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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
truth_n	scripture_n	speak_v	word_n	9,140	5	4.5911	4	true

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A67173	The mourners memorial in two sermons on the death of the truly pious Mris. Susanna Soame, late wife of Bartholomew Soame of Thurlow, Esq., who deceased Febru. 14, 1691/2 : with some account of her death / by Timothy Wright, Robert Fleming.	Wright, Timothy.; Fleming, Robert, 1660?-1716.	1695 (1695)	Wing W3712; ESTC R25216	54,544	137

most serious meditation on this sorrowful occasion To them who by patient continuance in well-doing c. A Scripture that was eminently Exemplified in her Life and is now more fully accomplished and made good to her in her death and upon both accounts I hope so much the more adapted for our present instruction in Conjunction with that awakening and teaching Providence which gave the occasion to this Discourse upon it Which is designed both for an instructive lesson to the living and a solemn Memorial of the dead and therefore I shall endeavour by the Divine assistance to cast it into such a Method and form as may be in some measure accommodate to both parts of that design but to the latter in subserviency to the former as that which is principally to be regarded in such sacred discourses In the Words we have two things more generally offered to our serious consideration 1. The descriptive Character of the Heirs of future blessedness they are such who by patient continuance in well doing seek for Glory and Honour and Immortality 2. The final Happiness unto which they shall at last be advanced by the gracious designation and appointment of their Heavenly Father And this is briefly sum'd up in those two comprehensive words Eternal life which indeed are both too big for our thoughts in this dark imperfect state and are only throughly understood where what is signified by them is fully enjoyed The Character of the Persons here spoken of is full extensive the felicity that awaits them at the end of their course is great and glorious and the Connection that is between them is firm and certain resulting from that divine 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is spoken of in the preceding part of the Context that righteous Judgment of God whereby he makes a true Estimate of Persons and actions according to the proper Rules of Judgment and will therefore render to every one according to his deeds And so with little variation we may summe up the sense of the Words in this Doctrinal Conclusion viz. Doct. That all they who by patient continuance in well-doing seek for Glory and Honour and Immortality shall at last obtain the full possession of what they seek after in Eternal life This is a Conclusion of that indubitable certainty that the Truth of it cannot be call'd in question without denying at once the divine veracity and remunerative justice for as much as the written word of God according to which his final distribution of Eternal Rewards and punishments shall be made at the last day hath expresly declared that it shall be thus And that in many other places of Scripture as well as in the Text And therefore looking upon it as altogether needless to insist upon the direct proof or Confirmation of this Truth amongst those that do acknowledge the divine Authority of the Holy Scriptures and believe them to be the Word of God All that I shall do further in speaking to it shall be first to explain and then to apply it to our selves on this sorrowful occasion In the Explication there are three things to be distinctly considered and spoken to viz. 1. The Extensive import of the Character by which the Heirs of future blessedness are here described 2. The nature and Excellency of that final happiness which doth by the divine Ordination and appointment belong to them as their everlasting inheritance 3. What kind of connection there is between the one and the other i. e. between the qualifications imported in this Character and that felicity to which all that bear it shall at last be advanced 1. That which doth most fitly come under our consideration in the first place is the extensive import of their Excellent Character who are here spoken of And as in the general we see they are described by the Spiritual and Heavenly Tendency and scope of their desires and aims which are too high to be confined to this lower World or to take up their Rest in any thing that is measured by Time So more particularly there are three things in this Character to be distinctly explained 1. The great and Noble Object of their earnest desire and constant aim expressed here by Glory Honour and Immortality 2. Their Souls Actual Motion towards this Object here express'd by their seeking after 〈◊〉 3. The regular Way and right Line in which their desires move and their aims are directed towards this blessed Mark and that is a patient continuance in well-doing First We may understand somewhat of the Excellency of the Character here given us of the Heirs of future Blessedness by considering the Object of their earnest Desire and steady Aim which indeed is great and noble well-beseeming the dignity of an heaven-born