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DEATH
A
BLESSIAG TO THE SAINTS.
[SERM.
XLIII.
The philosopher,
by
the,
labours
of
his
reason, and
by
a
certain hardiness
of
spirit,
persuades himself not
to
tremble
at
the thoughts
of
death
;
for
it
may
be,
there
is
no hereafter; or
if
there
be,'
he
would fain
hope for an
happy
one
:
And
thus
he
ventures into death,
with
some
sort of
courage and composure
of
mind,
like a
bold man,
that
is
taking
an immense leap, in the dark,
out
of
one
world
into
another;
but
he
can
never
know
certainly,
that
there are
no
terrible things'to meet
him,
in
that
un-
seen state.
,
The
religion
of
the
Jews
and patriarchs,
which
God
himself revealed
to men,
enabled many
of
them to resign
their
lives with
patience and hope, and
to walk through
the
val
y
of
death without
.much dismay,
when
the ap-
pointed
hour
was come.
A
few
of
them,
I
confess,
have
been elevated
by
a
noble faith above the level
of
that
dis-
pensation
:
Yet
some
of
them
seem
to make
bitter
mourning' , because
of
the shadows
of
darkness
that
co-
vered
the grave;
and
all
the regions beyond
it.
They
were
all
their
life
-time subject
to
bondage,
through the
fear
of
death
;"
Feb.
ii.
15.
It
is
our Jesus
alone,
who has
"
brought
life and im-
mortality into
so
glorious a light
by
the
gospel
;
"-
2
Tim.
i. 10.
He
dwelt long
in
heaven before
he came
into
our
world,'
and
again
he
went
as
afore-
runner
into
those
nn-
seen worlds,
and
came back again
and taught
his disci-
ples,
what
heaven
is
:
And thus
we
learn
to overcome
death
with all its
terrors,
by
the
richer prospect,
which he
has
given
us,
of
the heavenly country,
that
lies
beyond
the
grave
:
He
has
taught
his
followers
to
rejoice
in
dying,
and
to possess
the pleasures
that
are
to be
derived
from
death,
as
it
is
an
entrance
into
the regions
of
light and
joy.
Blessed be
God
!
that
we
were
born
in the days
of
the
Messiah, since
Christ returned
from the dead, and
that
we
are
not
sent
either
t6 the schools
of
the philoso-
phers, or
even to Moses, to
teach
us
how to die,
Inference
IV.
Learn
from these discourses,
what
a
sweet and delightful glory belongs to the
covenant
of
grace,
that
turns a curse into a
blessing.
When
the
broken
law,
or
covenant,
of
works
attempts to
curse thee
with
death, O believer, (as
Balak,tn
did
Israel) "
the
,Lord
thy
God turns
the curse into
a
blessing
to
thee
by
this
new covenant, because the
Lord
thy
God
loveth