thoughts and sanctifie the accidents of my sicknesse and that the punishment of my sin may be the school of vertue In which since thou hast now entred me Lord make me a holy proficient that I may behave my self as a son under discipline humbly and obediently evenly and penitently that I may come by this means neerer unto thee that if I shall go forth of this sicknesse by the gate of life and health I may return to the world with great strengths of spirit to run a new race of a stricter holinesse and a more severe religion Or if I passe from hence with the out-let of death I may enter into the bosome of my Lord and may feel the present joyes of a certain hope of that Sea of pleasures in which all thy Saints and servants shall be comprehended to eternall ages Grant this for Jesus Christ his sake our Dearest Lord and Saviour Amen An act of resignation to be said by a sick person in all the evil accidents of his sicknesse O Eternall God thou hast made me and sustained me thou hast blessed me in all the dayes of my life and hast taken care of me in all variety of accidents and nothing happens to me in vain nothing without thy providence and I know thou smitest thy servants in mercy and with designes of the greatest pity in the world Lord I humbly lie down under thy rod do with me as thou pleasest do thou choose for me not onely the whole state and condition of being but every little and great accident of it Keep me safe by thy grace and then use what instrument thou pleasest of bringing me to thee Lord I am not sollicitous of the passage so I may get thee Onely O Lord remember my infirmities and let thy servant rejoyce in thee alwayes and feel and confesse and glory in thy goodnesse O be thou as delightfull to me in this my medicinal sicknesse as ever thou wert in any of the dangers of my prosperity let me not peevishly refuse thy pardon at the rate of a severe discipline I am thy servant and thy creature thy purchased possession and thy son I am all thine and because thou hast mercy in store for all that trust in thee I cover my eyes and in silence wait for the time of my redemption Amen A Prayer for the grace of Patience MOst Mercifull and Gracious Father who in the redemption of lost Mankind by the passion of thy most holy Son hast established a Covenant of sufferings I blesse and magnifie thy Name that thou hast adopted me into the inheritance of sons and hast given me a portion of my elder Brother Lord the crosse falls heavy and sits uneasie upon my shoulders my spirit is willing but my flesh is weak I humbly beg of thee that I may now rejoyce in this thy dispensation and effect of providence I know and am perswaded that thou art then as gracious when thou smitest us for amendment or triall as when thou releevest our wearied bodies in compliance with our infirmity I rejoyce O Lord in thy rare and mysterious mercy who by sufferings hast turned our misery into advantages unspeakable for so thou makest us like to thy Son and givest us a gift that the Angels never did receive for they cannot die in conformity to and imitation of their Lord and ours but blessed be thy Name we can and dearest Lord Let it be so Amen II. THou who art the God of patience and consolation strengthen me in the inner man that I may bear the yoak and burden of the Lord without any uneasie and uselesse murmurs and ineffective unwillingnesse Lord I am unable to stand under the crosse unable of my self but thou O Holy Jesus who didst feel the burden of it who didst sink under it and wert pleased to admit a man to bear part of the load when thou underwentest all for him be thou pleased to ease this load by fortifying my spirit that I may be strongest when I am weakest and may be able to do and suffer every thing thou pleasest through Christ which strengthens me Lord if thou wilt support me I will for ever praise thee If thou wilt suffer the load to presse me yet more heavily I will cry unto thee and complain unto my God and at last I will lie down and die and by the mercies and intercession of the Holy Jesus and the conduct of thy blessed Spirit and the ministery of Angels passe into those mansions where Holy souls rest and weep no more Lord pity me Lord sanctifie this my sicknesse Lord strengthen me Holy Jesus save me and deliver me thou knowest how shamefully I have fallen with pleasure in thy mercy and very pity let me not fall with pain too O let me never charge God foolishly nor offend thee by my impatience and uneasie spirit nor weaken the hands and hearts of those that charitably minister to my needs but let me passe through the valley of tears and the valley of the shadow of death with safety and peace with a meek spirit and a sense of the divine mercies and though thou breakest me in pieces my hope is thou wilt gather me up in the gatherings of eternity Grant this eternall God Gracious Father for the merits and intercession of our mercifull high Priest who once suffered for me and for ever intercedes for me our most gracious and ever Blessed Saviour Jesus A Prayer to be said when the sick man takes Physick O Most blessed and eternall Jesus thou who art the great Physician of our souls and the Sun of righteousnesse arising with healing in thy wings to thee is given by thy heavenly Father the Government of all the world and thou disposest every great and little accident to thy Fathers honour and to the good and comfort of them that love and serve thee Be pleased to blesse the ministery of thy servant in order to my ease and health direct his judgement prosper the medicines and dispose the chances of my sicknesse fortunately that I may feel the blessing and loving kindnesse of the Lord in the ease of my pain and the restitution of my health that I being restored to the society of the living and to thy solemn Assemblies may praise thee and thy goodnesse secretly among the faithfull and in the Congregation of thy redeemed ones here in the outer-courts of the Lord and hereafter in thy eternall temple for ever and ever Amen SECT III. Of the practise of the grace of Faith in the time of sicknesse NOw is the time in which faith appears most necessary and most difficult It is the foundation of a good life and the foundation of all our hopes it is that without which we cannot live well and without which we cannot die well it is a grace that then we shall need to support our spirits to sustain our hopes to alleviate our sickesse to resist temptations to prevent despair upon the belief of the articles of our
he is to do is to secure his hold which he can do no way but by prayer and by his interest And by this Argument or instrument it was that Socrates refreshed the evil of his condition when he was to drink his aconite If the soul be immortall and perpetuall rewards be laid up for wise souls then I lose nothing by my death but if there be not then I lose nothing by my opinion for it supports my spirit in my passage and the evil of being deceived cannot overtake me when I have no being So it is with all that are tempted in their faith If those Articles be not true then the men are nothing if they be true then they are happy and if the Article fails there can be no punishment for beleeving but if they be true my not beleeving destroyes all my portion in them and possibility to receive the excellent things which they contain By faith we quench the fiery darts of the Devil but if our faith be quenched wherewithall shall we be able to endure the assault therefore seiz upon the Article and secure the great object and the great instrument that is the hopes of pardon and eternall life through Iesus Christ and do this by all means and by any instrument artificiall or inartificiall by argument or by stratagem by perfect resolution or by discourse by the hand and ears of premisses or the foot of the conclusion by right or by wrong because we understand it or because we love it super totam materiam because I will and because I ought because it is safe to do so and because it is not safe to do otherwise because if I do I may receive a good and because if I do not I am miserable either for that I shall have a portion of sorrows or that I can have no portion of good things SECT IV. Acts of faith by way of prayer and ejaculation to be said by sick men in the dayes of their temptation LOrd whither shall I go thou hast the words of eternall life I beleeve in God the Father Almighty and in Jesus Christ his onely Son our Lord c. And I beleeve in the Holy Ghost c. Lord I beleeve help thou mine unbelief I know and am perswaded by the Lord Jesus that none of us liveth to himself and no man dieth to himself For whether we live we live unto the Lord and whether we die we die unto the Lord whether we live therefore or die we are the Lords If God be for us who can be against us He that spared not his own Son but delivered him up for us all how shall he not with him give us all things Who shall lay any thing to the charge of Gods elect It is God that justifieth who is he that condemneth It is Christ that died yea rather that is risen again who is even at the right hand of God who also maketh intercession for us If any man sin we have an Advocate with the Father Jesus Christ the righteous and he is the propitiation for our sins This is a faithfull saying and worthy of all acceptation that Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners O grant that I may obtain mercy that in me Jesus Christ may shew forth all long-suffering that I may beleeve in him to life everlasting I am bound to give thanks unto God alway because God hath from the beginning chosen me to salvation through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth whereunto he called me by the Gospel to the obtaining of the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God