ease and his Spirit is wrapt up in most heavenly Delights Delights so blissful that there are none like them but those above in the eternal World Divine Love is the sweetest Power that humane Souls are capable of and the most perfect GOD is the sole Object of that Power And therefore whenever it is imploy'd in receiving the influxes of His special Favour and in sending up streams of reciprocal Affection to His MAJESTY O LORD what Delights must here be produc'd No less for certain than such as are beatifying beyond Expression And that indeed is the truest Character of them they are inexpressible When we call them so we really say more what they are and give in a juster Description of them than if leaving that out we should discourse never so long and largely concerning them And let any judge that are able to do it if those Comforts that raise this Love which causes these Delights do not render Men truly Blessed For when Time hath sunk them never so low and Old age hath worn them even quite out and both together have put them past relishing all other Pleasures they 'll fill the Religious with such a Love as will replenish them with such Delights as will affect them with unspeakable Sweetness But then Holy Mourning being one chief Door at which these blessed Comforts enter and come in upon us as many as would be Blessed in these Delights which they occasion and which survive all other must look upon it as a thing most eligible and for their own benefit must conscionably use it and keep close to it CHAP. XVI There are false Comforts as well as true How to distinguish the one from the other Whence false Comforts spring A Great deal and very great things have been said of holy Comforts which are Fruits or Effects of Religious Mourning Yet no more than is proper and applicable to them as being indeed most true concerning them For such is their excellent Worth and Usefulness that they do not only answer the Character given them but would easily fill up one far more large and comprehensive And yet as incomparable as these Comforts are there is a kind of mimical or mock-comforts like them And tho' they be false they are Images or Counterfeits of the true and to them that sit under the Influence of them which is Evil and Malignant may prove to be of pernicious consequence That there are False Comforts we need not question for we have loud Hints of them in the holy Books let us note but two King Herod heard John Baptist gladly S. Mar. 6.20 * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 pleasantly sweetly delightfully And whence came this sweet and delightful Pleasure As for the Baptist he was an austere Man and the Doctrines he taught were undoubtedly strict and severe like himself And so for certain there could be nothing in them which by reason of Agreeableness might take the Humour or tickle the Fancy of that unrighteous Prince The matter of His Preachin◠might be such rather and so delivered 〈◊〉 to be fitter on the other side to incense and provoke him In all likelihood therefore some spark of Comfort whencesoever it came was struck at this time into his Breast Tho' it might be as far from true Comfort as King Herod was from being a good Man The Stony Ground also received the Word with Gladness S. Mar. 4.16 Yet by that Ground as our great Master who delievered the Parable expounds it are meant those that proved unsettled or unsteady such as * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 had no Root of Virtue in themselves As had no Fixedness or Stability no living lasting growing Principle of real Goodness but were as He there says of them †〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 temporary in Religion or wavering and inconstant Professors of it For as He declares in the 17th verse When Affliction or Persecution ariseth for the Words sake immediately they are offended They were ready upon the first Occasion given by any sad or troublesome Emergencies to manifest their fickleness and unsincerity Now when such a Character of any sort of Men comes
of Scripture mistaken and misapplied First False Comforts are sometimes Effects of Nature Where the Spirits are good and the Bloud is sweet and the Ferments of the Body regular and even besides Health and Indolency we there find a constant readiness in Men or a standing Disposition to Lightsomness and Jollity So that if they of this Constitution who dwell as it were upon the Brinks of Joy be at any time carri'd by Just occasions but a little farther they forthwith step into the pleasing Passion it self And how they should come to be advanced to it and also raised to an high Pitch in it even by a natural complexional Efficiency is easy to apprehend Melancholy in conjunction with a sanguine Temper is able to do it For by mingling its brisk acrimonious Flatulency with a sweetish heavyish kind of Bloud it strikes upon the Nerves with such grateful Touches as cause delightful Titillations in the Body and so affect the Soul with much joy and pleasure Nor need we wonder that such joyous Comforts or Delights should result from meer nature or our bodily Temper if we do but consider how other things are very productive of the like Effects Wine for instance hath a power in it to chear our Spirits or as it is expressed in holy Stile * Psal 104.15 to make glad the Heart of Man Insomuch that Josephus says of it †〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Antiq. li. 11. cap. 4. it even transports and regenerates Souls It puts a kind of new life into them by mending or raising the Temper of their Bodies and rendring them more healthful and vegete I speak of the moderate and sober use of it it being most baneful both to Soul and Body wherever it is taken in excess So Mela informs us that the Thracians who had no Wine suppli'd the want of it at their Feasts by a certain Seed And of such a Quality was that Seed that the Smoak of it caused Intoxication and Mirth Which things considered how Melancholy should cause high Joys within us will not be difficult to conceive For it is but allowing hypocondriacal Humors to have Affinity with Wine or its Vapours to have cognation with the Fumes of the Thracian Seed and the work is done And that Nature which out-does the most exquisite Chymists should refine Melancholy to such a Degree and sublimate or exalt it to such an Height as to make it so capable of the forementioned Operations as to fill us with joyous and triumphant Delights cannot be surprizing to the intelligent For they know very well that where Melancholy is predominant and duly heated and invigorated by a sanguine Temper or Constitution very strong Joys and even rapturous Delights will result from it So * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Aristotle expressly affirms that it produces Extasies and Joys of Mind and that too as he adds †〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Probl. sect 30. with singing And when Men may so overflow with Joys as that their Joys shall rise up into Raptures and their Raptures run out and spend themselves in singing must not the Gratifications they feel within be exceeding high Yet these are Fruits that may grow upon the bare stock of Nature and so may have nothing at all of the Good SPIRIT in them or of His true Consolations Secondly Inward Comforts False ones I mean may be Effects of a worse Cause than this they may be derived from Satan himself As GOD sheds abroad true Joys and heavenly Consolations into the Hearts of His Servants to encourage and strengthen them in the Works of Religion so the Devil who loves to ape the ALMIGHTY where he can does sometimes cast false Joys and delusive Comforts into the Hearts of his Vassals to animate and imbolden them in the Ways of unrighteousness For should they always walk on in Dulness and Darkness this might so startle them as to make them seriously bethink themselves It might so alarm and terrify