of a Courtiers profession 121 TREAT 11. Of Medisance or detraction in 2. Sections 125 Sect. 1. The true nature of the crime of detraction and the subtilty of it in disguising it self ib. 2. Some rules whereby to square our discourse and an expedient offered towards the correction of Medisance 131 TREAT 12. Concerning scurrility or foulness of speech 〈…〉 three Sections 〈…〉 Sect. 1. Of the dangerousness of these liberties and the familiar ex 〈…〉 made for them 〈…〉 2. Some special causes of the growth of this licentiousness and some 〈◊〉 pedient proposed towards the suppression thereof 1â—0 3. What circumstances augment these faults and women incharged 〈…〉 severity in opposition to them â—4â— TREAT 13. Whether to be in love and to be devout are consistent in eight Sections Sect. 1. The nature of love and devotion compared 〈◊〉 2. Some subtle temptations detected and liberties reproved 1 〈…〉 3. The errors of prophane jealousie argued and a pious jealou 〈…〉 proposed 1â—â— 4. The deceit of passion in promise of mercy and power of resistiâ—g temptations 1â—â— 5. The faultiness of flattery to women discovered and disswaded 1 〈…〉 6. Presumption upon our vertue discussed and the danger thereof remoâ—strated 1â—6 7. Some scruples resolved about the esteem of beauty and the friendshiâ— of women 17â— 8 The conclusion framed upon the premised discourse and our love safe 〈…〉 addressed 179 TREAT 14. Concerning the test and ballance of filial and mercinary love in five Sections 181 Sect. 1. Of the value of love and Gods tolerating some mixture of self respects in it ib. 2. Mercinary love defined and the relying much on it disswaded 184 3. Filial love described and some strong incentives presented to kindle it in us 187 4 Motives to filial love drawn from our several relations to God as also from the dignity and advantage of this sort of love 191 5. Advices in order to the preserving this sort of love and fraternal dilection represented as a gracious rule whereby to judge of our rectitude in filial love 194 TREAT 15. Of the duties of a Christian towards enemies in five Sections 265 Sect. 1. The precept of loving enemies sweetned by many reasons drawâ— from Christs injoyning and his acting it ib. 2. The avâ—rsness to this duty riseth from our corrupted nature promoted by divers subtle temptations of our great enemy 270 3. The relation wherein all enemies are to be loved and what Offices are indispensably due to them the omission whereof can be redeemed by no other sort of piety 274 4. The inordinateness of our love difficilitateth this duty dissimulation in this conformity reproached and many benefits derivable from a sincere compliance represented as also presumption upon the Theory of this duty disswaded 282 5 The best preparatory disposition for the acting this duty the which maketh no obstruction in the course of justice as also powerful persons admonished of their temptation in this point of revenge and animated by their exceeding merit in this â—idelity 287 TREAT 16. Of considerations upon the unsuccesfulness of a good cause in six Sections 291 Sect. 1. That much Religion is requisite to assist us in this probation ib. 2. Motives to constancy after a prudent election of our cause 294 3. The variableness of the vulgar upon eventâ— and a prudent conduct proposed 297 4. An information of what kinde of conformity we owe Gods declared will in adverse events 299 5. The infirmity of our nature comforted by examples holy and prophane and the acquiesâ—ence to Gods order with constancy perswaded 302 6. The conclusion regulating all humors in this probation 310 TREAT 17. Of Solitude in two Sections 315 Sect. 1. The most useful order in describing the nature of solitude ib. 2. Solitude divided into three sorts and the first discoursed of 318 TREAT 18. Of a mixed sort or of Neutral solitude in three Sections 324 Sect. 1. Explaining this term by exhibiting the state of mans will in his elections 324 2. Treating divers motives that solicite this vocation 327 3. How God worketh and how the devil countermineth in this vocation wherein a safe course is directed 330 TREAT 19. Of violent solitude or close imprisonment in eight Sections 338 Sect. 1. How unwillingly our nature submitteth to the loss of liberty and society ib. 2. The deficiency of single natural reason argued for consolation in this case and the validity of grace asserted 340 3. Great benefit acknowledged to moral Philosophy and the right use thereof directed in order to our solacing 345 4. The disposure of our time treated and advised for improvement as well as easing of our minde 350 5. A method proposed in point of study and the use may be derived from story towards a right understanding of Divine providence 355 6. Some special meditations proposed for the divertisement of our minde 361 7. Some speculations suggested to recreate our spirits in sufferance and to invigorate our Faith 365 8. The final and most solid assignment of comfort for this condition 370 TREAT 20. Of the contempt of the world in 2. Sections 375 Sect. 1. Arguments to discredit all the attractives of this earth and Gods contribution thereunto produced ib. 2. Motives by the property of a Christian to contemn the world 384. TREAT 21. Of the preheminence of a true contemplative life in five Sections 385 Sect. 1. Contemplation defined and some excellencies thereof discoursed ib. 2. The gradations whereby we do ordinarily ascend up to this station 385 3. The requisitenes of lecture in order to this spiritual elevation 39â— 4. Speculation placed aâ— the last-step in this ascent of the soul 39â— 5. Of the sensible delight springing from this head of contemplation 401. The first Treatise A Map of HUMANE NATURE divided into two Sections §. I. Treating the Originall rectitude of Mans nature and the present obliquity thereof AS in Navigation Cosmographie is no lesse usefull then Astrologie by reason it is by some relation to the earth that all measures are taken and all reckonings are made in the severall courses of our saylings even so in our spirituall voyage through this life it seems no lesse requisite to study the Map of our own Earth we carry about us then to speculate the Globe of heaven whereunto we are steering in regard the constitution of our infirme Nature ought to be understood in order to the conducting of the Vessell to her supreme and heavenly designation And the knowledge of our selfe is as it were the Compasse whereby we must set our course since it is out of divers knowne properties of humane nature that we forme points of direction by which we judge how neere our actions and designs stand to the right course of a rational nature And as the soule and bodie in man hold an analogie with the firmament and the earth in point of constituting but one world of these so differing substances So shall we doe well to consider the spirituall and corporeall substances in man
god-head she could in number have made up that losse of quality she brought in all the celest all bodies into the account of Divinity serving the Militia of Heaven instead of the maker and we may call to minde that as humane bodies grew Giants mindes seemed to shrink into dwarfs when they fell in love as I may say with the daughters of men that is the conceptions of their owne naturall Reason in this point of Divinity And we may well suppose that the Giants soules in the law of nature became so by espousing this daughter of God which we may properly call Grace whereby their heads passed the skie and touched Heaven it selfe in this beliefe of the unity of the godhead and by this conjunction with grace reason produced their issue of a rectified Religion hence is it that we finde the Patriarks frequently visited by celestiall spirits as the allies as I may say of this daughter of Heaven they had espoused and most doe conclude that all those who in the law of nature continued in a rectified belief and worship of God were maintained in that state by grace supplementall to the virtue of single Reason How far humane Reason may alone finde the way to rectified Religion is a question to exercise curiosity rather then excite piety and very commonly reason in the disquisition of faith doth rather sink the deeper into the earth by falling from her over aspiring then she doth six her selfe upward in her proper station and besides this danger me thinkes there is this difference betweene them that are working upon reason to extract Religion and those that are feeding upon sincere faith that the first are labouring the ground for that fruit which the last are feasting on or that the first are plowing while the last are gathering of Manna I shall indeavour therefore to serve in this spirituall refection ready to be tasted treating of faith already digested rather then to be provided by ratiocination for devotion is faith converted into nourishment by which the soul contracting a sound active strength needs not study the composition of that aliment it finds so healthfull §. II. Treating the best habit of mind in order to the finding a rectified Religion ME thinks Religion and Devotion may be fitly resembled to the Body and the Soule in Humanity The first of which issues from an orderly procession of nature by a continuing virtue imparted all at once to mediate causes the last is a new immediate infusion from heaven by way of a creation continually iterated and repeated So Religion at large as some homage rendred to a supreme relation flows into every mind along with the current of natural causes But Devotion is like the Soule produced by a new act of grace directed to every particular by speciall and expresse infusion and in these respects also the analogie will hold that as Religion hath the office of the body to containe Devotion so Devotion hath the function of the soule to informe and animate Religion And as the soule hath clearer or darker operations according as the body is well organized or disposed so Devotion is the more zealous or remisse proportionately to the temper and constitution of the Religion that containeth it Sutable to the Apostle Saint James his intimation to us that Pure Religion keeps us unspotted from the world I shall not take upon me the spirituall Physitian to consult the indispositions and remedies of differing Religions but