up and down in white Revel. 3. 4 5. 14. 13. that is as candidates of the resurrection to immortality And this allegory of the Garden of Eden and Paradise was so heartily pursued by the Jews to represent the state of separation that the Essens describe that state by the circumstances and ornaments of a blessed garden {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} a region that is not troubled with clouds or shours or storms or blasts {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} but a place which is perpetually refreshed with delicious breaths This was it which the Heathens did dream concerning the Elysian fields for all the notices {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} concerning the regions of separate souls came into Greece from the Barbarians sayes Diodorus Siculus and Tertullian observes although we call that Paradise which is a place appointed to receive the souls of the Saints and that this is separated from the notices of the world by a wall of fire a portion of the torrid zone which he supposes to be meant by the flaming sword of the Angel placed at the gates of Paradise yet sayes he the Elysian fields have already possessed the faith and opinions of men All comes from the same fountain the doctrine of the old Synagogue confirmed by the words of Christ and the commentaries of the Apostles viz. that after death before the day of judgment there is a Paradise for Gods servants a region of rest of comfort and holy expectations And therefore it is remarkable that these words of the Psalmist Nerapias me in medio dierum meorum Psal. 102. v. 25. Snatch me not away in the midst of my dayes in the Hebrew it is Ne facias me ascendere Make me not to ascend or to goe upwards meaning to the supernatural regions of separate souls who after death are in their beginnings of exaltation For to them that die in the Lord death is a preferment it is a part of their great good fortune for death hath not only lost the sting but it brings a coronet in his hand which shall invest and adorne the heads of Saints till that day comes in which the Crown of righteousness shall be brought forth to give them the investiture of an everlasting Kingdome But that I may make up this proposition usefull and clear I am to adde some things by way of supplement 1. This place of separation was called Paradise by the Jews and by Christ and after Christs ascension by S. Iohn because it signifies a place of pleasure and rest and therefore by the same analogy the word may be still used in all the periods of the world though the circumstances or though the state of things be changed It is generally supposed that this had a proper Name and in the Old Testament was called Abrahams bosome that is the region where Abraham Isaac and Iacob did dwell till the comming of Christ But I suppose my selfe to have great reason to dissent from this common opinion for this word of Abrahams bosome being but once used in both the Testaments and then particularly applied to the person of Lazarus must needs signifie the eminence and priviledge of joy that Lazarus had for all that were in the blessed state of separation were not in Abrahams bosome but only the best and the most excellent persons but they were {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} with Abraham and the analogy of the phrase to the manner of the Jewish feastings where the best guest did lye in the bosome of the Master that is had the best place makes it most reasonable to believe that Abrahams bosome does not signifie the general state of separation even of the blessed but the choicest place in that state a greater degree of blessedness But because he is the father of the faithful therefore to be with Abraham or to sit down with Abraham in the time of the old Testament did signifie the same thing as to be in Paradise but to be in Abrahams bosome signifies a great eminence of place and comfort which is indulged to the most excellent and the most afflicted 2. Although the state of separation may now also and is by S. Iohn called Paradise because the Allegory still holds perfectly as signifying comfort and holy pleasures yet the spirits of good men are not said to be with Abrahams but to be with Christ and as being with Abraham was the specification of the more general word of Paradise in the old Testament so being with Christ is the specification of it in the New So S. Stephen prayed Lord Iesus receive my spirit and S. Paul said I desire to be dissolved and to be with Christ which expression S. Polycarp also used in his Epistle to the Philippians {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} they are in the place that is due to them they are with the Lord that is in the hands in the custody of the Lord Jesus as appears in the words of S. Steven and S. Paul So S. Ierome Scimus Nepotianum nostrum esse cum Christo sanctorum mixtum choris we know that our Nepotian is with Christ mingled in the quires of Saints Upon this account and it is not at all unreasonable the Church hath conjectur'd that the state of separate souls since the glorification of our Lord is much better'd and advanc'd and their comforts greater because as before Christs coming the expectation of the Saints that slept was fixed upon the revelation of the Messias in his first coming so now it is upon his second coming unto judgment and in his glory This improvement of their condition is well intimated by their being said to be under the Altar that is under the protection of Christ under the powers and benefits of his Priesthood by which he makes continuall intercession both for them and us This place some of the old Doctors understood too literally and from hence they believed that the souls of departed saints were under their material Altars which fancy produced that fond decree of the Councel of Eliberis Can. 3. 4. that wax lights should not by day be burnt in coemeteries inquietandi enim spiritus sanctorum non sunt left the spirits of Saints should by the light of the diurnal tapers be disquieted This reason though it be trifling and impertinent yet it declares their opinion that they supposed the souls to be neer their reliques which were placed under the altars But better then this their state is described by S. Iohn in these words therefore they are before the throne of God and serve him night and day in his Temple and he that sits upon the throne shall dwell among them with which general words as being modest bounds to our inquiries enough to tell us it is rarely well but enough also to chastise all curious
