the Communication of His blessed Body and Blood by consecrated Elements to worthy Partakers of His holy Table Which tho' they be great and infallible Truths are dark and enigmatical and full of divine and venerable Abstruseness There are REVELATIONS wonderful for Sublimity and Nobleness As those of the Creation of the World of the Fall of the Angels of the Sin and Redemption of Man of the Immortality of the Soul of the Resurrection of the Body and of the general and eternal Judgment There are PROMISES wonderful for Truth and Preciousness As of GOD's hearing our Prayers His pitying our Infirmities His assisting us in Duties His accepting our Performances His pardoning our Miscarriages His purifying our Souls His speaking peace to our Consciences His supplying us with Blessings His adorning us with Virtues and Graces in this Life and His crowning us with everlasting and glorious Recompences in the next These amongst others are wonderful Things which are contained in the sacred Books And when we rightly apprehend them and ruminate upon them or upon any of them they will not fail to lift up our Religious Minds into refreshing Joys especially if the Light of the divine Countenance be display'd upon us at the same Time Then both the Heavenly Instruments of Comfort being at once set a Work they cannot but produce it at a mighty Rate The Fourth Mark of true Comforts is they are productive of pious Effects That they should have no Effects being powerful things would be very strange and that they should have any but good ones must be as impossible considering how excellent they are in themselves and from whence they come Their Nature and Origin proclaim them Operative and all the effects which they work in us are absolutely pious or tending to Godliness Amongst many we are sure to find these that follow Hatred of Sin and Love to Righteousness Gentleness of Spirit and Tenderness of Conscience Fear to offend GOD and Forwardness to please Him Purity of Mind and Integrity of Life Disgust of earthly things and Desire of Heavenly ones Weariness of the World and Willingness to go out of it Wherever therefore Comforts have such Effects and Symptoms they have Evidence on their side to prove that they are right But where they find men bad in case they continue so or if instead of growing better they become worse under them we may cease all Enquiry concerning their truth because there 's enough to evince they are false And as one Specific inseparable Effect of genuine Comforts I might here mention their peculiar sweetness For tho' all Comforts carry sweetness with them where they go yet the Sweetness of the true may as well be distinguisht from that of the false as the Light of the Sun from the Light of a Torch The one is exceedingly finer than the other and also as superior to it in Strength And therefore David does not only own that the Light of GOD's Countenance put Gladness in his Heart Psal 4.7 which signifies it was no flashy frothy sort of Comfort as dwelling in the Heart but he farther declares that it put more Gladness in His Heart than the Increase of Corn and Wine could do That is it produced in him an higher kind of Joy than the greatest abundance of the usefullest Blessings of this Life could possibly infuse Which does more than intimate that a particular and extraordinary Sweetness is contain'd in the true spiritual Comforts And where-ever this Sweetness comes in its Strength it claps a seal upon the Conscience as I may say warranting it to be right and by its fulness and force bears down the Soul into a fiducial belief that the Comforts which imprint it come down from Heaven But having made Sweetness the first beatifying Property of true Comforts to say more concerning it here would be superfluous Only this would be noted that when the Religious are importunate in seeking and supplicating for the Light of GOD's Countenance as we may observe they are in Scripture they have greatest Reason to be so and I heartily wish that all Men were so for it is not only an Instrument but the chiefest Instrument of raising divine Comforts in the Soul The Last Mark of true Comforts is their coming upon us when we are in a good state in a state of Regeneracy or Righteousness The truth is * Mat. 15.26 27. they are the Childrens Bread and therefore shall not be given to Dogs or impious Livers They indeed eat of the Crumbs that fall from their Masters Table They share largely in temporal Blessings and in the common Use or external Injoyment of many Spiritual ones But as for true Comforts they belong not to them nor shall they partake of them They may have Comforts that are like the true but the real Consolations of the SPIRIT fall not to their Lot For as an excellent Man said †Fiat justitia habebis pacem August divine Peace is an Appendix of Righteousness But they that travel in the Rode of Sin are out of the way of true Comfort Hence we may judge of the Quality of our Comforts and be able to determine whether they are such as they ought to be How is it with our Souls that 's the Question to be askt here Are we in a righteous or regenerate condition Have we mortifi'd our Lusts and subdu'd our Corruptions Have we repented of our Sins and fully renounc'd them and finally relinquisht them Do we honour and love GOD and are we resolv'd to do so with our whole Hearts and through our whole Lives And to come home to the point is our Love to GOD express'd in obeying Him and is our Obedience faithful and undissembled Then we may conclude that our Comforts are true But instead of loving GOD if we disregard Him instead of serving Him if we disobey Him and do it constantly or do it frequently in any known instance in all likelihood our Comforts must be false By this last Mark the truth of our Comforts may as well be tri'd as by any of the rest Tho' our safest way will not be to trust to one singly except the last lest we should be deceived King Herod as we observed heard John the Baptist gladly and the People compared to the stony Ground receiv'd the Seed of the Word with Joy And so according to the first Mark Both when their Comforts came upon them were well imployed And according to the second Mark their Comforts flow'd from divine Objects But for all that they were still but counterfeit The best and only way to be assured they are genuine is to find all these Marks upon them at once And by those Four which are here laid down it will be easy to discern True Comforts from False We are next to consider whence these false Comforts spring And they issue from several Fountains First From Nature Secondly From the Evil Spirit Thirdly From Enthusiasm Fourthly From wrong Notions in Divinity Fifthly From Texts
measure of the stature of the fulness of CHRIST are St. Paul's Words Eph. 4.13 Which seem to insinuate that there is a decreed Pitch or Perfection for us to reach in this Life before we can dy and ascend to Blessedness And shall we not haste on then by holy Mourning with all possible speed to the heighth of Grace which must be accomplisht in us What would we not fain be in Heaven Do we not sigh and groan under the Load of our Mortality and would we not gladly be freed from the heavy Burthen and hard Bondage of it Are we not weary of our present Troubles and do we not complain of many uneasinesses and should not a call to endless Rest and perfect Joy be welcome to us Or had we rather continue here and abide still in this earthly State O senseless stupid and egregious Folly can we love our Prisons and embrace our Chains and hug our Fetters Can we court a longer Exile from our eternal Home and be content to be kept out of the coelestial Kingdom Is not God our loving Father there Is not CHRIST our tender Husband there Is not the HOLY GHOST our sweetest Comforter there And to go lower are not many of our good Friends and dear Relatives there And is not the greatest part of the true Church gone thither and now triumphing in the Presence of our LORD and can we once wish to stay behind Does not the Hireling long for his Pay The Servant for his Wages The Souldier for his Reward The Husbandman for his Harvest The Heir for his Inheritance And do not we long and pant and ardently desire to be in Heaven It will be seen here whether we do or no for then we shall mourn the oftener and the more earnestly that so we may get thither quickly To all good Christians the Gates of Heaven are set wide open and the faster we improve in Divine Grace the sooner possibly we shall enter What more forcible Reason can there be or Motive either to provoke to this Duty If we can outstand the Dint of this vain it will be to propound any more well therefore may it be the Last I offer Let good Christians think seriously with themselves what a vast difference there is between what we are now and what we hope to be hereafter What a sad case are we in here What variety of Infirmities encompass and incommode us We have stupid Minds and crooked Wills clouded Understandings and erroneous Judgments unfaithful Memories and extravagant Affections sensual Desires and unruly Appetites polluted Souls and filthy sickly mortal Bodies What a blessed Condition shall we be in above and what a fulness of Beatitude shall there surround us For besides a freedom from the aforesaid Complaints we shall have a clear and most comfortable Vision of GOD whom our Souls upon Earth so entirely loved The immediate Fruition of the eternal JESUS whose very Name was so ravishing to us The taking Society of Angels most spotless and illustrious that now do us good and we perceive it not The delightful Fellowship of departed Saints whom we prized so much and were so loth to forego Souls pure as the brightest Cherubim and Bodies at length more glittering and radiant than the Starrs or Sun And shall not the hope of such high Preferment make us forward to increase in Grace tho' it were by Mourning that so we may the sooner be invested with it Does not the sense of our many Miseries make us impatiently desirous of Heaven Are not our Sins many Are not our Doubts and Fears and Distractions many Do not these rend our Hearts and afflict our Spirits and sting and gnaw and wound our Consciences and make us oftentimes restless and joyless Can we serve and please GOD as the Souls of the just made perfect do Can we see Him and know Him and love Him and laud Him and derive Happiness from Him as they do Alas the best Services which we perform to Him and the Highest Felicities we receive from Him in these lower Regions are not worthy to be named in the same day with theirs The Duties we offer up to GOD are lame and imperfect mingled with Failings and many Weaknesses and scarce deserve the Name of Duties And answerable to our Duties to Him are our Comforts from Him so faint and low in comparison that they scarce deserve the Name of Comforts If now and then we can get a slight Taste of GOD's Goodness a short Glimpse of His Countenance a single Beam of His Favour darted into our Souls that 's all which ordinary Christians commonly attain to But O the quick and lively sense that the Saints in Glory have of GOD's Love O the close and sweet Embraces that they there feel in the Arms of His Mercy O the fresh Torrents of incessant Joys that always overflow and exceedingly affect them They continually bathe themselves in streams of delight that issue directly from the Great JEHOVAH and swim in such an Ocean of Divinest Pleasures as hath indeed neither Bounds nor Bottom Nor is the measure of their Happiness beyond its Duration for in respect of that it is really infinite being to last as long as GOD Himself Now are not these Excellent things worth the having Can there be any more valuable and so more eligible than they And consequently can we desire any thing so much as a speedy Passage into the Fruition of them Would we not gladly exchange corruption for Glory and a dying Life for blessed Immortality Had we not rather sit down before the Throne of GOD in Holiness and Triumph than abide here in a condition of Sin in a state of Sufferings and in a vale of Tears In short were it not better for us to be taken up into the Mansions on high to reap the Fruits and injoy the Rewards of our respective Labours than still to be imploy'd in any painful Exercises Why if in reality we think it better and accordingly desire it let us manifest the sincerity of our Desires by the Earnestness of our Endeavours to encrease our Graces by holy Mourning Happy are they who by any Piece of early Piety do so advance or augment their Graces as to obtain an early ascent to Heaven And to encourage a little farther yet as we shall go to Heaven perhaps the sooner for this so we shall have the more Glory there Every Vessel shall be full in that Sea but yet the biggest shall receive most That therefore we may be capable of the more Bliss in Heaven while we are on Earth let us enlarge our Graces by Religious Mourning CHAP. XXI Reasons why we must mourn for the Sins of others The Best have done it The neglect of it is blameable It prevails with Heaven It brings us Comforts It secures us from Judgments when others fall by them Both Nature and Religion bind us to it It may be we have been Sharers in the Sins of others HAving given in the Reasons why we
strangely satisfy us Yet just such is that River that River of Comforts which flows in GOD's House When our Souls drink of it it inebriates them as I may say with holy Joys and fills them with Pleasures and divine Delights like those at GOD's Right Hand for ever Which considered we need not by the way wonder at that strange Passion which raged in King David and transported Him with desire of joining in GOD's Worship when He was in Exile and under unhappy Exclusion from it * ver 2. My Soul longeth yea even fainteth for the Courts of the LORD my Heart and my Flesh cry out for the living GOD. And in another place †Psal 42.1 2. As the Hart panteth after the Water-brooks so panteth my Soul after Thee O GOD. My Soul thirsteth for GOD for the Living GOD when shall I come and appear before GOD And again ‖ Psal 63.1 2. O GOD my Soul thirsteth for Thee my Flesh longeth after Thee in a dry and thirsty Land where no water is to see Thy Power and Glory so as I have seen thee in the Sanctuary Now how came it to be thus with the King of Israel What occasion'd these extraordinary Affections and Emotions of his In all likelihood at present he was banisht And being unfortunately driven out of his Territories his Mind one would think might have been taken up with that sad calamity Or else the busy thoughts of recovering his Crown and Kingdom from which he was forced should have ingross'd it in a manner entirely to themselves Yet we plainly see that it stood quite another way even to GOD's Worship and the Place where it was publicly celebrated The loss of these was that which he lamented and the Reinjoyment of them was that which he desired For these he longed for these he thirsted and that so violently that his very Soul panted and even fainted for them But why so There must be some good Reason for so great Eagerness some mighty Cause of so marvellous an Effect And truly he more than insinuates what it was where he tells us as before was noted that his Soul thirsted to see GOD's Power and Glory as he had seen it in the Sanctuary There 's an Answer to the Query which may well satisfy us without seeking farther The excellent Prince as he was a constant frequenter of GOD's House so he was throughly acquainted with that River of Pleasures which flowed in it He had very often been very sensible of those truly Powerful and Glorious Comforts which there descend upon the Servants of GOD and this made him so passionately and impatiently desirous of joining with them in public Duties Now if such measures of divine Comforts as produced these Effects came down upon the Religious in their public Performances under the Law what Fulness of Comforts must rest upon those in their sacred Offices who are faithful Professors of the Gospel For as betwixt the Legal and Evangelical Dispensations there is as much difference as there is between Moses and CHRIST so between the respective Comforts of each there is as great Difference as there is betwixt the cloudiest and the clearest Day or betwixt the rising and the meridian Sun But then hence it will follow that Christians who exceed the Jews in comforts should excell them as to Duties and the Service of GOD as having more excellent Incouragements to the same And so in Truth they do The matchless Comforts which they there meet with do greatly indear GOD's House and Ordinances They make them forward to them and also pleased with and in them beyond all Measure and Expression When in outward communion with the great GOD they feel themselves affected with inward Consolations with deep Sensations of Divine Pleasure and ineffable Perceptions of ravishing Delights the high Satisfactions they find in His Ordinances do strangely captivate their very Souls and most sweetly enamour them on the same So sweetly and passionately that if all this World and a thousand better were profer'd to draw them from those Ordinances they would be no Temptation in the Least to them to relinquish and desert them They would refuse any thing they would reject every thing and that with holy Rage and scornful Indignation rather than choose to be barred from GOD's Ordinances * In Sancto magna est consolatio in Psal 36.8 where they perceive such an affluence of Comforts For as S. Austin says in the Sanctuary there is great Consolation And this I must add That the plenty of divine Comforts which they there meet with are not only happily felt by themselves but are sometimes plainly seen by others in lively Symptoms or Indications hard to be conceal'd Thus I have observ'd of zealous Christians that after their Converse with GOD in Duty particularly at His own Mysterious Table a more than ordinary lightsom pleasant Air hath appeared in their Faces Their hidden Joys have shined in their Countenances and that they abounded with inward Consolations was outwardly manifest in their sprightly Visages I could discern methoughts that they had received JESUS by the serious graceful Gayness of their Aspects and the Spirits have danc'd so chearfully in their Eyes as if their heavenly LORD taken into their Hearts had looked out at those sparkling Windows Now where such mighty Comforts as these fall in with holy Duties Private and Public they must strangely invigorate the Performers of them and bring in such Accessions of Heavenly Strength as will effectually conduce to their Settlement in Religion And they that are fixt in true Religion may well pass for blessed here on Earth So they were accounted and ever esteemed by the best of Men and so they must be according to the Word of the infallible GOD. For the HOLY GHOST speaking of such a one in the first Psalm describes him thus His delight is in the Law of the LORD and in His Law doth he meditate Day and Night He is so well grounded and confirmed in Religion that he is always studying the Law of Heaven in order to the conscionable Keeping of it That is his Temper but what 's His Condition No less than Blessed as the first Word of that Psalm informs us Nor is He there called Blessed only but * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Blessednesses As if He were Blessedness it self in the very abstract an Heap or aggregate Body of Beatitudes The least that can be meant is that he is Blessed in all respects or Capacities In his Soul in his Body in his Duties in his Estate c. But then remember we must that this Blessedness proceeds from Confirmation in Religion and that Confirmation flows from Spiritual Comforts and that those Comforts come in by Holy Mourning And so it is necessary as necessary for us to Mourn piously as it is for us to take the readiest Course to be thus Blessed that Exercise being a grand Instrument of this Beatitude CHAP. X. A Sixth Motive to Mourning in General
