brings them to Glory even by such unlikely wayes He will have them to be train'd up with difficulties to strive and to wrestle with them that so their Fervour may shame the coldness and indifference of others who take no pains for their Salvation He will have them to go laden under the sense of their Corruptions that so finding their daily need of Christ they may still remember him who is their help and finding so much guilt in themselves they may apply themselves to his unspotted Righteousness for Justification and to his Word and Spirit for new degrees of Holiness that they may have experience of his Goodness and he of their Obedience and Love that they may know the Loving-kindness the Care and the Wisdom of that God that Pilots their Ship when it is covered with waves and stormes for stormes are the Triumph of his Art and he steers even the sinking Vessel to the Port. Secondly By being brought from the Grave a Man may be enabled to do much good to himself as well as to others that so he may at last with joy give an account of his Stewardship that he may increase his own reward and by Gods Grace make his Crown of Happiness more sparkling and more full of weighty Glory As no man ought to be satisfied with the lowest degrees of grace so every one may and ought by an Innocent Ambition and a multitude of good Works to indeavour to sit near to the Throne and not only to save himself but to carry others with him to heaven that may be his Joy and his Crown in that Day Reason 6. and Lastly There are several circumstances that may enlarge the kindness of being brought from the Grave and which ought to render us more thankfull for it Those that are good may have their iniquities visited with stripes and it cannot but be a terrible thing to fear that they shall be snatcht away whilest they are punisht with the rods which their own Sins have made As the Prophet was devoured by a Lion for his Disobedience to the command of God 1 King 13. 21. It is a great Mercy to live to see the good of his Chosen and it is a punishment to be taken away just when some great deliverance is coming to the Church It was a thing which Moses greatly desired to see the Promised Land and to go thither to see it indeed was granted him but to enjoy it was denied him because of the provocation at the Rock It is a Misery to see Plenty for others and not to taste thereof our selves like that Lord of Samaria who perished for his unbelief 2 King 7. 2. 17. 18. It is a great Mercy to be delivered after we have been afflicted and ready to dye when the terrors of God have amazed us and his fierce wrath has gone over us Psal. 88. 15. How sad a thing is it to dye under a sense of the weight of sin and to have no prospect of a Pardon to feel as it were the very scorching flames of Hell and to have no hope that these will ever be cool'd or remov'd but rather grow more hot and scorching to have no Comfort from Heaven or Earth no rest for the Body no composure for the Soul to be sinking and to have nothing to lay hold upon to stand shivering on the brink of destruction and to see no way of escape to be compassed in with sin behind and with Miseries before to be in darkness and to see no light not to know where our Lot will be fixt not to know but that it may be among the damned To be near to the Judgment Seat of Christ and to be afraid of appearing there This is a state in which no man would chuse to dye for it is inexpressably terrible and it is a most wonderful mercy to be delivered from a Case so sad as this For how uncomfortable is it to a mans self to be roaring in the disquietness of his soul not to be able to live because of the insupportableness of his Pain nor to dare to dye because of the greatness of his sins that are always before him and that are like to lye down with him in the dust How uncomfortable is it to the Relations and Friends of the sick and dying that see him strugling and crying under pains which tear him to pieces How uncomfortable is it to them to hear his doleful Expressions about his Eternal state to see the anguish of his soul and the arrows of the Almighty sticking in it which makes him a terror to himself and to those that are round about him How woful a thing is this and if a man get to Heaven at last by the mighty Grace of God yet it is a thing very undesireable to go thither as by the very gates of Hell for a man to have his days shortned and his strength weakned in the way Psal 102. 23. and to have his Sun go down at noon looks like the displeasure of God and no man would dye by the frown of God A man cannot be blamed who is loth to dye till he save some Hope that it shall go well with him for ever 'T is a sore Evil to be thrown aside as a broken vessel in which there is no pleasure Jer. 22. 28. It is a great mercy to be kept from raging violent distempers and to be deliver'd from such after we have long groaned under them It is a great Mercy to have such a sickness as will allow us time to exhort and direct and counsel others and 't is very desireable that we may by a Christian Carriage set our Seal to Religion and shew its Power and Reality 'T is a most glorious thing to dye in the Lord i. e. as one Paraphrases it in the Spirit of our Lord Jesus Christ in the Spirit of Faith and Love in a Spirit of Elevation towards God which makes the dying believer to go towards Heaven with all his force and like his Saviour commit his soul with joy into the hands of his heavenly Father Du Bosc Sermons p. 354. We ought to pray that we may not be like the wicked in our death and that we may be found of our Lord in peace and that we may say with old Simeon when after long expectation he saw the Messiah and embraced him in his arms Lord now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace according to thy word for mine eyes have seen thy salvation Luk. 2. 29 30. This we may beg of God for it is not only for our happiness but for his Glory when we can trust him tho' we go into a state which he has promis'd indeed but which we never saw What a glorious thing is it when we are drawing near to the end of Life to be able to wait and not only to wait but to long not only to believe and hope but to rejoyce and triumph in the thought of seeing God To give to those that