Soul even Glory and Honour and Immortality or as it is in the Greek incorruption 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 three words that carry a great deal in them the two first expressing the substance of what they seek after Glory and Honour and the third subjoyned partly to set forth the perpetuity and everlasting duration of both and partly to denote their own endless existence and continuance in the full possession and enjoyment of them when once they shall have reached the Mark at which they aim I Shall neither trouble my self nor you with a needless enquiry into the more nice and critical distinctions that some may conceive to be between these two words as to the proper import of them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Glory and Honour Thus much being sufficiently evident not only from the third word that is subjoyned to them but also from the manifest scope of the Text that they are principally designed both together to denote that everlasting happiness in another World which is in the close of the verse summ'd up in those other two words Eternal life intimating that to be the great thing which all the faithful servants of God and Disciples of Christ do in subordination to the Glory of their great Lord and Master chiefly seek after Yet so as not to exclude from being a part of the Object of their Desire and Aim whatsoever in this life is necessary as preparative and introductory to the Glory and Happiness of another Much less excluding whatsoever else there may be in that future blessedness it self which cannot so aptly be conceived of under the notions of Glory and Honour especially if more strictly and properly understood such as that eternal satisfaction that inexpressible Joy and that inconceivable delight which will undoubtedly accompany the glory and honour of that immortal state Nothing short of that Crown of Glory 1 Pet. 5. 4. that fadeth not away can indeed ultimately terminate the Desires or fully answer the Aims of the Persons of that singular and noble Character which we are now considering It is not any worldly honour or greatness tho' they should be advanced never so high in those secular dignities which many are so ambitious to climb

And then the higher their presumptuous and groundless hopes have been raised the greater will their shame and disappointment be when they and their hopes shall perish together 3. The firm and certain connection which the gracious Promise and Covenant of God hath made and settled between a patient continuance in well-doing here and the enjoyment of eternal life hereafter may further serve for the comfort and encouragement of all his sincere and faithful Servants under all the difficulties and hardships afflictions and sorrows exercises and Tryals which they undergo here in the course of their obedience He that hath obtained a clear prospect by faith of the invisible World and of the glory honour and incorruption which are to be eternally enjoyed there by all that regularly seek after them here and is withal conscious to himself that he is one of that happy number can easily see through the darkest cloud and discern a comfortable end of all his present troubles And therefore his Faith mightily animating his Hope and his Hope proportionably strengthening his Patience he doth not faint in the day of Adversity nor is he weary of well-doing Prov. 24. v. 10. because he is sufficiently assured that the time is short and so that it will be but yet a little while before all Tears shall be wiped away from his eyes and all Isa 25. v. 8. grief and sorrow banished from his heart and endless Joyes succeed in their Rev. 7. v. 17. room 4. The same consideration may serve as a sweet and comfortable allay to the sorrows of such as are mourning for the death of such of their near and dear Relatives or Friends who in their life-time gave sufficient proof of their exemplary care and diligence to persevere in such a steady course of duty and obedience as hath eternal life and glory connected with it It is indeed very selfish and unbecoming our Christian hope with immoderate and unallayed grief and sorrow to lament the death of such For asmuch as altho' their absence and departure from us be very sensibly our great loss their presence with the Lord is in an infinitely higher degree their gain And therefore methinks even natural affection which makes us wish well to our dear Relatives especially when sanctified by Grace and assisted by faith should give some check to our immoderate grief for the Removal of such of them from us by the stroke of death concerning whom we have such comfortable and well-grounded hopes For why should we grieve at or regret their happy advancement unto that immortal glory and honour which they had been long seeking for but could never reach before 5. What we have heard may serve both for our direction and excitation unto such a regular and steady course of obedience here that we may all obtain eternal life hereafter Let us endeavour therefore to have that Truth which hath been this day suggested to us out of the Word of God so deeply impress'd upon our very hearts that the thoughts of it may continually dwell with us and have a