A SERMON PREACHED AT the funeral of the Lady MARY VILLIERS, eldest Daughter of the right honble Christopher Earl of Anglesey;  
Who died the xxi. of january 1625. at Horningold in Leicester shire, and was buried the xxiv. at Goadeby in the Sepulchers of her Ancestors.  
Preached by GEORGE JAY, Master of Arts, and Student of Christ-Church in OXFORD.  Psal. 39.6. 
Behold thou hast made my days as it were a span long.  Imperat cum Superior rogat. 
LONDON, Printed for Thomas Harper. 1626.   

TO THE RIGHT Honourable, Christopher, Earl of Anglesey, and his most virtuous Lady, Grace and Peace.  
My Lord, my Lady;  
HOnour shall it ever be to me, to obey your commands; at my Lords I preached, at my Ladies I printed: but the disadvantage of so short an allowance of time as two days, & mine inabilities beside, will show this not to be a Sermon fit for, though it hath past, the Press. This will be spoken when 'tis read; but he riseth betimes, that thinks worse of it than I do. I made a covenant with mine eyes, that they should neither go out in sleep nor slumber, until they had lighted me to perform my Lord's pleasure; which if I have done I have a protection▪ and no man shall dare to arrest me, because I was employed in his service. I know in these times of war, I shall meet with some tall men of their hands, that will put every syllable to the sword: but 'tis an honour to me to die in my Commander's service. Some mouths are Musket-bore, and do so scatter, that though I pass the Pikes, yet I cannot scape them: yet I shall think myself out of Gunne-shot, when your Lordship hath given me a dispensation for not giving a due honour to the most promising, Lady (if I flatter, I flatter myself) that ever mine eyes beheld. The levitical law gives a large restitution for a damage; God, out of his mercy, when he thinks fit, a greater for what he takes. I will therefore make bold with my Reader, and change my Epistle into a Prayer. May the God of fruitfulness give your Honours a numerous, and an obedient issue, in supplement of her that's gone now to him, that you and yours after a length of happiness here may succeed, exceed her in glory, shall ever be the prayer of him who is, and professeth still to continue,  
your Honours in all humble duty and observance at command, GEORCE JAY.   

A FUNERAL SERMON.  
I could wish that some better, some other occasion rather than this, had brought me hither; Et Si mea cum vestris valuissent vota. 
Ouid. Met.  And if I (I will believe the same of every one here) had been master of mine own desires, some other example should have told me that I must dye, and this body of mine must return to dust. But 'tis mine, and I hope your daily prayer, Thy will be done, O Lord. My prayer was otherwise, the same our Saviour used when the sorrows of death encompassed his soul, O my Father, 
Mat. 26.39.  if it be possible let this Cup pass from me. And as David did, in 2. Sam. 12.16. I besought God that the Child might live. His words shall be the subject of my discourse: may his resolution and cheerfulness, in this or the like case, be ever yours, and mine example and precedent. The words you shall find, in 2. Sam. chap. 12. vers. 22, 23.  
While the child was yet alive, I fasted, and wept: For I said, who can tell whether God will have mercy on me that the child may live?  
But now being dead, wherefore should I now fast? Can I bring him again any more? I may go to him, but he shall not return to me.  
HEre is David and his Child; the one lying sick upon his bed, the other lying weeping upon the ground. God smites the child with sickness for the Father's fault; David punisheth himself with fasting and weeping for the misery of the child, Who can tell whether God will have mercy on me, that the child may live? The prayers of the Faithful are never without fruit, though sometimes they bring it not forth in the same kind that we desire. God knows what is better for us than we ourselves. The child was not for David's keeping, and therefore the Lord will have him to himself; Death is sent, and fetches him away: what says David to this now? Sure he that was so passionate when the child was but sick, will now grow outrageous when he hears of his death. This is indeed the temper of worldly minds; but David's heart was cast in another mould: He that shown so much devotion and humility whilst the matter was in suspense, and before he knew what God meant to do; now he knows his pleasure, can as easily submit his obedience to Gods will with comfort. But now that God will so have it, and that he is dead, Why should I fast any longer? I will not fight against God's pleasure, and vex myself to no purpose: He cannot return to me. I will rather make use of it for mine own instruction, and take it up for a meditatiof mine own mortality: I must go to him.  
Thus the words may run in Paraphrase. And if you will have them in parts, you shall have these four. First, the sickness of David's child; in these words, 
Propter infantem jejun. Vatab.  While the child yet lived: that is, whilst the child was weak, sick and infirm.  
Secondly, the remedy he fled to for his recovery, fasting and weeping: Whilst the child yet lived, I fasted and wept.  
Thirdly, his resolution after the child was dead: But now being dead, wherefore should I now fast? can I bring him again?  
Fourthly, a meditation on his own mortality, He cannot come to me, but I shall go to him.  
First of the sickness of David's child. 'Tis a certain truth which Seneca doth urge out of the Poet, 
De brevit. vitae.  Exigua pars est vitae, quam nos vivimus. It is a very small part of our life, which we live free from sickness. And, as the same Seneca says, Omne spatium, non vita, sed tempus, All the space of our days is not life, but time: so with a little alteration may I say, with as much truth, Omne spatium non vita, sed tristitia, All our time is not life, but sorrow. What Tully said of old age, may be as well spoken of the whole life of man: 
Senectus est ipsa morbus. Cic●de senect.  Vitaipsa morbus est, Life itself, without the addition of any other pain, is a disease. That which the Prophet Esay says of our Saviour, the Head, that he was Vir dolorum, a man of sorrow; we may derive in a qualified sense upon all his Members, they are Viri tristitiae, men of sorrows, compastabout with infirmities. 
