perdition more than his coming For excepting some monstrous and notorious evills into which a man may fall and that when the Communion is instant so that no competent time nor meanes remain to discharge his part in due preparation though sudden accidents of that nature may admitt of sudden remorse and intense Repentance when time is denied of more full and thorow humiliation then perhaps such excuses may be tolerable as unpreparednesse but when men have timely advice of such ensuing Solemnitie and have no unavoidable impediments but wilfully and necessarily involve themselves in matters inconsistent with it and so absent themselves neglecting that competent preparation required then doe they shun the Curse of communicating unworthily and fall into the condemnation of not preparing themselves and contempt of such meanes of Salvation as he under the Law that refused to purge his House of Leaven and purifie himselfe to eat the Passe-over 4. For in this one Evill many more are contained such as are frustrating Gods invitation to Grace and Mercy a great provocation of men who are of the same nature with our selves though greater in Power and Honour A bereaving our selves of the benefits there tendered and an hazarding of the losse of the fruits of all other meanes ordained by God to our Salvation For God requires that we should put on the whole Armour of God Ephes 6. 11 13. And Saint Paul likewise Coloss 4. 12. exhorteth to stand perfect and compleat in all the will of God. And Saint James assures us Whosoever shall keep the whole Law and yet offend in one point he shall be guilty of all James 2. 10. insinuating sufficiently unto us that the willfull neglect of one such materiall Dutie and violating one so soveraign Ordinance as this doth injury to all and provokes God to withdraw his Blessing upon those other Ordinances we are content to admitt of For he that contemns him in one contemns the Authour of all and so cannot reasosonably expect any benefit from Sermons or from Publique or private service of God. For no man must trust to his making compensation to God one way having wronged him in another where both may be perfourmed And experience teacheth this to be true that none are generally more rare and remisse in the other parts of Gods Worship than they who are carelesse in this 3. A manifold Scandall is offered to Fellow Christians who upon observing the neglect of some in this point entertain suppositions of the little use of it and consequently that the offence in omitting the same is very inconsiderable and light passing it over accordingly or perhaps that receiving that Sacrament belongs chiefly to the Greater or better sort and such as are more at leisure than are they and not to poor obscure and busie persons as they are Furthermore a Scandall is hereby given to the Brethren of the same Faith and profession as if a Member of the Church were fallen away from them and found some evill in the Actions sacred For God doth not onely require at our hands that we should truely believe and become lively Members of Christs mysticall Body and invisible but allso Visible and not onely so but that so far as lies in us we should be visible members allso of that Body Visible and that we should declare the same and doe nothing to give ground or occasion to believe otherwise of us which must necessarily be if we forbear such necessary and solemn proofs and indications as this is even the Greatest of all and that which as it is Unitive of us to Christ so is it very effectuall to produce and preserve that bond of Charitie which Christ commands to be kept up amongst Brethren in Christ 3. Thirdly The main pretence and Apologie of abstaining from the Communion taken from its Sacrednesse and formidablenesse are grounded upon the foresaid words of Saint Paul which therefore to give a faithfull and proper sense of will be very expedient which we may attain to two wayes chiefly First by rightly understanding the occasion given him to write so severely above others For we finde nothing of the like charge given by Christ to his Disciples at the first Institution of it all which came with no other preparation to it than was Legall or Leviticall Neither have we in holy Writ any thing afterward except the words of Saint Paul about it who upon grosse corruptions and scandalous invading openly that holy Sacrament opportunely bestirs himselfe for the vindication of it from such abuses brings them back to the first institution of Christ which was that they should understand that to eat this as their own Supper was to profane it For Christ at that time had two Suppers One Mosaicall which though it had sacred Rites belonging to it did serve to the use of the naturall Body and was to imprint in their memories a sense of their deliverance from slaughter with the First-born in Egypt and from bondage there allso The other was Evangelicall not given in such quantitie as the other to nourish the Bodie but ceremoniously rather in such sort as might give the receiver certain information and proportionable affection of the Passion and death of Christ whose Bodie was broken and Blood shed for the sinnes of the whole World much more of true Believers Which if they who received those Elements did not consider of so as in them to discern the Lords Bodie thereby signified and his Passion thereby called to remembrance and received by the faithfull to their edification in faith and love