exemplified the same truth that he had taught For when by the Embassadors of Baeotia he askt the Oracle What was the very best thing that could befal men The answer was V. etiam Suidam in voc 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that Pindar knew well enough if he did not lie when he wrote the story of Agamedes but if he doubted he should shortly know what it was This he interpreted to signifie his death which within a few dayes after hapned But perhaps we are not of this mind and I need not go to an Oracle to know the reason which is plainly this We are acquainted with no other life but this If the world had not so much of our hearts we shoul not find any fault with the necessity of death because it would become desirable We should not then be so sorry for our friends departure as for our own stay We should be glad that neither they nor we were necessitated to dwell there alwayes where there are so many troubles that he is happiest who is soonest freed from them But there were many that thought not much of the goodness of death who yet were comforted with the bare thoughts of necessity How many Heathens might I tell you of who fled to this one truth for refuge and found protection under it against the assaults of sorrow Nothing is hapned to me but what hapneth to all The first minute that we began to live we began to dye This is not the first but the last moment of death It is now finished but it was born when we were born When one came and told Anaxagoras in the midst of a lecture that his child was dead Hold thy peace said he I knew that I begate a son that was mortal and so proceeded in his Discourse without any accents of grief or a mournful tone And so another said to his friend when he saw him weeping for his wife I thought you had known that you married a woman and not a Goddess Do but remember then what the thing is that thou lovest and thou must be willing either to leave or not to love it As they used to stand behind them that triumphed and to admonish them You are but mortal men so let us say to our selves when Love is in its greatest flames Arrian l. 3. cap. 24. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I love a dying person What hurt is there while we embrace and kiss a child to say 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to morrow it may dye and so to discourse with our friends To think of their death doth not make our lives uncomfortable To morrow either you or I may go away and never thus embrace any more Doth it make it our love the less doth it make us avoid their presence No therefore we are so greedy of our friends society because we know not how long we may enjoy them It makes love more fervently desirous to have all of them now because it knows that it may have none of them ere it be long It teaches us to use their friendship to the best advantages we can because we are not like to have the use of it as long as we please The knowledge of our departure doth not part friends now but makes them cleave the closer until they depart Let us be willing they should die and that will not abate of our love for we cannot be willing until we have loved them as much as we can We shall be loth they should go without the best testimonies of our love and that will make us only improve our time to have the benefit of them and they of us Epist 63. Seneca tells in one of his Letters that he who gave a great deal of good counsel to others not to grieve was himself almost made an example of one overcome with grief But the truth of it is saith he there was no other cause of that mourning which I must now condemn but only this I did not use to think that my friend might die before me I only had in my mind that he was younger much younger then my self whereas I ought to have added What is this to the purpose Though he ought I imagine to die after me yet he may die before me Because I did not thus meditate I received a stroak when I was unarmed which went to my heart But now I think both that all things are mortal and that their is no certain order of mortality That which may be at all may be to day And if you think that your friend may die to day then why do you not begin to mourn since his death is so near unless you mean to take it patiently when it comes If you will lament the death of your friends so sadly why do you not prepare your lamentations seeing death may be so near If you think it is not so near then it is likely your sorrow will be violent when it comes because sudden If you think it is and yet do not mourn then why should you lament that so sadly at night which you did not weep for at all at noon Plutarch There were some creatures they say in Pontus whose life lasted but one day They were born in the morning and came to their full growth at noon and grew old in the evening and at night dyed If these animals had been masters of the reason that we have would they have lamented after our fashion would they have mourned for one that chanced to die at noon when as it could not live longer then night No that which is necessary it is no matter when it comes And because we are of a longer life our trouble at death is not to be the greater but the less For it is a greater wonder that we did not die many dayes agone then that we die to day But some will say The kind of death is not so considerable as death it self that it is not death it self but the kind of death that so troubles them They could have been contented if he had gone out of the world another way But I beseech you do you know what will please your selves Can you tell what sort of death it is that would content you are there any that do not blame their hard fortune and wail and mourn as if none were so miserable are not men equally troubled if one dye of a Feavour and another of a Consumption if their love be equal It is very plain that he that perswades himself to part with his friends will not grieve for the manner of the parting He that can overcome himself in the greater cause of grief will not suffer the less so easily to overcome him And therefore you see that men have alwayes something to find fault withall If a friend die in a far Countrey then they say Alas that we should not see him before he dyed how sad is it that we should not take our leave If he dye at home
thou dost now lament the death of thy friend Will it groan and sigh to think of the hole where its flesh lies Will it sigh to think that its old companion is then become the companion of worms If not then let it not groan so heavily for a less matter that is now befaln it If it will then why art thou troubled for thy friend and not for thy self to think how sad thou must one day be The fear of thy own death must more then equal thy sorrow for the death of another man And how canst thou have time to think of any thing else if thou dost fear it Or if thou dost not fear it how canst thou fall under thy sorrow who hast overcome so great a fear Dost thou intend to go crying out of the world If not then be not now dismayed at that which thou must bear so valiantly thy self Then do not mourn so much for the loss of anothers life which will but put self-love into a most piteous case when thou comest to yield up thy own Death is no strange thing as I have said for we must all die But then why should we mourn so much if it be such an usual thing If we do mourn excessively it is a sign we think not of the commonness of it and then how shall we take our own death seeing we think not of it Let us but comfort our selves upon solid grounds against our own departure and I will warrant you that shall cure all our other lamentations Let us but dare to die our selves and we shall not dare to cry so much for any mans death Isidore of Pelusium thinks that our Lib. 2. Epist 173. Saviour did not mourn for his friend Lazarus because he was dead for he knew that he was going to raise him from the dead but because he was to live again and to come from the