N00941:92
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.
Quest. VI. Do none of our Trials hinder us from adoring the Goodness where with we are very much attended, notwithstanding our Trials? It is a strange Folly in us, that in one Grave we commonly bury all our Comforts. Though God has given us thousands of Comforts, yet, it we open one Grave to lay one of them there, we foolishly throw in all the rest. Oh foolish people and unwise! But instead of that, say we like the Lamenting Church, Lam. 3. 27. It is of the Lords Mercies, that we are not consumed! We have many Mercies round about us, under our Afflictions? Do we see them, and own them? or, Do we make fit Comparisons of our Condition? Do we say, Though it be bad with me, it may be ⟨p. 53⟩'tis worse with them that are better than I? Though things go bad with me, yet there are those that never Sinned as I have done, I should be loth to change with them Says Job, Shall we receive good at the hands of God, and shall we not receive evil? In our Afflictions do we think, that we receive more good than evil, and we have more Delights about us than we, have Sorrows? And do we think, That we don't know when we receive Good and when Evil? Our Lord said to him of old, What I do thou knowest not now, but thou shalt know hereafter, So, It may be hereafter I may know that this is best. Jacob egregiously mistook when he said, Joseph is not, and Simeon is not, all those things are against me. Instead of saying, all these things are against me, we should say, It may be God intends them all for my good. If it be thus, now I know that thou fearest God.
Quest. VI. Do none of our Tryals hinder us from adoring the Goodness where with we are very much attended, notwithstanding our Tryals? It is a strange Folly in us, that in one Grave we commonly bury all our Comforts. Though God has given us thousands of Comforts, yet, it we open one Grave to lay one of them there, we foolishly throw in all the rest. Oh foolish people and unwise! But instead of that, say we like the Lamenting Church, Lam. 3. 27. It is of the Lords Mercies, that we are not consumed! We have many Mercies round about us, under our Afflictions? Do we see them, and own them? or, Do we make fit Comparisons of our Condition? Do we say, Though it be bad with me, it may be ⟨p. 53⟩