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,…

5. Death as a Sleep administers this comfortable matter to our minds, that it will not be a perpetual sleep: For being but a sleep, they can be awakened, and because it is a Sleep, they shall be awakened; for if your Child, or Father, or Mother, or your self at Night go to Bed and sleep, do not you reckon and suppose you shall wake in the Morning? And you are not troubled to lay your Child asleep, when you have hopes and expectation it will wake again: When did you go to sleep, without waking after sleep? This Comfort, this representation of Death doth bring unto us, that as we saw the time when ours fell asleep, so there will be a Day when they shall awake.

6. Death as a Sleep suggests to our Thoughts, that the Bodies of th•se that Sleep in Jesus shall be much altered for the best, when they awake out of their sleep. If you are weary with Working or Travelling all the Day, you go to sleep at Night, and in the Morning you say, tho you went weary to Bed, yet by Sleep you are greatly refreshed, and as fit to Work or Travel as you were the Day before. When your Child complains he is not well, you hasten to have him to Bed, and say, go to sleep, You will be better after you have slept. Sure I am, these Bodies that are sick, and weak, and weary, when they fall Asleep in Jesus will be wonderfully refreshed, and be ⟨p. 149⟩much better, when after this Sleep they shall awake.

7. Death as a Sleep teacheth us, that it is no trouble to them that are in their Graves, that they do not know when they shall awake. Is this any trouble to a living Man fast asleep in his Bed, that he knows not when the day will dawn, and the Morning-light appear, and he awake? he sleeps on, and concerns himself with no such Thoughts. We that are alive think, when shall our Dead arise? how long must they sleep there? That which troubles us is no trouble unto them.