A09461:25
A salve for a sick man. or, A treatiseA salve for a sicke man. or, A treatise
A salve for a sick man. or, A treatise containing the nature, differences, and kinds of death as also the right manner of dying well. And it may serve for spiritual instruction to 1. Mariners when they go to sea. 2. Soldiers when they go to battle. 3. Women when they travel of child.A salve for a sicke man. or, A treatise containing the nature, differences, and kindes of death as also the right manner of dying well. And it may serue for spirituall instruction to 1. Mariners when they goe to sea. 2. Souldiers when they goe to battell. 3. Women when they trauell of child.
London: printed by John Legat, 1611London: printed by Iohn Legat, 1611
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
The fourth objection is, that those which have been reputed to be of the better sort of men, oftentimes have miserable ends: for some end their days despairing, some raving and blaspheming, some strangely tormented: it may seem therefore that the day of death is the day of greatest woe & misery. To this ⟨p. 23⟩I answer first of all generally, that we must not judge of the estate of any man before God by outward things, whether they be blessings or judgements, whether they fall in life or death. For (as Solomon saith) all things come like to all: and the same condition is to the just and the wicked, to the good and to the pure and to the polluted, and to him that sacrificeth and to him that sacrificeth not: as is the good so is the sinner, he that sweareth, as he that feareth an oath ▪ Secondly, I answer the particulars which be alleged on this manner: And first of all touching despair, it is true that not only wicked and loose persons despair in death, but also repentant sinners, who oftentimes in their sickness, testify of themselves that being alive ⟨p. 24⟩and lying in their beds, they feel themselves as it were to be in hell, and to apprehend the very pangs and torments thereof. And I doubt not for all this, but that the child of God most dear unto him, may through the gulf of desperation attain to everlasting happiness. This appears by the manner of gods dealing in the matter of our salvation. All the works of God are done in & by their contraries. In the creation all things were made, not of some thing, but of nothing, clean contrary to the course of nature. In the work of redemption, God gives life not by life, but by death: and if we consider aright of Christ upon the cross, we shall see our paradise out of paradise in the middest of hell. Eor out of his own cursed death ⟨p. 25⟩doeth he bring us life and eternal happiness. Likewise in effectual vocation, when it pleaseth God to convert and turn men unto him, he doeth it by the means of the Gospel preached, which in reason should drive all men from God. For it is as contrary to the nature of man as fire to water, and light to darkness: and yet for all this, though it be thus against the disposition and heart of man, it prevails with him and turns him to God. Furthermore, when God will send his own servants to heaven, he sends them a contrary way, even by the gates of hell: