A39690:86
A token for mourners, or, The advice of Christ to a distressed mother bewailing…
A token for mourners, or, The advice of Christ to a distressed mother bewailing the death of her dear and only son wherein the boundaries of sorrow are duly fixed, excesses restrained, the common pleas answered, and divers rules for the support of Gods afflicted ones prescribed / by J.F.
London: printed for Robert Boulter, 1674
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 Sorrow then becomes sinful and excessive when,
First, It causes us to slight and despise all our other mercies and enjoyments, as small things in comparison of what we have lost.
It often falls out that the setting of one comfort clouds and benights all the rest Our tears for our lost enjoyment, so blinds our eyes that we cannot see the many other mercies which yet remain: We take so much notice of what is gone, that ⟨p. 24⟩we take little or no notice of what is left: But this is very sinful; for it involves in it both ignorance, ingratitude, and great provocation.
Its a sin springing from ignorance. Did we know the desert of our sin, we would rather wonder to see one mercy left, than that twenty are cut off. They that know they have forfeited every mercy, should be thankful that they enjoy any, and patient when they loose many of their comforts.