A defense against the dread of death, or, Zach. Crofton's meditations and soliloquies concerning the stroak of death sounded in his ears in the time of his close imprisonment in the Tower of London, anno 1661 and 1662 : digested for his own private staisfaction and support in the vale of the shadow of death, and now made publique for the advantage of such as abide under Gods present visitation in London by the pestilence.

SECT. XVII.

DEath will seperate my soul from my body; * 1.1 it will so: but it can∣not seperate me from God; and that was the design of death; it cannot seperate either the one or the o∣ther from the love of God in Christ Jesus; I am perswaded nei∣ther life, nor death, nor Angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, * 1.2 nor things to come, nor any other creature shall be able to seperate us from the love of God, which is in Chrict Jesus our Lord: shall not this inseperable love to

me, meet with an answerable re∣turn of love from me? and make me with confidence and resolution conclude tribulation, nor distress, nor persecution, nor famine, nor nakedness, nor peril, nor sword, shall not seperate Christ from me? as it is written, for thy sake are we killed all the day long, and accoun∣ted as sheep to the slaughter; love is a principle of union; it cleaveth to, and looketh after its object, in its most low estate, and lost condition. Death shall not make me to be despised or forsaken by my God; This God is my God, * 1.3 my God for ever and ever, and he will be my guide unto death; yea, in, and through the vail of the shadow of death, his rod and his staff shall comfort me: * 1.4 the Lord his esteem of, and relation to my soul and body, abideth as well, and as much, (though not by the same acts and expressions of affection) now they are seperated from, as

whilst they were united each unto other: God doth triumphantly observe the faith and patience, by which I endure the tearing of them each from other; for the testimo∣ny of his truth: he doth dispatch his Angels to attend my death; and to conveigh my soul into Abra∣hams bosome, to the immediate enjoyment of himself: nor doth he disregard my body, when di∣vided from my soul; or disesteem the dust thereof; he causeth it to be mourned over by my friends, and natural relations, and to be buried with the greatest solemni∣ty, poor, they can observe; yea, he loveth it, and looketh on it as uni∣ted to Christ, though laid in the grave, or dispersed on the earth; all my members are written in Gods book, * 1.5 not one of them must be lost or miscarrie; they shall not be neg∣lected: my dust is precious in Gods sight, not a grain of it shall be lost after it is sown in the earth

it shall most certainly spring up as precious seed; watered with the dew of heaven; the word of the Lord to Zion, and all her sons doth assure them and me, that her dead men shall live; together with his dead body they shall arise; awake and sing ye that dwell in the dust, * 1.6 for thy dew, is as the dew of herbs, and the earth shall cast out the dead.

My body remaineth Gods Jewel, when it hath lost that lustre the soul did give it; God locketh it up in the grave as in his cabinet: God well knoweth my body is lia∣ble to danger, in the day of his wrath against the inhabitants of the earth: the grave is the recep∣tacle from distress whereinto he doth gather it: know my soul and body, you when divided, do abide objects of Gods compassion, com∣placency, and care; enter into your chambers, though dark; qui∣etly shut your doors about you;

the wise God is willing to hide you for a little moment, until his indig∣nation be past.

My soul and body are dear com∣panions; it is not strange to see these two parted with dread, and greif: and yet, nearest relations, dearest friends must shake parting hands each with other in this world; brethren that have lived long toge∣ther, and love most dearly, must leave each others company at their Fathers pleasure; and for their fu∣ture good: this is my case in death: my soul! be contented; take chear∣ful leave of thy body, thou art re∣turning to the father of spirits. My body! consent willingly to shake hands, and shut out thy soul; thou must for a time be shut up by God, from falling under those desperate dangers, and deep di∣stresses, which are more dreadful, and intollerable, then is death it self.

The design of death, in divi∣ding

my soul from my body, was to divide both from God: but this is impossible: for union with Christ and with God in him, is insepera∣ble; no case will make them cast me off; no condition can cut me off from them; whom they love once they love to the end, forever. * 1.7 Christs union is with me; my self; my whole self; the whole, not any single part of man; no part of me, can therefore be by the power of death dismembred from him: death may militate against Christs body, it may rend and mangle his mem∣bers; but it cannot destroy his bo∣dy, his mystical body; it cannot divide any his members, nor any part of his members from him: death shall ere it be long, by the sound of the last triumphant trum∣pet, at the glorious and general resurrection, know, and prove, that the union between Christ, and the bo∣dies of his people, is as real, as inse∣perable; as the union between him

and their souls: Christ will not lose any part of his purchase; he paid a price for man; for whole man; for our bodies; and for our souls; both are his: all enemies that in∣terrupt the union; that intercept the communion which is between Christ and his members, must be de∣stroyed, and the last enemy to be subdued is death: when the Grave, the Sea, and Hell shall give up the dead bodies which are in them, as in repositories for a time, I shall then find the design of death in di∣viding my soul, from my body, is failed, disappointed, and become frustrate; it never could divide either of them from God my Fa∣ther, or from Jesus Christ my Re∣deemer: nor shall it be able long to keep these parts of me asunder, and at distance each from other; for my union with God and Christ, doth necessitate; and will most powerfully, irresistably effect the re∣union of my soul and body, at the

resurrection; that I, whole I, my self, out only part of my self, may enjoy them for ever.

Let my God, and my Saviour, do with me what they please; so they will but please to be with me in life, and in death, whilst I am: and with my divided parts when I am not; I will then perswade, prevail with my self, contentedly to enjoy them in my divided parts; until the time return, that my parts reunied, my whole self, may be placed in an inseperable possession of them, in perfect glory, world without end.

Notes

• * 1.1

  Death se∣perateth soul and body, but not me and God.
• * 1.2

  Rom. 8.38, 39.
• * 1.3

  Psa. 48.14.
• * 1.4

  and 23.4.
• * 1.5

  Ps. 139.16
• * 1.6

  Isa. 26.19.
• * 1.7

  Joh. 13.1.