1. It ought to be most remote from us to confine, in our narrow thoughts, sincere religion and godliness to a party, 6. We ought hereupon to acknowledge and adore the distinguished by little things and most extra-essential munificence and power of Divine grace, that it should dethereto. Take we that great apostle's document, I per-sign the making of such abjects as we, fit to be associated ceive God is no respecter of persons; and what he said of with such an assembly, the innumerable company of nations, may not we as aptly say that of all such parties? angels, and the spirits of the just made perfect; and will They that fear God, and work righteousness, are accepted not fail to effect it, if we comply with the apt methods of him, Acts x. appointed for that blessed purpose.

THE GOOD MAN'S DESIRE

OF BEING ABSENT FROM THE BODY, AND PRESENT WITH THE LORD:

A FUNERAL SERMON,

ON THE DEATH OF

MRS. MARGARET BAXTER

SIR,

TO THE VERY REVEREND MR. RICHARD BAXTER.

WHEN you assigned unto me that part, not of forming a memorial for your excellent deceased consort, (which is reserved to the fittest hand,) but of instructing the people upon the occasion of her decease; this text of Scripture occurring also to my thoughts, (which I reckoned might sufficiently agree with the design you generally recommended to me, though I am sensible how little the prosecution did so,) it put me upon considering with how great disadvantage we set ourselves, at any time, to reason against bodily inclination; the great antagonist we have to contend against, in all our ministerial labours! An attempt which, if a higher power set not in with us, looks like the opposing of our faint breath to the steady course of a mighty river!

I have often thought of Cicero's wonder, "That since we consist of a mind, and a body, the skill of curing and preserving the body is so admired, as to have been thought a divine invention; that which refers to the mind is neither so desired, before it be found out, nor so cultivated afterwards, nor is approved and acceptable to so many: yea is even to the most, suspected, and hateful!"

Even the tyrant Phalaris tells one, in an epistle, (though by way of menace,) that whereas a good physician may cure a distempered body, death is the only physician for a distempered mind. It works not indeed a universal cure. But of such on whom it may, how few are there that count not the remedy worse than the disease! Yet how many thousands are there, that for greater hoped bodily advantages, afterwards, endure much more pain and trouble than there is in dying!

We are a mysterious sort of creatures! Yet I acknowledge the wisdom of God is great and admirable, in planting in our natures so strong a love of this bodily life, without which the best would be more impatient of living on earth, so long as God thinks it requisite they should; and to the worst, death would not be a sufficiently formidable punishment; and consequently human laws and justice would be, in great part, eluded.

And the same Divine wisdom is not less admirable, in providing there should so generally be so much of mutual love, as doth obtain among near friends and relatives; for thereby their cohabitation and mutual offices towards each other are made more pleasant and easy; which is a great compensation for the concomitant evil, that by the same love their parting with one another cannot but be rendered grievous.

But for you, who live so much upon the borders, and in the pleasant view of the other state: the one separation is, I doubt not, much easier to your sense, and the other to your fore-thoughts, than they are with the most. A perfect indifferency towards this present bodily state and life, is, in mine eyes, a most covetable thing, and my daily aim; wherein I entreat your prayers may assist Your most respectful, though most unworthy fellow-servant, and expectant in the work and hope of the Gospel,

J. H.

2 CORINTHIANS V. 8.

WE ARE CONFIDENT, I SAY, AND WILLING RATHER TO BE ABSENT FROM THE BODY, AND TO BE PRESENT WITH THE LORD.