though this life be lost yet they shall have another and a better a life in which God shall manifest himself to be their God to all the purposes of benefit and eternal blessings This argument was summed up by St. Peter and the sense of it is thus rendred by St. Clement the Bishop of Rome as himself testifies si Deus est juslus animus est immortalis which is perfectly rendred by the words of my text if in this life only we have hope then are we of all men the most miserable but because this cannot be that God who is just and good should suffer them that heartily serve him to be really and finally miserable and yet in this world they are so very frequently therefore in another world they shall live to receive a full recompence of reward Neither is this so to be understood as if the servants of God were so wholly forsaken of him in this world and so permitted to the malice of evil men or the asperities of fortune that they have not many refreshments and great comforts and the perpetual festivities of a holy Conscience for God my Maker is he that giveth songs in the night said Elihu Iob 35. 10. that is God as a reward giveth a chearful spirit and makes a man to sing with joy when other men are sad with the solemn darkness and with the affrights of conscience and the illusions of the night But God who intends vast portions of felicity to his children does not reckon these little joys into the account of the portion of his elect The good things which they have in this world are not little if we account the joys of religion and the peace of conscience amongst things valuable yet whatsoever it is all of it all the blessings of themselves and of their posterity and of their Relatives for their sakes are cast in for intermedial entertainments but their good and their prepared portion shall be hereafter But for the evil it self which they must suffer and overcome it is such a portion of this life as our B. Saviour had injuries and temptations care and persecutions poverty and labour humility and patience it is well it is very well and who can long for or expect better here when his Lord and Saviour had a state of things so very much worse then the worst of our calamities but bad as it is it is to be chosen rather then a better because it is the high way of the cross it is Iacobs ladder upon which the Saints and the King of the Saints did descend and at last ascend to heaven it self and bad as it is it is the method and the inlet to the best it is a sharp but it is a short step to bliss for it is remarkable in the parable of Dives and Lazarus that the poor man the afflicted Saint died first Dives being permitted to his purple and fine linnen to his delicious fare and which he most of all needed to a space of repentance but in the mean time the poor man was rescued from his sad portion of this life and carried into Abrahams bosome where he who was denied in this world to be feasted even with the portion of dogs was placed in the bosome of the Patriarch that is in the highest room for so it was in their discubitus or lying down to meat the chief guest the most beloved person did lean upon the bosome of the Master of the feast so S. Iohn did lean upon the breast of Jesus and so did Lazarus upon the brest of Abraham or else {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} sinus Abrahae may be rendred the bay of Abraham alluding to the place of rest where ships put in after a tempestuous and dangerous Navigation the storme was quickly over with the poor man and the Angel of God brought the good mans soul to a safe port where he should be disturbed no more and so saith the spirit Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord for they rest from their labours But this brings me to the second great inquiry If here we live upon hopes and that this is a place of hopes but not this only what other place is there where we shall be blessed in our hope where we shall rest from our labour and our fear and have our hopes in perfection that is all the pleasures which can come from the greatest and the most excellent hope Not in this life only so my Text Therefore hereafter as soon as we die as soon as ever the soule goes from the body it is blessed Blessed I say but not perfect it rejoyces in peace and a holy hope here we have hopes mingled with fear there our hope is heightned with joy and confidence it is all the comfort that can be in the expectation of unmeasurable joyes it is only Not fruition not the joyes of a perfect possession but less then that it is every good thing else But that I may make my way plain I must first remove an objection which seems to overthrow this whole affaire S. Paul intends these words of my text as an argument to prove the resurrection we shall rise again with our bodies for if in this life only we had hopes then were we of all men most miserable meaning