even our Father which hath loved us and hath given us everlasting consolation and good hope through grace Comfort my heart and stablish me in every good word and work The Lord direct my heart into the love of God and into the patient waiting for Christ. O that our God would count me worthy of this calling and fulfill all the good pleasure of his goodnesse and the work of faith with power That the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ may be glorified in me and I in him according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ. Let us who are of the day be sober putting on the brest-plate of faith and love and for an helmet the hope of salvation For God hath not appointed us to wrath but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ who died for us that whether we wake or sleep we should live together with him Wherefore comfort your selves together and edifie one another There is no name under heaven whereby we can be saved but onely the Name of the Lord Jesus And every soul which will not hear that Prophet shall be destroyed from among the people God forbid that I should glory save in the Crosse of Jesus Christ. I desire to know nothing but Jesus Christ and him crucified For to me to live is Christ and to die is gain Cease ye from man whose breath is in his nostrils for wherein is he to be accounted of But the just shall live by faith Lord I beleeve that thou art the Christ the Son of God the Saviour of the world the resurrection and the life and he that beleeveth in thee though he were dead yet shall he live Jesus said unto her Said I not to thee that if thou wouldest beleeve thou shouldst see the glory of God O death where is thy sting O grave where is thy victory the sting of death is sin and the strength of sin is the Law But thanks be to God which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Lord make me stedfast and unmoveable alwayes abounding in the work of the Lord For I know that my labour is not in vain in the Lord. The Prayer for the grace and strengths of faith O Holy and eternall Jesus who didst die for me and for all mankind abolishing our sin reconciling us to God adopting us into the portion of thine heritage and establishing with us a covenant of faith and obedience making our souls to rely upon spirituall strengths by the supports of a holy belief and the expectation of rare promises and the infallible truths of God O let me for ever dwell upon the rock leaning upon thy arm beleeving thy word trusting in thy promises waiting for thy mercies and doing thy commandements that the Devil may not prevail upon me and my own weaknesses may not abuse or unsettle my perswasions nor my sins discompose my just confidence in thee and thy eternall mercies Let me alwayes be thy servant and thy disciple and die in the communion of thy Church of all faithfull people Lord I renounce whatsoever is against thy truth and if secretly I have or do beleeve any false proposition I do it in the simplicity of my heart and great weaknesse and if I could
that the sick man make an universal confession or a renovation and repetition of all the particular confessions and accusations of his whole life that now at the foot of his account he may represent the summe totall to God and his conscience and make provisions for their remedie and pardon according to his present possibilities 5. Now is the time to make reflex acts of repentance that as by a general repentance we supply the want of the just extension of parts so by this we may supply the proper measures of the intension of degrees In our health we can consider concerning our own acts whether they be real or hypocritical essential or imaginary sincere or upon interest integrall or imperfect commensurate or defective and although it is a good caution of securities after all our care and diligence still to suspect our selves and our own deceptions and for ever to beg of God pardon and acceptance in the union of Christs passion and intercession yet in proper speaking reflex acts of repentance being a suppletory after the imperfection of the direct are then most fit to be used when we cannot proceed in and prosecute the direct actions To repent because we cannot repent and to grieve because we cannot grieve was a device invented to serve the turn of the mother of Peter Gratian but it was used by her and so advised to be in her sicknesse and last actions of repentance for in our perfect health and understanding if we doe not understand our first act we cannot discern our second and if we be not sorry for our sins we cannot be sorry for want of sorrows it is a contradiction to say we can because want of sorrow to which we are obliged is certainly a great sin and if we can grieve for that then also for the rest if not for all then not for this but in the dayes of weaknesse the case is otherwise for then our actions are imperfect our discourse weak our internall actions not discernable our fears great our work to be abbreviated and our defects to be supplied by spirituall arts and therefore it is proper and proportionate to our state and to our necessity to beg of God pardon for the imperfections of our repentance acceptance of our weaker sorrows supplies out of the treasures of grace and mercy and thus repenting of the evil and unhandsome adherencies of our repentance in the whole integrity of the duty it will become a repentance not to be repented of 6. Now is the time beyond which the sick man must at no hand defer to make restitution of all his unjust possessions or other mens rights and satisfactions for all injuries and violencies according to his obligation and possibilities for although many circumstances might impede the acting it in our lives-time and it was permitted to be deferred in many cases because by it justice was not hindred and oftentimes piety and equity were provided for yet because this is the last scene of our life he that does not act it so far as he can or put it into certain conditions and order of effecting can never do it again and therefore then to defer it is to omit it and leaves the repentance defective in an integrall and constituent part 7. Let the sick man be diligent and watchfull that the principle of his repentance be contrition or sorrow for sins commenced upon the love of God For although sorrow for sins upon any motive may lead us to God by many intermediall passages and is the threshold of returning sinners yet it is not good nor effective upon our death-bed because repentance is not then to begin but must then be finished and completed and it is to be a supply and reparation of all the imperfections of that duty and therefore it must by that time be arrived to contrition that is it must have grown from fear to love from the passions of a servant to the affections of a son The reason of which besides the precedent is this because when our repentance is in this state it supposes the man also in a state of grace a well grown Christian for to hate sin out of the love of God is not the felicity of a new convert or an infant grace or if it be that love also is in its infancy but it supposes a good progresse and the man habitually vertuous and tending to perfection and therefore contrition or repentance so qualified is usefull to great degrees of pardon because the man is a gracious person and that vertue is of good degree and consequently fit imployment for him that shall work no more but is to appear before his Judge to receive the hire of his day And if his repentance be contrition even before this state of sicknesse let it be increased by spirituall arts and the proper exercises of charity Means of exciting contrition or repentance of sins proceeding from the love of God TO which purpose the sick man may consider and is to be reminded if he does not that there are in God all the motives and causes of amability in the world that God is so infinitely good that there are some of the greatest and most excellent spirits of heaven whose work and whose felicity and whose perfections and whose nature it is to flame and burn in the brightest and most excellent love * that to love God is the greatest glory of Heaven that in him there are such excellencies that the smallest rayes of them communicated to our weaker understandings are yet sufficient to cause ravishments and transportations and satisfactions and joyes unspeakeable and full of glory * that all the wise Christians of the world know and feel such causes to love God that they all professe themselves ready to die for the love of God * and the Apostles and millions of the Martyrs did die for him * And although it be harder to live in his love then to die for it yet all the good people that ever gave their names to Christ did for his love endure the crucifying their lusts the mortification of their appetites the contradictions and death of their most passionate naturall desires * that Kings and Queens have quitted their Diadems and many married Saints have turned their mutuall vowes into the love of Jesus and married him onely keeping a virgin chastity in a married life that they may more tenderly expresse their love to God * that all the good we have derives from Gods love to us and all the good we can hope for is the effect of his love and can descend onely upon them that love him * that by his love it is that we receive the holy Jesus * and by his love we receive the Holy Spirit * and by his love we feel peace and joy within our spirits * and by his love we receive the mysterious Sacrament * And what can be greater then that from the goodnesse and love of God we receive Jesus Christ and