and comfort but prophanely ventured to take it as common bread yea to come to it first stuffed full with their own riotous Suppers and drunk with excesse of Wine before all the world would judge and condemne them for so doing and more especially would God be avenged of them for such affront put upon him and those divine Mysteries of his ordaining and that by sudden Deaths or grievous Sicknesses and weaknesses upon their bodies besides the evill upon their Soules Others forbearing to eat and drink at home in their Houses kept their stomachs for the good Cheer they were wont to make and plentifully to take in Gods House or the place and at the time they should have soberly modestly and devoutly partaken of these great Mysteries which worthily so incensed the Apostle as to demand if they had not Houses of their own to eat and to drink in but must come into the publique place of Worship the House of God and there gluttonize and revell not considering nor discerning the Lords Body to the shame of themselves and Religion And that this is the most plain and naturall sense of that whole passage of the Apostle will clearly appear to every attentive and judicious Reader taking in the Context And this St. Chrysostome than whome none of his time magnifies more the Mysteries of the Eucharist doth agree to in a second Homilie he hath upon the Passeover Tom. 5. pag. 921. telling
that as Pride is the beginning of all sins and wickednesse the contrary Vertue Humilitie is the mother of all Christian Vertues This foundation then must be laid here allso otherwise all repairs of the ruinous Soule will be frustrated For where Humility is wanting a thousand false phansies of our perfections and merits will swell the minde above its proper height and largenesse so that every little thing will stand in its way and offend it For men suspecting themselves undervalued by others as they doe and needs must who overvalue themselves presently the vindicative Spirit falls to work by word and deed to satiate it selfe upon detractours as it accounts them mistakenly childishly and madly at the same time 9. Where therefore true Humility is found Meeknesse will not be far distant nor long absent And where Meeknesse dwells Madnesse and Choler will have but cold entertainment And to the Spirit of Meeknesse doe much conduce a Discipline and cohibition imposed on the outward man. It is often alledged by the riotous minde I cannot bear that abuse or this affront or such contempt or disobedience or neglect I cannot be so advised as I should be But no man can say that professes manlinesse and humanity but he can move or hold his hand and can speak or keep silence or compose the outward parts of his body or suffer them to break out into disorders which Regiment when he hath obtained over himselfe outwardly and for a time practised he shall finde a considerable change in his inward man in due time and the heat allayed and a wonderfull calme and tranquillitie with admiration that he should heretofore be hurried away in a storme frivolously occasioned And as it is observed that too hot mettall'd Horses which are apt to run away with their Riders are no wayes better tamed and taken off their courage than by accustoming them to walk a foot-pace so modest and moderate actions outwardly will in time qualifie the impetuousnesse of the minde It were therefore well worth a mans labour attendance and time to bend his minde resolutely for tryall of his strength and what Mastery he hath of himselfe to act though an unwilling part of patience and to prove how impregnable he is against wonted provocations and having some few times hardened himselfe against such provokings it will become easie to doe and suffer the same in earnest even when the like caution and attendance are not used 10. But because there are certain junctures and causes which doe allmost naturally dispose to anger such as are Sicknesse and Pampering the Bodie making it thereby more than one way resty immoderate Cups and even Fastings rarely used and such as the Bodie is not accustomed to and some other which justle as it were nature out of its Rode and so offends it Great circumspection is in such cases to be used And in trueth such excesses are wholly and absolutely to be avoided as they which blinde the eyes of Reason inslame the Blood precipitate the Spirits to act violently And Abstinences or Fastings themselves stand in need of watchings over a mans disposition For as all things are molested inwardly by denyall of wonted food and naturally complain so the Body of man being disappointed of its ordinarie supply and refreshment is apt to be murmuring discontented and querulous untill it be better acquainted with such changes and fretting and pinchings within will goe nere to vent themselves outwardly upon such as shall stand in their way and converse with them Care therefore is to be taken not as some may inferre to shun fasting but to bridle at such times especially the sharp humour which may stir up strife or discontent lest the good be evill spoken of or a scandall brought upon a Christian Dutie by some misbehaviour consequent thereunto 11. And to the better preventing of such ebullitions of the Spirit it is requisite a man should carefully avoid such Passion when it seems to carrie much innocencie and veniallnesse with it For it seems to divers no offence allmost to be angrie as Balaam was with his Beast to be in Choler against