that unless there be a resurrection there is no good for us anywhere else but if they that dye in the Lord were happy before the resurrection then we were not of all men most miserable though there were to be no resurrection for the godly are presently happy So that one must fail either the resurrection or the intermedial happinesse the proof of one relies upon the destruction of the other and because we can no other wayes be happy therefore there shall be a resurrection To this I answer that if the godly instantly upon their dissolution had the vision beatifical it is very true that they were not most miserable though there be no resurrection of the dead though the body were turned into its original nothing for the joyes of the sight of God would in the soule alone make them infinite recompence for all the sufferings of this world But that which the Saints have after their dissolution being only the comforts of a holy hope the argument remains good for these intermedial hopes being nothing at all but in relation to the resurrection these hopes do not destroy but confirme it rather and if the resurrection were not to be we should neither have any hopes here nor hopes hereafter And therefore the Apostles word is if here only we had hopes that is if our hopes only related to this life but because our hopes only relate to the life to come and even after this life we are still but in the regions of an inlarged hope this life and that interval are both but the same argument to inferre a resurrection for they are the hopes of that state and the joyes of those hopes and
it is the comfort of that joy which makes them blessed who die in the love of God and the faith and obedience of the Lord Jesus And now to the proposition it selfe In the state of separation the souls departed perceive the blessing and comfort of their labours they are alive after death and after death immediately they finde great refreshments Iustorum animae in manu Dei sunt non tanget illos tormentum mortis Wisd. 3. The torments of death shall not touch the souls of the righteous because they are in the hands of God And fifteen hundred years after the death of Moses we finde him talking with our Blessed Lord in his transfiguration upon the Mount Tabor and as Moses was then so are all the Saints immediately after death praesentes apud Dominum they are present with the Lord and to be so is not a state of death and yet of this it is that S. Paul affirms it to be much better then to be alive And this was the undoubted sentence of the Jews before Christ and since and therefore our Blessed Saviour told the converted thief that he should that day be with him in Paradise Now without peradventure he spake so as he was to be understood meaning by Paradise that which the Schools and Pulpits of the Rabbins did usually speak of it By Paradise till the time of Esdras it is certain the Jews only meant that Blessed Garden in which God once placed Adam and Eve but in the time of Esdras and so downward when they spake distinctly of things to happen after this life and began to signifie their new discoveries and modern Philosophy by Names they called the state of souls expecting the resurrection of their bodies by the name of {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} the garden of Eden Hence came that forme of comprecation and blessing to the soul of an Israelite Sit anima ejus in horto Eden Let his soul be in the garden of Eden and in their solemn prayers at the time of their death they were wont to say let his soule rest and let his sleep be in peace untill the Comforter shall come open the gates of Paradise unto him expresly distinguishing Paradise from the state of the Resurrection And so it is evident in the entercourse on the Crosse between Christ and the converted thief That day both were to be in Paradise but Christ himself was not then ascended into heaven and therefore Paradise was no part of that region where Christ now and hereafter the Saints shall reign in glory For {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} did by use and custome signifie any place of beauty and pleasure So the LXX read Eccles. 2. 5. I made me gardens and orchards I made me a Paradise so it is in the Greek and Cicero having found this strange word in Zenophon renders it by agrum conseptum ac diligentèr consitum a field well hedg'd and set with flowers and fruits Vivarium Gellius renders it a place to keep birds and beasts alive for pleasure Pollux sayes this word was Persian by its original yet because by traduction it became Hebrew we may best learn the meaning of it from the Jews who used it most often and whose sense we better understand Their meaning therefore was this that as Paradise or the Garden of Eden was a place of great beauty pleasure and tranquillity so the state of separate souls was a state of peace and excellent delights So Philo allegorically does expound Paradise {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} For the trees that grow in Paradise are not like ours but they bring forth knowledge and life and immortality It is therefore more then probable that when the converted thief heard our Blessed Saviour speak of Paradise or Gan Eden he who was a Jew and heard that on that day he should be there understood the meaning to be that he should be there where all the good Jews did believe the souls of Abraham Isaac and Iacob to be placed As if Christ had said Though you only ask to be remembred when I come into my Kingdome not only that shall be performed in time but even to day thou shalt have great refreshment and this the Hellenist Jews called {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} the rest of Paradise and {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} the comfort of Paradise the word being also warranted from that concerning Lazarus {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} He is comforted But this we learn more perfectly from the raptures of S. Paul He knew a man meaning himself rapt up into the third heaven And I knew such a man how that he was caught up into Paradise 2 Cor. 2. 