A SERMON, PREACHED AT St. MARGARET'S IN WESTMINSTER: At the Funeral of Mrs. SUSANNA GREY, Daughter of Henry Grace, Esq of Enfield in Staffordshire; who on the 29 of October 1654. begins her Eternal Sabbath.  
Come Lord jesus come quickly.  
And it was a custom in Israel that the daughters of Israel went yearly to lament the daughter of Jeptha the Gileadite, four days in a year,  Judges 11. ult. 
LONDON, Printed by F. L. 1657.   
2 Sam 12.15, to 24. v. 22, 23. 
And he said, while the Child was yet alive I fasted and wept; For I said, who can tell whether God will be gracious to me, that the Child may live? (23) But now he is dead, wherefore should I fast? can I bring him back again? I shall go to him, but he shall not return to me.  
IT is not only the wonder of of David's Servants, but of all that read the Story, why David should fast and weep while the Child was yet alive, and dry up his tears upon the first news of the Child's death? why he should mourn and afflict himself, while there was some hopes, with the fear of that death which he mourned not, when it happened? This is so contrary to the Custom and Manners of most men that seek the chiefest relief and ease of their miseries from their complaints and sorrows, and indulge the sad remembrance of their Losses as a kind of Reparation and Remedy while they recover them, at least in their memories, and find them represented in their tears, and therefore at the death of friends they invite others to bear a part with them in their grief and lamentation.  
Yet seeing David was a man after Gods own heart, and therefore his Temper and very complexion more refined and purified with holy alleys, and even, his passions are more to be imitated by us (for a good man is a living rule to others, his example the best Sermon, and most pleasing direction to us, who are ever sociable sinners, or Saints, and regard more what we see others do, than what we ought to do.) Let us Learn here from David, not from the funeral Preacher, how we are to behave ourselves, what we are to do in the sickness and death of friends (whether Children or other near Relations:)  
This one example leads us through all the Duties we own to others in the saddest cases, this directs us: 1. How to behave ourselves amidst the confusion of fears and hopes in the sicknesses of our friends. 1st, To seek to God before the Physician; to distil our Tears for Balm, and apply our Prayers for their first Cure; to lend them breath from our Petitions, from our sobs and cries, before the sentence of death be passed, Who can tell whether God will have mercy on us, and not bereave us of so great content?  
2ly. How to appease and moderate our grief after the death of others, which we could not by our tears or prayers prevent. But now he is dead, wherefore should I fast? [should I mourn or afflict myself] Can I bring him back again?  
3ly. How to return to ourselves having lost our Friends, and from the death of others to prepare for our own. I shall go to him, but he shall not return to me.  
These 3 Considerations will best represent the Pattern in the most lively practical Lines for our imitation, and serve best to turn this story into an useful moral.  
How we are to behave ourselves in the sicknesses and visitations of others? Here good nature will join with piety to enforce these duties.  
We are to consider what ever present visitations, as the effects and punishments of our sins, as well as theirs who are visited particularly indeed: This was manifest in this case of David, where the Child being truly conceived in the sin of the Father, and born in the iniquity of the Mother, (in adultery) could have the shame and slain of his birth only blotted out by death, and covered by the Grave.  
But this may be a safe, useful, and proper consideration in the visitation of any Friend, to look upon his disease as bred from God's anger against us, his punishment of our sins, as well as from his own distemper. How knowst thou whether God takes him from thee, as he did St. Augustine's friend, to free him from thy corruptions? who wert apt to delight in him as an associate or brother in Iniquity, in Luxury, as that friend in Minutius (in erroribus socius, in amoribus conscius) as a partner in sins, a ready assistant in unlawful pleasures, and confident in wild excesses, endeared by mutual secrecy, and society in vice; then as that friend charactered by the Psalmist, a friend with whom thou mightest take sweet counsel together, and go up together to the house of the Lord, whence it is that God snatcheth him from thee, as Lot out of Sodom, to prevent his infection first, and then his destruction by thy sins; or else to free thee from thy immoderate Love and Carnal Affection; God removes the Object, and thus with jealousy courts thy affection, he suffers thee to enjoy nothing over much, which should share in that Love and Devotion which thou owest to God alone. Thus looking on children (on friends) as greater stays and contents of life, as so many Pins to fasten your Tabernacle on the earth; God loosens the Pins, to loosen your affections from the earth, and by degrees to bring you to a stricter dependence on him. Out of the sense of this so affectionate design of our jealous God, did the noble Matron Melania entertain the death of a Husband and two Sons at once, with that pious Exclamation: Expeditius tibi servitura sum Domine; quia me tanto onere liberasti; Thou hast, O my Lord, provided that I may henceforth serve thee more freely, having released thy servant from so great encumbrances and distractions.  
