[6.] Sixthly and lastly, You shall gain a clear, distinct, and full knowledge of all great and deep mysteries, 1 Cor. xiii. 10, 12. The mystery of the Trinity, the mystery of Christ's incarnation, the mystery of man's redemption, the mysteries of providences, the mysteries of prophecies, and all those mysteries that relate to the nature, substances, offices, orders, and excellencies of the angels. If you please to consult my ' String of Pearls, or the Best Things Reserved till Last,' with my sermon on Eccles. vii. 1, ' Better is the day of death than the day of one's birth ;' which is at the end of my ' Treatise on Assurance' — both which treatises you have by you — there you will find many more great and glorious things laid open that we gain by death ; and to them I refer you.l But,
6. Sixthly, Look upon death as a sleep. The Holy Ghost hath phrased it so above twenty times in Scripture, to shew that this is the true, proper, and genuine notion of death.2 When the saints die, they do but sleep : Mat. ix. 24, ' The maid is not dead but sleepeth.' The same phrase he also used to his disciples concerning Lazarus, * Our friend Lazarus sleepeth,' John xi. 11. The death of the godly is as a
^ For the ' String of Pearls,' see Vol i. : for the other Sermon, Vol. vi.— G. * 1 Cor. xi. 30, and xv. 51 ; John xi. 12 ; Mark v. 39. The Greeks call their church- yards dormitories, sleeping-places; and the Hebrews Beth-chaiim, the house of the living.
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sleep ; Stephen fell asleep, Acts vii. 60 ; and ' David fell asleep/ Acts xiii. 36 ; and ' Christ is the firstfruits of them that sleep,' 1 Cor. xv, 20 ; ' Them that sleep in Jesus, will God bring with him,' 1 Thes, iv. 14. The saints of God do but sleep when they lie down in the grave. That which we call death in such, is not death indeed ; it is but the image of death, the shadow and metaphor of death, death's younger brother, a mere sleep, and no more. I may not follow the analogy that is between death and sleep in the latitude of it, the printer calling upon me to conclude. Sleep is the nurse of nature, the sweet jparen- thesis of all a man's griefs and cares. But,
7. Seventhly, Look upon death as a departure : 2 Tim. iv. 6, * For I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand.' He makes nothing of death. It was no more betwixt God and Moses, but go up and die, Deut. xxxii. 49, 50 ; and so betwixt Christ and Paul, but launch out, and land immediately at the fair haven of heaven : Phil. i. 23, ' For I am in a strait betwixt two, having a desire to depart, and to be with Christ ; which is far better.' Paul longed for that hour wherein he should loose anchor, and sail to Christ, as the Greek word avaXva-at imports. It is a metaphor from a ship at anchor, importing a sailing from this present life to another port. Paul had a desire to loose from the shore of life, and to launch out into the main of immortality. The apostle, in this phrase, ava~ Xvaai, hath a reference both to his bonds and to his death ; and his meaning is, I desire to be discharged and released, as out of a common jail, so also out of the prison of my body, that I may pre- sently be with Christ my Saviour in heaven, in rest and bliss.i After Paul had been in the third heaven, his constant song was, ' I desire to be with Christ.' Nature teacheth that death is the end of misery ; but grace will teach us that death is the beginning of our felicity. But,
8. Eighthly and lastly. Look upon death as a going to hed. The grave is a bed wherein the body is laid to rest, with its curtains close drawn about it, that it may not be disturbed in its repose: so the Holy Ghost is pleased to phrase it, ' He shall enter into peace, they shall rest in their beds, every one walking in theii* uprightness,^ Isa. Ivii. 2. As the souls of the saints pass to a place of rest and bliss, so their bodies are laid down to rest in the grave, as in a bed or bed- chamber, there to sleep quietly until the morning of the resurrection. Death is nothing else but a writ-of-ease to the weary saints ; it is a total cessation from all their labour of nature, sin, and affliction, ' Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord, that they may rest from their labours,' Kev. xiv. 13, &c. Whilst the souls of the saints do rest in Abraham's bosom, their bodies do sweetly sleep in their beds of dust, as in a safe and consecrated dormitory. Every sincere Chris- tian may, like the weary child, call and cry to be laid to bed, knowing that death would send him to his everlasting rest. Now you should always look upon death under scripture notions, and this will take off the terror of death ; yea, it will make the king of terrors to be the
^ ' k.vaXiKTai, solvere anchoram. Or it may be rendered, to return home, or to change rooms. It is a similitude taken from those that depart out of an inn to take their journey towards their own country.
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