A discourse concerning old-age tending to the instruction, caution and comfort of aged persons…

And though your Years may dispose you to Drowsiness in the service of God, yet they will not wholly excuse you. We read but of one person in the Bible, that slept at Sermon, and he was taken up dead thereby, Act. 20. 9. It is a sin charged on them of old, Isa. 64. 7. There is none that calleth on thy name, that stirreth up himself to take hold on thee. You should use all possible means to shake off that drowsy distemper, and set the holy God before you, and remember that your own cause is still pleading or trying; that the diligent hand makes rich in this world, and the diligent heart rich for ever; and that Grace and Comfort are like the Manna, which was to be gathered early, or else it vanished: ⟨p. 283⟩they that loved their beds, starved their bellies. How much good might you do and get, notwithstanding your years, if you would shake off that slothful distemper, that haunts. you? how many have lamented at their end their loss of time? Nothing so much troubled that Excellent Preacher, Dr. Robert Harris, when he was on his death-bed, as Loss of time. Rouse up then your benumbed spirits, your time of Action will last but a while. Consider, wherein you are capable to serve your generation by the will of God, and up and be doing. The Grave will be most irksome to the loiterer, but most welcome to the labourer, for there the weary, and only they will be at rest.

And though your Years may dispose you to Drowsiness in the service of God, yet they will not wholly excuse you. We read but of one person in the Bible, that slept at Sermon, and he was taken up dead thereby, Act. 20. 9. It is a sin charged on them of old, Isa. 64. 7. There is none that calleth on thy name, that stirreth up himself to take hold on thee. You should use all possible means to shake off that drowsie distemper, and set the holy God before you, and remember that your own cause is still pleading or trying; that the diligent hand makes rich in this world, and the diligent heart rich for ever; and that Grace and Comfort are like the Manna, which was to be gather'd early, or else it vanished: ⟨p. 283⟩