In this regard David here used the most proper Cure of God's anger, and his own carnal affections, fasting, weeping, and praying. Who can tell whether God will have mercy on me? forgive me my sin and delinquency, for which the Child is sentenced to death, that the Child may live.  
This Remedy of Praying and Fasting for our own sins in Another, is like the weapon-salve that doth so strange and secret cures, being applied to the putrified matter, and the guilty weapon that made the wound, not to the patiented,  
2. This Consideration, that sicknesses, being but the Attachments and approaches of death, are (as death is said to be) the wages of sin, sets us on our first work, To remove the Cause, our sins, before we may hope to take away the Effect, the disease of our friend. This Order the ancient Canons seemed to point at, which enjoined the sick to send for his Confessor, before his Physician. Think then thy friend's consumption proceeds from thy languishing towards God, from the decay of holy heat and zeal in thee. Think his Fever but a just judgement on thy impure flames of Lust, or Envy, or Revenge, or thy immoderate affection towards him; his Lameness upbraids thy halting between God and the world; his Stone the Symptom of the hardness of thy heart; his bad spleen argues thy rotten malice, and what ever corruptions answering still some more corrupt desires of thy Soul, so wilt thou find as great necessity to Physic, and purge thy Soul, as the others body.  
3. After the Cause is removed, by washing away with thy tears thine own or thy friends stams, then mayst thou safely, orderly (and as the Physicians prescribe secundum artem) proceed to remove the Effect; to use all the means God allows for recovery; for to this end (saith the wise man) God created the Physician as well as the herbs of the field, for the time of need: Only remember that you first beg the life of God, before you seek it from the Physician. 'Twas Asahs' fault, not that he sought the Physician, but that he did not seek the Lord; 2 Chron. 16.12. only as you use the means, so trust not in them, but in God's blessing, and believe they have no farther operation, or virtue, than while they are joined with your Prayers. Epaphroditus Recovery St. Paul ascribes to God's mercy on him, and on the Corinthians, but his mercy awakened by prayers, Phil. 2.26, 27. his own preservation from the sentence of death passed against him at Ephesus to combat with wild beasts [1 Cor. 15, 32. which was drawn upon him by more Savage Beasts; Demetrius and his Silver Smiths, Act. 19.24] he imputes to the Prayers of the Corinthians 2 Cor. 1.8, 9, 10, 11. Who knows whether our letting our hands fall from prayer hath not caused death to prevail over the person we now mourn for?  
2. Duty or enquiry. How we are to moderate our grief in the death of near Relations, which by these degrees will be discovered.  
1. Some affections, some natural passions are not to be denied; God doth not, like the Lacedæmonians, load his Children with stripes, and require that hardiness in them, that they should return no signs of griefs nor groans at all. 'Tis no stoical Apathy, no senseless stupidity God requires, but only patience under his chastisements; for if we did not feel the blow, how should we look up to the hand that smites us? How should affliction lead us to godly sorrow, but by that sensible sorrow which is according to the world? that which is natural is first, and then that which is spiritual. Even worldly sadness, and melancholy is a good disposition to Devotion, and a fair degree to an humble temper. We find our Saviour weeping over Lazarus Grave, insomuch as the people could infer thence, See how much he loved him. John 11.35, 36. I know no Divinity (but that which the Sword and the Spirit, unlike that which came in the shape of a Dove, hath framed in this latter age) that excludes humanity, but delights always to plant itself in soft breasts, and either makes or finds good nature. I find in the Catalogue, and Spawn of highest Crimes (which the dregs of these last times should bring forth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, want of natural affection, reckoned 2 Tim. 33. and that joined with Haters of God, Truce breakers, False Accusers, unthankful, cursed Speakers, having a show of godliness, and denying the power thereof (Rom. 1.30.) And the Apostle argues it strongly; How can he love God whom he hath not seen, who loves not his brother whom he hath seen?  