Esai. 1.6  The whole head is sick, the whole heart is faint, from the sole of the foot even to the crown of the head, there is no soundness, but wounds, and bruises, and putrified sores. Our wounds have not been cured with the infusion of oil, like the man's that lay betwixt jericho & jerusalem; they have not been closed nor bound up, nor mollified with ointment, 
Ibid.  as the same Prophet speaks in a spiritual sense, and we find it true in a literal. I know that in myself, saith Saint Paul, there dwelleth no goodness; we may alter the words, and say, we know that in our flesh dwells no soundness nor health: it may sojourn or lodge there for a time, but for any settled habitation or constant abiding, it hath none: be we at what cost we will for the entertaining of it, let us bribe our Physicians to the wasting of our estates, they cannot preserve our bodies from ache and rottenness. Sicknesses, and death, were the curses that God laid upon our first Parent's disobedience. 
Gen. 3.16.  To the Woman first, I will increase thy sorrows & thy conceptions: in sorrow shalt thou bring forth children. And then to Adam, In sorrow shalt thou eat all days of thy life; in the sweat of thy face shaltthou eat thy bread, till thou return to the earth. Sin set the four elements in our bodies, and the harmony of our temper at odds; their continual combat creates daily diseases, so as we are still sick. And besides the malignity that sin infused into the body itself, there are vitiating and infesting qualities, diffused by the same sin over all the creatures that should nourish it: there is a root of intemperance in our appetite, that sucks unwholesomenesse out of these nourishments; that are in themselves good and conservative. Such a body provoked by such an appetite, to feed on such nourishment, must needs make the Physician necessary, and bring forth a large harvest of diseases. Nature is corrupted, and therefore tends to corruption; the end of corruption is death, the way to death is sickness. So long then as we have such a nature about us, we cannot think it strange, if sickness do often seize on us. A corrupt fountain cannot send forth sweet water, nor a corrupt nature maintain a healthy constitution. The seeds of sickness are sown in our nature by our Parents, when they beget us, & they lie lurking in our veins & bones, waiting every occasion to invade our health, and to cut off the thread of our life; though sometimes we perceive them not, yet in our flesh they are, and will never remove their siege until they have given us an overthrow. Colubros in sinu fovemus, We carry scorpions in our bosoms. And as it was said of Israel, perditio tua ex te, thy destruction is from thyself; so are we authors of ours. The body of man is nothing but a congeries, a heap of infirmities, as Martial said of Zoilus, Non vitiosus homo es, Zoile, sed vitium. Thou art not vicious, but vice itself. So I say to the body of man, thou art not diseased, but a disease itself: goodness, mercy, justice, do not only belong to the nature of God, but are the very Being and Essence of him: he is not only good, but goodness; not perfect, but perfection: so on the contrary, it is not much improper to say, that we are not only miserable, but misery; not sick, but sickness itself. Homo est animal aevi brevissimi, 
Petrarch. job. 14.2.  sollicitudinis infinitae. Man that is borne of a woman, is of short continuance, and full of trouble: when we are in our best health, we are Valetudinarij, weak and sickly; and (as the Physicians say) have only lucida inter valla, perhaps one good day betwixt two aguish, a calm betwixt two storms. Quid est homo? 'tis Seneca's interrogation, (and he answers himself) a weak & frail thing, liable and exposed to all danger, impatient of heat, cold, and labour; they are all diseases unto him. 
Seneca.  Imò otio iturus in tabem, & alimenta metuit sua quibus rumpitur. Ease consumes him, and the bread which he eats to give him length of days, doth shorten them.  
Our breath is corrupted, 
job 17.1. job 14.22.  our days are cutting off, and the grave is ready for us: while our flesh is upon us we shall be sorrowful, & while our souls are in us we shall mourn. 
Seneca.  Si velis credere altius veritatem intuentibus, omnis vita supplicium, If you will believe the Masters of truth, all our life is punishment. He that by an experimental trial, a serious observation, and a true contemplation, hath run through all sublunary and inferior things, though of the most transcendent perfection, speaks less than a truth, if he says he found not sickness, or (to use Salomons word) vexation in them all. When we come into the world, we are thrown into a tempestuous Sea of trouble, and there are beaten with incessant storms. Now the flood of discontent beats high, & whirls our troubled heads into amazement, and now the ebb of despair sinks our barque even to the lowest hell: now are we in danger of this rock, now of that; now this gulf, this shelf, this gust, these quicksands do make us fear, if not suffer shipwreck: so let us sail where we will, when we can, we shall find no haven of rest but the grave. 
Epict.  Homo est calamitatis fabula, infaelicitatis tabula, Man's life is a story of calamity, a map of misery: 
job. 10.17. job 10.1.  changes, and armies of sorrows are against us, and our souls are cut off though we live. All our life is but a continued disease: when we begin to live, we enter upon a lease of sorrows, entailed on us and our heirs. Ingressus flebilis, progressus debilis, egressus horribilis. Our birth is mournful, our growth is sorrowful, our death is fearful. 
Ecclus. 40.1.  Great travail is created for all men, and an heavy yoke upon the sons of Adam, from the day that they go out of their mother's womb, till the day that they return unto the mother of all things. Such is the weight of grief that doth depress our hearts, that we may truly say with job, If our grief were well weighed, 
job 6.2.3.  and were well laid together in the balance, it would now be heavier than the sand of the Sea: sickness and troubles come upon us like jobs unfortunate messengers, one upon the neck of another. Finis unius mali, gradus est futuri. Where one misery ends another gins, as one wave follows another: there is the same undivided continuation in sorrows that is in waters, no intermixtion nor interposition of any thing else. We have Bears, and Lions, and Philistims, & saul's, as David had, that successively assail us; and we have no sooner ended the combat with this sickness, but another with fresh supplies attempts our overthrow. 
