by the meritorious death and passion of the Lord of life and glory the great and promised Messias thy beloved Son our blessed Saviour Jesus Christ who by suffering death hath both overcome death and satisfied thy justice for us freeing all true believing and penitent sinners from the sting curse and fear of death both temporal and eternal bringing by his glorious Gospel life and glory honour and happiness to light We beseech thee O heavenly Father for his sake who hath tasted death for us all to magnifie thy infinite mercy upon us before we go from hence and be no more seen O be better to us then ever we should be to our selves or we are utterly lost Bestow upon us all those graces and gifts which may both teach and help us to lead an holy life and die an happy death Prevent us graciously and follow us effectually with the motions and operations of thy holy Spirit which may excite and inable us speedily and throughly to mortifie the life and power of every sin in us even while it is called to day lest death and hell prevent us in our delays and presumptions Sanctifie to us all those occasions monitions and warnings by which thy providence presents the thoughts and state of death to us as the truest glass of all earthly glory that we may so lay them to heart as to die dayly to all inordinate love of our selves and of this world which at best is loss and dung in comparison of the excellency of our Lord Jesus Christ in whom thy love to us is better then life it self Thou hast by thy power given us our lives in this vain world by thy providence thou hast preserved them by thy patience thou hast spared them to this day notwithstanding we have with many sins and much unthankefulness provoked thee to our hurt yea by thy holy Word thou hast shewed and offered to us the way and reward of a better life upon our turning to thee with all our hearts from dead works to serve the living God O teach us so to number our days as to apply our hearts to true wisedom to value this pretious moment not to mispend it yea to redeem it because the days past have been evil and upon this moment depends our eternal fate O thou that hast made our moment here though it be sinful not wholly miserable but hast sweetned it with many mercies let not our eternity be miserable and sinful It is one great comfort in our mortality as to this life that we consider our sins shall not be immortal in us O let not sin die with us but before us as a work of choise and grace not of infirmity force and necessity We humbly lay hold on that eternal life which is thy gift through Jesus Christ our Lord. As we every day grow elder so Lord make us every day somewhat better as neerer to our graves so fitter for heaven teach us to live every day as if it were our last that we may never live in any such way wherein we cannot meet death comfortably make us such as thou wouldst have us while we live that we may find thee such as we would have thee when we die that when we come to die we may have nothing else to do but to resign our bodies to thy custody and our souls to thy mercy who having made this life on earth common to the bad and good the just and the unjust hast certainly prepared another state in which shall be infinite difference and everlasting distinction of recompenses to such as fear thee and such as fear thee not O enable us to do our duty and we are sure to receive thy rewards write thy name in our hearts and we need not doubt but our names are written in heaven even in thy Book of Life Sweeten the bitter thoughts of death to us by our faith and hope in the meritorious death the victorious resurrection and glorious ascension of Jesus Christ for our sakes let us find by our holiness and newness of life by our being dead with Christ and living to him that we are passed from death to life That our departure hence may be a joyful passage to a better life which consists in the vision and fruition of thy self O blessed Creator who must needs be better then all things thou hast made and as more necessary so infinitely more useful sweet and comfortable to us O that we may be willing and fitted to leave all to come to thy self that we may with all the blessed Angels and Saints for ever in heaven see love praise admire adore and enjoy thee O holy Father Son and Spirit the only true God To whom be glory and honour life and power thanks and dominion for ever Amen Februarii 17. Anno 1657. Observationes habitae In Dissectione Corporis Illustrissimi Nobilissimi Viri D. ROBERTI RICH coram Medicinae Doctoribus Chirurgis infra subscriptis 1. INventi sunt Pulmones substantiâ duriores quam secundùm naturam mole longè majores quam pro ratione pectoris toti ferè scrophulosi caseosâ materiâ magna ex parte purulentâ referti Superiori parte lobi dextri lacuna reperta est pure plena ad quantitatem cochlearis unius 2. Aqua collecta in sinistra cavitate Thoracis ad fesque librae quantitatem vel circiter 3. Auricula dextra