constant influence upon us by the grace of God for the engageing us to the most strenuous diligence and constancy in prosecuting our present duty as that which hath by the divine ordination and appointment a direct tendency to our future eternal felicity Let us never forget that the only way to glory and honour and a blessed immortality is a patient continuance in well doing And so let none of us any longer indulge our selves in the neglect of that upon which our eternal welfare doth so evidently depend but let the time past suffice us to have wrought the Wills of the Flesh and to have misemployed the active strength and vigour of our Souls in minding only earthly things And now let us resolve by the grace of God to call off our hearts and affections from this lower World and all its perishing vanities and so set our selves in good earnest to seek those things that are above Minding the great Duties of Christianity with a more serious care than ever we have hitherto exercised about them Making True practical Religion more our business as it is what will turn to the best accompt unto us at last O let none of us be guilty of such preposterous folly in the great concernments of our immortal Souls as we would be ashamed of in the management of our secular affairs separating the Way from the End as if the one might be attained without a serious and due attendance to the other The Way in which we must seek for future glory and happiness if ever we would have it is plainly delineated to us in the Text And all those that are gone before us and have actually received the Reward of the eternal inheritance both sought and obtained it in this way and no other even by a patient continuance in well-doing It doth therefore concern us to tread in their steps that we also may in due time and in our appointed order come to the fruition of the same happiness with them And so my earnest exhortation to you is in the words of the Apostle Heb. 6. 11 12. That every one of you do shew the same diligence to the full assurance of hope unto the end that ye be not slothful but followers of them who through faith and patience inherit the promises And here for your further excitation I shall now on this solemn occasion set before you the illustrious and worthy Example of our deservedly honoured and lately deceased Friend whose immortal part is now with Christ For She was indeed One upon whose Heart and Life the divine Spirit and Grace had in most conspicuous and shining lineaments drawn that excellent and noble Character by which the Heirs of Blessedness are described in the Text And to that in the several parts of it I shall principally confine my self in the following Account that I shall give you of her Wherein my more immediate design and aim is to shew you how eminently this Text of Scripture was exemplified in her that you may thence be the more confirmed in your comfortable and well-grounded assurance of her being now happily possessed of that Eternal Life which by the divine designation and appointment belongs to all that bear that Character And therefore not to say any thing of her natural endowments either intellectual or moral altho they were such as made the Grace of God to shine with the greater lustre in her discreet and well-ordered conversation I shall speak only to those that were manifestly divine and supernatural And for as much as my happy acquaintance with her did commence too late to capacitate me to give you any particular account of the more early impressions of the Divine Grace upon her Soul or the more distant Passages of her pious Life and that I may keep my self as remote as may be from all suspition of flattery and falsehood in the payment of this my last solemn

if We consider the Vanities and Miseries of Mankind in this World abstracting from the future it is better to go out of it by Death than come into it by Birth But others understand it rather as specially referring to the death of good men who are thereby not only freed from troubles here but instated in true happiness felicity hereafter And this sense as it appears more consonant to the tenour of Scripture Truth and Phraseology so likewise seems not obscurely to be hinted here from its close connexion with the preceding part of the Verse For it is the death of him that has a good Name that seems to be here spoken of and whose Death is justly preferred to his Birth For a good Name does unquestionably suppose true worth and vertue as its Foundation and Basis And tho' the Epithet of good be not expressed in the Hebrew but simply a name which is preferred to precious ointment Yet that is so far from lessening the sense that it expresse it with the greater Emphasis as insinuating that wicked men have no name at all properly speaking It is chiefly in this sense that I conceive the proper meaning and scope of the words to lye tho' I would not totally exclude the former by reason of the largeness of the expression for I think Scripture is to be understood in the largest sense where the words and scope will naturally bear it without contorsion and straining And therefore the Doctrinal Proposition that I here lay down as the foundation of my ensuing Discourse is this That as the