3. The raptures visions were distinct for S. Paul being a Jew and speaking after the manner of his Nation makes Paradise a distinct thing from the third Heaven For the Jews deny any orbes to be in Heaven but they make three regions only the one of clouds the second of starrs and the third of Angels To this third or supreme Heaven was S. Paul wrapt but he was also born to Paradise to another place distinct and separate by time and station For by Paradise his Countreymen never understood the Third Heaven but there also it was that he heard {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} unspeakable words great glorifications of God huge excellencies such which he might not or could not utter here below The effect of these considerations is this that although the Saints are not yet admitted to the blessings consequent to a happy resurrection yet they have the intermedial entertainments of a present and a great joy To this purpose are those words to be understood To him that overcomes will I give to eate of the tree of life which is in the midst of the Paradise of God Revel. 2. 7. that is if I may have leave to expound these words to mean what the Jews did about that time understand by such words {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} the Tree of life does signifie the principle of peace and holiness of wisdome and comforts for ever Philo expounding it calls it {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} The worship of God the greatest of all vertues by which the soul is made to live for ever as if by eating of this tree of life in the Paradise of God they did mean that they who die well shall immediately be feasted with the deliciousness of a holy Conscience which the spirit of God expresses by saying They shall walke up and down in white garments and their works shall follow them their tree of life shall germinate they shall then feel the comforts of having done good works a sweet remembrance and a holy peace shall caresse and feast them and there they shall walk
some better thing for us that without us they should not be made perfect it must also conclude of all alike that they who died since Christ must stay till the last day that they and we and all may be made perfect together And this very thing was told to the spirits of the Martyrs who under the Altar cried How long O Lord c. Rev. 6. 10. that they should rest yet for a little season untill their fellow servants also shall be fulfilled Upon this account it is that the day of judgment is a day of recompence So said our Blessed Lord himself Thou shalt be recompensed at the resurrection of the just Luke 14. 14. and this is the day in which all things shall be restored for the Heavens must receive Jesus till the time of restitution of all things Acts 3. 7. and till then the reward is said to be laid up So S. Paul Henceforth is laid up for me a crown of righteousness which the righteous Iudge shall give me in that day and that you may know he means the resurrection and the day of judgment he addes and not to me only but to all them that love his coming 2 Tim. 4. 8. of whom it is certain many shall be alive at that day and therefore cannot before that day receive the crown of righteousness and then also and not till then shall be his appearing but till then it is a depositum The summe is this In the world we walk and live by faith In the state of separation we live by hope and in the resurrection we shall live by an eternal charity Here we see God as in a glass darkly In the separation we shall behold him but it is afar off and after the resurrection we shall see him face to face in the everlasting comprehensions of an intuitive beatitude In this life we are warriors In the separation we are conquerors but we shall not triumph till after the resurrection And in proportion to this is also the state of Devils and damned spirits Art thou come to torment us before the time said the Devils to our B. Saviour there is for them also an appointed time and when that is we learn from S. Iud. 6. They are reserved in chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day Well therefore did S. Iames affirme That the Devils believe and tremble and so do the damned souls with an insupportable amazement fearing the revelation of that day They know that day will come and they know they shall finde an intolerable sentence on that day and they fear infinitely and are in amazement and confusion feeling the worme of conscience and are in the state of Devils who fear God and hate him they tremble but they love him not and yet they die because they would not love him because they would not with all their powers and strengths keep his Commandments This doctrine though of late it hath been laid aside upon the interest of the Church of Rome and for compliance with some other Schools yet was it universally the doctrine of the Primitive Church as appears out of Iustin Martyr who in his dialogues with Tryphon reckons this amongst the {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} errors of some men who say there shall be no resurrection of the dead but that as soon as good men are dead {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} their souls are taken up immediately into heaven and the writer of the questions ad Orthodoxos asks qu. 