THE solemn face of this assembly seems to tell me, that you already know the present, special occasion of it; and that I scarce need to tell any of you, that our worthy, honoured friend, Mrs. Baxter, is dead. You have ('tis like most of you) often met her in this place, when her pleased looks were wont to show what delight she took to have many share in those great advantages, wherein she had a more peculiar interest; you are now to meet her here no more, but are met yourselves to lament together, that our world hath lost so desirable an inhabitant; and to learn

(as I hope you design) what so instructive an occasion shall (of itself, or as it may be improved) serve to teach us. It doth of itself most obviously teach the common document, that we, who are of the same make and mould, must all die too. And our own prudence should hereupon advance one step further, and apprehend it a most covetable thing, that the temper of our minds might comply with this unalterable state of our case; and that we be in a disposition, since we must die, to die willingly, and with our own consent. Nothing can be more irrational, or un

happy, than to be engaged in a continual quarrel with ne- my heart is glad, my glory rejoices, my flesh also shall rest cessity, which will prevail, and be too hard for us at last. in hope. For thou wilt not leave my soul in sheol, the No course is so wise in itself, or good for us, as to be re-state of the dead, nor suffer thine Holy One to see corrup conciled to what we cannot avoid; to bear a facile yield- tion, but wilt show me the path of life; and no matter ing mind towards a determination, which admits of no re- though it lie through the dark shady vale, it leads however peal. into that blessed presence of thine (the same with that in And the subject, now to be insisted on, may help us to the text) where is fulness of joy; and unto that right-hand improve the sad occasion to this very important purpose; (that high and honourable station) where are pleasures for and show us that dying, which cannot be willed for itself, evermore. Both these, the apostle's courage and fortitude, may be joined with somewhat else which may, and ought and his complacency or well-pleasedness, have express reto be so; and in that conjunction become the object of a ference to the state of death, or of being absent from the rational and most complacential willingness. A subject body. The one respects it as a formidable (but superable) recommended to me (though not the special text) by one, evil, the other as a desirable and most delectable good. than whom I know no man that was better able to make But both have reference to it in its concomitancy, or tena fit choice; as (in the present case) none could have that dency, viz. as absence from the body should be accomparight to choose. I cannot stay to discuss and open the nied (or be immediately followed) with being present with most fruitful, pleasant series of discourse, in the foregoing the Lord. The sense therefore of the whole verse may be verses, though there will be occasion to reflect somewhat fitly expressed thus :-That it is the genuine temper of holy upon it by and by; but, in the text, the apostle asserts two souls, not only to venture with confidence upon the state things concerning the temper of his spirit, in reference to of absence, or separation from the body; but to choose it death: His confidence, and complacency, Oappoùμev, kaí ¿v- with great complacency and gladness, that they may be δοκοῦμεν. present with the Lord.

First, His confidence, or his courage and fortitude, “We are confident, I say." He had said it before, ver. 6. We are always confident; and assigned the cause, Knowing that while we are present in the body we are absent from the Lord. And declared the kind of that knowledge, (viz. which he had of that presence of the Lord, whereof he was deprived, by being present in the body,) that is, that it was the knowledge of faith, not of sight, ver. 7. Now here he adds, We are confident, I say. It notes a deliberate courage, and the fixedness of it; that it was not a sudden fit, a passion soon over. He had said above, Cappoùvres návrore, We are confident at all times; it was his habitual temper. And here the ingemination signifies increase, as if he had sail, We grow more and more bold, and adventurous, while we consider the state of our case, and what we suffer by our presence in the body. Sense of injury or damage heightens, and adds an edge unto true valour. We would venture upon a thousand deaths, if the matter were left entirely to our own option, rather than be thus withheld any longer from the presence of our blessed Lord; a thing whereof nothing but duty to him could make us patient. We are not destitute of the fortitude to enable us even to rush upon death, without more ado, if he did say the word; but as yet he bids us stay, and his supreme and holy will must in all things determine ours. Therefore 'tis immediately subjoined, in the midst of this high transport, ver. 9. Wherefore we labour, that whether present or absent, we might be accepted of him, or well-pleasing to him (¿vapeṣọi dvr@ eivai.) We less mind the pleasing ourselves, than him. We are indifferent to life or death, being in the body, or out of it, in comparison of that; his pleasure is more to us than either. Here the highest fortitude yields and submits itself, otherwise, and for his own part, and as to what concerned his own inclination singly, and in the divided sense, the apostle to his confidence doth,

