body and wrapt it self about his head till the Philosophers of Egypt said it was natural that from the marrow of some bodies such productions should arise and indeed it represents the condition of some men who being dead are esteemed saints and beatified persons when their head is encircled with dragons and is entered into the possession of Devils that old serpent and deceiver For indeed their life was secretly so corrupted that such serpents fed upon the ruines of the spirit and the decayes of grace and reason To be cosened in making judgements concerning our finall condition is extremely easie but if we be cosened we are infinitely miserable SECT III. Of exercising Charity during our whole life HE that would die well and happily must in his life time according to all his capacities exercise charity and because Religion is the life of the soul and charity is the life of religion the same which gives life to the better part of man which never dies may obtain of God a mercy to the inferiour part of man in the day of its dissolution 1. Charity is the great chanel through which God passes all his mercy upon mankinde For we receive absolution of our sins in proportion to our forgiving our brother this is the rule of our hopes and the measure of our desire in this world and in the day of death and judgement the great sentence upon mankinde shall be transacted according to our almes which is the other part of Charity Certain it is that God cannot will not never did reject a charitable man in his greatest needs and in his most passionate prayers for God himself is love and every degree of charity that dwells in us is the participation of the divine nature and therefore when upon our death-bed a cloud covers our heads and we are enwrapped with sorrow when we feel the weight of a sicknesse and do not feel the refreshing visitations of Gods loving kindnesse when we have many things to trouble us and looking round about us we see no comforter then call to minde what injuries you have forgiven how apt you were to pardon all affronts and real persecutions how you embraced peace when it was offered you how you followed after peace when it run from you and when you are weary of one side turn upon the other and remember the alms that by the grace of God and his assistances you have done and look up to God and with the eye of faith behold him coming in the cloud and pronouncing the sentence of dooms day according to his mercies and thy charity 2. Charity with its Twin-daughters almes and forgivenesse is especially effectual for the procuring Gods mercies in the day and the manner of our death almes deliver from death said old Tobias and almes make an atonement for sins said the son of Sirach and so said Daniel and so say all the wise men of the world And in this sence also is that of S. Peter Love covers a multitude of sins and S. Clement in his Constitutions gives this counsell If you have any thing in your hands give it that it may work to the remission of thy sins for by faith and alms sins are purged The same also is the counsel of Salviâ—n who wonders that men who are guilty of great and many sins will not work out their pardon by alms and mercy But this also must be added out of the words of Lactantius who makes this rule compleat and useful But think not that because sins are taken away by alms that by thy money thou mayest purchase a license to sin For sins are abolished if because thou hast sinned thou givest to God that is to Gods poor servants and his indigent necessitous creature But if thou sinnest upon confidence of giving thy sins are not abolished For God desires infinitely that men should be purged from their sins and therefore commands us to repent But to repent is nothing else but to professe and affirm that is to purpose and to make good that purpose that they will sin no more Now almes are therefore effective to the abolition and pardon of our sins because they are preparatory to and impetratory of the grace of repentance and are fruits of repentance and therefore S. Chrysostom affirmes that repentance without almes is dead and without wings and can never soar upwards to the element of love But because they are a part of repentance and hugely pleasing to Almighty God therefore they deliver us from the evils of an unhappy and accursed death for so Christ delivered his Disciples from the sea when he appeased the storm though they still sailed in the chanel and this S. Hierome verifies with all his reading and experience saying I do not remember to have read that ever any charitable person died an evil death and although a long experience hath observed Gods mercies to descend upon charitable people like the dew upon Gideons fleece when all the world was dry yet for this also we have a promise which is not onely an argument of a certain number of years as experience is but a security for eternall ages Make ye friends of the mammon of unrighteousnesse that when ye fail they may receive you into everlasting habitations When faith fails and chastity is uselesse and temperance shall be no more then charity shall bear you upon wings of cherubins to the eternall mountain of the Lord. I have been a lover of mankinde and a friend and mercifull and now I expect to communicate in that great kindnesse which he shews that is the great God and Father of men and mercies said Cyrus the Persian on his death-bed I do not mean this should onely be a death-bed charity any more then a death-bed repentance but it ought to be the charity of our life healthfull years a parting with portions of our goods then when we can keep them we must not first kindle our lights when we are to descend into our houses of darknesse or bring a glaring torch suddenly to a dark room that will amaze the eye and not delight it or instruct the body but if our Tapers have in their constant course descended into their grave crowned all the way with light then let the death-bed charity be doubled and the light burn brightest when it is to deck our hearse But concerning this I shall afterwards give account SECT IV. General considerations to enforce the former practises THese are the generall instruments of preparation in order to a holy death It will concern us all to use them diligently and speedily for we must be long in doing that which must be done but once and therefore we must begin betimes and lose no time especially since it is so great a venture and upon it depends so great a state Seneca said well There is no Science or Art in the world so hard as to
