N00941:80
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.
2. Every Affliction that comes on good men has in it a Trial of those men. Our Afflictions are our Probations, Indeed all the Providence of God unto the Children of men are Probations. Our Enjoyments are our Trials. 'Tis said, Prov. 27. 21. As the fining pet for silver, and the furnace for Gold so is a man to his praise. I choose to read it this, So the mouth that praises any one is to try him. When we are praised by our Neighbours, we are Tried in those praises. And thus, when we are Blessed by our Maker we are tried in those blessings. Honours from below, they do, Indicare virum, or Try what metal the man is made of; they Try whether the man can bear Sail without Over setting, and have power to oppress without growing absolutely mad: So Mercies from above, do the like. In our Mercies, God deals with us as with the Soldiers of Gideon at the Waters; as God carried the Soldiers to the Waters, and said, Now I will try them there; so does our God bring us to the Rivers of plenty, and says, I will Try them there. By Prosperity our God is trying of us whether we will hear him speaking to us in our Prosperity: and, ⟨p. 42⟩whether when we wa• fat we will grow wanton and kick against him, or no. Our Afflictions too are our Trials. 'Tis said Jer 7 9. Behold, I will melt them, and I will try them. How does he do that […] By putting us into melting Afflictions When one Affliction after another shall melt away those things we have a kindness for, then we are Tried unto the uttermost. Here is the Trial of our Faith and Patience. Thus we read, I Pet. 1 6, 7, Ye are in heaviness if need be through manifold Temptations, that the Trial of your Faith which is much more precious than Gold might be found unto praise at the appearing of Jesus Christ. Our Afflictions are our Trials we are thrown into a fiery Furnace when Tried by God with Afflictions. A Sick bed, a Reproach, a Loss, is a Furnace. In that Furnace 'tis tried how much […] is in us, and how much gold The Afflicted may say, as Psal. 66. 10. 11 Thou O God, hast purged us, Tried us as silver, thou […] afflictions on our […] God is now Trying us whether we will despise the Chastening of the Lord, or faint when rebuked of him. God is now Trying us whether we will Glorify him in the Fire, or no.