them as at some time or other to fright them out of their vitious into virtuous Courses Now and then therefore he tantalizes them with some feeble Glimmerings of false Light and Comfort He darts some glaring Joys into their Souls to make them well opinion'd of themselves And perswading them by this means that their Condition is good tho' it be quite otherwise he so prevails with them to persist in Sin till at length they fall into irrecoverable Ruine Nor is it hard to conceive how the Evil Spirit should kindle this Fire of false Joys in our Breasts and warm us as it were with Comforts which flash from Hell For since an agreeable mixture of Melancholy with our Bloud can raise us as we have heard to an Elevation of rapturous Delights the Devil who hath power to actuate the Humors and Vapours in our Bodies especially if we be his Servants by his dexterous agitation of those Vapours and Humors inforcing them beyond their natural strength he may easily transport us with ravishing Satisfactions And thus the strange Delights which some Men feel and which they reckon to be divine Influences from above and blessed Productions of the HOLY GHOST are but natural Effects or Satanical Injections and so rather hellish Infusions than Inspirations from Heaven Thirdly False Comforts may proceed from Enthusiasm For where that prevails Imagination is strong Insomuch that the Mind which should always be under the government of free Reason is wholly sway'd by this lower Faculty And where Fancy rules it easily over-powers and bears down the Soul into a firm Belief of the Truth of what she vigorously apprehends be her Apprehensions never so enormous and extravagant Hence it hath come to pass that one Fanciful Enthusiast has conceited himself to be a Prophet or an Angel another has thought himself to be the true Messiah or the great Judge of the World another has boasted himself to be GOD the FATHER or the HOLY GHOST Now when the Strength of Fancy or Force of Imagination thus carries away the Mind into a credulous Assent to such wretched Mis-conceits these or the like Conceits naturally lift up Souls which fully believe them to be great Truths into very high Joys and Ravishments of Spirit Yet be they never so lofty or never so luscious they are but a corrupt and dangerous sort of Fruit as having nothing but Enthusiasm for their chiefest Root Fourthly False Comforts may arise from wrong Notions which Men have in Divinity Thus some too opinionative are mightily for absolute or irrespective Predestination Others for Justification by Faith alone Others for being justifi'd by CHRIST's Righteousness imputed And others again are as stiff Assertors and as strenuous Maintainers of that absurd Perswasion that GOD sees no Sin in His own Children Now they that firmly believe and fiercely contend for these and such Fancies conclude they are highly beneficial to them in their greatest Interests and so they are strangely affected with them and influenced by them and feel them
even to the ground by mournful Prayers let us labour to defeat them Night and Day let us crave of her Supreme ALMIGHTY Head to secure Her from Dangers and to deliver Her from Troubles to build up Her Walls and to repair her Breaches to strengthen her Friends and to beat down her Enemies To settle Truth and Peace in Her to add more Purity and Holiness to Her and to continue them both for ever with Her In a word together with our Prayers let us often pour out our Tears unto Him beseeching Him with all possible Importunity to be Her everlasting Patron and Protector To settle Her upon the Basis of his infinite Power and to rest her upon the Support of his never-failing Providence to watch over Her with the Eyes of his tender care and to incircle Her with the Arms of his gracious Custody to lay Her in the Bosom of His Paternal love and to Crown Her with the Blessings of His favourable kindness That so whatever Her past Hardships have been for the future she may not only be safe and easy but flourishing and happy And whatever in this way we do for the Church we may conclude Her extremely worthy of it For the true Christian Church is a Community of the best People in the World A Fraternity of virtuous and religious Persons A Society of innocent and holy Livers that believe and act the noblest things An Association or Body of such as are excellent in themselves approved of GOD dearly bought and beloved of CHRIST competently cleansed and sanctifi'd by the SPIRIT and nearly related and united to us On whom as we cannot but place much of our Delight here on Earth so with them we shall enjoy an eternally sweet and inconceivably delectable Conversation in Heaven And how despicable soever they may now seem and however vilifi'd and abused they may be yet over a while the LORD JESUS will dignify them with such high Perfections and vest them with such bright and radiant Splendors as will render them incomparably glorious and admirable even in the Eyes of all beholders He signifies no less where He openly declares that at His Second event He shall come to be glorifi'd in his Saints and to be admir'd in all them that believe 2 Thess 1.10 Upon these Considerations to name no more what good Christians would not willingly do any thing much more humbly Pray and Mourn to advance and hasten the Church's Happiness And let none refuse or reject the Exercise upon pretence that Her Happiness cannot be hastened because the Time when it commences is immutably decreed For if the Beginning of that happy state which the Christian Church is to enter upon be inalterably prefixt to a certain Period of time Isai 60.22 and so determined by prophetick bounds or limitation as not to be accelerated in any measure yet by Prayers and Tears She may notwithstanding be made very prosperous before-hand and this signal Prosperity may be previous and introductive to that Her Felicity CHAP. XIX Objections against Holy Mourning answered as that 't is beneath us Makes us Melancholy Disparages Religion Wastes our Time And hinders Business HAving done with the Motives which invite to Holy Mourning in General and may they effectually induce us to it 't will be proper in the next place to see what Objections may be brought against it and to remove them fairly out of the way The First may be this Mourning is a thing very much beneath us Below our Nature and our Dignity Man is no less than a marvellous Compound of different Principles And tho' his Body be as mean and faeculent as the Earth he treads on being originally made out of it and so symbolical and homogeneous with it yet his Soul is a divine and noble Essence immaterial and spiritual equal to Angels and like unto GOD. And in this respect he is highly advanc'd in the Classis or Scale of living Creatures and indu'd and adorn'd with such Faculties and Perfections as are suitable to a Being of his Rank or Station in the animate World Nor was his Original Dignity short of his Frame or Nature For when GOD created Him his Favour bestow'd the high Privilege upon him to make him Prince or Head of this sublunary World Gen. 1.28 And for Him that is of so high a Nature and also bears so high a Character Mourning must needs be too low an Exercise When his Person is so extraordinary as to excell even all the visible Creation and his Power so eminent as at first to hold the Reins of this World in his hand for him to sit whimpering with Tears in his Eyes will ill become so exalted a Creature and the Empire delegated to him from above To this I answer First Grief is one of our natural Passions And whatever is a piece of Man's Nature must not be counted either unworthy of him or disgraceful to him That would be a rude and impious reflection upon the All-wise and Glorious GOD who made Him Secondly Tho' Man in this inferior World was and in some measure still is a kind of Sovereign yet he is one of the ALMIGHTY's Subjects And so whatever Commands