So then, 'tis not only not unlawful, but a duty to mourn with those that mourn, if you will receive the Apostles Prescription, Rom. 12.15. It is in the Scripture noted as an extreme judgement and curse on the wicked, Job 27.15. (Ps. 78.64.) his Widows shall not weep, as either wanting leisure from other sorrows, or liberty from their cruel enemies, or oppressed with God's sore displeasure, so far as to yield and acknowledge the just curse with silence, Jer 16.5.7. or else, having spent their tears and grief, and dried up the fountain of sorrow, their very heart, Ezek. 24.16, 17.22.23. that the heaviest judgement you shall not mourn nor weep, but shall pine away in your iniquity, and mourn one towards another, for one to comfort another, etc. Tears are the first office we do for ourselves, and the last for others.  
They may not please themselves, that can with driest eyes behold the sicknesses, the losses, the Funerals of Friends, as who had attained a greater measure of Religion or Discretion, or the Spirit, or who had subdued their desires to a perfecter Resignation, and submission to Gods will. Let them question themselves whether this Apathy, this stoutness, proceeds not from a spirit void of sense and natural affection, and not from an humble Resignation to the Providence and pleasure of God; whether this calm arise not alike to that of the dead Sea, from a curse?  
2. On the other side, Though Religion forbids not mourning, yet it forbids us to mourn as those that have no hopes; Though it excludes not all grief, yet it moderates our grief, and teacheth us to turn our sadness to an holy sorrow, our melancholy to devotion, and convert our discontents to repentance. Religion otherwise will require us to weep our Carnal Tears over again, when they flow either from immoderate or mere worldly sorrow. Hence than we are to inquire,  
3. How far we are to mourn? For what, and how we are to grieve? and and that either in regard of the Object, or Measure of our grief.  
1. In regard of the measure of our grief, we are so far to mourn, as we join prayers with our tears; so far, (which is the true measure of all our passions, by which we may discern when they are immoderate) as not to indulge fruitless tears and complaints, instead of real duties. When our passions hinder not the free use of reason and Religion, and take not up the place of other Services; when they cause us not to omit the Evening Sacrifice, as Aaron did upon grief for the death of his two Sons, Nadab and Abihu, Leu. 10. ult. which yet Moses is said to be content with, and God to permit, not that he indulgeth more the extremities of this passion, (which most banisheth the sense of Humanity or Piety) but in regard of some holy Reflection in this his grief, that included some sorrow for the scandal and breach of God's worship. This may be some cause why God would not permit his Priests that natural Affection, to mourn for any friends, but their nearest kin, Leu. 21.2. Lest it should make them less holy, God would have them less humane than others. He would have them esteem no relation so near to them, as that of God, and his Service; He suffers them not to grieve for the loss of any thing, while they may, in so near a distance, enjoy God; the reason is alleged verse 6. In them it is interpreted Profaneness, what in others were but a commendable affection, and sign of a good nature; seeing sorrow indulged, must needs bring with it some distraction in Religion. The Heaviness of heart for Christ's departure, caused the Disciples to sleep, when they should have watched and prayed. St. Gregory breaks off his Comment on Ezekiel, to write Epitaphs on his Son; as Aaron omits the evening sacrifice, or a great part of the Ceremony, at his Son's death.  
2 In regard of the object; we are to mourn for sins first, and then for afflictions, sicknesses, deaths, as the Effects and Consequents of sin. So that death, and other evils, are the improper and secondary objects of sorrow, Sin the only proper object of grief, and just cause of tears;  
Because, 1st, Sin is the only evil, John 17.15. being the cause of all other evils: and without which, miseries themselves are not miserable, but are turned to the innocent to Exercises of their graces, and occasions of redoubled Rewards and Glories.  
2. Sorrow in other evils; save in sins only, is useless, and brings no proper remedy, but adds more disquiet to our troubles. Our tears naturally fall upon our breasts, as it were to wash the stains of that part; and are not to be wasted over graves, that may save souls. Our tears ('twas the complaint of St. Chrys●stome) are most abused by us; we lavish and spend them where they are not available on outward evils, or over the dead. We seldom (saith he) weep in the right place.  
But, as sins first deserve our sorrow, so affliction and misery, the consequents of sin, more sensibly provoke our griefs, and are indeed the just, but secondary cause and objects of Sorrow. Whence Sicknesses and Deaths are to be considered & looked on as the wages (nothing surer than the Hirelings wages) the effects and consequents of Sin.  