religion we can do the works of a holy life but upon belief of the promises we can bear our sicknesse patiently and die cheerfully The sick man may practise it in the following instances 1. Let the sick man be careful that he do not admit of any doubt concerning that which he beleeved and received from common consent in his best health and dayes of election and religion For if the Devil can but prevail so far as to unfix and unrivet the resolution and confidence or fulnesse of assent it is easie for him so to unwinde the spirit that from why to whether or no from whether or no to scarcely not from scarcely not to absolutely not at all are steps of a descending and falling spirit and whatsoever a man is made to doubt of by the weaknesse of his understanding in a sicknesse it will be hard to get an instrument strong or subtle enough to reenforce and ensure For when the strengths are gone by which faith held and it does not stand firme by the weight of its own bulk and great constitution nor yet by the cordage of a tenacious root then it is prepared for a ruine which it cannot escape in the tempests of a sicknesse and the assaults of a Devil * Discourse and argument * the line of tradition and a never * failing experience * the Spirit of God and the * truth of miracles * the word of prophecie * and the blood of Martyrs * the excellencie of the doctrine and * the necessity of men * the riches of the promises * and the wisdom of the revelations * the reasonablenesse and * sublimity the * concordance and the * usefulnesse of the articles and * their complyance with all the needs of man * and the goverment of common wealths are like the strings and branches of the roots by which faith stands firm and unmoveable in the spirit and understanding of a man But in sicknesse the understanding is shaken and the ground is removed in which the root did grapple and support its trunk and therefore there is no way now but that it be left to stand upon the old confidences and by the firmament of its own weight it must be left to stand because it alwayes stood there before and as it stood all his life time in the ground of understanding so it must now be supported with will and a fixed resolution But disputation tempts it and shakes it with trying and overthrowes it with shaking Above all things in the world let the sick man fear a proposition which his sickness hath put into him contrary to the discourses of health and a sober untroubled reason 2. Let the sick man mingle the recital of his Creed together with his devotions and in that let him account his faith not in curiosity and factions in the confessions of parties and interests for some over froward zeals are so earnest to professe their little and uncertain articles and glory so to die in a particular and divided communion that in the profession of their faith they lose or discompose their charity let it be enough that we secure our interest of heaven though we do not go about to appropriate the mansions to our sect for every good man hopes to be saved as he is a Christian and not as he is a Lutheran or of another division However those articles upon which he can build the exercise of any vertue in his sicknesse or upon the stock of which he can improve his present condition are such as consist in the greatnesse and goodnesse the veracity and mercy of God thorough Jesus Christ nothing of which can be concerned in the fond disputations which faction and interest hath too long maintained in Christendom 3. Let the sick mans faith especially be active about the promises of grace and the excellent things of the gospel those which can comfort his sorrowes and enable his patience those upon the hopes of which he did the duties of his life and for which he is not unwilling to dye such as the intercession and advocation of Christ remission of sins the resurrection the mysterious arts and mercies of mans redemption Christs triumph over death and all the powers of hell the covenant of grace or the blessed issues of repentance and above all the article of eternal life upon the strength of which 11000 virgins went cheerfully together to their martyrdome and 20000 Christians were burned by Dioclesian on a Christmas day and whole armies of Asian Christians offered themselves to the Tribunals of Arius Anthonius and whole colledges of severe persons were instituted who lived upon religion whose dinner was the Eucharist whose supper was praise and their nights were watches and their dayes were labour for the hope of which then men counted it gain to lose their estates and gloried in their sufferings and rejoyced in their persecutions and were glad at their disgraces this is the article that hath made all the Martyrs of Christ confident and glorious and if it does not more then sufficiently strengthen our spirits to the present suffering it is because we understand it not but have the appetites of beasts and fools But if the sick man fixes his thoughts and lets his habitation to dwell here he swells his hope and masters his fears and eases his sorrows and overcomes his temptations 4. Let the sick man endeavour to turn his faith of the Articles into love of them and that will be an excellent instrument not onely to refresh his sorrows but to confirm his faith in defiance of all temptations For a sick man and a disturbed understanding are not competent and fit instruments to judge concerning the reasonablenesse of a proposition But therefore let him consider and love it because it is usefull and necessary profitable and gracious and when he is once in love with it and then also renews his love to it when he feels the need of it he is an interested person and for his own sake will never let it go and passe into the shadows of doubting or the utter-darknesse of infidelity An act of love will make him have a mind to it and we easily beleeve what we love but very uneasily part with our belief which we for so great an interest have chosen and entertained with a great affection 5. Let the sick person be infinitely carefull that his faith be not tempted by any man or any thing and when it is in any degree weakned let him lay fast hold upon the conclusion upon the Article it self and by earnest prayer beg of God to guide him in certainty and safety For let him consider that the Article is better then all its contrary or contradictory and he is concerned that it be true and concerned also that he do beleeve it but he can receive no good at all if Christ did not die if there be no resurrection if his Creed hath deceived him therefore all that
2 That God delights not in the confusion and death of sinners 3. That in heaven there is great joy at the conversion of a sinner 4. That Christ is a perpetual advocate daily interceding with his Father for our pardon 5. That God uses infinite arts instruments and devices to reconcile us to himself 6. That he prayes us to be in charity with him and to be forgiven 7. That he sends Angels to keep us from violence and evil company from temptations and surprizes and his holy Spirit to guide us in holy wayes and his servants to warn us and reminde us perpetually and therefore since certainly he is so desirous to save us as appears by his word by his oaths by his very nature and his daily artifices of mercy it is not likely that he will condemn us without great provocations of his Majesty and perseverance in them 8. That the covenant of the Gospel is a covenant of grace and of repentance and being established with so many great solemnities and miracles from heaven must signifie a huge favour and a mighty change of things and therefore that repentance which is the great condition of it is a grace that does not expire in little accents and minutes but hath a great latitude of signification and a large extension of parts under the protection of all which persons are safe even when they fear exceedingly 9. That there are great degrees and differences of glory in heaven and therefore if we estimate our piety by proportions to the more eminent persons and devouter people we are not to conclude we shall not enter into the same state of glory but that we shall not go into the same degrees 9 That although forgivenesse of sins is consigned to us in Baptism and