relying more upon the Testimony of confessed experiments then the subtilty of that litigious art I shall prescribe one receipt to all Christian tempers which is to acquire the habit of Piety and Devotion for this in our spirituall life is like a healthfull aire and a temperate diet in our naturall the best preservative of a rectified faith and the best disposition to recover from an unsound Religion for the Almes and Prayers of the Centurion were heard and answered when they spoke not the language of the Church and the Angel was sent to translate them into that tongue in which God hath chose onely to be rightly praised that which his Eternall Word Christ Jesus hath peculiarly affected and annexed to his Church this shews the efficacie of piety and the exactnesse of Gods order who hath inclosed his eternall graces within those bounds into which he brings all that shall partake of them and so doth naturalize all such strangers as he intitleth to them doth not allot any portions to aliens but reduceth all them he will endow into that qualification he requireth which is into the rank of fellow-citizens of the Saints and of the houshold of God he leaves none with a dispensation of remaining forreiners The Angel that called the Centurion directed him to the gate of the Church Saint Peter did not bring him a protection to rest in his owne house with the exercise of his naturall pieties and so for those that are straying without the inclosure of the Catholique Church if they walk by the light of naturall charity morall piety and devotion in their religious duties this is the best disposition towards the finding of the way the truth and the life of whom the Psalmist sayes He is neere to all those that seeke him and those who are thus far advanced in morality may be said to be in atriis Templi in the Church-yard which is in a congruous disposition for farther advance into the body of the church I shall endeavour then to affect every one with the love of purity and holinesse of life for to those that are already rooted and growing in the Church this disposition will be are that fruit the Apostle soliciteth for them that their love may abound more and more in knowledge and in all judgement And in those who are yet strangers and forreiners as he calls them this reverentiall feare of God seemes to chase the wax for the seale of the holy Spirit for Prayers and Almes doe as it were retaine God for their Counsel and as his Clients open their cause to him in these tearms of the Psalmist Lord cause me to know the way wherein I should walk for I lift up my soule unto thee And such may be said to be halfe way towards their end that doe worship in a zealous spirit and are likely never left there but helped on to the other part of worshipping in truth by him that hath ordained our worship to consist of Spirit and Truth so that devotion sincerity in any Religion are the best Symptomes of our designation to the true and sincere Religion Wherefore having made this generall presentation of piety and virtue to all parties I shall not stay to wrastle in the Schooles but rather strive to set such Church-musick as all parties may agree to meet at the service and this I presume may sound in tune unto most eares that where consort and harmony in faith appeareth it is a good note of that
certainly such a temper is apter for a right conversion then a harsh and sowre constitution of the mind the first is a good mould of earth with ill seed cast into it and so the fruit may be ill while the pregnancy of the earth is good the other is a heath naturally unfruitfull and requires much more manuring to make it beare Wherefore that nature which hath not a kindly pregnancy in it to beare love is not the best mould for the seed in the Gospell for though it may render thirty it can hardly yeeld the increase of a hundred fold in Devotion Certainly we may then very religiously preferre the constitution of such mindes whose powers are best disposed for the act of loving for love as it is the greatest treasure of our soules so is it the only security stands bound to God for all our debts all the other faculties of man seeme to be receivers only and this the discharger of all their accounts but love hath this extraordinary blessing the greater expense it makes upon this occasion the richer it growes for the more our love payes God the more it improves the same estate but we can assigne nothing but this pure species of love to the receipt of heaven Wherefore all empty formalities and unsincere affectations in exteriour exercises that would passe for Devotion are me thinkes like servants that have got on fine clothes of their Masters by which strangers may mistake their quality but their Masters are not deceived by them so these garments and coverings of Devotion may abuse the eye of the world but we know the master of all sanctity distinguishes dissimulation in all the specious similitudes it weareth And I should beleeve a varnished hypocrite may be more offensive to the sight of God then a zealous unvailed idolater for this is but mistaken in God and the other seemeth to suppose God may be mistaken in him and certainly there is nothing more capitall against the lawes of Heaven then counterfeiting the coyne which piety may not improperly be tearmed as being the price and measure of all exchanges between heaven and earth of these false coyners King David sayes They slatter God with their mouth lye unto him with their tongues and he gives them Gods answer thus The Lord shall laugh them to scorn We may conclude then that the sincere love of God is the spirit and soul of Devotion and therefore is to be intire in every severall part of our religious exercises when God dignifies man with similitude to his own image it is the soul not the body that hath this Divine relation so in the service of God which is a consistence of two such parts united of spirit and of matter the spirit and breath of life doth not reside in the materiall part which is sensible religious offices but in the informing and animating part which is Devotion the which answereth to the soule in humanity as I have endeavoured to demonstrate And thus I hope that I have not indecently apparell'd Devotion in the habit of the place it is recommended to clothing it in this soft rayment of passion being to come unto the houses of Kings But now me thinkes I heare some sensuall and voluptuous persons cry out to warne their passions to stand upon their guard objecting that I like a pyrat have thus put up friends colours while I am in chase calling devotion love and passion that it might the easilyer enter our hearts which when it hath done it takes and imprisons all our humane delights To these I may answer that I have put up these colours indeed that those vessels I would speak with might not fly from piety at first sight as from an enemy to pleasure that speaking with them I might shew them how Devotion comming and possessing our mindes doth rather compose the munity then infringe the true liberty of our affections For grace findes Humane Nature like a vessell richly fraught for commerce with Heaven most commonly in a mutiny where the affections that should saile her rise up against their Commander resolving to make spoile of their commodities and to turne to the piracy of sense taking all whereof sensuality can possesse it selfe and if Devotion enter and compose this sedition and convey the affections cheerefully to their direct commerce with Heaven this may be rather thought a delivery then a violation And surely our senses cannot more justly complaine of Devotion as a dispossessor of their properties then wilde people can call a Law-giver a tyrant For piety doth but regulate the functions not ruine the faculties of our senses and licentiousnesse cannot more rightly be called the mindes liberty then nakednesse the bodies freedome For lawes and apparell doe both in their kinds cover natures nakednesse and lawes like clothes impart conveniencies the one to the minde as the other to the body without impeaching the decent and proper exercises of either and so Devotion doth but reduce the wild multitude of humane affections and passions under the Monarchall Government of the love of God under which they may enjoy a more convenient freedome then let loose in their owne confused Anarchy which they confesse when they are converted by God to this belief of their condition that to serve God is to raigne The Fift Treatise Discoursing whether sensible pleasure may consort with Devotion In two Sections §. I. The rectifying our Affections chiefely our love in the sense of beauty UPon the title of this Chapter me thinkes I see our humane affections stand with the same perplexed attention as a condemn'd multitude at the reading of a Proclamation of Grace to some particular specified names each one watching and praying for his owne Thus doe our humane passions seeme now concerned believing themselves all condemn'd by piety each one me thinkes in a frighted and tacit deprecation of their censure is expecting with anexity to know whether Devotion will allow them life and consistence with her edicts The answer to this must be that I shall only put to death the blind and the lame whch are commonly set to keep the strong hold of our corrupted nature against virtue As they were upon the walls of Sion to keep out David Such Devotion must destroy for they are hated by her Soule and are not to be admitted into the Temple Secular justice is allowed a latitude in mercy to which this spirituall judge cannot extend his favour viz. rather to save diverse guilty then to cut off one innocent for Devotion must rather put to death many innocent affections then save one criminall by reason that in this case mercy renders the judge a complice of the crime so that our Devotion must not looke upon the face of any of our affections but judge by the testimony our conscience brings in against them Yet piety is not so inhumane as many may apprehend that know not the nature thereof for it delighteth not in the death of our
