rejoice and glory in the sufferings of tlie poor people of God, and because some of them have fallen by the hand of the destroying angel, considering that the design of God herein is to stop the mouth of iniquity, and that none may say that he is either partial or fond ! Such men that have been eye-witnesses of God's impartial dealing with his own peui)le in this day of his wrath should rather be down-in-the- mouth than up in their spirits ; they should rather be silent than raving against the people of the Lord ; they should rather tremble than rejoice — for if God deal thus with his green trees, how will he deal with the dry ? When God cuts down liis best timber, will he not either grub up or burn up the old stumps ? Surely he will, Luke xxiii. 31. ' If judgment begin at the house of God, where shall the sinner and the ungodly appear?' 1 Pet. iv. 17, 18. If God deal thus with his best friends, how will he deal with his enemies ? If God deal thus with his dearest children, servants and slaves have cause to tremble. And thus much for the reasons why some of God's dearest children have fallen by the pestilence in this day of the Lord's anger.
X. The tenth divine maxim or conclusion is this — viz., That such sainis as do fall by the sivordor hy the pestilence, they receive no loss, no lorong, no injury, hy these sad dispensations ; they gain much, but they lose nothing; for by these sad providences they are hut hastened to heaven, to their Fathers house, to their eternal homes, and to those blessed mansions that Christ hath prepared for them, John xiv. 1-4.
Elijah went to heaven in a fiery chariot, 2 Kings xi. 12 ; and many thousand of the martyrs went to heaven in fiery chariots, and in bloody chariots ; and doubtless many worthies in this day are gone to heaven in a pestilential chariot, as in a chair of state. Heaven is a place of so much pleasure and delight that they are happy that can get thither anyhow. There is laid up in heaven ' an incorruptible crown,' a ' crown of life,' a ' crown of righteousness, a ' crown of im- mortality,' a ' crown of glory,' 1 Cor. ix. 25 ; 2 Tim. iv. 8 ; James i. 12 ; 1 Pet. V. 4 ; Rev. ii. 10 ; and who would not shoot any gulf to come to these crowns ? Nee Chrisfus, nee coelum patitnr hyperbolem — Neither Christ nor heaven can be hyperbolised. The good things of heaven are so many that they exceed number, and so great that they exceed measure, and so precious that they are above all estimation. What will that life be, or rather what will not that life be, since all good either is not at all, or is in such a life ? Here is light which place cannot comprehend, voices and music which time cannot ravish away, odours which are never dissipated, a feast which is never con- sumed, a blessing which eternity bestoweth, but eternity shall never see at an end ; and who would not wade through a Red Sea to come to this heavenly Canaan ? What are all the silks of Persia, and all the spices of Egypt, and all the gold of Ophir, and all the treasures of both Indies; yea, what is the glory of ten thousand worlds, to that glory that those saints are now enjoying who have died by the pesti- lence in the midst of us ? When Cyneas, the ambassador of Pyrrhus, after his return from Rome, was asked by his master what he thought of the city and state, he answered that ' it seemed to him to be respub-
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lica regum — a state of none but great statesmen, and a commonwealth, of kings.' Such is heaven — no other than a commonwealth of kings. Every saint in that kingdom is co-heir with Christ, and hath a robe of honour, and a sceptre of power, and a throne of majesty, and a crown of glory, Rom. viii. 17. Now what doth that Christian lose who dies of the pestilence, and by that means is brought to the fruition of all this glory ? ' Death,' saith Mr Brightman, ' that was before the devil's sergeant to drag us to hell, is now the Lord's gentleman-usher to conduct us to heaven,'
In the ceremonial law (Lev. xxv.) there was a year they accounted the year of jubilee, and this was with the poor Jews a very delightful and accei^table year, because that every man that had lost or sold his lands, upon the blowing of a trumpet, returned, and had possession of his estate again ; and so he was recovered out of all those miseries and extremities in which he lived before. Now our whole life in this world is made up of troubles and trials, of calamities and miseries, of crosses and losses, of reproaches and disgraces ; but death is the Chris- tian's jubilee ; it wipes away all tears from his eyes, it turns his miseries into mercies, his crosses into crowns, and his earthly hell into a glorious heaven. Though death, though the pestilence be to the wicked as the rod in Moses' hand that was turned into a serpent, yet to the godly, death, the pestilence, is like to the wand in Elijah's hand, a means to waft them over into a better life. The heathen gods held death to be man's summum honum, his chiefest good. Solomon upon his throne extolled his coffin above his crown. Death is a fall that came in by a fall. For a saint to die is for a saint to be no more unhappy. By death the saints come to a fixed and invariable eternity. Death is but an entrance into life. That is not death but life, which joins the dying man to Christ; and that is not life but death, which separates the living man from Christ. Death will blow the bud of grace into the flower of glory. Death is a saint's quiehis est. All fearful disasters, saith Gregory, which rob the saints of life, do but serve as a rough wind to blow them suddenly into their desired haven — I mean heaven. It matters not, saith Austin, whether a burning fever or flash of lightning, or whether a stone in the bladder, or a thunder-stone in thy head, sends thee out of this miserable world; for God minds not, saith he, the immediate occasion of thy coming to him, but the condition and posture that thy soul is in when it Cometh before him. The great thing that God will look at is, whether thou art a sheep or a goat, a sinner or a saint, a friend or an enemy, a son or a slave, a believer or an infidel ; whether thou art growing on the crab-stock of old Adam, or art engrafted into Christ ; whether thou art clothed with the righteousness of his Son, or whether thou standest before him in the ragged righteousness of thine own duties.
XI. The eleventh divine maxim or conclusion is this — viz.. Though a godly man should die of the plague, yet he shall be certainly delivered from the evil of the plague.
The smartest rod that God lays upon his own people is from a principle of love. Though he be angry with his people's sins, yet he loves their persons, Rev. iii. 19; Prov. iii. 11, 12; Heb. xii. 5-9.
432 A HEAVENLY CORDIAL.