that this Baptism is but once and cannot be repeated yet forgivenesse of sins is the grace of the gospel which is perpetually remanent upon us and secured unto us so long as we have not renounced our Baptisme For then we enter into the condition of repentance and repentance is not an indivisible grace or a thing performed at once but is working all our lives and therefore so is our pardon which ebbes and flowes according as we discompose or renew the decency of our Baptismall promises and therefore it ought to be certain that no man despair of pardon but he that hath voluntarily renounced his Baptism or willingly estranged himself from that covenant He that sticks to it and still professes the religion and approves the faith and endeavours to obey and to do his duty this man hath all the veracity of God to assure him and give him confidence that he is not in an impossible state of salvation unlesse God cuts him off before he can work or that he begins to work when he can no longer choose 10. And then let him consider the more he fears the more he hates his sin that is the cause of it and the lesse he can be tempted to it and the more desirous he is of heaven and therefore such fears are good instruments of grace and good signes of a future pardon 11. That God in the old law although he made a Covenant of perfect obedience and did not promise pardon at all after great sins yet he did give pardon and declared it so to them for their own and for our sakes too So he did to David to Manasses to the whole Nation of the Israelies ten times in the wildernesse even after their Apostacies and Idolatries and in the Prophets the mercies of God and his remissions of sins were largely preached though in the Law God put on the robes of an angry Judge and a severe Lord but therefore in the Gospel where he hath established the whole summe of affairs upon faith and repentance if God should not pardon great sinners that repent after baptisme with a free dispensation the Gospel were far harder then the intolerable Covenant of the Law 12. That if a Proselyte went into the Jewish communion and were circumcised and baptized he entred into all the hopes of good things which God had promised or would give to his people and yet that was but the Covenant of works If then the Gentile Proselytes by their circumcision and legall baptisme were admitted to a state of pardon to last so long as they were in the Covenant even after their admission for sins committed against Moses law which they then undertook to observe exactly In the Gospel which is the Covenant of Faith it must needs be certain that there is a great grace given and an easier conditon entred into then was that of the Jewish law and that is nothing else but that abatement is made for our infirmities and our single evils and our timely repented and forsaken habits of sin and our violent passions when they are contested withall and fought with and under discipline and in the beginnings and progresses of mortification 13. That God hath erected in his Church a whole order of men the main part and dignity of whose work it is to remit and retain sins by a perpetuall and daily ministery and this they do not onely in baptisme but in all their offices to be administered afterwards in the Holy Sacrament of the Eucharist which exhibits the Symbols of that blood which was shed for pardon of our sins and therefore by its continued ministery and repetition declares that all that while we are within the ordinary powers and usuall dispensations of pardon even so long as we are in any probable dispositions to receive that Holy Sacrament And the same effect is also signified and exhibited in the whole power of the Keyes which if it extends to private sins sins done in secret it is certain it does also to publike but this is a greater testimony of the certainty of the remissibility of our greatest sins for publike sins as they alwayes have a sting and a superadded formality of scandall and ill example so they are most commonly the greatest such as murder sacriledge and others of unconcealed nature and unprivate action and if God for these worst of evils hath appointed an office of ease and pardon which is and may daily be administred that will be an uneasie pusillanimity and fond suspicion of Gods goodnesse to fear that our repentance shall be rejected even although we have not committed the greatest or the most of evils 14. And it was concerning baptized Christians that Saint Iohn said If any man sin we have an Advocate with the Father and he is the propitiation for our sins and concerning lapsed Christians S. Paul gave instruction that if any man be overtaken in a fault ye which are spiritual restore such a man in the spirit of meeknesse considering lest ye also be temted the Corinthian Christian committed incest and was pardoned and ‑ Simon Magus after he was baptized offered to commit his own sin of Simony and yet Saint Peter bid him pray
state of sicknesse are onely upon the stock of vertue and religion There is nothing can make sicknesse in any sense eligible or in many senses tolerable but onely the grace of God that onely turns sicknesse into easinesse and felicity which also turnes it into vertue For whosoever goes about to comfort a vitious person when he lies sick upon his bed can onely discourse of the necessities of nature of the unavoidableness of the suffering of the accidental vexations and increase of torments by impatience of the fellowship of all the sons of Adam and such other little considerations which indeed if sadly reflected upon and found to stand alone teach him nothing but the degree of his calamity and the evil of his condition and teach him such a patience and minister to him such a comfort which can only make him to observ decent gestures in his sicknesse and to converse with his friends and standers by so as may do them comfort and ease their funeral and civil complaints but do him no true advantage For all that may be spoken to a beast when he is crowned with hairlaces and bound with fillets to the Altar to bleed to death to appease the anger of the Deity and to ease the burden of his Relatives And indeed what comfort can he receive whose sicknesse as it looks back is an effect of Gods indignation and fierce vengeance and if it goes forward and enters into the gates of the grave is a beginning of a sorrow that shall shall never have an ending But when the sicknesse is a messenger sent from a chastising Father when it first turns into degrees of innocence and then into vertues and thence into pardon this is no misery but such a method of the Divine oeconomy and dispensation as resolves to bring us to heaven without any new impositions but meerly upon the stock and charges of nature 2. Let it be observed that these advantages which spring from sicknesse are not in all instances of vertue nor to all persons Sicknesse is the proper scene for patience and resignation for all the passive graces of a Christian for faith and hope and for some single acts of the love of God But sicknesse is not a fit station for a penitent and it can serve the ends of the grace of repentance but accidentally Sicknesse may begin a repentance if God continues life and if we cooperate with the Divine grace or sicknesse may help to alleviate the wrath of God and to facilitate the pardon if all the other parts of this duty be performed