GOD lays upon him he is bound indispensably to obey them And holy Mourning being one of his Precepts in point of Duty he must submit to that And as that which is his Duty will be so far from debasing him that 't will conduce to his Honour as well as to his Interest so holy Mourning as being a Duty which GOD injoins must improve his Nature and imbellish his Worth and while it advances both can disparage neither For this we have a Proof that puts the thing past all doubt JESUS our LORD was once an holy Mourner upon Earth He wept for Lazarus St. Joh. 11.35 And in the days of His Flesh He offered up Prayers and Supplications with strong crying Tears Heb. 5.7 But did this at all sink or degrade our Nature which He graciously assumed So far from that that at this very time and for many Ages past it sits at GOD's Right hand in Glory and is there exalted far above all Principality and Power and Might and Dominion and every Name that is named not only in this World but also in the next Eph. 1.21 So far is Mourning from disparaging our Nature that GOD did not count it disparaged His. For when our LORD wept even He was concern'd in shedding those Tears as being hypostatically joined to our Flesh Secondly It may be objected against holy Mourning that it makes us Melancholy or is a piece of that unhappy and uneasy Temper And so indeed it will not only be of no use but of dangerous consequence For Melancholy is said and not improperly to be the Devil's * Balneum Diaboll Bath A complexion wherein our great Adversary delights as being troublesom to us and advantageous to him in carrying on his Malicious Designs against us And when religious Mourning leads to Melancholy or
measure of the stature of the fulness of CHRIST are St. Paul's Words Eph. 4.13 Which seem to insinuate that there is a decreed Pitch or Perfection for us to reach in this Life before we can dy and ascend to Blessedness And shall we not haste on then by holy Mourning with all possible speed to the heighth of Grace which must be accomplisht in us What would we not fain be in Heaven Do we not sigh and groan under the Load of our Mortality and would we not gladly be freed from the heavy Burthen and hard Bondage of it Are we not weary of our present Troubles and do we not complain of many uneasinesses and should not a call to endless Rest and perfect Joy be welcome to us Or had we rather continue here and abide still in this earthly State O senseless stupid and egregious Folly can we love our Prisons and embrace our Chains and hug our Fetters Can we court a longer Exile from our eternal Home and be content to be kept out of the coelestial Kingdom Is not God our loving Father there Is not CHRIST our tender Husband there Is not the HOLY GHOST our sweetest Comforter there And to go lower are not many of our good Friends and dear Relatives there And is not the greatest part of the true Church gone thither and now triumphing in the Presence of our LORD and can we once wish to stay behind Does not the Hireling long for his Pay The Servant for his Wages The Souldier for his Reward The Husbandman for his Harvest The Heir for his Inheritance And do not we long and pant and ardently desire to be in Heaven It will be seen here whether we do or no for then we shall mourn the oftener and the more earnestly that so we may get thither quickly To all good Christians the Gates of Heaven are set wide open and the faster we improve in Divine Grace the sooner possibly we shall enter What more forcible Reason can there be or Motive either to provoke to this Duty If we can outstand the Dint of this vain it will be to propound any more well therefore may it be the Last I offer Let good Christians think seriously with themselves what a vast difference there is between what we are now and what we hope to be hereafter What a sad case are we in here What variety of Infirmities encompass and incommode us We have stupid Minds and crooked Wills clouded Understandings and erroneous Judgments unfaithful Memories and extravagant Affections sensual Desires and unruly Appetites polluted Souls and filthy sickly mortal Bodies What a blessed Condition shall we be in above and what a fulness of Beatitude shall there surround us For besides a freedom from the aforesaid Complaints we shall have a clear and most comfortable Vision of GOD whom our Souls upon Earth so entirely loved The immediate Fruition of the eternal JESUS whose very Name was so ravishing to us The taking Society of Angels most spotless and illustrious that now do us good and we perceive it not The delightful Fellowship of departed Saints whom we prized so much and were so loth to forego Souls pure as the brightest Cherubim and Bodies at length more glittering and radiant than the Starrs or Sun And shall not the hope of such high Preferment make us forward to increase in Grace tho' it were by Mourning that so we may the sooner be invested with it Does not the sense of our many Miseries make us impatiently desirous of Heaven Are not our Sins many Are not our Doubts and Fears and Distractions many Do not these rend our Hearts and afflict our Spirits and sting and gnaw and wound our Consciences and make us oftentimes restless and joyless Can we serve and please GOD as the Souls of the just made perfect do Can we see Him and know Him and love Him and laud Him and derive Happiness from Him as they do Alas the best Services which we perform to Him and the Highest Felicities we receive from Him in these lower Regions are not worthy to be named in the same day with theirs The Duties we offer up to GOD are lame and imperfect mingled with Failings and many Weaknesses and scarce deserve the Name of Duties And answerable to our Duties to Him are our Comforts from Him so faint and low in comparison that they scarce deserve the Name of Comforts If now and then we can get a slight Taste of GOD's Goodness a short Glimpse of His Countenance a single Beam of His Favour darted into our Souls that 's all which ordinary Christians commonly attain to But O the quick and lively sense that the Saints in Glory have of GOD's Love O the close and sweet Embraces that they there feel in the Arms of His Mercy O the fresh Torrents of incessant Joys that always overflow and exceedingly affect them They continually bathe themselves in streams of delight that issue directly from the Great JEHOVAH and swim in such an Ocean of Divinest Pleasures as hath indeed neither Bounds nor Bottom Nor is the measure of their Happiness beyond its Duration for in respect of that it is really infinite being to last as long as GOD Himself Now are not these Excellent things worth the having Can there be any more valuable and so more eligible than they And consequently can we desire any thing so much as a speedy Passage into the Fruition of them Would we not gladly exchange corruption for Glory and a dying Life for blessed Immortality Had we not rather sit down before the Throne of GOD in Holiness and Triumph than abide here in a condition of Sin in a state of Sufferings and in a vale of Tears In short were it not better for us to be taken up into the Mansions on high to reap the Fruits and injoy the Rewards of our respective Labours than still to be imploy'd in any painful Exercises Why if in reality we think it better and accordingly desire it let us manifest the sincerity of our Desires by the Earnestness of our Endeavours to encrease our Graces by holy Mourning Happy are they who by any Piece of early Piety do so advance or augment their Graces as to obtain an early ascent to Heaven And to encourage a little farther yet as we shall go to Heaven perhaps the sooner for this so we shall have the more Glory there Every Vessel shall be full in that Sea but yet the biggest shall receive most That therefore we may be capable of the more Bliss in Heaven while we are on Earth let us enlarge our Graces by Religious Mourning CHAP. XXI Reasons why we must mourn for the Sins of others The Best have done it The neglect of it is blameable It prevails with Heaven It brings us Comforts It secures us from Judgments when others fall by them Both Nature and Religion bind us to it It may be we have been Sharers in the Sins of others HAving given in the Reasons why we