haven where he was arrived back again into the waves and storm from the crown which he enjoyed to a new encounter with his enemies If thou dost not believe his interpretation yet dost thou believe the thing Dost thou seriously consider that the misery of this world is so great that we should rather weep that we are in it then that others are gone out of it Then I ask thee again whether when thou art dead and well thou wouldst willingly live again If not then thou knowest what to say to thy self concerning thy friends death If thou wouldst then it seems thou canst be contented with this grief and I will not go about to comfort thee seeing thou lovest life with all the miseries thou createst to thy self But the very truth is we are so sensible of our bodies and have so little feeling of our souls or divine things that it is ready to make us think we are not when our bodies are dead This makes death such a terrible thing This makes both our own and others death so heavy because it seems as if there were an extinction of us That which we feel not nor have any sense of within us it is as if it was not And therefore if we feel not heavenly things and perceive not that we have a soul we shall receive death as if it was the loss of our selves and then who can but be sad Let us live therefore in a sense of such things as may make us die willingly and think that we our selves are not lost and then we shall not think that we have lost our good friends nor lay their death so much to heart XI Ask thy self likewise Nor wilt thou be able to help others to bear their sorrows How wilt thou be able to comfort others if thou canst not comfort thy self It should seem by thy tears that thou art very ambitious of the name of a friend but if thou be not able to comfort thy friend what is he the better for thee and how didst thou deserve to have the friend which thou hast lost If thou art able or hast ever given any comfort unto others administer then the same cordials to thy self Why should not that satisfie thee which thou expectedest with so much reason should satisfie them What thou wouldst say to another if his friend was dead that say to thy self And if thou wouldst wonder that he should reject comfort then do not make thy self a wonder Didst thou never tell any man that it is a shame to be impatient when we can cure our selves that they suffer nothing but what God and nature have appointed that we must all expect such losses that no body knows whose turn is next Take then thy own counsel and be not such a Physitian as cannot cure himself at all Is thy distemper different from theirs are there not the same griefs and maladies in their mind Then the same medicine will cure thee that thou gavest to them Or if it would not cure them then thou wast much too blame that didst not seek a better both for them and thee Or is thine some strange loss the like to which never any suffered Then this may comfort thee that thou shalt never suffer the like again For it would be more strange if a thing that never comâ—s shall twice fall upon one man If it be so strange to thee then thy courage will be as strange to others If thou art drawn into an example of suffâ—rings then thou mayst render thy self an example to all of patience and contentedness And so Seneca saith of the Brother of Drusus that though Drusus dyed in the midst of his embraces and with his kisses warm upon his mouth thoug he dyed in the very height of his fortune with the most war-like Nations dead at his feet yet he not only put a measure to his own grief but taught all the Army how to be moderate also And indeed he could not have stopt the tears of others unless he had been of so brave a spirit as first to stop his own If thou art a friend therefore unto any let them all learn of thee how to be well satisfied Comfort thy self as thou hast comforted others or else as thou dost intend to comfort them And let it be seen by thy worthy behaviour toward thy self that thou art worthy to be a friend to another person XII Ask thy self again Death doth sometime befriend us Whether friends only be mortal Do none die but they that love us must not all our enemies and they that hate us die also Death then that makes thee sad may give thee comfort As it puts an end to some comforts so it is the common end of all miseries Though we may not wish for the death of any yet it is no harm to think that they must die who hate us and their rage shall not last for ever If nothing can cease their malignity yet death can It hath done us then no such wrong but what it can repay us with the same hand that did it Though we have now
passions our joy our sorrow and a thousand other things can bring us to our graves Why then should it be lamented as if it were some wonder at which all the world should be astonished Men fill the air with sighs they beat the Heavens with their groans they clothe themselves with darkness and they pour out floods as in a tempest Why what is the matter Is the Sun faln from its Orb are all the lights of Heaven extinguished are they carrying out the worlds funeral What is it then that causes this moan A friend is dead There is one man less in the world then there was O wonderful what a prodigy is this One that was born to die is dead It had been a wonder indeed if he had not dyed Then we might have filled the earth with noifes Then there had been some cause for a tumult But now it is rather a wonder that men should make such a stir at an ordinary and common thing then that a thing so common should happen unto them One would rather look to see no tears then no death and we might more easily excuse their not weeping at all then we can these doleful lamentations Is it not necessary that our friends should dye Death is necessary yea it is so necessary that it is a thing past and cannot be recalled when men weep most for it If you can bring them back again with your tears if there be any hopes that with the noise you make they should revive to comfort you then you have leave to weep as much as you please Is there any Elijah or Elisha that can stretch forth themselves upon them and recover them to their warmth Is there any Paul or Peter or such great men that can raise them from the dead Go then and intreat them for to pitty you Beat your breasts tear your hair break your sleep with sorrow macerate your selves with fasting that they may take some compassion upon you But if all this pains be lost never put your selves unto it but say Why should I have my labour for my pains And did not all those men die again that they raised Were they made immortal here upon the earth what good would it do you to have them called to life again if they must again dye How would you be able to part with them then if not now What an uncomfortable life would you lead out of fear every day to fall into the same sadness How desolate would you be even in their company unless you learnt not to be troubled nor distracted And if that must be learnt then let us learn it now when it is as necessary as it would be then Do you take it ill that the Apple rots and your trees decay and your clothes grow bare and that any thing in this world is according to its nature Why then do you bewail that men die which is as natural to them as it is to be born Would you have God make the world anew for your sakes will you not be contented unless he make a mortal thing immortal Is it not sufficient that you know it must dye and that he gave it to you that it may be returned to him again Did he ever promise you how long you should have it may he not call for his own when he thinks good do not other men pay this debt to nature as well as you Seeing then it is both a common and a necessary debt do not repine as if you did only pay it He is an unworthy debtor that returns what is lent with a reproach to his creditor And therefore give it up chearfully perhaps he may intrust you with something better 2 Sam. 12. While David saw that