must call to mind that as this Blessedness also is the Offspring of Comforts so are they of Mourning And therefore as we would be blest in such Comforts as shall free us from extravagant Fears when we dye or as shall turn our Fears into Desires of Death we must live holy Mourners CHAP. XIV The Tenth Motive to Mourning in General being the Seventh Branch of that Blessedness which springs from the Comforts annexed to Mourning They sweeten our Life by conducing to our Health and by bettering the Temper of our Minds as well as the Habit of our Bodies THat holy Comforts are blessedly useful and beneficial to our Souls what hath been said on the foregoing Heads does sufficiently prove But then they have a benign and blessed Influence on our Bodies too Nor is it at all strange that those Comforts which are no other than the sweetness of Heaven in our Spirits should sweetly affect the bodily Part of our Beings For while the Spirit and the Flesh continue in this state of vital Union as what is agreeable to the Flesh or Body is frequently pleasing to the Soul or Spirit so on the contrary what is highly delightful to the Spirit will often be recreative to the corporeal fleshly Part of us A most excellent Man who knew this in himself hath transmitted his happy Experience to us in the infallible Book * Psal 84.2 My heart and my Flesh says he rejoice in the Living GOD. Where by the Heart cannot be meant that musculous piece of Flesh in the middle Region of the Body properly so called for then the Expression would have been tautological and might as well have run thus My Flesh and my Flesh rejoyce in the living GOD. But by it we are to understand the Mind or the Soul which is the Source of Understanding and of all Sense and the Spring of all Thoughts Desires and Actions But then this informs us that when Joy or Comfort descends upon the Soul it snatches the Body into Sympathy with it For here it is said of the Heart and the Flesh at once * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they have rejoyced or they have broken out into †To 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 usurpatur etiam de dolore sed praecipuè de gaudio cum 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ☊ conjunctum ut hic significat ovationem c. Pol. Synop. Jubilations or Ovations in which excessive Joys do commonly shew and naturally spend themselves Not that divine Joy affects the Body no farther than just the visible Gesture or the audible Voice in which it sometimes runs out or discharges it self for the Body hath its share as well in the sweet Passion as in those Expressions of it As it is said of the Soul and Body both 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so the Septuagint well renders the Hebrew they have exulted tho' the Soul in strictness cannot leap for joy but must leave that chiefly for the Body to do so the Body cannot strictly rejoyce neither but must leave that principally to the Soul Yet as when the Body leaps for joy the Soul must have a Perception of that Exultancy so when the Soul rejoyces for Comfort the Body hath some sense shall I say or shares in the effects of that heavenly Gladness The holy Psalmist cries out Psal 63.1 My Soul thirsteth for Thee ‖ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 my Flesh longeth for Thee Whence it is plain that when the good Soul is carri'd with passionate and thirsting Desires after GOD her very Flesh at the same time pines and languishes through their Eagerness and Ardency as if that were capable of divine Longings too So when the Soul is ravisht with transporting Joys the fleshly Body it wears rejoyceth with her according to its measures It is affected I mean with the Blessed Passion Which rising at first from a spiritual Motion begun in the Soul does yet terminate in the Body which is the Instrument of Passions and by causing grateful Motions there which return upon the Soul in way of Sensation she is thereby pleased with reflected Delights Now when holy Comforts that descend upon the Soul do thus influence the Body its partaking of them may be a means to keep it in a regular state and to sweeten Life by preserving of Health The Scripture seems to insinuate as much Psal 118.15 The voice of Joy and * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 omnimodam salutem significat tam 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 quam 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Health is in the dwellings of the Righteous Where by Joy a great †Interiora gaudia August Man understands the inward Joys of righteous Livers And as they have cause to lift up their Voice in praising GOD for those Joys so many times they have cause to do it likewise for that Health which is the Fruit or Product of them For the HOLY GHOST may not only signify here that the Righteous have more Joy and Health than others to praise GOD for but also that their Health may be derived from their Joy And in the Third of the Proverbs Solomon suggests something like this For there he tells us that Wisdom or true Religion ‖ Ver. 18. is a tree of Life to them that lay hold upon her That is it is like * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the tree of Lives which GOD planted in the midst of Paradise And that we know was to keep Man from Sickness as well as from Death and so not only to prolong his Life but to preserve his Health And as we find in the same Chapter also to fear the LORD and depart from evil which is Wisdom or Religion in other Terms * Ver. 8. shall be Health to the Navel and Marrow to the Bones A good Evidence that where-ever true Religion dwells in Men in the due Course or just Order of things it will have Health for its Inmate Unless GOD for great Reasons best known to Himself shall please to order it otherwise But then we must enquire whence is this Or how comes it to be thus Why should Religion in the Soul conduce to Healthfulness in the Body The making out this is the Scope of that Point which we are upon and Solomon hath done it to our hand I mean where he declares that the ways of Wisdom are ways of Pleasantness and that all her paths are Peace Prov. 3.17 That virtuous Livers by being virtuous have great Advantages of Health on their side beyond others who are loose and vitious in the World cannot be denied For their Piety and Purity their Self-denial and Sobriety their meek or dispassionate Temper and the Like besides that they entitle them to the Blessing of Heaven do effectually secure them from those Disorders of Mind and Distempers of Body which the contrary Evils naturally breed in them or bring upon them And then they as certainly prevent those dreadful Visitations which as often come down judicially from above and are
the sad Revenges of divine Justice upon the Dissolute and Licentious as they are natural Effects of their being so And farther as the wisest of Men we see hath told us they that walk on in the ways of Wisdom that are regular and persevering in the several Duties and progressive in the noble Perfections of Religion shall not fail to meet with Pleasantness and Peace With such Peace and Pleasantness as come from GOD and fill the Soul with inexplicable Comforts And these Comforts as little as some think it may be good and great Instruments of Health unto us As where the Body is well and strong they help to confirm it in that State so where it happens to be weak and low they raise and mend its Constitution They put a spring of new Life as it were into the Soul which excites most pleasing Motions in the Body even such as serve to inliven and invigorate it For as raking Grief does not only fret and imbitter the Mind but withal casts a sad Damp upon the Body and deadens the liveliness of those inward Motions on which its Health depends and by which it is conserved so heavenly Comforts where they are often and liberally imparted do ordinarily produce the contrary Effects They quicken the Spirits where they move too slowly and help the Bloud to circulate more freely and nimbly where 't is subject to Stagnancy and by taking off the sharpness and sowreness of them they insensibly sweeten and rectify both By peculiar Motions which they put them into they alter the Figures of their disordered Particles and so better the Mass or Substance of them with more Ease and Efficacy than the best Physic can possibly do And the Bloud and Spirits being thus corrected and the Ferments of the Body made light and soft and smooth and unctuous the Wheels of Nature will by this means be freed from cumbersome Cloggs and Entanglements within and in case no Violence happens from without may run on a great way in a regular Course And thus not only Life is prolonged as Length of Days is in Wisdom's right Hand Prov. 3.16 but that Life is made more happy because the Person injoying it is made more healthful And therefore we are taught by an incomparable Writer that the Fear of the LORD which maketh Peace or produceth Comforts where it dwells does thereby make perfect health to flourish Ecclus. 1.18 Nor can it seem strange that holy Comforts should thus conduce to Health if we do but remember what wonderful Effects they have had upon Martyrs turning their dying Pangs into rapturous Pleasures as was * Chap. 11. But then the Martyrs Comforts are there said more than once to be extraordinary ones and so much above those we here speak of noted above And another Instance may abate the strangeness of the thing As 't is commonly said Witches are †Note VI. suckt by their Familiars And to this end as we may reasonably suppose that thereby they might taint and disorder their Bodies And when Distemper of Body proceeds from the influence of wicked Spirits well may Healthfulness be an Effect of the Comforts of the HOLY GHOST And divine Comforts being such Preservatives and Restoratives of Health upon this Account they must be Blessed Things Health being necessary to our present Happiness For as he that would be wise must first put off Folly and as he that would be virtuous must first throw off Vice so they that would be Happy must first be Healthful Else in spite of all Rules and Principles of Stoicism a sickly Body will disquiet the Soul and a pained Body will disturb the Mind and Trouble and Unquietness in the Soul and Mind will soon convince all Persons concern'd that if they would build up Felicity to themselves they must lay its Foundation in Ease and Indolence However * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Diog. Laer. in Anaxar pounce the Sack of Anaxarchus for Anaxarchus thou dost not strike were big words in that Abderite's Mouth when cruel Nicocreon was braying him in a Mortar and might express a stout and resolute Humour yet they were as far from rendring the Sufferer happy as the Thumpings he endured were from rendring him easy Nor do heavenly Comforts conduce more to mending the Habit of our Bodies than they do to bettering the Temper of our Minds For as Pleasures that are sensual and impure do sink and soften and emasculate the Spirit as they fill it with pensive Solicitude and fretful Anxiety to find that it is fallen below it self and inslav'd to things unworthy of its Dignity so where it is ravisht with the Comforts of Heaven and nobly transported with frequent Returns or Iterations of them it will rise by Degrees into a very delicate and desirable Frame So that if before we were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 tart and waspish and peevish and passionate these in time will work a thorow and an excellent Change in us They will cool our Heat and quench our Fury and rebate the sharpness and fierceness of our Disposition and polish the Ruggedness and Unevenness of our Minds and take off the Bitterness and Sowreness of our Nature and so make us not only to be easy in our selves but obliging to others And to have our Passions thus curbed and tamed in us and all Harshness and Roughness thus taken out of us and to become moderate and well composed in our selves and meek and mild and pleasing unto all must needs be a great Improvement of our Temper And as this Improvement sweetens our Life which how it should do it the meanest Capacities can apprehend it must add considerably to our Blessedness upon Earth But then as we would live sweetly in this present World as we would have our Souls blessed with Health of Body and good Temper of Mind let us heartily take up Religious Mourning from which will result those holy Comforts that are productive of the same CHAP. XV. The Eleventh Motive to Mourning in General being the Eighth Branch of that Blessedness which springs up from the Comfort annexed to Mourning They supply us with noblest Delights in this Life when those that are less generous fail and forsake us Which they do by acquainting us farther with GOD and by inflaming us with Love to the LORD JESUS CHRIST IN our declining Years as our Strength decays so other natural Abilities and Perfections which depend upon it flag and decay with it Particularly our Faculties grow dull and our Appetites grow down our Pleasures wear off and by degrees wear out and the sinking Body so depresses the Soul that Men dye to most of their corporal Satisfactions even while they live But here the Force of holy Comforts again is blessedly felt this being a chief Juncture wherein they exert it For when in these our Declensions they dwell plentifully with us they are an inexhaustible Spring of rich and high Complacencies They do not only fill us with great Thoughts and
of Scripture mistaken and misapplied First False Comforts are sometimes Effects of Nature Where the Spirits are good and the Bloud is sweet and the Ferments of the Body regular and even besides Health and Indolency we there find a constant readiness in Men or a standing Disposition to Lightsomness and Jollity So that if they of this Constitution who dwell as it were upon the Brinks of Joy be at any time carri'd by Just occasions but a little farther they forthwith step into the pleasing Passion it self And how they should come to be advanced to it and also raised to an high Pitch in it even by a natural complexional Efficiency is easy to apprehend Melancholy in conjunction with a sanguine Temper is able to do it For by mingling its brisk acrimonious Flatulency with a sweetish heavyish kind of Bloud it strikes upon the Nerves with such grateful Touches as cause delightful Titillations in the Body and so affect the Soul with much joy and pleasure Nor need we wonder that such joyous Comforts or Delights should result from meer nature or our bodily Temper if we do but consider how other things are very productive of the like Effects Wine for instance hath a power in it to chear our Spirits or as it is expressed in holy Stile * Psal 104.15 to make glad the Heart of Man Insomuch that Josephus says of it †〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Antiq. li. 11. cap. 4. it even transports and regenerates Souls It puts a kind of new life into them by mending or raising the Temper of their Bodies and rendring them more healthful and vegete I speak of the moderate and sober use of it it being most baneful both to Soul and Body wherever it is taken in excess So Mela informs us that the Thracians who had no Wine suppli'd the want of it at their Feasts by a certain Seed And of such a Quality was that Seed that the Smoak of it caused Intoxication and Mirth Which things considered how Melancholy should cause high Joys within us will not be difficult to conceive For it is but allowing hypocondriacal Humors to have Affinity with Wine or its Vapours to have cognation with the Fumes of the Thracian Seed and the work is done And that Nature which out-does the most exquisite Chymists should refine Melancholy to such a Degree and sublimate or exalt it to such an Height as to make it so capable of the forementioned Operations as to fill us with joyous and triumphant Delights cannot be surprizing to the intelligent For they know very well that where Melancholy is predominant and duly heated and invigorated by a sanguine Temper or Constitution very strong Joys and even rapturous Delights will result from it So * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Aristotle expressly affirms that it produces Extasies and Joys of Mind and that too as he adds †〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Probl. sect 30. with singing And when Men may so overflow with Joys as that their Joys shall rise up into Raptures and their Raptures run out and spend themselves in singing must not the Gratifications they feel within be exceeding high Yet these are Fruits that may grow upon the bare stock of Nature and so may have nothing at all of the Good SPIRIT in them or of His true Consolations Secondly Inward Comforts False ones I mean may be Effects of a worse Cause than this they may be derived from Satan himself As GOD sheds abroad true Joys and heavenly Consolations into the Hearts of His Servants to encourage and strengthen them in the Works of Religion so the Devil who loves to ape the ALMIGHTY where he can does sometimes cast false Joys and delusive Comforts into the Hearts of his Vassals to animate and imbolden them in the Ways of unrighteousness For should they always walk on in Dulness and Darkness this might so startle them as to make them seriously bethink themselves It might so alarm and terrify them as at some time or other to fright them out of their vitious into virtuous Courses Now and then therefore he tantalizes them with some feeble Glimmerings of false Light and Comfort He darts some glaring Joys into their Souls to make them well opinion'd of themselves And perswading them by this means that their Condition is good tho' it be quite otherwise he so prevails with them to persist in Sin till at length they fall into irrecoverable Ruine Nor is it hard to conceive how the Evil Spirit should kindle this Fire of false Joys in our Breasts and warm us as it were with Comforts which flash from Hell For since an agreeable mixture of Melancholy with our Bloud can raise us as we have heard to an Elevation of rapturous Delights the Devil who hath power to actuate the Humors and Vapours in our Bodies especially if we be his Servants by his dexterous agitation of those Vapours and Humors inforcing them beyond their natural strength he may easily transport us with ravishing Satisfactions And thus the strange Delights which some Men feel and which they reckon to be divine Influences from above and blessed Productions of the HOLY GHOST are but natural Effects or Satanical Injections and so rather hellish Infusions than Inspirations from Heaven Thirdly False Comforts may proceed from Enthusiasm For where that prevails Imagination is strong Insomuch that the Mind which should always be under the government of free Reason is wholly sway'd by this lower Faculty And where Fancy rules it easily over-powers and bears down the Soul into a firm Belief of the Truth of what she vigorously apprehends be her Apprehensions never so enormous and extravagant Hence it hath come to pass that one Fanciful Enthusiast has conceited himself to be a Prophet or an Angel another has thought himself to be the true Messiah or the great Judge of the World another has boasted himself to be GOD the FATHER or the HOLY GHOST Now when the Strength of Fancy or Force of Imagination thus carries away the Mind into a credulous Assent to such wretched Mis-conceits these or the like Conceits naturally lift up Souls which fully believe them to be great Truths into very high Joys and Ravishments of Spirit Yet be they never so lofty or never so luscious they are but a corrupt and dangerous sort of Fruit as having nothing but Enthusiasm for their chiefest Root Fourthly False Comforts may arise from wrong Notions which Men have in Divinity Thus some too opinionative are mightily for absolute or irrespective Predestination Others for Justification by Faith alone Others for being justifi'd by CHRIST's Righteousness imputed And others again are as stiff Assertors and as strenuous Maintainers of that absurd Perswasion that GOD sees no Sin in His own Children Now they that firmly believe and fiercely contend for these and such Fancies conclude they are highly beneficial to them in their greatest Interests and so they are strangely affected with them and influenced by them and feel them
as being nearer to the common Sentient and so to the Soul her self Now let us but suppose and the Supposition is very easy that the Blessed SPIRIT can so influence the Soul and so possess her with ravishing Delights which we call Comforts as wholly to take her up and divert her from attending to what the Body suffers and this must be one mighty Alleviation of pain if not a perfect Exclusion or Cure of it For what better Anodyne can there be than an absolute inanimadversion or non-reflection upon Evil than a compleat alienation or entire abstraction of the Mind from what should trouble it And then let us but suppose also as well we may that the same good SPIRIT can imprint such delicate Motions upon the curious Fibres of all the Nerves in the Brain as shall produce strong divine Joys and Pleasures and that these fine Motions may be so brisk and vigorous as to continue in spite of all contrary Impressions tho' never so forcible made by any Violence on other parts of the Filaments of those Nerves and the great Work we speak of is intelligibly done upon the holy Sufferers For thus we may readily and fairly apprehend how all sense of Pain should be drowned in them and how their Souls might swim in deep Consolations when their Bodies were sinking under the Executioner's hands Not that we suppose tho that the SPIRIT 's influence upon Martyrs was ever so strong and vigorous as to leave no room or occasion for their Faith Love Patience and the like divine Graces to act in for their better Support and Comfort NOTE VI. Pag. 169. AND the Chief Reasons of it are Two First Because the evil Spirit with whom they are in Covenant may be delighted with the Steams of humane Blood And for a like reason they haunt Church-yards more than other Places and appear most frequently where the Dead are interred So Origen tells Celsus pretty often how the Daemons were gratifi'd with the Steams of those bloody Sacrifices which were offered to them and how they were greedily desirous of them Which he calls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the lickorishness of Carnal Devils And that they are strangely desirous of the Blood of Mankind and delighted with it is evident from the Complaints which the Devil us'd to make amongst his Devotoes in America For oftentimes when he appeared to them he would tell them he was thirsty meaning for Peoples Blood And then his Priests would urge their Kings to offer up store of Captives to their Gods lest poor things they should die for want of refreshment And as when they had no Captives they would go out on purpose to fight and take some so when they had plenty they would offer them most freely killing them as Victims sometimes by hundreds in a Day To which we may add those 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Mactations of Men wherein Multitudes of old were sadly sacrific'd to heathen Deities And if the reekings of dead or dying Sacrifices were so grateful to them without all question the Nidours or Fumes exhaled from the Veins of People alive must be far more pleasing For being of an hotter and finer nature they may well yield them a brisker and more relishing Flavour Secondly Evil Spirits suck of those Wretches whom they draw into hellish Compacts with them that they may have opportunity of corrupting them by transfusing a pernicious Venom into them Of tincturing their Bodies with so vile a Malignity as will help to numm and stupify their Souls in their moral Capacity As shall fill them with Darkness and Blindness and Dulness and Deadness to all that is good and at the same time dispose them to every evil thing to which they shall think fit to excite and instigate them As to Anger Envy Malice Revenge the basest Obscenities and most barbarous Cruelties And when wicked Fiends by their noxious Breathings into People do so poyson their Souls as to pervert their Bodies no wonder that the HOLY GHOST who still countermines the Wicked One in all his Workings should by His Inspirations I mean His consolatory ones not only most heavenly affect our Souls but withal derive an healthful Temper to our Bodies And let me add by these Consolations our Bodies may be so raised and improved as in some measure perhaps to advance towards the Adamical Crasis or Original Constitution They may approach as near as readily they can do to that excellent Temper which the Protoplasts at first were happy in Whereby it may sometimes happen tho' but seldom that they may not only attain to perfect Health which otherwise they might not have acquired but possibly may rise a step higher and gain such a balsamic Quality to themselves as may inable them to preserve Health in others and also such an healing Virtue as may inable them to restore Health to those about them that are commonly or continually with them I mean by salutary Perspirations or sanative Effluvia's which stream plentifully from them For as the Bodies of Men in high Distempers are so full of morbific Virulence or Malignity in themselves as to breathe out such store of contagious Emissions as will infect others with the like Diseases so they that are arrived at this excellent Temper and delicate Complexion of Body which sends forth these salutiferous and medicinal Exhalations may secretly and unperceivably derive Health as well as preserve it to those Persons with whom they frequently or constantly converse NOTE VII Pag. 292. COncerning this Mark there are several Opinions Some think 't was a Letter out of the Name Jehovah stampt upon his Forehead Others that it was a fierce and furious and truculent Aspect arising from the Checks and Gripes of his clamorous and tormenting Conscience And truly a wounded and accusing Conscience does often change the very Looks of people blasting the pleasant Air of their Faces where the Guilt is much inferior to Cain's Others think it was a constant trembling of all his Members especially of his Head join'd with a lamentable dejection of Countenance and so the Fathers conceive it to be And that Expression Gen. 4.12 insinuates as much a Fugitive and Vagabond shalt thou be The Hebrew words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signify moved and agitated to which the Greek ones 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 answer tossed and discomposed Intimating that he was subject to strange kind of Motions and Agitations in his Body the judicial Effects of GOD's Malediction upon him for his Fratricide And the appearance of these tremulous Motions about him did import or rather indicate so much terror and trouble in himself and imprint so much Awe and Dread upon others that they durst not do by him as he did by his poor Brother lest by contracting the same Guilt they should incurr the same dismal Punishment FINIS THE CONTENTS CHAPTER I. THE Usefulness of our Faculties and Passions What Religious Mourning is Two Sorts of it Public and Private The two Kinds of Private Mourning