Secondly, Add complacency. We are better pleased (¿vdoxovμev pádλov.) This is a distinct thing, (a valiant man will venture upon wounds and death, but is not pleased with them,) but in reference to so excellent an object, and occasion, they must mingle, and the latter runs into the former. We are willing rather (as we read it) to be absent from the body, and present with the Lord. The word which we read willing, signifies to approve or like well, not a merely judicious, but complacential approbation; the word, whence comes the vdoxía often ascribed to God in Scripture, which signifies the high satisfaction he takes in all his purposes and determinations. The ivdoxía eλiparos, Ephes. i. 5. is certainly no tautology, but speaks how perfectly and pleasingly he agrees, and (as it were) consents with himself, in all that ever he had resolved on. This rather, says the apostle, is our ivdoxía, the thing that would please us best, and wherein we should most highly satisfy ourselves. It would not be the matter of our submission only, or whereto we could yield, when we cannot help it; but of our highest joy and pleasure. According as we find it was with the Psalmist, (Psalm xvi.) in the same case, (which though it had a further meaning in reference to Christ, had a true meaning as to himself also,) Therefore

Body, we are not here to understand so generally, as if he affected, or counted upon a perpetual final state of se paration from any body at all. No, the temper of his spirit had nothing in it so undutiful, or unnatural; no such re luctation, or disposition to contend against the common lot of man, the law of human nature, and the comely order which the Author of our beings, and of all nature, hath settled in the universe; that whereas one sort of creatures, that have life, should be wholly confined to terrestrial bodies; another, quite exempt from them; ours should be a middle nature, between the angelical and the brutal. So as we should, with the former, partake of intellectual, immortal spirit; and a mortal body made up and organized of earthly materials, with the latter: which yet we might also depose, and reassume, changed and refined from terrene dross. The apostle's temper hath in it nothing of rebellion, or regret against this most apt and congruous order and constitution; he had no impatient proud resentment of that gradual debasement and inferiority that, in this respect, we are made a little lower than the angels. When Porphyry tells us, in the life of Plotinus, that he blushed as often as he thought of his being a body, it was agreeable enough to his notion of the pre-existence of the soul; i. e. if it were true, that the original state of human spirits was the same with that of angels, (which this is no fit season to dispute against,) and that by their own fault, some way or other, they lapsed and slid down into grosser matter, and were caught into vital union with it, there was just cause of shame indeed. Apuleius's transformation (which many of you know what it means) if it had been real, was not more ignominious.

But it appears the apostle affected not a state, wherein he should be simply naked, or unclothed of any body at all; for he longs to be clothed upon with his heavenly house, ver. 2. And whereas he tells us, ver. 4. that which he groaned for, was not to be unclothed, but clothed upon; that being unclothed, doth not mean the act, but the state, i. e. that he did not covet or aspire to a perpetual final state of being naked, or without any body at all. For so he speaks, ver. 3. If so be (as we read) that being clothed, we shall not be found naked. The particle ciye admits to be read, since that, inasmuch as, for truly; and so the 2d and 3d verses will be connected thus; In this, (ver. 2.) i. e. for this, viz. for this cause, as often signifies casualty (not in this house, for Tour and dikia will not agree,) we groan, earnestly desiring to be clothed upon with our house which is from heaven, i.e. of heaven, or suitable to heaven (& denotes here, as often, the matter whereof a thing is formed and made,) a body made up of a heavenly material; or (which is all one) an earthly body refined, and transformed into such an one. And then he subjoins the reason why his desire is so conditioned, and limited, or runs only in this particular current, to have not no body at all, but only not such a body. He wishes to have a body made more habile, and commodious, and fitter for the uses of a glorified soul; (which hath its own more inward clothing peculiar to itself, in respect whereof that of such a body would be an additional one, a superin vestiture,