Vita quid est hominis nisi vallis plen●● malorum.  We dwell in Megiddon, the valley of tears: sighs and lamentations are our companions: and, which is most miserable, our times appointed for rest, our sleeps are full of disturbances. 
job 7.13.14.  When we say our couch shall relieve us, and our bed shall bring comfort, in our meditations we are frighted with dreams, and astonished with visions. A little or nothing says the son of Sir ache is man's rest, & afterward, 
Ecclus. 40.6.  in sleeping he is as a watchtower in the day, he's troubled with visions of his heart, as one that runneth out of a battle. And lest you should think, that he doth only here describe the unquietness of the Reprobate, he tells you immediately, that such things shall come unto all flesh, 
Vers. 8.  but sevenfold to the ungodly; which we have no way to prevent or extenuate, but by fasting and weeping. And so I come to the remedy which David used for his child's recovery, abstinence and tears; While the child yet lived, I fasted and wept.  
The people Israel, 
Pars secunda.  when they made intercession for the obtaining of any great blessing, or the avoiding of any great danger, did always use this remedy of fasting and mourning And the Prophets did ever enjoin the Church, amongst others, especially to perform these two duties, when God threatened his judgements against her: Turn to the Lord with all your hearts, 
joel 2.12.  and with fasting, and with weeping, and with mourning, says the Prophet. Let the people and the Ministers of the Lord, weep betwixt the Porch and the Altar; and let them say, 
Vers. 17.  Spare thy people, O Lord, and give not thine inheritance to reproach. Sanctify a fast, call a solemn assembly, 
joel. 1.14.  gather the Elders, and all the inhabitants of the land into the house of the Lord, and let them cry unto the Lord. I dare alter our Saviour's words, though not his truth, Man lives by bread; yet with Solomon, I will pray against plenty: Feed me O Lord with food convenient for me, lest I be full, and deny thee. The empty soul sends to Heaven the most powerful ejaculations, the full is dull and sluggish, and cannot get up with the same nimbleness. yet I will not fast too long: for too much abstinence effeebles the body, & by consequence enervates the appetite to devotion: famine can kill as well as a surfeit. Were I to receive the Sacrament, and found that abstinence would disprepare my meditations, and unfit me for that purpose, I would eat, the better to enable me for God's service, but not too much: for that were to fall into the other extreme, excess, more dangerous, more pernicious: I will so eat, that I may be able to serve my God; and so fast, that I may do it willingly. It was a mere Epicurean saying, Let us eat and drink: such a temptation may verify the consequence in us, to morrow we may die. neither did it savour of discretion: for the last meat to him that knows he must immediately dye, can never be well relished. 
Non siculae dapes 
Horace.   
Dulcem elaborabunt saporem.  The most delicious fare, though helped with the best art of cookery, will be distasteful: had not God's blessing given a relish to jacobs' preparations, Isaac had not taken such delight in eating his Venison. Abstinence sets dying men more forward in their way to heaven; eating and drinking stops them in their journey, and makes them fit for rest, than a progress. If mine own knowledge did not, yet the Churches in junction should commend fasting unto me, as a manifest effect of it, doth at this instant. I presume it gave wings to our prayers, in the late contagious & pestilent times, and prepared a place for their welcome in the court of heaven. Fasting is a good preparation to devotion, and ever strongly insinuates, & furthers a grant; I place no merit in it, but 'tis an excellent preparative to devotion. And I shall ever believe▪ those good men, that fast most. The best of men that ever were, upon exmination of the Scriptures, you will find to be the greatest fasters; Moses that talked with God, Elias that in a fiery chariot went to God, Christ himself that was God. I dare say, that the perverse humour of dainty feeding, is as odious to God, as contrary to the laws of the Church: neither do I see how men can more strongly make their belly their god, than by yielding more obedience to their carnal appetite, than their spiritual Commander. Presumptionis genus est tum manducare, 
Cal. in Num.  cùm debemus jejunare, tum gaudere, cùm oportet flere. I equally detest the ambition of the Papist, and the perverseness of the Puritan, and therefore desire to bar the one from all thought of merit, and the other from the opinion of licentiousness. Vitanda superstitio, servanda abstinentia. 