longing Soul It is then upon the Mount and sees his smiling Face and would fain always see it it is loth to come down to the meaner Employments of this World and when the necessary Affairs of the present Life call it away it comes from the pleasant Work shining with brighter Grace and Holiness It is a thing of more Honour to You than a thousand honourable Titles that You keep up constantly the worshipping of God and reading the Scriptures in your Families Morning and Evening and indeed it is an Arrogance in those to call themselves Christians who neglect so sacred and so considerable a part of our holy Religion And your good Example in the due practice of these excellent Things will have a powerful Influence upon your Children and what you now do they will also do if they live to have Families and the sight of Religion in you will convey to them a greater Approbation and a more easy practice of it God has bless'd you with a numerous and an hopeful Offspring whose present and future Welfare I do with an undissembled Affection most heartily desire By their Seriousness their Ingenuity and their good Inclinations they give us cause to expect that though they are now as Olive-plants round about your Tables yet that they will hereafter refresh the Hearts of many more besides your own Families And that as it is expressed in Psal. 144. 12. Your Sons may be as Plants grown up in their Youth that your Daughters may be as Corner-Stones polished after the Similitude of a Palace I question not but the Prayers that you send up to Heaven for them will procure the Blessing of the Divine Providence which is the richest and the best Inheritance It is a Blessing of God that you have so many living Images of your selves in whom you see your own Life renewed And you are so happy as to have your Quivers full of them May they all live to be your Comfort and to maintain Religion in the World God has been pleas'd to give You several Instances of the Vanity of this World by the Deaths of several of your Relations some of which died in their most hopeful Youth and in the Flower of their Age whilst their Friends promised themselves a long Comfort and Delight in their Conversation who had they lived might have been of great use to their Country and to the Church of God And one Relation you lost by a way that was very afflicting to you but advantagious to him He died unseasonably as to us for we needed his Prayers and his good Example but his Death was seasonable as to himself for I do not doubt but he was prepared for it He died much beloved and greatly bewailed Those that knew him could not but esteem and value him for the Assableness and Civility of his Temper the Conscientiousness of his Dealings the Sincerity and Heartiness of his Expressions the good Order that he kept in his Family and for that Uprightness and unaffected Religion that appeared to all that observed his Conversation I may without any shew of Flattery say he was one of those good Men for whom many would have died could they have exchanged their meaner Lives for his more serviceable Life He died by a may somewhat terrible to Flesh and Blood but which by Faith he overcame His Zeal for the Liberties of this City and which he shewed whilst he was in an honour able Station rendred him obnoxious to those Persons then in Authority who gave liberty to their Revenge to fall upon those who knew not how to flatter or commend or promote their Arbitrary Designs It was a thing below him to use such sneaking and such unchristian Arts for Honour or for Safety There is nothing can satisfy his Friends for the loss of so excellent a Citizen so good a Man and so sincere a Friend but the consideraon of that Providence which tho it be mysterious and severe for the present yet will hereafter appear to have been very wise and very good to all those that love God Tho the Loss his Friends sustained by his removal from them be great yet it cannot but be a Satisfaction to them to consider that he was happy in his Death He is gone to that God that as he said himself knew his Innocence and to a Place where there are no false Accusations and where he and his holy Friends shall never part again This and much more than what I have said is due to the Memory of so great and so good a Man whom it is impossible for a true Lover of his Country ever to forget My Zeal to the remembrance of those Persons which I have mentioned and whom I honoured and esteemed together with the Respect that I ought to express to them has drawn me to a much greater Length than what I at first intended and tho when I consider the multitude of your Affairs both publick and domestick I am afraid I have too