76. q 60. q. 75. whether before the resurrection there shall be a reward of works because to the thief Paradise was promised that day He answers it was fit the thief should goe to Paradise and there perceive what things should be given to the works of faith but there he is kept {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} untill the day of resurrection and reward But in Paradise the soul hath an intellectual perception both of her self and of those things which were under her Concerning which I shall not need to heap up testimonies this only It is the doctrine of the Greek Church unto this day and was the opinion of the greatest part of the Antient Church both Latine and Greek and by degrees was in the West eaten out by the doctrine of Purgatory and invocation of Saints and rejected a little above two hundred years agoe in the Councel of Florence and since that time it hath been more generally taught that the souls of good men enjoy the beatific vision before the resurrection even presently upon the dissolution According to which new opinion it will be impossible to understand the meaning of my text and of diverse other places of Scripture which I have now alledged and explicated or at all to perceive the Oeconomy and dispensation of the day of judgment or how it can be a day of discerning or how the reapers the Angels shall bind up the wicked in bundles and throw them into the unquenchable fire or yet how it can be useful or necessary or prudent for Christ to give a solemn sentence upon all the world or how it can be that that day should be so formidable and full of terrors when nothing can affright those that have long enjoyed the beatific presence of God and no thunders or earthquakes can affright them who have upon them the biggest evil in the world I mean the damned who according to this opinion have been in hell for many ages and it can mean nothing but to them that are alive and then it is but a particular not an universal judgment and after all it can pretend to no piety to no Scripture to no reason and only can serve the ends of the Church of Rome who can no way better be confuted in their invocation of Saints then by this truth that the Saints do not yet enjoy the beatific vision and though they are in a state of ease and comfort yet are they not in a state of power and glory and kingdome till the day of judgment This also perfectly does overthrow the doctrine of Purgatory For as the saints departed are not perfect and therefore certainly not to be invocated not to be made our Patrons and advocates so neither are they in such a condition as to be in torment and it is impossible that any wise man should believe that the souls of good men after death should endure the sharp pains of hell and yet at the same time believe those words of Scripture Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord from henceforth yea saith the spirit that they may rest from their labours and their works doe follow them Rev. 24. 13. If they can rest in beds of fire and sing hymns of glory in the torments of the damned if their labours are done when their pains are almost infinite then these words of the spirit of God and
from that trouble who had so often rescued them from hunger He was of a meek and gentle spirit but not too soft he knew how to do good and how to put by an injury but I have heard it told by them that knew his life that being by the unavoidable trouble of a great estate ingag'd in great suits at law he was never Plaintiffe but always upon the defensive part and that he had reason on his side and justice for him I need alledge no other testimony but that the sentence of his Judges so declared it But that in which I propound this good man most imitable was in his religion for he was a great lover of the Church a constant attender to the Sermons of the Church a diligent hearer of the prayers of the Church and and an obedient son to perform the commands of the Church He was diligent in his times and circumstances of devotion he would often be at Church so early that he was seen to walk long in the Churhyard before prayers being as ready to confess his sins at the beginning as to receive the blessing at the end of prayers Indeed he was so great a lover of Sermons that though he knew how to value that which was the best yet he was patient of that which was not so and if he could not learn any thing to improve his faith yet he would finde something to exercise his patience and something for charity yet this his great love of Sermons could not tempt him to a willingness of neglecting the prayers of the Church of which he was a great lover to his dying day Oves meae exaudiunt vocem meam says Christ my sheep hear my voice and so the Church says my sheep hear my voice they love my words they pray in my forms they observe my orders they delight in my offices they revere my Ministers and obey my constitutions and so did he loving to have his soul recommended to God and his needs represented and his sins confessed and his pardon implored in the words of his Mother in the voice and accent of her that nurs'd him up to a spiritual life to be a man in Christ Jesus He was indeed a great lover and had a great regard for Gods Ministers ever remembring the words of God keep my rest and reverence my Priests he honoured the calling in all but he loved and revered the persons of such who were conscientious keepers of their depositum that trust which was committed to them such which did not for interest quit their conscience and did not to preserve some parts of their revenue quit some portions of their religion He knew that what was true in 1639. was also true in 1644. and so to 57. and shall continue true to