For first, so Sin and Affliction in Scripture are both represented under the name of Death. Open my eyes, O Lord, that I sleep not in death; that is, in Sin that leads unto Death, Ps. 13.3. Pray unto the Lord to take away this death only, Exod. 10.17. that is, the plague of Vermin, that did not so much threaten to destroy, as to disquiet Pharoabs' life; In the Prophet, (Ezek. 7.) sword without, and death within, is threatened, when Famine, Plague, and other messengers of death are denounced, whereupon the wise man concludes safely, Prov. 8.38. He that loves sin, loves death.  
2. To look on Affliction otherwise, as not sent by providence, either to punish or to discipline us: as the Fiery Trial, either to refine and purge, to better us, or to consume us: as the Wind, either to fan or to scatter us utterly; is to look on them no otherwise than the Heathen, as Chances, and the casual events of the Fates. Thus to bear them as things of course, without any thoughts of Sin, is to say that affliction riseth out of the dust, or (what is a blasphemy God less endureth) That God willingly grieveth the children of men, (Jupiter non nocet, nisi ut prosit, Sen.)  
From this consideration, (that Death and all other evils, are the effects and consequents of Sin) will follow these father Inferences.  
1. Against security in health or youth, that as Death came into the world by Sin, so it came over all the world, in that all have sinned: that we may not wonder when we find Children conceived in Sin should have death bequeathed to them, before they are well entered into life. Whence they which are not marks large enough for any of Death's darts, for any wound, are yet wounded so often by it, and find their grave in the womb, that even the Child that is not grown to David's span, is yet old enough to die. No security in any place or state of life, while we carry about us, not a body only, but a soul tempered with contrary and corrupt humours, and a body of sin and death, as well as of flesh. We may conclude with the Apostle, Rom: 8.10. The body is dead through sin. What wonder if so many are cut off in the flower of their strength,  they well know how to live, and less how to die. 'Tis the sinner, not the sick or aged person, dies. Paradise alone had the tree of Life in it; when Adam was cast out of that, into this our Forth, he brought nothing but Death, and the Emblems of Mortality: See him no sooner fallen, than cast out of Paradise, a flaming sword, and a destroying Angel driving him from the Tree of Life: the skins of Beasts, that is, Mortality itself serving to cover him; and at last he condemned to dig continually the earth, and to prepare his own Grave; His posterity ever since feeding their Luxury, and sustaining their life with the death of birds and beasts (mortibus vescimur) doth not he seem to have planted in this our earth the tree of Death? whereon all the fruits perish, e'er they come to maturity, some in the bud, others in the growth. We pass through so many deaths to Eternal life: from the womb of the mother, of the world, of the earth, to heaven. In the midst of life we are in death, and like sentenced persons, under a reprieve, however we are permitted to live, yet to enjoy no certainty of life, as not knowing when we may be called forth to execution. While we walk upon earth, we always tread over our graves, and know not whether our next step may bring us into it. For our bed is made in the dark, and our graves lie ready open for us, but as pits covered with snow.  
2 Against impatience, or Immoderate sorrow. If sin brings forth death, we are to consider death as an evil, not so much inflicted by God, as drawn upon ourselves by our own deserts, & as it were our own choice; and therefore with more patience to be endured, Wisd. c. 1.13, 16. God made not death (adeo non est creatione, sed ordinatione aut ultione in poenam peccati, he framed it not, he meant it not for a creature, but ordained it for a punishment of his disobedient creature) for then should the great workman have destroyed his own works, which yet he allowed to be good; the Creator should have been the Abbaddon, 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, the Confounder of his own creature; but death was the creature of Man's Invention, and as his own brood, makes way for its birth, like the Viper; by eating through the entrails of the Parent.  
3. Against fear of death as well as sorrow, that as other Afflictions, so death in its self is not simply evil, and therefore not simply to be feared or mourned, but in reference to sin, the sting of death is sin. Sin alone makes death deadly, and miseries miserable. Death, like those creatures. which take their colours from the place to which they cleave (as the Polypus and Camaeleon) becomes good or evil, as the persons are to whom it happens: It is the voice from Heaven, could our dull earth be persuaded to hear it, that they are blessed who die in the Lord, What is it then we mourn for? either our friends loss? who is more blessed by dying in the Lord (Rev. 14.13.) who hath exchanged the company of helpless friends, for the society of Angels, the Valley of Tears for the Regions of Joy; and (in a word) Earth for Heaven: or do we mourn (which is the truth if we would put off out mourning Veil) our own loss of a friend? a loss of a content, of an Instrument of God's Providence, which still remains the same, and retains the same power and goodness, to supply as great contents as it hath taken away:  
Whence will follow the last consideration in this point of moderating our grief.  
