Death unstung a sermon preached at the funeral of Thomas Mowsley, an apothecary, who…

Min. By what you have said, I perceive then you were throughly convinced of ⟨p. 118⟩the necessity of holiness, and of leaving your sins, and serving the Lord, and that there must be Regeneration wrought in you, before Glorification could be hoped for by you; but surely being convinced of the blessed condition of the godly, you could not but sometimes wish your self in their condition; how did you carry your self under this, did you resolve that you would never be as they were?

Conv. Truly, many times I would have been glad to have been in their condition, but I was so glued to the world, and my sins, that I could not endure to think of leaving them, yet (to my best remembrance) I never resolved that if I should live never so long I would not repent, but that after I had gotten a great estate in the world, and was grown old, and were as it were uncapable of taking any more delight in these things below, that then I would have set out towards Heaven, and oh I cannot but think (and I desire with fear and trembling to think) what a loathsome Sacrifice I should then have been, even stunk in Gods nostrils, when I had given the marrow and fatness and strength of my body to the devil; then I should have had just cause to fear the Lord would have buried me out of his sight; Oh I say, I staid in the devils ⟨p. 119⟩service so long, that I smelt so of fire and brimstone, I mean of sin, that had not the body of a Crucified Advocate Jesus Christ, as a Veil, stood between the Justice of God and my guilty soul, certainly he would soon have drawn out a bill of indictment against me, and have sent me away with a Go ye Cursed.

Conv. Truly, many times I would have been glad to have been in their condition, but I was so glued to the world, and my sins, that I could not endure to think of leaving them, yet (to my best remembrance) I never resolved that if I should live never so long I would not repent, but that after I had gotten a great estate in the world, and was grown old, and were as it were uncapable of taking any more delight in these things below, that then I would have set out towards Heaven, and oh I cannot but think (and I desire with fear and trembling to think) what a loathsome Sacrifice I should then have been, even stunk in Gods nostrils, when I had given the marrow and fatness and strength of my body to the devil; then I should have had just cause to fear the Lord would have buryed me out of his sight; Oh I say, I staid in the devils