preserve thee in the faith and fear of his holy Name to thy lives end and bring thee to his everlasting Kingdom to live with him for ever and ever Amen Then let the sick man renounce all heresies and whatsoever is against the truth of God or the peace of the Church and pray for pardon for all his ignorances and errors known and unknown After which let him if all other circumstances be fitted be disposed to receive the Blessed Sacrament in which the Curate is to minister according to the form prescribed by the Church When the rites are finished let the sick man in the dayes of his sicknesse be imployed with the former offices and exercises before described and when the time drawes neer of his dissolution the Minister may assist by the following order of recommendation of the soul. I. O Holy and most Gracious Saviour Jesus we humbly recommend the soul of thy servant into thy hands thy most mercifull hands let thy Blessed Angels stand in ministery about thy servant and defend him from the violence and malice of all his ghosâ—ly enemies and drive far from hence all the spirits of darknesse Amen II. LOrd receive the soul of this thy servant Enter not into judgement with thy servaant spare him whom thou hast redeemed with thy most precious blood deliver him from all evil and mischief from the crafts and assaults of the Devil from the fear of death and from everlasting death Good Lord deliver him Amen III. IMpute not unto him the follies of his youth nor any of the errors and miscarriages of his life but strengthen him in his agony let not his faith waver nor his hope fail nor his charity be disordered Let none of his enemies imprint upon him any afflictive or evil phantasme let him die in peace and rest in hope and rise in glory Amen IIII. LOrd we know and beleeve assuredly that whatsoever is under thy custody cannot be taken out of thy hands nor by all the violences of hell robbed of thy protection preserve the work of thy hands rescue him from all evil for whose sake thou didst suffer all evil Take into the participation of thy glories him to whom thou hast given the seal of Adoption the earnest of the inheritance of the Saints Amen V. LEt his portion be with Abraham Isaac and Iacob with Iob and David with the Prophets and Apostles with Martyrs and all thy holy Saints in the arms of Christ in the bosome of felicity in the Kingdom of God to eternall ages Amen These following prayers are fit also to be added to the foregoing offices in case there be no communion or entercourse but prayer Let us Pray O Almighty and eternall God there is no number of thy dayes or of thy mercies thou hast sent us into this world to serve thee and to live according to thy lawes but we by our sins have provoked thee to wrath and we have planted thorns and sorrows round about our dwellings and our life is but a span long and yet very tedious because of the calamities that inclose us in on every side the dayes of our pilgrimage are few and evil we have frail and sickly bodies violent and distempered passions long designes and but a short stay weak understandings and strong enemies abused fancies perverse wils O Dear God look upon us in mercy and pity let not our weaknesses make us to sin against thee nor our fear cause us to betray our duty nor our former follies provoke thy eternall anger nor the calamities of this world vex us into tediousnesse of spirit and impatience but let thy Holy Spirit lead us thorow this vally of misery with safety and peace with holiness and religion with spirituall comforts and joy in the Holy Ghost that when we have served thee in our generations we may be gathered unto our Fathers having the testimony of a holy conscience in the communion of the Catholike Church in the confidence of a certain faith and the comforts of a reasonable religious and holy hope and perfect charity with thee our God and all the world that neither death nor life nor Angels nor principalities nor powers nor things present nor things to come nor height nor depth nor any other creature may be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Amen II. O Holy and most gracious Saviour Jesus in whose hands the souls of all faithfull people are laid up till the day of recompence have mercy upon the body and soul of this thy servant and upon all thy elect people who love the Lord Jesus and long for his coming Lord refresh the imperfection of their condition with the aids of the Spirit of grace and comfort and with the visitation and guard of Angels and supply to them all their necessities known onely unto thee let them dwell in peace and feel thy mercies pitying their infirmities and the follies of their flesh and speedily satisfying the desires of their spirits and when thou shalt bring us all forth in the day of Judgement O then shew thy self to be our Saviour Jesus our Advocate and our Judge Lord then remember that thou hast for so many ages prayed for the pardon of those sins which thou art then to sentence Let not the accusations of our consciences nor the calumnies and aggravation of Devils nor the effects of thy wrath presse those souls whâ—ch thou lovest which thou didst redeem which thou doest pray for but enable us all by the supporting hand of thy mercy to stand upright in judgement O Lord have mercy upon us have mercy upon us O Lord let thy mercy lighten upon us as our trust is in thee O Lord in thee have we trusted let us never be confounded Let us meet with joy and for ever dwell with thee feeling thy pardon supported with thy graciousnesse absolved by thy sentence saved by thy mercy that we may sing to the glory of thy Name eternall Allelujahs Amen Amen Amen Then may be added in the behalf of all that are present these ejaculations O spare us a little that we may recover our strength before we go hence and be no more seen Amen Cast us not away in the time of age O forsake us not when strength faileth Amen Grant that we may never sleep in sin or death eternall but that we may have our part of the first resurrection and that the second death may not prevail over us Amen Grant that our souls may be bound up in the bundle of life and in the day when thou bindest up thy Jewels remember thy servants for good and not for evil that our souls may be numbred amongst the righteous Amen Grant unto all sick and dying Christians mercy and aids from heaven and receive the souls returning unto thee whom thou hast redeemed with thy most precious blood Amen Grant unto thy servants to have faith in the Lord Jesus a daily meditation of death a contempt of
ignorance and prodigious errours made ridiculous with a thousand weaknesses worne away with labours loaden with diseases daily vexed with dangers and temptations and in love with misery we are weakned with delights afflicted with want with the evils of my self and of all my family and with the sadnesses of all my friends and of all good men even of the whole Church and therefore me thinks we need not be troubled that God is pleased to put an end to all these troubles and to let them sit down in a natural period which if we please may be to us the beginning of a better life When the Prince of Persia wept because his army should all die in the revolution of an age Artabanus told him that they should all meet with evils so many and so great that every man of them should wish himself dead long before that Indeed it were a sad thing to be cut of the stone and we that are in health tremble to think of it but the man that is wearied with the disease looks upon that sharpnesse as upon his cure and remedie and as none need to have a tooth drawn so none could well endure it but he that hath felt the pain of it in his head so is our life so full of evils that therefore death is no evil to them that have felt the smart of this or hope for the joyes of a better 2. But as it helps to ease a certain sorrow as a fire drawes out fire and a nail drives forth a nail so it instructs us in a present duty that is that we should not be so fond of a perpetual storm nor doat upon the transient gaudes and gilded thorns of this world They are not worth a passion not worth a sigh or a groan not of the price of one nights watching and therefore they are mistaken and miserable persons who since Adam planted thorns round about Paradise are more in love with that hedge then all the fruits of the garden sottish admirers of things that hurt them of sweet poisons gilded daggers and silken halters Tell them they have lost a bounteous friend a rich purchase a fair farm a wealthy donative and you dissolve their patience it is an evil bigger then their spirit can bear it brings sicknesse and death they can neither eate nor sleep with such a sorrow But if you represent to them the evils of a vitious habit and the dangers of a state of sin if you tell them they have displeased God and interrupted their hopes of heaven it may be they will be so civil as to hear it patiently and to treat you kindly and first commend and then to forget your story because they prefer this world with all its sorrowes before the pure unmingled felicities of heaven But it is strange that any man should be so passionately in love with the thorns that grow on his own ground that he should wear them for armelets and knit them in his shirt and prefer them before a kingdom and immortality No man loves this world the better for his being poor but men that love it because they have great possessions love it because it is troublesome and chargeable full of noise and temptation because it is unsafe and ungoverned flattered and abused and he that considers the troubles of an overlong garment and of a crammed stomach a trailing gown and a loaden Table may justly understand that all that for which men are so passionate is their hurt and their objection that which a temperate man would avoid and a wise man cannot love He that is no fool but can consider wisely if