sinking of a Line Move one yeares haste to sow in Hymen's bed Some seed which when thou ere mer't gathered In living buds might fresh and growing save The Grand-sire trunke from rotting in a grave But since the closing of thine eyes alone Wink's many glorious Tapers into none We waile thy death more thy Virginity We lose in that in this posterity Thy soule might still have liv'd in others breath Whose single life is now a numerous death Io. Castillion On the most immature Death of the late young Lord Stafford the last Baron of that Family WHat Nemesis what envious fate Still waites on those who antedate Their yeares by vertue and behind Cast slow pac't age with swiftest mind So 't is wise nature shortest day Allowes to things which post away The long liv'd Olive tree of peace And Lawrell slowly doe increase But the early pledge of Spring The Primrose soone is withering So Ceres oft with too much haste Her yellow dangling lockes doth waste And having rose too soone from bed Before night hangs her drowsie head O see what hopes which raisd were high To aggravate our misery Now blasted as a starre which shone New shot from Heaven are flit and gone Have you seene a Pine tree proud Her head invested in a cloud Which the fatall axe hath throwne Or the giddy whirlewind blowne Whilst th' Hamadryades with floods Of teares doe drowne their mournfull woods And Sylvan his espoused Queene Laments faire hopefull fresh and greene Have you seene a vessell trim Vpon the smiling Sea to swim Whose sayles doe gently swell with aire Of many a Merchants zealous prayer O never ship with greater pride Did on a watry mountaine ride But strait a blustring storme doth rise And dasheth her against the skies Then on a rocke her glory teares No shrikes nor cryes nor clamours heares Or have you seene but newly borne The rosy-finger'd fairest morne Whilest the sprightfull Satyres play And leape to see the golden ray But then a sullen cloud this light Turn's to a darke and dismall night These were Emblems of thy fall Noblest Stafford so I 'de call Vertue by this name she 's knowne And t is more proper then her owne But which deeper wounds with thee Dy'd thy stem and Baronie As that Nymph which by the Pine Liv'd and with the same doth life resigne When the Deluge did deface The booke of nature humane race Reprinted was and found supply From the floating Library But of Stafford w' have lost all Both transcript and originall Onely some margent notes are left To tel's of what we are bereft Here multa desunt which to fill Passeth the learned Criticks skill But as in ruin'd abbyes we Admire their faire deformity And doe build up thoughts from thence To reach the first magnificence So yet of Staffords house doe stand Some sacred reliques which command Our rev'rence and by these we see What was his noble Pedigree Whose earthly armes inter'd doe ly But soule plac't in th' aetheriall skie Shines with star-blaz'd nobility Charles Mason On the Death of the Right Honorable Lord the Lord STAFFORD being the last of that Noble Family VNseasonable Fate vexe not our sence With Balefull sorrowes due forty yeares hence Must Stafford needs expire at twenty foure Because in goodnesse onely he 's three score So have we seene the morning Sun to lay His glory downe and make a rainie day Trust me ye Destinies it was unjust So soone to lay his honour in the dust But we doe fixe our sorrowes as upon A private fate when 't is a publicke one And weepe alas as yet but with one eye If but for one we weepe why here doth lie Not my Lord onely but a Family No no! he 's but the Center-point from whence Our grones and sighes fetch their Circumference Here we must teach our eye to drop a teare Even for the losse of those who never were Griefes mysterie we must for those be sad Who lose a being which they never had Must ye your selves O Parcae women prove In that the greenest of our fruites ye loue Fruites which not cropt had thriv'd into a Tree Of a large branching Geneologie Ye might have seaz'd some puling witlesse Heire And made a younger Brother 't had beene faire And we had Praise and kist those bloody palmes Which in the killing this gave to'ther Almes But you will no such spotted sacrifice Such please not yet for such are in your eyes Are neither good for earth nor yet for Heaven Stafford must onely make your weeke-Bill even He 's good and therefore ripe thus still we finde That good wares first goe off bad stay behinde Will. Wallen Coll. Joan. Soc. Vpon the Death of the young Lord STAFFORD VNequall nature that dost load not paire Bodies with soules too great for them to beare As some put extracts that for soules may passe Still quickning where they are in frailer glasse Whose active gen'rous spirits scorne to live By such weake meanes and slight preservative