as the word revoúcaobaι imports;) his desire is thus limit- | while that remains in a due temper, it cannot by any art ed and modified for this reason." Inasmuch as, being thus or power free itself! It can by any act of the will move a clothed, we shall not be found naked, ver. 3. or without hand, or foot, or the whole body; but cannot move from any body at all; which the law of our creation admits us it one inch. If it move hither and thither, or by a leap not to effect, or aspire unto. And therefore in qualifying upward to ascend a little, the body still follows; it cannot our desire thus, we shall contain ourselves within our own shake or throw it cff. We cannot take ourselves out; by bounds, and not offer any thing whereof humanity is, by any allowable means we cannot, nor by any at all (that are the Creator's pleasure and constitution, incapable. There- at least within mere human power) as long as the temperfore he inculcates the same thing over again. We groan ament lasts. While that remains, we cannot go; if that not to be unclothed, but only to be clothed upon; ver. 4. fail, we cannot stay; hough there be so many open avewhere that unclothed (the thing he desired not) must sig- nues, (could we suppose any material bounds to hem in, nify the state and not the act only, is evident; in that be- or exclude a spiri,) we cannot go out or in at pleasure. A ing clothed (the thing which he did desire) must plainly wonderful thing and I wonder we no more wonder at be so understood. For was it only an entrance into glory our own make and frame in this respect, that we do not, he desired, and not continuance in a glorified state? Nor with reverent submissive adoration, discern and confess can this being unclothed much less refer as an act to the how far we are outwitted and overpowered by our wise present clothing of this earthly body, as if it were our be- and great Creator; that we not only cannot undo his work ing divested of that which he intended in this 4th verse, as upon us in this respect, but that we cannot so much as unthe thing he desired not, for then the 4th verse would con- derstand it. What so much akin are a mind and a piece tradict this 8th, where he tells us he did desire it. The of earth, a clod and a thought, that they should be thus meaning then is, that he did not desire to be exempted from affixed to one another; or that there should be such a wearing a body, or to be without any at all; he did only thing in nature as thinking clay! But hereupon, what adcovet to be absent from this body (gross and terrene as vantage hath this baly upon the soul and spirit! In the nanow it was) that he might be present with the Lord; with tural union is grounded a moral one, of love and affection; which he found being in such a body, and in the several which (on the soul's part) draws and binds it down with accompanying circumstances of this bodily state, to be in- mighty efficacy. · consistent. Wherefore it was a terrestrial body (the earthly house of this tabernacle, as 'tis ver. 1.) which he was now better pleased to quit upon this account.

And I say it is the genuine temper of a holy soul to be like-minded, not their constant, explicit, discernible sense. We must allow for accidents, (as we shall note afterwards,) but when they are themselves and in their right mind, and so far as the holy divine life doth prevail in them, this is their temper.

And now, that I may more fully open this matter to you, I shall,

I. Endeavour to unfold, somewhat more distinctly, the state of the case, in reference whereto good and holy souls are thus affected.

II. Shall show you what is their true and genuine temper, or how it is that they stand affected, in reference to

that case.

III. Shall discover, how agreeable this temper is to the general frame and complexion of a holy soul.

And then make such reflections upon the whole, as may be more especially useful to ourselves.

I. We are to take, as much as we can, a distinct view and state of the case. We see the apostle speaks by way of comparison, ¿vdokovμev pâdλov, we are willing rather. We are therefore to consider (that we may comprehend clearly the true state of this case) what the things are which he compares; and between which his mind might be supposed, as it were, to have been before (at least in order of nature before) in some suspense, till at last it come so complacentially to incline, and be determined this one way. Take the account of the whole case in these particulars. 1. There are here two principal terms, between which the motion and inclination of such a mind lies, from the one to the other. The Lord, and the body. Both do as it were attract and draw (or are apt to do) two several ways. The Lord strongly draws on the one hand, and the body hangs on, and holds, and draws in as strongly to itself as it can, on the other. The body as having us present in it. And how? not locally only, but in the way of vital union and communion with it. And that shows how we are to understand being present with the Lord too, not by a mere local presence, but of a more intimate vital union and commerce. Where, as in the union between the soul and body, the more excellent communicates life, the other receives it; so it must be here. Though now the Lord is present thus, in some measure, (which this attraction supposes,) yet speaking comparatively, that presence is absence, in respect to what we are to look for hereafter. Both these unions are very mysterious, and both infer very strong and powerful drawing, or holding together of the things so united.