he be in love with this world we need not despair but that a witty man might reconcile him with tortures and make him think charitably of the Rack and be brought to dwell with Vipers and Dragons and entertain his Guests with the shrikes of Mandrakes Cats and Scrich Owls with the filing of iron and the harshnesse of rending silk or to admire the harmony that is made by a herd of Evening wolves when they misse their draught of blood in their midnight Revels The groans of a man in a fit of the stone are worse then all these and the distractions of a troubled conscience are worse then those groans and yet a carelesse merry sinner is worse then all that But if we could from one of the battlements of Heaven espie how many men and women at this time lye fainting and dying for want of bread how many young men are hewen down by the sword of war how many poor Orphans are now weeping over the graves of their Father by whose life they were enabled to eat If we could but hear how many Mariners and Passengers are at this present in a storm and shrike out because their keel dashes against a Rock or bulges under them how many people there are that weep with want and are mad with oppression or are desperate by too quick a sense of a constant infelicity in all reason we should be glad to be out of the noise and participation of so many evils This is a place of sorrows and tears of great evils and a constant calamity let us remove from hence at least in affections and preparation of minde CHAP. II. A general preparation towards a holy and blessed Death by way of exercise SECT I. Three precepts preparatory to a holy death to be practised in our whole life 1. HE that would die well must alwayes loook for death every day knocking at the gates of the grave and then the gates of the grave shall never prevail upon him to do him mischief This was the advice of all the wise and good men of the world who especially in the dayes and periods of their joy and festival egressions chose to throw some ashes into their chalices some sober remembrances of their fatal period Such was the black shirt of Saladine the tomb-stone presented to the Emperour of Constantinople on his Coronation day the Bishop of Romes two reeds with flax and wax taper the Egyptian skeleton served up at feasts and Trimalcions banquet in Petronius in which was brought in the image of a dead mans bones of silver with spondiles exactly turning to every of the Guests and saying to every one that you and you must die and look not one upon another for every one is equally concerned in this sad representment These in phantastic semblances declare a severe counsel and useful meditation and it is not easy for a man to be gay in his imagination or to be drunk with joy or wine pride or revenge who considers sadly that he must ere long dwell in a house of darknesse and dishonour and his bodie must be the inheritance of worms and his soul must be what he pleases even as a man makes it here by his living good or bad I have read of a young Hermit who being passionately in love with a young Lady could not by all the
image of the disease he made the very picture to sigh and groan It is easie to tell upon the interest of what vertue such counterfeiting is to be reproved But it will be harder to snatch the politicks of the world from following that which they call a canonized and authentick precedentâ— and Davids counterfeiting himself mad before the King of Gath to save his life and liberty wil be sufficient to entice men to serve an end upon the stock charges of so small an irregularity not in the matter of manners but in the rules and decencies of natural or civil deportment I cannot certainly tell what degrees of excuse Davids action might put on This onely besides his present necessity the Laws whose coercitive or directive power David lived under had lesse of severity and more of liberty and towards enemies had so little of restraint and so great a power that what amongst them was a direct sin if used to their brethren the sons of Iacob was lawfull and permitted to be acted against enemies To which also I adde this general caution that the actions of holy persons in Scripture are not alwayes good precedents to us Christians who are to walk by a rule and a greater strictnesse with more simplicity and heartinesse of pursuit And amongst them sanctity and holy living did in very many of its instances increase in new particulars of duty and the prophets reproved many things which the law forbad not and taught many duties which Moses prescribed not and as the time of Christs approach came so the sermons and revelations too were more evangelical and like the patterns which were â—ully to be exhibited by the Son of God Amongst which it is certain that Christian simplicity and godly sincerity is to be accounted * and counterfeiting of sicknesse is a huge enemy to this * it is an upbraiding the Divine providence * a jesting with fire * a playing with a thunderbolt * a making the decrees of God to serve the vitious or secular ends of men * it is a tempting of a judgement * a falâ—e accusation of God * a forestalling and antidating his anger * it is a cousening of men by making a God party in the fraud and therefore if the cousenage returns upon the mans own head he enters like a fox into his sicknesse and perceives himself catched in a trap or earthed in the intolerable dangers of the grave 3. Although we must be infinitely careful to prevent it that sin does not thrust us into a sicknesse yet when we are in the house of sorrow we should do well to take Physick against sin and suppose that it is the cause of the evil if not by way of natural causality and proper effect yet by a moral influence and by a just demerit We can easily see when a man hath got a surfet intemperance is as plain as the hand writing upon the wall and easier to be read but covetousness may cause a Feaver as well as drunkennesse and pride can produce a falling sickness as well as long washings and dilutions of the brain and intemperate lust and we finde it recorded in Scripture that the contemptuous and unprepared manner of reception of the Holy Sacraments caused sicknesse and death and Sacriledge and Vow-breach in Ananias and Saphira made them to descend quick into their graves Therefore when sicknesse is upon us let us cast about and if we can let us finde out the cause of Gods displeasure that it being removed we may return into the health and securities of Gods loving kindnesse Thus in the three years famine David enquired of the Lord what was the matter and God answered it is for Saul and his bloody house and then David expiated the guilt and the people were full again of food and blessing and when Israel was smitten by the Amorites Ioshuah cast about and found out the accursed thing and cast it out and the people after that fought prosperously And what God in that case said to Ioshua he will also verifie to us I will not be with you any more unlesse you destroy the accursed thing from among you But in pursuance of this we are to observe that although in case of loud and clamorous sins the discovery is easy and the remedie not diâ—ficult yet because Christianity is a nice thing and religion is as pure as the sun and the soul of man is apt to be troubled from more principles then the inâ—ricate and curiosluy composed bodie in its innumâ—rable parts it will often happen that if we go to enquire into the particular we shall never finde it out and we may suspect drunkennesse when it may be also a morose delectation in unclean thoughts or covetousnesse or oppression or a crafty invasion of my neighbours rights or my want of charity or my judging unjustly in my own cause or my censuring my neighbours or a secret pride or a base hypocrisie or the pursuance of little ends with violence and passion that may have procured the present messenger of death Therefore ask no more after any one but heartily endeavour to reform all sin no more lest a worse thing happen for a single search or accusation may be the designe of an imperfect repentance but no man does heartily return to God but he that decrees against every irregularity and then onely we can be restored to health or life when we have taken away the causes of sicknesse and a cursed death 4. He that means to have his sicknesse turn into safety and life into health and vertue must make religion the imployment of his sicknesse and prayer the imployment of his religion For there are certain compendiums or abbreviatures and shortnings of religion fitted to several states They that first gave up their names to Christ and that turned from Paganism to Christianity had an abbreviature fitted for them they were to renounce their false worshippings and give up their belief and vow their obedience unto Christ and in the very profession of this they were forgiven in Baptism For God hastens to snatch them from the power of the Devil and therefore shortens the passage and secures the estate In the case of poverty God hath reduced this dutie of man to an abbreviature of those few graces which they can exercise such as are patience contentednesse truth and diligence and the rest he accepts in good will and the charities of the soul in prayers and the actions of a cheap religion And to most men charity is also an abbreviature And as the love of God shortens the way to the purchase of all vertues so the expression of this to the poor goes a huge way in the requisites and towards the consummation of an excellent religion and Martyrdom is another abbreviature and so is every act of an excellent and heroical vertue But when we are fallen into the state of sicknesse and that our understanding is weak and troubled our bodies sick and uselesse