So high-borne mindes whose dawning 's like the day In torrid climes cast forth a full noone-ray Whose vigorous brests inherit throng'd in one A race of soules by long succession And rise in their descents in whom we see Entirely summ'd a new borne Ancestry These soules of fire whose eager thoughts alone Create a feaver or consumption Orecharge their bodyes lab'ring in the strife To serve so quicke and more then mortall life Where every contemplation doth oppresse Like fits o' th Calenture and kils no lesse Goodnesse hath its extreames as well as sin And brings as vice death and diseases in This was thy fate great Staffords thy feirce speed T' outlive thy yeares to throng in every deed A masse of vertues hence thy minutes swell Not to a long life but long Chronicle Great name for that alone is left to be Call'd great and 't is no small Nobility To leave a name when we deplore the fall Of thy brave stem and in thee of them all Who dost this glory to thy race dispence Now knowne to Honour t' end with Innocence Me thinkes I see a sparke from thy dead eye Cast beames on thy deceast Nobility Witnesse those marble heads whom Westminster Adores perhaps without a nose or eare Are now twice raised from the dust and seeme New sculp't againe when thou art plac't by them When thou the last of that brave house deceast Hadst none to cry our Brother but the Priest And this true riddle is to ages sent Stafford is his Fore-father's Monument Richard Godfrey On the untimely Death of the Lord STAFFORD NOt to adorne his herse or give Him another age to live Need we to pretend at wit His worth hath intercepted it Whose every vertue doth require A Muse that onely can admire Death though he strove his utmost fear'd He could not take him unprepar'd H' had ripenesse in his Infancy And liv'd well in Epitomie Of what we hop'd in others he At th' same age had maturity
in and out as if they had belong'd to beasts which Cato at severall Visits not onely took notice of but withall mark'd how good men sigh'd and groan'd at this cruelty and he himselfe abhorring so bloudy a Tyranny with a resolute minde and countenance said to his Tutour Why does no man kill this monster of men To this Sarpedo replyed Because they fear him more then they hate him but you answered Cato have given me a Sword that I may dispatch him and free my Countrey from servitude Hee utterd this with such fiercenesse that Sarpedo after that time seldome or never presented him to Sylla or if he did it was not without preparation of him by his authority and advise From the vanquishing of outward Enemies our method leads us to the subduing of inward which are our passions and affections The Conquerour of these is Temperancie who is Natures Minion and studies her preservation By this Reason governes the sensuall part tames it and makes it endure the Bitt Without this our passions will violently carry us into the gulph of pleasure out of which few or none return at all or if they doe it is not without suffering of shipwrack and extreame perill Delights betray us with kissing and having charm'd us into a profound sleep we no sooner awake but wee see our selves environ'd with Horrour and Despair out of whose sharpe claws none ever yet escaped unwounded In the entry to Voluptuousnesse we discerne nothing but Roses Violets and the prime flowers of the Spring strewed in our way but in comming backe wee view nothing but unked dismall Objects of solitude and sorrow The comfort is incredible of those who joyfully flie into the imbraces of this Vertue loathing and abhorring the very shadow of Intemperancie which ugly Traytresse never leaves Youth till she hath brought them to those Precipices which she hath prepared for their destruction The famous Oratour Demosthenes upbraided the Athenians with this folly that they never treated of peace but in mourning Garments which they wore for their friends lately lost in the Warres And this is the custome of luxurious men they never so much as mention Sobriety and Continencie of Life till they are under the lash of the Physician or the hand of Death We are by much more vertuous saith Pliny in sicknesse then in health wee then make God and Vertue our continuall meditation and are no longer ruled by our passions and affections We are not then Amorous Ambitious Covetous Revengefull Riot is like a fierce untamed Tiger the keeping whereof is as perillous as the taking Wee must here imitate Vlisses not his followers whom Circes turn'd into Swine If wee lend an eare to the inticing ravishing voice of pleasure we also shall be transform'd into beasts This Vertue is exercis'd in brideling and restraining the inordinate appetite to meat drinke and Venery The Romans used ever to imbowell their dead and not to allow those ignoble parts the