his child was alive he earnestly besought of God that it might not die but when once it had given up the ghost he anoints his head and puts on other garments because he knew God was not bound to work a miracle though he might be inclined to shew mercy While there was life there was some hope of mercy but when it was dead there was no hope of a miracle And yet there is one thing that may be pertinently observed in that story of David which exceedingly argues our folly Though God had said by a Prophet that his child should die yet he earnestly beg'd that it might live Men are not so earnest for that which they may be assured God will do if it concern their souls as they are for that which they have all reason to fear he will not do if it concern their bodies Men would have him recal his word and alter his decrees in temporal matters but they little mind the obtaining of his promises and the fulfilling of his Word in spiritual concernments They would have life as long as they please which they know he will not bestow but they seek not for contentment which they may be assured he hath a mind to give They would have him willing to let them enjoy their friends alwayes which cannot be but they feek not to him that they may be willing to part with them though they must part with them and he would make them willing For shame let us not continue in this kind of folly Death is not only necessary but good to be angry at things necessary which we cannot avoid and to neglect those necessaries which we cannot want And since death is such a common thing and so easie to be met with that every thing in the world may bring it to us let us further consider that it cannot be very hurtful in it self for all such things are more unufal and rare God is not so unkind unto the world as to let the most noxious and poysonous things grow everywhere in the greatest plenty Things of that nature they are but thinly scattered through the world they lie hid and dare not commonly appear Since death therefore is in every thing since it lurks not for us like a Serpent in the grass but the smallest thing in this world may strike us with it let us verily perswade our selves that there is no such great harm in it as we imagine especially considering that there is another life I am sure that some as wise as we that mourn so much have thought that death was the best thing that befals the sons of men And if we do not think so it is because we think not of death it self Plutarch ad Apollor It is a common story which Pindar was first Author of how that Agamedes and Trophonius having built the Temple of Apollo asked a reward of that God for their service He promised that after seven dayes he would pay them well for their pains at the end of which they both dyed in the midst of a sleep This the world believed was a lesson to them that God could do men no greater favour then to take them out of the miseries of life Not long after this Pindar himself
and supports And as for brute creatures you see that they make a doleful noise for the loss of their young a very short while and then they remember it no more Some of the people of Cous if I forget not used at the age of seventy years either to kill their parents or pine them to death and to rejoyce much at it They thought that they had lived long enough and that it was both a misery to themselves and a great burden to their children to have them continue any longer The Caspians also and some of the people of old Spain had the like custom which we well can inhumane and barbarous But why cannot understanding teach us that which want of understanding taught them Why should Barbarism make them rejoyce at what they did themselves and Christianity make us sad at what is done by God and the order of things St. Hierome reports that in his time there was at Rome a man who had had twenty wives marryed to a woman who had had two and twenty husbands There was great expectations which of them should die first and when the man buryed her his neighbours crowned him with Lawrel and caused him to bear a bough of Palm in his hand in token of a victory at his wives funerals It seems that men can sport at death if they list and laugh at that which makes so many cry Why then cannot reason make us moderately sad to bear that which humor and fancy can make men not to lament at all Why cannot our Religion do more with us then the people or our friends who it is like can laugh us our of our sorrows If I have not said too much in this argument I have some confidence that I have not said too little And indeed I have said more then I first intended and so much that if any one have the patience to read it through me thinks the very length of the discourse should make them forget their sorrows and by thinking so long upon another thing they should not remember what they thought upon before One soul is scarce big enough to hold all these considerations and the thoughts of grief also Here are so many that they are able to thrust sorrow out of doors by their multitude if not by their strength and force And yet notwithstanding I must detain you a little longer before I give your thoughts leave to turn themselves to other things For I am of the mind that all these considerations will only asswage the grief and pricking of the wound but will not quite heal it and take away its putrefaction I shall therefore commend two or three things for the pressing out all the filthy matter for the closing of the sore and to make the soul perfectly whole and sound Be dead to all things and thou wilt not be offended that they die §. 8. I. It is not their death but the life of something else that troubles us Mortifie thy spirit to the world and all things that are in it and when thou hast left them it will be no wonder that they leave thee Think with thy self often that thy friends are dead that thou seest them carryed to the grave that thou beholdest worms crawling out of their eyes and mouth and try how thou art able to bear that thought Think that he or she that lies in thy bed by thy side is as cold as a stone think that thou embracest the carkass of thy dear friend and ask thy soul how it can brook it Think thus often and though thy soul may start at the first yet at last it will be patient That little sadness will banish and chase away all the greater that else would seize on thee hereafter There will be little to do when death comes if thou constantly dost this Thy soul will be so loose from them that thou wilt not give a shrike none will bear the strings crack when you are separated Death will not be a breaking of your society but a fair easie untying of it Nothing will happen to you but what you have looked for long before and you will be able to say This is not the first time that I have seen my dear friend dead Yea think with thy self that thou seest thy own body laid in the grave and that thou feelest thy self as cold as a clod of earth Think that thou art turned into rottenness and dirt and that thou art forgotten by thy neighbours If thy soul can endure these thoughts then why should it be troubled at the death of another This is a kind of death to be so separated from thy body in thy thoughts It is all one not to be in thy body and not to feel that thou art in it Raise thy mind then up toward heavenly things fix thy thoughts on God and the life to come think that thou seest thy self in heaven among the Saints of God and while thy soul is there it is not in thy body here below This kind of death differs from that which will be hereafter in this only that then thou wilt be more perfectly out of thy body But if there be no trouble in this separation which thou now makest even whilest thou art in it There will be far less trouble one would think quite to part with it and to get from it And the way to be dead to these earthly things We must not let false opinions live is to change our opinion of them and to see them to be what indeed they are