: be desired, and ought to be our chief end in all our actions. God bless you! God bless !" you So they parted from his grace, but he never saw him more. For within a few days after, Nicholas Ferrar fell ill and on Easter day he was desirous to receive the Communion at St. Paul's, whither he went early in the morning, and communicated; and, returning home, had little appetite to his dinner, eating little or nothing. He went to a sermon in the afternoon; but at night grew somewhat worse. The physicians prescribed things for him, but he mended not; but with great patience and cheerfulness did bear his sickness, and was very comfortable in it, to all that came to visit him, wholly referring himself to God's good will and pleasure; only telling his friends, and the Bishop of Peterborough, Dr. Towers, who loved him dearly, and came to visit him twice in that short time, that he was no way troubled to die, and to go to Heaven, where he knew was only peace and quiet, and joys permanent; whereas all things in the world were but trouble and vexation; and death must be the end of all men, and he that went soonest to Heaven was the happiest man. The Bishop would say, when he went away, and had a long time talked with him, that Nicholas Ferrar was better prepared to die than he, and was a true child of God, and could comfort himself in God, without directions from him or others that his pious education under his pious uncle of blessed memory, his old and dear friend, was now showed forth in these his so young years; that they had taken mighty root downward, and in his soul, and now sprang up not only with leaves and fair blossoms, but with good and ripe fruit of heavenly matters. It joyed his heart to see him so disposed to God-ward, and to so willingly leave the world, and the late testimonies of worth that he had received from the best in the land. That sure he was too good longer to stay here. God would take him to Heaven, and willed his father to prepare for his departure; and to take it with all thankfulness to God; and not look what himself, he might think, had here lost on earth, but to that crown which his good son, by the mercies of God and merits of his Saviour, he was persuaded would now enjoy in Heaven. "He is too good; he is too good," said he, "to live longer in these, in approaching times." And when at other times some friend would say to him, "Good cousin, are you not grieved to leave this world: you are now so young, and in the flower of your youth and hopes ?" he would cheerfully answer, "No truly; I leave all to God's good will and pleasure, that is my best Father, and knoweth what is best for me. Alas! I am too young to be mine own judge what is best for me, to die, or live; but let all be as God's will is. If I live, I desire it may be to His further glory, and mine own soul's good, and the comfort and service that I intend to be to my father, that loves me so dearly, and in his old age to be his servant. die, I hope my father will submit all to God's will and pleasure, and rejoice at my happiness in Heaven, where by the merits of my blessed Lord and Saviour, I know I shall go out of this wretched life." If I In this manner, and upon the visits of friends, he would discourse; and the Bishop came to him two days before he died, and found him most cheerful to die, and to be with God, as he would say to him; who gave him absolution, and with many tears departed, saying to his father, "God give you consolation; and prepare yourself to part with your good son. He will in a few hours, I think, go to a better world; for he is in no way for this; that I see by his body and by his soul. Be of good comfort; you give him but again to Him that gave him you for a season." And in two days after, God took him away, who died praying and calling upon God, "Lord Jesus, receive my soul! Lord, receive it. Amen '." "Good cousin, are you not grieved to leave this world so young ?" It matters little what hour o' the day The righteous falls asleep; death cannot come The less of this cold world, the more of Heaven, MILMAN. BISHOP BEDELL. DIED 1641. AGED 70-71. BISHOP BEDELL was eminent for his piety and usefulness. He was Provost of Trinity College, Dublin, and was afterwards consecrated Bishop of Kilmore. He translated the Old Testament into the Irish language-a work which was afterwards published by Mr. Robert Boyle. Bedell was very active in his endeavours to convert the Roman Catholics, but conducted himself with so much mildness and prudence as very generally to gain their esteem. When the Rebellion broke out in Ireland, Bishop Bedell was for a time unmolested by the Roman Catholic insurgents; and while his Protestant neighbours in general were driven from their homes, the sanctity of his mansion was re 1 Wordsworth's Eccl. Biog., vol. iv. spected; and it might probably have so continued, if he had not given offence by granting a general asylum to the distressed Protestants. On his refusal to dismiss some of them, he was, together with his family, seized and conveyed to a ruinous castle in the midst of a lake. The hardships he there suffered proved fatal; for being removed to the house of Mr. Sheridan, a Protestant minister, he was seized with a fit of illness which terminated his life; of which event the following are the particulars. When he approached his speedy change, he called for his sons and his sons' wives, and spoke to them, at several times, as near in these words as their memories could serve them to write down after: "I am going the way of all flesh. I am now ready to be offered up, and the time of my departure is at hand. Knowing, therefore, that shortly I must put off this tabernacle, even as our Lord Jesus Christ hath showed me, I know also that if this my earthly tabernacle were dissolved, I have a building of God, an house not made with hands, a fair mansion in the new Jerusalem, which cometh down out of Heaven from my God. Therefore, to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain; which increaseth my desire even now to depart and to be with Christ, which is far better than to continue here, in all the false, transitory, and vain pleasures of this world, of which I have seen an end. Hearken, therefore, unto the last words of your dying father. I am no more in this world, but ye are in the world. I ascend to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God, through the all-sufficient merits of Christ my Redeemer, who ever lives to make intercession for me, who is a propitiation for all my sins, and washed me from them all in His own blood, who is worthy to receive glory, and honour, and power, who hath created all things, and for whose pleasure they are and were created. "My witness is in Heaven, and my record is on high, that I have endeavoured to glorify God on earth, and in the ministry of the gospel of His dear Son, which was committed to my trust; I have finished the work which He gave me to do, as a faithful ambassador of Christ, and steward of the mysteries of God. I have preached righteousness in the great congregation; so I have not refrained my lips, O Lord, Thou knowest. I have not hid Thy righteousness within my heart; I have declared Thy faithfulness and Thy salvation; I have not concealed Thy loving-kindness and Thy truth from the great congregation of mankind. He is near that justifieth me, that I have not concealed the words of the Holy One; but the words that He gave to me I have given to you, and ye have received them. I had a desire and resolution to walk before God (in every station of my pilgrimage, from my youth up to this day) in truth, and with an upright heart, and to do that which was upright in His eyes, to the utmost of my power; and what things were gain to me formerly, these things I now count loss for Christ; yea, doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Jesus Christ my Lord; for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and I account them but dung, that I may win and be found in Him, not having my own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith that I may know Him, and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being made conformable unto His death. I |