panch and guts buriall as being the onely causers of our Dissolution Hee is unworthy the Name and Definition of man who lives onely to eat Diogenes called the Belly the Charybdis of the Life Musonius the Philosopher warns us that it is decent and behoofefull that man alone amongst all Creatures being descended from the Gods should chiefly nourish himselfe as they do with contemplation not minding food farther then to satisfy nature Drunkennesse and Gluttony are comprehended under excesse who is the common mother to both The Ancients represented to us the uglinesse of the former by picturing Bacchus naked and young to signifie unto us that Drunkards can keepe nothing secret As when Wine begins to worke in a Vessell that part of it which is in the bottome mounts up to the top so a Drunkard discloseth the secrets that lie in the very bottom of his heart His Chariot was drawn by Lions Leopards and Panthers to intimate unto us that Wine metamorphoseth them into Savage bruits that drinke it beyond measure They drew him clad in Goats skins to denotate the incontinencie of such His Sacrifices were ordinarily executed by women to argue the effeminacie of men given over to that vice Neither are Surfeits of meate lesse odious and enormous then these of drinke What a strange and undecent sight is it to behold men lothing and longing for meats like women with child Where this Vice raignes nothing of value can reside As when we behold the Sun through vapours and clouds he appeares not to us so beautifull as when hee is in his full shine having nothing interpos'd between him and us so a soule charged with Repletion Fumes that arise from excrements and meates undigested is eclipsed and through the mists and fogs raised by sensuality can discerne nothing subtile and generous expressing no more harmony in her functions than we can expect from an instrument fild with Durt and Rubbish Uncleane spirits love uncleane lodgings as we may perceive by the Divells in the possessed man who petition'd our Saviour that they might enter into the herd of hogs not into Oxen Sheep or any other clean Beast nourish'd with cleane food The example of Dives should much terrifie these ravenous devourers who was so cruelly tormented in his Tongue the Organ of Tast The devill knew man to be so prone to this sinne that he made it the baite to catch our first Parents and the snare wherwith he thought to hold fast our Redemer If thou bee the sonne of God said hee command these stones to be made bread Innocentius thus inveighes against this superfluous feeding Gula Paradisum clausit primogenituram Vendidit suspendit pistorem decollavit Baptistam Nabuzardam Princeps coquorum Templum incendit Hierusalem totam evertit Gluttony first shut up Paradise sold the Birth-right hang'd the Baker beheaded St. John Baptist Nabuzardam the Master Cooke burnt the Temple and overthrew the Walls of Hierusalem The frequent use of delicious meates and drinkes amongst the Romans as their Jecur Anserimum their Porcus Trojanus Sumen Vvedulae Ficedulae Phaenicopteri and their generous Wines Cecuba Falerna c. caused them to be as much censur'd by succeeding Historians as their vertues made them admir'd The Naturallists report that the Sea-horse hath his heart placed in his belly to intimate his voracity Philoxenes wished his neck were as long as a Cranes that he might the longer feele the sweetnesse of his meate I knew an old witty Epicure of this nation who hath often in the presence of a whole Ordinary wish'd himselfe a Cowe that hee might eate his meate over twice Alas said hee a man hath small pleasure in feeding twice a day halfe an howre at a time I would bee ever eating He wished if hee must needes goe to heaven hee mought bee wound up thether by a Jacke All the while this glutton pamper'd his body his soule starv'd receiving no nutriment but what was uncleane and putrid Sminderides rode a wooing attended by a thousand Cooks
a thousand Fowlers and as many Fishers That this sin of gluttony is no solitary vice but is ever accompanied by Incontinency St. Hirome tells us Semper Saturitati junct a est Lascivia Vicina igitur sunt venter genitalia pro membrorum ordine ordo vitiorum Lasciviousnesse ever associates saturity Therefore are the Belly and the secrets placed close by one another to shew that they are as neare in consequence and dependancy as in scituation the one feeding and maintaining the other Wherefore they were in no errour who stiled hunger the friend of Virginity in that it cooles the boyling blood and renders the Flesh subject to the Spirit Water Fruits and Rootes were mans first sustinance Lord how farre is his dyet alter'd from its first simplicity Remarkable is that saying of Alexander I know no better a Cooke to procure me an Appetite to my dinner