empty and unsatisfying changeable and unconstant Of this I have spoken before in the former discourse but seeing it is a thing so great and fundamental to our contentment let me again present you with it We are the cause of our own grief by magnifying the things of the world to such a value that the loss of them shall be worth so many tears We think that they are happy who are rich and honourable though they be never so wicked and unskilful how to live 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. L. 1. cap. 19. We presently cry up a man for wise and what not who to use Arrianus his phrase is preferred by Caesar though it be but to be Groom of his close-stool And on the contrary we dispise vertue if it be in a thred-bare coat and count him a fool who is unfortunate No wonder then that we cry and whine like children when we lose any of these worldly things seeing we think our selves more happy then men in the enjoyment of them We think that we are undone when we part with that which we have such an high opinion of and there is no way to make us think that all is safe but by altering of that forlish opinion We expect what cannot be and will not be content with what may easily be We cannot make the things of this world to be still and quiet but may make our selves so and the way to that quietness
will breath into our dust and make it stand upon its feet And then in the mean time if our condition be never so sad and we be left all alone why do we not solace our selves in the great compassion of our High Priest who hath a feeling of all our miseries which we endure Can we expect that ever he should love us more then when we are like unto him in sufferings We should be so far from being sad at what befalls us that we should think if our condition was a little worse we should be more dear unto him then now it is when nothing extraordinary is hapned to us No man can be alone as long as he lives who hath said I will not leave you comfortless like fatherless children I will come to you Did not he bid his Disciples to be well content when he himself dyed Did he not leave his peace with them and bid them that their hearts should not be troubled And what is the death of one of our friends to the departure of the best friend to the world that ever was from his little flock of friends Did not Christ know what he said when he was going to die Did he advise them not to be troubled when it was impossible that they should be otherwise And if they were not to be troubled then I am sure we have less reason to be troubled now both because we have a less loss to bewail and we have a stronger and more excellent comfort against our loss Our friends are as much below him as his state in the grave was beneath that to which he is now advanced in the Heavens Their hearts were not to be troubled when He that is the Lover of the world was held in the chains of death because they knew that he would loose them Why then should we be disturbed for the death of one that loves us only when we know that Christ is risen and that he is in the Heavens Angels Authorities and Powers being made subject to him If an Angel was necessary for our comfort we should not want his Ministry He is so full of love and compassion towards us that if he did not think he had left Cordials enough to support us he would come himself to chear us and raise our friend as he did Lazarus from the dead But now we may well live in hope and he hath given us strong consolation and good hope through grace Let us have patience but a little and we shall not be capable of mourning any more All tears shall be wiped off from our eyes sighing and sorrow shall fly away Remember then I beseech you §. 9. Let no man therefore be in love with tears whosoever you are that cast your eyes on these lines what I said at the beginning Take heed you do not indulge your selves in your tears Est enim dolendi quaedam ambitio for there is a certain ambition even in mourning and men think that they shall be the better thought of for their grief But assure your selves that if we study to exceed one another in grief it is but just with God that we should never want misery enough seeing we are so ambitious of it If we will mourn immoderately when he would have us to be patient we shall not keep our selves patient when perhaps there is little or no cause to mourn When the air is disposed to rain it is a long time before we can recover fair weather and every little cloud will fall a weeping which at another time would have been dry and barren And just so it is with those that strive to gather as many clouds as they can to overcast them and make them sad It is so long before they can disperse them all that every little thing renews their grief as if a chearful day should never shine upon them more It was a very handsome device that one of the Ancient Philosophers used to comfort Arsinoe when he observed her to weep immoderately for her sons death Let me intreat you said he to lend me your patience till I tell you this story On a time Jupiter conferred honour upon all the lesser Gods or divine Powers and there was none of them wanting but only Sorrow When all the rest were gone away rejoycing she came and begged some honour also with many tears and intreaties Jupiter having conferred all honours that were worth any thing upon the other Heavenly Powers He granted to her all that which men bestow upon their dead friends viz. grief and tears as best befitting her quality Now all these little Deities said this wise man do love those most that love and honour them and so doth Sorrow also They bestow most of their gifts on their Votaries and those that pay them constant services and they care not for those that observe none of their ceremonies If you therefore bestow no honour upon Sorrow then she will not love you nor come to you But if you studiously seek how to please her and honor her by tears and lamentations and all such sad things that are the offices wherein she delights she will be in love with you you shall never want her company nor be without occasions of doing continual honour to her She will be continually supplying thee with tears to pour upon her Altar and filling thee with sighs which are the incense which she loves thou shouldst evaporate toward Heaven By this Art the wise man staid her tears for she knew that he meant that if we give way to grief we shall never want it and much more if we seek for arguments to aggravate it it will stick so fast unto us that it will never forsake us Though love and respect to our friends and the natural affection which distinguisheth us from beasts do allow and require a moderate sorrow and contristation of our spirit yet an intemperate grief and afflicting of our souls is unreasonable for it doth them no good and it is unnatural for it doth both our body and mind abundance of harm and let me add likewise that it is unchristian and argues that we have little hope in God either for our selves or others God hath done us the honour to make us Priests unto himself and you know it was the law for the Priests Lâ—v. 21. that none of them should mourn for a dead friend unless he was of their nearest kindred And therefore let us take heed how we make our selves unclean for the dead by weeping so that we should unfit our selves for any Christian service which God hath appointed us for our constant imployment Can you mourn and praise God too Can you pour out your souls to God while you pour out these tears of grief Can you pray in faith for other things and not be able to believe that you can live without a friend Can you read seriously when your eyes are sore with the sharpness of your sorrow Can you meditate of heavenly