to viz. whether they make that cozening advantage by them or no with the creature they must answer for as much to the Creator as they projected to make of them and thus as the Prophet saith As much Wind as they have sowed so much Tempest they shall reape §. VI. Presumption upon our vertue discussed and the danger thereof remonstrated THere are many Lovers who when they find no direct design of impurity at first in their passions conclude them competent with their salvation and care not how neare the wind they steere nor how many boards they make as long as they believe they can reach the Port with this wind which is so faire for their senses therefore they pretend they need not stand so strait a course as making Jobs covenant with their eyes nor setting Davids watch over their lips provided they set a guard over their heart that no foule possession enter upon that seate thus do they expose many faire models of their love which in speculation may seem designed according to the square of Religion but how hard it is to build adequately to the speculative measures in this structure none can tell that presume to know it our senses are not inanimate materials that obey the order of the spirits designe but rather labourers which are easily debauched to worke contrary to the measures and rule of the Spirit hence it is that they who will undertake in this case all they can argue possibly for humane nature render it impossible by their undertaking it for they reckon not their presumption as any impediment which in the practise as being an irritation of God out-weighs all the other difficulties and the more alwayes the lesse it is weighed in the designe therefore as Solomon saith The wise man declineth evil and the foole heapes on and is confident The beliefe of impossibility is the most prudent supposition in such experiments as cannot be essayed without some desperate exposure of our selves it may be demonstrate by reason that we may have halfe of our body over a precipice so the centre of the weight be kept in an exact aequilibrium that part which is pensile can never weigh down the other which is supported but we should thinke one mad that would try this conclusion when the least motion changeth the Position and consequently destroyeth the practicer of this speculation so those that pretend to keept their soules equally poised in the just measures between piety and prophane love their eyes hanging over the precipice of temptations which do so easily turne their heads and then alter all the positions of their mind adventure upon just such a spirituall experiment He that seeketh danger shall perish in it is attested by the unhappy president of the wisest of men and it is superfluous to instance other testimonies of this truth When David and Solomon the two brazen pillars of the Temple being the direction and fortitude of the Princes of Israel were melted and poured out like water as David himselfe confesseth by the ardors of his flesh and so they seem to stand in holy record as two high eminent markes set upon these sands to advertise the strongest vessels not to venture to passe over them and if Saint Paul that vessel of election after his having seen the beauty of Heaven to possesse his heart thought himselfe hard matched with the Angell of Sathan and cryed out to heaven for helpe against him shall any presume to entertain and cherish this ill Angell and hope to overcome him with flattery and civility for they make this tryall who lodge in their thoughts and serve with their fancies strong impressions of humane beauty and propose to keepe their body in order even by the vertue of such a guest pretending that the very object infuseth a remembrance and reverence of purity With this and the like glittering conceipts do many vain Lovers fondly satisfy and abuse themselves which is to answer the question of the Holy Spirit that the fire they carry in their bosomes preserveth them from being enflamed by it we may fitly say to such in answer from the Prophet God laughs at you when all Gods advices are that there is no security against this bosome enemy but violence and diffidence there is no meane between the flesh's being slave or master this treaty of Friendship between it and the spirit proves but Dalilahs kind holding of Sampsons head in her lap while she is shaving him How often do we see the Spirit thus betraid and lye bound by this confidence And truly all those chaines which vain Lovers forge for the figuring out the powerfulnesse of beauty may be said to be those irons the flesh hath cast off and set upon the Spirit which is truly captivated alwayes by the others liberty This considered let none presume that while they deny the 〈…〉 eyes nothing which they covet they can deny their hearts any undue cupidity for this seemeth such an experiment as if one of the children of Israel should have carryed a fiery Serpent in his bosome presuming that while he looked upon the Brazen Serpent he could not be stung sure such a perverted confidence would not have proved safe to the projector So those who believe while they have the love of God before their eyes they may expose them to all the fiery darts of lustfull eyes seem to tempt God by such a vain presumption these are such of whom we may fitly say with the Apostle that Erring themselves they lead others into errour and have a forme of Godlinesse but deny the Power of it being lovers of pleasure more then lovers of God Let no body then trust to any confederacy between the flesh the spirit which is of humane loves making for of all reconciled enemies the flesh is least to be trusted after the accord and love the least for the arbitration therefore let none believe their souls out of danger because in the first paces of their passion they meet no insolent temptations that face them and declare the danger of their advance for the Devill keepes likely his first Method still with those he findeth in the state of innocence he taketh the shape of the serpent and creeps up by insinuation and then changeth his shape into the figure of his power and this transmigration of the evil spirits from one body into another is truer then the fancy of Pythagoras for we find often this Metamorphosis of the devill from the form of a dove unto a serpent from a lamb into a lion since it is the same spirit that moves in the poetical doves of Venus as was acting in Eves serpent thus what hath at first in our love an innocent form passeth quickly into a venemous nature Wherefore severe caution and repulse of the first motions of our sensitive appetite is the onely guard our soules can trust against our bodyes in this case for certainly many lovers sink into temptations in
delight the owners of it shewing what a reall blessing beauty hath by being made by God one of the best opticke glasses for the helpe of mans spirituall eye by report from his corporeall in the speculation of divinity for by this inference of the Wise-man he may argue If we are delighted with these materiall beauties we may judge how much more beautifull and lovely is the Lord and Creator of them adding that by the greatnesse of the beauty of the creatures the heathens were inexcusable that they did not find the truth of one Creator We may remarke a speciall providence of God in the order of nature providing against the pervertiblenesse of this great blessing of beauty for the most vehement cupidity of our nature ariseth not before the use of reason the abuse of beauty and the use of reason are both of an age whereby we have a defence coupled with the time of temptation and our reason when it is seriously consulted for our safety hath the voyce of the holy cryer in the desart and directeth us to a stronger then her selfe which was before her though it appeared after her this is Grace which we may call in to our succour in all the violencies of our nature so as with these pre-cautions I propose beauty to be truly honoured in that highest degree of nobility which God hath been pleased to rank it among his materiall creatures preserving religiously the Prerogative Rights of the Soveraign of our hearts who demandeth not the putting out of the right eye as the Ammonites did for a mark of slavery but proposed it onely as a medicine in case of scandall when the liberty of the whole body is indangered by it whereby we see devotion doth not infringe any of the rights of humanity in the valuation of materiall blessings for in not admitting vain passion it doth rather defend then diminish the liberties of humane nature which are truly inslaved by the tyrannies of passion Now in answer to that question concerning friendship with women I professe to intend so little the discrediting of reall friendship with them as I approve it for an excellent preservative against the contagiousnesse of passion for as passion hath been well said to be friendship runne mad so friendship may be properly styled sober passion since it hath all the spirit and cordiality of the wine of love without the offensive fumes and vapors of it and so doth the office of exhilarating the heart without intoxicating the braine Insomuch as we finde that our friendship with the proprietor of what we are tempted to covet doth often even by the single virtue of morality suppresse those unruly appetites Therefore when the power of Christianity is joyned to re-inforce it we may expect it should much the easilier correct frailty of nature It hath been well said of friendship that it is the soule of humane society and if our friendship hold this Analogy with the soul to be equally intire in every part of the body it is very safe with women if the love be no more in the face then in the feet as long as it is like a soule thus spiritually distributed equally in the whole compound of body and mind it is not in danger of the partiality of passion which never maketh this equall communication of it selfe but lodgeth solely in the externall figure of the body and friendship thus regularly spirituall may find a sensible as well as a lawfull delight in the beauty and lovelynesse of the person for beauty hath somewhat that affecteth and taketh our nature which methinks is somewhat like to that we call the fire or the water in diamonds which are certain rayes of luster and brightnesse that seem the Spirit of the whole matter being equally issued from all parts of it and so there may be a kind of spirit and quicknesse of joy and delight that may shine upon us from the object of a beautifull person whom we may love