than to rise betimes nor to my Supper than to eate little at Dinner Epictetus Counsaileth us not to decke our Rooms with Tablets and Pictures but with Sobriety and Temperancy in that the former onely feed the eyes but the later the soule to which they are eternall Ornaments This our sweetly dispos'd Lord closely followed the advice of this Philosopher who in all his Actions did nothing without the consultation and approbation of Sobriety and Modesty Hee never was invited to a feast but he diligently cal'd to minde that hee had two guests to entertaine the body and the soule and that what ever he bestowed on the one would be corrupted and converted into Excrements but what hee conferred on the other would enjoy the same Eternity with it He observ'd such a beautifull Order in all his desires that they never ranne before nor lagg'd behinde but ever kept that rank in which Reason had placed them He lived by a Rule composed and confirm'd by either Testament and taught his soule to affect nothing shee might not lawfully covet Thus wee see the admirable fruit Temperancy brought forth in his mind and will in all other wherein shee is once planted I will give a period to the discourse of this Vertue with the words of Prosper who thus extolls it Temperantia facit abstinentem parcum sobrium moderatum pudicum tacitum Verecundum Haec Virtus si in animo habitat libidines fraenat affectus ' temperat ' desideria sancta multiplicat vitiosa castigat omnia inter nos confusaordinat cogitationes pravas removet scientiam inserit ignem libidinosae cupiditatis extinguit mentem placida Tranquilitate componit totam ab omni in semper tempestate Vitiorum defendit Temperancy makes a man abstinent sparing sober moderate chast silent and modest This Vertue once entred into the mind bridles lust tempers affections multiplyes holy desires and chastiseth the vitious sets our confused thoughts in order and removes the wicked ones inserts knowledge quencheth all libidinous flames within us composeth and setleth the minde in a pleasing Tranquility and evermore defends every part of it from all Stormes raised by Vice Justice challengeth a place here and deservedly it being a Cardinall Vertue and of great eminency not only amongst the Morall but Divine vertues also Homer sayes she was begotten by all the gods so divers and so admirable are her effects Cicero thus commends her to us Justitia Virtutis splendor est Maximus ex qua viri boni nominamur Justice is the greatest splendour of vertue from which we purchase the names of good men Most elegantly Cassiodorus Iustitia non novit Patrem non novit Matrem veritatē novit personā no accipit Deum imitatur Iustice knows neither Father nor mother she knowes Truth she is no respector of persons and is in that an imitator of God According to the strict or slacke practice of this vertue all Common-wealths have flourish'd or decay'd Without her what were Man-kinde but a confused multitude of ravenous hungry Lyons living by rapines and murders This Vertue consists of two parts the distributive and commutative The distributive is chiefely Regall and appropriate to Emperours Kings Princes and to all those who derive their Authority from them The Commutative is an equall and just dealing betweene all men of what Condition soever they be The former part is of greatest dignity and acted but by a few and they of great ranke and quality yet of those few how many shall we find that execute the great Offices committed to their charge by God himselfe with impartiality and equity The difference Aristotle puts betweene a just Prince and a Tyrant is that the aime of the former is the publicke good the scope of the later is his owne profit These two behold their Subjects with a different eye no otherwise than a Shepherd and a Butcher looke on a sheepe to different ends the one to preserve the other to destroy it A Tyrant is like Boreas that ever threatens shipwrack and ruine A just King resembles Zephyrus whose breath begets plentie and sweetnesse That a just King or Judge ought to be a most studious and carefull Investigatour of the Truth is taught us by the example of God himselfe who said I will descend and see whether the cry which is come unto mee be just or no The Ancients pictur'd Astraea whom they made a Representour of Justice without a head which they said was in Heaven to signifie that Justice should not regard men but have her eyes fixed on God In Athens the Delinquents ever pleaded before the Judges with their faces covered lest the sweetnesse of some pleasing countenance should so much move and so farre work upon them as to make them doe injustice Two stupendious presidents of Justice wee have in two mighty Monarchs Seleuchus and Cambyses Seleuchus having made a law the transgression whereof