Cordis major erat sinistrâ proportione ferè quintuplici 4. Mesenterium refertum glandulis scrophulosis aliquibus magnitudinem Ovi Gallinacei aequantibus aliis minoribus materiâ quadam sebaceâ plenis cum purulentiae guttis hinc inde sparsis in aliquibus 5. In substantia Panchreatis glandulae peregrinae huic annexus tumor scrophulosus grandis ad hepar usque protensus Orisicium Venae Portae comprimens 6. Vesicula fellis exteriùs albicans flaccida aliquam quantitatem fellis dilutioris continens 7. Hepar colore Albidiori substantiâ debito majori 8. Splen satìs laudabilis nisi quòd hinc inde granulis scrophulosis refertus 9. Inte Musculos Lumbares glandulae duae ingentes scrophuloae à quinta vertebra sinistrae partis una ad Inguen usque se protendebat ex dextra parte altera non adeo longa Fran. Prujean Geor. Bates Tho. Coxe Robertus Lloyd J. Goddard Theophilus Garancieres Edward Arris Chirurgus John Soper Chirurgus I Have judged my publishing of this Funeral-Sermon upon the immature death of the Son the fittest occasion I am ever like to have while I live to present those who can look upon eminent goodness without evil eyes with a short Epitome of the Mothers worth as it was long since in way of Epitaph composed by a person whose ambition is That justice might be done to the dead as well as to the living Vicious minds and manners like dead carkasses are then best when so buried that nothing may appear to posterity of their noysome and contagious fedities But exemplary and meritorious
thoughts of death 1 Cor. 7.31 or using this world as if men used it not being so little so nothing of a true and generous Christians main design Yea not only in pursuance of secular and civil advantages with much warpings from law and equity besides violent expressions of their uncharitable passions beyond what becomes men and women professing godliness and tender of the scandals of Christian Religion But further under pretence of religious zeal and special sanctity Blessed Lord what uncharitable fires what unchristian furies are mens spirits ready to kindle in Churches and States both Christian and reformed Tantaene animis coelestibus irae Can heavenly hearts burn with such Kitchin-fires which must be inflamed by pouring the holy oyl of religion upon them untill they come to such conflagrations as kill and destroy even in Gods holy mountain Isa 65.25 raising such fewds and animosities among Christians as are not to be quenched but by each others bloods yea they burn to the nehtermost hell to mutual Anathemas and damnings to eternity Mortales quum simus immortalia non debent esse odia Have we not forgot that we are mortals who maintain such immortal hatred despites cursings condemnings Do we remember the same condemnation from God under which we all naturally lie or that we have the same Redeemer Jesus Christ who hath purchased us to himself and called us to peace love and good order as children of his heavenly Father and brethren to himself and one another Proximorum odia sunt accerbissima Fratrum quoque gratia rara est The neerer we are of kindred must we have less kindness and the more sharp contentions because of the same Country and Church heretofore I beseech you tell me O you torn and tottered flock of Christians now in Old England Can the world in reason think that we Christians are brethren the sons of one Father going on t of Egypt homeward to him every day of this mortal pilgrimage and yet we are every day falling out by the way making religion it self one of the greatest occasions of our bitterest and bloodiest contentions both with each other and with our selves even the more silly and less subtil sort of plain and possibly not ill meaning Christians these are most what gnawing of bones doting about questions endlesly disputing and doubting even while they are decaying and dying So intent as Souldiers to plunder other mens opinions and to live as it were upon the spoils of the Church of England and the Reformed Religion therein heretofore happily established and professed as if free quarter in professing preaching doubting disputing and denying what ever they list that they much neglect as good husbands the more painful charitable and profitable duties of Gods husbandry planting watering and weeding those principles and plants of religion which bear the graces of repentance mortification newness of life charity humility and good works from being Isaacs and Jacobs plain and peaceable spirited professors are turned Ismaels and Esaus rough handed of a more ferine temper living by their bow and sword their hands against every man that is not of their faction and party and their hearts alienated highly from such as were heretofore their Mother Fathers and Brethren These scorching heats of angry differences among Christians spirits do very much dry up all the dews of grace and sweeter influences of Gods Spirit Few consider how soon the Sun may go down upon their wrath Ephes 4.26 