in our healthfull state so that it may serve at the entrance in or at the going out But sicknesse at no hand is a good stage to represent all the substantiall parts of this duty 1. It invites to it 2. It makes it appear necessary 3. It takes off the fancies of vanity 4. It attempers the spirit 5. It cures hypocrisie 6. It tames the fumes of pride 7. It is the school of patience 8. And by taking us from off the brisker relishes of the world it makes us with more gust to taste the things of the Spirit and all this onely when God fits the circumstances of the sicknesse so as to consist with acts of reason consideration choice and a present and reflecting minde which then God sends when he means that the sickness of the body should be the cure of the soul. But let no man so rely upon it as by designe to trust the beginning the progresse and the consummation of our piety to such an estate which for ever leaves it unperfect and though to some persons it addes degrees and ministers opportunities and exercises single acts with great advantage in passive graces yet it is never an intire or sufficient instrument for the change of our condition from the state of death to the liberty and life of the sons of God 3. It were good if we would transact the affairs of our souls with noblenesse and ingenuity and that we would by an early and forward religion prevent the necessary arts of the Divine providence It is true that God cures some by incision by fire and torments but these are ever the more obstinate and more unrelenting natures Gods providence is not so afflictive and full of trouble as that it hath placed sicknesse and infirmity amongst things simply necessary and in most persons it is but a sickly and an effeminate vertue which is imprinted upon our spirits with fears and the sorrowes of a feaver or a peevâ—sh consumption It is but a miserable remedy to be beholding to a sicknesse for our health and though it be better to suffer the losse of a finger then that the arm and the whole body should putrifie yet even then also it is a trouble and an evil to lose a finger He that mends with sicknesse pares the nails of the beast when they have already torn off part of the flesh But he that would have a sicknesse become a clear and an entire blessing a thing indeed to be reckoned among the good things of God and the evil things of the world must lead an holy life and judge himself with an early sentence and so order the affairs of his soul that in the usuall method of Gods saving us there may be nothing left to be done but that such vertues should be exercised which God intends to crown and then as when the Athenians upon a day of battell with longing and uncertain souls sate in their Common-hall expecting what would be the sentence of the day at last received a messenger who onely had breath enough left him to say We are conquerours and so died So shall the sick person who hath fought a good fight and kept the faith and onely waitâ— for his dissolution and his sentence breaths forth his spirit with the accents of a conquerour and his sicknesse and his death shall onely make the mercy and the vertue more illustrious But for the sicknesse it self if all the calumnies were true concerning it with which it is aspersed yet it is far to be preferred before the most pleasant sin and before a great secular businesse and a temporall care and some men wake as much in the foldings of the softest beds as others on the crosse and sometimes the very weight of sorrow and the wearinesse of a sicknesse presses the spirit into slumbers and the images of rest when the intemperate or the lustfull person rolls upon his uneasie thorns and sleep is departed from his eyes Certainly it is some sicknesse is a blessing Indeed blindnesse were a most accursed thing if no man were ever blind but he whose eyes are pulled out with tortures or burning basins and if sickness were always a testimony of Gods anger and a violence to a mans whole condition then it were a huge calamity but because God sends it to his servants to his children to little infants to Apostles and Saints with designes
our passions turned into fear and the whole state into suffering God in complyance and mans infirmity hath also turned our religion into such a duty which a sick man can do most passionately and a sad man and a timorous can perform effectually and a dying man can do to many purposes of pardon and mercy and that is prayer For although a sick man is bound to do many acts of vertue of several kindes yet the most of them are to be done in the way of prayer Prayer is not onely the religion that is proper to a sick mans condition but it is the manner of doing other graces which is then left and in his power For thus the sick man is to do his repentance and his mortifications his temperance and his chastity by a fiction of imagination bringing the offers of the vertue to the spirit making an action of election and so our prayers are a direct act of chastity when they are made in the matter of that grace just as repentance for our cruelty is an act of the grace of mercie and repentance for uncleannesse is an act of chastity is a means of its purchase an act in order to the habit and though such acts of vertue which are onely in the way of prayer are ineffective to the intire purchase and of themselves cannot change the vice into vertue yet they are good renewings of the grace and proper exercise of a habit already gotten The purpose of this discourse is to represent the excellency of prayer and its proper advantages which it hath in the time of sicknesse For besides that it moves God to pity piercing the clouds making the Heavens like a pricked eye to weep over us and refresh us with showers of pity it also doth the work of the soul and expresses the vertue of his whole life in effigie in pictures and lively representments so preparing it for a never ceasing crown by renewing the actions in the continuation of a never ceasing a never hindred affection Prayer speaks to God when the tongue is stiffned with the approachings of death prayer can dwell in the heart and be signified by the hand or eye by a thought or a groan prayer of all the actions of religion is the last alive and it serves God without circumstances and exercises material graces by abstraction from matter and separation and makes them to be spiritual and therefore best dresses our bodies for funeral or recovery for the mercies of restitution or the mercies of the grave 5. In every sicknesse whether it will or will not be so in nature and in the event yet in thy spirit and preparations resolve upon it and treat thy self accordingly as if it were a sicknesse unto death For many men support their unequall courages by flattery and false hopes and because sicker men have recovered beleeve that they shall do so but therefore they neglect to adorn their souls or set their house in order besides the temporall inconveniences that often happen by such perswasions and putting off the evil day such as are dying Intestate leaving estates intangled and some Relatives unprovided for they suffer infinitely in the interest and affairs of their soul they die carelesly and surprized their burdens on and their scruples unremoved and their cases of conscience not determined and like a sheep without any care taken concerning their precious souls Some men will never beleeve that