the preservation and continuance of it some way or other It is in vain likewise as I touched before in their opinion to be troubled Confilium ejus est qui nullum habet consilium and patience is his remedy who hath no remedy else It is also to be considered That it is no great proof of vertue not to trouble others but this is excellent quietly to bear the trouble they give to us CAP. IV. THese and such like Arguments I shall dismiss and proceed rather unto the second general part of my discourse which I propounded The rules we should observe to preserve us from trouble which I shall lay down after I have premised these two things 1. Let us seek for them in their right place where they are to be found And then 2. Let us firmly settle our selves upon such principles else we shall alwayes be shaking For the first that we may find out the truest rules for the obtaining peace and quiet let us resolve that Evil is not so much in things as in our selves and if the evil which disquiets us be not in outward things neither is the good which must give us rest to be found in them All unquietness arises from the mind and a plaister applyed to the stomach will as soon cure a wounded conscience as riches or any thing in the world heal a discontented mind All the earth quakes and shakings are begot within our own bowels and proceed not from the winds which blow without This therefore is the first thing we must do get acquaintance with our own hearts see the cause of all our grief for nothing will heal us without our selves Our Saviour seems to intimate this truth to us in that phrase in the Gospel Joh. 11.33 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he troubled himself as the margent hath it which some think signifies the perfection of our Saviour that nothing could trouble him but it also shews whence properly trouble arises viz. from the motion of mans own spirit which our Saviour could compose but now he groaned even to the troubling and disturbing of himself For want of this easie observation it is that men labour for peace at endless expences both of pains money and time yet never purchase it Some seek for it in Company and cheerful society which they think can put away the melancholy but still they raind not that they carry the disease about them which cannot so be cured Others seek for it in a contrary way of a solitary life by quitting the affairs of the world and retiring from all company into a Closet but all this while they retire not into themselves and the evil spirit which is in them is not yet cast out So while they thought they had ended their trouble they did but change it while they shake off all they are disquieted because they have not shaken off themselves Their own foolish opinions appetites passions and desires remain unmortified and though they should never see man they will be vexation enough to themselves Others seek for it in travel and seeing forreign parts but this will not effect the business neither as long as they have themselves in company Motion will but stir and enrage the humor and make it more turbulent and unquiet Others leave off some evil practices which they find do disturb them but as long as the body of sin is remaining they are not setled Nam luctata Canis nodum arripit c. Pers sat 5. They are like the Dog who breaks his chain but a great part of it still he trails after him They retain their antient love and affection and so are the same men though they do not the same things And as some one I remember saith He that retires out of the world and thinks thereby to be at peace but yet desires the fame or the glory of the world or any thing else that is in it he hath only his arm and his legs out of it his heart and his mind is still in it Here therefore we must begin as I said in the mortification of our selves If we be not quieted within every thing in the world will make us miserable if we be then nothing can harm us If our false opinions unreasonable desires fond affection ungrounded hope c. be alive we are no longer quiet then the world pleaseth Our peace is at the mercy of every report of every mans mouth and all the several accidents of evil that are in the world If we be sick and are afraid to die if we be in pain and have no patience if we be scorned and are proud if we be lessened in our estates and are covetous c. then nothing can help us from being miserable but on the contrary if we do not fear death so much as an ill life if we think impatience and murmuring a worse disease then the Gout if we think pride to be the greatest reproach and the highest disgrace and take covetousness to be the greatest beggary and basest poverty there is no harm a man can feel by death or sickness or scorn or want when all the alterations in the world will not quiet us one alteration will and that is the change of our opinions concerning things and our estimate of them by this one more will be done then by ten thousand changes The Heathen could say That no man can make another a slave unless he hath first enslaved himself * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Arrian l. 3. cap 24. Be not enthralled to pleasure or pain to hope or fear to life or death and thou art free What he said in this case we may say in all other nothing can overcome him that is not first overcome by his own imaginations and passions Thou art poor perhaps and contemned what of that if thou hast not this beggarly thought also that riches and honour make a man Another hath a bad opinion of thee but what then if thou hast not also a foolish opinion then mens censures are not much to be minded In every thing rule but thy self and thou shalt be at ease because thou wilt be thy self but never wilt thou till then be eased For remember this as a true saying which may be added to the reasons foregoing A proud man hath no God an unpeaceable man hath no neighbour a distrustful man hath no friend and he that is discontented hath not himself Not the rich man or the wise man alwayes possesses himself but in your patience saith our Saviour possess ye your souls Luk. 21.19 We have found therefore where we must begin to lay a foundation for all our rules viz. in our selves But then secondly we must build and firmly seat our selves upon these principles for if we do not use them notwithstanding all that I can say we shall be troubled By the former discourse you may easily perceive that we cannot be at peace without our
themselves and we must not let them gather more strength by our negligence If we do not at the very first set our selves in a posture of defence against them they will seize upon our whole soul and get every thing into their possession As soon therefore as our grief stirs we must strive to comfort our selves and not either help forward or suffer our grief If we go and bewail our friends as much as we can and think to chear our souls afterward we shall soon find that our souls are drowned with a flood and that it will be a long time before it be soaked up When we give the least leave to these passions they will ask no leave of us afterward but the soul will mourn like Rachel and refuse to be comforted As soon therefore as thou hearest of the death of thy friends do not say Alas what a friend have I lost did ever any man part with such a friend where shall I find one comparable to him in wisdom in love in faithfulness in all manner of sufficiencies to make a friend Do not I say after this sort aggravate thy grief but instantly say Why should I grieve and torment my self why should I trouble my self with my own thoughts why should wind and tide run together how many reasons have I to be contented and spread them all before thine eyes that they may dry up thy tears and cease thy sorrow And so doing thou wilt weep as much as is fit but no more then thou oughtst Nature will be satisfied and thou thy self not ashamed None will think that thou art not grieved and thou wilt feel that thy heart is comforted But what comfort are these may some say which you bring us §. 