much presum'd upon your Time in this Dedication yet the Experience that I have often had of your Candour makes me to believe that you will forgive even so criminal a Presumption God has given you plentiful Estates and which is as great a Mercy Hearts to use them You have often been Eyes to the Blind and Feet to the Lame There are many hundreds whom your Charities have refresh'd the Blessing of those that were ready to perish has often come upon you And you have made the Hearts of the Desolate to sing for Joy And it is no small support of your Prosperities to have many praying for you to God and who are the more earnest as having been greatly obliged by you I do now thank you for all the many Kindnesses that I have received from you both in my former Health and in my late sore Affliction I thank you for Visiting me in my low Estate tho the greatness of my Pain and the anguish of my Thoughts allowed me not to take such notice of so great an Honour as otherwise I should have done I have often said when I was greatly afflicted That I should neither see you nor any others of my Friends till the great Day and till the Heavens were no more And God alone by his Soveraign Goodness hath brought me from the lowest Pit It was to manifest my Thankfulness to my great Deliverer that I preached the following Sermons in a Place where were many of my Friends many that had prayed for me many that had continued their Kindnesses to me when I could no way be serviceable to them and to whom I can make no other Requital than by praying for them and endeavouring to live to the Glory of that God for whose sake both you and they so kindly remembred me In these Discourses you will find a Relation of some part of my Affliction It is impossible to relate the whole of it for my Sorrows were beyond expression I have not here
many things are to pass in that Moment In the same is our Life to finish our Works to be examined and we are then to know how it will go with us for ever and ever In that Moment I shall cease to Live in that Moment I shall behold my Judge in that moment I must answer for all my publick and my secret Actions for all that I have ever thought or spoke or done for all the Talents the Time the Mercies the Health the Strength the Opportunities and the Seasons and Dayes of Grace that I have ever had for all the Evil that I might have avoided for all the good I might have done and did not and all this before that Judge who has beheld my wayes from my Birth to the Grave before that Judge who cannot be deceiv'd and who will not be impos'd upon Little can he that has not been brought near to Death and Judgement know what Thoughts the diseased have when they are so Little very little does a Soul in Flesh know what it is to appear before the Great God This is so great and so strange a thing that they onely know it who have receiv'd their final Sentence but they are not suffer'd to return to tell us how it is or what passes then and God sees it fit it should be concealed from us who are yet on this side the Grave But who does not tremble to think of this mighty Change and of this Moment that is the last of Time and the beginning of Eternity that includes Heaven and Hell and all the Effects of the Mercy and Justice of God See Moral Essayes Vol. 4. Lib. 1. Chap. 9. Who does not tremble when he Considers that Infinite and Holy Majesty before whom the Angels cover their Faces that Considers his Omniscience and his Greatness and the mighty Consequences of that Sentence how sudden it is and how irresistible and that it is an irrevocable Decree and by a Word of this Mighty Judge we live or dye for ever It is no wonder if the thoughts of it make us shrink and quiver It is a greater wonder that when some or other whom we know are almost every week going to such a place and state as this we who are not yet cited to the Bar are no more concerned and use no more endeavors to be ready for it 't is a wonder that we put no higher a value on that Gospel that teaches us how we may avoid Condemnation 't is a wonder that we prize no more that Gracious Redeemer who alone can plead our Cause and that we labour and strive no more to be partakers of his Righteousness by which we may be Justify'd It is no wonder if this prospect throw men into strange Agonies as it frequently does those who are dying Many people will say when they hear the Complaints of the Sick and their Long Continued Groans It were well if God would take their souls away from their pained Languishing Bodies it were well indeed if that could put an end to their present and their future pain But do they not know that they must go into Eternity and be judged after death Oh my Friends when you come to the Borders of the Grave when you are within an Hour or two's distance from your Final Judgment and your unalterable state what a mighty Change will it cause in your thoughts and your apprehensions You will then know and feel it Then when the Perspective is turn'd and the other World begins to appear very great and this very little This that I have represented to you is a part of that which we call dying Death is that which the Philosophers have talk't of with great Contempt and with lofty Speeches but I believe they commonly talk't so confidently when they thought themselves far from it and I am sure they did so because they had not a distinct knowledge of Futurity For had they consider'd their own sins and the nature of their last Trial with the