N00941:128
Meat out of the eater. Or, Funeral-discourses occasioned by the death of several relatives.…
Meat out of the eater. Or, Funeral-discourses occasioned by the death of several relatives. Work accommodated unto the service of all that are in any affliction; but very particularly such as are afflicted with the loss of their consorts or children. / By Cotton Mather. ; [Four lines from I Corinthians]
Boston: printed by B. Green & J. Allen for Benjamin Eliot, 1703
Title page typeset from the transcription.
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.
What is that Glorious HEAVEN, where to Heavenly Spirits, do go away?
Now the First Answer which I have to give you, and the Fit Answer, is, That on this side of Heaven you must not Expect a Full Answer. The Things of Heaven are such as are pronounced by one that had been there; a Cor 12.4 Unutterable Things. Our Notions of Things, while we are on ⟨p. 73⟩Earth, are marvellously limited by our Conversation with Earthly Objects. The Nature of Heaven, alas, we cannot see it, but with Colours and with Glosses fetched from Earth; and you may be sure, They are gross enough! We must confess, 1 Cor. 2 9 Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the Heart of man, the Things which God hath prepared for them that Love Him. They are, as one well says, Far more above the highest Ascent of our Thoughts than the Marriage Feast of a King, exceeds in magnificence, the Imagination of one that has always lived in an obscure Village, that never saw any ornaments of State, nor tasted wine in his life. The most Effectual, and the most compendious way, to learn what Heaven is, will be, by Religion to walk in the way to Heaven. Scies cum Fies. Let us make sure of Heaven, by the methods plainly enough described in the Word of God, & it will not be long before we shall have a very comfortable Description of Heaven made unto us; even in our own Admission to the Comforts of it.
Now the First Answer which I have to give you, and the Fit Answer, is, That on this side of Heaven you must not Expect a Full Answer. The Things of Heaven are such as are pronounced by one that had been there; a Cor 12.4 Unutterable Things. Our Notions of Things, while we are on ⟨p. 73⟩Earth, are marvellously limited by our Conversation with Earthly Objects. The Nature of Heaven, alas, we cannot see it, but with Colours and with Glosses fetched from Earth; and you may be sure, They are gross enough! We must confess,