the Holy Ghost and Adoption and the inheritance of sons and to be coheirs with Jesus and to have pardon of our sins and a divine nature and restraining grace and the grace of sanctification and a rest and peace within us and a certain expectation of glory * who can choose but love him who when we had provoked him exceedingly sent his Son to die for us that we might live with him who does so desire to pardon us and save us that he hath appointed his Holy Son continually to intercede for us * That his love is so great that he offers us great kindnesse and intreats us to be happy and makes many decrees in heaven concerning the interest of our soul and the very provision and support of our persons * That he sends an Angel to attend upon every of his servants and to be their guard and their guide in all their dangers and hostilities * That for our sakes he restrains the Devil and puts his mightinesse in fetters and restraints and chastises his malice with decrees of grace and safety * That he it is who makes all the creatures serve us and takes care of our sleeps and preserves all plants and elements all mineralls and vegetables all beasts and birds all fishes and insects for food to us and for ornament for physick and instruction for variety and wonder for delight and for religion * That as God is all good in himself and all good to us so sin is directly contrary to God to reason to religion to safety and pleasure and felicity * That it is a great dishonour to a mans spirit to have been made a fool by a weak temptation and an empty lust and to have rejected God who is so rich so wise so good and so excellent so delicious and so profitable to us * That all the repentance in the world of excellent men does end in contrition or a sorrow for sins proceeding from the love of God because they that are in the state of grace do not fear hell violently and so long as they remain in Gods favour although they suffer the infirmities of men yet they are Gods portion and therefore all the repentance of just and holy men which is certainly the best is a repentance not for lower ends but because they are the friends of God and they are full of indignation that they have done an act against the honour of their Patron and their dearest Lord and Father * That it is a huge imperfection and a state of weaknesse to need to be moved with fear or temporall respects and they that are so as yet are either immerged in the affections of the world or of themselves and those men that bear such a character are not yet esteemed laudable persons or men of good natures or the sons of vertue * That no repentance can be lasting that relies upon any thing but the love of God for temporal motives may cease and contrary contingencies may arise and fear of hell may be expelled by natural or acquired hardnesses and is alwayes the least when we have most need of it and most cause for it for the more habitual our sins are the more cauterized our conscience is the lesse is the fear of hell and yet our danger is much the greater * that although fear of hell or other temporal motives may be the first inlet to a repentance yet repentance in that constitution and under those circumstances cannot obtain pardon because there is in that no union with God no adhesion to Christ no endeerment of passion or of spirit no similitude or conformity to the great instrument of our peace our glorious Mediatour for as yet a man is turned from his sin but not converted to God the first and last of our returns to God being love and nothing but love for obedience is the first part of love and fruition is the last and because he that does not love God cannot obey him therefore he that does not love him cannot enjoy him Now that this may he reduced to practise the sick man may be advertised that in the actions of repentance * he separate low temporal sensual and self ends from his thoughts and so do his repentance * that he may still reflect honour upon God * that he confesse his justice in punishing that he acknowledge himself to have deserved the worst of evils * that he heartily believe and professe that if he perish finally yet that God ought to be glorified by that sad event and that he hath truly merited so intolerable a calamity * that he also be put to make acts of election and preference professing that he would willingly endure all temporal evils rather then be in the disfavour of God or in the state of sin for by this last instance he will be quitted from the suspicion of leaving sin for temporal respects because he by an act of imagination or fained presence of the object to him entertains the temporal evil that he may leave the sin and therefore unlesse he be a hypocrite does not leave the sin to be quit of the temporal evil And as for the other motive of leaving sin our of the fear of hell because that is an evangelical motive conveyed to us by the spirit of God and is immediate to the love of God if the Schoolmen had pleased they might have reckoned it as the hand-maid and of the retinue of contrition but the more the considerations are sublimed above this of the greater effect and the more immediate to pardon will be the repentance 8. Let the sick persons do frequent actions of repentance by way of prayer for all those sins which are spiritual and in which no restitution or satisfaction material can be made and whose contrary acts cannot in kinde be exercised For penitential prayers in some cases are the only instances of repentance that can be An envious man if he gives God hearty thanks for the advancement of his brother hath done an act of mortification of his envy as directly as corporal austerities are an act of chastity and an enemy to uncleanness and if I have seduced a person that is dead or absent if I cannot restore him to sober counsels by my discourse and undeceiving him I can onely repent of that by way of prayer and intemperance is no way to be rescinded or punished by a dying man but by hearty prayers Prayers are a great help in all cases in some they are proper acts of vertue and direct enemies to sin but although alone and in long continuance they alone can cure some one or some few little habits yet they can never alone change the state of the man and therefore are intended to be a suppletory to the imperfections of other acts and by that reason are the proper and most pertinent imployment of a Clinick or death-bed penitent 9. In those sins whose proper cure is mortification corporal the sick man is to supply that part of
tongue shall sing aloud of thy righteousnesse The sacrifice of God is a broken heart a broken and a contrite heart O God thou wilt not despise Lord I have done amisse I have been deceived let so great a wrong as this be removed The prayer for the grace and perfection of Repentance I. O Almighty God thou art the great Judge of all the world the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ the Father of mercies the Father of men and Angels thou lovest not that a sinner should perish but delightest in our conversion and salvation and hast in our Lord Jesus Christ established the Covenant of repentance and promised pardon to all them that confesse their sins and forsake them O my God be thou pleased to work in me what thou hast commanded should be in me Lord I am a dry tree who neither have brought forth fruit unto thee and unto holinesse nor have wept out salutary tears the instrument of life and restitution but have behaved my self like an unconcerned person in the ruins and breaches of my soul But O God thou art my God earnestly will I seek thee my soul thirsteth for thee in a barren and thirsty land where no water is Lord give me the grace of tears and pungent sorrow let my heart be as a land of rivers of waters and my head a fountain of tears turn my sin into repentance and let my repentance proceed to pardon refreshment II. SUpport me with thy graces strengthen me with thy Spirit soften my heart with the fire of thy love and the dew of heaven with penitentiall showers make my care prudent and the remaining portion of my dayes like the perpetuall watches of the night full of caution and observance strong and resolute patient and severe I remember O Lord that I did sin with greedinesse and passion with great desires and an unabated choice O let me be as great in my repentance as ever I have been in my calamity and shame let my hatred of sin be great as my love to thee and both as neer to infinite as my proportion can receive III. O Lord I renounce all affection to sin and would not buy my health nor redeem my life with doing any thing against the Lawes of my God but would rather die then offend thee O dearest Saviour have pity upon thy servant let me by thy sentence be doomed to perpetuall penance during the abode of this life let every sigh be the expression of a repentance and every groan an acccent of spiritual life and every stroke of my disease a punishment of my sin and an instrument of pardon that at my return to the land of innocence I may eat of the votive sacrifice of the supper of the Lamb that was from the beginning of the world slâ—in for the sins of every sorrowful and returning sinner O grant me sorrow here and joy hereafter through Jesus Christ who is our hope the resurrection of the dead the justifier of a sinner and the glory of all faithful souls Amen A prayer for pardon of sins to be said frequently in time of sicknesse and in all the portions of old age I. O Eternal and most gracious Father I humbly throw my self down at the foot of thy mercy seat upon the confidence of thy essential mercy and thy commandment that we should come boldly to the throne of grace that we may finde mercy in time of need O my God hear the prayers and cries of a sinner who calls earnestly for mercy Lord my needs are