Reasons for it The Nature of those things which occasion it and the Power of that Being which excites to it First The Nature of those things which occasion it Things of highest concern must be most affecting But Spiritual things concern us most highly and consequently they must affect us most deeply And of that sort only are those things which occasion holy Mourning they are either Spiritual in themselves or else have Relation to such as are so Not but that Temporal Accidents may be extreamly afflictive to good people and make strong Impressions of Grief upon them Yea some of them may assault them so rudely and shock them so terribly as to disturb them more and make wider Breaches in their Peace and Patience than most spiritual considerations usually do But then Spiritual Evils which are really deplorable sink deeper into them and sit closer upon them and call for Mourning and cause it too when those boisterous Storms of bigger sorrow which Temporal calamities raised in them are quite over and so perfectly gone as to return no more For tho' Worldly Misfortunes do sometimes ruffle us with mighty Violence yet the great discomposures which they give us for the most part do in time settle and are seldom lasting Whereas Spiritual Sorrows which are less raging are more durable and by their long continuance shew that they are deeply rooted in the Heart and have taken a more full Possession of it Thus we oft see the Passions even of well-grown Christians strangely tumultuating and at the Deaths of some of their Friends or Relations transporting them beyond the Bounds of Decency and Moderation Yet the same good people in a few Months or Years after their Departure are freed from these furious Transports of Grief and can think and talk of the dear deceased Ones without a Sigh or a Tear But then these very Persons can frequently be passionate for GOD and their Souls and to their dying Days at times can weep liberally for their Follies and their Sins And this plainly argues that pious Sorrow hath a deeper Place in the Heart and faster hold of it than the other and that dwelling constantly there whenever it flows it must proceed from thence So that in short Civil Mourning and Sacred differ as much in themselves as a Shower and a Spring or as a sudden Land-flood and a setled River And in reference to the Heart they differ as much as a Stranger in an House does from the Owner or Inhabitant For the One as a troublesome and unwelcome Guest does now and then come and lodge in it the Other as the Proprietor or Occupant of it resides continually there and is always ready to issue thence as Occasions shall happen to call it forth And these Occasional Provocations being of great Force by being as hath been said of a Spiritual Nature religious Mourning must needs be hearty especially when in the pious Heart it is so throughly and so deeply grounded Secondly Religious Mourning must be hearty because a powerful Being excites unto it And what that mighty Being is our Description of Holy Mourning shews as it makes it a Work of the HOLY GHOST Outward Objects act upon the Senses they have no other way to come at the Soul yet how violently they strike and how vehemently they affect every one of us feel But when one Spirit acts upon another the Action in reason must be * Note I. stronger And so how can religious Mourning be otherwise than hearty when the good Soul is at once both stirred up to it and actuated in it by the SPIRIT of GOD Who by his gracious Operations disposes her to and assists her in that pious Exercise Lastly We describe holy Mourning to be a grieving upon some Spiritual account For as it takes its Rise from Spiritual Principles and as it tends directly to Spiritual Ends so its Process all-a-long is upon Spiritual Grounds or Considerations Tho' it be exprest in natural Passion and there most evidently where it runs so high as to reach to Tears yet that Passion is raised and set on work with Respect to and by the Force of things that are Supernatural and Divine It fares with us in Mourning much as it does in Singing The same Organs serve as well for a Common Sonnet as for a Church Anthem yet in the Cases there is considerable Difference For in the one there is Music only in the Voice and to the Ears of Men Whereas in the other there is Melody †Eph. 5.19 in the Heart made unto the LORD So the same Passion is Used in holy Mourning that is Employed in ordinary Grieving But yet there is great Difference betwixt them for the one Commences upon low Accounts relating to this present earthly State the other proceeds upon more refined and elevated Considerations belonging to the spiritual and coelestial Life As for the Sorts of religious Mourning they are Two Public and Private Public is when a City People Church or Nation are ingaged in it Private is of Two Kinds For it relates to others or else to our selves As it relates to others it hath respect to their Miseries or to their Impieties If it respects their Miseries it is matter of Sympathy If it respects their Impieties it is matter of Charity As it relates to our selves it hath respect either to our Sufferings or to our Duties or to our Sins If it respects our Sufferings it is pious affliction If it respects our Duties it is a piece of Zeal If it respects our Sins it is a part of Repentance We shall speak to it briefly in both its Sorts and in the respective Branches springing from each of them Tho' our Design is chiefly to promote Mourning for Sin and mourning for it in Private CHAP. II. Public Mourning when to be used By whom to be appointed The Practice of it ancient It s great Success noted in the Ninevites which encourages us to it when injoyned PUblick Mourning is properly to be undertaken upon Public Accounts That is when the Sins of a People are grown loud and high and Judgments or Calamities by reason of them are heavy upon them or like to be so Then is the season of Public Mourning as being of singular Use to remove those Judgments or avert them by procuring Pardon for such provoking Sins as were the Cause or might be the sad Occasion of them As for the Ordering or Appointing this sort of Mourning it belongs to the Magistrates Their Office and Care it is to call the People that are under them to it and to put them upon it where they find it needful to be done For Supreme Magistrates being * Ultriusque tabulae custodes Keepers of both the Tables of the Law they are firmly obliged to take care of Religion as well as of Political or State-affairs And so whenever they apprehend Religious Fasting and Mourning to be necessary they are bound to Command their Subjects to the same that are
us at last and shall eternally condemn us Matth. 12.41 CHAP. III. Of Private Mourning as it relates to Others and to Our selves THO' Public Mourning is besides our Purpose yet let not that little which we have said concerning it be thought impertinent the Design of it being but to excite us to it and ingage us in it when at any time it shall be imposed or required We are now to speak to private Religious Mourning And this is matter of our free choice We enter upon it voluntarily or of our own accord without any intervention of the Civil Power or Compulsion from it As it relates to Others it hath respect to two Evils their Miseries and their Impieties First unto their Miseries And as it dwells upon them it springs up from a sympathetic Principle I mean from those Bowels of Compassion Mercy or Commiseration which the holy and elect of God are to put on Col. 3.12 Those choice Persons that are happy in a true Sanctification are full of Pity of Pity so tender and affectionate as commonly makes them prone to Tears Being high in the Evangelical Spirit or Temper they come up to the Evangelical Rule or Precept Weep with them that weep Rom. 12.15 And if we weep and mourn for our Brethrens outward Afflictions it is no more than what our Religion obliges us to For where the Christian Law injoins us to be all of one mind and to be loving to the Brethren 1 Pet. 3.8 it means we should be and it intends to make us of so sweet a Temper and of Spirits so united and mutually endeared as not to fail in sympathizing with our Suffering Brethren tho' their Troubles be but secular and external so they be really sharp or heavy This may seem a melancholy Doctrine yet to practise it is much our Duty and therefore let us do it Whenever we hear or where-ever we see any good People under GOD's hand let us duly lay their Condition to heart If they labour and groan under War or Famine or Pestilence or Persecution or the like Judicial or Providential Severities let us be affected with their deplorable Calamities and think of their Infelicities with Sorrowful Resentments To this the Apostle instructs us powerfully where He elegantly compares the whole Community of Christians to a body Organical telling us that tho' they be Many Members yet they are but One Body 1 Cor. 12.20 And then from the Comparison He rightly inferrs the Sympathy we speak of that if one member suffers all the members suffer with it v. 26. So that not to be toucht with a Compassionate fellow-feeling of good Christians Sufferings makes it questionable whether we be true living Members of CHRIST's Mystical Body or rather it puts it past all Question by making it evident that we are not such And tho' hearty Sympathizing with the Righteous in their Sufferings was never so clearly taught and forcibly recommended as now under the Gospel yet on the Religious it was incumbent before long before that blessed Dispensation came into the World As much may be gathered from that Passage Amos 6.5 6. For there the Prophet charged it as a Fault upon some in his Time that they were unconcerned for good Mens Adversity and addicted themselves to Pleasures while they Languisht in Trouble They chaunted to the Sound of the Viol and invented to themselves Instruments of Music like David they drank Wine in Bowls and anointed themselves with chief Ointments but they were not grieved for the Affliction of Joseph For us to live in high Delights and to give up our selves to be Merry and Gay when the Church of GOD is grievously afflicted and in great Tribulation must needs be a Crime and none of the Least by its falling thus under a Prophet's Reproof Very different from this was the King of Israel's Carriage even to Evil Men and such as derided Him and were injurious to Him When they were sick says He my Clothing was Sack-cloth I humbled my Soul with Fasting I behaved my self as a Friend or Brother I bowed down heavily as one that Mourneth for His Mother Psal 35.13 14. How divinely Soft and Sympathetic was the Temper of this good Prince When unworthy Wretches base in themselves and spiteful to Him fell into Misery he Fasted and Mourned and wore Sackcloth for them Tho' they scorned and maligned and aspersed Him yet he prayed most heartily and importunately for them for GOD's Mercy to them for His Blessing upon them for His Deliverance of them O that we did but demean our selves towards our best Friends when miserable and to the choicest and most eminent Servants of God as this renowned Monarch did towards his Enemies and hypocritical mockers as they are there termed Yet we are happy in a nobler Dispensation than he was and live in that time when according to the inspired mans Prediction he that is feeble shall be as David Zech. 12.8 And as we must mourn in private for others Miseries so we must 2ly for their Impieties And indeed much more for them there being much more reason for it Tho what the Reasons for it are we need not here consider We 'll rather note at present that Charity is the Principle from which it flows and that in this sort of mourning we exercise that Principle And can we set it a Work upon a better Account I believe that excellent man thought he could not whose Wish it was Oh that my Head were Waters and mine Eyes a Fountain of Tears that I might weep Day and Night for the slain of the Daughter of my People Jer. 9.1 But surely he meant as in other places it appears to weep more for those that were slain morally by Sin than for those that were to be slaughter'd by the Sword Charity from which pious sorrow springs would cause him to shed most Tears for such And so it behoves us all to do To mourn more for our sinning than for our suffering Brethren And tho' we be short of the Prophet in Goodness yet in Proportion to our Virtues and the Degrees of our Charity let us bewail the miscarriages of that People to whom we belong But then besides mourning for Others we must mourn in private for our selves And when we do so our mourning hath respect to three things to our Sufferings to our Duties or to our Sins When it respects our Sufferings it is pious Affliction No sooner do good Men feel themselves in Pain or fall into trouble but they are ready to consider from whence it comes And if upon mature consideration they find it descends from Heaven upon them as the fruit of an offended GOD's displeasure and a just infliction of His deserv'd severity it usually brings an holy Grief upon them Thus did David fast and weep and lie all night upon the Earth for the dangerous Sickness and the threatned Death of His illegitimate Son 2 Sam. 12. Or if in the Sufferings they feel there be no sting of Guilt
for this pious Exercise may be doubly considered Either as to the Quantity how much thereof is to be spent in it at once or as to the frequency of its Return when it must be resumed or how often repeated As for the Quantity of Time to be imployed in it at once it cannot well be less than one whole Day The Space I mean of an Artificial Day consisting of twelve Hours and continuing as with us it is usually reckon'd from Six a Clock in the Morning to Six in the Evening And truly we who expect that Labourers should work for such a Day and can run out whole Days in civil Solemnities of our own as we do our Birth-days our Wedding-days or the like how can we bestow less than a whole Day in holy Mourning when we intend to be Solemn in that Sacred Duty But then as to the Return of such a Day how often it must be reiterated it is not so easy for us to set For in this matter we have no certain Rule to go by No common Standard applicable to all whereby to take convenient Measures For here Respect must be had to the various Conditions or Circumstances of Persons Some in regard of their Secular Business or Bodily Constitution as having Less Imployment and more Health can better spend a Day in a Week in holy Mourning than others can do it in a Quarter of a Year Here therefore Wisdom and Piety must rule and People must govern themselves according to the different circumstances they are in and the Principles of their Prevailing Goodness and Discretion I can only say in this Case as the Apostle did in another every Man according as He purposeth in his Heart So let him do 2 Cor. 9.7 When we have wisely pondered all things relating to the weighty Affair let us resolve to mourn either seldomer or oftener as in our very Consciences we shall Judge to be best Only let us remember that what St. Paul says there in reference to Mercy is every whit as applicable to Mourning He that soweth plentifully shall reap plentifully and He that soweth sparingly shall reap sparingly For if they that sow in Tears shall reap in Joy then in proportion to our Seed must be our Crop and our * Yet as two Mites were once preferred before richer Offerings Luk. 21 so one day spent by some in holy Mourning may be â—quivalent 〈◊〉 many 〈◊〉 by others who have more time to spare And in such Case the Rewards are answerable Mournings upon Earth will help to rate the Measures of our Joy in Heaven A Thought which cannot but draw us powerfully to the Work provided that it dwells as long upon our Minds and sinks as deep into them as it ought Especially if we consider that the Joys in Heaven being eternal every extraordinary degree of them in us must be attended with an infinite because endless Sweetness beyond what other Saints shall feel who are inferiour to us but that one Degree in those triumphant Joys Yet that we may not leave the Time for this work wholly in suspence let us come to this moderate Determination concerning it Lest a Day in a Quarter of a Year should be too â—â—â—dom to mourn as the Religious may think for some Reasons and lest a Day in a Week should seem too often for other Reasons let us steer a middle Course betwixt them both and mourn one Day in every Month. And that all who are disposed to be frequent in the Exercise may ingage in it at once and their united Tears may be the more prevalent it will not be amiss to keep constantly to some certain Day in the Month. And because the holy Communion is generally celebrated on the first Sunday in every Month in the Principal Towns as well as Cities of this Kingdom the Friday still coming before such Sunday will be as proper a Day for this monthly Mourning as any I can think of For then something may be done on such Days in way of direct and special Preparation to that Mysterious Solemnity Tho' where Sickness at any time or urgent Business shall hinder any from doing their part on that Day of the Month as they sometimes may they may make choice of some other Day which in such a Case will be more convenient And as many devout and pious Souls as shall give up themselves to this Religious Practice the Blessing of the Good GOD rest upon them and His Grace and SPIRIT assist and prosper them in the holy Undertaking Sixthly In case we would mourn solemnly we must join a free Forgiveness with it Forgiveness I mean of all those that offend us be they never so bitter Enemies to us For that will help to open the Door of GOD's Mercy and let us into an happy possession of the Like great Blessing from Himself Were there no Sin there could be no Mourning because indeed there would be no Misery But our Mournings being caused by our Sins and our Miseries as oft as we mourn we should endeavour to get our Sins remitted that so our Miseries which are their Effects may either be sanctifi'd or removed Now one special means to procure GOD's Pardon for our selves is for us to pardon others Freely let us Pardon their Faults then that He may do the same by ours For this we have a Rule from Heaven and so very clear and full it is that I need but recite it Forgive and ye shall be forgiven Luk. 6.37 And must not free Forgiveness of our Brethrens Offences be a necessary Companion of holy Mourning when upon it our own Forgiveness depends and without that Forgiveness all our Mourning will signify little But then since it is so needful a Concomitant let us be sure to make it a constant one And remember one thing more that if God should ever be so gracious to us as competently to assure us of the remission of our Sins we must then be as willing freely to forgive our trespassing Brethren from the sense of that great Mercy received as ever we were to do it before from the hopes we had that we should at last obtain it For this we have a divine Rule too Forgiving one another even as CHRIST forgave you so do ye Col. 3.13 Lastly To compleat the Solemnity of this private Mourning we may take some fit Associates to us in it So we may inforce it happily by inlarging it and by making it more comprehensive shall make it more effectual GOD who did not spare Sodom for Lot one righteous Person would not have destroyed it could ten have been found in it Two holy Mourners may do more than one and Ten may prevail where Two cannot 'T will be Wisdom therefore to increase our Number that so we may be the better accepted Daniel was not only a Prophet but * Dan. 20.17 a Man greatly beloved of God So the Angel pronounced him And surely the sweetest Character it is that any mortal can bear and