so spiritually as to consider nothing in the person severed from the whole consistence and virtuous integrity of soul and body no more then we do the fire of a diamond apart from the whole substance Thus beauty may innocently raise the joy of friendship whiles sincere friendship doth suppresse the danger of beauty which is onely the kindling of passion wherefore if it be rightly examined passion which pretendeth to honour beauty more then friendship will be found but to vilifie and debase it for passion useth this diamond but as a flint to strike materiall sparkles of lust out of it whereas friendship lookes upon the fire of this diamond as delighted only with the luster of nature in the substance of it which reflects alwaies the splendor of the Creator unto a Pious ' and religious love But this high Spirituall point of friendship with women where we have no defence by consanguinity against the frailty of flesh and blood is not so accessable as we should presume easily to reach it many loves have stray'd that pretended to set out towards it therefore we cannot be too cautious in this promise to our selves of security in such difficulties for our spirit can make no such friendship with our flesh as to rely upon the fidelity thereof without his own continuall vigilancy wherefore S. Peters advise is very pertinent in these intelligences Converse in feare in this time of your sojourning for otherwise I may presage to you in the termes of the Prophet Evil shall come upon you and you shal not know from whence it riseth for friendship doth often when it is too much presumed upon rob upon the place it did first pretend to guard being easily tempted by the conveniency our senses finde in that trust And as those theeves are the hardliest discovered that can so handsomely change their apparencies upon the place as they need not flie upon it so friendship when it is debaushed into passion is very hardly detected For when it is questioned by Gods authorized examinants it resumeth the lookes and similitude of innocent friendship and so remaineth undiscovered not onely by the exterior inquest but very often it eludeth a slight interior search of our own conscience thereby proving the most dangerous theef in the familiarities with women For this reason I must charge this admission of friendship towards women with this clause of Saint Paul While you stand by saith presume not but feare for in this case we may warrantably invert the rule of Saint John and say that perfect love bringeth in feare wherefore I will conclude this case with Solomons sentence Blessed is the man who feareth alwayes he that hardneth his heart shall fall into mischiefe § VIII The Conclusion framed upon all the premised Discourse and our Love safely addressed NOw then upon these evidences we may fairely cast passion in this charge of Treason against the Soveraign of all our love and consequently all libertine discourse and familiarities with women
of whom I may say with the Apostle That in the midst of a perverse generation they have shined as lights in the world their mindes seeming to be kindes of Spiritual fixed Stars which never altered their distances from the Earth and intended onely the finishing their course at the same time imparting light unto the world by divers irradiations respective to their positions therein either of Prayer or other Edifications Wherefore of such habits of minde the Holy Spirit saith The path of the just is as the shining light that proceedeth even to perfect day which is Contemplation consummated when the day-Star whereby Saint Peter expresseth it shall be risen in our hearts whereof these acts of our intellect seem to be some inchoative or imperfect rays and to give you as fair a view as I can of this abstruse object I shall set it in the most luminous definition I can deliver it out of the mouth of S. Augustine Contemplation is a clear in t 〈…〉 on and a delightful admiration of perspicuous Verities so that the minde in that state may be said to walk in the meridional light of Faith towards the incomprehensible clarity of perfect vision and this light of Grace wherein a pure Contemplative Soul inhabiteth may me thinks be said to hold some such proportion to the purer light of glory she expecteth as the sight which the three Apostles had of Christs Body transfigured on Tabor holds to that they are to have of it glorified in Heaven for as the brightness of Lightning and the cand or of Snow did in some measure represent to them the far transcending lustre and beauty that was to be looked for in his Body beatified so these admirable intellectual Verities which are the objects of a true Contemplative Soul in this life do in some degree figure to it the unexpressible notions rising out of a fruitive Contemplation of the increated Verity insomuch as these elevated Spirits may be conceived to have such a kinde of advantage over others who may also be faithful in lower stations of Christianity as the three Disciples called up to Tabor had of them that were left below the Mountain For certainly this sight must have imprinted in their mindes a more lively and affecting image of the amiableness of glorified Bodies then the others could apprehend But as Christ admitted few even of his Apostles to this sight of him so doth God vouchsafe to select and elevate but very few to this superlative pitch of Contemplation of whom we may say with the Psalmist This is the generation of them that seek the face of the God of Jacob who we know was one of the most eminent in this high vocation feeding on this bread of Angels and having this Spiritual Manna showâ—red down upon him while he was feeding the flocks of others in a servile obligation And holy David in all his exterior bitternesses tasting of this Spiritual reflection saith as it were this Grace to it How great is the multitude of thy sweetness O Lord which thou hast hid for them that fear thee thou shalt hide them in the secret of thy face from the disturbance of men This expresseth well their state of minde which is covered from the sight of the world in the secret of Gods face that is in his most private and reserved kindenesses and as God hideth himself in his own inaccessible light so such Souls adhering unto God and becoming as the Apostle â—aith one Spirit are hid to the world in the excessive light of their Graces which common apprehensions cannot penetrate of such mindes we may most peculiarly say Who knoweth the things of such men save the Spirit that is in them which searcheth the deep things of God while their apprehensive faculty perfecteth it self by extracting the pure species of Truth and their affecting power is perfected by transmitting it self exteriorly upon the object that attracteth it Thus the understanding is never satiated by a continual receiving nor the affection ever diminished by an incessant issuing it self out upon the object but doth rather acquire by this perpetual Self-alienation In this admirable commerce doth the true Contemplative Soul negotiate with her own Maker while what is imported from him into the Understanding obligeth the Will to export unto him her faculty of loving and thus knowledge infused draweth forth love and love efused remitteth back fresh illuminations This Angelical correspondence with God the Contemplative Man entertaineth and hath in proportion to his Nature the same priviledge that Angels have when they assume apparent Bodies for their ministery on Earth namely to finde no intermission of their seeing God So in all the exterior offices which the Soul acteth by the ministery of the Body in such persons the Minde doth not remove out of that apprehended presence of God whereof her transitory state is capable insomuch as a profound Contemplator may be said to be never so much alive to this life as when he seemeth to be the most dead to it For in the image of Death when the other powers of his Minde cannot controul his Fancy that may introduce imaginations into him superfluously relative to this life and removed from the scope of all his reasonable cogitations which never move but in a presential reverence of God So that the Natural Man may be said to live in him no longer by the strength or power of his Nature but meerly by the infirmity of it that requireth such a suspension of the Spiritual Man which lives so powerfully in such a person as he seems fully in possession of Christs promise of his Fathers and his coming and making his abâ—de with him which according to the division made by the Holy Ghost of the whole Man may be conceived to be done in this maner The Father residing in that portion called the Soul as it importeth the Origine of all vital operations the Son resting in the Minde as that is the seat of our actual intelligence or understanding and both of them may be said to expirate and breathe forth the Holy Ghost into the Heart as that is taken for the continent of our affections and by this means the whole Man cometh as near the loving God with all his Soul with all his Minde and with all his Heart as this traverse and interposed vail of Flesh and Blood can admit him forgetting with Saint Paul the things that are behinde and stretching forth himself to those that are before by this constant Application preserving the whole Spirit Soul and Body without blame to the coming of our Lord Christ Jesus Considering then the properties of these golden vessels of Charity placed within the outward vale of the Temple and looking continually towards the Propitiatory seated within the inward vale which figured the beatifical vision even their Bodies may be well compared to the grate upon the Altar of Incense from which all the ashes of carnal appetites
