For it is meet and right to give care and honor to the
burial of the dead, in a manner worthy of that blessed article
of our creed, the resurrection of the dead, and to the spite
of that dreadful enemy, death, who doth so shamefully and
continually prey upon us, in every horrid way and shape.
Accordingly, as we read, the holy patriarchs, Abraham,
Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, and the rest, kept their burials with
great pomp, and ordered them with much diligence; and
afterwards the kings of Judah held splendid ceremonials over
the dead, with costly incense of all manner of precious herbs,
thereby to hide the offense and shame of death, and
acknowledge and glorify the resurrection of the dead, and so
to comfort the weak in faith and the sorrowful.
In like manner, even down to this present, have
Christians ever been wont to do honorably by the bodies and
the graves of the dead, decorating them, singing beside them
and adorning them with monuments. Of all importance is that
doctrine of the resurrection, that we be firmly grounded
therein; for it is our lasting, blessed, eternal comfort and
joy, against death, hell, the devil and all sorrow of heart.
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