greater then all the degrees of my desire can be unlesse thou hast pity upon me I perish infinitely and intolerably and then there will be one voice fewer in the quire of singers who shall recite thy praises to eternal ages But O Lord in mercy deliver my soul. O save me for thy mercy sake For in the second death there is no remembrance of thee in that grave who shall give thee thanks II. O Just and dear God my sins are innumerable they are upon my soul in multitudes they are a burden too heavy for me to bear they already bring sorrow and sicknesse shame and displeasure guilt and a decaying spirit a sense of thy present displeasure and fear of worse of infinitely worse But it is to thee so essential so delightful so usual so desired by thee to shew mercy that although my sin be very great and my fear proportionable yet thy mercy is infinitely greater then all the world and my hope and my comfort rise up in proportions towards it that I trust the Devils shall never be able to reprove it nor my own weaknesse discompose it Lord thou hast sent thy Son to die for the pardon of my sins thou hast given me thy holy Spirit as a seal of adoption to consigne the article of remission of sins thou hast for all my sins still continued to invite me to conditions of life by thy ministers the prophets and thou hast with variety of holy acts softned my spirit and possessed my fancie and instructed my understanding and bended and inclined my will and directed or overruled my passions in order to repentance and pardon and why should not thy servant beg passionately and humbly hope for the effect of all these thy strange and miraculous acts of loving kindnesse Lord I deserve it not but I hope thou wilt pardon all my sins and I beg it of thee for Jesus Christ his sake whom thou hast made the great endearment of thy promises and the foundation of our hopes and the mighty instrument whereby we can obtain of thee whatsoever we need and can receive III. O My God how shall thy servant be disposed to receive such a favour which is so great that the ever blessed Jesus did die to purchase for us so great that the falling angels never could hope and never shall obtain Lord I do from my soul forgive all that have sinned against me O forgive me my sins as I forgive them that have sinned against me Lord I confesse my sins unto thee daily by the accusations and secret acts of conscience and if we confesse our sins thou hast called it a part of justice to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousnesse Lord I put my trust in thee and thou art ever gracious to them that put their trust in thee I call upon my God for mercy and thou art alwayes more ready to hear then we to pray But all that I can do and all that I am and all that I know of my self is nothing but sin and infirmity and misery therefore I go forth of my self and throw my self wholly into the arms of thy mercy through Jesus Christ and beg of thee for his death and passions sake by his resurrection and ascension by all the parts of our redemption and thy infinite mercy in which thou pleasest thy self above all the works of the creation to be pitifull and compassionate to thy servant
in the abolition of all my sins so shall I praise thy glories with a tongue not defiled with evil language and a heart purged by thy grace quitted by thy mercy and absolved by thy sentence from generation to generation Amen An act of holy resolution of amendment of life in case of recovery O Most just and most mercifull Lord God who hast sent evil diseases sorrow fear trouble and uneasinesse briars and thorns into the world and planted them in our houses and round about our dwellings to keep sin from our souls or to drive it thence I humbly beg of thee that this my sicknesse may serve the ends of the Spirit and be a messenger of spirituall life an instrument of reducing me to more religious and sober courses I know O Lord that I am unready and unprepared in my accounts having thrown away great portions of my time in vanity and set my self hugely back in the accounts of eternity and I had need live my life over again and live it better but thy counsels are in the great deep and thy footsteps in the water and I know not what thou wilt determine of me If I die I throw my self into the arms of the Holy Jesus whom I love above all things and if I perish I know I have deserved it but thou wilt not reject him that loves thee But if I recover I will live by thy grace and help to do the work of God and passionately pursue my interest of Heaven and serve thee in the labour of love with the charities of a holy zeal and the diligence of a firm and humble obedience Lord I will dwell in thy temple and in thy service religion shall be my imployment and alms shall be my recreation and patience shall be my rest and to do thy will shall be my meat and drink and to live shall be Christ and then to die shall be gain O spare me a little that I may recover my strength before I go hence and be no more seen Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven Amen SECT VIII An Analysis or resolution of the Decalogue and the speciall precepts of the Gospel describing the duties injoyned and the sins forbidden respectiuely for the assistance of sick men in making their confessions to God and his Ministers and the rendring their repentance more particular and perfect I THou shalt have none other Gods but me Duties commanded are 1. To love God above all things 2. To obey him and fear him 3. To worship him with prayers vows thanksgivings presenting to him our souls and bodies and all such actions and expressions which the consent of Nations or the Lawes and Customs of the place where we live have appropriated to God 4. To designe all to Gods glory 5. To enquire after his will 6. To beleeve all his word 7. To submit to his providence 8. To proceed toward all our lawfull ends by such means as himself hath appointed 9. To speak and think honourably of God and recite his praises and confesse his Attributes and perfections They sin against this Commandement 1. Who love themselves or any of the creatures inordinately and intemperately 2. They that despise or neglect any of the Divine precepts 3. They that pray to unknown or false gods 4. They that disbeleeve or deny there is a God 5. They that make vows to creatures 6. Or say prayers to the honour of men or women or Angels as Pater nosters to the honour of the Virgin Mary or S. Peter which is a taking a part of that honour which is due to God and giving it to the creature it is a religion paid to men and women out of Gods proper portion out of prayers directed to God immediately and it is an act contrary to that religion which makes God the last end of all things for this thâ—ough our addresses to God passes something to the creatures as if they stood beyond him for by the intermediall worship paid to God they ultimately do honour to the man or Angel 7. They that make consumptive oblations to the creatures as the Collyridians who offered cakes and those that burn incense or candles to the Virgin Mary 8. They that give themselves to the Devil or make contracts with him and use phantastic conversation with him 9 They that consult Witches and Fortune-tellers 10. They that rely upon dreams and superstitious observances 11 That use charmes spels superstitious words and characters verses of Psalms the consecrated elements to cure diseases to be shot free to recover stolne goods or inquire into secrets 12. That are wilfully ignorant of the lawes of God or love to be deceived in their perswasions that they may sin with confidence 13. They that neglect to pray to God 14. They that arrogate to themselves the glory of any action or power and do not give the glory to God as Herod 15. They that doubt of or disbeleeve any article of the Creed or any proposition of Scripture or put false glosses to serve saecular or vitious ends against their conscience or with violence any way done to their reason 16. They that violently or passionately pursue any temporall end with an eagernesse greater then the thing is in prudent account 17 They that make religion to serve ill ends or do good to exil purposes or evil to good purposes 18. They that accuse God of injustice or unmercifulnesse remissenesse or cruelty such as are the presumptuous and the desperate 19. All hypocrites and pretenders to religion walking in forms and shadows but denying the power of godlinesse 20. All impatient persons all that repine or murmur against the prosperities of the wicked or the calamities of the godly or their own afflictions 21. All that blaspheme God or speak dishonourable things of so Sacred a Majesty 22. They that tempt God or rely upon his protection against his rules and without his promise and besides reason entring into danger from which without a miracle they cannot be rescued 23. They that are bold in the midst of judgement and fearlesse in the midst of the Divine vengeance and the accents of his anger II. Comm. Thou shalt not make to thy self any graven image nor worship it The morall duties of this commandement are 1. To worship God with all bodily worship and externall forms of addresse according to the custom of the Church we live in 2. To beleeve God to be a spirituall and pure substance without any visible form of shape 3. To worship God in wayes of his own appointing or by his proportions or measures of nature and right reason or publike and holy customes They sin against this Commandement 1. That make any image or pictures of the Godhead or fancy any likenesse to him 2. They that use images in their religion designing or addressing any religious worship to them For if this thing could be naturally tolerable yet it is too neer an intolerable for a jealous God to suffer 3.