see Christ promiseth us in expresse termes the company of the Father and his residence in us Wherefore Now O happy man that thou art look not down upon the stage of the Serpent where he lyeth still hissing at thee to call thy thoughts to the earth since thou didst first hearken to him But raise thy lookes upward to the throne of Heaven where the splendor of thy humanity at the right Hand of God reflecteth to thee thy owne dignity for even in the mirrour of the word wherein God the Father seeth himselfe man may now see his own image there man may see not only his nature made after Gods image but God himselfe in the image of his nature Correspond with thy own worthynesse then O exalted creature and live as if thou had'st never seene thy selfe in any other glasse for here is that eminence truly conferred on thee which thou did'st at first so vainly affect of being like God and the holy Spirit is thy councellour in this claime of thy divinity and thy comforter against the disswasions of thy first projector who would now divert thee from the aspiring to the consort and participation of the divine nature which is offered to thy aspiring This premised and ponder'd man may say I rejoyce even in my infirmities that the power of Christ may rest upon me and triumph in me for my strength is made perfect in weaknesse and may consort the harp of David to the same tune of praysing mans condition professing thy friends O Lord are become exceeding honourable their principality is exceeding strengthened for when mans infirmities appear in temptations and suggestions to deface the image and Character of the holy Ghost in him then hath he the holy Spirit to second him in the defence of his own image So that by the adjunction of these helpes even all mans infirmities may be converted into his glories and man hath nothing left to undeifie him now but his owne preferrence of degeneration and flavery to the enemy of his nature before his adherence to her Author Finally upon all these representations I may justly re-extoll and magnifie the dignity of humane nature which we may consider sent down at first from Heaven as Gods image and next as a state to which God himselfe did vouchsafe to come down in person and taking it upon him will inhabit therein eternally and then that the holy Spirit of the Father and the Son abideth in it as in his Temple which he sanctifies incessantly nay more that it is designed to partake the same glory which the whole Trinity injoyeth by being promised to be made like him who hath it all the God and man Christ Jesus O then he that may hope this let him never plead his frailty or infirmity in discredit of his nature let him not in a dejection of spirit seek to cover his pusilanimity with O wretched man I finde a Law reluctant in me against all these motives and incentives of my aspiring to divinity but rather let him boldly pronounce in such a holy confidence as is prescribed him I can doe all things in him that strengthens me for since God is in so many sorts with us who shall prevaile against us Therefore in all these reluctances let us aspire to be more then conquerors by him who so much loveth us The Third Treatise Of Religion §. I. Considering it under the generall Notion of some reference to a Divine Power REligion riseth in the first dawning of the light of nature for the soul as soon as she doth but see her selfe by the reflex of any discourse discernes her own relation to some superiour cause to which she assigneth some present reverence and reason as it riseth and ascendeth breaketh the day a little further but leaveth the mind still in such a twy-light as the understanding doth hardly distinguish singularity in the supremacy discryed above it selfe for reason doth but as it were feele out her way to Divinity by a kinde of palpation and sensible touches upon materiall creatures and cannot by an immediate elevation of her faculties to immateriall notions raise her selfe up to the speculation of any spirituall substance much lesse to the supreme spirituall Essence So that by the meere light of nature the mind oftner scatters and breakes the object of Divinity then singleth it into unity This deficiency appeareth in the speculations of most of the Philosophers who all looked naturally upward for some supream reference and asscription of their being but unto most of them Heaven like a crack'd mirrour broken by their various imaginations reflected multiplyed images of the Divinity whereby we may discerne that the perception of unity in the divine Essence is not derived so much from the emission of the rayes of naturall Reason as from a reception of a supernaturall light whereby reason is rather illuminated from above it selfe then singly producing this selfe-illustration and this forrein clarity diffused upon our reason is the Grace of the Divine essence which elucidates to our minde the simplicity and indivisiblenesse of the object from whence this gracious splendour issueth upon our understanding Grace thus inspired worketh by the soule as light doth by the sense not inducing the faculty but only the exercise of sight for grace doth not conferre any new faculty to the soul but only perfecteth the capacity of naturall reason in this act of singling the notion of the Diety and settling the unity of a Creator in our beleef And this first position alwayes suggesteth some Religion taken largely as a recognition by some exteriour homage of one Supreamacy above our Nature but this estate admits of much diversity in Religious beliefs in which even the wise men of the World as Saint Paul termeth them did stray and lose themselves growing vain in their own imaginations for by a seeming pretext of piety namely of making religious addresses enough to God they made many Gods under the colour of one Supream addresse By this Errour we may perceive that naturall reason needeth still a further conduct from grace to lead it to a rectified Religion Certaine it is that the materiall and visible species of this world afford some notion of the invisible producer as in mines whereof the specificall matter is of a much meaner substance there are found some veines of Gold and Silver so out of the grosse masse of nature those that work upon it by single reason may easily extract some Spirituall ore of Religion for through the elemented body of the universe there run some veines of intimation of a spirituall nature independent on all matter which reason may discerne and so resolve some Religious acknowledgment of a Divine principle as the producer of subordinate causes and effects but how apt humane reason is to sever and disunite this principle we may easily judge when we remember how soone reason forgot her owne origine and as if having lost the unity of the
are not like thy 〈◊〉 for even the speculations of our own inventions do not so much as create that reall peace of mind which is concluded by devotion This metaphor of Physick suggesteth to me the carrying it a little further on to my purpose for me thinks I may truly say of the spirit of devotion what some curious Naturalists have vented of a medicinall extraction they call the spirit of the world which giveth vegetation to all bodies they affirme it to have the vertue of restoring nature from decay to integrity and to preserve mans body long in an indeficient vigour and propose contrary effects produceable by this spirit respectively to divers constitutions but still to the benefit and redintegration of nature in each individuall whereunto it is ministred I may without questioning or signing this position make this application of it and affirme that these properties are really verified in the virtue of this supernatural spirit which I call Devotion so that I need not feare what I promise to perswade the taking it in that manner I have formerly receipted it whereupon I propose to every regular user thereof no lesse benefit then the conferring on them their finall desire in this life which is comprized under this notion of happinesse by which terme we understand the resting and quieting our mindes in the fruition of goods convenient and agreeable to our nature in which state I propose to shew that Devotion doth establish the minde of man in order whereunto I may well prefix this Axiome of Saint Augustine Lord thou hast made the heart of man for thy selfe and therefore it is alwayes restlesse untill it requiesce in thee Nothing hath so perplexed the wit of man as to determine the supreame felicity of this life The Phylosophers have been so divided about it as they seeme to have passed their lives in a continuall warre upon one another in the very treaty of this generall peace they sought to establish it seemeth Almighty God in revenge of the partitions and fractions they made of his unity broke their opinions into so many pieces as they could never joyâ—ne in one uniforme conclusion but as Saint Paul saith of them They grew vaine in their imaginations and in the darknesse of their hearts every Sect had a severall Phantasme of happinesse appearing to it Surely God who saw with what presumption they were building up the designe of their security in this life by the modell of their owne naturall Reason sent this confusion of opinions like that of the tongues amongst them to ruine that structure of humane felicity the wisdome of the world was raising for her refuge shelter against the stormes of Heaven And so these bricklayers of humane happinesse which they may be properlytermed in respect they wrought only upon the matter of the earth tempered by humane wisdome and with that stuffe thought to build up their forts of felicity were struck from Heaven into this confusion of language and dispersed into severall Sects in which every one spake a different tongue and never concurr'd in an intelligence to constitute one unanimous position touching the supreame felicity This point of mans constant happinesse seemeth to be in Morall Philosophie the great secret in search whereof most of the speculative Sages have imployed their studyes and have advanced no further then the naturall Philosophers have done towards finding the famous Elixir for the Moralists have made many usefull discoveries by the way whereby they have composed diverse excellent medicines for the infirmities of the minde but never any of them though they have much boasted it did attaine unto that consummate virtue which could settle the minde in a perfect tranquillity and invariable temper This virtuous power in morality as it answereth adequately to those properties the Chymicks attribute to their great worke so is there this Analogy betweene them that they both seeme much more feisable by their speculative rules then they are found by practicall experiment The swelling science of the Ancients which had never heard of the fall of Humane Nature grew too well conceited of her sufficiency