4? ': Verf: a 5. An Expo!ition upon the Bookof J OB. Chap.3. the fabtilty or policyofCouncellors is not able todefeat it , there is no Eloquence, no Rhetorick canperfwade death to depart ; alb' the gold and riches in the world cannot bribe death , or flay its hand ; I faith job) thouid have found Kings and Councellors, and rich men, even all th'efe refi in the grave, and we fhould have retied together. Riches avail not in the day of wrath, ( Prov. zx.4.) but righteoufnefs delivereth from death. Righteoufneff delivereth from death ; why, (hall not righteousmen dye ? Surely job might have Paid, with righteous men , withholymen fhould I have refted, withAbraham, with Ifaac, and with Jacob, thefe. are in the grave,death feiz'd on them as well as other Princes, and Kings andCouncellors : How then doth Solomon fay, that righ. teoufnefs. delivereth from death ? Death is there either tobe un deriiood of force dangerous Judgment ; for,' faith he, Riches avail not in a day of wrath, that is, in a dayof publick calamity but righteoufnefr delivereth from death, that is, from thole troubles and dangers ; God hath refpea to a righteous per- fi)n, and hideth'him from that death. Or r hteaufnefs doth de- liver from death, that is, from the evil of death, from the fling of .:death, from the bitternefs of death the bitternefs and evil ofdeath is pail to a righteous man. Butriches ,they avail not at all,they cannot at all, as not deliver from death, fo not mitigate the pain,or pull out the fling, or fweeten the bitternefs of death; yea rather riches increafe all thefe : that is a truth, O death, how bitter is thy remembrance to a man that isat cafe in his poffeffion ! Men may put their riches with them into the grave , but riches cannot keep them amoment out of the grave. This thought,How bitter l Secondly, When job fpeaks- of-Kings, and Councellors, and Princes, there great men oftheworld, he iheweth us what their fiudy and bufinefs for the moil part is in the world , it is about worldly things ; They build defoiate places , they havegold, they fill their houfes with treafure ; Theft are their employments, the current of their cares and endeavours runs out this way. Hence obferve, That the thoughts of the greatefr and wifelf of the world, are ufually but for and about the world. The poor receive the Go- fpel, and the rich receive the world. As a godly man is defcri bed by hisfaith , Abraham believed God ; by fear by upright- nefs,by juflice,as Job in the firfi Chapter of this Book; by meek- nefs
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy OTcyMjk=