The worthy of Ephratah represented in a sermon at the funerals of the Right Honorable Edmund Earl of Mulgrave, Baron Sheffield of Botterwic. In the church of Burton-Stather, Sept. 21. 1658. / By Edward Boteler, sometimes fellow of Magdalen-Colledge in Cambridge, and now rector of Wintringham in the county of Lincoln.

3.

The third is taken from the name that is attendant on such a great person, in so eminent a place, doing thus worthily; and that is here termed famous: And be famous in Beth-lehem. Fac praedicetur no∣men, make that thy name may be preach∣ed

and cryed up, as Tremellius renders it: Proclaim thy name, as the Margin gives it from the Hebrew: Habeas nomen ce∣lebre, so the Vulgar Latine; Have a great, a renowned, a famous name. All speak one and the same thing; Be famous in Beth-lehem.

A good name is a great blessing, and the guerdon of worthy actions: As the works, so the worth of blessed men and women follow them. Mary Magdalen for her Box of precious Ointment, * 1.1 hath a good name given her, which Solomon says is the better of the two; * 1.2 and where∣ever the Gospel is preached, that which she did is told for a memorial of her. What an honor have the Romans got in one line of S. Paul's Epistle to them, far above all that Histories write of them and their Ancestors prowess; That their faith is spoken of throughout the whole world. * 1.3 Those Worthies whose heads are now crowned in heaven, have their names cried up on earth; for, by faith they have obtained a good report, as it is said of them, where they are fairly listed, Heb. 11. Memoria justi in benedicti∣one; The memory of the just is blessed, * 1.4 but the name of the wicked shall rot.

It is observed that God shews himself much in the disposal and ordering of mens names: He deals with their names, as he affects their persons; so that his love or his anger, blessing or punishment, are legible in names. Is God angry? he'll cut and curtail them, he'll take them off by the halfs: Jeconiah shall be but Coniah, and enough for him too, without he were better; * 1.5 Though Coniah the son of Jehoiakim king of Judah were the signet upon my right hand, yet would I pluck him thence. Is God pleased? sometimes he'll add and enlarge: * 1.6 Thy name shall no more be called Abram, but Abraham. Some∣times he'll alter and change: Thy name shall no more be called Jacob, * 1.7 but Israel; for as a Prince hast thou power with God and with man, and hast prevailed. Hath God a mind to punish? * 1.8 he'll expunge and erase: Let me alone that I may destroy them and blot out their name from under heaven. * 1.9 Does he intend to bless? Then, I will give them a name better then of sons and of daughters; I will give them an everlasting name, which shall not be cut off.

God is ever ready to honor them that have honored him, * 1.10 to set them on high that have known his name: As their

lives and deaths, so their names and me∣mories are precious in his sight; they shall not be forgotten, nor out of the mind of God, when they are dead men and out of the sight of the world. It was a very passionate expression, and spake abundance of love, that of Ruth to Na∣omi: Where thou diest will I die, * 1.11 and there will I be buried. But the love or God is wonderful, passing the love of women: * 1.12 He says, Where thou diest, my care shall not die, and there will I not bury my loving kindness; mine eyes shall be upon thee in the chambers of darkness, my faith∣fulness shall be seen in the grave; I'll value thy very dust, and set a price upon thy scatter'd atoms; I'll embalm thy name for after-ages, and send it down to posterity with a relish; * 1.13 it shall be sweet as honey in all mouths, and as musick at a banquet of wine.

Notes

• * 1.1

  Eccles. 7.1.
• * 1.2

  Mat. 26.13.
• * 1.3

  Ro. 1.8.
• * 1.4

  Pro. 10.7.
• * 1.5

  Jer. 22.24.
• * 1.6

  Gen. 17.5.
• * 1.7

  Gen. 32.28.
• * 1.8

  Deut. 9.14.
• * 1.9

  Isa. 56.5.
• * 1.10

  1 Sam. 2 30 Ps. 91.14
• * 1.11

  ch. 1.17.
• * 1.12

  2 Sam. 1.26.
• * 1.13

  Eccl. 49.1.