Hierom.  Let us fast, and 'tis commendable, if not superstitiously. Holophernes intending the overthrow of his besieged enemies, diverts the course of their springs, and cuts off the convoy of their provision. if we will conquer our cross passions and affections that fight against us, we must weaken their strength by fasting and abstinence. The institution of fasting, is almost of the same antiquity that the world is: for, nequaquam comederis, 
Chrys. serm. de jejunio.  God's prohibition to Adam, that he should not eat of the tree of knowledge, was a kind of command of abstinence: the breaking of it brought all misery into the world, the remedy is the practice of that which he in Paradise violated. Physic doth cure by contraries, there is no better receipt for a surfeit, than fasting. Our first Parent's gluttony hath diseased our souls, and bodies, and we cannot find a better means of recovery than abstinence: their riot drove us out of Paradise, our abstinence will possess us of a better place. Quem luxuriando provocavimus, abstinendo placemus. Let us humble those bodies with fasting, which excess and intemperance hath made rebels to their Creator. When a man hath committed a sin, he hath incurred the wrath of God, and rendered himself liable to eternal damnation, there is no way to take away this wrath and punishment, but by repentance; and what is repentance, but a disavowing of the sin we have committed, and being sorry that we have committed it, and a wishing it uncommitted? Quem paenitet peccasse, 
Seneca.  penè est innocens, Hearty penitence doth extenuate, if not annihilate the greatest fault. And though sorrow, and tears, and affliction of the soul, which should be used in fasting, are not things in themselves pleasing unto God, yet because they are arguments that we hate our sin, & sincerely wish it undone, and take a kind of holy revenge upon ourselves for committing it, they are acceptable in his sight, and if attended with servant prayers, motives to accelerate and procure an absolution for it. The end of fasting, is either to obtain some good that we want, or to escape some evil which we either feel, or fear. Good is either ordinary, or extraordinary: ordinary good is obtained by ordinary devotions; these can not be joined with fasting, because they are to be daily. For extraordinary blessings we must use extraordinary devotions, and, like jacob, wrestle with God. Now evil is either of sin, or punishment: we fast to escape the evil of sin, either by way of prevention (as Saint Paul, when he said, I chastise my body) to keep us from falling into it; or by way of remorse, and penitence, to move the Lord to help us out of it. For the escaping the evil of punishment, if already inflicted, we fast to move God to stay the procession of his vengeance: and this was David's case here; he fasted that the Lord might spare the life of his sick child. neither was it hypocritically, for my Text says that he wept also; and tears are powerful invitations to draw God to mercy. They are the soul's best orators, and enter the gates of heaven, when our prayers are excluded. jejunando Deum oramus, flendo exoramus, By fasting we move our request, by tears we obtain it, or if you will have it in the words of a Father, 
Bernard.  Orando Deum lenimus, lachrymis cogimus, prayers are petitioners, tears are ravishers, and force a pardon from God. There is no voice louder in God's ears, than the sighs and groans of a weeping Penitent. Let our tears precede, and God's mercy will follow. Quò quisque est sanctior, 
Aug.  eò in fletu uberior. Plenty of tears do witness a full devotion, and the more holy we are, the more we should express it in our lamentations. Prayers often times receive a denial, but tears are bold petitioners, and will take none: Ezekiah and Mary Magdelen had freer access to their God by their tears, than prayers: when Peter's tongue had pronounced him a traitor, his tears reconciled him to his Saviour. They that sow in tears shall reap in joy: a sleight scattering and sprinkling of tears, will in the time of gathering yield us a fruitful harvest of consolations. Away with the blood of Rams & of Goats; if ye will bring an acceptable sacrifice, offer up the tears and sighs of a contrite heart. No Epicure finds that pleasure in feasting, which repentant David enjoyed in his banquet of tears: and therefore he was desirous to make tears his meat, and his drink; for they are the best nourishment of the soul unto eternal life. 
Fulg. Ep.  Quae ex compunctione cordis lachrymae manant, nob is donum laetitiae triumphantis acquirunt. Our Saviour Christ in the sixth of Luke, sets forth their happiness that weep, Beati qui fletis, quia ridebitis, Blessed are you that weep: for you shall laugh. When the tongue is ignorant what to say, tears do argue and plead our cause strongly, 
Hi●●.  Loquuntur lachrymae silente linguâ. They quench the flames of hell, and make dull and rusty the edge of God's avenging sword; they are the aqua fortis, which eats out the hand writing, which sin hath made against our souls, and give an ease unto us, when we are weighed down with the burden of transgressions. Expletur lachrymis, egeriturque dolour. These, like powerful Ambassadors, 
Ovid.  never return with an ungranted suit. 
Psal. 6.  Therefore the Psalmist every night watered his couch with tears. And jeremy wished his head a fountain, 
jer. 9.8.  and his eyes as overflowing channels. They that now sit weeping by the rivers of Babylon, shall one day have their eyes dried by the Lamb that sits upon the Throne. But if our tears be only super ficiall, Et habent arts, 
Ovid.  quaque jubentur eunt. and proceed not from a hart that trumournes, they are so fare from advantaging our souls, that they add to our condemnation: we must not only weep, but mourn; cloth our hearts with sadness and affliction: They are the wedding garments which shall welcome us on the feast day, when the presumptuous guest shall be bound hand and foot, and cast into utter darkness. 'Tis not the moisture that distils from the eyes, but the drops that fall from the heart, that make the grace of God fruitful in us. I would my head were a spring of tears, that I might powerfully teach by example, what I labour to persuade by my words. O may the Father of goodness and mercy, give us all tears for our sins, and grant that we may fast, and sincerely weep for the prevention of his judgements: but if it shall be thy pleasure (Lord) for our sins, to let them fall upon us, yet give us courage and patience, meekly to suffer what thou shalt inflict. And so I come to David's resolution after his child's death: But now being dead, wherefore should I now fast?  