Consequents of it this would have lower'd all their Pride and Glory they would have changed their Language had they look't upon Death as the Conclusion of Time and the beginning of Eternity and not onely as a going out of this but as an entrance into a state that would never Change It is a great Mercy and greatly to be acknowledg'd that God allows us so much time wherein to prepare our selves for this final and irrevocable doom It is an instance of his Patience that is truly Divine that notwithstanding our many repeated Sins he has not cut us off It is his great Mercy that gives us leave to appear in his Courts before we appear at his Tribunal and that he affords us such large notice and warning that so we may be ready for our Last Tryal whereon so very much depends The Conclusion I May say to you this Evening as Christ to the People concerning John Mat. 11. 7. What came you out to see As for those who came hither out of a Curiosity onely to see one of whom they have it may be heard much discourse Let them know that though by reason of my long and sore Affliction I have been a wonder unto many yet now I can say with some hope that God is my strong Refuge As for those that came with an expectation of hearing something new and diverting that might please their Fancies or gratifie their Ears onely they find themselves by this time mightily disappointed But Those of you that came with a more serious Intention know that you see a Person that has by his own Sins and the Righteous Displeasure of God been for a long Season as in the very Grave and yet by the Power and Goodness of God brought from thence again You see a poor Reed that has been shaken indeed by the Wind but which the Grace of God has kept from being broken to pieces 'T is to you to whom I would principally direct my Speech 't is your Prayers which I would beg that so you would desire of God that the Deliverance which he has so far advanced may be compleated by the same Hand and Mercy that has hitherto reviv'd me You that have Health have cause to praise him for his Mercy and I that have been long sick have cause to praise him who has been my Physitian and my Helper O magnifie the Lord with me and let us exalt his name together Psal. 34. 3. Let us as we join our Prayers so unite our Praises to this mighty Lord. Do you praise him for keeping you from violent overwhelming pains and I will Praise him for mitigating those that I laboured under and though he chastened me sore yet he has not deliver'd me over to death And so by this means we shall bring an acceptable Sacrifice to his Altar and it may be that through Jesus Christ he will receive as an odour of a sweet smell this our Evening Sacrifice The End of the First Sermon Practical
immortality to light and with that Saviour who is the great Prophet and Teacher of the Church who came from Heaven and is now gone thither and we may fully rest and Acquiesce in the discoveries that he has given us of that Countrey for he knew it very well was very faithful in the discharging of his office and does not impose upon us any thing that is either false or incredible by our Holy Prayers we are to maintain a Commerce with him and with that World and by our frequent going thither in our Meditations we may gain a clearer knowledge of it Though there are no bounds on which our thoughts can terminate but onely the Revelations which God has been pleas'd to make in his own Word What is above those Heavens and that Firmament that we see there 's none can tell us but God and our Saviour who are there For when Men have abstracted their Thoughts with as much industry as they can from All that is material and sensible when they have refin'd their Understandings to the greatest spirituality and pored never so long upon the state of separation they will still remain in the dark about it And he is the most happy Man who in the sincere performance of the Duties of Religion can resign his Soul to Christ in Death and trust him though he is to be removed to a strange and a new World For immediately after he is loos'd from the Body he will understand more in an instant then all the most Learned in this World have ever understood by the labour and diligence of many years Secondly That which renders the continuance of Time to us wherein to prepare for Death a great Mercy is because we are to dye but Once and upon the well or ill doing of it depends our future Happiness or Misery It is a great Mercy that we have time wherein to make ready for our last Combat for if we lose the Battle once we are overthrown for ever it must not be fought over again It is a Mercy that we have leisure to compleat our journey well for we must never travel over the same Road again There will be no second Edition wherein to Correct our former Errors when a period is once put to the last Line of Life Oh what Faith what Courage what Strength is necessary to Conquer the Fears of Death and Death it self If men fail in their Trades they may by the kindness of their Friends be set up again if they have suffer'd Losses by Shipwrack by Fire or by Plunder they may be repaired but a Soul once lost will remain so for ever 'T is a long long Eternity that succeeds our Time if we should live on Earth as many Hundred years as the most Aged live Months it would bear no proportion with that vast and endless duration Whoever compares the shortness of our present state with the continuance of that into which we enter when we are to