the happiest Circumstance he can possibly be in And being so high in GOD's Favour he must consequently be as mighty with Him in Prayer And that he really was so is evident Ezek. 14.14 where He and Noah and Job are all remarked by the HOLY GHOST for extraordinary Intercessours Yet this powerful Man being to call upon GOD in a matter of very mournful concern when his own Life and the Lives of many others lay at Stake would not trust to the force of his single Invocation but desired his †Dan. 2.17 three Companions to assist that by their joint Importunity tho' in separate Devotions Strength might be added to their sorrowful Supplications Let us conform to this excellent Pattern and ingage as many good Friends as we are able to join with us in holy Mourning If there be any in the World that we are acquainted with or related to who are sincere and faithful Christians or who for Holiness of Life or Zeal in Religion outstrip others let us invite them to be our Partners in this Heavenly Imployment Let us use our own Interest and where we have none the Interest of others to draw them into the Fraternity of Holy Mourners And if that will encourage and induce them to it they may please to Consider that they can never be Members of a more choice Society upon the Face of the Earth What Respect the Great GOD will have to his People in such a Venerable Combination and what Power they again shall have with Him and what Mercies and Favours they shall Receive from Him is not easy to think much less to say even in many Words They that enter upon holy Mourning and carry it on attended with these seven Concomitants do seem to fill up the Solemnity of it according to its just and adequate Measures For to dilate or amplify it farther than thus would be to stretch it beyond the Capacities of a Man For if we look upon a Man in his entire Capacities of an holy Mourner how can he be more concerned than in His Soul His Body His Estate his Time his Enemies and His Friends And all these are plainly ingag'd in the Concomitants forementioned His Soul in Prayer His Body in Tears and Fasting His Estate in Alms His Time in Set Days His Enemies in Forgiveness and His Friends in Select Associates CHAP. V. Two Motives to holy Mourning in General It is a Christian Duty And a Duty most acceptable unto GOD. Its Acceptableness manifested in four Particulars FRom the Nature and Concomitants of Holy Mourning we should now pass to the two Branches of Private Mourning Namely to Mourning for our Own and for Other Mens sins But before we enter upon them it will be necessary to offer General Motives to Holy Mourning in General that is to the several Sorts and Branches of it mention'd in the Close of the first Chapter and to remove those Objections which lie against it tho' it takes a Considerable Part of our Discourse to do it So we being the better prepared for the Work and the Way to it being cleared from the Common Obstacles we shall step into it with more Readiness They that are fit for all Studies in General may the better enter upon any particular ones So being disposed to mourn upon all Accounts we may easily turn the Passion upon our selves or others or upon the Faults of either as we shall think best Whereas if we be not Qualified for Mourning in General we shall never mourn to purpose in the two main particular Cases that is to say either for our Personal or for National Sins Two Motives to such Mourning in General shall fill up this Chapter First Consider Holy Mourning is a Duty incumbent upon Christians And therefore tho' it be not over-pleasing to Flesh and Blood yet we must not neglect it but forthwith undertake it and resolve to go through with it as being indispensably needful That considered we must not shrink from it because it is difficult but rather carry it on with a double diligence because it is necessary And that it is a necessary Duty upon Christians may be gathered from Zech. 12.12 There the Prophet tells us that the Land the whole Land of Judea shall mourn and every Family in it apart and their Wives apart So that Persons of all Sorts and Conditions were to mourn in that Country and withal to be so solemn in it as to act it separately even in most close and distinct Retirements And when was this Remarkable Mourning to be * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in that Day as we are there informed in the time of the Messiah For it was to be after He was †Ver. 10. pierced or crucified and when the fountain of his blood was ‖ Chap. 13.1 opened for Sin and for Uncleanness A manifest Proof that this Solemn Mourning was to be practised under the Gospel by the Christians of Palaestine And then why it should not be so by other Christians in all Parts of the World no good Reason can be given To which I need but add that if our dearest LORD did not command it in a way strictly preceptive yet He fairly imposed it in a predictive manner S. Mat. 9.15 JESUS said unto them Can the Children of the Bride-Chamber mourn as long as the Bridegroom is with them But the days will come when the Bridegroom shall be taken from them and then shall they Fast Where it is observable that our Blessed SAVIOUR seems to make Fasting and Mourning equivalent For when the Querists in the foregoing Verse asked Him about the one He plainly answered them by the other And truly Fasting was so usual or constant a Companion of pious Mourning that 't is commonly joined with it as we find both in the Canonical and Apocryphal Books And withal it was so clear and natural a signification of the same that the Jews never practised it upon their Weekly Sabbaths nor the Ancient Christians upon their LORD's Days because they were Days of Joy And to put on a Sign or Expression of Mourning in Times of Religious Mirth or Festivity would have been very unsuitable and absurd And when Fasting before our LORD's Incarnation was such a Constant Companion of Mourning no Wonder that when He was here in the Flesh He should make them synonymous by putting one for the other as in the forecited Text. But He having done so what He did will bear this Remark When He said then shall they fast it was the same in effect as if He had said then shall they mourn Which being spoken positively not then may they do it as matter of chance or then will they do it as matter of choice but then shall they do it as matter of injunction as well as prediction it amounts to no less than a peremptory Command Unless we suppose that what our REDEEMER spake at that time was meant only to His Proselytes then about Him But that cannot be For in
disquieted be not at all discouraged by it Tho thy circumstance be uneasy Thou maist yet be happy and much the happier for this Disappointment GOD sees what Thou discernest not and the lowring Providence shall never hurt Thee 'T is only out of kindness that He keeps Thee in the Dark and so Thou shalt find it to be in the Event For however He may hide His Face for a while and draw a Thin cloud betwixt Himself and Holy Mourners He will not hold them long in such a gloomy State not one minute longer than till they are Qualifi'd to receive Consolations and Benefit by them When that 's once done He 'll quickly unveil His Blessed Countenance and by the bright Displays of its affecting Glories warm their Hearts with Supernatural Gladness And should their Melancholy State chance to be more chronical or lasting than they look for yet let none impute its Protraction or Continuance to GOD's unkindess For so indulgent is He to his dear Children that He loves not to detain any thing from them which they need or desire in case it were better to impart it to them When Mourners particularly are destitute of His Comforts and complain that they want them and pine and languish for the injoyment of them 't is only some unhappy Indisposition of their own that causes Him to withhold them and were but that removed they should not live one Hour without them Could GOD but find that the Comforts they wish would not be pernicious or could He perceive they would bd profitable to them they should be forthwith blessedly replenish'd with them Then the Load of Anguish which damps their Minds and the Burthen of Terror which oppresses their Souls and the Weight of Heaviness which sinks their Spirits should immediately be taken off and out of their Grief and Fear and Trouble they should soon emerge and rise into Angelic Triumphs and Delights CHAP. VII A Fourth Motive to Mourning in General the present divine Comforts which attend it yield Blessedness Four beatifying Properties of them they are Sweet Glorious Strong and Secure Which contain the first Branch of Holy Mourners Beatitude ALthough Holy Mourning be a needful Duty yet we must not think it is injoined for it self then it would be a melancholy and irksom Imployment When GOD invites to that He intends we should meet with somewhat more than Sorrow for He hath so ordered it as we have made appear that it shall minister to our Spiritual Comfort If holy Tears flow sometimes plentifully out of our Eyes He hath taken care that His divine Consolations with reference to those Tears shall flush exuberantly into our Souls Which made a * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrysost great Man cry out If thou wouldst be comforted then grieve And who would not plunge to the Bottom of holy Grief to be raised up to such lofty Delights But then this is not all Holy Mourners are not only sure of present Comforts but such Comforts shall attend their Mourning as will make them Blessed according to the Doctrine of our dearest LORD in His Sermon on the Mount Blessed are they that Mourn for they shall be Comforted Where by Blessedness is not meant the inestimable Habits of Virtue and Righteousness which throughly rectify and improve our Nature and exalt it in its best and noblest Capacities and so qualify us to be Blessed But the remunerative and pleasurable Delights of Blessedness which lie in or result from the lively sense or free injoyment of divine Satisfactions descending from above And if upon this Head of the Blessedness of Spiritual Comforts I be somewhat prolix let me not be thought tedious For it is a grand Incentive to the Work we recommend and one of the main Springs which must give motion to us in it and then keep up and continue the same For Holy Mourning the truth is may seem an heavy Task to all such as are unacquainted with it The very Look or Idea of it is sufficient to fright and drive them from it Something therefore had need be done to reconcile and win all Strangers to the Work And what can be more proper than to open and unfold the blessed Comforts annexed to it and so to exhibit Some of those fair Advantages which are concomitants of the same That therefore I shall endeavour to do tho' I spend a great part of this Book upon it Look what Wages is to the Labourer or Pay to the Souldier or Gain to the Trader and the very same is the Blessedness of divine Comforts to the holy Mourner a most mighty Inducement or cogent Attractive to draw him to the exercise of godly Sorrow Now the first Branch of Blessedness which accrues to Holy Mourners from their Present Comforts grows out of the PROPERTIES of their Comforts And the Principal of those PROPERTIES are these Four 1. They are Sweet 2. They are Glorious 3. They are Strong 4. They are Secure The first Property of Holy Mourners Comforts which contributes to their Blessedness is that they are Sweet And so very sweet are they that they far surpass all Bodily Delights The Church acknowledgeth this Sweetness and makes Proclamation of it Cant. 2.3 I sate down under His Shadow and His Fruit was sweet to my Tast As the Shadow of CHRIST His Shelter or Protection is highly grateful to His People so His Fruit is as sweet to them And what is that Fruit but the Fruit of the SPIRIT one sort of which is Joy or Comfort Gal. 5.22 A Fruit so deliciously sweet that none can excel it save that which the Blessed Tast above As for Pleasures of Sense they must not compare they are not to be nam'd with it When they rise highest they are but flat when they run clearest they are but Dregs and when we take our fullest Injoyment of them we find Trouble in them or a Sting after them The pleasantest Gratifications that we here meet with are but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 bitter-sweets and the loftiest Transports of our sensual Joys are either allay'd with sadness or quickly sink into it One that perfectly knew this delivers it as plainly speaking the same thing tho' in different Words Even in Laughter the Heart is sorrowful and the end of that mirth is heaviness Prov. 14.13 But divine Comfort is of another strain That shines upon us without dazling our Eyes lifts us up on high without turning our Heads and contains such a true and thorough Sweetness in it as utterly excludes all mixture of Sowrness Well therefore might I say as I just now did and I say it again because it is Truth its Sweetness is such as sets it above all Bodily delights So bitter are the Pangs of a troubled Mind that Solomon insinuates they are unsupportable a wounded Spirit who can bear Prov. 18.14 But be they never so grievous and intolerable Spiritual Comforts are as delightful Where they rise to any heighth in the Soul or flow into her in any good
Healths and their Lives and their dearest Souls are often times made the Price to purchase them O most sad consideration this those very Pleasures which they violently love and eagerly desire and painfully pursue and excessively pay for are not only false but destructive Ones to them and the Reverse of those which should make them Happy However they may please them they most miserably cheat them and instead of contributing to their Benefit tend to their Ruine and unless they grow wiser will terminate in it In reference to these Men therefore I cannot but resume I cannot but inforce the Caution I have taken up Be not Enemies O be not Enemies to your own Happiness If for enjoying Pleasures you be in good earnest and your vehement Desires of them cannot be controll'd make choice of the best and take up with none but the most beatifying And that ye may lay sure hold of these be truly Religious Study the Will and obey the Laws of our LORD JESUS CHRIST Be most humble and obsequious Subjects of his heavenly Kingdom Let His Throne be erected and establisht in your Hearts and make your very Souls submit to the Scepter of His holy Government Then besides that natural Peace and Delight which attend your Being and your Doing good you shall in time be sensible of a great Reward And that Reward shall be great Comforts And from those Comforts shall flow great Pleasures Even such Pleasures as you want and much better Pleasures than ye now seek as being the best sort which Heaven here gives or Mortals can receive Do but believe do but so far believe a faithful Informant as to make a due Trial and ye shall certainly find that thus it will be The other Word behind is to be spoken to strict and circumspect Christians Let such continue in their Zeal and Watchfulness and labour to improve them If they persist not in their zealous Vigilance their great Reward will soon vanish into none at all For tho' the fear of the LORD giveth Joy and Gladness and is a Crown of rejoicing Ecclus 1.11 12 Yet if any that wear this inestimable Crown should give up Religion and cease to fear GOD it would certainly and immediately fall from their Heads When their Zeal flaggs their Comforts must fail and the quenching of the one will extinguish the other And how will they be able to bear that As the Sweetness of their Comforts is really ineffable So the Loss of the same especially if so unhappily occasion'd must be intolerable A total Deprivation of such incomparable Satisfactions by their own Lukewarmness pull'd down upon themselves must needs reduce them to Saddest Trouble I tremble almost to think how they 'll indure it They must surely want something of Extraordinary Mercy even to keep them in their Wits And then they must improve also in Zeal and Watchfulness as well as persist in them So their great Reward will be made greater still and they shall add to the Degrees of their delightful Consolations For tho' in regard these Comforts are free Issues of the ALMIGHTY's Goodness He might dispense them as arbitrarily as Himself pleaseth giving them when and to whom and in what measures He thinks fit yet look what Rule He foretold He will go by in distributing the great and final Rewards and the same 't is like He 'll observe in bestowing these lesser and intermediate ones He 'll apportion them that is to mens Works respectively They shall have most of them that do best and they that by active and passive Duties or else by both bring greatest Honour to His MAJESTY shall probably have the largest share of them at His hands In case we be dispos'd therefore to * Rev. 3.11 hold that fast which we have and to let no man take our Crown the Crown of our Comforts which is preferable to the richest Diadem upon Earth and if we would not only keep these Comforts but augment them that so our †Ecclus 24.31 Brook may become a River and our River may become a Sea we plainly see the way that we must go in But 't is high time for us to stop this our Excursion and from that to return to the Argument we were prosecuting CHAP. IX A Fifth Motive to Mourning in General being the Second Branch of that Blessedness which springs from the Comforts that attend it they confirm us in Religion by sweetning it to us at the beginning and by incouraging us in the Duties of it ever after EVer since unhappy Man fell and his Nature was debased by Original Corruption his Mind hath stood bent as it were in a stiff and continual Tendency to Evil and his Will hath been violently carri'd that way by the Strong Biass of crooked Inclinations and Proclivities So that now if at any time we become Religious we must be drawn to it by a divine Power and if for any time we continue so we must be confirmed by the same And this Confirmation is a blessed Fruit of Spiritual Comforts And happy is it for us that they are effective of it Else when we are entred on the Ways of GOD and have devoted our selves to Him in the Laudable Beginnings of an holy Life we should quickly repent of our worthy Undertaking it would prove so irksom and uneasy to us Or if here and there one by the Force of Reason and strong Actings of Faith could hold on in the Works of Obedience for a while without having them sweetned with these Consolations yet they are not many that would be able to do it Especially if we consider that when first we give up our selves to Religion besides the busy Corruptions of our Nature we meet with many other troublesome Oppositions which greatly discourage us So that should not some Honey be mingled with our Gall some high Consolations be mixt with those Difficulties which meet us in our first Advances to GOD's Service or Engagements in it we should soon grow weary of the Sacred Imployment and willing to resign it or retreat from it It pleases GOD therefore at or sometime after our Conversion to Himself usually to afford us good measures of His Comforts to wedd us to and to settle us in the happy Way which we have chosen The Laws of our Religion run high and the Doctrines it teaches and the Rules and Precepts which it lays before us are strangely excellent But then being of a divine and lofty Pitch they must be hard as well as useful So that had Christianity nothing but its own intrinsic Worth to induce Men to embrace it and adhere unto it without the Assistance of an extraordinary Grace such as perhaps is given but to few its Duties would be too much for all those that make up the main Body of Believers And consequently were there not high Comforts in it as well as spiritual Excellency to recommend it it would not gain many Proselytes to it self How many sorever might offer at it
their charitable and affectionate Sympathy the Sufferings of other People in a good Degree are made their own This of necessity must mightily augment the Afflictions of the Righteous by adding innumerable foreign Troubles as I may call them to their own private and personal Hardships Never let us wonder therefore to see David in a Deluge on every side surrounded or rather quite overwhelm'd with an inundation of Miseries I am come into deep Waters where the Floods overflow me Psal 69.2 Which might well cause him to petition as he did * v. 14 15. Let me be delivered out of the deep Waters let not the Deep swallow me up And these very Petitions imply what we would prove Namely that good Men may be implunged into Miseries into such Floods or Gulphs of Affliction as they should certainly sink in and be irrecoverably drowned did not GOD in His Mercy interpose to prevent it And therefore it is observable that the HOLY GHOST marks out the Righteous for the most afflicted ones Many are the afflictions of the Righteous Psal 34.19 So that if others have Afflictions the Righteous shall have many and if others have many afflictions they shall have many more Which made the * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Rabbies say There are seven Pits for the Just and but one for him that doth evil To all which add as the Afflictions of the Righteous are very many so oftentimes they are very great And the Word which signifies †〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 many signifying great also by being joined with Afflictions in the now cited Text fairly shews them to be both So that as no purity of Heart or Integrity of Life or perfection in Virtue can save us from Mortality so neither from these usual concomitants of it Troubles and Afflictions No Goodness privilegeth against Sufferings Afflictive contingencies are inseparable Adjuncts of this Life and none upon Earth can be exempted from them or exalted above them be they never so rarely and divinely Qualifi'd Yea rather as we have heard Eminence in Piety may make us the more miserable and the fewer our sins are the more may be our Sorrows But then it being thus with the best in this World for us to have the Joys of GOD upon us to have the comforts of Heaven dwelling with us or abiding in us must be a strangely high and happy Privilege For tho' the Number of our afflictions exceed and the Burthen of them be equal to their multitude yet these most heavenly Joys and Comforts will not fail to support us under them And at such a rate will they support us as to render the heaviest Afflictions that befall us always tolerable and mostly easy to us They 'll anoint our Sores and bind up our Wounds they 'll cool our Heats and mitigate our Pains they 'll lighten our Pressures and lessen our Miseries they 'll take out the Sting of our fiercest Terrours and rebate the Edge of our keenest Troubles they 'll asswage the Anguish of our most dolorous Maladies and sweeten our sharpest and bitterest Adversities so far as it is requisite or needful for us Thus much the Royal Prophet teaches of them Psal 94.19 In the multitude of my Thoughts within me Thy Comforts delight my Soul Where by Thoughts we are not to understand purely meditative and contemplative ones but such as were troublesome and afflicting And that the Thoughts here meant are agitated and perplexed anxious and disquieting Thoughts the Septuagint does more than suggest For that expresses the place thus * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according to the multitude of my Griefs within my Heart And to it the Vulgar Translation answers So that by these two Versions Thoughts here are no other than Griefs and no slighty or superficial ones neither for they reacht the Heart And let none think that restless turbulent thoughts are a light sort of Misery They rack the Mind beyond all things here and are the most piercing terrible and tormenting Evils that the next World hath And they must needs be so For as they will force the Soul to look back continually upon the pernicious Folly and amazing Madness of her past sins so they will compel her to look forward as much in the black confounding and intolerable Prospect of her endless Punishments the sad effects of her wretched Exorbitancies But at present we are to note that the Thoughts mentioned by the Psalmist were very afflicting ones As they sprung from great Troubles so they produced such Nor is the Sense thus set at all too high for the Context indeed does not only allow but also require it and the condition of GOD's People warrants as much as that Psalm represents it For as we find in the Beginning of it the Church's Enemies were now in the Heighth of their Triumph and Tyranny and so its Members under their Insolence must needs be in lamentable Tribulation and Distress How could they be otherwise when these insulting Tyrants did not only afflict GOD's Heritage but break in pieces the People of the LORD v. 5. Surely a Prophet as David was at such a time and on such an occasion could not but be full of Griefs as well as Thoughts But now see the Efficacy the supporting Efficacy of holy Comforts When his Mind was ground as it were with vexatious Thoughts and His Heart oppress'd with most burthensome Griefs and a multitude of both lay very hard and heavy upon him yet then did they uphold him Nor did they only inable him to bear up with Patience but they produc'd Delights produced Delights in his very Soul notwithstanding the melancholy Circumstances he was in From whence we may very reasonably inferr that when the good Soul is most clogg'd with Sufferings or sunk never so deep in Sorrow and Afflictions she may yet by the counterpoise of sacred Delights such as divine Consolations afford be sustained in them and raised above them And as Comforts will support thus under all common and unavoidable Afflictions which spring up from our corrupt Nature and are the deserved Fruits of divine Justice and of our own Sins as Infirmities Diseases Misfortunes and the like so under special and chosen Sufferings as I may call them they will do no less And therefore as the Apostle affirms that GOD comforts us generally in all our Tribulations 2 Cor. 1.4 not only in this or that not only in some or many or most but * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in all Pressure or Affliction so he carefully signifies in the next Verse that if we suffer for CHRIST's sake we shall not only have Consolations to support us but shall have them in proportion to the measures of our Persecution †v. 5. As the Sufferings of CHRIST abound in us so our Consolation also aboundeth by CHRIST And therefore when GOD calls us to suffer for JESUS and His heavenly Grace inables us to it as certainly as He is the occasion of these our