he ordaind to be punish'd with the losse of both eyes it most unfortunately happened that his own sonne was the first transgressour of it whereupon being a most indulgent Father and withall a most severe Justicer to satisfie the rigour of the Law he caused one of his own eyes to be pulled out and another of his sonnes Cambyses having condemned a cruell and corrupt Judge to be flead alive caused the chaire of Justice to be covered with his skin and make the sonne of this monstrous Oppressour sit and give judgement in it for an astonishment and terrour to him and all succeeding Judges Iunius Brutus executed his own children for their conspiring against the liberty of their Country By the severe Lawes of Draco which were written in bloud when the Authour of a Crime could not be found out even things inanimate were cited condemn'd throwne out of the City banished for ever or broken in pieces according to the Nature of the Fact As a Physician or Surgion oftentimes administers stinking and lothsome potions nay sometimes cuts off a limbe and all this for the preservation of his patient so in the body politick a just Judge
alwayes inflicts bitter punishments on the putrid wicked members of the Common-wealth nay sometimes cuts them off having this for a Statemaxime that hee who is mercifull to the bad is cruell to the good In this distributive part of Justice no wise man can look that this our mirrour of the youthfull Nobility should attaine to the least degree of perfection since neither his few yeares admitted nor his Prince called him to sit in the seat of Justice In the commutative part hee was no way defective doing to all men as hee would be done unto In this hee strictly in all points obeyed the advice of Seneca Quisquis Justitiam sectari desideras prius Deum time ama ut ameris à Deo Amabis Deum si in hoc illum imitaberis ut velis omnibus prodesse nihil nocere Ab alio expectes quod alteri feceris Praestabis parentibus pietatem cognatis dilectionem pacem cum hominibus habebis bellum cum vitiis praestabis amicis fidem omnibus aequitatem Whosoever thou art that desirest to follow Iustice first feare and love God that thou mayst be beloved of God Thou shalt shew thou lovest God if in imitation of him thou seekest to profit all to hurt none Expect from another what thou hast done to him Thou shalt make an expression of pietie towards thy Parents love to thy Kinred thou shalt have peace with all men warre with vices thou shalt keepe thy faith unviolated to thy friends and observe the Lawes of Equitie towards all men What should have beene placed in the Front comes here in the Reare and that is prudencie a vertue which serves measures graces and crownes all other vertues whatsoever As amongst precious stones some are of greater prize then the rest and by their presence impart to them a lustre so prudencie amongst all other Vertues is of greatest esteeme in the eyes of all men as being to the rest a Guide a Gage and an Ornament As the eye in the body is by all preferred before the other senses so prudencie in the soule is commended above all other perfection In the troope of Vertues she hath the most honourable charge Prudencie gives a measure and a Gage to every other Vertue for if not measur'd and directed by discretion a needfull Care turns into an utter Despaire a decent grief into Rage and Bitternesse Love into Flattery Hope into Presumption Joy â—nto Wantonnesse and a just Anger into an immoderate Fury So that wee may perceive an undiscreet vertue to be no better then a Vice This is shee that hath ever an eye to what is past present and to come and out of all three picks this advantage that her Adversary can never surprize her unawares or take her unprovided Shee laughs at that usuall saying of Fools I had not thought As in the warres though the Enemy be farre off the Watch is still constantly set so she is alwayes vigilant and hath a severall ward for every blow of Fortune She is like double-faced Ianus looking two severall wayes at one and the same time This all men will readily grant me that if Fortune cause a Tempest to rage and rore shee shall not so soon sink him that fore-seeing the storme hath taken in his sailes as him who mistrusting nothing beares them all out Prudencie teacheth us that in this rolling tottering World there is nothing stable that the best remedie against an evill is the prevention of it To be briefe her assistance is more necessary cleane through all the affaires of this life then on the Sea is the government of a Pilot who knows not how to asswage the violence of a storme nor to appease the fury of the Windes nor to gaine his desired Port at his pleasure whereas prudencie will for the most part either prevent or frustrate all practices that tend to her ruine As if there