N00941:68
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.
A Serious and a thorough Trial of our selves, is a duty at all Times necessary for us. It is required with a repeated Admonition, 2 Cor. 13. 5. Examine your own selves, prove your own selves. We are to Try our selves; But Why so? That so we may to […] our ⟨p. 33⟩selves. We are to Try our selves, least we perish going astray in the greatness of our Folly; least a deceived Heart may turn us aside, while we are unable to say, Is there not a lye in my right hand? But the Trial of our selves is of a special importance in our Preparation for the Table of the Lord. Thus it is inculcated, I Cor. 11. 28. Let a man Examine himself and so let him eat of that Bread and drink of that Cup. We are then to Try our selves with a more peculiar Exactness in our scrutiny. But why so? Lest we be the Unworthy receivers of the Mysteries; lest we be found without a Wedding Garment at the Feast of the Immoral King; lest we do but Eat Judgment to our selves by Sacramental Profanations. Having thus advanced this point, that Self Trial is always a needful, and n•w a most needful thing, I am to tell you that among all the Marks for our Trial of our selves, none are more sensible than those that are drawn from our behaviour under our Trials from the Hand of God. We are to Try our selves, whether we Fear God, or no; and that will be best known by our carriage when God is by Afflictions Trying of us. An instance thereof we have in the words newly read ⟨p. 34⟩unto us. In the Context, we have the Story of Abraham offering up his Isaac unto God, at the Call of the Lord. Our Father Abraham underwent Nine very Famous Trials from the all-wise God; But he was now brought unto a Tenth. We have our Father Abraham here Tried, every vein of his heart; and it was under the consideration of a Father, that he underwent the Trial. The Trial ordered for that great man of God, was a most afflictive Trial. It was that of parting with a Child singularly dear unto him. You shall hear the demand of God, are hear so many claps of Thunder in every article of that Command; seven or eight very penetrating stings methinks aculeate it. Cen. 22. 2 Take now thy Son, thine only Son, Isaac, whom thou lovest, & get thee into the Land of Moriah, and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the Mountains which I will tell thee of. Here was the demand. There follow in the Story especially two things.