how to reason very wisely argues to the purpose in this matter * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 M. Anton lib. 4. sect 47. That if we make any difference betwixt dying to morrow or dying next day betwixt dying to morrow or a thousand years hence this must proceed from an ungenerous or abject Mind For truly as many as are of a noble Temper and think worthily always ought as he says to * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ib. sect 48. look upon all humane things as but of a day's continuance and that it is but a †〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 meer Moment or indivisible Point of Time which we have to spend here And perhaps something of the same Passion is visible in Hezekiah's Carriage Who when he received the Sentence of Death from Isaiah's Mouth turned his Face towards the Wall and wept Esay 38.2 3. Which plainly shews that his Mind was cast down and consequently that he was afraid to die For Fear it self according to Theophrastus his Definition of it ‖ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Eth. Char. cap. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is but a timorous Dejection of Mind And if in the Breasts of such excellent Persons where so much Piety and Goodness dwelt there could be room for the Fear of Death then where Graces and Virtues are lower and weaker there must be higher and stronger Fears of that nature But here again divine Comforts shew themselves to be most blessed things and that very eminently and conspicuously For where these Fears are full-grown as I may say and run up to the highest Pitch that they can reach to in pious Souls holy Comforts are able to expel them Such is their Force that they no sooner enter the religious Heart but they immediately quell all Fears of Death in it or in a great measure exterminate them out of it Nor are they only able to damp the Terrors of Death in us or effectually to abolish or drive them out of us but to turn those Terrors into real Triumphs and Transports of Mind accompani'd with high and heavenly Delights Let none take these for loud Words only or think that they are spoken meerly at random Many righteous Souls departing this Life as subject to Infirmities and Fears as we have sealed them up for certain Truths by very remarkable experimental Testimony For by seasonable Influxes of these mighty Comforts they have not only had their Fears suppress'd or chased from them but their Spirits so ravisht at their dying hour that they have been forc'd to give vent to their rapturous Pleasures and delightful Passions in strange and amazing Exclamations In such exalted and surprizing Strains as have not only sweetly affected but even astonisht all those about them O the Joys the Joys the Joys that I feel said * Mrs. Brettergh See her Life and Death annext to Mr. Leigh's Souls Solace one upon her Death-bed they be wonderful they be wonderful they be wonderful I am as full of comfort as my Heart can hold said †Mr. Bolton See his Life and Death prefixt to his Discourse of the four Last things another and feel nothing in my Soul but CHRIST with whom I heartily desire to be Now farewel World and welcome Heaven the Day-star from on high hath visited my Heart O speak it when I am gone and preach it at my Funeral GOD dealeth familiarly with Man I feel His Mercy I see His MAJESTY whether in the Body or out of the Body I cannot tell GOD He knoweth I see things inutterable O my dear Brethren Sisters and Friends it pitieth me to leave you behind c. So said a * Mr Holland See Mr. Leigh's Souls Sollace c. Third upon sight of a glorious Brightness suddenly appearing to him a little before he died He took it at first for some ordinary Light and asked if any Candles were set up Answer was made no it was the Sun-shine for it was about four a clock in a clear Summer's Evening Sun-shine said he nay it is my Saviours shine c. I know whom I have preached whom I have professed whom I have believed and now I see Heaven open and ready to receive me said a Mr. Hieron See the Relation of his Death before the 2d Vol. of his Works Fourth I shall die But O what unspeakable Glories do I see What Joys beyond Thought or Expression am I sensible of I am assured of GOD's Mercy through JESUS CHRIST Oh how I long to die and to be with my SAVIOUR said a †The Earl of Rochester See the Sermon at his Funeral by Mr. Robert Parsons Fifth And memorable it is of Severinus the Indian Saint that GOD in his last Sickness did so replenish him with holy Consolations that he earnestly besought him either to take him presently out of the World or to stay his divine Joys from descending so freely and exuberantly upon him Lest if he out-liv'd them he should be miserable through the want of them when they were withdrawn and the more miserable for having drunk so deep of their abounding Sweetness Now in the midst of such blessed Comforts what Fear even of Death it self can fasten upon us The Pleasures of them do so powerfully divert our Minds and delight our Souls that we can neither attend to any formidable Objects nor becapable of afflictive Impressions from them They give us such a lively and overcoming sense of GOD's Love to us of His Care of us of His Protection over us and of the strange Felicities He hath provided for us and is putting into our eternal Possession as quite bears down and perfectly swallows up all manner of Dread So that in these circumstances we are not only free from Fear but impossible it is that we should be touched with it while they continue Where Souls swim in such a Deluge of Comforts their Fears must be drowned in the Inundation It is a great Word which the Psalmist speaks and very significant as to our purpose * Psal 37.37 Keep innocency and take heed to the thing that is right or Mark the perfect Man and behold the upright the Original may be rendred either way for the End of that Man is Peace There 's the good Man's Felicity Whatever Troubles or Tumults Disquietments or Uneasinesses Tossings or Terrors he meets with in the Beginning or Progress of his Life yet before it comes to its final Period in all likelihood he is sure of Peace Of Prosperity that is for same time before he goes hence if best for him and of Comfort at the hour of his Departure Thus as David noted it was in his Days and so perhaps we may see it to be in ours if we take but due Care and Pains to observe it With the unrighteous Person it is quite otherwise He lives in frequent Feuds with himself and is seldom at quiet for Frays with his Conscience That checks and twitches and gripes him at every turn If he
flourishes in the World Guilt within dulls his Happiness and makes it insipid yea imbitters the same and makes it unsavoury And in case he declines or falls under Misfortunes the same Guilt aggravates and inrages his Miseries It adds extreamly to the weight of his Calamities and sets so terrible an Edge upon them as makes them to cut more deeply and direfully And as the Guilt which Impious Men have contracted tortures them thus wofully while they live so it racks them a thousand ten thousand times worse when they come to die if they be not senseless of their sad condition Then quick Apprehensions of the Justice of GOD and of their own unworthiness break in upon them And being once entred they startle their Minds and they awaken their Souls that before perhaps slept securely in sin and dreamt of nothing but Ease and Pleasure And the same Apprehensions that rowze them out of their wretched Security help them to form right Notions of Death They tell them plainly and they tell them truly what it must be to their unprepared Spirits Namely a Messenger of Wrath and an Instrument of Vengeance and a sad Consignation to endless Torments A terrible Breach which the divine Anger makes upon them whereat Condemnation and their Ruine enter When GOD summons them from hence out of the Body they can think no other than that 't is to send them directly to Hell and to confine them for ever to the Regions of Darkness and the Prisons of Sorrow and the cursed Habitations of rebellious Sinners And when once they are convinc'd that their Passage hence is a Descent to everlasting Plagues and Miseries how must they fear and what Horrors will seize them when they feel it approaching As the * De Serres Historian relates concerning Lewis the Eleventh of France when he drew on a pace to his Dissolution he strictly charged all about him that they should not so much as mention that cruel Word Death to him And no wonder that from the aforesaid conviction such excessive Fear should arise to such as die impenitent For when Men perceive that they are sinking down into the bottomless Depths of eternal Sufferings how can they chuse but be lamentably overwhelmed with raging Horrors Nor does the amazing Prospect of this dismal Calamity overset Men with Fears only at their last Hour but hurries them on to other Expressions of their Astonishing Troubles For when they feel they must die and that Death will convey them to interminable Punishments then poor Souls they sigh and lament Then they ring their Hands and they tear their Hair and they curse the Day that ever they were born to be so unhappy Then they sigh when they are awake and they start in their sleep and are continually frighted with such inward Terrors that they would gladly run away even from themselves if so be they did know but how and whither Then they call for Ease but they cannot have it they seek for Rest but they cannot find it and therefore bursting out into doleful Tears in the heighth of bitter but fruitless Passion to those about them they make either this or the like heavy complaint Now we are undone O wretched Creatures we are lost for ever We might have been saved if we would and we verily thought we should have been so but alas we find that we were greatly deceived For our Hopes are now gone and our Confidence is quite sunk we are leaving the World and GOD hath left us and who can relieve whom He rejects Once we were offered Peace and Love and might have had them both upon easy Terms But those blessed Tenders are now over and the Hand that kindly reach'd them towards us is armed with Rage and stretcht out with fierce Indignation against us Oh the precious Hours that we imbezilled the sweet Opportunities that we neglected the gracious Invitations that we refused the holy Motions that we resisted the heavenly Glories that we despised Foolish rash and senseless Creatures that we were to do it O that we might but repeat our Lives that we might injoy these Mercies but once again But here 's the thing that breaks our Hearts we know that this shall never be Our Time is spent and Grace is past the LORD is just and we must perish Such are the Wailings of hopless Sinners and in such mournful Strains as these they sometimes relate their Death-bed Miseries And let none blame them as if they were too querulous at such a time they have cause enough for the Complaints they make Yea when in bitterest Words and loudest Out-cries they express their Grief they rate the Accents of it too low their Sorrow is bigger than their Lamentation Grant O GOD of Mercies we beseech thee that we may never fall under the one and never have occasion to take up the other Of all the sad Spectacles in the whole World I think none more lamentable than to see a wicked Man upon his Death-Bed To see how the nearer he draws to dying the more afraid still he is to do it because he is unfit With what terrible Anguish must this Fear of his needs sting his Soul and how intolerable must that Anguish be because it is incurable Yea the truth is in reference to the ungodly Death is armed with a double sting before it comes it strikes them with the Sting of woful Horror when past with that of cursed Misery Death to them is but an Inlet into Hell that Kingdom of Misery where Sorrow reigns without Measure or End And as they that are in this miserable state cannot but languish in grievous Tortures so they that feel themselves hasting to it cannot but lie under as grievous Fears But now when the righteous go from hence they do it in far more easy circumstances because they do it in a better condition They profess themselves strangers here upon Earth and they seek a City that hath Foundations in Heaven And as they have wisely laid up their Treasure there so their Hearts are with it already which makes them very willing to follow When their Turns come they never repine or quarrel at their Destiny nor lament the case of their dislodging Souls but lie down contentedly at the Feet of Providence and are really pleas'd that they have leave to be gone And one good Help to make them so is the Sweetness of their Passage Their uprightness according to the Royal Psalmist brings them Peace at the last And that Peace keeps all those Thorns out of their Death-bed Pillows or else plucks them thence which prick and gall ungodly Wretches and make their Heads to lie uneasy And when that is done instead of these Thorns it wreaths Olive Branches about their Temples fills them with Tranquillity and holy Quietness And then though Death comes never so suddenly and though when it comes it strikes never so furiously its fiercest Blow cannot make them unhappy They can bear it composedly and without Fear
because they can do it comfortably and without Danger It was a noble piece of courage which David put on and a gallant Resolution worthy of himself which he bravely took up Psal 23.4 Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of Death I will fear no evil But whence did it spring or what was the Basis upon which it stood Not his Puissance though he was a mighty Prince not his Magnanimity though he was an Heroe of a great Mind but Divine Comforts They were the blessed and generous Stock which bare this excellent and desirable Fruit. So the following words inform us for Thou art with me Thy Rod and thy Staff they shall comfort me Whence it is plain that GOD's Presence and his supporting Consolations were the Grounds of the good Man's confidence and courage And truly as many as are happy in those though they be in the valley of the Shadow of Death must needs be above all fear of dying For for such to dye is but to step out of one Heaven into another and can the fearfullest in the World be afraid to do that Whenever we draw near to the Gates of Death if GOD be but with us if the Rod of His Power does but protect us and the Staff of His Comforts does but sustain us we are as sure to be free from distracting Terrors as they that are destitute of those Encouragements and unworthy of them are sure to be full of them at such a Time if they be themselves and think what they are about to Suffer And let none surmise as some perhaps may be ready to do that divine Comforts those Cordials from Heaven may be too weak or languid things to support them under their Death-bed Terrors For be their Illness never so great and be their Miseries never so many and be their Pains and Agonies never so strong and never so wearisome Yea be their Condition as sad and deplorable as violent Sickness or approaching Death are able to make it and so their Fear as high as dying Circumstances can possibly raise it yet if GOD will but please to be merciful to them if He will but graciously condescend to visit them if He will but look down and smile upon them or as we read in the * Chap. 1. 2. 2. 6. Canticles fall upon their Necks and Kiss and Embrace them all their fears will leave them in a Moment And no wonder that the Comforts which issue from the Face and Favour of GOD should immediately chase away the Fears of Death when they would do no less by the Pains of Hell were they shed down upon the blackest Spirit that suffers the worst or extreamest of them But alas his ruful unfitness for them and incapacity of receiving them will for ever bar and hinder the Experiment Nor will holy Comforts only expell good Peoples Fears of Death and turn them into noble courage against it but they often improve their Courage into pious Desires of it This is discoverable from several Texts of Scripture So we find Rev. 22.17 that the SPIRIT and the Bride say Come The true Church of GOD being influenc'd by His SPIRIT for in the words there is an Hendiadis one thing express'd by two does beg CHRIST's Second Coming His coming to Judgment And they who desire that Advent of His must also implicitly desire to Dye because whenever it comes if they be alive it brings upon them a Change equivalent to Death And S. Peter tells the Christians of his time that they should not only be looking for but hasting unto the coming of the Day of GOD 2 Pet. 3.12 or rather †〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 hasting or speeding the coming of that Day But one chief way of accelerating or hastening it is by desiring it or praying for it So S. Paul speaking of others as well as of himself professes We are willing to be absent from the Body 2 Cor. 5.8 And how willing were they to it That He tells us at the 2d Verse For in this in this Body we groan earnestly desiring to be cloathed upon with our House which is from Heaven While the best Souls dwell here their Habitation is mean no better than an * V. 1. earthly House And most fitly it is so denominated as rising from the Earth and as returning to the Earth and as remaining upon the Earth while it continues undissolved In which respect it is said by the Apostle to be not only a bare ‖ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 earthly house but * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an house upon the Earth And as Christians are willing to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 go far out of the Body their earthly house so they are so willing we see that they are desirous of it and so desirous of it that they groan and groan earnestly for it For when they groan earnestly to be cloathed upon with their House which is from Heaven as immortal Glory is here expressed they can do no less than groan as earnestly at the same time to go out of their Earthly House that is to dye Even in the Old Testament we have Intimations of such Desires as these in the eminently Religious All the days of my appointed time will I wait till my Change comes said the good Man Job 14.14 And he that expected the great Change * That Job speaks of his change from life to death and not from death to the resurrection as some think his very Expression shows For he says 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I will wait or hope or expect which sounds but harshly if said of one in his grave And when or how long would he wait all the days 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of my warfare But could he fight when he was dead And then 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the change he mentions according to the Targum cannot be a change from death because that renders it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the changes of my life the last of which all know is death And therefore Rabbi Levi expresses 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 my excision or my divorce that is from the body And Aben Esra speaks it out more plainly yet by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 my death And so that must be the change which Job means of Death and expected everlasting Happiness by it as Job questionless did must needs wait for it with Desire as well as with Patience Whom have I in Heaven but Thee and there is none upon Earth that I desire besides Thee said Asaph Psal 73.25 And when he desired GOD so much he could not chuse but desire to dye that he might come to the full and most comfortable Enjoyment of Him Especially when he apprehended him to be the Strength of his failing Flesh and Heart and his Portion for ever as it appears he did in the following Verse Like as the Hart panteth after the Water-brooks so longeth my Soul after Thee O GOD. My
