Self Dedication Discoursed, Title page – Dedication
Self-dedication DISCOURSED In the Anniversary THANKSGIVING Of a Person of Honour For a Great DELIVERANCE.
By J. H.
LONDON, Printed for Brabazon Aylmer, at the three Pigeons in Cornhill over against the Royal Exchange, 1682.
TO THE Right Honourable JOHN, Earl of Kildare, Baron of Ophalia, First of his Order in the Kingdom of Ireland.
MY LORD,
I Little thought, when, in so private a way, I lately offered much of the following Discourse to your Lordship's ear; I should receive the command (which I am not now, so far as it proves to me a possible one to disobey, or further to dispute) of exposing it thus to the view of the world, or so much as to present it to your Lordship's own eye.
It was indeed, impossible to me to give an exact account of what was then discoursed, from a memory that was so treacherous, as to let slip many things, that were prepared, and intended to have been said that day; and that could much less (being assisted but by very imperfect memorials) recollect every thing that was said, several daies after.
Yet I account, upon the whole it is much more varied by enlargement, than by diminution. Whereby, I hope, it will be nothing less capable of serving the end of this enjoyned publication of it.
And I cannot doubt but the injunction proceeded from the same pious gratitude to the God of your life, which hath prompted, for several years past, to the observation of that domestick Annual Solemnity, in memory of your great preservation from so near a death. *By a fall from an Horse. Decemb. 5. 1674.That the remembrance of so great a mercy, might be the more deeply imprest with your self, and improved also (so far as this means could signify for that purpose) to the instruction of many others.
Your Lordship was pleased to allow an hour to the hearing of that Discourse, What was, proposed to you in it, is to be the business of your life.
And what is to be done continually is once to be throughly done. The impression ought to be very inward, and strong, which must be so lasting as to govern a man's life. And were it as fully done as mortality can admit, it needs be more solemnly renewed at set times for that purpose.
And indeed that such a day should not pass you without a fall, nor that fall be without an hurt, and that hurt proceed unto a wound, and that wound not be mortal, but even next to it, looks like an artifice and contrivance of Providence to shew you how near it could go without cutting thorough that slender thred of life, that it might indear to you its accurate superintendency over your life, that there might here be a remarkable juncture in that thred, and that whensoever such a day should revolve in the circle of your year, it might come again, and again, with a note upon it, under your eye, and appear ever to you as another Birth-day; or as an earlier day of resurrection.
Whereupon, my honoured Lord, the further design of that Providence is to be thoroughly studied, and pondered deeply. For it shews it self to be, at once, both mercifull, and wise, and as upon the one account it belong'd to it to design kindly to you, so upon the other, to form its design aptly, and so as that its means, and method might fitly both serve, and signify its end.
If, therefore, your Lordship shall be induc't to reckon the counsel acceptable, which hath been given you, upon this occasion, and to think the offering your self to God, a living Sacrifice, under the endearing obligation of so great a mercy is, indeed, a reasonable service. Your life by that dedication acquires a sacredness, becomes an holy, divine life. And so by one, and the same means, is not onelyonly renewed, and prolonged in the same kind of natural life, but is also heightned and improved to a nobler, and far more excellent kind. And thus, out of that umbrage onelyonly and shadow of death, which sat upon one day of your time springs a double birth, and resurrection to you. Whereby (as our Apostle speaks in another place of this Epistle) you come to yield your self to God as one alive from the dead.
So your New year (which shortly after begins) will alwaies be to you a fresh setting forth in that new, and holy course of life, which shall at length (and God grant it to be, after the revolution of many fruitfull years, wherein you may continue a publick blessing in this wretched world) end, and be perfected in a state of life not measured by time, wherein you are to be ever with the Lord.
Which will answer the design of that mercifull providence towards you; and of this performance (how mean soever) of
Your Honours most obedient, humble Servant John Howe.