Preventing grief is warrantable, 
Pars tertia.  nay necessary, but after a deed past help, effeminate, or (which is worse) rebellious. Let tears precede, if punishment be feared; thankfulness follow, when 'tis past. 'Tis good for me (says David) that I have suffered affliction: 
Psal. 90.  We are not to repine, when God shall please to lay his crosses on us, but to welcome them as badges and tokens of his favour; and when they most torment us, to say with job, Though thou kill me, yet will I put my trust in thee. 
job 13.15.  The sacrifice of tears which we shall offer to this innocent Hearse, is to be lessened, if it exceed the measure of affection and nature; the overplus is redundancy and superfluous, and must be cut off, or we are not wise: excess of grief for evils remediless, hath more affinity with stubborness, than use or profit; it may shorten ours, not recover her life, that is here the sad spectacle of mortality. Facilius nos dolor illiadjiciet, quàm illam nobis. Unquietness and disturbance do ingeminate, and double the weight of grief, not lessen it. Shall we punish ourselves, because God hath punished us, I may rather say blest us? for this blessed child is not lost but preferred, her soul hath exchanged a house of clay for a kingdom of glory, and having broken prison, hath left an unquiet habitation, to enjoy a perpetuity of rest; she is gone thither, where the Sun shall not burn her by day, nor the Moon by night, nor lying slanderer shall blemish her unspotted cleanness, nor base calumny make the truth of her worth questionable. She needs not fear such enemies, who with damnable plots & falsities invade the fortunes, (if they can) the lives of innocents; her happiness hath removed her from their reach. No cunning Courtier can make crimes, and beg her forfeited patrimony, foreign preparations, and the danger of invasion comes not near her thoughts; nor earthly villainy, nor vexation, can disquiet her happiness, she prays for ours▪ she is now there blessedly arrived, whence nothing can force her, nothing can fear her. Why then do the honourable parents of this happy soul mourn so excessively? Can they think to call her back again? If they could, I presume they would not, from this state of bliss. If she were dead, and imprisoned in the cold earth, it might something trouble them; but now they know she lives, & triumphs in heaven, shall they not rejoice? 
Immaturè moritur senex, maturè puer. Fulg▪ Epist.  If we love our children, we desire their happiness; and can they have greater than to be in heaven? and shall we grieve because they have it sooner? Bis that, qui citò dat, a quick and hasty giver augments the value of his benefit, whereas tardy blessings are lessened by their stay. Is it not written, 
job. 1.21. ●  that the Lord giveth and the Lord taketh? and shall I grieve because he calleth for his own? for, to speak properly, she was lent to us, not bestowed upon us. Unwillingness to pay a debt, lent without interest, argues an unthankful disposition. God might have sent his messenger Death to receive tribute from us, let us be thankful that he did not, and not grieve that he demanded it there, where it might be more easily paid. The thought of this may something moderate our impatience, what we had in her was delicate, and sweet; what we lost, frail and mortal: judge how unreasonable it is extremely to be moved that we enjoied her not long, and not to rejoice that once we had her: we should rather be thankful for the donation of her, than be sorrowful for her loss; for the one argues our love to God, the other to ourselves. Let us weigh onewith the other, and we disfavour ourselves, if the state of our joys doth not equally poise that of our grief. God, that meant not to lend us her longer, gave her suddenly that perfection, which others before a long time do not own; she had that sweetness in the bud, in the April of her age, which blossomed, and well-grown flowers do seldom afford.  
Such and so frequent are the precedents of mortality, that we could not think she should live ever. If the care of our safety had not this last Summer hurried us from the city of affliction, we might have seen near five thousand such, a week. Tota vita, 
Seneca.  says the Philosopher, nihil aliud est quam ad mortem iter: 'tis then a kind of impudence, and unjustnes of claim, to challenge that unto ourselves which is denied to all. and in this universal necessity of death to desire a dispensation for us, and ours; as if, when we knew a universal flood of destruction should over-streame the whole world, we should hope our houses might be exempted. Let the thought of this be our comfort, she hath but pledged that cup, which all our ancestors began unto her, and at last we that are here present must taste of the same. 
Chrys. in Mat. hom. 35.  Etsi senex aliquis, etsi adolescens sit, morti tamen in qualibet aetate vicinus. All must die, God set this period to her days, else she had lived; and why should we be against the ordinance of the most highest? 
Ecclus. 41.4.  Since she is irrevocably gone, why should you so violently desire her? But such is the nature of us, that we love nothing so much as that which is removed from us, never to be had again; nay, we less esteem those that survive, through the inordinate desire of them that are dead. It would mitigate, if we would but consider God's mercy in his punishments, his Manna in the desert of our affliction. 
Bern. de trans. Mal.  Pium est defunctum plangere, magis pium congaudere viventi. Have you not many surviving comforts for one single loss, friends of as great eminency and place, as much graced and favoured by their King, loved by their country, as ever subjects were? Have you not a large series, and catalogue of the Nobility your kindred? and two daughters yet alive? Pereat contristatio, ubi est tanta consolatio: 
Aug. de verb. Dom. serm. 35.  forget your sadness in the midst of such joys.  
But will yet yet grieve? cannot these consolations dry up the fountain of your tears? suppose her to be only absent, that will help: for we do not grieve for those which are absent, and must continue, if we know they live; with that opinion you may cozen your grief, and be fafe. But, make the worst of it, she is but sent before, you must follow. 
Aug de verb. Dom. serm. 34.  Scias eam non in aeternum relinquere te mansurum, sedpraecedere secuturum.  
But you will say, she was my only joy, my only delight. This argues you loved yourself, not your child. If for her sake you wish her life, then wish her there, where her life shall be longest and happiest. If God should take our children in the midst of their sins, than it might justly move us; tears would then become our cheeks, whereas now they are inexcusable. The tearing of our hair, the rending of our garments, the beating of our hearts, the lamentations & outcries of our voices cannot awake her: sleep she will, till the Trump at the last day, 
Aug de verb Dom. serm. 44.  or Christ call her Mortua est, quantumlibet pulses, quantunlibet vellices, quantumlibet lanies, non expergiscetur; Christo dormit, cum dicet surge, surget. Impatience is a crime, when God's hand occasions the accident. Undutiful murmuring may incense him, and for our sins perhaps he will take away the rest of our children, who for his own pleasure, and their good removed the first. When God is angry, and smites thee on the right cheek, with patience submit thyself to his pleasure, and turn to him the other also. If servants (by S. Paul's injunction) may not expostulate with their Masters, shall the clay ask the Potter why he did thus? Take heed of lamentations, and waywardness, lest, as mothers do their children, God whip you so much the more for it. jesus the son of Syrach pronounceth a woe against them, that have lost their patience, and by way of interrogation tells them in what a miserable plight they are: 
Ecclus. 2.15.  What will ye do when the Lord shall visit you? And jesus the son of God pronounceth, I may say gives a blessing to the patiented, an inheritance of joy and comfort: 
Luk. 21.19.  By your patience possess your souls. Will you have an example to move you? He was led as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before the sheerer is he dumb, so opened he not his mouth. Nay, I'll come home to you, and instance in the same kinds. When Anaxagoras heard of the death of his own son, without fainting, or vain exclamations against the Destinies for their cruelty, he said, Scio me mortalem genuisse, I know the issue of my body could not be immortal. Livia lost her son Drusus, a yongue Prince of admirable worth; no mother could exceed her lamentations for the death of a child, 
Nec plus doluit quam ave honestum erat, aut Caesare, aut aequo maius. Sen. ad Mar.  yet in the same grave with him she entombed her sorrows, neither afterward was she more troubled, than became a Caesarean and discretion: and without tears afterwards she could repeat his virtues, his excellencies, and those did best please her that did most remember him. As no man went beyond Sylla in cruelty, so not in the love of a son; yet the sad story of his fatal end was almost as soon forgotten, as related. But what need I go for a precedent beyond my Text. Now the child is dead, why should I fast? says as tender, as loving a father, as the Scripture can show us. But some there are more stoically obstinate, than wisely courageous, 
Aug. de verb. Dom. serm. 35.  which bar a discreet man from the least impression of grief Potest non dolere cor humanum defuncto charissimo, melius tamen dolet, & sanatur cor humanum, quùm non dolendo sit inhumanum. I will easily believe, that such men were never owners of a jewel of this prize, or if they were, so they are still; otherwise the loss would have humbled their haughty confidence, and have forced a confession of what they deny. Reason hath done her part, if she hath cut off and defalcated the luxuriancy, and overplus of grief; in great detriments 'tis stupidity and dulness, not to lament at all; as the excess is madness, the mean is safest, and will gain you the opinion of a discreet, and well-tempered mourner. Permittantur itaque pia corda charorum de mortibus suorum contristari dolore sanabili et consolabiles lachrymas fundant conditione mortali, 
Aug. de verb. Dom. serm. 34.  quas citòreprimat fidei gaudium, quâ credunt fideles quando moriuntur paululùm à nobis abire, & ad meliora transire. I will allow that the floodgates of your eyes may be open, but not too wide, nor too long; and I will give you leave to sigh from the bottom of your hearts, but not too often, nor too much. No man shall persuade me but they are Gods children which silently suffer, and with patience endure his correction, humbly, and contentedly submitting themselves to the wisdom of his proceed. Especially in this case, when that, which we take to be a punishment, is a blessing; for they that die in the Lord (as Saint Bernard says) ab omni peccato, & labour, & periculo liberantur, are freed from all sin, 
Bern. de trans. Mal.  labour, and danger of either; but these, that survive, are not, and at last must dye. And so I come to David's meditation on his own mortality, I shall go to him.  
Turn over the whole book of nature, 
Pars quarta.  and you shall read mortality in every page, every character is written in dust, and the hand of Time wipes it out, & sooner in this later & decrepit age of the world, than heretofore. We cannot now say with jacob, The days of the years of our Pilgrimage are 130 years; 
Gen. 47.9.  but we may conclude with him, Few and evil are the years of our life; we have not attained unto the days of the years of the life of our Fathers in the days of their Pilgrimage. When first we begin to live, we begin to dye. 
●or.  Nascentes morimur, or (to use Saint Ambrose his words, which excellently express our condition) Vitae hujus principium, mortis exordium, 
Amb. l. 8. de voc. Gent.  nec augeri●●●jus, quam minui incipimus. If death make a thrust at us, we have no defence; if she assault us, we cannot find a place of security to protect us. Ille licet ferro ca●tus se condat, & are: Mors tamen inclusum protrahet inde caput. Whither can we go from the presence of death? take we the wings of the morning, and fly whither we will, wheresoever we settle ourselves under heaven, she will be sure to find us out. And as she is unavoideable, so is she unpartial: 'tis not greatness, nor height of place that can privilege any man from her attempts. The Scripture calls Kings gods of the earth, but, lest they should flatter themselves with the hope of immortality, it immediately follows, They shall dye like men. Can any get a Patent for eternity, these are they; but a late example fresh still in our memories, tells us they have it not. Where are the great Commanders of the world? where are the Rulers over thousands, and 10000, the Princes & Potentates of the earth? are they not dead? Go search the grave, and you shall be no more able to distinguish betwixt their dust, and the meanest beggars, than Diogenes was to find Philip the King of Macedons bones. Intervallis distinguimur, exituaequamur. Life makes a difference betwixt us, death none, neither in the means of dissolution, nor the ruins after; she can make a weapon of the least of the unlikeliest of things to destroy them, a needle, a fish-bone, a raysin-stone is sufficient; nay, two great Princes, one of India, the other of Rome, were slain by a hair. A great Duke of Brittanny was pressed to death in a throng. Aemilus Lepidus, and Aufidius, great Romans, died with a stumble, the one at his own threshell, the other at the senate house. Etian cibus & potus, & sine quibus vivere non possumus, mortifera sunt, 
Mors aequo pede, etc. Hor.  & no less to them than us. She doth as well besiege the palace of the King, as the cottage of the Beggar: as they have the same sun, the same climate, the same seasons with us, so have they the same infirmities, the same ages, and not unequal deaths: If there be odds, the advantage many times lies on our sides. If travel, or gold, or watchings, or the industry of the best of Physicians, could have given life, this curious piece of mortality had not been yet defaced. Let this visible argument (a stronger I cannot use) rectify the truth of your frailty. If you desire a confirmation from God's Word, I can give it. All flesh is grass, 
Esa. 40.6.  and the glory thereof as the flower of the field. Here is set down the condition as well of the noblest, as the common sort, their glory fades as a flower, the other dies like grass, all meet in the dust.  