the Title Private Devotions And most fitly may we peruse and consi or them well on our Mourning Days Heads of Self-examination contained in that excellent Book the whole Duty of Man Where we shall find Sin so fully though compendiously represented in the sundry Kinds and Branches of it as will very much help us to understand the great variety of our Sins Thirdly Our Sins have been frequent and repeated As we have committed many Sins so we have acted them many times As if some had been born for nothing but to Sin they have indeed done little else And they that have been more moderately vicious or the most strict and virtuous livers of all have run into so many reiterations of Sin that they are without Number Witness the Psalmist's solemn Interrogatory * Psal 19.12 Who can understand his errors That is how frequently he hath repeated or renewed them And therefore in our other Translation it runs thus Who can tell how oft he offendeth According to which to count up our Sins will puzzle the best Arithmeticians amongst us Who can reckon up their evil thoughts And yet the Sins of the Tongue can no more be numbred than those of the Mind And therefore truly to summ up all our Sins must needs be impossible Even as impossible as to compute the Drops of Water that are in the Sea or the Grains of Sand that lie spread upon the biggest Desart of the Earth A most sad Thought if seriously entertain'd by pious Men. Lastly We have sinned boldly and impudently Many of us want common Modesty as well as Christian Integrity and therefore we * Isa 3.9 declare our sins as Sodom and hide them not Some amongst us have not only been foolish and brutish before GOD but also before men and in the sight of the Sun They have wallowed publickly in their leudness and have owned their Prophaness and have been so far from sneaking into corners to cover their Baseness that they have practis'd it abroad in the open Streets And when they have done instead of being abashed at their monstrous sin they have rather been proud of it and have gloried in that which was their greatest shame And to this very day how usual is it every where for naughty Men to glory thus shamefully To boast of their strength in Drinking to vaunt of their malice in Revenging to make sport with Atheistical Talking to divert themselves and others like them with nauseous Stories of their Swearing lying defrauding debauching and the like And so besides affronting and dishonouring GOD by breaking his Righteous and Holy Laws they mock and laugh at the violation of them As if they meant to put Shamefacedness quite out of countenance and to scorn and deride and hector all Bashfulness out of the World This may be thought very plain and I own it to be so but then withal it is very true and that makes it as sad O that I had no occasion to speak thus And though all of us have not the same Degrees of Impudence to answer for yet sinning too impudently or audaciously may well be charged on us because as hath been said we have sinned highly and sinned variously and sinned frequently A most lamentable consideration if throughly weighed Enough to melt any Heart that is not as hard as the nether Milstone Now what remains but that in the Name of GOD I beseech all those who read this Book designed to promote Religious Mourning that they would duly consider these Suasives to it and add any else which they shall think or find to be proper and useful So I doubt not but what I aim at in this plain Treatise will with Heaven's Blessing be happily accomplisht I mean our Souls shall weep in secret and our Hearts shall mourn within us for our own and others Sins especially those of this Nation A Form of Devotion Proper for the pious Christian when he spends a Day in private Mourning for his own and the Nation 's Sins WHEN the Day you have set is come rise no later than you use to do but if you use to rise late then somewhat sooner When you are dress'd retire into your Closet or be as private as well you can But if any thing of necessary Business or Civility forces in upon you be not too shie of admitting them But when you are fain to ingage in either and with the company that brings the same converse as freely as you are wont and conceal the serious Imployment you are about Only make all the prudent innocent Excuses that you may to withdraw as soon as is convenient and to return to your better Exercise But if inavoidable Diversions take you off it too much then break off the Performance you have begun that Day and deferr it to another but be sure that you lose not a Day in the Course you have resolved on or appointed to your self A preparatory Prayer As soon as your ordinary Morning-Devotions are ended use the following Prayer preparative to the Solemnity of the Day I Am taught in thy Word that the * Prov. 16.1 Preparations of the Heart in Man are from Thee O LORD Before Thee therefore I prostrate my self earnestly beseeching Thee to prepare my Heart to seek Thee this Day with Fasting Praying and holy Mourning Without Thee I know that I can do nothing and that 't is Thou who must work in me both to will and to do whatever is good Cause Thy divinest SPIRIT O GOD to descend upon me and by His blessed Inspirations so to inliven and assist my Soul as that I may offer up an acceptable Service unto Thee Let Him give me a due Sight of my own Vileness and Unworthiness and affect me with a deep Sense of thy Glories and Perfections that so I may approach Thy Presence with such Reverence and Humility with such Faith and Modesty and with such Zeal and Fervency as becomes most sinful Dust and Ashes addressing to the Infinite and Adorable MAJESTY of Heaven and Earth And then †Psal 5.1 2. give ear to my Words O LORD and hearken I beseech Thee to the Voice of my Cry my King and my GOD even for JESUS CHRIST His sake Amen Before you rise off your Knees humbly offer unto GOD what Money you think fit to be laid by at present and afterward to be given to the Poor as occasion serves Remembring that as Fasting is one of the Wings of Prayer to carry it up to Heaven with more force and speed so Alms-deeds are the other But when you make your Oblation say thus Accept it O GOD in thy Beloved SON and vouchsafe me thy special Assistance this day in the weighty Duty I am undertaking Then rising up read one or two or more of the * Which are the 6th 32th 38th 51th 102th 130th 143th Penitential Psalms meditating so upon what you read as that it may help to work you into a Mourning frame And when you break off