a villain will betray them though they receive often advices from suspicious persons and likely accidents till they are entered into the snare and then they beleeve it when they feel it and when they cannot return but so the treason entred and the man was betrayed by his own folly placing the snare in the regions and advantages of opportunity This evil looks like boldnesse and a confident spirit but it is the greatest timerousnesse and cowardize in the world They are so fearfull to die that they dare not look upon it as possible and think that the making of a Will is a mortall signe and sending for a spirituall man an irrecoverable disease and they are so afraid lest they should think and beleeve now they must die that they will not take care that it may not be evil in case they should So did the Eastern slaves drink wine and wrapt their heads in a vail that they might die without sense or sorrow and wink hard that they might sleep the easier In pursuance of this rule let a man consider that whatsoever must be done in sicknesse ought to be done in health onely let him observe that his sicknesse as a good monitor chastises his neglect of duty and forces him to live as he alwayes should and then all these solemnities and dressings for death are nothing else but the part of a religious life which he ought to have exercised all his dayes and if those circumstances can affright him let him please his fancy by this truth that then he does but begin to live But it will be a huge folly if he shall think that confession of his sins will kill him or receiving the holy Sacrament will hasten his agony or the Priest shall undo all the hopefull language and promises of his Physitian Assure thy self thou canst not die the sooner But by such addresses thou mayest die much the better 6. Let the sick person be infinitely carefull that he do not fall into a state of death upon a new account that is at no hand commit a deliberate sin or retain any affection to the old for in both cases he falls into the evils of a surprize and the horrors of a sudden death For a sudden death is but a sudden joy if it takes a man in the state and exercises of vertue and it is onely then an evil when it finds a man unready They were sad departures when Tegillinus Cornelius Gallus the Praetor Lewis the son of Gonzaga Duke of Mantua Ladislaus king of Naples Speusippus Giachettus of Geneva and one of the Popes died in the forbidden embraces of abused women or if Iob had cursed God and so died or when a man sits down in despair and in the accusation and calumny of the Divine mercy they make their night sad and stormy and eternall When Herod began to sink with the shamefull torment of his bowels and felt the grave open under him he imprisoned the Nobles of his Kingdom and commanded his Sister that they should be a sacrifice to his departing ghost This was an egresse fit onely for such persons who meant to dwell with Devils to eternall ages and that man is hugely in love with sin who cannot forbear in the week of the Assizes and when himself stood at the barre of scrutiny and prepared for his finall never to be reversed sentence He dies suddenly to the worst sense and event of sudden death who so manages his sicknesse that even that state shall not be innocent but that he is surprized in the
discover it would dash it in pieces by a solemn disclaiming it for thou art the Way the Truth and the Life and I know that whatsoever thou hast declared that is the truth of God and I do firmly adhere to the religion thou hast taught and glory in nothing so much as that I am a Christian that thy name is called upon me O my God though I die yet will I put my trust in thee In thee O Lord have I trusted let me never be confounded Amen SECT V. Of the practise of the Grace of Repentance in time of the Sicknesse MEn generally do very much dread sudden death and pray against it passionately and certainly it hath in it great inconveniences accidentally to mens estates to the settlement of families to the culture and trimming of souls and it robs a man of the blessings which may be consequent to sickness and to the passive graces and holy contentions of a Christian while he descends to his grave without an adversary or a tryal and a good man may be taken at such a disadvantage that a sudden death would be a great evil even to the most excellent person if it strikes him in an unlucky circumstance But these considerations are not the onely ingredients into those mens discourse who pray violently against sudden deaths for possibly if this were all there may be in the condition of sudden death something to make recompence for the evils of the over-hasty accident For certainly it is a lesse temporal evil to fall by the rudenesse of a sword then the violences of a Feaver and the axe is much a lesse affliction then a strangury and though a sicknesse tries our vertues yet a sudden death is free from temptation a sicknesse may be more glorious and a sudden death more safe the deadest deaths are best the shortest and least premeditate so Caesar said and Pliny called a short death the greatest fortune of a mans life For even good men have been forced to an undecencie of deportment by the violences of pain and Cicero observes concerning Hercules that he was broken in pieces with pain even then when he sought for immortality by his death being tortured with a plague knit up in the lappet of his shirt And therefore as a sudden death certainly loses the rewards of a holy sicknesse so it makes that a man shall not so much hazard and lose the rewards of a holy life But the secret of this affair is a worse matter men live at that rate either of an habitual wickednesse or else a frequent repetition of single acts of killing and deadly sins that a sudden death is the ruine of all their hopes and a perfect consignation to an eternal sorrow But in this case also so is a lingring sicknesse for our last sicknesse may change us from life to health from health to strength from strength to the firmnesse and confirmation of habitual graces but it cannot change a man from death to life and begin and finish that processe which sits not down but in the bosom of blessednesse He that washes in the morning when his bath is seasonable and healthful is not onely made clean but sprightly and the blood is brisk and coloured like the first springing of the morning but they that wash their dead cleanse the skin and leave palenesse upon the cheek and stiffnesse in all the joynts A repentance upon our death-bed bed is like washing the coarse it is cleanly and civil but makes no change deeper then the skin But God knowes it is a custom so to wash them that are going to dwell with dust and to be buried in the lap of their kinred earth but all their lives time wallow in pollutions without any washing at all or if they do it is like that of the Dardani who washed but thrice in all their life time when they are born and when they marry and when they die when they are baptized or against a solemnity or for the day of their funeral but these are but ceremonious washings and never purifie the soul if it be stained and hath sullied the whitenesse of its baptismal robes * God intended we should live a holy life * he contracted with us in Jesus Christ for a holy life * he made no abatements of the strictest sense of it but such as did necessarily comply with humane