A29694:78
A heavenly cordial for all those servants of the Lord that have had the…
A heavenly cordial for all those servants of the Lord that have had the plague ... , or, Thirteen divine maxims, or conclusions, in respect of the pestilence which may be as so many supports, comforts and refreshing springs, both to the visited and preserved people of God in this present day : also ten arguments to prove that in times of common calamity the people of God do stand upon the advantage ground as to their outward preservation and protection ... : also eight reasons why some of the precious servants of the Lord have fallen by the pestilence in this day of the Lords anger / by Thomas Brooks.A heavenly cordial for all those servants of the Lord that have had the plague ... , or, Thirteen divine maximes, or conclusions, in respect of the pestilence which may be as so many supports, comforts and refreshing springs, both to the visited and preserved people of God in this present day : also ten arguments to prove that in times of common calamity the people of God do stand upon the advantage ground as to their outward preservation and protection ... : also eight reasons why some of the precious servants of the Lord have fallen by the pestilence in this day of the Lords anger / by Thomas Brooks.
London : Printed for and are to be sold by John Hancock, 1666
Title page typeset from the transcription.
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.
But as I was saying, No godly man falls in any Common Calamity till his glass be run, and his work done; so I say of all those dear servants of the Lord that have fallen by the pestilence in the midst of us, their hour was come, and 1their course was finished. Had God had any further doing work, or suffering work, or bearing work, or witnessing work for them in this world, 'twas not all ⟨p. 54⟩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 2Martha and Mary came to Christ with tears in their eyes, and sad complaints in their mouths. 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 pestilence; 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 eat 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 applied such or such a remedy, they might have been alive to this day. ⟨p. 55⟩Not considering with Job, that the days of man are determined, and his bounds appointed, which he cannot pass. 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 Squinancy in the throat, another of a Cough and Consumption of the Lungs; that so many thousands dies of Obstructions, Inflammations, Dropsies, 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: 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.