Soul is athirst for GOD yea even for the living GOD when shall I come to appear before the Presence of GOD Psal 42.1 2. Which pathetic Expressions tho' in their primary Aspect they look to GOD's Presence in the Sanctuary yet they may extend to His Presence in Heaven as well And so they show the vehemently transported Passions of a Soul ravish'd with Comforts from GOD and languishing with eager and importunate Desires of the Body's Dissolution that so she might be carri'd up hence to an everlasting Participation of more of those Comforts And therefore here we must note that none desire Death merely for it self nor can they in reason do it as being destructive to their Nature For the Nature of Man we know consists in the Vital Union of Soul and Body But Death divides these two and very rudely tears them asunder And who can desire such contra-natural Violence should ever befal them for its own sake a Violence that separates those essential Principles whereof they are compounded and so brings with it the present Ruin of their Persons The Law of Self-preservation in the animate World is universal and so must be in force among Rational Beings and can never be rooted out where Humanity grows For us therefore to desire what is fatal to us merely for its self must be nothing less than to put off our own Nature and to be what we are not even while we continue what we are which is perfect nonsense and manifest contradiction and a thing most unpracticable because impossible And then besides there is a farther malignity in Death which makes it that it cannot be desirable for its self For it is not only an enemy to Man as it demolishes his Body and breaks his vital Frame to pieces but also as it contains malediction in it For it is the cursed fruit of Adam's sin and so carries with it the bitterness of a penal severity it being justly inflicted as a punishment of Disobedience But tho' none can desire Death for it self yet we may desire it upon other Accounts particularly upon account of Divine Comforts And here let me add these Desires * Note that what follows is spoken only of eminent Christians and but of some of them neither in some eminent Christians are strangely vehement and importunate They grow so high and they run so strong that they are fain to give vent to them in Solemn Expressions For sometimes they sigh and sometimes they weep and sometimes they are ready to fret and be half discontented and sometimes to repine and be holily impatient that they cannot dye They are fit to cry out and that very often O Death where art thou thus long Why comest thou so slowly Mend thy pace and make more haste that so thine hand which others fear may lead my weary Soul to Heaven They wonder what shift those famous Men made who liv'd so long in the Primitive World and should they be condemned to the Like Abode upon Earth they would think it an hard and most cruel Sentence They rejoice exceedingly upon their own account that the Life of Man is so very much shortned and next to the Mercy of dying at all they reckon it a choice one that they dye so soon And as short as the Thread of Life is now made they grudge it should run out to its utmost Length but are willing rather to have it cut off betimes that so they may be happy in a speedier Dismission Whereas others quarrel with Time for its Swiftness and angrily wish that its Wings were clipt for flying so fast they cry out 't is slow and blame it that it does not mend its Pace For if they must be old before they depart they would be so quickly that they might the sooner be gone They hope for Death every Year they look for it every Month and they long for it every Day If they envy not the Saints that dye young they are hugely pleas'd with their happy Lot and had it been in their choice how very contentedly would they have been of their Number So very desirous are they to dye that they can scarce hear of one desperately Sick but they are ready to grieve that it is not their case So very desirous are they to dye that when they hear of one dead or see him carri'd to his Grave they are ready to cry out O that I had gone in his stead and that he had staid in my Room So very desirous are they to dye that high Distempers do but chear their Spirits and tho' through weakness of Body their countenance may droop yet their Souls even then rejoice and triumph and are vested with Robes of Light and Gladness So very desirous are they to dye that when dangerous Sickness wears off again and fair Possibilities of Life return the Sense of this makes them dumpish and heavy and is matter of Trouble and Affliction to them Now how Divine Comforts may stir up such eager desires of Death is obvious and easy enough to apprehend As for Death it self we have already hinted it is no more desirable to the very best than to any else nor is there any Reason why it should be so Pain and Sickness which usher it in and the Coffin and the Grave which follow after it if considered in themselves are as little pleasing to them as to others But then this is confessedly true on all hands that when we have once tasted what is rarely sweet 't is natural for us to desire more of it and where we are sensible most of it is there we are most desirous to be Now the Comforts of GOD which descend from Heaven being so incomparably sweet and pleasant they inflame us with Desires of removing thither And tho' our Way lies through the Gates of Death yet our burning Desires make us earnest to pass them that so we may exchange these imperfect Measures of delicious Comforts for the Entire Fulness and Immensity of them The little Draughts we drink of them here enrage our Appetites after the Fountain from whence they spring The slender Rivulets which run through us now make us thirst insatiably after that Ocean from whence they flow Those single Rays which strike us at present as through a crevise make us long incessantly to ascend into the clear and open Light and to sit under the Gleams of that Eternal Sun whose consolatory Glories shall irradiate our Souls and delight and satisfy them to everlasting Ages Thus the sweet foretasts of future Satisfactions make us greedy of dying that we may be finally settled in the Possession of them And who can deny this to be a piece of true Blessedness All must dye and most are afraid of Death and many fear it immoderately they therefore that fear it not at all but are lifted up so far above Fears that they earnestly Desire it must needs be reputed signally Blessed and which is more must really be so But then here we
them true and that He really is what our garish and misguided Fancies make Him And tho' 't is hard to give in an exact Account of all our vain Fictions and Misrepresentations of GOD yet this may go for a general Rule and in observing it we shall find that we are pretty constant We usually assimilate GOD unto our selves and our Ideas of Him correspond to our own Complexions or Tempers Thus he whose Breast is surcharg'd with boiling Malice and a swelling Spleen against his Neighbour thinks GOD is full of livid Envy Rancour and deadly Hatred to Men. And He whose Brain is heated and disturb'd with fiery Spirits and whose Mind is toss'd with unbecoming Rage and Phrantic Fury conceives GOD is little better than a Flame of Passion one that loves at times to sally forth in Flashes of devouring Vengeance and to consume His helpless undeserving Creatures And because all darker Minds indeed are ready to harbour crooked Thoughts of GOD concerning the Rigidness of His Disposition He endeavours in His Word to prevent their entertaining any hard and hideous Apprehensions of Him For there He teaches * Isai 27.4 Fury dwelleth not in Him That †ch 28.21 Judgment is His strange Work That He doth not ‖ Lam. 3.33 afflict willingly nor grieve the Children of Men. That His Name is * Exo. 34.6 Merciful and Gracious That His †ch 33.18 19. Glory is Goodness Not to say That His very ‖ 1 Joh. 4.8 Essence is Love And how incomparably Excellent must His Nature be of which these are the true and genuine Characters But when GOD by this fair Description of Himself fences against all black Thoughts of His MAJESTY for us then to fasten such Thoughts upon Him when He strives industriously to beat them off must not only be shameful Folly but hainous Sin as being dishonourable to Him as well as prejudicial and destructive to our selves Here therefore holy Comforts again are helpful to us I mean as they rectify our Mistakes of GOD and disabuse our Minds from harsh and horrid Imaginations of Him by inabling us to judge more rightly concerning Him For however too many that are clouded with Sins and so encompass'd with Fears and so kept in a dark and disconsolate condition may conceive very uncouth and frightful things of the Blessed GOD however they may think Him Touchy and Supercilious Ireful and Implacable and take Him for no better than a vowed Enemy to all Sinners Happiness and inexorable Author of their endless Ruine or at least for one indifferently affected with whatever befalls them and wholly unconcerned whether they live or dye eternally Yet where the Comforts of Heaven dwell down go such incongruous Thoughts of the DEITY and others more becoming and also more agreeable are advanced in their Room And well they may for sacred Comforts as we have said do better our Genius or improve our Temper They do not only help us as to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a good Capacity of Nature rendring our Minds by well composing them and keeping them in order more fit to think and more acute in their Thoughts whereby they are inabled to more suitable and worthy Apprehensions of the ALMIGHTY but moreover they impregnate us with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a good Disposition of Nature They put a great deal of Kindness and Lenity into us and making us mild and sweet and benign in our selves we shall according to the Rule just now laid down in course conclude that GOD is infinitely so For look what we are and such we presently conceive Him to be In case we doubt it the SPIRIT proves it Thou thoughtest that I was altogether such a one as thy self Psal 50.21 And if Evil Men because they are evil think GOD to be like them then by the same Reason the better we are the better Thoughts we shall have of Him So that from the Melioration or Improvement of our own Temper we naturally rise up into the more fit and genuine Conceptions of GOD. And the meet Idea or proper Character of His Nature being by this means the more fairly drawn or stamped upon our Minds from hence again will spring most Blessed Delights For they that so far as humane Measures reach attain to a right Notion of GOD's excellent Nature do plainly see Him with an intellectual Eye And they that see Him see a most exquisite and most infinite Beauty A Beauty consisting of such essential Glories and divinest Perfections that all other Beauties in compare with it are but Dirt and Darkness and the ugliest Deformity And as such a Beauty when beheld with an intent and fixed Eye must raise great Admiration in those that view it so that Admiration must cause as great Delights and those Delights a rare kind of Blessedness I cannot but cast in this as an Overplus that they who have the truest Notion of GOD's Nature and so the clearest Prospect of His bright and beauteous Excellencies are not more blessed than others in seeing Him only but in serving Him also For all that they do in Adoration of Him or in Obedience to Him He being the object of their highest Delights must commonly be pleasant as well as easy to them and matter of Felicity as well as of Duty Indeed as many as have gross and grisly Apprehensions of GOD can know no Religion but what is Mechanical They never pay any Service to Heaven with hearty Willingness nor act its Commands from a free ingenuous and noble Choice But when they move towards Duties they are forc'd to do it by slavish Fears and when they run through them 't is meerly because they dare not pretermit them Necessity and Constraint give Laws to their Devotion But they who conceive of GOD as they should worship Him as they ought They do not only perform His Service but they do it chearfully and faithfully so they will do it to the End of their Days For what they do of that nature proceeds from a Principle of divine Life and from the Power of a divine Love within And this brings me to the Second Means whereby holy Comforts furnish us with such high and noble Delights as will stick by us When all other forsake us and that is by inflaming us with Love to the LORD JESUS For where this Flame is throughly kindled it fills the Heart with such sacred Ardors as turn the Saints into lower Seraphim and while they are but Men make them like to Angels Like to Angels not only in their Purity and burning Zeal but also in their Pleasures and extatic Delights Where Souls are throughly enamoured on CHRIST that their Affections run high we need not doubt No Tongue can tell the heat and vigour of that holy Love which flames in the Hearts of good Men towards Him So superlative is it that to compare it with any natural or civil Love were to disparage it or detract from it The Love of a Wife to her Husband
good Arts and holy Exercises to seek them earnestly before we can find them Nay perhaps all we can do will not sometimes procure them at last For possibly our Sins may offend our GOD and force him to stand at a distance from us Or it may be He sees our Dispositions to be such that He durst not shed down Comforts upon us lest we should wax loose and wanton under them and so instead of kindnesses they should prove occasions of ruine to our Souls But in Heaven it shall be otherwise As we shall there be fit to receive great Joys so GOD will be ready to impart the same and nothing between us shall intercept and hinder their Descent upon us or render them more flat or less pleasing to us This is the first excellent Property of future Joys They are derived immediately from GOD Himself and pour'd into our Hearts by His sacred Hands And in this regard they far exceed our present Comforts For when they come most directly of all there are some things or other which bring them to us or work them in us as the HOLY GHOST makes them instrumental to produce them And tho' this does not make our Comforts at all impure yet it renders them the more imperfect Secondly Our future Joys will be sincere There shall be no sadness or bitterness intermixed with them This Property is an inseparable consequent of the former For Joys Immediate must needs be simple and unsophisticate Proceeding from GOD solely they must be sincere for what Composition can they bring from Him whose Perfection it is to have none in Himself Our present Comforts are not such Here our finest Gold is mingled with Dross and our purest Grain is blended with Chaff Our whitest Flour hath its Bran and our sweetest Roses have their Pricks Our highest Pleasures go off with Pain and our strongest Delights have somewhat in them or somewhat with them that damps or weakens them But in Heaven our Joys shall be pure and defaecate There shall be Light without Darkness and Peace without Trouble Mirth without Heaviness and Ease without Affliction Happiness without Care and Pleasure without Complaint or the least Lamentation There 's nothing there to stop nothing to trouble the Torrent of our Satisfactions but the deep and mighty Streams of Joy run on with undisturbed Smoothness as well as with undefiled Clearness This is the Second excellent Property of future Joys They are simple and sincere sublimated and refin'd from all drossy Mixtures Not clogg'd not stain'd not toucht with any diluting or diminishing Adherencies And upon this account they far exceed our present Comforts For when they are most divinely bright and sweet there is still some Cloudiness or Uneasiness in them or soon after them Yea GOD many times is constrain'd to dash and allay our Comforts lest by being too strong they should prove injurious Thus Numbers in the Church are so unhappy in Weakness Giddiness and Levity that were they favoured with plenty of high Consolations they would be so puft up with the valuable Privilege as to be very unseemly if not sinfully transported Thirdly Our future Joys will be Satisfactory In GOD's Presence His glorious Presence there is Fulness of Joy Psal 16.11 A compleat Satiety of heavenly Contentment An immense and also an entire Felicity A Sea of Delights where the most inlarged Appetites may not only fill themselves up to the Brim but sink and drown as it were in boundless and bottomless Gratifications Our present Comforts are not of this sort Comparatively they are slight and shrivell'd things rather and of a very narrow and contracted nature When they are shed down most copiously upon us they leave huge Chasms and Vacuities in us They are so far from satiating the Soul that when she drinks deepest of them she thirsts after more and the freest Draughts that ever she takes do rather inflame than fill her Desires And they that always burn with desires after more Joys than here they have sufficiently prove that the greatest they feel are not big enough for them But in Heaven there 's a Plenitude of divine Joys Such a perfect and absolute Fulness of them as is every way commensurate to our vast Capacities Such as will easily supply all our Necessities and also entertain all our Faculties and likewise answer all our Expectancies even beyond whatever we can think or wish And so we shall not be able to say we want this or we would have that because we shall have more than we can need or long for in the Joys we shall possess And they that are furnisht at such a Rate I hope must be satisfi'd Now one great Reason why our future Joys are so throughly satisfying is because they are so very suitable Otherwise they could never be satisfactory to us tho' most Excellent They shall not be gross and sensual indeed but then for that they will not be the less but the more suitable For being of a fine and spiritual Quality they must be the more agreeable to humane Souls because they are of the like Nature And so carnal Pleasures and secular Things can never satisfy them in regard they are of a spiritual Substance For that Reason the Soul can no more be satisfi'd with Gold and Silver with Houses and Lands with Dignities and Honours and the Delights of Sense than our Barns can be filled with Virtue or our Baggs with Grace or our Coffers with Godliness Could any Man improve his Estate to a Kingdom and then raise that Kingdom to an Empire and then make that Empire universal extending it over the whole World and so intitle Himself to all earthly Power and Pleasure yet his Soul could no more be satisfi'd therewith than his Body can be fed and nourisht with Wind. For betwixt the Soul and the World betwixt spiritual Desires and material Objects betwixt divine and lofty Appetites and low and sordid and ignoble Gratifications there is no manner of parity or congruity But therefore the Joys we speak of are spiritual and so exactly suitable and so compleatly satisfying their Suitableness being joyned with abundant Fulness This is the Third excellent Property of future Joys They reach even to our real thorough satisfaction They fill us so as perfectly to quiet us So as to leave us no Needs of or Cravings for more than we possess nor yet any Emptiness whereby they should be caused And here again they far exceed our present Comforts They never did nor can so abound as throughly to satisfy any Soul When in greatest measures they rest upon us we are capable of greater and reach after them as desirous to receive them They may be highly useful and beneficial to us as hath been shewed but satisfy us they cannot they were never designed to that End They are spiritual indeed and so suitable enough but they are short of that Sufficiency which should render them satisfactory Where the Fire is too little we may still be cold
even to the ground by mournful Prayers let us labour to defeat them Night and Day let us crave of her Supreme ALMIGHTY Head to secure Her from Dangers and to deliver Her from Troubles to build up Her Walls and to repair her Breaches to strengthen her Friends and to beat down her Enemies To settle Truth and Peace in Her to add more Purity and Holiness to Her and to continue them both for ever with Her In a word together with our Prayers let us often pour out our Tears unto Him beseeching Him with all possible Importunity to be Her everlasting Patron and Protector To settle Her upon the Basis of his infinite Power and to rest her upon the Support of his never-failing Providence to watch over Her with the Eyes of his tender care and to incircle Her with the Arms of his gracious Custody to lay Her in the Bosom of His Paternal love and to Crown Her with the Blessings of His favourable kindness That so whatever Her past Hardships have been for the future she may not only be safe and easy but flourishing and happy And whatever in this way we do for the Church we may conclude Her extremely worthy of it For the true Christian Church is a Community of the best People in the World A Fraternity of virtuous and religious Persons A Society of innocent and holy Livers that believe and act the noblest things An Association or Body of such as are excellent in themselves approved of GOD dearly bought and beloved of CHRIST competently cleansed and sanctifi'd by the SPIRIT and nearly related and united to us On whom as we cannot but place much of our Delight here on Earth so with them we shall enjoy an eternally sweet and inconceivably delectable Conversation in Heaven And how despicable soever they may now seem and however vilifi'd and abused they may be yet over a while the LORD JESUS will dignify them with such high Perfections and vest them with such bright and radiant Splendors as will render them incomparably glorious and admirable even in the Eyes of all beholders He signifies no less where He openly declares that at His Second event He shall come to be glorifi'd in his Saints and to be admir'd in all them that believe 2 Thess 1.10 Upon these Considerations to name no more what good Christians would not willingly do any thing much more humbly Pray and Mourn to advance and hasten the Church's Happiness And let none refuse or reject the Exercise upon pretence that Her Happiness cannot be hastened because the Time when it commences is immutably decreed For if the Beginning of that happy state which the Christian Church is to enter upon be inalterably prefixt to a certain Period of time Isai 60.22 and so determined by prophetick bounds or limitation as not to be accelerated in any measure yet by Prayers and Tears She may notwithstanding be made very prosperous before-hand and this signal Prosperity may be previous and introductive to that Her Felicity CHAP. XIX Objections against Holy Mourning answered as that 't is beneath us Makes us Melancholy Disparages Religion Wastes our Time And hinders Business HAving done with the Motives which invite to Holy Mourning in General and may they effectually induce us to it 't will be proper in the next place to see what Objections may be brought against it and to remove them fairly out of the way The First may be this Mourning is a thing very much beneath us Below our Nature and our Dignity Man is no less than a marvellous Compound of different Principles And tho' his Body be as mean and faeculent as the Earth he treads on being originally made out of it and so symbolical and homogeneous with it yet his Soul is a divine and noble Essence immaterial and spiritual equal to Angels and like unto GOD. And in this respect he is highly advanc'd in the Classis or Scale of living Creatures and indu'd and adorn'd with such Faculties and Perfections as are suitable to a Being of his Rank or Station in the animate World Nor was his Original Dignity short of his Frame or Nature For when GOD created Him his Favour bestow'd the high Privilege upon him to make him Prince or Head of this sublunary World Gen. 1.28 And for Him that is of so high a Nature and also bears so high a Character Mourning must needs be too low an Exercise When his Person is so extraordinary as to excell even all the visible Creation and his Power so eminent as at first to hold the Reins of this World in his hand for him to sit whimpering with Tears in his Eyes will ill become so exalted a Creature and the Empire delegated to him from above To this I answer First Grief is one of our natural Passions And whatever is a piece of Man's Nature must not be counted either unworthy of him or disgraceful to him That would be a rude and impious reflection upon the All-wise and Glorious GOD who made Him Secondly Tho' Man in this inferior World was and in some measure still is a kind of Sovereign yet he is one of the ALMIGHTY's Subjects And so whatever Commands GOD lays upon him he is bound indispensably to obey them And holy Mourning being one of his Precepts in point of Duty he must submit to that And as that which is his Duty will be so far from debasing him that 't will conduce to his Honour as well as to his Interest so holy Mourning as being a Duty which GOD injoins must improve his Nature and imbellish his Worth and while it advances both can disparage neither For this we have a Proof that puts the thing past all doubt JESUS our LORD was once an holy Mourner upon Earth He wept for Lazarus St. Joh. 11.35 And in the days of His Flesh He offered up Prayers and Supplications with strong crying Tears Heb. 5.7 But did this at all sink or degrade our Nature which He graciously assumed So far from that that at this very time and for many Ages past it sits at GOD's Right hand in Glory and is there exalted far above all Principality and Power and Might and Dominion and every Name that is named not only in this World but also in the next Eph. 1.21 So far is Mourning from disparaging our Nature that GOD did not count it disparaged His. For when our LORD wept even He was concern'd in shedding those Tears as being hypostatically joined to our Flesh Secondly It may be objected against holy Mourning that it makes us Melancholy or is a piece of that unhappy and uneasy Temper And so indeed it will not only be of no use but of dangerous consequence For Melancholy is said and not improperly to be the Devil's * Balneum Diaboll Bath A complexion wherein our great Adversary delights as being troublesom to us and advantageous to him in carrying on his Malicious Designs against us And when religious Mourning leads to Melancholy or