Dogs that will not hunt and Hawks that will not flie against Horses that will not goe according to our mindes and some think themselves excusable when their Choler is high only against their Servants but all with a dangerous errour For as much as libertie being allowed to a mans selfe in such cases Flesh and Blood will not long contain themselves in those bounds but being accustomed to such heats and perturbations will transgresse where perhaps they never intended For by such usances tolerated men become easily inflameable and their blood afore they are aware is as it were sowr'd and disposing to other excesses and that upon occasions lesse warrantable 12. And upon the same reason circumspection is to be had how a man is offended and angrie with himselfe for some men have held it verie laudable so to be and some have been religiously vindicative upon themseves by severe Penances for their follies and offences against God and others which must not be disallowed when governed by Christian prudence which many times being wanting a man punishes one sin by another and offers unnaturall violence to himselfe which is worse than to doe the same to another So that herein is requisite the Counsell and conduct of others no lesse than in Controversies of trespasses against a mans Neighbour to whome he would seldome doe justice if he were Accuser Judge and Executioner too And so not rarely men transported with a religious Passion against themselves as it may seem offend in punishing offences And this is seen in cases extra-religious men fretting and storming and raging that matters under their hands succeed not according to their mindes and merits They will miscall themselves complain of themselves and be enraged as if no man had so ill luck as they or did so ill as they and this doing hold themselves very excusable because none but themselves suffer hereby But there is herein commonly a double errour For first they who give way to any exorbitances against themselves prepare a way to be injurious and furious against others much more and that upon the reason here given But secondly what seemeth to be seldome is really so And men fretting and in a tosse against themselves to outward appearance are in trueth incensed against Gods Providence or perhaps their tutelarie Angells not doing their parts toward them in giving better events to their good actions For no man as Saint Paul saith ever hated his own flesh or himselfe naturally and no man that is supernaturally or by Grace vindicative upon himselfe can lightly fall into such passions and therefore inconsiderately accuses others of his mistakes and miscarriages who can be no other than the mentioned whether he intends so much or not Some instances may make this more probable as When he misses a thing he had in his hand a little before and cannot suddenly finde it for
shall begin to beat the Men-servants and Maidens and to eat and to drink and to be drunken the Lord of that servant will come in a day when he looketh not for him and in an hour when he is not aware and will cut him in sunder and will appoint him his portion with Vnbelievers And the wise Servant will not say within himselfe My Lord deferreth his coming understanding this to be spoken only of the coming of Christ at the last and generall Judgement but of his particular Domes-day when his life shall be called for by God and his own beloved sin of excesse shall snatch his Soule from his wretched bodie for indulging it How many Tragicall Instances doth our Age afford of such who have been confounded in their own sin and perished in this pleasure I shall need to name none of yesterday or of this Nation I would it were not notorious But two most eminent and mighty Potentates I may mention I hope without offence and not without sense or some effect Alexander the Great his Friends and Flatterers write that he died of Poison given him at Babylon but others more severe tellers of Trueth write that Wine was that Poison excessively taken and that Drunkennesse kill'd him as may be seen in Seneca Epist 58. And who so great a Man in his dayes and so victorious as Attilas who after his many Conquests not being able to overcome his Appetite of Wine was overcome by it to that degree one day that he was taken so ill the next night that he voided blood at his Mouth and so died choaked with it As Munster tells us in his Cosmographie Let these things then sink into our hearts and have such influence upon our lives and manners as to prevent such disorders and miscarriages And let all they whose faith is dim-sighted or weak as to have no power over them in declaring to them and convincing them of the defilements of their Soules contracted by these excesses and shamefull spewings on their own glorie as the Prophet Habakkuk aptly expresses it Chap. 2. 