were no Sun we should live in a perpetuall darknesse for all the comfort and light the other Stars could afford us so except the beams of this bright and radiant prudencie reflect on all our actions and Negotiations they will appeare dimme and sordid notwithstanding all the light the other Vertues can lend us This vertue was in such repute with Agesilaus that hee exhorted his souldiers now ready for the combat that they should not minde the multitude of their Enemies but bend all their forces against Epaminondas their Generall for hee once subdued all the rest would in a trice be vanquish'd For said hee none but wise and prudent men know how to prevent a defeat or obtain a victorie This Vertue eminently and superlatively appear'd in all the proceedings of Christ himself with the Iewish Nation When hee had attain'd to the age of twelve yeares hee sate in the Temple amongst the grave Doctours questioning answering and instructing and the Text witnesseth that all who heard him stood amazed at his prudent demands and replies Hee also deluded the Priests and Elders of the Iewish Synagogue by prudently answering one question with another When they asked him by what power hee did those Miracles hee demanded of them Whence the Baptisme of John was When again they demanded of him if he were the Son of God he replyed You say that I am This prudencie next to the Invocation of his Father was the onely Engine wherewith hee defended himself against the pernicious plots of this Generation of Vipers As no Architecture can come to perfection without the help of the Compasses the Rule so stands it with Human Actions without the aid of prudencie none of them can receive their grace and accomplishment Let a man be master of all abilities imaginable if he be not withall judicious and prudent to make a right use of them and to produce them in their proper times and places they will acquire him rather shame then glory If one could have Aristotle and Seneca without book and were withall injudicious inconsiderate undiscreet he would oftener purchase laughter then applause Diodorus omitting the idle Fables of Proteus informes us that hee was adopted King by the Egyptians in that he excell'd all men in Wisdome which made him so cunning in giving and taking counsell and in changing it with dexterity when opportunity served that hence arose the Fable that hee could turn himselfe into so many formes and shapes If in his determinations hee altered any thing you could not so properly say he chang'd as hee fitted his minde to the present occasion as we see the hand is the same still whether it be shut or extended Indeed the minde of a Wiseman is as Seneca sayes like the state of the World above the Moone where there is no change He alwayes returns home as it is said of Socrates with the same countenance hee carried out and according to Epictetus is like himselfe even in his dreames This our incomparable Child of Honour gave strong essayes to climbe the summity of this vertue both by diligent reading
they would have also the same passions They would after our womanish custome lament their untimely death who die before noon esteeme them happy that live till the evening and yet bewaile them too who depart at night Our fond whining were seasonable and to purpose if it could prevent the death of our friends or call them from the dead but it savours of a vain foolish arrogant ambition to desire they should be privileged and exempted from the fatall common condition of Mankinde since wee cannot be ignorant that God hath set down a period beyond which Nature her self shal not passe Nothing representeth better to us this world then a theater wheron one acts a King another a Lord a third a Magistrate others again play the base servil parts of fools messengers mutes Some of them stay stare strut look big a long time on the Stage others only shew themselvs without speaking one word as soon as they come on go off againe to conclude all have their Exits So we poore Mortals who are sent by our provident omnipotent Creator into this world to undergo several charges some wherof are honorable some ignominious have al an egresse out of this life aswel as an ingresse allotted us Some a long time be at this earthly Stage with the Majestie of a Tragedian others are fools sneak up down to the laughter of all men others again lie manacled bed-rid or which is the worst of Fates distracted Some no sooner enter but they go out again as did that child in the besieged depopulated desolate town of Saguntum who by an instinct of Nature no sooner put his head out of his Mothers wombe but he pull'd it in again as divining the approching destruction of his Citie and himself To continue the similitude As hee who acted an Emperor the Play once done is no better