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A36854 A sermon preached in the metropolitical Church of Canterbury, October 17, MDCLXXII, at the funeral of the Very Reverend Thomas Turner, D.D., dean of the same church by Peter du Moulin ... Du Moulin, Peter, 1601-1684. 1672 (1672) Wing D2567; ESTC R10909 12,567 32

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A SERMON Preached in the Metropolitical Church OF CANTERBURY October 17. MDCLXXII AT THE FUNERAL Of the very Reverend THOMAS TURNER D.D. Dean of the same Church By Peter du Moulin D.D. Canon there and One of His Majesties Chaplains LONDON Printed for Henry Brome at the Gun in S. 〈◊〉 Church-Yard near the West End 1672. PHIL. 1.21 For to me to live is Christ and to die is gain THE Gospel is the onely Doctrine of true Wisdom and therefore the onely direction to true Happiness Thereby the Christian learneth to walk before his God unto all pleasing and charitably and uprightly with his Neighbours to instruct his ignorance and correct his perversness to stand fast erected and contented in the several turns of this World to live well and to die well which is all That sacred Doctrine is then most effectual to those great ends when it comes seconded by example and attested by experience Give me lessons like my text and the two before where the Teacher teacheth himself and sets forth his doctrine by his practice The good Apostle was in bonds in imminent peril of death And besides the persecution from Pagans he was maligned by false brethren who preached Christ out of contention not sincerely supposing to adde affliction to his bonds In that double trial see how the holy champion puts on the breastplate of righteousness and the helmet of salvation and takes in one hand the sword of the Spirit in the other the buckler of faith Vers 19. I know saith he that this shall turn to my salvation through your prayer and the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ According to my earnest expectation and my hope that in nothing I shall be ashamed but that with all boldness as alwayes so now also Christ shall be magnified in my body whether it be by life or by death For to me to live is Christ and to die is gain or to make it more English Either way or rather both the ways Christ is a gain unto me both to live and to die Yet he had declared before and so he doth after that he held it a far greater gain for him to die for Christ and would rather glorify him by his death than life This was also the godly mind of our dear and highly honoured Dean in his last sickness especially So deep was the gaining of Christ in his pious soul that he could be sensible of no comfort but through death that he might gain Christ The mention of recovery did afflict him yea offend him I fear nothing so much would he say as to recover I long to be dissolved and to be with Christ That sentence was continually in his mouth That resolution was stedfastly fixt in his mind Did any speak to him of life and health and the comfort of his wife and children Away would he answer I have enjoyed all these long enough Christ I would have O when shall I be dissolved and be with Christ Much in the same stile as David As the hart panteth after the water-brooks Psal 42.1 so panteth my soul after thee O God My soul thirsteth for God for the living God When shall I come and appear before God One may tell me that I press the practice of my text before the doctrine But I will say for my self that in this text the practice is the leader of the doctrine Vnto me to live is Christ and to die is gain And to shew how Christ was a gain unto St. Paul and to those that are his followers as he also was of Christ it is the life of the text Yet because the doctrine is the pattern of the practice this is the kernel of the doctrine of the text and the order to be kept in the exposition Christ being sent unto men to be a gain unto them it is presupposed thereby that they are at a loss without him Mans natural losses are the deprivation of Gods knowledge in his understanding and of Gods righteousness in his will Whence follow heavy judgments upon him in his life and eternal woe after his death To help him in this sad condition The Son of God hath brought from the bosom of his Father unto mankind that heavenly doctrine of glory to God on high and on earth peace good will towards men Which being embraced with obedience of faith will prove such a gain unto him that those spiritual losses shall be repaired his temporal wants shall be supplied his afflictions shall be removed or so sanctified that they will prove lucrative unto him And Death that proper and dismal stipend of sin will prove unto him the greatest gain of all for instead of tumbling him down into hell it will powre him into the bosom of his Father which is in heaven that bottomless depth of goodness and glory Of which goodness and glory the summary is to be fully conformed in mans measure unto Christ his soveraine good and to be joined with him for ever To resume these consider a little what a wretched thing a man is that hath not learned Christ As for his understanding he is plunged in deep ignorance knowing neither God nor himself nor his danger nor his remedy Much like one who being fallen from a high place is so stunned with the fall that he knoweth not that he is fallen Carnal men are much like moles that dig under ground with great industry but are blind in the sunshine So naturally ignorant in the things of God that the wisest of this world the Philosophers were divided into more then two hundred opinions about the soveraine good And that the ingenious nations the Egyptians and Grecians were the most monstrous of all in their religions The Egyptians worshipping oxen and crocodiles onions and leeks The Grecians imagining in heaven feasts and combats and adulteries among their Gods And even in our days corrupt men have so intailed ignorance upon religion that we are taught by Popery that faith consisteth in ignorance which is a vertue easily attained Well to heal mens minds of ignorance in the things of God God hath sent his Son into the world 2 Tim. 1. who hath brought life and immortality to light by the Gospel Here is a gain indeed Mat. 13.46 Here is that pearl of great price which that a man may have he must sell all that he hath and buy it Prov. 3. Here is that wisedom the merchandise whereof is better than the merchandise of silver and the gain thereof then fine gold She is more pretious then rubies and all the things thou canst desire are not to be compared unto her The excellency of that gain is then made most manifest when from the illuminating of our understanding it passeth to the regulating of our affections and the sanctifying of our hearts Christ enabling our spirits freely to join with his Spirit to subdue all our inward rebellions and bringing them captives under the throne of Christ say unto him Lord rule