it seems to have been as much his settled Companion as Temptations were from which a faithful Minister of CHRIST is seldom free Nor did it hold for some Days or Weeks only but for Years together It had dwelt with him now for three Years past as he signifies at the 31th Verse By the space of three Years I ceased not to warn every one night and day with Tears Was there ever such a watchful was there ever such a mournful Monitor as this But then when he wept with such Constancy in a monitorial Capacity many of his Tears must needs be spent upon other Mens sins And what is there implied is other-where very plainly exprest As in Rom. 9.33 where he complains that he had great heaviness and continual sorrow in his heart for his brethren his Kinsmen after the flesh For their hainous Sin that is in despising the Doctrine and rejecting the rich Privileges of the Gospel And great heaviness and continual sorrow in the heart of a Man proclaims him an unfeigned and deep Mourner for those that cause or occasion the same So he tells the Philippians and that with weeping that they were Enemies of the Cross of CHRIST Phil. 3.18 And what he did for them he was ready to do for those of another Church I mean to bewail the Corruptions and Calamities of many that had sinned and not repented 2 Cor. 12.21 And whoever bewails such as have not repented plainly mourns for them because they have sinned Out of the New Testament I offer only one Instance more But 't is such as infinitely out-does all other as being the most Holy and ever Blessed JESUS He was pleased to be a passionate Mourner as well as the great Sufferer for the Sins of Men so the Evangelist witnesseth When He came near He beheld the City and wept over it S. Luk. 19.41 And so by those * Legati doloris Embassadors of Grief as S. Cyprian calls Tears He testifi'd the tender Concern he had for the sinful Inhabitants of populous Jerusalem For thus before He shed the Bloud of his Body as †D. Hieronim Brentius P. Martyr Sanguis vulneratae animae the Learned express Tears the bloud of his wounded Soul was poured out for them An Act of extraordinary Kindness and Condescension however it gave great Offence to some For as Epiphanius relates they thought Weeping so mean and so very unsuitable to His divine Person that they blotted the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he wept out the Text in honour to His MAJESTY But far more judicious and orthodox were they and Irenaeus particularly amongst the rest who did not only strenuously assert that word to be in the Original but moreover improv'd it as well they might into an irrefragable Argument of His real humanity And truly when the Begotten SON of GOD would assume our Nature and be incarnate in our Flesh that He might dye for our Sins and that on the cursed and ignominious Cross why should any imagine it would disparage Him to weep Especially when His Tears were bestowed on Mens sins as they certainly were which He shed over Jerusalem For there as * Caecitatem Civium Stell in loc one says the LORD deplored the sinful blindness of the Citizens And as another says †Civium ingratitudinem Brugen in loc He bewailed the sinful ingratitude of the same And as a ‖ Subversionem animarum Dionysius Carthus in loc Third affirms he lamented the destruction of their Souls which only their Sins could bring upon them I might here add others of great Name and Worth in the Church tho' not recorded in the Sacred Books For says * Gemimus plerunque in peccatis fratrum nostrorum De verb. Dom. Ser. 44. S. Austin We oftentimes mourn over our Brethren's sins And he †Plangis mortuum magis plange impium De Sanct. Ser. 13. argues for it Thou wailest for the dead rather bewail the ungodly What hast thou not the Bowels of Christian Pity in thee that thou canst mourn for the Body from which the Soul is separated and not mourn for the Soul from which GOD is departed Of so mourning a Temper was S. Ambrose that when any Man came to him for Council or Conduct in ‖ Quotiescunque c. ita flebat ut illum flere compelleret Paul in vit the Matter of Repentance he could not hear his Confession without Tears But would weep at such a Rate as to force the Party to weep with him The number of such excellent Mourners might easily be increased here But instead of bringing in more Particulars I shall only remark what a learned Commentator says of them in general His Words are these * Lege divinas literas replica c. Pint. in Ezek. 9. Read the divine Writings and turn over the Records of Annals enquire into the Stories of the holy Fathers and you shall every-where find that Men illustrious in Piety turned their Eyes into Fountains of living Tears for the Sins of others whereby GOD was offended Now if we look back upon the Persons mention'd we cannot but see that they were Men of the best Ranks as well as of the best Principles David was a King and Nehemiah a Governour Ezra was a Priest and Jeremiah a Prophet Paul was an Apostle and Austin and Ambrose both Bishops And when they were great in Dignity as well as in Goodness and yet mourned so sadly for others sins their Quality in the World does honour to the Duty and is enough to convince even the highest of all that they are not above it but that People of every Order and Degree have reason to practise it And which still makes more for its Vindication and farther inforces the pious Exercise our adorable LORD and SAVIOUR performed it as we have seen And we being predestinated to be conformed to Him in His Sufferings Rom. 8.29 we must conform to Him in his Sympathies and Sorrows which were one Sort of His Sufferings And so we have reason to mourn for other Mens sins because He did so And therefore a Multitude of Considerable Writers do properly urge to that Duty upon the account of his great and prevailing Example As a Specimen of such I name only * Christus non sibi flevit sed vobis De Trin. lib. 10. Hilary †Quare flevit Christus nisi quia hominem flere docuit Austin ‖ Flenda sunt aliorum peccata ut Christus exemplo suo docet Stella and ¶ Sunt lachrymae invitantis ut nos quoque lachrymas profundamus Gerhard And when CHRIST as they say did not weep for Himself but for us when He wept that so He might teach Men to weep teach us to weep for the Sins of others as inviting us to it by His own precious Tears how can we possibly neglect the Work and outstand the Force of so powerful a President Indeed some of the Learned have positively
taught he that is * Prudens nemini miseretur prudent pities none But as the Wisdom of this World is foolishness with GOD 1 Cor. 3.19 so this Piece of Wisdom as the Stoics reckon'd it amongst true Religionists is the worst sort of folly as being a real and an hainous Sin And tho' †〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 De Rep. lib. 3. Plato who was Master of a nobler Philosophy excluded Tears from great Mens Eyes yet it cannot be deni'd but his Political Rule in that case does plainly interfere with the Evangelical Law and His Maxim of state lies cross to the precepts of Orthodox Christianity And then the weakness of their Principles is notoriously manifest from the contrary Practice For notwithstanding the Doctrines of both these Schools great and wise Men have been struck with commiseration and upon just occasions have exprest their Pity in plenty of Tears Thus Julius Caesar wept when the Head of Pompey was brought before Him Scipio Africanus wept excessively when he saw Carthage in flames Marcellus wept when he beheld Syracuse which he was to enter in so sad a condition tho' Livy says he wept for Joy at so great an Atchievement as his Conquest of it Now these were not only great and wise Men but wise and great Generals and by being Martial Heroes were Sons of Bloud not to add of Rapine and Violence and so by reason of their Office might be much harder than others Yet these very Persons had a natural Tenderness for Mankind and Sympathized deeply with such as were their proclaimed and professed Enemies And when heathen Soldiers could with Tears lament the sufferings of their Enemies shall not we Christians mourn for the sins of our Brethren In case we do not besides that we refuse to tread in the steps of the best we plainly call our own Goodness in question For according to the Greek Proverb * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 good Men are prone to Tears And as they are so upon many accounts so especially for the sins of others And therefore in the Judgment of an admirable Divine †Guil. Paris lib. de Morib none can doubt but pious Souls do so much the more flow with tears of Pity by how much the more they see or hear the sins of their Neighbours to abound Secondly We must mourn for the sins of others because to neglect it is highly blameable It is GOD's Command to Christians Phil. 2.15 and so should be our care and endeavour to be harmless and blameless and without rebuke in the midst of a crooked and perverse Nation Tho' the Generation wherein we live be never so irregular and unrighteous yet we must not only be harmless as to others but blameless in our selves So blameless as to be guilty of nothing that the piercing Eye of the All-seeing GOD shall discern to be a wilful fault or that the fierce and malicious Accuser of our Souls may be able to charge upon us as such But then in order to this 't will be necessary for us to mourn for the known and scandalous Sins of those about us else the very omission of that will render us grossly culpable So it did a whole Church once and laid it under Apostolical Censure The Church I mean was that at Corinth It was newly planted and had lately received the Christian Faith and being just born and in her tender Infancy one would have thought she might have been innocent Especially having one so skilful and careful so pious and prudent as St. Paul was to super-intend her 1 Cor. 5.1 But we find it far otherwise with Her and that She was over-run not only with early but great Disorders Amongst the rest there was one corrupt and scandalous Member that liv'd in open and horrid Incest with his Father's Wife And yet which aggravates the Crime he was a Person that made some figure in the Church for according to S. Chrysostom and Theodoret both * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he had obtained the Degree of a Doctor Now so grievous a Lewdness being so publickly committed amongst the Corinthians how should they have behav'd themselves in reference to the bold and shameful miscarriage They ought by all means to have lamented it or mourned for it And because they did not they are reprehended and blamed by the great Apostle in these Words ye are puffed up and have not rather Mourned Which gives us to understand that when any in the Communion which we are of fall into deadly and damnable Sins it lies upon us to mourn for the same And in case we do not we are utterly in a fault In a fault so great that it deserves express Reproof from Heaven And as it highly deserves it it shall certainly have it for indeed such a fault where-ever it happens stands actually reproved by GOD already in those very words which we last cited As therefore we would escape the Dint of this Reproof we must bewail the great Sins of all those Christians that come to our knowledge but especially of those who belong to the same Church or Nation with us And if they be so many as GOD knows they are very numerous that we cannot consider and bewail them apart or every one in particular it must suffice that we do it in gross by a more comprehensive and general Mourning But then we must take care that this our Mourning be not slight and superficial but deep and hearty such at least for the sadness and seriousness of it as we usually bestow on our departed Friends And let none despise this Rule or Measure as being borrowed from no meaner Person than learned Origen For where he describes the Discipline of the Primitive Church he thus informs us That as the venerable School of the Pythagoreans * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Con. Celsum lib. 3 set up empty Coffins in the places of all such as deserted its Philosophy to shew they were esteemed no better than Dead so for those that were conquered either by Carnality or any other Evil Christians us'd to mourn as for Creatures lost and dead to GOD. So that look how we mourn for dead and so we must mourn for sinful Christians Or if there be any Difference to be allow'd betwixt them the abatement must be made on the Deceased's side inasmuch as Moral or Spiritual Death is far more deplorable than that which is Natural Thirdly We must mourn for the Sins of others because such Mourning prevails with Heaven As we read Lam. 3.26 The LORD is good to the Soul that seeketh Him But how good He is to such and how strangely he manifests His Goodness to them in a gracious Readiness to be found of them none can tell like the well experienc'd Yet this I must say that none prevail more and none prevail sooner with GOD than they who seek Him with holy Mourning And therefore when Jacob had Power with GOD and such Power as to have his
sinned against the Light of Conscience When we have been ready to run out of the way of Righteousness and foolishly inclin'd to commit Iniquity Conscience hath stood up in opposition to us and attempted to hinder us It hath friendly smitten us and flown in our faces and with very kind and officious checks hath warned us against the Evils we were about And when with all our Arts we could not drown its Voice nor stifle its Suggestions nor quiet its Clamours nor silence its loud tho' secret Dissuasions we have frowardly and forcibly broken through them all rushing into sin as an horse into Battel Do we not remember that it hath been thus with us When we have been lingring after any pleasing Sin and just stepping into the Perpetration of it hath not Conscience risen up and like a faithful Monitress rounded us in the Ear with proper and seasonable Cautions against it Hath She not plainly told us tho' not with an audible articulate Voice this is evil and that is forbidden here ye will offend GOD and there ye will dishonour CHRIST thus ye may endanger and so ye may undoe your immortal Souls When we have been just upon the point of doing foolishly and running unadvisedly into the Regions of Death hath not Conscience thus gently reproved us and made us feel and confess her Rebukes to be good Insomuch that indeed it hath been uneasy to resist them and a very great Pain and Trouble to us to go against such clear and strong Convictions But did all this work upon us or did it at all prevail with us When Conscience hath thus haunted us from Day to Day and Her light hath followed us from Place to Place and hath shown us the Deadliness of our respective sins from Time to Time hath this caused us to cease from them O no we have been so far from making that due use of this excellent Light that we have rather wisht it quite out that so we might sin with more Pleasure and less Reluctancy And when it was not in our Power to extinguish it wretchedly but in spite of all we could do it would glare us in the face we have walked perversely and prophanely against it sinning Presumptuously in defiance to that Light which GOD set up to keep us from Sin Secondly We have sinned against the Light of the SPIRIT When Conscience prov'd too weak to restrain us the gracious GOD hath struck in with the suasions of His Blessed SPIRIT to turn us off from our vitious Practices And with what sweet but cogent Arguments hath He sometimes set upon us When we have hankered after unreasonable Extravagancies and have been fit to plunge our selves into Perdition for the injoyment of them how watchfully and lovingly hath He appli'd himself to us in these or the like soft and compassionate Whispers to check and stop us in our unhappy Tendencies O rash and inconsiderate Creature art thou tampering again with thy dangerous Lusts and ready to reembrace thy fatal Sins It is but a while since through such Follies GOD found thee in a most rufull Plight Defiled with Guilt overwhelmed with Grief dejected with Doubts astonisht with Fears confounded with shame and by many woful but deserved Distractions brought almost to the brink of Despair Then as thou canst not chuse but remember His Mercy piti'd thee and in Pity He relieved thee He pardoned thee by His Grace and refreshed thee with His Comforts and restored unto thee the Joy of his Salvation upon thy penitent humbling of thy self before Him And art thou now disposed to apostatize from Him and rebelliously to kick against Him afresh Is this the amends He shall have for His Goodness Hast thou forgot the Smart of thy old Impieties that thou art so forward to listen to new Temptations Did Satan use thee so well when thou wert last in his hands that thou art willing to come into his hateful Power and under his hellish Tyranny again Or was GOD so hard a Master to thee that thou art so prone to desert His Service Judge for thy self in the case hadst thou not much Peace and many Pleasures when thou walkest uprightly with thy GOD And hadst thou not as much trouble and as many torments when you joinedst with His and thine own Enemies When thou was last at a Distance from Him and under His Displeasure didst thou not promise that if He would return and be reconciled to Thee thou wouldst be cautious and circumspect and take more care off offending Him than ever And did He not condescend to the measures thou desiredst Did He not hear thy Complaint and accept thy Vow and snatch thee from thy Woes and lay thee in His Bosom and renew thy Delights and give thee competent Assurance of His regained Favour And silly Wretch art thou now relinquishing this GOD and resigning thy Happiness to lie down and wallow in repeated Wickedness I appeal to Christians hath it not been thus Hath not the good SPIRIT very often thus contended with us and by his sacred Strugglings sought to check the fire of our kindling Lusts and so prevent its breaking out into flames of Sin Not that He hath spoken these very words distinctly to our Ears but He hath darted such Thoughts as these into our Minds which is His way of speaking to Men. Nor hath He barely suggested them to us but set them home upon us causing them to dwell in us so long and so powerfully to work with us as throughly to convince us of the Naughtiness of those things we were about to attempt But when all this was done it could not restrain or keep us from our sins which renders them most horrid and provoking And as it hath been with many in this case so I fear it may be still The SPIRIT of GOD pleads hard with them but alas He speaks to the deafest in the World even to a People that will not hear I mean that will not hear his charming Insinuations so as duly to regard them and be influenc'd by them O let them whose unhappy Temper and Carriage this is take all the care that possibly they can to rectify the same If they do not their Condition may prove extremely sad For then that divine and loving SPIRIT who hath striven so much and striven so long will not continue to do it always when He thus finds it to be in vain And if once He ceases His sweet Conflicts with us by reason of our affronting Him and gives us up to follow our vitious Inclinations because we grieve and quench Him by Stubborn resistance what will become of us The Curb that held us in being taken off us we shall presently fall to committing sin with greediness even all the Sins that we like and love to GOD's Dishonour and the eternal Ruine of our Immortal Souls And must not such be in a lamentable Plight They that are in it I confess are oft-times insensible of it They do not discern