us with constant and most powerful Preaching of Thy Word but we do not hear it so as to obey it Thou indulgest to us a blessed Liberty and frequent Opportunities of calling upon Thee by Public Prayer but we do not join it so as to honour Thee and advantage our selves by it Instead of keeping holy * Isai 58.13 Thy Day we break and pollute it Instead of Reverencing Thy †Levit. 19.30 Sanctuary we neglect or prophane it Instead of ‖ Mat. 6.9 Hallowing Thy Name we abuse and blaspheme it Instead of Duly frequenting Thy Table we turn our Backs upon it or come unworthily to it Instead of rightly attending on any of Thine Ordinances we either so slight them as to absent from them or if we resort to them we are so lukewarm in them that we profit little or nothing under them Instead of * 1 Thess 5.13 Esteeming Thy Ministers very highly for their Works-sake we despise them too much and vilify them too often upon that account These are great and provoking Sins O LORD and who besides Thy patient Self could ever have born so long with us in them But yet I have more and more hainous Sins to confess unto Thee which multitudes amongst us most Blessed GOD commit against Thee For many are guilty of horrid Atheism They do not only say in †Psal 14.1 their Hearts there is no GOD but profess and contend for it and maintain it in their Discourse Notwithstanding they are Baptiz'd into the Faith of Thy SON they doubt of thy Being and dispute against it O Heavenly Father Many are guilty of abominable Idolatry The Glory which is due to Thee alone they superstitiously give unto a meer Creature against the plainest sense and clearest Reason adoring even the Bread which themselves do eat Many are guilty of damnable Heresie and some allow not of Thy DIVINITY O Eternal and most Glorious JESUS But though Thou hast laid down Thy Life as a ‖ Mat. 20.28 Ransom for our Souls they wretchedly deny * 2 Pet. 2.1 the LORD that bought them Many are guilty of hideous Perjury They make light not only of common Swearing but of the Solemn Oaths of GOD upon them They count them such sorry and trifling Obligations as impiously to neglect the necessary Duties to which they are bound by those Sacred Ties And O LORD how lamentable must our case be when in this one miscarriage alone there is malignity enough to make †Jer. 23.10 a Land to mourn Many are guilty of most filthy Pollutions Thou feedest them to the full and they assemble themselves by Troops in the ‖ Jer. 5.7 Harlots Houses Instead of * Gal. 5.24 crucifying the Flesh they †Ephes 4.19 work uncleanness with greediness and Adultery and ‖ 5.3 Fornication which should not once be named amongst Christians are matters of their common and continual Practice How shalt thou * Jer. 5.7 pardon us for this O LORD and what direful effects of thine Anger may we justly expect when for †Eph 5.6 these things sake the wrath of GOD cometh upon the children of Disobedience Many are guilty of high Injustice They oppress the Widow and wrong the Fatherless and instead of living righteously in the World they steal and they kill and addict themselves to Fraud and all manner of violence Many are guilty of Faction in the State Instead of being ‖ Rom. 13.1 subject to the higher Powers which are ordained of GOD and of * 1 Pet. 2.13 submitting themselves to every Ordinance of Man for the LORD's sake they are so †2 Pet. 2.10 presumptuous as to confront Government ‖ Jude 8. despise Dominion and speak evil of Dignities Many are guilty of Schism in the Church Instead * Eph. 4 3. of keeping the Unity of the SPIRIT in the bond of peace of being of one †Act. 4.32 heart and of one Soul of ‖ Rom. 15.6 glorifying GOD with one mind and with one mouth they have sowed Dissentions and have caused Divisions they have invaded the Ministry and seduced thy People drawing them away into divers Sects by dangerous Separations Many are Guilty of Gluttony and Drunkenness Instead of eating and drinking to thy * 1 Cor. 10.31 Glory O GOD they do it continually to their own great shame and to thy dishonour And notwithstanding the many and great Obligations upon them to Sobriety they abuse themselves and the good Creatures Thou vouchsafest them to most brutish Intemperance and Excess And which mightily aggravates all our sins so deadly in themselves they have been acted directly against Knowledg and Conscience We can plead no Ignorance O LORD in excuse of our Enormities For Thy word from Heaven hath taught us plainly and told us aloud that we †2 Cor. 5.10 must all appear before the Judgment Seat of Christ That ‖ Rom. 6.23 the wages of Sin is Death That there shall be * Rom. 2.9 tribulation and anguish upon every Soul of Man that doth evil That except we †Luk. 13.3 repent we shall all perish That the Wicked shall go into ‖ Mat. 25.46 everlasting Punishment But all this and whatever else should have hindred us from sin through our own perverseness hath but heightned our Guilt Nor have we sinned only against strongest Convictions but with greatest Boldness We have boasted of our Lewdness we have bragged of our Baseness and have been ready to defend if not to applaud it Our Immoralities and Irreligion have fac'd the Sun and instead of concealing them we have gloried in them And as thus we have offended the upright and virtuous so the vitious we have encourag'd to do like our selves Nor are our Sins few O LORD that have been thus hainous For they are greatly multiplied as well as scandalous and are not more notorious than innumerable * Jer. 5.9 Shall not GOD visit for these things shall not His Soul be avenged on such a Nation as this Here rest again and by reflecting and ruminating on the Nation 's Sins raise your Sorrow for them as high as you can And to help to increase it use these Petitions LORD make mine Eyes a Fountain of Tears to weep for the Transgressions of this sinful Nation Let mine †Lam. 1.16 20. Eye run down with Water O GOD and let my Bowels be troubled because this People have so grievously rebelled We have ‖ Ps 106.6 sinned with our Fathers we have committed iniquity we have done wickedly for this let mine * Lam. 2.11 19. Eyes flow with Tears and let me pour out my heart like Water before the face of Thee O LORD I have contributed too much to the Sins of this Land which call for Vengeance inable me Good GOD to help to drown that hideous Cry with holy Mourning If Sorrow swells to such a rate as to debilitate or dispirit you then once more
pleasest both them and me from the Strokes thereof by thy Special Providence †Psal 57.1 hiding us under thy Wings O LORD until the Calamities be over-past But if as we deserve Thou justly involvest us in the Common Miseries O mingle our Sufferings with a sense of thy Love and make them all Instruments of our Benefit and Blessedness And whatever shall happen to our Estates or Bodies LORD let our Souls be precious in thy sight and ‖ Mal. 3.17 remember them in the day when Thou makest up thy Jewels And that for His sake who redeem'd them even Thy CHRIST and our JESUS who hath given us assurance that * Joh. 16.24 whatever we ask in His Name we shall receive In His Name therefore and in His Words I humbly conclude my unworthy Supplications Our Father c. As short as this Mourning-Office may seem to be yet if it be recited deliberately and with calling to mind and sadly confessing our particular Offences compriz'd in those general Heads which come most home to our personal Extravagancies we shall find it will take up more time to rehearse it than we are aware But should it with the Intervals of Reading require all the Forenoon yet to fill up the whole Day from the time we rise till Six at night we shall want a farther supply for Devotion As meet provision therefore to carry on the pious Exercise thus far contitinu'd I shall here add another Form of Prayer And lest it should be too much to use it all at once I have divided it into several Collects or Sections that so you may the less abruptly break off where you please and as often as you think fit and then begin again where you left off A PRAYER For the Holy SPIRIT of GOD and the Principal of His Heavenly Graces O Most Merciful GOD and Father I the unworthiest of all thy Children prostrate in thy Fear and sacred Presence from my Heart do magnify Thee for the innumerable Blessings I have received from Thee And most humbly I intreat Thee to bestow such other good things upon me as I still need and can no where obtain but at thy bounteous Hands I. For the HOLY GHOST ABove all vouchsafe me thy HOLY SPIRIT which thou hast freely promised to them that * Luk. 11.13 ask Him And let Him be helpful to me in those several Offices which He came down from Heaven to execute in the Church even in comforting conducting and santifying of my Soul Make Him a Comforting SPIRIT to me That freeing my Mind from afflictive Horrors and disconsolate Heaviness I may †Phil. 4 4. rejoyce in the LORD evermore and live in that divinest Peace of GOD ‖ 4.7 which passeth all understanding Make Him a