of marriage 2. To keep all the parts of our bodies in the care and severities of chastity so that we be restrained in our eyes as well as in our feet They sin against this Commandment 1. Who are adulterous incestuous Sodomitical or commit fornication 2. They that commit folly alone dishonouring their own bodies with softnesse and wantonnesse 3. They that immoderately let loose the reins of their bolder appetite though within the protection of marriage 4 They that by wanton gestures wandring eyes lascivious dressings discovery of the nakednesse of themselves or others filthy discourse high diet amorous songs balls and revellings tempt and betray themselves or others to folly 5. They that marry a woman divorced for adultery 6. They that divorce their wives except for adultery and marry another VIII Com. Thou shalt not steal The duties are 1. To give every man his due 2. To permit every man to enjoy his own goods and estate quietly They sin against this Commandment 1. That injure any mans estate by open violence or by secret robbery by stealth or cousenage by arts of bargaining or vexatious law-suits 2. That refuse or neglect to pay their debts when they are able 3 That are forward to run into debt knowingly beyond their power without hopes or purposes of repaiment 4. Oppressors of the poor 5. That exact usury of necessitous persons or of any beyond the permissions of equity as determined by the laws 6. All sacrilegious persons people that rob God of his dues or of his possessions 7. All that game viz. at Cards and Dice c. to the prejudice and detriment of other mens estates 8. They that imbase coyn and mettals and obtrude them for perfect and natural 9. That break their promises to the detriment of a third person 10 They that refuse to stand to their bargains 11. They that by negligence imbecil other mens estates spoiling or letting any thing perish which is intrusted to them 12. That refuse to restore the pledge IX Com. Thou shalt not bear false witnesse The duties are 1. To give testimony to truth when we are called to it by competent authority 2. To preserve the good name of our neighbours 3. To speak well of them that deserve it They sin against this commandment 1. That speak false things in judgement accusing their neighbors unjustly or denying his crime publickly when we are asked and can be commanded lawfully to tell it 2. Flatterers and 3. slanderers 4. backbiters 5. and detracters 6. They that secretly raise jealousies and suspition of their neighbours causelesly X. Thou shalt not covet The duties are 1. To be content with the portion God hath given us 2. Not to be covetous of other mens goods They sin against this commandment 1. That envy the prosperities of other men 2. They that desire passionately to be possessed of what is their neighbours 3. They that with greedinesse pursue riches honours pleasures and curiosities 4. They that are too careful troubled distracted or amazed affrighted and afflicted with being sollicitous in the conduct of temporal blessings These are the general lines of duty by which we may discover our failings and be humbled and confesse accordingly onely the penitent person is to remember that although these are the kindes of sins described after the sense of the Jewish Church which consisted principally in the external action or the deed done and had no restraints upon the thoughts of men save onely in the tenth commandment which was mixt and did relate as much to action as to thought as appears in the instances yet upon us Christians there are many circumstances and degrees of obligation which endear our duty with greater severity and observation and the penitent is to account of himself and enumerate his sins not onely by external actions or the deed done but by words by thoughts and so to reckon if he have done it directly or indirectly if he have caused others to do it by tempting or incouraging by assisting or counselling by not disswading when he could and ought by fortifying their hands or hearts or not weakning their evil purposes if he have designed or contrived its action desired it or loved it delighted in the thought remembred the past sin with pleasure or without sorrow these are the by-wayes of sins and the crooked lanes in which a man may wander and be lost as certainly as in the broad high wayes of iniquity But besides this our blessed Lord and his Apostles have added divers other precepts some of which have been with some violence reduc'd to the Decalogue and others have not bin noted at all in the catalogues of confession I shall therefore describe them entirely that the sick man discover his failings that by the mercies of God in Jesus Christ and by the instrument of repentance he may be presented pure and spotlesse before the throne of God The special precepts of the Gospel 1. PRayer frequent servent holy and persevering 2. Faith 3. Repentance 4. Poverty of spirit as opposed to ambition high designes 5. and in it is humility or sitting down in the lowest place and in giving honour to go before another 6. meeknesse as it is opposed to waywardnesse fretfulnesse immoderate grieving disdain and scorn 7. contempt of the world 8. prudence or the advantagious conduct of religion 9. simplicity or sincerity in words and actions pretences and substances 10. hope 11. hearing the word 12. Reading 13. Assembling together 14. obeying them that have the rule over us in spiritual affairs 15. Refusing to communicate with persons excommunicate whither also may be reduced To reject Hereticks 16 Charity viz. love to God above all things brotherly kindnesse or profitable love to our neighbours as our selves to be expressed in almes forgivenesse and to dye for our brethren 17 To pluck out the right eye or violently to rescind all occasions of sin though dear to us as an eye 18 To reprove our erring brother 19 To be patient in afflictions and longanimity is referred hither or long sufferance which is the perfection and perseverance of patience and is opposed to hastinesse and wearinesse of spirit 20 To be thankful to our benefactors but above all in all things to give thanks to God 21. To rejoyce in the Lord alwayes 22. Not to quench not to grieve not to resist the Spirit 23 To love our wives as Christ loved his Church and to reverence our husbands 24. To provide for our families 25 Not to be bitter to our children 26. To bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord 27. Not to despise prophesying 28. To be gentle and easie to be intreated 29. To give no scandal or offence 30. To follow after peace with all men and to make peace 31. Not to go to law before the
everlasting habitations He that gives with his own hand shall be sure to find it and the poor shall find it but he that trusts Executors with his charity the Oeconomy and issues of his vertue by which he must enter into his hopes of heaven pardon shall find but an ill account when his Man thee behoueth oft to have this in mind That thou giveth with thine hand that shalt thou find For widows be slofull and children beâ—h unkind Executors beth covetous keep all that they find If any body ask where the deâ—ds goods became â—hey answer So God me help Halidam he died a poor man Think on this executors complain he died poor Think on this To this purpose wise and pious was the counsell of Salvian Let a dying man who hath nothing else of which he may make an effective oblation offer up to God of his substance Let him offer it with compunction and tears with grief and mourning as knowing that all our oblations have their value not by the price but by the affection and it is our faith that commends the money since God receives the money by the hands of the poor but at the same time gives and does not take the blessing because he receives nothing but his own and man gives that which is none of his own that of which onely he is a steward and shall be accountable for every shilling Let it therefore be offered humbly as a Creditor payes his debts not magnifically as a Prince gives a donative and let him remember that such doles do not pay for the sin but they ease the punishment they are not proper instruments of redemption but instances of supplication and advantages of prayer and when we have done well remember that we have not payed our debt but showen our willingnesse to give a little of the vast sum we owe and he that gives plentifully according to the measure of his estate is still behind hand according to the measure of his sins let him pray to God that this late oblation may be accepted and so it will if it sails to him in a sea of poenitentiall tears or sorrows that it is so little and that it is so late 6. Let the sick mans charity be so ordered that it may not come onely to deck the funerall and make up the pomp charity waiting like one of the solemn mourners but let it be continued that beside the alms of health and sicknesse there may be a rejoycing in God for his charity long after his funeralls so as to become more beneficial and lesse publike that the poor may pray in private and give God thanks many dayes together This is matter of prudence and yet in this we are to observe the same regards which we had in the charity and alms of our lives with this onely difference that in the funerall alms also of rich and able persons the publike customes of the Church are to be observed and decencie and solemnity and the expectations of the poor and matter of publike opinion and the reputation of religion In all other cases let thy charity consult with humility and prudence that it never ministers at all to vanity but be as full of advantage and usefulnesse as it may 7. Every man will forgive a dying person and therefore let the sick man be ready