xliv THE DEAD MAN'S REAL SPEECH. noble relations of the great man deceased, as to believe that if they could with their wishes and tears waft him over back from heaven to labour again on earth, they would not do it, if they loved him indeed, and not rather themselves. It is an excellent observation of Isidored Pelusiota-he lived above twelve hundred years ago-who commenting on these words of our Saviour's compassion for Lazarus expressed by His tears, that it was not at the death of Lazarus, but that it was Joh.11.35. at his resurrection that Jesus wept,' a real demonstration of His humanity, both natural and moral. This Father's note upon that difference is this, that our Saviour Christ's love towards Lazarus was a rational love, yea a divine love, not as ours towards our dead friends too too oft, too carnal or natural, or at the best a human love, if not a self-love; we wish them alive for our own ends. True it is, that it is very lawful, and also very fit, to pay our deceased friends their due tribute of grief, and to let nature have her course, lest Rom.1.31. we should seem or appear without natural affection; but ἄστοργοι provided always that the current of nature do not overflow the banks of reason, much more the banks of religion settled by St. Paul, who would not have Christians to be sorry for 1 Thes. 4. their deceased friends, as others who have no hope; for there is a lively hope of a joyful meeting again in the state of glory, if we in the state of grace do follow the saints deceased. Upon this consideration is worth the observing the different manner of mourning of Joseph for his father Gen. 50. Jacob, his dear and near relation, for Joseph mourned seven days only; and of the Egyptians mourning seventy days for the same Jacob, a stranger to them. The reason of the difference is, because the Egyptians were unbelievers; but Joseph was a believer of the resurrection, and of a glorious meeting once again with his deceased father, from thenceforth never to be separated. This posy of sacred meditations I do now present to the noble relations of the deceased; desiring them to accept this offer, and to use it as a spiritual handkerchief to wipe off, if not drain, the spring of tears for this their deceased support. 13. 3, 10. 6. Meanwhile our main care must be not to forfeit that d [Isid. Pelus. Epist. Theodosio presbytero, διὰ τὶ ἐπὶ Λαζάρῳ ἐδάκρυσεν Kúpios. Lib. iii. ep. 173. p. 207. edit. fol. Par. 1638.] glorious meeting by a course of life contrary to the good example of the saints departed; but instantly to resolve earnestly to study, constantly to endeavour, to live well, that is to say, to make the will of God the rule of our life, and the honour of God the end of our life; this is to live unto Rom. 14. the Lord, that is, in subjection unto Him; and then we may be sure to die in the Lord, that is, under His protection, both of body and soul, for evermore. 7. You may be pleased to remember that our text was two-faced, and therefore we compared it to the Israelites' guide through the wilderness, a cloud; we are now past the dark side of it, death, he being dead.' We must now face about and cheerfully behold the bright side of the cloud, wherein the dead speaketh, and here we have 1. The speaker, 'he.' 2. The speech implied, 'he speaketh.' 3. The time expressed, 'yet;' that is, after death: 'He being dead, yet speaketh.' 7, 8. [i. e. Eccl. 12.7. 8. First, the speaker is Abel, whose name bears mankind's universal motto in the holy tongue, that is, vanity; for when vanity] all is done, 'vanity of vanities, all is vanity,' until the spirit Eccl. 1. 2. of man 'return to God Who gave it;' till then, whatever Ps. 39. 5. pride may prompt vain man, verily every man living in his best estate, is altogether vanity. Selah! Secondly, for his trade, he was a herdsman, for he offered to God the best of his flock, in due homage and as a figure of that Lamb of God Which was to come to 'take away the Joh. 1. 29. sins of the world.' No doubt he was well instructed by his parents, Adam and Eve, of whose conversion and salvation to doubt, (since the promise of the Blessed Seed preached unto Gen. 3. 15. them by Almighty God Himself after their fall, and which we must in reason suppose was apprehended and applied by them to themselves through faith, lest God's preaching should prove vain such a suspicion or doubt of their eternal state) were in us, their posterity, an odious want of charity, and against the current of the ancient Fathers, who give for it this probable reason, that God did expressly curse the serpent and the earth, but God did not at all curse either Adam or Eve; vii. § 112. edit. fol. Colon. 1622.] e : Iren. Epiph. Chrysost. Augustin. &c. [See Perer. in Genes., cap. v. lib. 41. xlvi THE DEAD MAN'S REAL SPEECH. but contrariwise, God in mercy did bestow upon Adam and Eve the original and fundamental blessing of the Promised Seed, the Messiah, which is Christ Jesus our Lord and Saviour, in Whom all Adam and Eve's posterity should be blessed. And therefore they are not to be concluded within the number of the damned crew, upon whom shall be proMat. 25. nounced that dreadful final sentence of Ite maledicti; 'Go ye cursed.' As a clear evidence of Adam and Eve's faith, we produce their works, namely the godly education of their children, Cain and Abel, in God's true religion, to offer corporal sacrifices &c., with a spiritual reference, and therefore with faith in the only expiatory and satisfactory sacrifice to Gal. 4. 