16. be taught at length and convinced by their senses and common experience what a stain to their Name what a wound to their Bodie they bring from which they can never be purged or of which cured but by Tears of timely Repentance and the happie change of due Renovation both which will be so much the more difficult by how much they are more deferred SECT XVII Of Slothfullnesse the last Capitall Sin. 1. SLothfulnesse and affected dulnesse of Minde and lazinesse of Bodie is not denied to be a Sin by any but to many seems so modest innocent and harmlesse that they wonder why it should be ranked amongst the most dangerous and deadly But as we before observed Sins are not to be estimated from their intrinsick or absolute evill only but allso from the tayle they draw after them and the brood issuing from them And thus Slothfullnesse may be inferiour in consequentiall mischiefs to none For this numnesse of minde and indisposition of bodie to act extendeth it selfe equally to both capacities viz. Naturall and Divine or Religious it being seldome known that he whose minde is dull'd by indulging to ease is active any wayes in Religion And in trueth so notorious is it that Divines treat of it onely or chiefly as to Religion which it corrupteth if not totally destroyeth 2. For as Labour and honest industry seems to be the first Vertue insinuated in Scripture and appointed to Man so may the Vice of Sloth be the very first of practicall Errours supposing that Pride was the first of Mentall Vices For we read Genesis Chap. 2. that there was at first no man to till the ground v. 5. and we read v. 8. That God made man so soon as he had made Eden and put him therein surely not to be idle lest the Earth should be idle too so that Action was a Vertue of Paradise And so it was afterward when man turned out from thence was to make a Vertue of necessity and work to keep him from adding sin unto sin and calamitie unto calamitie For as Chrysostome well observes it was an act of Goodnesse in God to turne fallen man out of Paradise to the wide world and a blessing to him to curse the Land so that without hard labour he could not well subsist For if when Man was master of so much Reason and owner of so much Grace given him of God he fell into temptations and from thence into sin who can imagine but destitute in great measure of such aids and abilities he should riot unmeasurably living in ease plenty spontaneous and unactive rest odious and dangerous 3. And therefore though my purpose be to oppose Sloth as it relates to Religion the Connexion being so neer and strait between diligence in humane and divine Affairs it is necessarie to declare the sinfullnesse and odiousnesse and to correct the pravitie of the first before we can expect any good event in the latter For a soft heavie temper is the originall of both and a sicklenesse and wearinesse in doing any thing long or of difficultie but a certain spiritlesse loying and lying still or as the saying is Wandering up and down to see who does nothing and help them untill all meanes used to gratifie flesh and blood and none sufficing idlenesse proves more tedious and tiresome than labour to others And none groan under the burden and heat and length of the day by labouring so much as the slothfull and idle person doth under void time and emptie hours And none brings more distempers upon his bodie by working nor so many as the Sluggard by doing nothing 4. But doe I say or suppose that a man awake and well in his witts and limbes can rest in the Negative doing nothing it is hard to be believed The Devill will not suffer his Soule to be as Aristotles Understanding of Infants Rasa Tabula a smooth and eaven Table or as white Paper in which nothing is writ but is capable of any stamp or impression it pleases the stander by to make in it but he will write his minde in it speedily This is saith Cassian Collat. 10. the judgement of the Monastique Fathers of old in Egypt that the industrious Monk is tempted with one Devill but the idle with innumerable So that as the same Author there allso tells it was the custome of Abbot Paul to avoid idlenesse to burne those effects of his labours which were more than sufficient to bring in a bare livelihood that he might never want work or become idle 5. And this he might learn of Saint Paul Rom. 12. 11. who teaches us the dependence secular labour in an honest way hath upon Religion and on the contrary saying Not slothfull in businesse fervent in spirit serving the Lord. Diligence here in businesse is set before Fervour in Spirit and in the service of God intimating the usefulnesse of bodily labour in disposing to
eares so that if Christ should tell us that it was his Bodie we may as reasonably denie that he doth say what in trueth he doth say For the Eye is a lesse fallible sense than the Ear as Philosophers agree And whereas it is said We cannot see substances themselves but onely Accidents it matters not whether that Opinion be true or false being we see as much of those bodies and their substances as of any substance in the world and no more is needfull 8. Seventhly The sacred Symboles are called the Bodie and Blood of Christ because we should understand the dignity and efficacie and strait conjunction between them and Christ and Christ and us who thereby receive him as our Food 9. Lastly The meanes whereby we so receive Christ in this Blessed Sacrament is Faith as is truely and generally said but not alltogether as some may understand and conceive For Faith as in our Sanctification so in our Justification doth work and no otherwise doth it make us worthie and happie Communicants For it layes the foundation of all our Religion and becoming lively by love and Charitie gives life to all our spirituall performances and consequently renders them effectuall to us So that we must believe first according to the true Catholique Faith in generall then specially the nature ends and uses of this Sacrament Lastly we must have a comfortable perswasion of the goodnesse of God in accepting us in the Sacrament and his