Conducting SPIRIT to me That dispelling the Darkness and Blindness of my Mind by illuminating me with bright and saving Knowledge He may help to lead me into a competent understanding of all necessary Truths Make Him a Sanctifying SPIRIT to me That Cleansing me from all moral Corruptions and Impurities I may become holy as * 1 Pet. 1.16 Thou art Holy by His infusing precious Graces into my Heart II. For Hatred to Sin LET Him fill me with Hatred and Detestation of Sin With such an Hatred as may not only turn me from it but set me against it and make me a deadly and irreconcilable Enemy to it To which End let Him open mine Eyes to see the malignant Nature of it How it is a Transgression of Thy Law a Contradiction of Thy Mind and an Opposition to Thy Will and so the worst and basest thing in the World as being contrary to Thee the Chiefest Good Let Him convince me also of its direful Effects How besides many Temporal and Spiritual Miseries it subjects me to woful Eternal Calamities which I can neither avoid nor yet abide And let the Consideration of its abominable Vileness and destructive Consequents help to beget in me speedy Repentance where I have committed it and also strongest Antipathies to it and constant and vehement Aversations from it in all presumptuous Instances whatever III. For Faith LET Him indue me with unfeigned Evangelical Faith With such a Faith as may inable me to †Heb. 11.6 believe that GOD is and that He is a Rewarder of them that diligently seek Him and so to believe it as to become my self a most diligent and unwearied Seeker of Him With such a Faith as is a ‖ Gal. 5.2 fruit of the SPIRIT as will shew it self * Jam. 2.18 by my Works as will †1 Joh. 5.4 overcome the World and so throughly ‖ Rom. 5.1 justify me that I may have peace with GOD. Even peace with Him * Eph. 4.13 till we all come in the Unity of the Faith to the sweet and endless injoyment of Him who is the sole †Heb. 12.2 Author and Finisher of it IV. For Hope LET Him work in me a most firm and lively Hope Such an Hope as may not ‖ Rom. 5.5 make me ashamed by suffering me either to presume or despair But may be an * 1 Thess 5 8. Helmet to me in my Spiritual Warfare and an †Heb. 6.19 Anchor of my Soul while I am tossed in the Waves of this tempestuous World And having this Hope in me let me ‖ 1 Joh. 3.3 purify my self even as He is pure who is at once both the Object and End of my Hope the LORD JESUS CHRIST V. For Love to GOD. LET Him inflame my Heart with Love to Thy MAJESTY O my GOD. With such an holy ardent and passionate Love as becomes a Creature to his Sovereign LORD and Maker and a Dutiful Child to his indulgent heavenly Father I acknowledge my self unworthy of so high a Favour But Thy only SON died to purchase this inestimable Grace amongst others for all that need and seek it of Thee None O LORD want it more than I and with humblest Earnestness I seek and crave it O deny me not this one Request whatever else Thou with-holdest from me I am willing to be I am willing to do I am willing to bear or to suffer any thing with Thy help so I may but love Thee Turn me all into Love and indear me greatly to Thy self and I wish no more I neither want nor ask nor care for any thing in this World like that It is not Health nor Wisdom nor Riches nor Honour nor Life it self nor any thing in it or belonging to it that I so importunately beg but the Love of Thy Self O dearest GOD the Love of Thy Self is the Blessing I desire LORD give me but that and I have enough Thou hast said that Thou * Psal 107.9 satisfiest the longing Soul and fillest the hungry Soul with goodness †Ps 71.4 Thou O LORD art the thing that I long for and my Soul Thou seest hungers after Thâ—… O that Thou wouldst fill it with
the 25th of Matthew the Subjects of the Kingdom of Heaven or the Professors of the Gospel are all likened unto Virgins tho' of different Characters and Qualities some of them being wise and some foolish And the * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Virgins or Paranymphs there being but the same with the †〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Children of the Bride-chamber in the ninth Chapter hence it is Evident that all Christians are Children of the Bride-chamber and consequently that all must mourn as well as they who then attended the Bridegroom And tho' they with whom the Bridegroom was never corporally present could not mourn at his Actual parting from them yet they are to do it in their distance from Him that being most true which the Apostle pronounced While we are at home in the Body we are absent from the LORD 2 Cor. 5.6 Enough to afflict us with Sorrows tho' we had nothing else to trouble us to think that we should be so Remote from Him who is so Affectionate and so Dear to us As therefore we would approve our selves to GOD and our Consciences to be wise Virgins true Children of the Bride-chamber or pure Christians we must not fail to mourn There is as much Reason for it as there is for us to Do our Duty as there is for us to perform and fulfill what CHRIST our LORD foretold and injoin'd Secondly It is a Duty most acceptable to GOD. As some Sins have more Malice and Vileness in them than other and so are more contrary and offensive to GOD and therefore they that commit them ‖ Mat. 23.14 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 shall receive the more abundant Judgment or greater Damnation so on the other side some Duties are more worthy in themselves and so to GOD more pleasing than other and Holy Mourning is one of these This the SPIRIT who * 1 Cor. 2.11 knows the things of GOD does fully manifest and give authentic Testimony of in the Sacred Writings For there He informs us 1. That GOD hath a Regard for it 2. That He highly esteems it 3. That He dwells with them that exercise it And 4. That He ranks it amongst the Noblest Perfections of the best Religion All which Particulars taken together must be a clear Manifestation of the great Acceptableness of Holy Mourning 1st GOD hath a Regard for it A broken and contrite Heart O GOD thou wilt not despise Psal 51.17 In the Words there is a Meiosis or a certain Figure whereby they mean a great deal more than they speak As to outward Appearance and the view of the World there is scarce a meaner or poorer thing in it than a Pious Mourner For he is so throughly and truly dejected that all which might make him externally Gay is clouded or eclipsed if not sunk and swallowed up of Sorrow and Darkness But as little and contemptible as he may seem at any time in the Eyes of Men he is never despicable in the sight of GOD. Tho' his Heart be broken and contrite shattered to pieces as it were and ground to Powder by the vehement Anguish of violent Grief yet still that Glorious Being above cannot slight it in the least He expressly declares the contrary that He hath a Regard for it To this Man will I look even to Him that is of a contrite spirit Isai 66.2 The Prophet in the foregoing Verse signifies that the Heighth and Greatness of GOD's MAJESTY is such that Heaven is His Throne and the Earth is His Footstool Now where a Being so transcendently high and great looks upon any one with an Eye of Favour that is infinitely less and lower than it self 't is certain it must have a Regard for that Person Yet the Holy Mourner is that happy Man to whom this Signal Honour is shewn To this Man will I look saith the LORD And 't is well the LORD was pleased to say it for had any but Himself or one of His appointing dared to utter it So vast is the Condescension promised that we might well have question'd the Performance of it But since the GOD of Truth thought fit to speak it who shall doubt of what He declares He having affirmed that He will look to the Mourner He is sure enough of GOD's propitious Aspect Indeed none in the World are out of His view none can hide themselves tho' they would never so fain do it out of His sight