Use 3. And take heed ice he not ensnared icith the bodies of others. This is the ' corruption ' of men, to gaze in this kind. You see wise Solomon and others were much troubled with temptations in this kind. Consider that body that thou doatest on now, and which is made by the devil a snare to thee, what will it be ere long ? So noisome that thou wilt not endure the presence of it. It is but a flower, and it is fading, fresh in the morning and dead at night. All flesh is but grass. It is a corruptible body. If thou wilt needs love, be acquainted with such as have excellent spirits that shall live eternally. Oh, there is an object of love indeed ! That is the true love and acquaintance that is spiritual. Many things may he lovely in the outward person, but see that there be a heavenly spirit, that is mounting up, that savours of good things ; a spirit that hath life tegun in it, that shall be for ever happy in heaven. Unless there be this, there cannot bo a fit gi'ound for the love of any wise man.
To end all, j'ou see here a short story of a good life and a blessed death. Xet us make this blessed man of God exemplary to us in both. Let our whole life be nothing but a service of God, and let us consider the genera- tion wherein we are to take and do all the good we can in our time. And then consider what death will be. When we come to die, it will be a sweet sleep to us, and our resurrection will be a refreshing. ' Our flesh shall rest in hope,' as David saith, * we shall be gathered to our fathers ;' we shall 'see corruption,' indeed. But mark what David saith, Ps. xvi. 9, 10,
KING David's epitaph. 515
* My flesh shall rest in hope, because thou wilt not suffer thy holy one to see corruption.' Then this is the upshot of all. Though we * see corrup- tion ' when we are dead ; yet, with the eye of faith, we see a rising again from ' corruption.' We see death hut as a pot to refine us in. Even as it is with silver, when there is much corruption and heterogeneal matter mingled wdth it, the fire refines it, hut it is not lost. So the grave refines the hody, and fits it for a glorious resurrection. ' The flesh rests in hope' all the while, though the hody see corruption. Because our head saw no corruption. If the head be above water, what if the hody be down ? Our head saw no corruption ; that is, Christ, for he rose out of the grave before his body was putrified ; for his body had a subsistence, and was gloriously united to the second person in Trmity ; and, being united to the Lord of life, it saw no corruption. For that did not lie upon Christ as our Saviour to be corrupt, but to die, * to be made a curse for us,' Gal. iii. 13, and then especially, I say, by reason of the near union of it to the God of life.
Well, then, what is David's argument of comfort? In Ps. svi. 9, 10,
* My flesh shall rest in hope ; because thou wilt not sufl'er thine holy one to see corruption.' Because Christ rose from the grave himself, the holy one of God, our flesh may rest in hope, though we see corruption. Be- cause the same divine power that raised Christ our head out of the grave, that his body saw no corruption, will raise our bodies to be like his glorious body. Our blessed Saviour, that overcame death in his own person, by his power he will overcome death for all his mystical body, that is, his church. It shall be perfect in heaven, soul and body together, as he himself is glorious now in heaven. That we may say with Davfd, notwithstanding our bodies see corruption, as his did, yei our flesh shall rest in hope, because God's holy one saw no corruption.
NOTES.
[a) P. 490. — ' This I observe from the very language or phrase.' The phrase is, VTrriiirTiGag ttj to^j (dioZ (SouXri = having served the counsel of God, as Sibbes suggests. Of. ver. 22.
{h) P. 492. — ' " David in his generation served the will, or'counsel, of God," as the word is.' See note a above.
(c) P. 493. — ' Man, take him in his nature, is like a tree. The poet could say to that purpose.' This comparison is frequent in the Classics and in all languages. By the poet is probably intended Homer, and the reference to the famous passage II. ^ 146—
O'Irj VIP (p-JXXMV yiviri, roir,bi -/.ai dvd^Zv <E>i(X?va TO, /Miv T avs;j,og ynx'xdhig yj^i, dXka hi d' ZXri TriXs66c>j(ja (pvii, ia^oc, d' i-Tiylyvirai wori- 'fig avB^uv ysviri, 7] [miv <pvii, i] o' avoh/fiyii. Thus translated by Cowper : —
' Why asks Diomcde of my descent ? For as the leaves, such is the race of men. The wind shakes down the leaves, the budding grove Soon teems with others, and in spring they grow. So pass mankind. One generation meets Its destined period, and a new succeeds.' The Elizabethan poets furnish many splendid examiles of the metaplior ; c.y., Br n Jonson, Massinger, and their compeers.