dye cannot but esteem the being brought back from the Grave to be a great Mercy If you have been careless of hearing at one season you may hear the Word again at another if you have heretofore been cold in your Prayers you may now excite your Hearts and pray with more fervour but if you once dye ill you must never mend so concluding a Miscarriage All the Tears we shed cannot give Life to the Body from which the Soul is fled All the Anguish of Miserable Souls cannot procure for them another Tryal They that are once cut down must never be planted by the Rivers side any more There is hope of a tree if it be cut down that it will sprout again and that the tender branch thereof will not cease though the root thereof wax old in the earth and the stock thereof die in the ground yet through the scent of Water it will bud and bring forth boughs like a plant But man dieth and wasteth away yea man giveth up the ghost and where is he Job 14. 7 8 9 10. Reason 5. Those who are brought up from the grave have cause to be thankful because by that means they have more opportunity to be serviceable to the Glory of God and to be useful in the World Meerly to live is not a thing very desireable considering how many Miserie 's there are in Life to what Evils and Inconveniences our Bodies are obnoxious and that the pains which they may suffer may be both very long and so secret that none can understand either what they are or how to remove them But it is a most desirable thing to Live when we can thereby obtain the Ends that are truly Great and Noble For First Hereby a man may do good to others He may teach the Ignorant reduce the wandring and by the sincerity of his Counsel by the zeal of his Prayers and the Lustre and Holiness of a good Example advance the power of Religion Our Lives are not our own they are Gods by a double title both of Creation and Redemption they are to be us'd for him who preserves or takes them away as he will Not onely Ministers but every private Christian is obliged by the Name he bears and by the Relation that he has to the holy Society of Believers and to the Kingdom of Christ whereof he is a Subject to enlarge it by all good ways that he can and every man is the more obliged to this when God has bestow'd a new Life upon him When we are near to the Gates of the Grave and look back and see with how little Zeal and Diligence we had spent our time and how little we had done for him who blest us all our dayes then we are enclined most earnestly to beseech him that he would grant us another Tryal and that then we would improve it much better than we did our former time and when he does grant us what we have askt then it should be our great indeavour not to frustrate and disappoint the designs of his Goodness and Mercy Then must we teach transgressors his way telling them how dreadful thing it is to fall into the hands of the living God Then we may tell the Healthful what Sickness is what we have found it to be by our own Experience then we may tell them how it makes very uneasie and troublesome Companions of our now beloved Bodies How it deprive us of all our Pleasures and Recreations in the day and of our rest at night That all their Friendships Conversations and Merryments without true Religion are altogether vain and not onely so but they leave a sting of guilt behind when the sweetness that once allur'd is gone away We may warn them to provide for the dayes of darkness and for the many Miseries of Life that will sooner or latter overtake them When we are Recover'd we can tell the Diseased of the Goodness and the Power of God that they can never be so distressed but that it is still
their Hands thrived very much The Tears and Prayers of their Hearers and their Friends that would have had them to flourish with perpetual Youth and that were very sorrowful to see Men that filled them with such great hopes taken away could not stay them here any longer nor would God have them to stay longer from their happiness It is indeed a Mercy to those that are good fit for Heaven to have an early Deliverance from such an evil World as this where there is so much Sorrow and Disorder and Temptations and Sins to be taken away from the Evil to come and from many sad Objects that such as live longer may be troubled to see to be fully assured that God is their God and Heaven their Home Jesus Christ did leave the World as one says and ascend to Glory about the 33 d or 34 th year of his Age to teach us in the prime of our Years to despise this World when we are best able to enjoy it and to reserve our full Vigour for Heaven and for his Love Yet though this be a way to promote a Man's own Happiness yet it must be received as a Mercy from God when any one lives not only to promote his own Salvation but the Good of others also Some will say What need we to pray for long Life what need we sollicite God to no purpose or tire him with our Prayers for we shall not live a day beyond our time nor die a moment sooner Do you not think your selves concern'd to eat and to drink and to procure to your selves other Gratifications of Life notwithstanding this And why should you not think your selves under an equal Obligation to use those other Means that are necessary to preserve Life as Prayer to God for his Blessing seeing Man lives not by Bread alone Mat. 4. 4. You find that Hezekiah by his Prayers to God obtained fifteen years more after he had received the first Summons of Death And Paul by the Prayer of the Corinthians was delivered after he had received the Sentence of Death 2 Cor. 1. 