The causes of the necessity of death, which are laid upon all men, are three: first, the decree of God, Statutum est omnibus semel mori, which, as the law of the Medes & Persians, is unchangeable.  
Secondly, the composition of our flesh, which is of contrary qualities: their struggle and combustions necessitate diseases, they death.  
Thirdly, the sin of our souls, which is the true, 
Non mors homini accideret nisi ex paena, quam praecesserat culpa. Aug de verb. Dom. serm. 34. Steriles dominantur avenae. Virg.  real, and radical cause.  
God in our creation sowed in our bodies, the good corn, the wholesome grain of health and soundness; sin and disobedience came with an after-cast, and sprinkled tares of sickness amongst the corn, and they grow up together with it, and in some grounds they prosper so well, that the weed overgrowes the corn, and the days of sickness are more than the days of health, and the end of them is death. God's sentence cannot be recalled; a lease for our lives we may have for a certain time, but not an absolute pardon. The difference of the elements within us, cannot be composed; a truce they make with each other, not a peace. And sin will not lose the possession of our souls; we may curb her power, but not take it away; we may sinne less, but not not at all: for the best man sins seven times a day; 
Rom. 6.23.  and the wages of sin is death: how soon we shall receive them, we are uncertain. We know not how suddeuly we are to travel into another country, let us therefore be ever readily furnished for our journey; let neither youth, delight, nor honour so rake up our thoughts, that we forget the main business of our life, to dye well. We cannot plead minority, if we are now unprepared: we were of full age long since to sue out the livery of death; and, if we live until we are decrepit, our soul is like our bodies, if we think not every minute may be our last. The Poet will give no man above a day, 
Horace. job 7.6.  Omnem crede diem tibi diluxisse supremum. job little, or no time at all. Man's days are swifter than a weaver's shuttle: 
job 14.2.  He cometh forth like a flower, and is cut down, he flieth also like a shadow, and continueth not. Let us then so live in these houses of clay, as if we were tenants at will, and might be thrust out of possession every moment; not as if we could not be remooved, until the expiration of ninety nine years, or had a lease of three lives in them. The edifice of our mortal selves is not erected upon a rock, a foundation of stone, but on sand, so as when the sea and tide beat, and the wind rageth, it is in danger continually of an utter overthrow. 
Horace.  Quid brevi fortes jaculamur aevo Multa? Why then in this uncertainty, do we make a preparation, as if we should live unto the third & fourth generation? He is wise that can dislodge at an instant, and when death knocks at his door, can unaffrightedly let her in, and hath then so dispatched all his affairs, that he hath nothing to say, but come Lord jesus, come quickly; nothing to do, but to deliver back his soul to his Creator. Whereas miserable is his condition, who is marrying a wife, or giving in marriage, or banqueting, when the inundation of an unresistable flood is ready to over whelm his unfinished ark of himself. History tells me of a miserable complaint, one made against Death and Destiny, that they should cut him off in the midst of his work, when 'twas half finished; worse is their case who are taken away in the midst of their sins, nay, if it be in the midst of their repentance. Si maneant opera imperfecta, 
Virg.  minaeque Murorum ingentes. If the tabernacle of their hearts be not thoroughly finished, and seasoned with repentant tears, if they are not perfectly and wholly reconciled unto their God. May no agency keep us from negotiating for our soul's health against the day of death, that with more truth than presumption, we may say with David, we shall go to her, to that Heaven where she is, to those Saints and blessed souls, that are her companions, to the Spirit of truth, the Son of mercy, the God of glory, who crowned her with immortality, and infinity of happiness, to reign with them for evermore.  
Thus have you heard of the sickness of David's Child, 
Application.  his behaviour before the death of him, his resolution after it, and his meditation upon it. Of which I must say, 
Rom. 4.23.  as the Apostle doth of Abraham's justification: Now it is not written for him only, but for us.  
As David's Child was sick, so was this yongue Lady, sick of a long and linger sickness, but patiented and quiet in her sickness, as if she had not been borne to dye, but suffer: and even at her last gasp, she carried such cheerfulness in her countenance, as if she had been sensible of the nearness of her glory. Death did not appall her, but the fresh vermilion of her cheeks (had she been of riper years) might have seemed to witness a joy for leaving the world so soon. She was of no robustious constitution, but of a fabric and making so delicate, that as in your neatest watches, the Artificer breaks a wheel or two, before he can work one out: so nature was so curious in the workmanship of this Lady, that she was apt upon the least occasion to be out of frame. She lived to spend her flesh, as if she had thought it too good for the worms. When there was nothing almost left but bones and skin about her, she desired to be in her nurse's arms, as if she had known that nearer heaven than her bed; and then to be in the cradle, seeming to intimate it best resembled her grave; where presently into the hands of her Saviour she delivered a spotless soul. that she was dead, they found, but when, they knew not. Her breath, unobserved, stole away, like Noah's Dove out of the Ark; it went forth and came in, it went forth and never returned again.  