thinking the perversity and wrynesse of the superiour part of the minde to grow only by an ill habit of stooping and bending towards the lower portion which is the sensitive appetite thus the Stoiks concluded that single reason might by the reflex of discourse see this indecent posture whereunto custome inclined her and so by degree rectifie and erect her powers to such a point of straightnesse as neither the delights nor the distresses of the lower and sensitive part of nature should ever bowe or decline the evennesse and rectitude of the minde and by this means they arrogated no lesse to mans sufficiency then even the power of remaining in a calme apathy and impassivenesse in all offensive emergencies But alas the wisdome of the world knew nothing of that inward bruise our nature had in her fall which keepeth her too infirme to be reduced to that perfect activity whereunto pure speculation might designe her we understand that repugnant law in our members by which all their imagined tenures of security were voyded when they came to their triall but they understood so little this law as what we know to be the defect of frail title namely our nature they took for the security of their estate of peace Me thinkes the Ancient Philosophers with all their wisdome and precaution were served by their owne nature as children use to doe one another at a certaine schoole-play when he that hides striketh him he holdeth blinded who being thought out of play is never guessed at and thus did our corrupted Nature while she her selfe held them blinded strike them and she was never suspected of the blow but the accidents of fortune were only taken for the strikers with which singly those Sages thought their mindes were exercising themselves for they never misdoubted this infidelity in Humane Nature they thought her intirely sound and selfe-sufficient to afford this consummate tranquillity of spirit in all seasons and thus they were like children kept blinded and strucken by the same hand which they never suspected charging fortune as a forreine actor with all those blowes that provoked their passions Upon which ground they presumed on the sufficiency of naturall Reason even to extinguish all passion or distemperance in their mindes but to these presumptions the Apostle answereth While they accounted themselves wise they became fooles And surely these Morall Ideas conceived by the Stolkes may well be coupled with the naturall Ideas supposed by the Platonikes out of which principle there may be some light drawne towards the inquiry into the nature of formes abstracted from matter although the position be erroneous After this sort we may derive much clarity towardes our discerning the latitude and power of morall virtue by these maximes of the Stoiks which are not sincerely true in their conclusions I may therefore justly bring in this
designe to fix it and so convert it into earthly treasure but as good Physitians do onely in order to the extracting medicines and remedies out of it And by this Method as they render Mercury beneficiall by drawing from it some good quality and fixing that upon some other body while that substance remaineth unfixed and volatile We may likewise without setting our thoughts to work upon temporall goods in hope to make our happynes by the fixure of them wel derive great utility from them by the infusion of some of their virtue making thereof remedyes for the necessityes of our neighbours Such an extraction Daniel counselled the King to draw out of his perishable felicity and by this Method while the matter of worldly goods remaineth fluent and transitory there may be great utility derived even from the consideration of these qualities For by using this matter according to the nature of it by keeping it passing and transient through our hearts and hands we may provide a fixed and eternall happinesse This advice is given us by the Author both of Nature and Grace to make out of the unfaithfull company of this worlds friendship such loyall friends as shall receive us into those tabernacles where no good is lesse then eternall This is a practicall use which Devotion will alwayes introduce in our temporall possessions There is also another speculative influence which it hath in order to the settlement of our mind namely the frequent meditation on the instability of all things sublunary which cogitations are pregnant seeds of the contempt of this world whereby we learn to draw the cure of the venome out of the bowels of the beast it self distilling out of the serious contemplation of the mutability of all worldly happines a remedy against the evill of that ficklenes and impermanency and by this course we raise some succour out of the adverse party of our own frailty For they who ponder frequently how all things sublunary move continually in an interchangeable flowing and refluencie may easily learn not to imbarque their mindes in any earthly delights never so fairly secured without expecting adverse revolutions and repeales of those joyes and by this preparation Devotion doth by degrees teach us to make our peace Postable upon all the tides of fortune understanding them to be truly the current of Divine providence This light we can receive onely from the beames of Grace and they shine the clearer in our hearts the more Devotion is kindled in them For this Spirituall flame as it riseth alwayes attracteth more of that first fire that lighted it and thus from our affections being inflamed by devotion our understandings take this light whereby they discerne the greatest security we can contrive for our contentments in this world to be the being so prepared for mutations that our wils may be so loose from anchorage upon any earthly pleasure as they remove easily from their hold on that delight and put out to the sea of Gods providence in all the stormes of adversity And considering how Gods way is in the sea and his paths in many waters and that his foot-steps are not to be discerned Our affections may easily repaire their earthly losses by that treasure they may find in this Ocean of Gods will the riches whereof we make ours by entring into his will as often as we are driven out of our own by the variations of this world and by this Pious acquiescence to all vicissitudes of this life we shall come to a constant good habit of mind as men at sea obtain an unmoved state of body for as they do not confirm their health by the steddynesse of the vessell in a calme but by the custome and habitude of the rowlings and tossings of it in severall weathers So shall we settle the peace of our mind not by the calme equality of a prosperous condition but by the acquaintance and inurement to severall adverse revolutions And this is undoubtedly the best Method in point of attaining a good constituton of happynes in this life for King David himself found little security in this I have said in my prosperity I shall never be moved For he seemeth to retract this opinion all in a breath the next words confessing Thou hast hid thy face from me and I was troubled Wherefore his reflexion upon the instability of our humane condition proved a more assured stay for him in his agitations when he concluded Doubtlesse all things are vanity every man living surely man passeth as an Image yea and he is troubled in vain §. III. Resultancies from the meditation of humane frailty and a resolving the right of Happynes as belonging to Devotion THe state of humane Nature being thus determined me thinks there may be an excellent medicinall extraction drawn by prudence directed by Grace out of the nature of temporal felicity in order to the fortifying our minds which may not improperly be tearmed the Spirit or salt of humane frailty since it may work upon the mind as Phisitians say those kind of Diaphoretical medicines do upon the body the which although they do not produce any violent sweat yet they clense by opening the pores and keeping the body in a continued transpiration and breathing out of the Malignity After this manner may our minds be purged and rectified by this meditation of our frailty which notwithstanding it forceth not out any notorious expressions of the contempt of this world in a sensible alteration of our course of life yet it may maintain the mind in a constant temper of purifying by a soft evacuating much of the uncleannesse of her sensitive appetite through an insensible perspiration of mortifying thoughts and the proper time to minister this receipt is in the health of our fortune while we are in an easie fruition of the joyes and solaces of this life for then the perswasion of their insecurity holds us loose from that dangerous adherence which carryeth away our peace along with their removals but this prescript looseth much of the efficacy when it is taken but after our mindes are decayed and infeebled by the sadnesse and weight of affliction because in that ease they commonly want that vigor of reason which should cooperate with this remedy and in that respect what might have been a sufficient stay to our minds while they stood straight and upright may not be able to redresse and erect them when they are faln and dejected I will therefore leave this prescription thus signed by the Holy Spirit Say not I possesse many things and what evill can come to me hereafter but in the good dayes remember the evill for the malice of one hour maketh oblivion of great voluptuousnesse and therefore in another place the same hand giveth this advice From the morning to the evening the time changeth All things are soon done before the Lord A wise man will fear in every thing But lest me should conceive happynes to be