then he who represented a slave so the Grave as Horace saith equals all the King the Beggar Pertinently to this S. Ambrose We are born naked saith he and die naked there is no difference between the carcasses of the rich and the poore save that the former stinke worse through a repletion with excrements which surfets of delicious fare have left behinde This world is Deaths region about it as a triumpher over all flesh he rides his circuit Since then his cōming is so necessary so inevitable whether he comes in the dawne the noon or twilight of life let us bid him welcome What should hinder us to doe so I cannot tell since as there is no ship but in one Voyage or other dasheth not against some hidden rock or shelf so the most happy life is not free from infinite crosses and disasters Yet though every man knows the inconveniences perils of this life saith S. Austin and that he must once die yet all men seeke to shun and defer the houre of death not onely the heathen but they to who believe the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting To our reproch the holy Father spake this for though it be no shame for a Gentile to fear death whose onely scope of life is to see and be seen to know be known yet to a Christian it is whose aime and desire should be not onely to serve God faithfully here but also to raigne gloriously with him hereafter What is necessarily to be done a wiseman does voluntarily let us not therefore with the foolish Tyrant in Lucian either with tears prayers or bribes vainly think to perswade inexorable Death but wisely consider that wee are neither the first nor the last All have gone before and must follow us Nay not a man dies that hath not at the same time many to accompany him who arrive at the house of Death by severall waies Life is a due debt to God and Nature as long as we have it we enjoy a benefit when wee are deprived of it wee have no wrong Let us then daily render it backe to him that gave it since hee is a bad debtour who unwillingly payes As a Souldier the signe once given readily obeyes the command of his Generall and armed at all poynts followes him through all Dangers and faceth Death himselfe so must we chearefully observe the very Beck of our Heavenly Commander and through all miseries and destruction it selfe make our way to him Death should be no longer formidable to us since our Redeemer hath taken out his sting and hee is now no other then an old toothlesse Dragon It is a foolish thing to delight in sleep and abhorre Death sleepe being onely a continuall imitation of it Hee that seriously contemplates the priviledges and advantages that accompany a Christian Death will be in love with it It is the Refuge of the afflicted and the end of all earthly evils It takes not life from us but presents it to the custodie of Eternity It is not an end but an intermittance of life nor no longer a punishment but a Tribute and we are gainers by it As he who hath a long time layne in a darke dungeon is beyond imagination joyfull when he comes to the light so the soule when shee is freed from the vapours and clouds in which the flesh involv'd her is ravish'd with delight While shee is yet in the body though her ambition reach at Heaven yet is shee still clogg'd with that heavy masse of earth and cannot so nimbly and nobly operate as she would She may fitly be call'd the Guest and the Body the Host that makes her pay dearly for her clayie lodging For if a Magistrate be vexed and busied to subdue and pacifie the Rebels of a seditious Citie needs must the soule be troubled and afflicted who hath a harder office assign'd her which is to bridle and restrain the vitious inordinate dissolute affections which are inseparable adjuncts to her while shee hath a conjunction with the body The prerogatives of Death being so many and so certaine let us no longer condole the decease of this our compleatly noble Friend but congratulate his happy departure hence and his safe arrivall in the Imperiall Heaven When Proculus Iulius had reported to the Romans that hee had seene Romulus and that assuredly hee was a God a Wonder it was saith Livie how much they gave credit to this Tale and how greatly the misse of Romulus both amongst the Commons and Souldiers was by this beliefe of his Immortalitie digested Much more should our sorrow be mittigated by the confidence we have that this our blessed Friends soule is ascended to him from whom it descended When Brasse or Gold is melted to make the Statue of some great deserving Man wee say not that the Mettall is lost but dignified In like case when a Body is turn'd into its first Principles Dust and Ashes wee who have an eye to the glorious Resurrection of it thinke not it is utterly ruin'd but dissolv'd to be refin'd As in the Eclipse of the