infirmities or possibilities that is he understood it in the sense of repentance which stil is so to renew our duty that it may be a holy life in the second sense that is some great portion of our life to be spent in living as Christians should * a resolving to repent upon our death-bed is the greatest mockery of God in the world and the most perfect contradictory to all his excellent designes of mercy and holinesse for therefore he threatned us with hell if we did not and he promised heaven if we did live a holy life and a late repentance promises heaven to us upon other conditions even when we have lived wickedly * It renders a man uselesse and intolerable to the world taking off the great curb of religion of fear and hope and permitting all impiety with the greatest impunity and incouragement in the world * by this means we see so many 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Philo calls them or as the prophets pueros centum annorum children of almost an hundred years old upon whose grave we may write the inscriptions which was upon the tomb of Similis in Xiphilin Here he lies who was so many years but lived but seven * and the course of nature runs counter to the perfect designes of piety and * God who gave us a life to live to him is only served at our death when we die to all the world * and we undervalue the great promises made by the Holy Jesus for which the piety the strictest unerring piety of ten thousand ages is not a proportionable exchange yet we think it a hard bargain to get heaven if we be forced to part with one lust or live soberly twenty years But like Demetrius Afer who having lived a slave all his life time yet desired to descend to his grave in freedom begged manumission of his Lord we lived in the bondage of our sin all our dayes and hope to dye the Lords freed man * but above all this course of a delayed repentance must of necessity therefore be ineffective and certainly mortal because it is an intire destruction of the very formality and essential constituent reason of religion which I thus demonstrate When God made man and propounded to him an immortal and a blessed state as the end of his hopes and the perfection of his condition he did not give it him for nothing but upon certain conditions which although they could add nothing to God yet they were such things which man could value and they were his best and
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
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
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
the holy man must pray and another time he must exhort a third time administer the holy Sacrament and he that ought to watch all the periods and little portions of his life lest he should be suprized and overcome had need be watched when he is sick and assisted and called upon and reminded of the several parts of his duty in every instant of his temptation This article was well provided for among the Easterlings for the Priests in their visitations of a sick person did abide in their attendance and ministery for seven dayes together The want of this makes the visitations fruitlesse and the calling of the Clergy contemptible while it is not suffered to imprint its proper effects upon them that need it in a lasting ministery 3. S. Iames advises that when a man is sick he should send for the elders one sick man for many Presbyters and so did the Eastern Churches they sent for seven and like a college of Physitians they ministred spiritual remedies and sent up prayers like a quire of singing Clerks In cities they might do so while the Christians were few and the Priests many But when they that dwelt in the Pagi or villages ceased to be Pagans and were baptized it grew to be an impossible felicity unlesse in few cases and to some more eminent persons but because they need it most God hath taken care that they may best have it and they that can are not very prudent if they neglect it 4. Whether they be many or few that are sent to the sick person let the Curate of his Parish or his own Confessor be amongst them that is let him not be wholly advised by strangers who know not his particular necessities but he that is the ordinary Judge cannot safely be passed by in his extraordinary necessity which in so great portions depends upon his whole life past and it is a matter of suspicion when we decline his judgement that knowes us best and with whom we formerly did converse either by choice or by law by private election or publike constitution It concerns us then to make severe and profitable judgements and not to conspire against our selves or procure such assistances which may handle us softly or comply with our weaknesses more then relieve our necessities 5. When the Ministers of religion are come first let them do their ordinary offices that is pray for grace to the sick man for patience for resignation for health if it seems good to God in order to his great ends For that is one of the ends of the advice of the Apostle and therefore the minister is to be sent for not while the case is desperate but before the sicknesse is come to its crisis or period Let him discourse concerning the causes of sicknesse and by a general instrument move him to consider concerning his condition Let him call upon him to set his soul in order to trim his lamp to dresse his soul to renew acts of grace by way of prayer to make amends in all the evils he hath done and to supply all the defects of duty as much as his past condition requires and his present can admit 6. According as the condition of the sickness or the weaknesse of the man is observed so the exhortation is to be less and the prayers more because the life of the man was his main preparatory and therefore if his condition be full of pain and infirmity the shortnesse and small number of his own acts is to be supplied by the act of the Ministers and standers by who are in such cases to speak more to God for him then to talk to him For the prayer of the righteous when it is servent hath a promise to prevail much in behalf of the sick person But exhortations must prevail with their own proper weight not by the passion of the Speaker But yet this assistance by way of prayers is not to be done by long offices but by frequent and fervent and holy in which offices if the sick man joyns let them be short and apt to comply with his little strength and great infirmities if they be said in his behalf without his conjunction they that pray may prudently use their own liberty and take no measures but their own devotions and opportunities and the sick mans necessities When he hath made this general addresse and preparatory entrance to the work of many dayes and periods he may descend to particulars by the following instruments and discourses SECT III. Of ministring in the sick mans confession of sins and repentance THe first necessity that is to be served is that of repentance in which the Ministers can in no way serve him but by first exhorting him to confession of his sins and declaration of the state of his soul. For unlesse they know the manner of his life and the degrees of his restitution either they can do nothing at all or nothing of advantage and certainty His discourses like Ionathans arrows may shoot short or shoot over but not wound where they should nor open those humours that need a lancet or a cautery To this purpose