3. The best and wisest persons have not mourned much with what reasons will you assist us I suppose it will be of no great effect to answer that the wisest persons have alwayes made their mourning short because I have already named two both good and wise that were excessive And therefore I must endeavour to make men wise and furnish you with such reasons as will not suffer them to be oppressed with their sorrows Yet me thinks it is observable that the Aegyptians mourned ten times as long as the children of Israel Seven dayes ordinarily contented the people of God for their grief as you may see Eccles 22.12 Job 2.13 whereas they that were strangers to the God of Israel extended their mourning seventy dayes as you may read Gen. 50.3 yea the greatest mourning that the Israelites used for their two famous leaders Numb 20.29 Deut. 34.8 Moses and Aaron was prolonged but to thirty dayes which is not half the time that those Heathens allowed I think not fit neither to pass by the shortness of Abrahams grief for his dearest wife Sarah who dyed as some of the Jews conjecture for very grief when he was at Mount Moriah thinking that her son was offered This they gather from that expression Gen. 23.2 Abraham came to mourn for Sarah and to weep for her From whence it was that he came I have nothing to affirm yet this note of theirs is considerable that in the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to weep for her there is a small Caph in the middle of great letters 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which may very well show that his weeping was little and moderate and not of the greatest size That expression is likewise taken notice of by some which follows in the next verse He stood up from before his dead as if it signified that he turned his eyes from her that so he might not be overcome with grief We must not love to look on our losses nor think that it becomes us to weep as long as we can But we should learn by the manners of Gods people to do all we can to make our mourning short Yea I might teach you from Heathens themselves if examples would do us any good Plutarch in Lycurg Lycurgus ordained that none should weep above eleven dayes and that they should make no Funeral solemnities Solon likewise took them away 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Plut. in Solone that so he might ease men of those howlings and lamentations which they use to make at their friends Interment Augustus as Seneca observes though he lost all his children and Nephews and was fain to adopt an heir yet he was so little moved at their death that he constantly went to the Senate and neglected no Publike affairs Pericles likewise having lost two sons of great hope within the compass of eight dayes put on notwithstanding a white garment and with a great constancy of mind went to deliberate about the necessities of the Common-wealth All stories are full of such great souls that after they had conquered others at last conquered themselves also I know it will cure no man to tell him that his neighbour was cured yet these examples do commend to us the remedies which they used and give us hopes that our griefs are not incurable The cure of this distemper doth he chiefly in a fulness of consideraâ—ions §. 4. What it is that must ease us wherewithal our minds must be stored Nothing can resist grief but a great mind no mind can be great that is not big with truth nothing can impregnate us with truth but serious advice and consideration in our selves and therefore we must provide our selves with sufficient Antidotes that may be ready at hand when we have need of them Our sou's must be as an Apothecary and our heart must be the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or shop where all medicines are in a readiness against any grief or malady that shall invade us If we have our remedies to gather and to compound when our sickness comes the mind will be so weak that it will not be able to make them We have least power to consider when we are full of sorrow our affections are ready to overlay our reasons and therefore we must have our medicines made before that then we may have nothing else to do but only to take them And we shall find that to have so much labour in it our stomacks being squeamish and nauseateing that we shall clearly see we need have nothing else to do First then I. The first means is to consider what it is that we lament Let us seriously consider What is it that we grieve for It is soon answered that we mourn for the Death of those that we love For their Death What is that I beseech you Is death such a strange and unusual thing that we should take it heavily are your friends the first that ever dyed are you the only persons that God hath singled out to be left alone Death is an usual thing Do you not see that every thing in the world can cause death The wind the lightning the fire the smoak the dust of the earth the water our meat and drink our own
then him we lost So it is said 2 Sam. 12.24 David comforted Bathsheba his wife and how did he comfort her he went in unto her and lay with her and she bare a Jedidiah a man beloved of the Lord. If we count it such a strange thing to die then it should seem it is an ordinary thing to live and so why should we not expect the new life of another But if it be no strange thing to die then as I have said already we may well be comforted Or if we should have no more yet this may be some comfort that then we shall have no more to mourn thus sadly for Yea suppose thou art the last of thy family and name as was the great Scaliger and Lipsius also another excellent Scholar it is no great matter seeing the world is not to last long If thy name must have an end what needest thou to trouble thy self when it ends And if men can think it no harm to suffer their name to die of it self as Scaliger did who would not marry why shouldst thou be troubled if thine perish after thou hast done what thou couldst for to preserve it But then if thou hadst never so many children Or when it is uncertain whether they or none at all be better yet who knows how they may prove If they should be bad then thou thy self wilt say that it had been better they had never been They that thou mournest for because they are dead might have given thee greater cause of mourning if they had lived If the death of a child be sad his wickedness would have been far sadder for that is a worser death He that dies doth trouble his parents but ouce but he that is bad is a perpetual torment to them He that is dead cannot indeed help his parents but then he doth not hurt them as many a bad one doth For those that are dead we only grieve we do not fear but for those that are bad we fear perpetually and we grieve also yea all the sorrow we now conceive at their death will not equal perhaps the meer fear which we should have had from their infancy lest their life should be bad It is said in the life of John the patriarch of Alexandria that a Merchant came to him to pray for a son of his that was at Sea that he might be safe Within a moneth the child dyed and his ship likewise was cast away And when he was much troubled at this double loss he thought one night that he saw the Patriarch standing by his bed and saying to him Thou desiredst me to pray that thy son might be safe and behold now he is safe for he is dead If he had lived wickedly in his future course then he could not have been safe And besides their badness suppose our children should have dyed of some infamous and base death this would have troubled us more then death it self Yea some there have been that have sought their parents death and what a trouble would this have been Some have slain their fathers and others their mothers and who was there left to mourn then If you be affrighted at these strange supposals which yet sometimes have had a real truth yet consider once more that if they had not been bad yet who knows what miseries they might have endured worse then death Can you tell what misfortunes might have befaln them which might have made them wish they had dyed sooner They are now dead