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DISCOURSE II.

THE WATCHFUL CHRISTIAN DYING IN PEACE.

OCCASIONED

BY THE DECEASE OF MRS. SARAH ABNEY,

Daughter of the late Sir THOMAS ABNEY, Knt. &c.
Preached April 2, 1732.

Dedicated to the Lady ABNEY, Mother of the deceased, and to Mrs. MARY and Mrs. ELIZABETH ABNEY, her two surviving Sisters.

MADAM,

IF sorrows could be diminished in proportion to the multitude of those who share in them, the spring of your tears would have been drawn almost dry, and the tide of grief have sunk low, by being divided into a thousand streams. But though this cannot afford perfect relief to your Ladyship, yet it must be some consolation to have been blessed with a daughter, whose removal from our world could give occasion for so general a mourning.

I confess, Madam, the wound which was made by such a smarting stroke is not to be healed in a day or two, reason permits some risings of the softer and kinder passions in such a season; it shews at least that our hearts are not marble, and reveals the tender

ingredients that are moulded up in our frame; nor does religion permit us to be insensible when a God afflicts, though he doth it with the hand of a father and a friend. Nature and love are full of these sensibilities, and incline you to miss her presence in every place where she was wont to attend you, and where you rejoiced in her as one of your dearest blessings. She is taken away indeed from mortal sight, and to follow her remains to the grave, and to dwell there, gives but a dark and melancholy view, till the great rising-day. Faith may ken the distant prospect, and exult in the sight of that glorious futurity; yet I think there is also a nearer relief, Madam, to your sorrows. By the virtues which shone in her life, you may trace the ascent of her spirit to the world of immortality and joy. Could your Ladyship keep the eye of your soul directed thither, you would find it an effectual balm for a heart that bleeds at the painful remembrance of her death. What could your Ladyship have asked as a higher favour of heaven, than to have born and trained up a child for that glorious inheritance, and to have her secured of the possession beyond all possible fear or danger of losing it.

This, Madam, is your own divinest hope for yourself, and you are hastening on toward that blessed society as fast as days and hours give leave. When your thoughts descend to this lower world again, there are two living comforts near you of the same kind with what you have lost: May your Ladyship rejoice in them yet many years, and they in you! And when Jesus, who hath the keys of death and the invisible

state, shall appoint the hour for your ascent to heaven, may you leave them behind to bless the world with fair examples of virtue and piety among men, and a long train of services for the interest of their Redeemer.

you

If I were to say any thing, Young Ladies, to you in particular, it should be in the language of our Saviour, and his beloved Apostle, "Hold fast what have till the Lord comes, that none may deprive you of your crown. Take heed to yourselves, that you lose not the things which you have wrought, but that ye receive a full reward." Go on and persevere as you have begun, in the path of true religion and happiness: And in this age of infidelity and degenerate life, be ye daily more established in the Christian faith and practice, in opposition to the smiles and frowns, and every snare of a vain delusive world. Let this one thought set a double guard upon you, that while your elder sister was with you, it was something easier to resist every temptation, when she had pronounced the first refusal: Her steadiness was a guard which you have now lost, but you have an Almighty God in covenant on your side, and the "grace of our Lord Jesus is sufficient for you,"

To his care, My Lady, I commend yourself, and your whole family, with affectionate petitions: And am,

MADAM,

Your Ladyship's most obliged
and faithful Servant,

London, April 28, 1732.

I. WATTS.

THE

WATCHFUL CHRISTIAN DYING IN PEACE.

A FUNERAL SERMON, &c.

IT is an awful providence which hath lately removed from among us a young person well known to most of you, whose agreeable temper and conduct had gained the esteem of all her acquaintance, whose constitution of body, together with the furniture of her mind, and circumstances in the world, concurred to promise many future years of life and usefulness. But all that is born of the race of man is frail and mortal, and all that is done by the hand of God is wise and holy. We mourn, and we submit in silence. Yet the providence hath a voice in it, and the friends of the deceased are very solicitous that such an unexpected and instructive appearance of death, might be religiously improved to the benefit of the living. For this end I am desired to entertain you at present with some meditations on those words of our Saviour, which you read in

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Blessed are these servants, whom the Lord, when he cometh, shall find watching.

VARIOUS and well chosen are those parables whereby our Saviour gave warning to his disciples,

that when he was departed from this world they should ever be upon their guard, and always in a readiness to receive him at his return: Because he would come on a sudden, and "in such an hour as they thought not," to demand an account of their behaviour, and to distribute his recompences according to their works. There are two of these parables in this chapter: But to enter into a detail of all the particular metaphors which relate to this one, whence I have borrowed my text, would be too tedious here, and would spend too much of the present hour. Without any longer preface therefore, I shall apply myself to improve the words to our spiritual profit in the following method.

I. I shall enquire what is meant by the 'coming of Christ' in the text, and how it may be properly applied to our present purpose, or the hour of death."

II. I shall consider what is implied in the watchfulness which our Saviour recommends.

III. I propose some considerations which will discover the blessedness of the watchful soul' in a dying hour.

IV. I shall add some practical remarks.

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First, Let us enquire what is meant by the coming of Christ' in my text.

The coming of Christ,' in some of these parables, may have reference to his speedy appearance in the course of his providence in that very age, to judge

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