PREFACE. S. It is the way and means of conveying a sense of God's love unto our souls, which is that alone wherein ultimately we find rest in the midst of all the troubles of this life, as the apostle declares, Rom. v. 2. By whom also we have access by faith into this grace where- in we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God, ver. 3. And not only so, but we glory in tribulation also, knowing that tribulation worketh patience; ver. 4. and patience, experience; and experience, hope; ver. 5. And hope maketh not ashamed, because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts, by the holy Ghost which is given unto us. It is the Spirit of God, who alone communicates a sense of this love unto our souls; it is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost. Howbeit there are ways and means to be used on our part, whereby we may be disposed and made meet to receive these communications of divine love. Among these the principal is the contemplation of the glory of Christ insisted on, and of God the Father in him. It is the season, it is the way and means, at which and whereby the Holy Ghost will give a sense of the love of God unto us, causing us thereon to rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory. This will be made evi- dent in the ensuing discourse. This will lift the minds and hearts of believers above all the troubles of this life, and is the sovereign antidote that will expel all the poi- son that is in them, which otherwise might perplex and enslave their souls. I have but touched on these things, as.designing to enlarge somewhat in that which doth ensue. And this is the advantage we may have in the discharge of this duty with respect unto death itself. It is the assiduous contemplation of the glory of Christ, which will carry us cheerfully and comfortably into it and through it. My principal work having been now for a long season to die daily, as living in a continual expectation of my dissolution, I shall on this occasion acquaint the reader with some few of my thoughts and reliefs, with reference unto sleuth itself: There are sundry things required of us, that we may be able to encounter death cheerfully, constantly, and victoriously. For want of these, or some of them, I have known gracious souls, who have lived in a kind of bondage for fear of death all their days. - We know not bow God will manage any of our minds and souls in that season, in that trial. For he acts towards ,us inall b such things, in a way of sovereignty. But these are the thingswhich he requireth of as in a way of duty. First. Peculiar actings of faith to resign and commit our departing souls into the hand of him, who is able to receive them, to keep and preserve them, also to dis- pose of them into a state of rest and blessedness, are re- quired of us. The soul is now parting with all things here below, and that for ever. None of all the things which it hath seen, heard, or enjoyed, by its own outward senses, can be prevailed with to stay with it one hour, or to take one step with it, in the voyage wherein it is engaged. It must alone by itself launch into eternity. It is en- tering an invisible world, which it knows no more of than it bath received by faith. None hath comefront the dead to inform us of the sate of the other world. Yea, God seems on purpose so to conceal it from us, that we should have no evidence of it, at least as unto the manner of things in it, but what is given unto faith by divine revelation. Hence those who died and were raised again from the dead, unto any continuance a- mong men, as Lazarus, probably knew nothing of the invisible state. Theirsouls werepreserved by the power of God in their being, but bound up no unto present operations. This made a great emperor cry out on the approach of death; O animula, tremula, vagula; blandula; qum nunc abibis in loca horrida, squalida! &c. t O poor trembling, wandering soul, into what places of darkness and defilement art thou going!" How is it like to be after the few moments, which under the pangs of death we have to continue in this world? Is it an annihilation that lies at the door? Is death the destruction of our whole being, so as that af- ter it we shall be no more? So some would have the state of things to be. Is it a state of subsistence in a wandering condition, up and down the world, under the influenceof other more powerful spirits that rule in the air, visiting tombs and other solitary places, and sometimes making appearances of themselves by the im- pressions of those more powerful spirits, as seine ima- gine from the story concerning Samuel and the witch of Iÿndor, and as it is commonly received in the papacy, out of a compliance with their imagination of purga- tory? Or is it a state of universal misery and wo? a state incapable of comfort or joy? Let them pretend what they please, who can understand no comfort or joy in this life, but what they receive by their senses, 14
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