9 10 11. And whatsoever may be in the Decrees of God yet I am sure he may justly deny us what we will not take the pains to beg tho the longest Life that we can hope to live will be some hundreds of years shorter than the Lives of Men before the Flood for their long Lives are rather to be ascribed to some extraordinary Priviledg than to the ordinary Course of Nature The World was then to be replenished with Inhabitants which could not be so speedily done but by an extraordinary multiplication of Mankind neither could that be done but by the long Lives of Men. Again Arts and Sciences were then to be planted for the better effecting whereof it was requisite that the same Men should have the Experience and Observation of many Ages As also the Food wherewith they were nourished before the Flood may well be thought to be more medicinal and haply the Influence of the Heavens was at that time in that Climate where the Patriarchs lived more favourable and gracious Hakewell Apol. p. 38. If Deliverance from the Grave be a great Mercy and greatly to be acknowledged then it is a very evil thing in haste and passion to wish for Death There are several People when any thing falls out that crosses their Inclinations or Designs will presently say I wish I were dead I wish I were in the Grave and out of such a troublesom World as this But do you know what it is to die it is to appear before the eternal God and to render an Account of all that you have thought or spoke or done it is to be judg'd to Heaven or Hell and that for ever I cannot forget here that sad Story that is mentioned by Bellarmine and quoted from him He speaks of a Man notoriously worldly-minded whom he went to visit on his Death-bed and when he did him duly to provide for another World answer'd him Sir I have much desired to speak with you but it is not for my self but in behalf of my Wife and Children for my self I am going to Hell neither is there any thing that I would desire in my own behalf And this he spake saith he with such Composedness as if he had been but going to the next Town or Village The Ignorance of this miserable Person suffer'd him to be in no Commotion nor Horror at all but what a doleful Change did he feel in his Thoughts and Apprehensions when he came to that real Hell and to those Flames of which he spake in so cold a manner People make very little of dying and those that are poor usually die with the least concern for they imagine that having suffer'd so many Miseries in this World they shall be very happy in the next Life is a very dear Enjoyment and it is a wonder any should desire in haste to be deprived of it but it is usually then when they are in very great and almost insupportable Pain or under the fear of Evils that seem to be greater than what they are able to bear Thus the Children of Israel being in great straits wish'd they had died in Egypt Exod. 16. 3. Thus the meekest of all other Men press'd by the Calamities that he had in view says Numb 11. 14 15. I am not able to bear all this People alone because it is too heavy for me and if thou deal thus with me kill me I pray thee out of hand if I have found favour in thy sight and let me not see my Wretchedness Thus Elijah 1 King 19. 4. and Job chap. 6. 8 9. and Jonah the Sun beat upon his Head and he fainted and he wished in himself to die and said It is better for me to die than to live chap. 4. 8. but by a Mercy of God not inferiour to his former Deliverance he was reserv'd to another Repentance and to more peaceable Days Thus even good Men have sinned through the pressure of some very great Affliction and Calamity In this they followed the Motions of their sensitive Nature and not those of Grace the tediousness of their Trouble and the weight of the Cross that they groaned under made them with too much eagerness and haste to pray for Death which is always reckoned to be the last Refuge of the Miserable But God is not used to grant these fretful and passionate Desires he will make them to know their own Folly and the Justice of his Soveraign Authority he will have them not only to serve him but to wait till he dismiss them from their Service and all their Haste shall not make their Sun decline till he see it is their time to die And it is indeed a piece of Arrogance unsuitable to the Condition of a Creature to desire it just at such a particular Season as if we knew the most convenient time to depart and were not in this as
cause to upbraid us as he did his Disciples Why are ye afraid O ye of little Faith But this will be most inexcusable in us whom God hath brought to the very grave and back again The remembrance and experience of so great a Mercy should for ever preserve us from the least distrust of our Benefactor Psal. 56. 13. Thou hast delivered my Soul from Death wilt not thou deliver my feet from falling that I may walk before thee in the Land of the Living Psal. 23. 6. Surely Goodness and Mercy shall follow me all the days of my Life Psal. 63. 7. Because thou hast been my help therefore in the shadow of thy Wings will I rejoice Psal. 71. 