shift your Posture and Imployment in favour of your fainting tiring Zeal For tho' the Spirit in it self be strong and so very willing and forward to persist yet being clogg'd and loaden with the burthen of this flesh it may very well want Support and Respite Here therefore rising up from your humble Prostration read a Chapter or two of the Lamentations or of some other Book in the Bible Unless you had rather make use of any practical Piece of some pious Author by you That so by remitting the Intensness of your Devotion you may recover a more lively degree of Fervency And then prostrating again in the Heavenly Presence supplicate thus A Supplication respecting our own and this Nation 's Sins O GOD most Gracious and Compassionate look down look down from Heaven I beseech Thee with an eye of Mercy of tenderest Mercy upon this miserably sinful Nation We have offended Thee greatly but LORD do Thou pity us We have provoked Thee strangely but LORD do Thou spare us We have dishonoured Thee shamefully but LORD do Thou pardon us It is of Thy * Lam. 3.22 Mercy that we are not consumed in our Sins O let the same Thy Mercy which hath forborn us in them absolve us from them And that Thou mayst freely forgive us all our Sins help us to repent unfeignedly of the same Awaken our Consciences into a due sense of our Guilt and smite our Hearts with Godly remorse and contrition for it and let us so bewail our Evil deeds as finally to forsake them and return †Hos 14.1 unto the LORD from whom we are fallen Open our Eyes O our good GOD that we may ‖ Luk. 19.42 see the things which belong to our peace and incline us effectually to consider and pursue them that so Thou mayst be fully reconciled to us and turn away * Jer. 18.22 Thy Wrath and Thy Judgments from us We know O LORD we know we have cause to fear Thy Judgments great cause to tremble in Expectation of them nor can heavier come than our Crying sins deserve and call for But in Mercy with-hold those dreadful Severities which with greatest Justice Thou might'st sadly inflict Or if we have so wretchedly wearied out Thy Patience that Thou art immutably resolv'd to give us up to Punishment Yet then O GOD whose Compassions fail not deal not with us after our Iniquities but in the midst of Judgment remember Mercy Let thy Rod correct but not destroy us and let the Smart we suffer end in thy Favour Sanctify all thy Dispensations to us and be they never so bitter let them turn to our Advantage But of all Evils Thou shalt bring upon us deprive us not O GOD and Father of Mercy of the Light of Thy Truth of the Purity of Thy Worship of the Solemnity of Thine Ordinances of the Liberty of Thy House of the Help of Thy Ministers But tho' we have long since forfeited these precious Injoyments yet so far overlook our provoking unworthiness as to continue them to us and also to our Posterity in succeeding Generations so long as the Sun and Moon shall endure And let these inestimable Mercies continu'd to us have their proper Influence and Effects upon us Let them banish Ignorance and abolish Atheism and drive away Infidelity Superstition and Prophaneness Let them lead us on to such Meekness of Wisdom and Sweetness of Temper and Lowliness of Mind and Holiness of Life as may conduce effectually to the healing of our Divisions and the composing of our Differences Let them so fill us with Love and unite us in Peace that the GOD †2 Cor. 13.11 of Love and Peace may be with us and Truth and Righteousness establisht amongst us and we may no more dishonour our Reformed Doctrines by our Dissolute Practices A general Intercession AND O Merciful GOD who ‖ 1 Tim. 2.4 wouldst have all Men to be saved * Psal 67.2 make thy saving Health known unto all Nations Let Strangers to Thy Truth and Enemies to Thy Gospel be made acquainted with Thy Will and obedient to Thy Word Be good to thy holy Catholic Church Purify it from Sin and preserve it from Error Free it from Fears and secure it in Dangers And where any in it are under Troubles or Persecutions arm them with such Courage that they may suffer with Constancy till they obtain Deliverance or be Crowned with Victory By Faith unfeigned knit all its Members firmly to Thy Self and by mutual Love to one another Settle it in Truth I most humbly beseech Thee and establish it in Peace Crown it with Prosperity and exalt it in Righteousness Fill every one in it with such divine Graces and Perfections from Heaven as may make it the Light and the Joy and the Glory and the Praise of the whole Earth Lead all Nations into it O GOD that the People of this World may become the Sheep of thy Pasture and we may all make but one most holy and happy Fold under that most good and great Shepherd the LORD JESUS CHRIST O that the time were come for Thee to have such Mercy upon Sion LORD let that Blessed time come Bless all Christian Kings and Governours As they bear Thy Name and are Thine Ordinance and act by Thy Power so let them carefully imitate Thy MAJESTY Let them rule their People with Mercy and Justice and make such wise Provisions for them as shall greatly advance both their present Welfare and their future Happiness Be with the Bishops and Pastors of Thy Flock Make them vigilant in their Stations and diligent in their Functions and zealous for Thy Honour and the Souls of Men. †1 Tim. 4.16 Let them take heed to themselves as well as to their Doctrines and not only teach Men to be good by their sound Instructions but provoke them to it by their powerful Examples Pour down thy Mercy upon the Neighbourhood I am of and upon this Family to which I belong upon my Relatives and Friends and upon all that have desired my Prayers and need them Grant them such a Faith in thy Doctrines such an Hope in thy Promises such a Fear of thy Threatnings as may put them upon dutiful Obedience to thy Commands Keep them from all known and presumptuous Sins and if there be any secret Wickedness in them let them so search their Hearts as presently to find it so try their Way as immediately to turn from it and that with the greatest Detestation and Abhorrency And to the End they may abhorr every evil Way do Thou ‖ Psal 139.24 lead them in the Way everlasting Even in the Way of Truth and Sincerity of Meekness and Temperance of Justice and Charity of Purity and Humility of Peace and Salvation And if at any time while we live Thou * Deut. 32.41 whet'st thy glittering Sword and thine hand takes hold on Judgment to execute it generally on the People of this Land secure if Thou
pleasest both them and me from the Strokes thereof by thy Special Providence †Psal 57.1 hiding us under thy Wings O LORD until the Calamities be over-past But if as we deserve Thou justly involvest us in the Common Miseries O mingle our Sufferings with a sense of thy Love and make them all Instruments of our Benefit and Blessedness And whatever shall happen to our Estates or Bodies LORD let our Souls be precious in thy sight and ‖ Mal. 3.17 remember them in the day when Thou makest up thy Jewels And that for His sake who redeem'd them even Thy CHRIST and our JESUS who hath given us assurance that * Joh. 16.24 whatever we ask in His Name we shall receive In His Name therefore and in His Words I humbly conclude my unworthy Supplications Our Father c. As short as this Mourning-Office may seem to be yet if it be recited deliberately and with calling to mind and sadly confessing our particular Offences compriz'd in those general Heads which come most home to our personal Extravagancies we shall find it will take up more time to rehearse it than we are aware But should it with the Intervals of Reading require all the Forenoon yet to fill up the whole Day from the time we rise till Six at night we shall want a farther supply for Devotion As meet provision therefore to carry on the pious Exercise thus far contitinu'd I shall here add another Form of Prayer And lest it should be too much to use it all at once I have divided it into several Collects or Sections that so you may the less abruptly break off where you please and as often as you think fit and then begin again where you left off A PRAYER For the Holy SPIRIT of GOD and the Principal of His Heavenly Graces O Most Merciful GOD and Father I the unworthiest of all thy Children prostrate in thy Fear and sacred Presence from my Heart do magnify Thee for the innumerable Blessings I have received from Thee And most humbly I intreat Thee to bestow such other good things upon me as I still need and can no where obtain but at thy bounteous Hands I. For the HOLY GHOST ABove all vouchsafe me thy HOLY SPIRIT which thou hast freely promised to them that * Luk. 11.13 ask Him And let Him be helpful to me in those several Offices which He came down from Heaven to execute in the Church even in comforting conducting and santifying of my Soul Make Him a Comforting SPIRIT to me That freeing my Mind from afflictive Horrors and disconsolate Heaviness I may †Phil. 4 4. rejoyce in the LORD evermore and live in that divinest Peace of GOD ‖ 4.7 which passeth all understanding Make Him a Conducting SPIRIT to me That dispelling the Darkness and Blindness of my Mind by illuminating me with bright and saving Knowledge He may help to lead me into a competent understanding of all necessary Truths Make Him a Sanctifying SPIRIT to me That Cleansing me from all moral Corruptions and Impurities I may become holy as * 1 Pet. 1.16 Thou art Holy by His infusing precious Graces into my Heart II. For Hatred to Sin LET Him fill me with Hatred and Detestation of Sin With such an Hatred as may not only turn me from it but set me against it and make me a deadly and irreconcilable Enemy to it To which End let Him open mine Eyes to see the malignant Nature of it How it is a Transgression of Thy Law a Contradiction of Thy Mind and an Opposition to Thy Will and so the worst and basest thing in the World as being contrary to Thee the Chiefest Good Let Him convince me also of its direful Effects How besides many Temporal and Spiritual Miseries it subjects me to woful Eternal Calamities which I can neither avoid nor yet abide And let the Consideration of its abominable Vileness and destructive Consequents help to beget in me speedy Repentance where I have committed it and also strongest Antipathies to it and constant and vehement Aversations from it in all presumptuous Instances whatever III. For Faith LET Him indue me with unfeigned Evangelical Faith With such a Faith as may inable me to †Heb. 11.6 believe that GOD is and that He is a Rewarder of them that diligently seek Him and so to believe it as to become my self a most diligent and unwearied Seeker of Him With such a Faith as is a ‖ Gal. 5.2 fruit of the SPIRIT as will shew it self * Jam. 2.18 by my Works as will †1 Joh. 5.4 overcome the World and so throughly ‖ Rom. 5.1 justify me that I may have peace with GOD. Even peace with Him * Eph. 4.13 till we all come in the Unity of the Faith to the sweet and endless injoyment of Him who is the sole †Heb. 12.2 Author and Finisher of it IV. For Hope LET Him work in me a most firm and lively Hope Such an Hope as may not ‖ Rom. 5.5 make me ashamed by suffering me either to presume or despair But may be an * 1 Thess 5 8. Helmet to me in my Spiritual Warfare and an †Heb. 6.19 Anchor of my Soul while I am tossed in the Waves of this tempestuous World And having this Hope in me let me ‖ 1 Joh. 3.3 purify my self even as He is pure who is at once both the Object and End of my Hope the LORD JESUS CHRIST V. For Love to GOD. LET Him inflame my Heart with Love to Thy MAJESTY O my GOD. With such an holy ardent and passionate Love as becomes a Creature to his Sovereign LORD and Maker and a Dutiful Child to his indulgent heavenly Father I acknowledge my self unworthy of so high a Favour But Thy only SON died to purchase this inestimable Grace amongst others for all that need and seek it of Thee None O LORD want it more than I and with humblest Earnestness I seek and crave it O deny me not this one Request whatever else Thou with-holdest from me I am willing to be I am willing to do I am willing to bear or to suffer any thing with Thy help so I may but love Thee Turn me all into Love and indear me greatly to Thy self and I wish no more I neither want nor ask nor care for any thing in this World like that It is not Health nor Wisdom nor Riches nor Honour nor Life it self nor any thing in it or belonging to it that I so importunately beg but the Love of Thy Self O dearest GOD the Love of Thy Self is the Blessing I desire LORD give me but that and I have enough Thou hast said that Thou * Psal 107.9 satisfiest the longing Soul and fillest the hungry Soul with goodness †Ps 71.4 Thou O LORD art the thing that I long for and my Soul Thou seest hungers after Thâ—… O that Thou wouldst fill it with
displaced let them never be disappointed Absolve me from my sins assure me of Thy Love and fill me with thy Graces which may fit me for Thy Glory Pity my Infirmities pardon my Imperfections Hear my Prayers and grant me my Requests Bless preserve and govern me while I live and when I die take me O GOD and Father to Thy self where Thou knowest I would fain be for ever And all for the sake of my LORD JESUS CHRIST to whom with Thy Self and ever Blessed SPIRIT three most Divine Adorable PERSONS and one infinitely Glorious and most Perfect GOD be all Love and Honour and Obedience World without End Amen Amen Ejaculations to be used on Mourning-Days THE Blessing of the ALMIGHTY rest upon me the Grace and Comfort of the HOLY SPIRIT support and sanctify me and the Mercy of GOD in the Bloud of JESUS save me from the dreadful Wrath to come and Crown me with Glory everlasting Amen LORD pity my Soul and pardon my Sins strengthen my Graces and assure me of Thy Favour let me always please Thee in religious Duties and never offend Thee by any Miscarriages Amen Make me vigilant and circumspect in my Life that so my Death may be safe and blessed and a sweet and happy Passage to Thy Self Amen Gracious GOD I desire to love Thee and nothing but Thee or at least nothing in comparison of Thee My dear GOD in Mercy grant me but this one desire and as for all other deny them as Thou pleasest Amen Cause me O LORD to be tender of thine Honour and zealous for Thy Glory painful in Thy Service and sorrowful for my Sins while I live and when I die translate me I beseech Thee into Thy Kingdom and Presence where I may dwell in Rest and Peace in the Heighth of Joy and the Fulness of divine and heavenly Pleasure for evermore Amen Do good in Thy good pleasure unto Sion build Thou the Walls O blessed LORD of Thy Jerusalem Amen Have Mercy upon all Jews Turks Infidels and Hereticks and so fetch them home unto Thy Self O GOD as that they may be saved at the last Amen Create in the sinful People of this Land such new and contrite Hearts O LORD as that they may forthwith turn from all their Sins and through thy Mercy obtain forgiveness of the same Amen LORD I cannot live without Thee LORD I cannot die without Thee O Thou who art the GOD of my Life be Thou my GOD and Guide unto Death Amen NOTES NOTE I. Pag. 7. FOR there the Agency is direct without the dull Help or Mediation of Organs and wherever the Soul is toucht immediately she must be mov'd more forcibly And this may probably give much strength to Temptations I mean to Satanical ones or such as the Devil assaults us with For He being a Spirit for that Reason tho' his actings upon us be secret and invisible yet they may be exceeding strong and powerful For spiritual Beings are capable of nearer mutual Unions than material ones Because things corporeal touch but superficially and join only in their outsides whereas Penetrability being a Property of Spirits they can easily pervade or run through one another mingling their very Substances together And thus 't is like the Tempter deals with us He may not only make use of our Blood and our Spirits and the Humors of our Bodies to imprint and fasten his Temptations upon us but moreover may insinuate himself to our very Souls and so by most inward presential Applications strongly incline us to that which is evil Thus we sometimes find by uneasy Experience that our Minds are held close to sinful Objects even against our Wills and when we would fain break loose and turn our Fancies another way they are kept intent even by reluctant Animadversion upon Motives to Naughtiness Now what could thus far force our Minds and keep them fixt in such unvoluntary postures or dispositions but the great Enemy of our Souls And how can we conceive he should do it so well as by his own striking through them by unperceiv'd Penetration For so he may impregnate his pernicious Motions with the fiercest vigour and raise them to the highest degrees of Strength by conveying himself into us together with them Yea some Temptations are so extravagant and unreasonable so base and malicious and so much against Religion and the Christian Temper as those to atheistical and blasphemous Thoughts and the like that methinks they could never break in upon us if Satan himself were not there already to help them to enter nor could they ever continue so long with us nor press so mightily as they do upon our Souls if he were not intimately joined to us to maintain and uphold them in so high a force But then since he can tempt us so powerfully by virtue of his Spirituality which qualifies him for nearest accesses to us and conjunctions with us we should be so wise as to keep our selves always by holy living in GOD's favour and custody that so the utmost of our Adversary's fury and violence may never be able to prevail against us And as evil Spirits may tempt Men as abovesaid by insinuating into them so according to the Number and Malice of those Spirits in any loose Persons will their Temptations and their Sins be And therefore the HOLY GHOST speaking of one whose Mat. 12.45 last State was to be worse than his first gives this account of the sad Cause of that dismal Effect that seven Devils worse than that which actuated him before Were gotten into him And for the like reason Mary Magdalen was so scandalously guilty of carnal impurities even because seven Devils or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 unclean Spirits as the Gospel terms them were in her as Tempters to that sort of Lewdness For so many were cast out of her by the SON of GOD S. Mark 16.9 Yet still we must allow that there is some difference betwixt the Persons thus tempted by Devils and those that are down-right possessed of them For in the first Case evil Spirits apply themselves only to our Souls and that with intention and endeavour to stimulate and urge them on to Sin But in the latter Case they seem to settle in the Body and to take up their Residence in that designing some way or other to be injurious to it And the Injuries they do it of this Nature are commonly very visible or apparent and are mostly done one of these ways Either by vitiating its Organs and so hindring its Functions or hurting its Faculties or its Senses Thus we read of one that was dumb by the Devil 's possessing him Mat. 9.32 And of another that was deaf and dumb upon the same account Mar. 9.25 Or by offering ruder Violences to it As casting it into Mar. 9.22 the Fire or casting it into the Water Or tearing it inwardly or Luk. 9.39 bruising it outwardly or Luk. 13.11 putting it into some distorted or disfiguring Posture and keeping it in the
credit to Jonah and to be so happily influenc'd by his threatning Preachments is still a Question But for resolving it let us try if we cannot find something material hinted by the HOLY GHOST 2 King 14. For there perhaps we may find a Key of His making which will help to unlock this Difficulty In the latter part of that Chapter we read that Jeroboam the King of Israel recovered Damascus and Hamath and that he restored the Coast of Israel from the entring of Hamath unto the Sea of the Plain according to the word of the LORD GOD of Israel which he spake by the hand of His Servant Jonah the Son of Amittai Now as Damascus was an ancient City built before Abraham's time for his Steward was called Eliezer of Damascus and as it was a most pleasant City so delightful that Mahomet never durst enter into it lest it should tempt him to neglect his Designs so it was a great and most powerful City as being no less than the Metropolis of Syria And such a City as this the Head of a Country and the Royal Seat of a mighty Kingdom being taken by the King of Israel from the King of Syria the King of Nineveh the Confines of whose Empire were not remote from it could not but take special notice of And Jeroboam being animated to the War which was thus successful by the word of the Prophet Jonah who clearly foretold what the Issue would be we need not question but the King of Nineveh understood this too there being nothing more usual than for Kings and States where their Dominions are contiguous or no farther distant to pry into the Intrigues and affairs of each other But then he understanding that there was a Prophet in Palestine who unerringly foretold contingent Events and particularly the Fate of that flourishing City which fell out according to his Prediction when he heard that this very Prophet was come to Nineveh on purpose to denounce Destruction against it which according to his Threatning was to happen suddenly too unless the Inhabitants of it repented he might very well be concern'd as he was and set himself and his People to mourn as he did And the more readily might this be done yet in case Jonah went to Nineveh with any Merchant Caravan Trading into the East from Tyrus then the greatest Empory in that part of the World For Tyrians living upon that Sea where Jonah was thrown over-board and so miraculously preserved and knowing it to be true if any of them reported and affirmed it at Nineveh this might help to beget a more firm belief still of his dreadful Threatning NOTE III. Pag. 44. BEyond the Bounds of this Material World there is a strangely vast and infinite Place if we may so call it An Extension as illimited as GOD Himself and also as eternal as He else it could not be what He proclaims it His Habitation And very properly does He call it Eternity For neither Days nor Months nor Years nor Ages nor any thing of time was ever in it and yet it always did and shall exist And in this immense Capacity or Extension naturally boundless both in measure and Duration and holy too as being made so by Him that fills it the HIGH and LOFTY ONE does dwell There 's the Seat and everlasting Residence of His sublime and most exalted MAJESTY and by his Essence which is Ubiquitary He throughly possesses and every where replenishes that so Stately and expanded Mansion And where does He dwell besides O amazing Condescension in Him and Honour unto us as Himself declares He dwells with the Humble and contrite Spirit So that next to the highest Place He takes up His special Abode in the lowest mind In that Mind most which sinks lowest in holy Mourning NOTE IV. Pag. 80. BUT that he was far from being so appears by one Expression of his in his Laert. li. 10. Epistle to Pythocles Where he says 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Tho a wise man be tortured yet he is blessed And from another clause in his Ib. Epistle to Menaeceus Where he declares most worthily 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That Drinkings and continual Banquets carnal injoyments and the sumptuous Provisions of a well furnisht Table are not the things that make a sweet life but sober Reasoning And by and by he adds 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The greatest good is Wisdom 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And therefore Wisdom is more precious than Philosophy because out of it all Virtues spring Which teach that we cannot live pleasantly without living prudently and well and that we cannot live uprightly without living pleasantly For Virtues are connatural to a pleasant life and from these a pleasant life is inseparable And then from another Passage in the same Epistle where he says Virtutes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 are to be desired for pleasure and not for themselves as Physick is desired for health And says withal that Virtue is the only thing which cannot be separated from pleasure From all which it is evident that when Epicurus founded Happiness in Pleasure he meant that Pleasure which is the fruit of Virtue NOTE V. Pag. 130. WE are not to imagine that Heaven did any thing to restrain or hinder the outragious violences done to those Martyrs Their Eyes were really bor'd out their Legs cut off their Bones broken their Flesh beaten bruised mangled burned c. Not are we to conceive that when these Violences were done to their Bodies the Law or Order of communicating them to their Souls in way of Sensation was interrupted or dissolved For when their Bodies suffered in any capacity by Incisions Contusions Rackings Searings Scourgings Scaldings or the like these must make grievous Impressions on the Nerves and agitating them by furious Tensions or Vellications must transmit the Motions to the common Sensorium and so excite most dolorous Pains in their Souls For the Nerves which are thee great Instrument of Sense derive their Original from the Brain and by innumerable Sprigs or Ramifications being spread and propagated through the Body they terminate in the exterior parts of it So that nothing of violence can be done outwardly to the Body but at the same time it lights upon the Fibres of some of those Nerves whose Extremities are lodged in its Superficies I mean in the Cutis or Skin thereof And if these at any time be fiercely moved tho' at the Ends of them most distant from the Head yet the same motion at the same time is felt at their other Ends which are in the Brain And the Seat of the Soul or the proper place of her special vital Residence being some where there She cannot but be vehemently affected thereby But then we must consider that these Nerves may receive Impressions as well at the Roots of them within the Brain as in any parts of any Branches of them any where dispersed in the Body Yea there is reason why they should be most receptive of impressions there