Now as David's Child was dead, 
Optima prim fere manibus rapiuntur avaris, Implentur numeris deterior suis. Ovid. Hor.  so is this sweet Lady, and, like the minute she died in, never to be recalled again; so have I seen the sweetest flowers cropped in the bud. 
Impube corpus quale possit impia  
Mollire Thracum pectora.  Such was her delicacy, that the loss of her would even force a tear from a Barbarians eye. God thought this jewel of too great a price for man's use; he showed it to testify his richness, and presently took it again for our unworthiness. She was the finest thread, that ever was spun to make up frail nature; which time and age would but have sullied and made worse: I never saw flesh and blood of a purer complexion. Her soul was not blotted nor scribbled with black and fowl thoughts, her hands were not polluted with any action of evil, she was never out yet, but like a good Musician, tuning her pipes, and organs, against she came to bear her part; her tongue she had put almost three years to school to learn to speak: and, if I look into her conditions, I can see, through less than three years, a most ingenuous, and sweet disposition towards: so good, as if she were too good to live to sin, and so God took her; she had but that one sin, we are made of, Original; towards the expiation of which when she came first into the world, she baptised herself with her own tears, and that little remnant of days she lived, she did perpetual penance, and now hath undergone the last, Death.  
Now me thinks we should stand all like Belshazzar when he saw the hand-writing upon the wall; 
Dan. 5.5.  our countenances should be changed, our thoughts troubled, so that the joints of our loins should be lose, & our knees smite against one another to think upon this harmless innocent, that here hath suffered for one sin, and that sin none of her own; to think now that 'tis we that are dead, and yet she is to be buried. The multiplication of our years, hath been but an increase of the reckoning, we must make for sin, and runs us further still upon the score. We have put off our innocence long since with our infancy, the elder we grow the worse we are, as our first parents were in their clothes of figge-leaves. It may grieve us to see the happy estate we have outlived, and put us in mind of the fitness of a reparation. We may live until we are old, and old men are twice children, but this last is a childishness of impotency, not of innocence; of such was this Lady, Mrs; of whom I cannot speak the full truth, but that I make an argument against mine own purpose, which is to settle David's resolution in you to bear this loss with patience.  
As David then resolved when his child was dead, to fast no more, so let us to weep no more; let his reason be ours, 'tis a good one, We cannot bring her back again. Me thinks the thought of this should allay the impetuousness of our sorrow, that it doth not profit her, whose life we desire, but hurts ours. If grief could do her good, every night I would wash my bed with weeping, and wish my head a fountain of water; nay, had I but one tear to spend after those for my sins, she should have it. But Seneca, a mere Heathen, hath taught me to hate unprofitable grief; Quae amentia est poenas à se infoelicitatis suae exigere & mala sua augere? what madness is it to revenge my crosses on myself, & wilfully to augment my grief? Is not my sorrow weighty enough, but with a fresh supply of tears I must increase the burden of it? But why so violent now? you could not but perceive long since that thus it would be. Can you imagine that such perfection could be of continuance? Things sublimated of a superusuall goodness, take a sudden flight from us. The brightness of the fire argues a vicinity to extinction; it is of longer durance, when it feeds on dull & gross matter, as it is less quick and agile; so children the more forward & sprightly they are, the less hope they give me of a long life. But that which we grieve for in this Lady, is her blessing: we toil & are full of sorrows, and must dye; but she doth rest from all labour, without which with the Saducees you will deny a resurrection. Cesset igitur dolor compassionis, ubi oritur fides resurrectionis. I would not have you ignorant brethren concerning them which are asleep, that ye sorrow not, even as others which have no hope; for if we believed that Christ jesus died, and rose again, 
Thes. 4.13.14.  even so all those which sleep in Christ, will the Lord bring with him. Can this young Lady speak, she would bid us not weep for her, but for ourselves: for she is not dead, but, 
Matt. 9.24.  like the maid in the Ruler's house, she sleepeth. Therefore comfort your hearts, drive sorrow far from them: for sorrow hath slain many, & there is no profit therein, 
Ecclus. 30.33.  saith jesus the son of Sirach. Let us not for the greatest loss grieve too much, lest we make our friends grieve for the loss of us: for through immoderate sorrow death can find an easy passage to destroy us. And now to end with my Text, let us with David from hence take up a meditation of our own mortality, let us think on death, but not occasion it. let us assure ourselves that we shall go to her: but let us not through immoderate grief send ourselves before God calls us, lest we dispossess ourselves of the place where she is. Let every occasion be a memorandum of our mortality. I like the custom of the Egyptians, who at their festivals and times of mirth, had ever at the last course a deaths-head served in, which was a silent insinuation of the frailty of their nature. A frequent iteration of this would make us understand ourselves better than we do. O may the God of light unseal our eyes, & make us see and know how subject we are to die▪ good God imprint in our memories the thought of death, bestow on our hearts a preparation to welcome it, grant that with job we may wait all the days of our appointed time, until the Son of righteousness appear, & then be exalted into an everlasting mansion in heaven, there to reign with him for evermore. To whom with the Father & the holy Ghost, be ascribed all power, etc. Amen.  
FINIS.