20. Fifthly Preserve those serious Thoughts now which you then had when you were near unto the Grave What a cold damp did the sight of death bring upon all our former joys What a low and contemptible thing did this so much adored World seem to be when we were just about to leave it How little charming then were all its gayest Smiles and how little terrible all its frowning Threats There did not appear then to be any thing that was enticing in a great Name and Reputation in pompous Honours or in vast Treasures We saw then that all our fellow Creatures and all that we our selves are apt to doat upon was very vanity All the Contentments and Satisfactions of our Appetites and all the Pleasures that we had ever taken in eating or drinking in our Travels or in our Recreations did all pass away like a Vision in the night Then we saw indeed the great worth of Faith and Patience and Self-denial and a Conquest of this World Then we could heartily wish that instead of all the vain Books we read we had more delighted in the Book of God That instead of all our unprofitable knowledge we had known Christ and him crucified That instead of all our Contrivances for this Body and the present state we had spent all our strength and our whole vigor to get Heaven and Eternal Life Then we were apt to say Oh that we had heard his Word with more attention whilst we had our day and whilst the joyful voice was sounding in our ears Oh that we had prayed in our Closets with more fervour whilst God called us to seek his Face Oh that we had bewailed our Sins with a more sincere and hearty Sorrow when we were called to the Duties of Repentance and Humiliation Let us do all those things now which we then wisht we had done Let it for ever dash all our confident and foolish Projects for this World remembring how by a sudden stroak all our Purposes were broke asunder Let us not trust too much in mortal Men for we can remember the time when as to us all the help of Man was vain Let us now prize all those divine Truths embrace those Promises and fear those threats which we then saw to be very true What did we then think of time when our glass was even running out and our day covered with the shadows of the night There was nothing in all the World that did appear to be of so great a value let us now prize it at the rate we then did What Company was it which we then most admired Whom did we esteem the most excellent and happy People Were they those that trample on the Laws of God that prophane his Sabbaoths that scorn his Word that defie his Threats and dare venture to go to an Eternal Hell or those that are afraid to sin that season their Entertainments with Spiritual Discourse that are sober in their Lives fervent in their Prayers conscientious in all their Dealings and that are going to Sion with their faces thither Surely these were the Men that we call'd Blessed and these are the Persons to whom we should now joyn our selves and have the most delightful Conversation and the greatest Familiarity Sixthly Perform all those things now which in your Distress you you resolved to do if God would but bring you from the Grave Psal. 116 13 14. I will take the cup of salvation and call upon the name of the Lord I will pay my vows unto the Lord now in the presence of all his people When a Man seems to be just entring into Eternity then 't is a common thing to say If God would but give me another Trial if he will but save my Life and give me another year and another day of Grace I will amend my ways and serve him more and be better than ever I was When we have not enjoyed those opportunities that we now do have we not said within our selves If God will trust us again with his Gospel and the priviledges of his open Sanctuary we will acknowledge his Goodness and be more fruitful It concerns us to see that the Resolutions that were form'd in our Hearts in the day of our distress do not expire with our departing Trouble In Sickness and the Neighbourhood of Death Sin does appear to be quite another thing than we took it to be in the time of our careless Health its Aspect then is very formidable and its Wounds very deep In whatsoever disguise it may come to us hereafter let us in the fear of God and by his Grace couragiously resist it for it is the worst of Enemies and when it wraps it self in false and alluring colours let us remember what an hideous and frightful Look it had when Sickness took the mask away Let it still appear as an odious and abominable thing to us When we were near to Death what Seriousness what Zeal what Holiness did we then vow to God Was not this our Language If I may have but a few more Talents bestowed upon me I will emprove them better than I did before I will hear his Word with more Reverence and read it with more Care I will with more frequency and impartiality it search and try my own Soul Now the time is come that you wish'd for Let it appear that your serious resolutions were not the fruits of Fear but of Love Let not our sense of God and of Eternity decline as our Troubles wear away God will not be mockt He will observe and punish our hypocritical Intentions if all that we promise him in our Distresses prove but as Chaff before the Wind and as the Dew of Morning which is exhaled and scattered with the Rising Sun God has losed our Bonds but it is that we may be tied faster to himself Let us shine with as great a brightness as we hoped to do and said we would if God would but recruit our dying Lamp and pour in fresh Oyl again Oh let us now improve our Time as we then intended to improve it and let us among our other expences remember that we are then most prodigal when we waste this Treasure and that we give our Friends and Companions too much when we give them a great deal