not only that of a natural day which should never be for he that sleeps in uncharitable passions hath the Divel for his bed-fellow that night not only in his bed but in his bosome but that Sun of our natural life may go down before thy distempers are alaied to a Christian composure Many Christians in our later dog days are so agitated and hurried up and down with the heat of the weather 1 Tim. 1.16 and the vexatious gadflies of endless and vain janglings that like cattel in Summer they cannot fall to their food wasting much time and spirits in unprofitable disputes following first this faction next that mode in religion 2 Tim. 3.7 ever learning and never coming to the knowledge of saving and necessary which are practical truths So that like the poor Link-boys in winter-nights at London they so spend their lights in running to and fro after every wind of doctrine other mens fantasies opinions and humors that they are fain to go to their own home and to be in the dark going down to their graves in sorrow neither so chearful nor comfortable as Christians might do Isa 50.11 who less delighted living in those sins and sparks which themselves have kindled From this occasion and the like meditation of death lay to heart how much it concerns and becomes thee to carry great moderation as in all things Phil. 4.5 so chiefly in thy passions to be prudent in all the dispensations of thy endeavours cares fears joys loves hopes desires and griefs as well as of thy anger these streams of thy soul must not be let go too plentifully at the flashes or flood-gates which run to waste lest thou robbest that course which should drive thy mill I mean carry on the grand preparations for death and eternity by a sober exact and holy life in which all passions and affections may have their holy use and a comely part to act It is great pity in that one passion of grief which is the softest and most human to see tears plentifully shed for some temporal losse Mollissima corda Humano generi dare se natura fatetur Quum lacrymas dedit or for the death of some dear friend and yet so little so seldome applied to soften and supple the hard and callous heart of a sinner Men and women too are prone to be prodigal of these precious drops which are as the pearls of a penitent sinners eyes and cheeks whose water is turned into wine even of Angels when they rejoyce to see a sinners penitent sorrows which end in eternal joys Lacrymae poenitentium vinum Angelorum Luke 15.10 when every tear quencheth a fiery dart of the Divel or rinseth the conscience of some remaining filth of sin St. Austin confesseth and deploreth his excessive softness after his conversion in mourning for the death of his dear friend Alipius Flebam Didonem occisam cum animam meam mortuam non flebam as somewhat beyond the gravity and moderation of a Christians sorrow And more he bewaileth those fond tears which before his conversion he wept when he read the fable of Didoes death when at the same time he neither deplored nor considered as he saith the dead estate of his own heart and soul to God The blessed Angels if they did visibly converse with us might justly ask most women and men too as these did Mary at the Sepulchre John 20.13 Ploratur lacrymis amissa pecunia veris. Woman why weepest
he died of that scrophulous humor abounding in him which we call the Struma or Kings evil full of little and great knots or kernels in his lungs and entrails some as big as pullets eggs some larger and adherent to the backbone on both sides his lungs so full of that caseous or cheese-like substance that they were swelled and inflamed to a quantity too big for his brest and breathing so that he died on the suddain presently after he had spoken and removed himself with much seeming strength and earnestness the heart being suddenly suffocated and wasted on one side or Auricle for want of due refreshing and however the lungs began in some folds to be putrified yet neither my self nor any other perceived either while he lived though I spake very neer him any thing offensive in his breath or unsavoury from his pectorals or vitals This was the disease and languor of which this poor Gentleman died and I know by most assured experience it hath befaln such as have been both for unspotted virtue and exquisite handsomeness inferiour to no persons living in their times In a word the means which providence permitted to put an end to this noble Gentlemans days was such as might well deserve the pity of all but not the reproach of any good Christian who being at last thus truly and fully informed will in all respects carry themselves as becometh humanity and Christianity modesty and veracity A more solicitous confutation of any vulgar surmises and false reports were to give them too much reputation credulity not duly informed is venial though applied to calumnies but clearly convinced it becomes venomous and mortal because malicious How miserable a people are