Can any hide themselves in secret places that I shall not see them Jer. 23.24 He is All-seeing and of necessity must see every one where-ever they are and what-ever they do But then tho' GOD sees all He looks but to few that is with an Eye of special Regard and in this Number are the truly contrite Nor will it be hard to convince the contrite Man of as much tho' he should be somewhat Sceptical in the Case For suppose that on Every of thy Mourning-Days periodically returning thou shouldst see a bright Angel sent down from Heaven standing by thee with a Book and a Bottle in his holy Hands ready to enter the Number of thy Tears in the one and then to put them up and preserve them in the other Wouldst thou not presently think and conclude that GOD hath a Regard for thee in what thou art doing Yet know and be assured that thy Tears which flow at such solemn Times shall be as certainly numbred and remembred by GOD as if they were entred in a Book or put up in a Bottle by one of His glorious Ministers from above The HOLY GHOST attests as much in King David's Petition and Interrogatory Psal 56.8 Put thou my Tears into thy Bottle are they not noted in thy Book But then what a strange Incentive must this be to Holy Mourning to think that our Tears shall be recorded in Heaven as surely as things are kept in Memory by being registred or most closely and carefully reposited upon Earth When thine Heart melts and thy Tears drop tho' they fall upon the Floor and mingle with the Dust yet none shall be forgotten not one of them shall be lost The GOD who numbreth * Mat. 10.30 the Hairs of thine Head will keep account of the Tears from thine Eyes And for farther Encouragement the only reason why He remembers them is but that He may reward thee for them Which considered who would not Endeavour to pull up the Sluces of Godly Sorrow and even drown themselves if they could in Holy Mourning The least we can resolve on methinks when we ruminate on this is to do on our Mourning-Days as David and His People did 1 Sam. 30.4 weep till we have no more power to weep 2ly GOD highly Esteems our Holy Mourning He affords it not only a common Regard but an extraordinary Respect So He gives us clearly to understand where He tells us expressly by His King and Prophet that the Sacrifices of GOD are a broken spirit Psal 51.17 When the Pangs of holy Grief once
come so thick and grow so strong as to rent the Heart and to wound the Soul and to make as it were breaches in the Spirit of a Man this will be a valuable Temper with GOD a Frame of Mind that He will approve and love that He will really prize and make as great account of as ever He did of the Jewish Sacrifices under the old Mosaic Dispensation And that He had an high Esteem for them we need not question inasmuch as Himself was the Author of them By His order Sacrifices were introduced and set up in the Church and so were Rites of His own Institution The several Kinds of them and their respective Materials the Times when the Places where the Occasions upon which the Ways how the Parties for whom and the Persons by whom they were to be offered were all of His prescribing And when they were duly performed according to His pleasure and divine Appointment He could not but set an huge Estimate upon them But then it is as evident that He hath an equal Esteem for the Spirit that is broken with Holy Mourning because He calls it the Sacrifices of GOD. Not only His Sacrifice making it equivalent to this or that or the other single Sacrifice under the Law but His Sacrifices intimating that in His Esteem it equals many if not all of them at once And I must farther add this great Truth That if legal Sacrifices were so esteemed of GOD the broken Spirit must be much more estimable as being much more excellent For They were only outward and typical Services Symbols Figures and Shells of Religion at best but positive and so temporary things good for a time because they were commanded But the broken Spirit contains in it intrinsic Piety mental Virtue and moral Duty And so the mention'd Sacrifices must be as much short of it as a meer Skeleton is of a Man or as Shadows and Appearances are of most solid and substantial Realities For here the Religious do not bring their Oxen or their Heifers their Calves or their Kids their Sheep or their Lambs to be slain But things that are very much dearer to them I mean their Passions and their Appetites their Affections and their Lusts their selfish Interests and their sensual Delights and all their Pleasures and Practices that are sinful These are checked these are weakened these are wounded conquered and killed by holy Contrition When the Christian mourns these gasp and dye the Tears He sheds are the very Life-bloud of his Corruptions And therefore the broken Spirit must needs set us higher in GOD's Esteem than Holocausts or Hecatombs or the richest Sacrifices at any Altar And there is Reason for it For in them Men sacrificed their Beasts but in this they sacrifice Themselves which recommends them to the best Acceptance And shall not this effectually draW thee to Religious Mourning When thou doest it heartily beest thou never so low in thy Person or thy Circumstances thou shalt be very highly esteemed of GOD. Surely when the Jewish High Priest in his richest Garments did rightly make his choicest Offerings no spiritual Man could be more honourable in his Self or more acceptable in his Function Yet when Aaron array'd with all the pompous Ornaments of the Pontifical Habit stood in the holiest Place upon Earth and there presented the sweetest Incense to the MOST HIGH he could not be more approved or better esteemed than the poorest zealous Christian shall be when with a broken Spirit he pours out his Sighs or mournful Tears unto the same GOD. Nay if we measure Mens acceptance with GOD by the Quality or Goodness of the Oblations they make Him the Christian Mourner in his meanest Rags will be more acceptable than the Jewish Sacrificer in his Stately Robes Perhaps in this World there is not a Man that shines so bright in the Eyes of Heaven as the Christian does in a Mourning Cloud 3ly GOD dwells with Holy Mourners When one that is great and good and wise shall take up his Residence with such as are unspeakably beneath him and unworthy of him this alone sufficiently argues that he is much delighted with their Company and their Converse that what they are and what they do is extreamly pleasing and grateful to Him Let the Rule be applied to the most Great and Good and Wise GOD and it will shew his Acceptance of Holy Mourning for He professeth to dwell with them that exercise it Thus saith the HIGH and LOFTY ONE that inhabiteth Note III. Eternity whose Name is HOLY I dwell in the high and holy Place with him also that is of a contrite and humble Spirit Isai 57.15 And can any amongst us refuse to mourn or refrain from doing it that consider this If thou beest solidly good think with thy self what is there in the whole World comparable to this Where canst thou look for any thing like it or where shalt thou find it To have GOD dwell with us to have the Glorious GOD dwell in us O unspeakable Privilege 'T is much too high for the brightest Cherubin only He is pleased not to think it so But what is it then for sinful Souls in vile and frail and fleshly Bodies Where-ever a King dwells there is a Court and where-ever GOD dwells in the sense we speak it there must be Heaven Yet as mean as thine Heart is or as bad and base as it may have been GOD is ready to descend into it and to abide there if by Holy Mourning it be fitted for Him And should we weep till we wept our Eyes out methinks we should count it a cheap Price wherewith to purchase so rich a Blessing Tho' we plainly see that we need not go so far for it neither for a moderate Grief so much as makes the Spirit contrite will entitle us to it and settle it upon us Enough to amaze any thinking Christian O ponder it well and then speak Can the GOD of Heaven do thee a greater Honour or canst thou ask a greater Favour of Him than to dwell with thee for ever Blessed Blessed and for ever Blessed be His MAJESTY for it 4ly GOD hath ranked Holy Mourning amongst the noblest Perfections of the best Religion The LORD JESUS is GOD Blessed for ever Rom. 9.5 And when in tender Pity to lost Men He assumed their Nature to restore their Happiness and in order to accomplishing that glorious Work was newly entred upon His Mediatorship He publicly preached a most excellent Sermon to a Multitude of Hearers And in that divine and incomparable Discourse amongst other sacred useful Doctrines He recommended eight Beatitudes to them Truths and Duties of so high a Nature and heavenly an Efficacy as will certainly render all sincere Believers and hearty Conscientious Practitioners of them Spiritually first and then Eternally Blessed Now as we find in the Fifth of S. Matthew the Second in order of these Eight Beatitudes is the Holy * Whereas a considerable part of our