4. Having ordered aright out sorrows, the better to moderate them, we are to learn from David how to dry up our Tears, How to comfort ourselves in the death of friends?  
1. From their happy Fate and condition, the hope of a better life, whereof we receive any signs or assurances at their death. This was David's main comfort here, I shall go to him, etc. the Child had got the Goal before him. David that wept so impatiently for Absalon, wept not at all for this his dear infant, begot indeed in sin, but dying in innocence (David parricidam Absolonem) mortuum flevit, non Innocentem, fletur sceleratus, non fletur Dilectus, Ambros de f. Res c. 4.) Now the hopes of salvation are the surest and infallible in baptised children. They are undoubtedly saved saith our Church. And the Scripture assures by infinite arguments of it, that to little children belongeth the Kingdom of Heaven. For by Baptism having put on Christ, having past the laver of Regeneration, having drowned the old man in Christ's blood and death, and raised the new man, washed and cleansed out of water, as it were to present Resurrection (seeing God saves by water the new world, as he destroyed the old, and that none could perish in the Ark) whereof Baptism is the Antitype, (so St. Peter) how can we doubt but that Christ receives them into his Arms in Heaven, as well as on Earth? and that they must needs be admitted into Paradise, who bring that innocence thither, which Adam lost? Next to Children, our Hopes are most comfortable of those, who have come nearest those little ones, and passed their days in a Childlike Innocence and simplicity; having no opinions, no affections of their own; but what their Heavenly Father directs. These we part with upon the easiest Terms,  
(Ut praemissos non amissos) as only gone before, 
Profectio est quam putas mortem. cur moderatè feras abiisse, quent mox subsequeris [Tert. de pat.] Brevis vitaeususnec illi multum videtur eripuisse, nec tibi distulisse. [Amb.] Res. c. 3.  not taken away from us, as one absent and retired to a warmer Clime and happier Region, not lost, not dead; And why dost thou so impatiently bear his departure, whom thou art ere long to follow? For he whom thou persecutest thus with sad thoughts, is but divided from thee by a short Isthmas (the breadth of the Grave) a narrow scantling and space of Time, some fews days or months, or at most some few years, which are either taken from him, or reserved to thee. Conceive then the blessed Spirits departed in the Lord, crying out from heaven to you, Weep not for us, but weep for yourselves, who yet live in the Regions of Death, in the Borders of Sin and misery. Why do ye parents forbidden the Children to come unto Christ? Can ye believe the Mother's embraces softer than the Arms of their Saviour? Are they not much happier in Abraham's Bosom, than in the Parents Lapp? If you have lost a Child on earth, you have brought forth a Saint now in Heaven. 
Ubertim fluentes lachrimas reprime, ne grandis pietas in nepotem apud incredulas mentes desperatio put etur in Deum. Desiderandus est ●ibi, quasi absens, non quasi mortuus, etc.— Illum expectare, non amisisse videaris. [Her. Ep. 24. ad Hebrid.]  Why do ye (o Friends) put on Blacks for them, who have put on their white Robes? Why shed ye tears for them, whose tears are wiped from their eyes? Why such Groans and Lamentations for them, whose mouths are filled with songs and praises, to him that sitteth on the Throne, & to the Lamb for ever and ever? This is not kindness, but Envy, or some misapprehension; or misbelief of their present condition. You grieve not thus for a Friend preferred to another Kingdom. Jacob turned his Tears into Joy, when he received his Son Joseph as from the dead; testored not to life only, but to a Throne, Gen. 45.27.  
2. A secondary Comfort from the state irrevocable, unalterable, remediless, whereby David rather chides and reproves (violently stifling and suppressing his grief, as vain and unprofitable) than lenifieth or healeth it. Wherefore should I now fast? Can I bring him again? Can the consuming of my flesh restore his? Can my prayer lend breath to the deceased? Can my howl, like the Lioness, revive the young One? And if I beat my breast, is there any Hopes, that, as the Pelican by piercing her breast, I may restore to life? How can tears, that cannot make the strewed flowers grow again, revive the interred Carcase? No hopes now; the Spirit is returned to God that gave it, and no wresting it out of his hands; The Plant dies in the ground, and yet through the scent of the water buds again; but Man dyeth and wasteth away, without hopes of springing again, till the earth be no more, Jeh 14, 8, 9, 10, etc. he's gone, he's gone past recall. No remedy. [We came not altogether, we must not go away together; what cannot be help d, must be endured. These are the Common Cordials of vulgar Comforters. But what if your grief in the same Impatience with Augustus, shall reply, as he did to his Daughter Julia, thus comforting him (Sir, Your Complaints cannot recall, cannot help, but trouble you, all is past remedy) that is it which grieves chief, That there is no remedy, no cure of the wound, no Recovery of the Loss.  
