The mourners cordial against excessive sorrow discovering what grounds of hope Gods people have…

USE I.

VSE I.

For Information; learn hence▪

1. The great advantage that Gods people enjoy by the Gospel; and truly it is that which gives the Gospel no small commendation to the hearts of the Children of men; the consideration that it affords to men such an hope, from whence they may be deriving of those conclusions, the right improvement whereof will help to swallow up a great part of their sorrow, and make their Mourning to be comparatively next unto none: it provides and supplies us with such matter for hope to live upon, as hath solidity in it: humane ⟨p. 118⟩reason hath strained it self in seeking •o find out many arguments wherewith to stop the current of sorrow, but it could never make a discovery of such as the Word of God hath furnished his people withal: and the Children of God have a great deal of reason to bless him for it, who have so much of occasion to be making use of it; who live among so many deaths, and are so often called into mourning over their choice Friends and Relations, whom Gods Providence is from time to time snatching out of their arms and embraces: and truly, if the Gospel did not afford a better hope to them, than what carnal reason doth suggest, it would leave them more miserable and sorrowful than other m•n. They are but dark notions which the Gentiles have groped out by their best improvement of the light of nature, concerning the after stae of men, and therefore their solicitude about it cannot be so great: but they that enjoy the Scriptures, and live under the means of grace have more clear and distinct discoveries of an after Eternity which all men pass into by dying, and of the great miseries which then meet and fall upon such as die in ther unregeneracy and if they had not a better prospect of the glories which are prepared for all those that die in Christ, these thoughts would more terribly cruciate their