day of Death is prefeferable to the day of ones Birth with respect to all when the parallel is only in reference to this Life considered as miserable abstracting from the Future So far more is the day of death preferable to the day of ones Birth with respect to the Saints when the parallel is not only in reference to This Life but inclusive also of the Future In which General Proposition as we may see both senses of the Text conjoyned as being no way opposite dissonant or exclusive the one of the other So we may observe them so conjoyned as notwithstanding to remain Distinct And therefore we must of necessity disjoyn them again in order to a distinct handling And though it is the second sense of the words that I principally intend to consider and prosecute Yet since it may be of use to premise some brief Reflection upon the former I shall therefore distinctly and apart propose both senses in two Propositions which are nothing else but the two parts of the preceding General Doctrine First Proposition The Day of Death is preferable to the Day of ones Birth with respect to All when the parallel is only in reference to this Life considered as miserable abstracting from the Future I suppose there is none that considerately and seriously ponders this Proposition but will easily assent unto it since I do not here barely and nakedly reflect on the notions of Birth Death in themselves with respect to Life simply considered but only draw the parallel between them with respect to Life as miserable or to speak plainly with respect to the miserys of Life And I suppose none can duely consider this but must instantly be enforced to prefer the exit from Misery to the intrat into it Which is all that according to this sense of the Text is understood by Death and Birth For let us but suppose that we were under a necessity to go a dangerous tedious and afflictive Journey wherein we were to encounter with all manner of Miseries pains and troubles and it were then proposed to us Whether we did not prefer the End and Close of it to the Beginning of it and our Entry upon it I reasonably conclude abstracting from all consideration of the place whether that Journey might lead us that our Answer would be in the Affirmative from the Melancholly Idea and Representation of such a Journey And now what else is our Life in this Miserable world but such a tedious and afflictive Peregrination For we are born to trouble as the sparks flie upward No sooner do we enter by birth into the Society of the Living but our Infant Crys and Tears become a sad prelude to a succeeding sorrowful scene Our Childhood and Youth are wholly vanity and spent in such a way as we seem rather to breath than live And our propensity then to extravagancy and sin oblige our best Friends to keep us under the Pedagogy of necessary tho' to us afflictive Correction And when ever we arrive to something of further Maturity and judgment we are immediately beset with cares and incumberances the inseparable Companions of worldly Business Then do our hearts run out impetuously after the Trifles of time the nick-nam'd Honours Profits and Pleasures thereof the Game which Ambitious Covetous and Wanton Spirits flie at The fine varnish and gaudy shew of guilded dross and dung takes us and after it are our endeavours bent Here cares to get this worlds dross cares to keep it cares to encrease it and cares to dispose of it eat out the best part of our little time And yet notwithstanding our rising up early sitting up late and eating the bread of sorrows the defectiveness of the creature and its transitoriness thwarts our hopes and expectations Besides that oft a secret curse from God blasts our endeavours and breaks our measures in all that we do Riches and Estates take to themselves wings and flie away as an Eagle towards Heaven to receive a new disposal And the fair image and shadow of Honour Grandeur and Pleasure passeth away and leaves our minds perplexed and troubled for the disappointment Thus do we seek for the living among the dead and satisfaction and contentment where it is not to be found Distance and separation from our best Friends eat out the seeming comfort we might enjoy in their company Wants pains sickness sorrows fears and disappointments swallow up any little pleasure that we meet with in the world and drown the sense of enjoyments otherwise comfortable And besides all these things that happen to our selves immediately we are oftimes called to be sad spectators of the many Tragedies acted in the world We see National and Church Calamities and Family and Personal Distresses And oft-times the nearness of our Relation to others obliges us by something more than Sympathy to suffer with them And now all these things being impartially reflected on if we return with Solomon ch 4. 1 2 3. and consider the oppressions that are done under the sun and how destitute not only the Oppressed but the Oppressors also are of True comfort on that account I say considering these things we may see ground with him to praise the Dead rather than the Living yea to conclude that better is he than both these who hath not yet been because he hath not seen the evil work which is done under the sun Object How can