and sure if he can to send to such persons whom he hath injured and beg their pardon and do them right For in his case he cannot stay for an opportunity of convenient and advantageous reconcilement he cannot then spin out a treaty nor beat down the price of composition nor lay a snare to be quit from the obligation and coërcion of lawes but he must ask forgivenesse down-right and make him amends as he can being greedy of making use of this opportunity of doing a duty that must be done but cannot any more if not now untill times return again and tels the minuts backward so that yesterday shall be reckoned in the portions of the future 8. In the intervalls of sharper pains when the sick man amâ—sses together all the arguments of comfort and testimonies of Gods love to him and care of him he must needs find infinite matter of thanksgiving and glorification of God and it is a proper act of charity and love to God and justice too that he do honour to God on his death-bed for all the blessings of his life not onely in generall communications but those by which he hath been separate and discerned from others or supported and blessed in his own person Such as are In all my life time I never broke a bone I never fell into the hands of robbers never into publike shame or into noysome diseases I have not begd my bread nor been tempted by great and unequall fortunes God gave me a good understanding good friends or delivered me in such a danger and heard my prayers in such particular pressures of my spirit This or the like enumeration and consequent acts of thanksgiving are apt to produce love to God and confidence in the day of triall for he that * gave me blessings in proportion to the state and capacities of my life I hope also will do so in proportion to the needs of my sicknesse and my death-bed This we find practised as a most reasonable piece of piety by the wisest of the Heathens So Antipater Tarsensis gave God thanks for his prosperous voyage into Greece and Cyrus made a handsom prayer upon the tops of the mountains when by a phantasme he was warned of his approaching death Receive O God my Father these holy rites by which I put an end to many and great affairs and I give thee thanks for thy celestiall signes and prophetic notices whereby thou hast signified to me what I ought to do and what I ought not I present also very great thanks that I have perceived and acknowledged your care of me and have never exalted my self above my condition for any prosperous accident And I pray that you will grant felicity to my wife my children and friends and to me a death such as my life hath been But that of Philagrius in Gregory Nazianzen is eucharisticall but it relates more especially to the blessings and advantages which are accidentally consequent to sicknesse I thank thee O Father and maker of all thy children that thou art pleased to blesse and to sanctifie us even against our wils and by the outward man purgest the inward and leadest us through crosse wayes to a blessed ending for reasons best known unto thee However when we go from our hospitall and place of little intermediall rest in our journey to heaven it is fit that we give thanks to the major domo for our entertainment When these parts of religion are finished according to each mans necessity there is nothing remaining of personall duty to be done alone but that the sick man act over these vertues by
the renewings of devotion and in the way of prayer and that is to be continued as long as life and voice and reason dwell with us SECT X. Acts of charity by way of prayer and ejaculation which may also be used for thanksgiving in case of recovery O My soul thou hast said unto the Lord thou art my Lord my goodnesse extendeth not to thee But to the saints that are in the earth and to the excellent in whom is all my delight The Lord is the portion of my inheritance and of my cup thou maintainest my lot As for God his way is perfect the word of the Lord is tried he is a buckler to all those that trust in him For who is God save the Lord or who is a rock save our God It is God that girdeth me with strength and maketh my way perfect Be not thou far from me O Lord O my strength haste thee to help me Deliver my soul from the sword my darling from the power of the dog save me from the lions mouth and thou hast heard me also from among the horns of the Unicorns I will declare thy Name unto my brethren in the midst of the Congregation will I praise thee Ye that fear the Lord praise the Lord ye sons of God J Glorifie him and fear before him all ye sons of men For he hath not despised nor abhorred the affliction of the afflicted neither hath he hid his face from him but when he cryed unto him he heard As the hart panteth after the water brooks so longeth my soul after thee O God My soul thirsteth for God for the living God when shall I come and appear before the Lord. O my God my soul is cast down within me all thy waves and billows are gone over me as with a sword in my bones I am reproached yet the Lord will command his loving kindnesse in the day time and in the night his song shall be with me and my prayer unto the God of my life Blesse ye the Lord in the congregations even the Lord from the fountains of Israel My mouth shall shew forth thy righteousnesse and thy salvation all the day for I know not the numbers thereof I will go in the strength of the Lord God I will make mention of thy righteousnesse even of thine onely O God thou hast taught me from my youth And hitherto have I declared thy wondrous works But I will hope continually and will yet praise thee more and more Thy righteousnesse O God is very high who hast done great things O God who is like unto thee thou which hast shewed me great and sore troubles shalt quicken me again and shalt bring me up again from the depth of the earth Thou shalt encrease thy goodnesse towards me and comfort me on every side My lips shall greatly rejoyce when I sing unto thee And my soul which thou hast redeemed Blessed be the Lord God the God of Israel who only doth wondrous things And blessed be his glorious name for ever and let the whole earth be filled with his glory Amen Amen I love the Lord because he hath heard my voice and my supplication The sorrows of death compassed me I found trouble and sorrow Then called I upon the name of the Lord O Lord I beseech thee deliver my soul. Gracious is the Lord and righteous yea our God is merciful The Lord preserveth the simple I was brought low and he helped me Return to thy rest O my soul the Lord hath dealt bountifully with thee For thou hast delivered my soul from death mine eyes from tears and my feet from falling Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints O Lord truly I am thy servant I am thy servant and the son of thine handmaid thou shalt loose my bonds He that loveth not the Lord Jesus let him be accursed O that I might love thee as well as ever any creature loved thee He that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God There is no fear in love The prayer O Most Gracious and eternal God and loving Father who hast powred out thy bowels upon us and sent the son of thy love unto us to die for love and to make us dwell in love and the eternal comprehensions of thy divine mercies O be pleased to inflame my heart with a holy charity towards thee and all the world Lord I forgive all that ever have offended me and beg that both they and I may enter into the possession of thy mercies and feel a gracious pardon from the same fountain of grace and do thou forgive me all the acts of scandall whereby I have provoked or tempted or lessened or disturbed any person Lord let me never have my portion amongst those that divide the union and disturb the peace and break the charities of the Church and Christian communion And though I am fallen into evil times in which Christendom is divided by the names of an evil division yet I am in charity with all Christians with all that love the Lord Jesus and long for his coming and I would give my life to save the soul of any of my brethren and I humbly beg of thee that the publike calamity of the severall societies of the Church may not be imputed to my soul to any evil purposes II. LOrd preserve me in the unity of the holy Church in the love of God and of my neighbours let thy grace inlarge my heart to remember deeply to resent faithfully to use wisely to improve and humbly to give thanks to thee for all thy favours with which thou hast enriched my soul and supported my estate and preserved my person and rescued me from danger and invited me to goodnesse in all the dayes and periods of my life Thou hast led me thorow it with an excellent conduct and I have gone astray after the manner of men but my heart is towards thee O do unto thy servant as thou usest to do unto those that love thy Name let thy truth comfort me thy mercy deliver me thy staffe support me thy grace sanctifie my sorrow and thy goodnesse pardon all my sins thy Angels guide me with safety in this shadow of death and thy most holy Spirit lead me into the land of righteousnesse for thy Names sake which is so comfortable and for Jesus Christ his sake our Dearest Lord and most Gracious Saviour Amen CHAP. V. Of visitation of the sick or the assistance that is to be done to dying persons by the ministery of their Clergy Guides SECT I. GOd who hath made no new Covenant with dying persons distinct from the Covenant of the living hath also appointed no distinct Sacraments for them no other manner of usages but such as are common to all the spirituall necessities of living and healthfull persons In all the dayes of our religion from our baptisme to the resignation and delivery of our soul God hath appointed