perhaps they have that which afterward they might have desired and not so easily have obtained Who is there that desires any one should live unless it be in hopes that he shall enjoy more good then evil But how few are there to whom this happens unless it be a fool who knows not what evil and misery means One of the Gymnosophists answered Alexander when he askt whether death or life was stronger Life sure for that bears the most evils And suppose he that is dead should not have been miserable yet now he is gone if he might rise again it is likely he would not lest he should know again the fear and the pains of dying But it is the Death of our parents perhaps that we thus bewail Comforts against the death of parents they that brought us into the world are themselves gone out of it And what wonder is there in this If they had not been to go out what need would there have been of bringing us in If they were designed to stay alwayes then there had been no room for us They might more easily remember their mortality then we for there is no act that puts us more in mind of death then that whereby we give another life But it is but one of them it is likely that we have lost we may then love the other the more Or if both yet we have least reason to complain about their death of all others for both Nature and they themselves and we also would have them die before us We complain that people die when they are young and will we complain too when they die of old age then it seems we will have none die and cannot be contented unless they live alwayes Would they have been willing to have been left childless without you if not then they have their choice to go first Or are you so well in love with death that it would have been more acceptable to you to have gone before or are you so much in love with them that on that account you had rather have dyed then they Then know that your death would as much more have troubled them then theirs doth you as the love of parents to their children transcends the love of all children unto them It is very well then as it is It is not handsome neither to complain when we are forty or fifty years of age that our parents are dead for they could live no longer or if they could it would have been but a kind of death If we will not cease to complain when we are of age neither shall we ever cease when we grow older For as Cardan tells us a poor woman once came to his door to beg an alms and though she were seventy years of age yet she used this argument in her complaints that she was a poor fatherless and motherless creature and had none to take any care of her We need the less of their care when we can take care of our selves But perhaps they die before we are of age and can take care of our selves Then we are least sensible of their loss or if we are so considerate as to know that we may consider also such things as these There is none fatherless that hath God for his Father and he that hath not would be little better for his earthly parents If they were good let us follow their example and remember their Counsel If they were bad they would not have been true parents
all agree to put all the troubles and calamities of men into one heap on this De Consol ad Apollon condition that after every man had brought his and thrown them there then they should all come again and take every man an equal portion of them there would be a great many that now complain who would rather take up what they brought and go their ways contented with them And so Antimachus an Ancient Poet when his wife dyed whom he loved exceedingly he went and writ a Poem bearing her name wherein he reckoned up all the calamities that he could remember had befaln any in the world By this means he did deter himself from grief for how can one suffer the miseries which others endure if he cannot bear this light one of his own Fifthly It is better with us then with those of former times Let us compare our selves with the Ancient Christians Their children were snatcht out of their arms by the hands of tyrants They see their brains dasht out against the stones their friends were buried in fires or banished into strange places and they had no comforters left but God and themselves and their chiefest comfort was that they must shortly die the same death But notwithstanding all this and much more they did not take it heavily but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Photius speaks They bare it all thankefully Epist 234. and blessed God who could tell how to govern the world beyond all the thoughts of men Let not us who suffer but common things weep with an extraordinary sorrow when they who suffered most unnatural deaths did bear it with more then natural courage They might have been allowed to have wept blood rather then we to shed tears And yet they rejoyced as if their friends had been offered in Sacrifice to God and we weep as if they had been put to some shameful torments for their crimes Shall we mourn more for the death of a friend then they for a butchery What arguments had they to comfort them which we have not What Scripture had they before their eyes to stay their tears which we read not If either of us have more to comfort us then the other it is we for we have their most excellent example And when I think of the Mother of the seven Brethren mentioned in the Macabees Mac. 2.7 she calls my thoughts back a little further then the times of Christ Did she wring her hands when she saw the skin of her son stead off from his head Did she cast any tears into the fire wherein another of them was fryed No she speaks as chearfully as if they were not stripping them of their skins but cloathing them with a royal robe She looks upon them not as if they lay upon a pan of coals but in a bridal bed She exhorted them being filled with a couragious spirit saying V. 21 22. I cannot tell how you came into my womb for I neither gave you breath nor life neither was it I that formed the members of every one of you But doubtless the Creator of the world who formed the generation of man and found out the beginning of all things will also of his own mercy give you breath and life again as you now regard not your own selves for his sake This marvellous woman as she is called v. 20. knew very well that she did not give them life and therefore why should she take so heavily their death She considered they were none of hers and why should not the owner take them She knew that she did not lose them but only restore them That life sometimes is not worth the having That unless God will have us live no wise man would desire to live That none gives any thing unto God though it be his own but he gives them something better And therefore she said Die my sons for that 's the way to live What poorness of spirit then is it that we cannot see a soul put off her cloaths without so much ado That a Jewish woman could see seven souls torn out of their body with more courage then a Christian man can see one soul quietly to depart and leave its lodging I would wish every one to save his tears till some other time when he may have some greater occasion for them If he will weep let it be when he sees the bodies of his children or friends so mangled as theirs were But if he would not weep out his eyes then let him weep soberly and not as if he were drunk with sorrow now After we have taken this course with our selves §. 