us in the childhood of our love to lead it by degrees to filiall love which is the full age of our affections For indeed while our love is in this first infancy our minds may be well said to be in bondage under the elements of the world rather serving upon a servile contract then acting as heires of the Promise which dignity a Christian evidenceth only by filiall Love indeed the other sort is rather legall then evangelicall and alone bringeth nothing to perfection §. III. Filiall love described and some strong incentives presented to kindle it in us NOw then as the Apostle saith Let us leave these beginnings and rudiments of the doctrine of Christ and covet earnestly the best gifts and I will shew unto you a more excellent way by as much as the matter of the altar of perfumes was more precious then that of Holocausts let us then leave fouling our hands with this brasse of mercenary love and fall a telling out this gold of Filiall dilection Filiall love is an adherence of our hearts to God under this mixt notion principally of his own being and secondarily of our relation to him So as this may be said to be a repercussion of his own light upon him as simply as our compounded nature can reflect it the light of Gods countenance impressed upon us being by this love reverberated upon the divine nature From the eyes of the hand-maid fixed upon the eye of her mistresse more in order to the duty of her nature then in private affection to her selfe So that this kind of love seemeth to be in the regeneration of man in the age of reason what the soul is in his first generation to wit the first principle of life For our devotion is but as it were an Embrion before it receive this animation which is induced by an infusion even of that love wherewith God loveth himselfe since it is the holy Spirit diffused in our hearts that quickneth and informeth them by this kind of love This is then the onely sort of affection worthy of God whereby we returne him that part of the divine nature we partake by his communication while we seem thus to remit the holy-Ghost back to him out of our hearts loving God with the same affection we derive from this residence in our soules Methinks the dignity and present delight of this noble love though it were an unthrift anticipation in this our minority and were to be discounted to us out of our future estate of loving might tempt a soule to take up for her present joy and satisfaction the suavity and blessednesse of this excellent love how much the rather ought we then aspire to this degrees of loving when the estate of our reversion is reproved proportionately to the degrees of this our anticipation This may well be the Method of such a father whose portions to his heires are the injoying himselfe no wonder then that the desire to preoccupate this state should augment the childrens inheritance For the Father who is infinite love must needs be largest to them who have advanced to themselves the most of Filiall love and the reason is that this Celestiall Father can reward nothing but his own gifts assigning alwayes second benefits by the measures of his first liberality and thus the more he hath inriched us with this love the more he remunerateth the possession of it so that mercenary love when it is understood will be found to damnifie it selfe by this projected aeconomy of selfe-provision for in this commerce all private reference imbaseth so much the species wherewith we negotiate as it falles in value just as much as it riseth in quantity When we reflect upon the state of humane nature we may collect easily how much God desireth this correspondence of Filiall love since even from the forfeiture of all our filiall dignity he tooke the rise of a nearer and firmer alliance of our nature unto his and fastned it so to this filial constitution as he took it out of mans own power ever to divide or sever it againe from this relation for even the sinne of man can never divorce our humanity now from this filiall state since the naturall Sonne of God will now no more cease to be man then to be God so inseparably is our nature now fixed in this filiall reference for though individuals may by want of Filial love to the divine nature separate themselves from a blessed participation thereof in eternity yet our nature can never fall from this divine conjunction but shall remaine elevated above that of Cherubims and Seraphins to all eternity O who can contemplate this and consent to love God lesse nobly then our present nature will admit considering we have even the noblenesse of our nature now set out to us as an object of our love for as it is in Jesus Christ we cannot over-love our own humanity and since God hath done as much as was possible for him in honour of our nature shall man be content to love this God lesse then is possible for his constitution nay there are grave Divines who indeare this obligation upon our humanity by this supposition that God lost the love of much nobler creatures by his preference of mans nature before theirs and if the supreamest of all creatures thought this as a partiality to an unworthy subject a provocation to leave loving of God shall not this prefer'd creature derive from hence a powerfull motive to raise and purifie his love in respect of this so obliged proposure whereof the Apostle glorieth and insisteth much upon the prelation of the seed of Abraham before the nature of Angels as one of the strongest inducements to â—nterest our hearts in this filial affection And since God hath prefer'd the nature of man before that of Angels not onely in point of honour but likewise in the part of succour why may we not suppose he valueth more the love of men then that of Angels this conception may safely be made use of to incite us to the studying the abstraction and spiritualizing our loves to the purest degree of our compound nature in which the very disadvantage we have more then pure spirits in the devesture of self-respects may be converted into a conducement to the value of our purity by reason the opposition of our bodyes in this disinterested love is counted to us an indearement of our hearts when in this reluctancy of one halfe we reduce our love to that decree of implicity which is compatible with this our complexure and as Saint Jerome saith of the chastity of virgins composed with that of Angels There is more felicity in the one but more fortitude in the other So we may say respectively of their two loves that there is more happynesse in the one but more Heroicknesse in the other What Angelicall love exceedeth in the finenesse of abstraction humane may answer in the fidelity of extraction since his is laboured
testimony to the beatification of it I shall descend to the other two which are more terrestial and of my familiar acquaintance Wherefore I may hope to give some more pertinent information of the nature of them for as I may truly say I have neither learnt wisdom nor have I the knowledge of the Saints so I may also own That I have seen many things by erring and going astray whereby I have found that the sensitive part hath often an equal voyce with the rational in the election of this second state of Solitude which I have stated as Neutral and so will treat of it in the middle between those two I have termed Voluntary and Violent as mixed and partaking of them both What hath been said of the great Patron of Solitude John Baptist may in my conceit sort well with this particular I now describe to wit That he was the Horizon of the Law and the Gospel his state being a kinde of middle Circle that did divide those two Haemispheres touching upon each of them Such a position doth this Neutral Solitude seem to have of being an Horizon between the two states of purely Voluntary and Violent Solitude as it is a middle term between both of them which parteth and disterminateth them from one another and partaketh of either of them For indeed it toucheth both upon Freedom and Constraint on the first as it is an act of Election on the latter as it is an effect of some exterior compulsion which notwithstanding it cannot fully distrain the will yet it lays such forcible motives upon it as carry away the election in a posture mixed between Consent and Coaction and this is the maner of our willing in many occasions when our Imagination suggesteth to our Will some apparent good under the form of Real and moving this choyce in a kinde of imperious maner of perswasion carrieth the election which although it be always voluntary in the act yet may be said to be violent in respect of the means that wrought it forasmuch as that voluntary act holds more of the imperfection then of the perfection of Free-wil as being an act contrary to the order of Reason thatdoth dictate rather the choyce of the real good then the apparent which is preferred in this election To elucidate this point we may consider That the Angels now cannot make such a choyce in respect their free-acts are always perfect and regulated by right Reason though before they did see God it was not so as in Lucifer is clear when therefore such a vote is passed by our Will it must needs argue a kinde of violence and tyranny indeed excerseded over our Reason and consequently this choyce partaketh of violence in point of perfection of the act however it is likewise voluntary in the order of our imperfect Natures that are less truly free then Angels albeit we may be said to have an extension of liberty above them viz. that we can choose as well to do evil as good which amplitude argueth in effect imperfection and deficiency of liberty no◠any compleatment or perfection thereof And for this reason That by the order of Nature the understanding ought to command in all rational elections wherefore it is rather a regulation of Nature to restrain the Will unto Reason then any violence upon Free-will to have it so confined or restrained In proof whereof we may consider That even mans Will which is now in via rebellious when it cometh to be perfectionated in Heaven or in patria as Divines call it will be reduced into this order and conformity so while we finde this order inverted by the irregularity of our corrupted Nature we may say many of our voluntary acts partake of a kinde of violence when by the predominating of our Will over our Reason they are rendred acts imperfect however we may call them free From whence ariseth this mixed amphibious kinde of election which nevertheless doth not infringe the liberty of the Will since that electeth always freely for no force of motives can rise to a direct compulsion of the Will and the efficacy of extrinsecal impressions in this case may be fairly illustrated by Gods maner of working upon the Will which he moveth efficaciously to his own end yet freely in order to her Natures preserving his power and her liberty After such a sort do external Motives very often carry the elective faculty of the Minde to some choyces