Add then to these uncertain Comforts of Reason, which are as easily confuted by a more peevish and sullen Reason, that is apt to dispute for its passions,  
3. A third comfort, from a Religious submission to God; For, as Reason commands us to yield to Necessity: So Religion bows us perfectly to stoop with willingness to this Necessity, as it proceeds from God's Providence and Mercy, ordering even out Losses to our good. Here is that forcible Masterer of our sorrow to a necessary submission to the power of the Almighty, which we foolishly provoke while we resist.  
2. A voluntary Resignation (shall I say to the Providence and merciful disposing) or even to the holy will of God, now manifestly declared by the event; for as his other will is revealed in his Word, to be the rule of our life and actions; so this Ordering; Governing, overruling Will, revelata factis, discovers Gods secret purposes, by the visible effects, and issues of things, to be the rule of our passions and sufferings. Do we daily profess to God, Thy will be done, and now it appears to be particularly Gods will (seeing nothing is brought to pass in Heaven or in Earth without the will of him that ruleth over all) why do we not give the Lord leave to do what he will in Heaven and Earth, whom we so often standing profess the Maker of Heaven and Earth? what Atheism now possesseth us, because Gods will crosseth ours, to stick at last to pronounce with good Eli (in as hard a case, as great a loss as any we can complain of, the utter ruin of his family and Excision from the Priesthood, the loss of two sons and the Ark of God at once) It is the Lord, let him do what seemeth good unto him.  
3. There is yet a greater reason of thy Resignation in this Case; in that God hath the propriety and right, the Sovereign Dominion of all, we only the short use. If God recall but his own Gift, what Injury, what so great cause of complaint? May not God as well take the Child away from the Mother, to whom it was committed only to breed up in the fear of God, as the Mother takes it home from the Nurse? 'Tis called to a better home, what Relation or Title soever thou canst plead in the dear loss, Whether thy Husband, thy Child thy Father, Brother, or thy friend (which is as thy own soul) God pleads a nearer claim, his Creature, his Image, his Member, the price of his redemption, etc. his by many Titles, his even before he was, and his when he shall not be.  
3 Duty or Inquiry, How we are from the present sense of another's death, to prepare for our own.  
1. Prepare by a tender and watchful apprehension of all those Memento's and Remembrances of Mortality, wherewith God and Nature daily alarm us, so that nothing is more frequently represented, howsoever nothing be less thought on than death, and we at last complain of a surprisal; Like to the Man in the old story, who had covenanted with death, that he should before his last stroke give some warning, with a Finger at least lift up; and yet after many funerals of his friends, and many parcel-funerals, and decays of his own body and senses, being to die, required some other Messengers and Forerunners of his end, and challenged Death for not knocking at the door before he entered, only because he would not hear the knocks.  
Amongst the many Remembrances of death, 
So the Captain of fifty seeing the other Captains consumed by str●, foll upon his face, with I pray thee let my life be precious in thy sight, 2 Kings 1 13.  the most sensible and sharp admonitions towards this preparation, are sounded to us by the Last groans of our expiring friends, as by the last Trump, that Grave which buries part of our Souls with their bodies, must needs call some of our thoughts that way. And how few are there amongst us that have lived half the age of man, that hath not outlived half his Family or Acquaintance. That continued Felicity of the Grecian Prince, to pass an whole age without the losss of one Friend, was a glory or boast not to be seconded by many. Now the first preparative for death, is the premeditation of it. Death, like the Basilisk, losing its sting and force, being first seen and viewed by us.  
2 Prepare, not only by a weariness and contempt of life, and of the world, wherein you no longer find your Friend, but by a more comfortable Thought of going to him, and overtaking him. Prepare to follow. If this could so sweeten Socrates last deadly draught, the Thought of passing to the society of Orpheus, Homer, and the ancient Sages, How much more should it make us gladly embrace death, that leads us to the society of Angels, and takes us not away, but restores us to our Friends, and to the Spirits of Just men, made perfect by the Vision of the most Holy One? Especially if we consider, that the Friends we go away to, are much more than those we part from. We are gathered to our Fathers.  