There is no greater mystery in nature, than the union between the soul and the body. That a mind and spirit should be so tied and linked with a clod of clay, that,

Again, how myserious and ineffable is the union of the Lord and the soul; and how more highly venerable, as this is a sacred mystery! And who would not admire at their proud disdainful folly, that while they cannot explain the union between the soul and body, are ready to jeer at their just, humble, and modest ignorance, that call this other a mystical union? or, because they know not what to make of it, would make nothing, and will not allow there should be any such thing, or would have it be next to nothing. Have those words no sense belonging to them, or not a great sense, (1 Cor. vi. 17.) But he that is joined unto the Lord, is one spirit? And, upon this supernatural union also (be it what it will) methinks the binding and drawing power of love should not be less!

2. We must conceive in our minds as distinctly as we can, the peculiar adjuncts of each of these more principal terms; i. e. on the part of the body first, we are to consider a sensible, a grossly corporeal world, to which this body doth connaturalize us, and whereto we are attempered by our being in the body, and living this bodily life. This body, while we live in it, is the terminus uniens, the medium, the unitive bond between us and it. In this world we find ourselves encompassed with objects that are suitable, grateful, and entertaining to our bodily senses, and the several principles, perceptions, and appetites that belong to the bodily life and these things familiarize and habituate us to this world, and make us, as it were, one with it. There is, particularly, a bodily people, as is intimated in the text, that we are associated with by our being in the body. The words ivdnuñoa and exonuñoat, in this verse, (and the same are used verse the 6th and 9th,) signify there is such a people of which we are, and from which we would be dissociated; vônpos is civis, incola, or indigena, an inhabitant, or native, among this or that people; as exonμos is peregrinus, one that lives abroad and is severed from the people he belonged unto. The apostle considers himself, while in the body, as living among such a sort of people as

dwell in bodies, a like sort of people to himself; and would be no longer a home-dweller with these, but travel away from them, to join and be a dweller with another people.

For also, on the other hand, he considers, with the Lord, an invisible world, where he resides; and an incorporeal people, he presides over. So that the case here is, are we willing to be dispeopled from this bodily sort of people, and peopled with that incorporeal sort, the world, and community of spirits?

3. It is further to be considered in this case, that we are related both ways, related to the body, and related to the Lord; to the one people, and the other, the one claims an interest in us, and so doth the other. We have many earthly alliances, 'tis true, and we have many heavenly; we are related to both worlds, and have affairs lying in both. And now what mighty pleadings might the case admit, on the

one hand, and the other? Were the body, apart, capable | we are sure can have no design or inclination to deceive of pleading for itself, to this effect it must bespeak the soul: "I am thy body, I was made and formed for thee, and, someway, by thee. Thou hast so long inhabited and dwelt with me, and in me. Thou art my soal, my life, my strength; if thou be absent, I am a carcase and fall to dirt; and thou wilt be a maimed thing, and scarce thy whole self." But though it cannot dictate, and do not utter such words, nature doth itself plead more strongly than words can.

1. The general frame of a holy soul, as such is natural 4. It is again to be taken into the state of this case, that to it. "Tis not an artificial thing, a piece of mechanism, we have, one way or other, actual present notices of both a lifeless engine, nor a superficial, an external form, an the states, which both sorts of objects, that stand in this evanid impression. It is the effect of a creation, (as Scripcompetition belong unto. Of the one, by sense and ex-ture often speaks,) by which the man become a new creaperience; we so know what it is to live in the body, and in a sensible world, and among a corporeal people: of the other, by faith; by believing as we are told by one that