we whose civil and religious fewds are such that men are made to live and die to be saved and damned not as the mercy and justice of God wills but as human adherencies or antipathies list to censure No party no passion here sways with me I abhor to flatter or calumniate any man in Court or Country I follow no dictates but those of experience impartiality certainty upon which ground I presume no ingenuous man or woman can envy or deny me to apply even to the now dead body of this noble Gentleman these sweet persumes and honest spices made up of nothing but evident truth comely civility just honour and upright conscience which last office I perform not so much a friend and servant to him as to truth and the God of truth to whose merciful dispose we leave his soul for ever His Corps or bodily remains are brought you see to be deposited with you his kind friends his loving neighbours his honest tenants in reversion and his worthy Country-men to be laid up with the mortal reliques of his excellent Mother and other his noble Ancestors to whom he is gone before his Father or Grandfather by a preproperous fate inverting the usual and by most parents desired methods of mortality I need not tell your ingenuity to my worthy Country-men and you of this place what causes you have more then other men to lay this death to heart and to stand still at this dead Corps as the men of Judah and Israel did that came to the place where Asahel fell down and died as of a person eminently related as to many other 2 Sam. 2.23 so to a principal noble Family in this County the experience of whose piety hospitality charity and love of learning poor and rich have had long experience and some constant living monuments among you in this village besides that to which they have committed their urns and bones their dust and ashes as it were to your safe custody How far you are injured or detrimented by this noble persons death depends much on the piety vertue and honour of their minds and actions who now enjoy or may after succeed to those honours and revenews to which he was Heir apparent which he now neither wants nor envies nor desires How far you are or may be bettered by his death and these endeavours for your good depends much upon your care and conscience to lay to heart those many instances of improving a Funeral which I have told you wherein Gods grace upon your humble prayers and honest endeavours will enable you to live as becomes those that remember dayly they must die and appear before God For which last agony and great appearance the Lord in mercy fit us all for his sake who died for us Jesus Christ the righteous To whom with the Father and holy Spirit be everlasting glory for ever Amen Phil. 1.21 To me to live is Christ and to die is gain Id agamus ut vita sit jucunda morbus non injucundus mors verò jucundissima A PRAYER in order to prepare for DEATH O Lord the everlasting God the only giver and preserver of all life natural spiritual temporal and eternal who hast breathed into these our vile bodies of dust the breath of life even pretious and immortal souls by which we are capable to know to love to live with and enjoy Thee for ever as the only Supream Good who only art an object adequate to the vast capacities and sufficient to satisfie those infinite desires of living happily to eternity which thou hast planted in us Thou hast justly passed upon all mankind for our sinful falling from thee which is the present death of our souls as to an holy and happy life the irrevocable decree of once dying and after that appearing before thy judgement both which will certainly ere long overtake us all Blessed Lord the terrors of death and of judgement of our present mortality and our deserved misery are infinite upon us very fearful we are because very sinful and loth because unfit to die a natural death but we are wholly confounded and even swallowed up with the thoughts and dread of that black Abyssus an eternal death If the death of our bodies by the soules separation be so horrid and grievous to us O what must the death of our souls be which consists in an utter separation from thy love and favour shutting us up in the chains of eternal darkness and under the pains of everlasting burnings We confess how just cause we have to be ashamed to live and yet afraid to die having no hope of the least degree of life or happiness in our death as from our selves where our own consciences have already passed a sentence of death and an expectation of thy just vengeance to destroy us In which sad state of dying and despairing we should have both lived and died if thou hadst not made us who were dead in sins and trespasses to hear thy voice in Jesus Christ that we might live As thou hast been a God of great goodness and long-suffering to us not willing we should die in our sins but repent of them and live so as a most merciful Father thou hast made a new and living way to the throne of thy grace