Religion & morality > Human nature in its fourfold state

Head II. anent Death, anfzvered. 351
to ftrengthen the things that remain ; your fright will
be the lefs, that ye awake from fpiritual fieep, ere
death come to your bed fide : and you ought to lofe
no time, feeing you know not how foon death may
feize you
Cafe 5 It is terrible to think of the other world,
that world of fpirits, which I have fo little acquaint¬
ance with Jnf. Thy heft friend is Lord of that other
world. Abraham’s bofom is kindly, even to thefe
who never faw his face. After death thy foul becomes
capable of converfe with the blefTed inhabitants of that
other world. The fpirits of juft men made perfetT,
were once fuch as thy fpirit now is. And as for the
angels, howfoever they be of a fuperior nature, in
the rank of beings, yet cur nature is dignified above
theirs, in the man Chrift ; and they are, all of them,
thy Lord’s fervants, and fo thy fellow-fervants.
1 Cafe 6. The pangs of death are terrible. Anf. Yet
jnot fo terrible as pangs of confcienpe, caufed by a
ipiercing fenfe of guilt, and apprehenfions of divine
bvrath, with which I luppofe thee to be not altogether
lunacquainted But who would not endure bodily fick-
|iefs, that the foul may become found and every whit
ItwHole ? Each pang of death will fet fin a ftep nearer
idae door ; and with the laft breach, the body of (in will
ureathe out its laft The pains of death will not laft
ong; and the Lord thy God will not leave, but fupport
hee under them.
Cafe 7. But 1 am like to be cut off in the midft of
tiny days. Anf. Do not complain, you will be the
ooner at home . 'You have thereby the advantage of
our fellow-labourers, who were at work before you
a the vineyard God, in the courfe of his providence,
ides fome early in the grave, that they may be taken
way from the evil to come. An early removal out
f this world, prevents much fin and mifery : And they
ave no ground of Complaint, who get the reiidue of
ie:r years in Immanuel’s land. Surely thou Ih.Jt live
0 a long as theu haft work cut out for thee, by the great
G g Matter,