3 Prepare, by casting aside all that makes Death bitter or terrible unto us. Now we fear death (saith the Monk, on Climacus) for one of these two Causes; either because we love this present Life, or Distrust a better. So Reuben, Gad, and Manasse, did choose their seat on this side Jordan, because they saw the ground fit for pasture, Num. 32 5. Some there are unwilling to leave their Pastures, and , for all the beasts and houses Divines or Astrologers talk of in heaven. Some, with St Peter, confounded with the Glories, and bright Honours of the world, cry out in an Ecstasy, It is good to be here, let's here fix our Tabernacle; but the Text tells us, He knew not what he said, being dazzled with the glorious light, Luke 9.33. Others, that with the Apostles betray a fear of storms, and the danger of death, though Christ be in the storm with them, deserve Christ's check, O ye of little faith, what are you afraid of? So that our whole work of Preparation is reduced to these two points, 
Contempt of this world,  
Faith, hopes of a better.   
that we strive to leave the world, its noise, and vanities, before we depart out of it. Look on the earth, and all his Comforts, as passengers in swift streams, still fleeting and parting from us, or we from it; and as Sojourners or Pilgrims abstain from fleshly lusts, never fix our delight in a pleasant way, or Inn, which is suddenly to be quitted. And seeing no distance can hinder us, more than the banished Jews, from turning our faces towards the heavenly Jerusalem, let us (that we may be able with the Martyrs of old, to refuse Life, in hopes of a better Resurrection) lay hold on Eternal life, before this life fail us; lay hold by a lively faith on the hands of our Saviour, stretched out to receive us, and lay that sure foundation for the time to come, of Good Works, that best preparative to a good death, a good life.  
Let us not rest, till we have brought our Souls to that temper of the good Heathen, [Summan, nec metuas diem, nec optes,] neither to fear, nor desire, over-passionately the day of our change, or rather to this Resolution of St. Paul, Phil. 1.21, 22, 23, 24. If I live, I shall do well; if I die, I shall do better. To me to live is Christ, To die is Gain.  
And now that we may with David rise from our sorrow, and wash our faces with tears of Joy, in the thought of this Virgin, who is not lost, but gone before us to that place, whither we all strive to follow: Let us reflect on that principal Comfort, the hopes of that life, however lost on earth to us, yet recovered in heaven being hid with Christ. While your Eyes overflow with tears, being fixed on the Corpse, on the Mantle here dropped below, send your thoughts beyond your sight, after the better part, ascended above to the Heavens, as we have great cause to believe and hope, by the assurances of eternal life in this Virgin departed? And what greater assurance can there be? If (in the words of the Church) we are to know for a truth, 
Preface before the Catechism.  and it is certain by God's word, that Children being baptised have all things necessary for their salvation, and are undoubtedly saved. How much more this child? who was blessed with a Lois, and an Eunice, that gave her a Bible for the first thing to play withal, and taught her first to lisp the language of Canaan, before she could speak her Mother's Tongue, who even with her milk sucked in the sincerer milk of the word. As they writ of the blessed Virgin Mary, that at three years she entered the Temple, offered herself as a living Sacrisice at the Altar; warmed her hands and her heart at the holy flame, and made Religion her pastime before the vanities of the world, or the pleasures of sin could seduce her; so was this Virgin brought by her Parents to the Temple (as it were after her Saviour's steps) to ask of the Doctors the way of life, even before she could firmly walk in it. She learned Repentance ere she knew what it was to Sin; She first began the life of Grace, ere she attained the full life of Nature, and had her Senses exercised in the knowledge of Good and Evil, before she could distinguish the degree of bravery and Pride. She yielded herself to be regulated by Religion, before she could be abused by sense or reason. Her first care was not her Dress, or Looks, but her pensum quotidianum de flore Scripturarum (as St. Hierom directs, Laetal. l. 2. Ep.) her daily task out of the choicest Scripture, to sanctify her memory, as well as her Affections.  
Instead of wanton Songs she repeated the Psalms (which was an ability required to make a Divine in the Primitive times) but was it not strange in those tender years? she had not only strength and force to hold David's Harp, but to tune it: when others of her soft age would call for a Companion, she cried out, come Lord Jesus, come quickly! and I pray thee help thy servant, whom thou hast redeemed with thy most precious blood.  