dispensations towards us but there must allso be joyned herewith 1. Discerning the Lords Body and that not to be it properly which we see but that which is invisible and spiritually taken 2. That we judge our selves by examination and humiliation of our selves that by rashnesse of approach we be not condemned of the Lord. 3. Invocation of Gods mercie for past sins and of his assisting Grace for preventing the like future failings and falls as we have been formerly subject to 4. To have no malice nor notorious hatred in our hearts but Charitie to all men especially towards them with whome we communicate 5. That we be void of all purpose or designe of committing over again any of those sinnes which we finde in our selves upon due enquity and examination but rather have a sincere how weak soever it may be desire and purpose of living more agreeably to Gods holy Will in all things 6. That we have a good hope through Gods Grace which some miscall Faith that we shall live according to our Vow in Baptisme of old made and there renewed and ratified and that this hope begets a care and conscience of our wayes hereafter lest we by relapsing into former errours dissolve that happie Union and conjunction obtained in this Blessed Sacrament with the Father and the Son. SECT X. Of the Difficulties and dangers in receiving the Holie Communion which are here discussed 1. WE are told in the Office of our Church for the celebration of the Communion That as the benefits are great if with a true penitent heart and a lively Faith we receive that Holy Sacrament so is the danger great if we receive the same unworthily for then are we guiltie of the body and blood of our Saviour Christ we eat and drink our own damnation not considering the Lords Body we kindle Gods wrath against us we provoke him to plague us with divers Diseases and sundry kindes of Death All which seems to be drawn from the words of Saint Paul 1 Corin. 11. ver 27. Whosoever shall eat this Bread and drink this Cup unworthily shall be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord. And ver 29. He that eateth and drinketh unworthily eateth and drinketh damnation to himselfe not discerning the Lords Bodie which Speeches it behoveth straitly to understand aright lest by violence used in wresting them to too favourable a sense we occasion the profanation of those Holy Mysteries by rudenesse and presumption of unbelieving and impenitent comers unto it or we so straiten the way to Gods holy Table that Believers and they none of the worst rank should be disheartened and discouraged from approaching to it The genuine sense therefore and importance of those Sayings are faithfully to be unfolded for the better informing of the Judgement and directing and satisfying the Conscience of the cordiall Christian and sincere For it is most certain upon too frequent experience that an horrible abuse is made of the opinion of the Holinesse of the Sacrament and Doctrine of Saint Paul and allso of the Church even now recited and that by worldly and loose men who believing in grosse the sacrednesse of the Communion alledge that for a sufficient cause to excuse themselves from receiving of it when God knowes they have little apprehension either of the Holinesse of that or their unholinesse or unfitnesse pretending more scrupulousnesse and warinesse than others and than the Word of God requires absolutely at their hands though it is granted that divers finde themselves so entangled between the consciousnesse of their own unworthinesse and perswasion of the worthinesse of that that they are unwillingly obstructed in drawing nigh thus unto Christ so mercifully offered to them For whose sake I have prepared these following instructions leaving others to be condemned for their falsenesse and hypocrisie in sacred things by their own consciences and that very judgement which is pretended to be feared in so abstaining 2. First then It is to be granted and supposed by all ingenuous as well as pious Christians that it is in it selfe incredible and a great injurie done to the wisdome and goodnesse of Christ instituting this holy Sacrament to imagine that he should so mock the greatest number of true though weak Believers as to ordain such a Sacrament and to such great ends and propound so great benefits and leave so many gracious and kinde invitations and exhortations to come to him there present and in readinesse to satisfie the hungrie Soule with goodnesse and to feast him with the fat and sweet of his own Table and yet withall cloth that precious Ordinance with so many severe circumstances and clogge it with so many dangerous difficult and heavie Conditions as very few should dare to come at it or be the better for it 3. Secondly There is to be observed a very great difference between Worthy Communicating and due or Fit communicating and that both these are vulgarly and Fallaciously contained in that one word Worthie which hath a double sense For he properly is said to be worthy who is equall in qualifications of Vertue and Graces to the worth and merits of that holy Sacrament and in this acceptation no man may be said to be worthy no not the best prepared and holiest man. Another sense of Worthinesse is that we call'd Fitnesse whereby how unworthy soever a Soule may be of that Sacrament he may be reputed worthy and come acceptably and fruitfully and so that willfully in such cases to absent himselfe may turne to his own