the sick man may be reminded Arguments and exhortations to move the sick man to confession of sins 1. That God hath made a special promise to confession of sins He that confesseth his sins and forsaketh them shall have mercy and if we confesse our sins God is righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousnesse That confession of sins is a proper act and introduction to repentance * That when the Jews being warned by the sermons of the Baptist repented of their sins they confessed their sins to Iohn in the susception of Baptism * That the converts in the dayes of the Apostles returning to Christianity instantly declared their faith and their repentance by confession and declaration of their deeds which they then renounced abjured and confessed to the Apostles * That confession is an act of many vertues together * It is the gate of repentance * an instrument of shame and condemnation of our sins * a glorification of God so called by Ioshuah particularly in the case of Achan * an acknowledgement that God is just in punishing for by confessing of our sins we also confesse his justice and are assessors with God in this condemnation of our selves * That by such an act of judging our selves we escape the more angry judgement of God S. Paul expresly exhorting us to it upon that very inducement * That confession of sins is so necessary a duty that in all Scriptures it is the immediate preface to pardon and the certain consequent of godly sorrow and an integral or constituent part of that grace which together with faith mâ—kes up the whole duty of the Gospel * That in all ages of the Gospel it hath been taught and practised respectively that all the penitent made confessions proportionable to their repentance that is
the world a longing desire after heaven patience in our sorrows comfort in our sicknesses joy in God a holy life and a blessed death that our souls may rest in hope and my body may rise in glory and both may be beatified in the communion of Saints in the kingdom of God and the glories of the Lord Jesus Amen The blessing Now the God of peace that brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus that great shepherd of the sheep thorough the blood of the everlasting covenant make you perfect in every good work to do his will working in you that which is pleasing in his sight to whom be glory for ever and ever Amen The doxology To the blessed and onely Potentate the King of kings and the Lord of Lords who only hath immortality dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto whom no man hath seen nor can see be honour and power everlasting Amen After the sick man is departed the Minister if he be present or the Major dome or any other fit person may use the following prayers in behalf of themselves I. ALmighty God with whom do live the spirits of them that depart hence in the Lord we adore thy Majesty and submit to thy providence and revere thy justice and magnifie thy mercies thy infinite mercies that it hath pleased thee to deliver this our brother out of the miseries of this sinful world Thy counsels are secret and thy wisdom is infinite with the same hand thou hast crowned him and smitten us thou hast taken him into regions of felicity and placed him among Saints and Angels and left us to mourn for our sins and thy displeasure which thou hast signified to us by removing him from us to a better a far better place Lord turn thy anger into mercie thy chastisements into vertues thy rod into comforts and do thou give to all his neerest relatives comforts from heaven and a restitution of blessings equall to those which thou hast taken from them And we humbly beseech thee of thy gracious goodnesse shortly to satisfie the longing desires of those Holy souls who pray and wait and long for thy second coming Accomplish thou the number of thine elect and fill up the Mansions in heaven which are prepared for all them that love the coming of the Lord Jesus that we with this our Brother and all other departed this life in the obedience and faith of the Lord Jesus may have our perfect consummation and blisse in thy eternall glory which never shall have ending Grant this for Jesus Christ his sake our Lord and onely Saviour Amen II. O Mercifull God Father of our Lord Jesus who is the first fruits of the resurrection and by entring into glory hath opened the kingdom of heaven to all the beleevers we humbly beseech thee to raise us from the death of sin to the life of righteousnesse that being partakers of the death of Christ and followers of his Holy life we may be partakers of his Spirit and of his promises that when we shall depart this life we may rest in his arms and lie in his bosom as our hope is this our brother doth O suffer us not for any temptation of the world or any snares of the Devil or any pains of death to fall from thee Lord let thy H. Spirit enable us with his grace to fight a good fight with perseverance to finish our course with holiness and to keep the faith with constancie unto the end that at the day of judgement we may stand at the right hand of the throne of God and hear the blessed sentence of Come ye blessed children of my Father receive the kingdom prepared for you from the beginning of the world O blessed Jesus thou art our Judge and thou art our Advocate even because thou art good and gracious never suffer us to fall into the intolerable pains of hell never to lye down in sin and never to have our portion in the everlasting burning Mercy sweet Jesu Mercy Amen A prayer to be said in the case of a sudden surprise by death as by a mortal wound or evil accidents in childebirth when the forms and solemnities of preparation cannot be used O Most gracious Father Lord of heaven and earth Judge of the living and the dead behold thy servants running to thee for pity and mercy in behalf of our selves and this thy servant whom thou hast smitten with thy hasty rod and a swift Angel if it be thy will preserve his life that there may be place for his repentance and restitution O spare him a little that he may recover his strength before he go hence and be no more seen but if thou hast otherwise decreed let the miracles of thy compassion and thy wonderfull mercy supply to him the want of the usual measures of time and the periods of repentance and the trimming of his lamp and let the greatnesse of the calamity be accepted by thee as an instrument to procure pardon for those defects and degrees of unreadiness which may have caused this accident upon thy servant Lord stirre up in him a great and effectual contrition that the greatnesse of the sorrow and hatred against sin and the zeal of his love to thee may in a short time do the work of many dayes and thou who regardest the heart and the measures of the minde more then the delay and the measures of time let it be thy pleasure to rescue the soul of thy servant from all the evils he hath deserved and all the evils that he fears that in the glorifications of eternity and the songs which to eternal ages thy Saints and holy Angels shall sing to the honour of thy mighty Name and invaluable mercies it may be reckoned among thy glories that thou hast redeemed this soul from the dangers of an eternall death and made him partaker of the gift of God eternall life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen If there be time the prayers in the foregoing offices may be added according as they can be fitted to the present circumstances SECT VIII A peroration concerning the contingencies and treatings of our departed friends after death in order to their buriall c. WHen we have received the last breath of our friend and closed his eyes and composed his body for the grave then seasonable is the counsell of the son of Syrach Weep bitterly and make great moan and use lamentation as he is worthy and that a day or two lest thou be evil spoken of and then comfort thy self for thy heavinesse But take no grief to heart for there is no turning again thou shalâ— not do him good but hurt tâ—y self Solemn and appointed mournings are good expressions of our dearnesse to the departed soul and of his worth and our value of him and it hath its praise in nature and in manners and publike customs but the praise of it is not in the Gospel that is it hath