7. IV. We must think with what reason we weep we shall be the more prepared to hearken unto reason And let us proceed from making comparisons to ask our selves some Questions and stay till they give a good answer Let us know of our selves why we are so sad and heavy Let us speak to our souls and say Tell me what is the matter what is the cause of all this grief thou art a rational creature what reason hast thou for all this sorrow Thou art not to be pittyed meerly for thy tears if thou canst cry without any cause Hideous things appear sometimes before us to affright us but they are the Chimera's of a childish imagination and not things really existent Let us bid fancy then to stand aside a while and let reason speak what it is that so troubles us Children cry who cannot speak and we are not much troubled at it because they cry for they know not what Unless we therefore can tell why we weep no body will pitty us because it is not weeping that we are to mind but the cause of mens weeping Let me then propose these questions to be answered some of which will discover that there is no cause of lamentation when our friends die And if there be no cause that the fountain of tears should run that is cause enough to stop it up I. For whose sake dost thou weep For the sake of him that 's dead or for thy own No cause of mourning for their sakes who are dead Not for him that is dead sure for we suppose him to be happy Is it reasonable to say Ah me what shall I do I have lost a dear friend that shall eat and drink no more Alas he shall never hunger again never be sick again never be vexed and troubled and which is more he shall never die again Yet this is the frantick language of our tears if we weep for the sake of him that is gone Suppose thy friend should come to thee and shake thee by the hand and say My good friend why dost thou lament and afflict thy soul I am gone to the Paradise of God a sight most beautiful to be beheld and more rare to be enjoyed To that Paradise am I flown where there is nothing but joy and triumph nothing but friendship and endless love There am
is well to consider their inconstancy and that our happiness is in something better It was a good rule which Pythagoras gave to all his Scholars and is the same that I would have you learn 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Do not walk in the high way i. e. Do not follow the common opinions be not led by vulgar and popular apprehensions Rectifie the ordinary conceits which you have carelesly entertained of things and judge of them as they are in themselves and not as they are reputed of If we would do thus then that which is the cause of our sorrow would be the cause of our tranquillity because nothing hath left us but that which we knew would not stay with us We mourn now because things are so inconstant but then we should not mourn because we knew them to be inconstant If we could make it good that any of these things are ours then I might avouch it that they would never have left us But if they were not ours why are we offended that God doth what he will with his own And besides shall we who are so inconstant oblige all things besides our selves to constancy shall we whose desires are so restless and uncertain expect that all things but only we should be stable and quiet No let us look into our selves and we shall find so much difficulty to settle them that we shall not wonder that other things are unsetled And again if things be so mutable why should we not think as I have already said that they will one day change to what we would have them But suppose they should what are we the better If our opinion be not turned too we shall be as much afraid to lose them again seeing they are so unconstant as now we are desirous to have them by the benefit of their inconstancy We must therefore alter our esteem of things now else we shall only change our trouble but not be rid of it when things are changed Adeo nihil est miserum nisi cum putes c. So certain it is that nothing is miserable but when we think it is so and that nothing will make us happy unless we think that we are happy And we had better think so now then stay to be taught this lesson by the dear experience of a great many troubles Let thine estate be never so prosperous yet if thine heart be unmortified thou wilt never be the nearer but rather the further off from settlement For they that have the greatest abundance are the soonest disturbed by every trifle because they are not used to have any thing go contrary to their humour But if thou wilt take any comfort from the unconstancy of things let it be this That if thou thinkest thy self therefore unfortunate because those things are gone that were joyful then thou mayst think thy self happy enough seeing the things that are unpleasant are going away also And think I beseech you once more and be of this opinion That there is nothing better in this world to thee then thy self As long therefore as thou hast thy self why shouldst thou be troubled especially if thou thy self thinkest never the worse of thy self because thou art poor and destitute of friends For these take away nothing of thy self nor can any thing in the world deprive thee of thy self And as Boethius well saith This is the condition of humane nature that it then only excels all things here when it knows it self But when it doth not it is below the very Beasts For it is natural for them to be ignorant but for a man it is the basest vice especially when he is ignorant of himself There was a Fable among the heathens which wise men understood to contain in it great Philosophy In the midst of this sad discourse it will please you perhaps if I relate it and it will please you a great deal more for to learn and live by it After Jupiter had made the world he thought that men would not be restrained from sin without rewards and punishments and so he made two great barrels the one full of good things the other full of bad to be sent down among men as there was occasion Pandora being very desirous to know what was in these barrels did one day broach them and all the good things flew out towards heaven and all the bad towards hell Hope only and Fear remained in the bottom of these Casks the former in that of Evil things and the latter in that of Good When this was done Jupiter threw down these empty Tubs to the earth and all mortals ran at the rareness of the sight to see what they could find in them Some looked into the one and some into the other and though both of them were empty yet they thought verily that the one was full of good and the other full of evil And ever since it came to pass that here below we have nothing but a fancy or conceit of Good mixed with fear and jealousie and a meer conceit of evil with some hope in the compound of it The Moral of it is this I hat the things of this world are but seeming Goods and seeming evils They are our own opinions that trouble us with the shadow of evil and that flatter us on the other side with a fair shew of Good All real Good is in heaven and all real misery is in hell If we go to heaven we are wâ—ll enough whatsoever we loose if we fall into sin and so into hell we cannot be well though we should enjoy all the world Let us turn our minds then toward these heavenly things which they did but dream of in the dark ages of the world Let us heartily believe the Gospel which hath brought to light eternal life And then we shall think our selves happy enough if we lose not those things and perhaps the death of our friends and such like crossâ—s befall us that we may not lose them When the dayes of mourning do come II. Our tears should be kept for that which is the cause of death and all our tears Turn thy sorrow for thy friend into sorrow for thy sins Remember that thy tears may be due to some other thing and the cure of that will cure all thy other griefs If thou art not a Christian then it is thy duty to mourn neither for one thing nor other but only to bewail thy self Let the dead bury their dead as our Saviour said do thou presently follow after thy Lord with tears Take no care of funerals think of no earthly thing but only how thou mayâ—st be a Christian And if thou art so thâ—n thou oughtest to rejoyce that thy sins are pardoned and that thou hast not the greatâ—st cause of griâ—f and this joy sure will swallow up all thy sorrows There is scarce any thing so considerable in our bodies that is seen as our tears for they are the most notable expressions of what is in