Right thoughts in sad hours representing the comforts and the duties of good men…

Well, this is the Calamity which many of you at some time or other have experience of; The Death of Children, this is a thing which the Children of Jacob seldom escape a resemblance of their Father in. Many carry themselves under the trial, as if, A Death of Virtue, yea as if, A Death of Reason, had therewithal befallen them; but recollect your selves, O dejected Christians, and be not like them that Mourn without Hope this day. Let Bereaved Parents be yet Believing Parents; the Voice of the great God that formed all things is unto them that in Jer. 31. 16. Refrain thy Voice from Weeping, and thine Eyes from Tears, for thy Work shall be Rewarded, saith the Lord.

Well, this is the Calamity which many of you at some time or other have experience of; The Death of Children, this is a thing which the Children of Iacob seldome escape a resemblance of their Father in. Many carry themselves under the tryal, as if, A Death of Vertue, yea as if, A Death of Reason, had therewithal befallen them; but recollect your selves, O dejected Christians, and be not like them that Mourn without Hope this day. Let Bereaved Parents be yet Believing Parents; the Voice of the great God that formed all things is unto them that in Ier. 31. 16. Refrain thy Voice from Weeping, and thine Eyes from Tears, for thy Work shall be Rewarded, saith the Lord.

Let the Thoughts which have been this day tendered unto our Improvement, gloriously ⟨p. 48⟩compose and settle our Roiled minds under this Affliction. Let us not say, This thing is Against us; but let us say, The Lord that hath given hath also taken away, blessed be the name of the Lord. It is indeed very true, That this Affliction is none of the most easy to be born; the Heart of a Parent will have peculiar Passions working in it, and racking of it, at such a time as this. Though there be greater Sorrows than those with which we follow a Child unto the Grave; I bless God, it is a more bitter thing to say, My Sin is mighty, or to say, My Soul is guilty, than it is to say, My Child is Dead; that moan, I have pierced my Saviour, is more Heart-wounding than to Mourn as one mourneth for a Firstborn. Yet few outward Earthly Anguishes are equal unto these. The Dying of a Child is like the Tearing off a Limb, unto us. But, O remember, That if ever we had any Grace in our Souls, we have ere this willingly plucked out a Right Eye, and cut off a Right Hand, for the sake of God. Why should we not then at the Call of God readily part with a Limb, and leave Him room to say, Now I know that thou fearest me, because thou hast not withheld thy Child when I called for it! It was