What can we imagine, but that she (who breathed her first air in Devotion, and her last in Prayers, who was sealed to eternal life by Baptism, and kept in the assurance and blessed hope thereof by a pious education) had gained the Love of our Saviour, much sooner than the young man, who had observed all that God commanded even from his youth, though not so perfectly as he conceived. In sum, she was brought up One of the Order of St. Paul's Virgins, who from her Infancy only cared for the things of the Lord.  
And here, might it be safe to expostulate with the Almighty, I should ask, Why these Graces that are not to be received in vain by us, or rather Offered than Given? Why so fair characters, that others might take copies from, thus immediately blotted out, and dust thrown on them? Why doth God delight to crop such fragrant flowers in the bud, ere they are fully blown?  
Is it that the unwholesome Air, or rude Touch might not fully them? Indeed so we read some hastily snatched out of the world, as out of a Pest-house, Ne malitia corrumperet Intellectum, before Malice or Vanity should infect their minds. Some are taken away out of a special Love and Tenderness of God; because there is some good Thing in them towards the Lord God: as Jeroboams son, 1 Kings 14.13. Is it to show that we have here no abiding City? that this world is but our Tiring room, or stage, where some Mute persons are brought in only for Number or show, merely to pass over the Stage, and so serve to grace it, even in the Passage, not unlike Angelical apparitions.  
Or is it (as a devout pensive Writer observes) that God trains us, as we do our children, by giving them gay and precious things, but demanding them immediately again, to try our Submission, whether we could with Abram, yield up, sacrifice a child at Gods call, and give thanks with Job to God, even when he resumes his Gifts— (The Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh away; Blessed be the name of the Lord.  
Let not this yet discourage Parents from making their Children fit for Heaven and the society of Angels; But rather shame those careless and indulgent Parents. (Parents indeed, as the Apostle terms them, after rthe flesh, as who had no share in the Soul) who being forward to surrender to God in Baptism, by a most holy Vow, the Children they received from him, are not yet afraid (with Ananias and Saphira) to withdraw that they had once devoted to the Lord: and neglect the teaching them to keep their Vow, as religiously at least as formal Nuns would. Will they not allow that Diligence that senseless Creatures use in training and practising their young ones? seeing we bring them forth as deformed and misshapen in the sight of God, as any ugly Lumps of flesh the Bear is said to whelp; Shall we deny them the labour of our Tongues, to instruct them, and to lick them into shape? Having betrayed them to a life of Sin and Misery, Ought we not in conscience, in Equity, procure them that other life of grace and glory? Let the Duty or the Shame, the Terror or the Comfort, answerable to the Education of your Children, move you to express your Affection in this pious Care of providing a richer stock of manners, then of Fortunes, and hopes of a more lasting Inheritance. St. Hierom observes from Ezekiel 18.28. The Son shall not bear the iniquity of the Father, nor the Father the iniquity of the Son.— That this only frees and secures the Parents in these Children, that yet arrive not to the use of Reason, that live not on their own score, that have no proper Motion of their own, but (as the Parent's limbs) what the Parents derive to them: in these the Parents negligence, or sinful Indulgence makes them (who are said to live again in their Children) to perish rather in their sinful courses, and to invert the threat of the Commandment, that the sins of the 3 and 4 Generation shall be visited and avenged on the Parents, who have propagated those sins, by their lose neglect or example: On the other side the joy of those shall be redoubled and multiplied with their seed, who being not more ambitious to enlarge their Family than the Household of the Faithful, or to propagate their own name more than Gods, may with boldness present themselves with their righteous seed, at the Throne of God; Behold us, and the Children that thou hast given us. These are they that may with more comfort lose their Children at Gods Call, than others enjoy them amidst other frail possessions, and uncertain contents of this life, seeing children so lost, are not to be accounted lost; Whence (the Father observes) Job having by his patience merited a double Restitution of all his other losses, had not his Children redoubled, for they are not taken away, they are only secured in the hands of God, and sent as pledges before us, to be more happily recovered and enjoyed for ever, when some shall be gathered to their Fathers, and others more gloriously gathered to their Children, whom they are to follow, first in their Innocence, then in their Inheritance and Happiness; That Kingdom of Heaven which none shall enter that are not like unto those little Children. To both which God fit us, and then hasten his Kingdom! Even so, sweet Jesus, come quickly. Amen.  
FINIS.