our true Sampson, hath taken away the gates of hell, and hath carried them up to the highest summit of glory: wherefore, instead of looking upon them, as heretofore, with horror, as the gates of hell, let us now contemplate them with raptures of joy, crying out as Jacob did at Bethel, This is the gate of heaven, Gen. xxviii. 17.

Seeing therefore, that this is the nature of death, I think that men commonly make it too great concessions, and that we should by no means affirm those to be dead, whom God hath gathered into the bundle of life: for denominations should always be taken from principal parts. As it is in nature, there is no generation without corruption ; and we usually call that a generation, when the thing engendered is more excellent than the thing corrupted; and, on the contrary that corruption, when the thing corrupted excels the thing that is engendered. For the same reason, the change which happens to us when we remove out of this world, should rather be called a life than death. Though our body dies, and rots in the earth, our soul revives, and lives glorious in heaven; and this life which we leave here below amongst men, is nothing, in comparison with that which we shall enjoy above with Christ and his holy angels. God styles himself the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, Exod. iii. 6.

Now he is not the God of the dead, but of the living, Matth. xxii. 32.

I may also, without any hyperbole, affirm, that, even with respect to the body, the change which befals us, when we leave this world, is not properly death, but a kind of sleep; as it is said in the prophecy of the prophet Daniel, Many sleep in the dust of the earth, ch. xii. 2; and in Isaiah, That the righteous rest in their

beds, ch. lvii. Hence likewise our Lord Jesus Christ, speaking of Jairus's daughter, said, The maid is not dead, but sleepeth, Matth. ix. 24; and of Lazarus his friend, that was laid in the tomb, Our friend Lazarus sleepeth, but I go that I may awake him, John xi. 11. My dear brother, if thou art of the number of those whom Christ loveth, thy death will be but a kind of sleep of short continuance; and in a few days the Lord will raise thee up again: For the hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God; and they that hear shall live, John v. 25.

During the course of this life, the attacks of death are no other than slight skirmishes; the most sensible blow that it strikes, and to appearance the most dangerous, is when it separates the soul from the body; but the final and decisive combat, which shall put an end to all disputes, will not be till the day of judgment, when Christ himself will descend from heaven to assist us, with thousands and ten thousands of his saints. He shall descend with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and the last trumpet shall sound, 1 Thess. iv 16. Then will death make its last efforts. to retain us in its dark prison, and our bones will be found without life or motion; but the spirit of God will breathe upon these dry bones, and they shall live, Ezek. xxxvii. As when the prophet Jonah had lain three days and three nights in the whale's belly, God commanded the fish to vomit him up upon the dry land, ch. ii. 10; so, when we shall have made our abode in the grave, the time that God of his infinite wisdom, hath appointed, Death will be forced to restore all he hath swallowed; and as Daniel came out of the lions' den very early in the morning, without having received any hurt from those savage beasts, Dan.

vi. 23; so at the break of the last day, at the rising of the Son of righteousness, we shall all come out of death's deep dungeon; and as if he had sent his angels on purpose to stop the mouth of this old lion, we shall then find, that we have sustained no harm Instead of devouring us, it will prove a faithful keeper of our bones. The christian may then speak to death in the words of the prophet Micah, Rejoice not against me, O mine enemy? when I fall, I shall arise; when I sit in darkness, the Lord shall be a light unto me, ch. vii. 8; and as Moses said unto Pharaoh, We will go into the wilderness to sacrifice unto our God; we will go out of thine Egypt, with our young, and with our old, with our sons, and with our daughters, with our flocks and with our herds, there shall not an hoof be left behind, Exod. x. 9. Thus we, being armed with an holy confidence, may talk to death; in spite of all thy rage and fury, we will go up into heaven, to sacrifice to our God everlasting praises; we shall get free from thy fetters, we, our wives and our children, our brothers and sisters, our parents and friends, and all the people of God, whom thou at present detainest in thy unrighteous prison. Notwithstanding the utmost efforts of thy cruel and infernal power, there shall not remain so much as an handful-no, not so much as the least grain of our ashes behind us.

When the son of God shall appear from heaven, like a consuming fire, he shall burn up in a moment all the trophies of death; and it shall happen to this proud enemy, who tramples upon all mankind, as it happened to the kings of the Amorites mentioned in the Israelitish history, Joshua suffered them to live while he pursued his victory; but as soon as he had entirely defeated the rest of his enemies, he ordered them to be brought out

of the cave, and commanded all his captains to tread upon their necks, and having slain them with his own sword, cast them into the cave, and caused great stones to be laid in the mouth thereof, Josh. x. Thus our true and heavenly Joshua suffers death to reign, while he pursues his conquests; for the last enemy that shall be destroyed is death, 1 Cor. xv. 26. But when he shall have entirely subdued all his other enemies, to crown all his victories with a glorious end, and complete his church's triumph, he shall cause us to trample death under our feet; after which he will cast it into the lake of fire, and the mouth of the bottomless pit shall be shut upon it forever, Rev. xx. Then shall be fully accomplished this glorious prophecy, Death is swallowed up in victory, 1 Cor. xv. 54; for the spirit of God assures us, in express terms, That there shall be no more death, Rev. xxi. 4.

From what hath been said, we may easily understand what is become of this threefold cord, twisted by the devil, with a design to strangle all mankind. The Son of God hath cut in pieces the first of these unhappy bands with the sharp sword of his almighty power. By the spirit of sanctification, he loosens and wears away the second by degrees; and by the last he draws us to himself, and then he burns and consumes them altogether. Therefore we have no occasion to fear an eternal death, nor to tremble, when hell opens its enormous jaws. If we resist the devil, he will flee from us, James iv. 7. and we shall some day bruise him under our feet, Rom. xvi. 20. It is true, the consequences of the spiritual death make us sigh and groan bitterly, while our souls remain in this sinful flesh; for though we are risen from the tombs of our sins, yet we bear about

with us the grave-clothes of our corruption. But we have this consideration to comfort us, that Jesus Christ. will shortly give the same order from heaven concerning us, as he did in the case of Lazarus, Loose him, and let him go, John xi. 44; when instead of these rags of corruption which at present disgrace us, he will clothe us with light and glory, and immortality, and perfect happiness. As to the natural death, we can truly say, that all its bitterness is over, and that our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ hath delivered us from all its terrors. Nay, in my opinion, it is talking too coldly to say that we no longer fear it, and that we expect it with courage for if we are really Christians, and of the number of God's children, we shall hope for and desire it, and hasten its arrival, by our sighs and most passionate wishes.

What I have taken notice of in this chapter, might suffice to furnish any christian soul with ample comforts and consolations against the fears of death. But as one who goes to buy stuffs in a shop, when he cheapens such as are of small value, he only casts his eye slightly upon the piece, or just looks upon some small pattern; but when he is about to purchase a rich tapestry of great price, he desires to see every part of it, one after another, to view it at leisure, and consider all its beauties; so I judge that the pious and sagacious reader will desire; now I have discovered to him in gross this treasury of Consolations against the Fears of Death, that I should in the next place, reveal its hidden excellencies, produce every part of them by degrees to his contemplation, and with my pen remark to him all its most exquisite beauties.