Holland, lying at the point of death, said, * Wliat brightness do I see?' and being told it was the sunshine; ' No,' saith he' my Saviour shines. Now farewell world, welcome heaven ; the day-star from on high hath visited me. Preach at my funeral. God dealeth comfortably and familiarly with man : I feel his mercy ! I see his majesty ! whether in the body or out of the body I cannot tell, God he knoweth ; but I see things that are unutterable.' i Mr Knox found so much comfort from the Scriptures upon his death-bed, that he would have risen and have gone into the pulpit to tell others what he had felt in his soul. And by that information that I have had from some good hands, several precious Christians that have lately died of the plague have gone to heaven under as high a spirit of joy, of comfort, of assurance, and of a holy triumph, as any of the last-mentioned worthies, or as any other that ever I heard of or read of : the remembrance of which hath been, and still is, a singular cordial to all their relations and friends that yet survive them. But as I was saying, no godly man falls in any common calamity till his glass be run and his work done ; so I sny of all those dear servants of the Lord that have fallen by the pestilence in the midst of us, their hour was come, and their course was finished, John vii. 30, and viii. 19, 20 ; 2 Tim. iv. 6, 7. Had God had any further doing-work, or suffering-work, or bearing-work, or witnessing-work for them in this world, it was not all the angels in heaven, nor all the malignant diseases in the world, that could ever have cut them off from ' the land of the living.' When Lazarus was dead, his two sisters, Martha and Mary, came to Christ with tears in their eyes and sad complaints in their mouths: John xi. 21-32, * Lord, if thou hadst been here, my brother had not died,' said Martha : and ' Lord, if thou hadst been here, my brother had not died,' said Mary. And is not this the common language of many this day, when such and such precious Christians have fallen by the pesti- lence ? Oh ! if such a physician had been here they had not died ; or if they had been let blood they had not died ; or if they had taken such a potion they had not died ; or if they had ate but of such or such meats they had not died ; or if they had not lived in such a foggy air they had not died ; or if they had not been shut up in such close, narrow, nasty rooms and places they had not died ; or had they been but so wise and happy as to have aj^plied such or such a remedy, they might have been alive to this day ! not considering with Job that ' the days of man are determined, and his bounds appointed, which he cannot pass,' Job xiv. 5. The time and place, and every circumstance of his dissolution, is decreed from all eternity. That one man dies in the field, another in his bed, one at sea, another on the shore, one of an apoplexy in the head, another of a struma in the neck, one of a sqttinacy^ in the throat, another of a cough and consumption of the lungs ; that so many thousands dies of obstructions, inflamma- tions, dro])sies, gouts, pestilence, it is foreordained in heaven. The hand of the Lord is in all, and he it is that, having brought us into the world at his pleasure, will take us hence at his appointment. The Jews have a saying that ' God hath four keys under his own girdle :
' The saintly friend, and editor of the works, of Dr Robert Harris. — G. ' 'Quinsy. —G.
A HEAVENLY CORDIAL. 427
1. The key of the clouds ; 2. The key of the womb ; 3. The key of the heart ; and 4. The key of death, the key of the grave.
(5.) Fifthly, God sometimes takes away his dearest children in the common calamity in judgment to ivicked men. Because the hand of the Lord hath touched some of his dearest servants in this sore visita- tion, how do the wicked insult, rejoice, and triumph ! They say, Aha ! so would we have it ! As the fire-fly leaps and dances in the fire, so do wicked men rejoice in the sufferings and death of the people of God. How do many wicked men bless themselves because they have escaped the hand of the destroying angel, when such and such have fallen by it ! Oh, how proud, how obdurate, how impudent, are many grown, because they have escaped the present judgment, when many others that have been a thousand times better than themselves have been sent to their graves ! Eccles. viii. 11. The Alcoran saith, God created the angels of light, and the devils of the flame. Certainly God's children are of the light, but Satan's children are furious, wrathful children ; they are children of the flame. Oh, in what a flame now are many wicked men against the people of God — since the hand of the destroying angel hath not yet reached them — over what they were in when the destroying angel first drew his sword in the midst of us ! as if they were spared on purpose to oppress, perse- cute, and scatter the people of God more than ever. Oh that all such would be but so favourable to their own souls, as seriously to ponder upon Ezek. xxv. and xxxv. ! Obad. 8-19 ; Nahum i. 9-1 5. ^
Felix, earl of Wurtemburg, one of the captains of Charles the Fifth, burning in rage and anger against the people of God, he swore, in the presence of divers at supper, that * before he died he would ride up to the spurs in the blood of the Lutherans ;' but God soon cooled his courage, for that very night he was choked and strangled in his own blood. Paul prayeth that he might be delivered from ' unreasonable and wicked men,' 2 Thes. iii. 2. The word is utottol, absurd men, such as put themselves upon ways of opposition against all reason and common sense ; yea, such who in their rage and bitterness of spirit make no bones of breaking all the laws both of God and men, so they may but have their wills and lusts satisfied in afilicting, scattering, and tormenting of the people of God. 'Absurd' men, with Judas, kiss Christ, and betray him. They kiss the head and stab the body ; or, as one wittily expresseth it, they kiss the mouth and tread upon the toes. Reader, remember this, when the people of the Jews made use of Philo to apologise for them unto Caius the emperor, Caius used him very ruggedly ; but when he was come out of his presence the Jews came round about him. ' Well,' saith he, to encourage them, ' surely Caius will arm God against himself for us.' Let the reader apply it as he pleaseth.
(6.) Sixthly, God sometimes takes atvay some of his dearest chil- dren in the common calamity, that he may deliver them from greater calamities that are coming upon the world. The Jews have a sayino- that, ' When good men die it is an ill sign to the world.' When the luminaries of heaven are eclipsed, Dens avertat omen! Paulinus
^ The scales of the leviathan, as Luther makes the comparison, stick close together • and so do mcked men in their counsels, plots, and projects against the people of^od. '
428 A HEAVENLY CORDIAL.
reports of Ambrose that he would weep bitterly when he heard of any