4. be performed in the fulness of time by the person of the Messiah, the second Adam, for the saving of mankind, as the first Adam was in the damning of mankind; both the Adams being public representatives of all mankind, as the first in the fall, so the second in the resurrection. 9. This just apology for our first parents, Adam and Eve, I thought it my filial duty to offer unto all mankind, Adam's offspring; once for all to stop the mouths of censorious children unmindful of their original duty, and of the rule Gen. 9.22, parentum mores non sunt arguendi. Shem and Japhet were blessed for turning away their faces from their father's nakedness; but wicked Cham was for outfacing it cursed with a grievous curse. 23. ver. 4. 10. It is very observable, that God had respect unto Abel first, and then to his sacrifice; to intimate that God first accepts the person and then his service; for Abel offered by faith, but Cain without faith, for want of which God rejected the person of Cain, (though the elder brother,) and consequently his sacrifice. Hence observe, that two men may come and worship God with the same kind of outward worship, and yet differ much in the inward manner and success of their service to God; witness Cain and Abel in the Old Testament, and the Pub- Lu. 18. lican and the Pharisee in the New. For the true religion is [10.] chiefly inward for the substance, and not only outward for the circumstance and ceremony; the religion of too many, I had almost said of most formal professors now a days; an artificial religion, as being moved chiefly, if not only, by outward respects and objects, without any inward life; the want of which did make a wide difference betwixt Cain, and Abel, the speaker here. From whom to pass unto his speech, we shall interpret it by a threefold exposition. 1. Grammatical. 2. Doctrinal. 3. Moral. 11. As to the grammatical exposition, I am not ignorant that the word aλeira, in the original, may be verbum medium, and so may be translated either in the passive sense 'He is spoken of,' as some few interpreters have rendered it, or in the active sense, to which I am rather carried by the clear and strong current of almost all interpreters, and the harmony of eight translations", both ancient and modern; who all render it actively, 'he speaketh.' This translation is confirmed by a clear parallel (Heb. xii. 24), where comparison being made betwixt the precious blood of Jesus Christ and that of Abel, it is expressed in the active sense λaλoûvтi; not in the passive, that the blood of sprinkling is better spoken of,' but in the active, that 'it speaketh better things than that of Abel.' Ergo, Abel being dead, yet speaketh,' quod erat demonstrandum. Enough of the grammatical exposition. 12. We pass now to the doctrinal exposition. The doctrine is this, that for the godly there is a life after this life; for 'Abel being dead yet speaketh.' But we know that dead men are speechless, and that speech is both a sign and an action of life. Abel is not absolutely dead; though dead in part, he still lives. We enlarge the instance from righteous Abel unto all the faithful; the total sum is this, that though [See Lud. de Dieu Animadv. in Epistolas, p. 321. edit. 1646.] Syriac, Vulgar, Ethiopic, Arabic, French, English, German, Italian; Clem. Alex. Chrysost. Vatablus, Ze- Prov. 31. 31. 13. xlviii THE DEAD MAN'S REAL SPEECH. good men die, yet their good deeds die not; but they survive, and that in both worlds. First, in this world, to their due praise, for 'their own good works praise them in the gates.' Secondly, they live in the next world by their reward and Rev. 14. coronation, for their 'works do follow them.' So many good works, so many living tongues of good men after death; Lu. 20. 36. who are therefore styled in the Holy Gospel 'the children of the resurrection.' And again, Abel still lives unto men in the memory of all good men, for to such the memory of the Prov. 10.7. just shall be blessed, and the memory of their virtues calls for both our commemoration and imitation of them; which leads me to the third point propounded, which was the moral exposition. 13. For I suppose none that hear this are so gross of understanding as to imagine a vocal speech of the dead, which would be a miracle; but a speech analogical, by such Ps. 19. 1. a figure as the heavens speak when they declare the glory of God. The parallel of St. Chrysostom upon the speech of Abel, our speaker in the text, the Father after his wonted rhetoric amplifies it thus; 'If Abel had a thousand voices when he was alive, he hath many more now he is dead,' speaking to our admiration and imitation. But though the dead man's speech be no vocal speech, yet it is and will be a real speech for our conversion or condemnation to the end of the world; for Abel being dead, yet speaketh. First, he speaketh by his repentance implied in his sacrifice, not only for homage due by all rational creatures, whether Angels or men, unto God their creator; but also as a tacit confession of sin to be expiated by the all-sufficient sacrifice of the promised Blessed Seed, the Messiah to come. And so Abel being dead, yet speaketh,' and was by his typical sacrifice the first prophet of the Old Testament. The good examples of holy men are standing real sermons; for there are two ways of preaching; by word, or deed. The first is good, the latter is better; but both are best. Secondly, Abel 'being dead yet speaketh' by his faith expressed here in the text; which faith is a never-dying preacher to all ages of the Church, because it assureth all |