credit to Jonah and to be so happily influenc'd by his threatning Preachments is still a Question But for resolving it let us try if we cannot find something material hinted by the HOLY GHOST 2 King 14. For there perhaps we may find a Key of His making which will help to unlock this Difficulty In the latter part of that Chapter we read that Jeroboam the King of Israel recovered Damascus and Hamath and that he restored the Coast of Israel from the entring of Hamath unto the Sea of the Plain according to the word of the LORD GOD of Israel which he spake by the hand of His Servant Jonah the Son of Amittai Now as Damascus was an ancient City built before Abraham's time for his Steward was called Eliezer of Damascus and as it was a most pleasant City so delightful that Mahomet never durst enter into it lest it should tempt him to neglect his Designs so it was a great and most powerful City as being no less than the Metropolis of Syria And such a City as this the Head of a Country and the Royal Seat of a mighty Kingdom being taken by the King of Israel from the King of Syria the King of Nineveh the Confines of whose Empire were not remote from it could not but take special notice of And Jeroboam being animated to the War which was thus successful by the word of the Prophet Jonah who clearly foretold what the Issue would be we need not question but the King of Nineveh understood this too there being nothing more usual than for Kings and States where their Dominions are contiguous or no farther distant to pry into the Intrigues and affairs of each other But then he understanding that there was a Prophet in Palestine who unerringly foretold contingent Events and particularly the Fate of that flourishing City which fell out according to his Prediction when he heard that this very Prophet was come to Nineveh on purpose to denounce Destruction against it which according to his Threatning was to happen suddenly too unless the Inhabitants of it repented he might very well be concern'd as he was and set himself and his People to mourn as he did And the more readily might this be done yet in case Jonah went to Nineveh with any Merchant Caravan Trading into the East from Tyrus then the greatest Empory in that part of the World For Tyrians living upon that Sea where Jonah was thrown over-board and so miraculously preserved and knowing it to be true if any of them reported and affirmed it at Nineveh this might help to beget a more firm belief still of his dreadful Threatning NOTE III. Pag. 44. BEyond the Bounds of this Material World there is a strangely vast and infinite Place if we may so call it An Extension as illimited as GOD Himself and also as eternal as He else it could not be what He proclaims it His Habitation And very properly does He call it Eternity For neither Days nor Months nor Years nor Ages nor any thing of time was ever in it and yet it always did and shall exist And in this immense Capacity or Extension naturally boundless both in measure and Duration and holy too as being made so by Him that fills it the HIGH and LOFTY ONE does dwell There 's the Seat and everlasting Residence of His sublime and most exalted MAJESTY and by his Essence which is Ubiquitary He throughly possesses and every where replenishes that so Stately and expanded Mansion And where does He dwell besides O amazing Condescension in Him and Honour unto us as Himself declares He dwells with the Humble and contrite Spirit So that next to the highest Place He takes up His special Abode in the lowest mind In that Mind most which sinks lowest in holy Mourning NOTE IV. Pag. 80. BUT that he was far from being so appears by one Expression of his in his Laert. li. 10. Epistle to Pythocles Where he says 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Tho a wise man be tortured yet he is blessed And from another clause in his Ib. Epistle to Menaeceus Where he declares most worthily 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That Drinkings and continual Banquets carnal injoyments and the sumptuous Provisions of a well furnisht Table are not the things that make a sweet life but sober Reasoning And by and by he adds 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The greatest good is Wisdom 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And therefore Wisdom is more precious than Philosophy because out of it all Virtues spring Which teach that we cannot live pleasantly without living prudently and well and that we cannot live uprightly without living pleasantly For Virtues are connatural to a pleasant life and from these a pleasant life is inseparable And then from another Passage in the same Epistle where he says Virtutes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 are to be desired for pleasure and not for themselves as Physick is desired for health And says withal that Virtue is the only thing which cannot be separated from pleasure From all which it is evident that when Epicurus founded Happiness in Pleasure he meant that Pleasure which is the fruit of Virtue NOTE V. Pag. 130. WE are not to imagine that Heaven did any thing to restrain or hinder the outragious violences done to those Martyrs Their Eyes were really bor'd out their Legs cut off their Bones broken their Flesh beaten bruised mangled burned c. Not are we to conceive that when these Violences were done to their Bodies the Law or Order of communicating them to their Souls in way of Sensation was interrupted or dissolved For when their Bodies suffered in any capacity by Incisions Contusions Rackings Searings Scourgings Scaldings or the like these must make grievous Impressions on the Nerves and agitating them by furious Tensions or Vellications must transmit the Motions to the common Sensorium and so excite most dolorous Pains in their Souls For the Nerves which are thee great Instrument of Sense derive their Original from the Brain and by innumerable Sprigs or Ramifications being spread and propagated through the Body they terminate in the exterior parts of it So that nothing of violence can be done outwardly to the Body but at the same time it lights upon the Fibres of some of those Nerves whose Extremities are lodged in its Superficies I mean in the Cutis or Skin thereof And if these at any time be fiercely moved tho' at the Ends of them most distant from the Head yet the same motion at the same time is felt at their other Ends which are in the Brain And the Seat of the Soul or the proper place of her special vital Residence being some where there She cannot but be vehemently affected thereby But then we must consider that these Nerves may receive Impressions as well at the Roots of them within the Brain as in any parts of any Branches of them any where dispersed in the Body Yea there is reason why they should be most receptive of impressions there