The mourner directory, guiding him to the middle way betwixt the two extremes, defect,…The mourner directory, guiding him to the middle way betwixt the two extreams, defect,…

Rule 9. OUR sorrow for such as die full of Days, and full of Grace and Hopes of Glory, should not be so deep as for such that are holy, but taken from us in the midst of their Days. When an Holy Person, Converted when Young, hath led an Holy Conversation, filled up his Duties in his General and Particular Calling, been useful and serviceable in his respective Circumstances, hath fought a good Fight, hath kept the Faith, and finished his Course; when the Lease of Man's Life, [Seventy years] is almost out, is ripe for Heaven, and Nature is worn, parts of the Body decayed with Age, and with such a Constitution in a Course of Nature could not live much longer, but with grief and pains, with aches and groans, like ripe and mellow Fruit without violent shaking fall to the ground, we have more cause to give thanks to God they lived so long, served him so much, were useful so many years, ⟨p. 111⟩and such a long-standing Comfort to Relations, than to be bowed down with sorrow, to be filled, straitened, and loaded with grief that they died at last. Wherefore the Survivors of such should reckon up their Mercies, take an account of their many Comforts, and remember Blessings old and new, had and received in the long Enjoyment of such a Relation in Life, and then let thankfulness and sorrow, joy and grief contend for Victory, and strive which should exceed the other; and when all is laid together, and duly weighed by a Soul that is desirous that God should have the praise of his manifold Mercies in a Relative state almost for Forty years, as well as himself have a sense of his loss, if Nature prompt him to be sorrowful, Grace would provoke him to be thankful; but yet if the Contest remain, as his Condition is mixed with Mercy and Affliction, so let his frame of Heart be mixed with a Tincture of both; and let them take their turns, that one while he may be sorrowful for his loss, another while be thankful for so many Mercies before that loss did befall him.

Rule 9. OƲR sorrow for such as die full of Days, and full of Grace and Hopes of Glory, should not be so deep as for such that are holy, but taken from us in the midst of their Days. When an Holy Person, Converted when Young, hath led an Holy Conversation, filled up his Duties in his General and Particular Calling, been useful and serviceable in his respective Circumstances, hath fought a good Fight, hath kept the Faith, and finished his Course; when the Lease of Man's Life, [Seventy years] is almost out, is ripe for Heaven, and Nature is worn, parts of the Body decayed with Age, and with such a Constitution in a Course of Nature could not live much longer, but with grief and pains, with aches and groans, like ripe and mellow Fruit without violent shaking fall to the ground, we have more cause to give thanks to God they lived so long, served him so much, were useful so many years,