eternal ages and they that change their perswasions by force or interest did neither believe well nor ill upon competent and just grounds they are not just though they happen on the right side Hope of gain did by chance teach them well and fear of loss abuses them directly He pitied the persecuted and never would take part with persecutors he prayed for his Prince and serv'd him in what he could he loved God and lov'd the Church he was a lover of his Countries liberties and yet an observer of the laws of his King Thus he behaved himself to all his superior relatives to his equals and descendants he was also just and kinde and loving He was an excellent friend laying out his own interest to serve theirs sparing not himself that he might serve them as knowing society to be the advantage of mans nature and friendship the ornament of society and usefulness the ornament of friendship and in this he was known to be very worthy He was tender and carefull of his children and so provident and wife so loving and obliging to his whole family that he justly had that love and regard that duty and observance from them which his kindness and his care had merited He was a provident and carefull conductor of his estate but farre from covetousness as appeared toward the evening of his life in which that vice does usually prevail amongst old men who are more greedy when they have least need and and load their sumpters so much the more by how much neerer they are to their journeys end but he made a demonstration of the contrary for he washed his hands and heart of the world gave up his estate long before his death or sickness to be managed by his only son whom he left since but then first made and saw him his heir he emptied his hands of secular imployment medled not with money but for the uses of the poor for piety for justice and religion And now having devested himself of all objections and in his conversation with the world quitting his affections to it he wholly gave himself to religion and devotion He waken'd early and would presently be entertained with reading when he rose still he would be read to and hear some of the Psalms of David and excepting only what time he took for the necessities of his life and health all the rest he gave to prayer reading and meditation save only that he did not neglect or rudely entertain the visits and kinde offices of his neighbours But in this great vacation from the world he espied his advantages he knew well according to that saying of the Emperor Charles 5. oportet inter vitae negotia diem mortis spatium aliquod intercedere there ought to be a valley between two such mountains the businesses of our life and the troubles of our death and he stayed not till the noise of the bridegrooms coming did awaken and affright him but by daily prayers twice a day constantly with his family besides the piety and devotion of his own retirements by a monethly communion by weekly Sermons and by the religion of every day he stood in precincts ready with oyle in his lamp watching till his Lord should call And indeed when he was hearing what God did speak to him of duty he also received his summons to give his account For he was so pertinacious an attendant to Gods holy word and the services of the Church that though he found himself sick he would not off but stay till the solemnity was done but it pleased God at Church to give him his first arrest and since that time I have often visited him and found him alwayes doing his work with the greatest evennes and indifferency of spirit as to the event of life and death that I have observed in any He was not unwilling to live but if he should he resolved to spend his life wholly in the service of God but yet neither was he unwilling to die because he then knew he should weep no more and he should sin no more He was very confident but yet with great humility and great modesty of the pardon of his sins he had indeed lived
{non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} sayes Aristotle But the soul only comes from abroad from a Divine principle for so saith the Scripture God breathed into Adam the spirit of life and that which in operation does not communicate with the body shall have no part in its corruption Thus far they were right but when they descended to particulars they fell into error That the rewards of vertue were to be hereafter that they were sure of that the soul was to survive the calamities of this world and the death of the body that they were sure of and upon this account they did bravely and vertuously and yet they that thought best amongst them believed that the souls departed should be reinvested with other bodies according to the dispositions and capacities of this life Thus Orpheus who sang well should transmigrate into a Swan and the soul of Thamyris who had as good a voice as he should wander till it were confined to the body of a Nightingal Ajax to a Lion Agamemnon to an Eagle Tyrant princes into wolvs and Hawks the lascivious into Asses and Goats the Drunkards into Swine the Crafty Statesmen into bees and pismires and Thersites to an Ape This fancy of theirs prevailed much amongst the common people and the uninstructed amongst the Jews for when Christ appeared so glorious in miracle Herod presently fancied him to be the soul of Iohn the Baptist in another body and the common people said he was Elias or Ieremias or one of the old Prophets And true it is that although God was pleased in all times to communicate to mankind notices of the other world sufficient to encourage vertues and to contest against the rencontres of the world yet he was ever sparing in telling the secrets of it and when St. Paul had his rapture into Heaven he saw fine things and heard strange words but they were {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} words that he could not speak and secrets that he could not understand and secrets that he could not communicate For as a man staring upon the broad eye of the Sun at his noon of Solstice feels his heat and dwells in light and loses the sight of his eyes and perceives nothing distinctly but the Organ is confounded and the faculty amazed with too big a beauty So was S. Paul in his extasy he saw that he could see nothing to be told below and he perceived the glories were too big for flesh and blood and that the beauties of separate souls were not to be understood by the soul in Conjunction and therefore after all the fine things that he saw we only know what we knew before viz. that the soul can live when the body is dead that it can subsist without the body that there are very great glories reserved for them that serve God that they who die in Christ shall live with him that the body is a prison and the soul is in fetters while we are alive and that when the body dies the soul springs and leaps from her prison and enters into the first liberty of the sons of God Now much of this did rely upon the same argument upon which the wise Gentiles of old concluded the immortality of the soul even because we are here very miserable and very poor we are sick and we are afflicted we do well and are disgraced we speak well and we are derided we tell truths and few believe us but the proud are exalted and the wicked are delivered and evil men reign over us and the covetous snatch our little bundles of money from us and the Fiscus gathers our rents and every where the wisest and the best men are oppressed but therefore because it is thus and thus it is not well we hope for some great good thing hereafter For if in this life only we had hope then we Christians all we to whom persecution is allotted for our portion we who must be patient under the Crosse and receive injuries and say nothing but prayers we certainly were of all men the most miserable Well then in this life we see plainly that our portion is not here we have hopes but not here only we shall goe into another place where we shall have more hopes our faith shall have more evidence it shall be of things seen afar off and our hopes shall be of more certainty and perspicuity and next to possession we shall have very much good and be very sure of much more Here then are three propositions to be considered 1. The Servants of God in this world are very miserable were it not for their hopes of what is to come hereafter 2. Though this be a place of hopes yet we have not our hopes only here If in this life only we had hopes saith the Apostle meaning that in another life also we have hopes not only metonymically taking hopes for the things we hope for but properly and for the acts objects and causes of hope In the state of separation the godly shall have the vast joyes of a certain intuitive hope according to their several proportions and capacities 3. The consummation and perfection of their felicity when all their miseries shall be changed into glories is in the world to come after the resurrection of the dead which is the main thing which S. Paul here intends 1. The servants of God in this life are calamitous and afflicted they must live under the Crosse He that will be my Disciple let him deny himself and take up his Cross and follow me said our Glorious Lord and Master And we see this Prophetic precept for it is both a Prophecy and a Commandment and therefore shall be obeyed whether we will or no but I say we see it verified by the experience of every day For here the violent oppress the meek and they that are charitable shall receive injuries The Apostles who preach'd Christ crucified were themselves persecuted and put to violent deaths and Christianity it selfe for three hundred years was the publick hatred and yet then it was that men loved God best and suffered more for him then they did most good and least of evill In this world men thrive by villany and lying and deceiving is accounted just and to be rich is to be wise and tyranny is honourable and though little thefts and petty mischiefs are interrupted by the laws yet if a mischief become publick and great acted by Princes and effected by armies and robberies be done by whole fleets it is vertue and it is glory it fills the mouths of fools that wonder and imployes the pens of witty men that eat the bread of flattery How many thousand bottles of tears and how many millions of sighs does God every day record while the oppressed and the poor pray unto him worship him speak great things of his holy Name study to please him beg for helps that they may become gracious in his eyes and are so and yet never
sing in all their life but when they sing Gods praises out of duty with a sad heart and a hopefull spirit living only upon the future weary of to day and sustain'd only by the hope of to morrows event and after all their eyes are dim with weeping and looking upon distances as knowing they shall never be happy till the new Heavens and the new Eearth appear But I need not instance in the miserabili in them that dwell in dungeons and lay their head in places of trouble and disease take those servants of God who have greatest plenty who are incircled with blessings whom this world calls prosperous and see if they have not fightings within and crosses without contradiction of accidents and perpetuity of temptations the Devil assaulting them and their own weakness betraying them fears incompassing them round about lest they lose the favour of God and shame sitting heavily upon them when they remember how often