communication from an Angel or the sâ—ock of acquired notices here below it may the rather endear us to our charities or duties to them respectively since our vertues use not to live upon abstractions and Metaphysical perfections or inducements but then thrive when they have materiall arguments such which are not too far from sense However it be it is certain they are not dead and though we no more see the souls of our dead friends then we did when they were alive yet we have reason to beleeve them to know more things and better And if our sleep be an image of death we may also observe concerning it that it is a state of life so separate from communications with the body that it is one of the wayes of Oracle and prophecy by which the soul best declares her immortality and the noblenesse of her actions and powers if she could get free from the body as in the state of separation or a clear dominion over it as in the resurrection To which also this consideration may be added that men long time lived the life of sence before they use their reason and till they have sumished their head with experiments and notices of many things they cannot at all discourse of any thing but when they come to use their reason all their knowledge is nothing but remembrance and we know by proportions by similitudes and dissimilitudes by relations and oppositions by causes and effects by comparing things with things all which are nothing but operations of understanding upon the stock of former notices of something we knew before nothing but remembrances all the heads of Topicks which are the stock of all arguments and sciences in the world are a certain demonstration of this And he is the wisest man that remembers most and joyns those remembrances together to the best purposes of discourse From whence it may not be improbably gathered that in the state of separation if there be any act of understanding that is if the understanding be alive it must be relative to the notices it had in this world and therefore the acts of it must he discourses upon all the parts and persons of their conversation and relation excepting onely such new revelations which may be communicated to it concerning which we know nothing But if by seeing Sacrates I think upon Plato and by seeing a picture I remember a Man and by beholding two friends I remember my own and my friends need and he is wisest that drawes most lines from the same Centre and most discourses from the same Notices it cannot but be very probable to beleeve since the separate souls understand better if they understand at all that from the Notices they carried from hence and what they find there equall or unequall to those Notices they can better discover the things of their friends then we can here by our conjectures and craftiest imaginations and yet many men here can guesse shrewdly at the thoughts and designes of such men with whom they discourse or of whom they have heard or whose characters they prudently have perceived I have no other end in this discourse but that we may be ingaged to do our duty to our Dead lest peradventure they should perceive our neglect and be witnesses of our transient affections and forgetfulnesse Dead persons have religion passed upon them and a solemn reverence and if we think a Ghost beholds us it may be we may have upon us the impressions likely to be made by love and fear and religion However we are sure that God sees us and the world sees us and if it be matter of duty towards our Dead God will exact it if it be matter of kindnesse the world will and as Religion is the band of that so fame and reputation is the endearment of this It remains that we who are alive should so live and by the actions of Religion attend the coming of the day of the Lord that we neither be surprized nor leave our duties imperfect nor our sins uncanceld nor our persons unreconciled nor God unappeased but that when we descend to our graves we may rest in the bosome of the Lord till the mansions be prepared where we shall sing and feast eternally Amen Te Deum laudamus THE END BEsides this Rule of Holy Dying the Author hath in Print 1. The Rule of Holy Living 2. The Liberty of Prophesying 3. Episcopacie asserted 4 o 4. The History of the Life and Death of the ever blessed Iesus Christ. 4 o 5. An Apologie for Authorized and â—et forms of Lyturgie 4 o 6. A Sermon Preached at Oxon. on the Anniversary of the fifth of November 4 o 7. Together with 28. Sermons Preached at Golden grove fol. Lately published viz. SErmon 1.2 Of the Spirit of Grace Rom. 8. ver 9.10 Sermon 3.4 The descending and entailed curse cut off Exodus 20. part of the 5. verse Sermon 5.6 The invalidity of a late or death-bed repentance Ier. 13.6 Sermon 7.8 The deceitfulnesse of the heart Ierem. 17.9 Sermon 9.10.11 The faith and patience of the Saints Or the righteous cause oppressed 1 Pet. 4.17 Sermon 12.13 The mercy of the Divine judgements or Gods method in curing sinners Rom. 2.4 Sermon 14.15 Of groweth in grace with its proper instruments and signes 2 Pet. 3.18 Sermon 16.17 Of groweth in sin or the severall states and degrees of sinners with the manner how they are to be treated Iude Epist. ver 22 23. Sermon 18.19 The foolish exchange Matth. 16. ver 26. Sermon 20.21.22 The Serpent and the Dove or a Discourse of Christian Prudence Matth. 10. latter part of ver 16. Sermon 23.24 Of Christian simplicitie Matt. 10. latter part of ver 16. Sermon 25.26.27 The Miracles of the Divine Mercy Psal. 86.5 A Funerall Sermon Preached at the Obsequies of the right Honourable the Countesse of Carbery 2 Sam. 14.14 A Discourse of the Divine Institution necessity sacrednesse and separation of the Office Ministeriall Printed for Richard Royston at the Angel in Ivie-Lane * Vel quia nil rectum nisi quod placuit â—ibi ducunt Vel quia turpe putant parere minoâ—ibus quae Imberbes didicere senes perdenda fateri * Tenellis adhuc infantiae suae persuasionibus in senectute puerascunt Mamertus Concil Trid. hist lib 4. * Tertul de Monog S. Cyprian l. 1. ep 9 Sa. Athan q. 33. S. Cyril myst cat 5. Epiphan Haeres 75. Aug. de haeres c. 33. Concil Carth. 3. c. 29 * Dii majorum umbris tenuem sine pondere terram Spirantesque crocos in urna perpetuum yer Pers. Sat. 7. Otia das nobis sed qualia forat ulioâ— Meccenas Placco Virgilio que m◠〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 4 James 14. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Nihil sibi quisquam de futuro debet promittere Id quoque quod teâ—etur per 〈◊〉 anus exit