they talk foolishly and lose their duty and dishonour their greatest relations and walk unworthy of those glories which they would fain obtain and all this is besides the unavoidable accâ—dents of mortality sickly bodies troublesome times changes of Government loss of interests unquiet and peevish accidents round about them so that when they consider to what they are primarily obliged that they must in some instances deny their appetite in others they must quit their relations in all they must deny themselves when their Natural or Secular danger tempts to sin or danger and that for the support of their wills and the strengthening their resolutions against the arguments and sollicitation of passions they have nothing but the promises of another world they will easily see that all the splendour of their condition which fools admire and wise men use temperately and handle with caution as they trie the edge of a rasor is so far from making them recompence for the sufferings of this world that the reserves and expectations of the next is that conjugation of aids by which only they can well and wisely bear the calamities of their present plenty But if we look round about us and see how many righteous causes are oppressed how many good men are reproached how religion is persecuted upon what strange principles the greatest princes of the world transact their greatest affairs how easily they make wars and how suddainly they break leagues and at what expence and vast pensions they corrupt each others officers and how the greatest part of mankind watches to devour one another and they that are devoured are commonly the best the poor and the harmless the gentle and uncrasty the simple and religious and then how many wayes all good men are exposed to danger and that our scene of duty lies as much in passive graces as in active it must be confessed that this is a place of wasps and insects of Vipers and Dragons of Tigres and Bears but the sheep are eaten by men or devoured by Wolves and Foxes or die of the rot and when they do not yet every year they redeem their lives by giving their fleece and their milk and must die when their death will pay the charges of the knife Now from this I say it was that the very Heathen Plutarch and Cicero Pythagoras and Hierocles Plato and many others did argue and conclude that there must be a day of recompences to come hereafter which would set all right again And from hence also our B. Saviour himself did convince the Sadduces in their fond and pertinacious denying of the resurrection For that is the meaning of that argument which our B. Lord did choose as being clearly and infallibly the aptest of any in the old Testament to prove the resurrection and though the deduction is not at first so plain and evident yet upon neerer intuition the interpretation is easie and the argument excellent and proper For it is observed by the learned among the Jews that when God is by way of particular relation and especial benediction appropriated to any one it is intended that God is to him a Rewarder and Benefactor {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} for that is the first thing and the last that every man believes and feels of God and therefore St. Paul summes up the Gentiles Creed in this compendium He that commeth to God must believe that God is and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him Heb. 11. 6. And as it is in the indefinite expression so it is in the limited as it is in the absolute so also in the Relative God is the rewarder and to be their God is to be their rewarder to be their Benefactor and their Gracious Lord Ego ero Deus vester I will be your God that is I will do you good sayes Aben Esra and Philo {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} The Everlasting God that is as if he had said one that will do you good not sometimes some and sometimes none at all but frequently and for ever And this we finde also observed by St. Paul Wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God Heb. 11. 16. and that by which the Relative appellative is verified is the consequent benefit He is called their God for he hath provided for them a city Upon this account the argument of our B. Saviour is this God is the God of Abraham Isaac and Iacob that is the gracious God the Benesactor the Rewarder and therefore Abraham is not dead but is fallen asleep and he shall be restored in the resurrection to receive those blessings and rewards by the title of which God was called the God of Abraham For in this world Abraham had not that harvest of blessings which is consigned by that glorious appellative he was an exile from his Country he stood far off from the possession of his hopes he lived an ambulatory life he spent most of his dayes without an heir he had a constant piety and at the latter end of his life one great blessing was given him and because that was allayed by the anger of his wife and the expulsion of his handmaid and the ejection of Ishmael and the danger of the lad and his great calamity about the matter of Isaac's sacrifice and all his faith and patience and piety was rewarded with nothing but promises of things a great way off and before the possession of them he went out of this world it is undeniably certain that God who after the departure of the Patriarchs did still love to be called Their God did intend to signifie that they should be restored to a state of life and a capacity of those greatest blessings which were the foundation of that title and that relation God is not the God of the dead but of the living but God is the God of Abraham and the other Patriarchs therefore they are not dead dead to this world but alive to God that is