and resolutions moving the Will with efficacy and withal conveying it with freedom to the determination And this is the case I suppose of what I term Neutral or Mixed Solitude when any exterior injury from the world presseth the Will vehemently to elect this state of life which is often chosen as in this mixed Disposition hath been represented Wherefore the chief intendment of this Discourse shall be to furnish the Will with such precautions as may fortifie her against such violent assaults of the Imagination in this act of so great importance §. II. Treating divers Motives that solicite this vocation THe Soul of man being the seat of the Divine Image in Humane Nature the instinct of sociableness may be said to be the eye or the sight of the Divine Image in it for as the eye is the organ of light which conveyeth to us the chiefest society of all material things and thence is the noblest maner of Commerce the Body hath with the World as consequently the worthiest portion of our sensitive Nature So the instinct and Natural appetency of Society is the noblest faculty of our intellectual For by Society we receive all our rational light as by the Eye we take all visible species and the love of company is not imprinted in us so much for our own private solace as for the support of the common frame of Humane Society So that the sociableness of Humane Nature is in order to the conservation and comfort of the whole by a convenient union of the parts And the same reasons that require a due disposition of the several parts of our Natural body for the decency and health of it hold in the constitution of the Spiritual frame of our Nature so as the love of Society is referred to the constituting of order which consisteth always of parts and is nothing but a due marshalling and ranking of divers and distinct portions either in material things or rational designs Whereupon since order is in Nature the final end of this impression of the love of Society an inordinate love of Company may be out of the order of the sociableness of Humane Nature as it may aim onely at some propriety that respecteth some such single desire as is much severed from the common good of Society and so many self-assignments may be in this respect said rather to tend properly to Singularity then Society According to this rule all the busie negotiation of our passions in the world do rather break the chain of Society then make
for our Pâ—ney This irregularity in our nature may be much corrected by pondering seriously every day the property of time and the state of e 〈…〉 ity I do not meane to impose upon any body a subtile penetration into any abstâ—use conceptions upon these subjects only a pious reflection upon the familiar notions of each of them as the lightness and inanity of the one the weight and immensity of the other unto which every one may conceive himself passing on as a straw upon a â—orrent and at the foot of this precipice suppose an Ocean of endless joy or misery which hath a division in it of these two qualities of Good or Evil but no difference in the infinity of either and we may contemplate how we are not carried to either of these as we are the greater or the lesser straws but as we come off clean or fowl from this torrent of time it is not by the greatness but by the purity of our lives that we are delivered over to these divers states in this indivisible eternity these are 〈◊〉 tations competent to all sises of mindes in reference to this method of meditation on Eternity When King David was upon this application as he saith I thought upon old days and the Eternal years had I in minde he telleth us thâ—â— he swept his Spirit that thought presently applied him to the cleaning of his Spirit which temporary objects had bedusted and sure our soul in this point is like our eye which may have dust and filth in it while it is closed whereof it is not sensible but as soon as it is open it presently findeth the offence so our minde wh 〈…〉 she is shut to the apprehension of eternity may have many impurities in her which she discerneth not but as soon as her thoughts are wide open upon that object she feeleth the offensiveness of every fowl Atome sticking on her so as this cogitation of the Royal Psalmist is the readiest address to that cleanness of heart to which our Savior hath annexed the seeing of God Me thinks this lesson is given us by the nature our soul which partaketh both of Time and Eternity as having a beginning and no end to couple in our thoughts the images of both these Beings that as the minde draweth fluent and transitory affections from time she may derive also fixed and permanent desires from Eternity and this intermixture of these divers impressions is the greatest setlement or simplicity a soul can attain unto during her operation by such organs as are meerly temporary and the Holy Spirit giveth this security to the frequent meditation on the ending and endlesness of our two lives In all thy works remember thy latter ends and thou will not sin for ever And surely this habitual prospect on our end will abate much the sense of any present condition for it affecteth us not with what we are or have been but with what we are to be for ever and since by Naâ—â—ue death hath a share in every day we live they who let this debt run on without paying unto it any of their time will finde the sum risen so high as they will at last come to owe death even their eternity But by this order I propose of assigning some parcel of every day to this discharge we may convert that portion we pay death into a debt accrening unto us of eternal life which at our last day death shall be forced to deliver to us In order to this address of your cogitations I will offer you this obvious conception to suppose all states of life imbarqued upon one vessel and that continually sinking which surely is sensible enough to such as are not dizied and distracted by the motions of it and when the vessel is palpably sinking doth the General who is commanding above think himself in a better state then the slave working in his chains Doth he that is in the lanthorn account himself happier then he that lieth in the hold because he is like to perish some minutes later Do not they all then alike forget what they have been and think onely on what they are to be they who will accustom themselves to ruminate upon this similitude reporting aptly to all the conditions of this life which are in an equal certainty of expiration may easily forget their present posture and be possessed intirely with their future expectation which in one instant becomes unalterable to all Eternity and they cannot be assured that this instant is not as near them as their next thought I surely then I am perswaded that whosoever shall fasten his thoughts attentively once every day upon this meditation shall not be disquieted with that kinde of life he is reduced unto but rather joyed to consider that he is in a capacity of making our of any sort of life never so grievous a life everlasting and eternal beatitude whereof he may be assured from S. Paul the Patern and Patron of prisoners whom he may suppose speaking this to him in his chains Our light affliction which is but for a moment worketh for us a far exceeding and eternal weight of glory and if our prisoner be one that hath the thorns of an ill life to pull out of his conscience he will think himself much happies while he is in a state which conduceth to his repenting of what he hath done then when he was in a condition that did contribute to his doing what he was to repent §. VIII The final and most solid assignment of confort for this condition NOw then to sum up the true account of all my propositions I do not pretend they should amount to so much as the Stoicks have vainly reckoned upon their precepts I do not promise the minde such an apathy or insensibleness of all distresses and afflictions as those Rational Charlâ—tans have undertook this deading and stark calming of all passion is rather a dream of Philosophy then the rest of a Christian and of that fancied slumber of theirs we may say with the Psalmist of these mens fancied riches They have slept their sleep and have found nothing a Christian must not affect to say I have slept a good sleep but I have fought a good fight and my Crown hangs where I must take it away by violence it will not fall upon my head while that lieth upon the pillows of my sensitive appetites they therefore who are the best studied in the precepts of Reason or the power of Grace must expect to meet with some dark obscure parenthesis's in their Solitude which at sometimes they cannot understand and the more contestingly they set their Reason to explain them the more intricate they perhaps will finde them at that conjuncture for there are some intervals of wearisomness and disfavor in our Spirits which no Reason can clear to us though it may be they have a coherence with the whole contexture of our peace as being interposed by God to introduce
s 2. Inconstancy of vain affections p. 41. s 2. Incredulity in prayer a mental stammering p. 83. s 1. Imitation of Princes is very familiar for the reasons of gain p. 91. s 2. Iustice for our first fault requireth the love of enemies p. 272. s 2. Injustice prospering not to be wondred at p. 307. s 2. Imperfection of Mans Will in many election consisting with his liberty p. 325 326. Iealousies nature treated and the good use of it in Gods love p. 155. sect 1 2. Instincts of expressing our passion sheweth our loves to be due to God p. 161. s 2. L LOve justifieth the Incarnation of God p. 13. s 3. Love from man enjoyned by the Incarnation of God p. 13. s 2. Love rendring it self to Devotion is not ill treated p. 38. s 4. Love to enemies forgot in the Law and revived in the Gospel like the fire of the Altar after the Captivity p. 266. s 2. Liberty rather given to our Souls then restraint made by the Precept of loving enemies p. 267. s 1. Love of enemies proveth a counterpoison to the forbidden fruit p. 269. s 3. Love to enemies misinterpreted in a figurative sense by many p. 273. s 2. Love to enemies not ordains as they are simply enemies p. 275. s 2. Love irregular causeth our aversion to the love of enemies p. 282. s 1. Liberty dear to Humane Nature p. 339. s 2. Learning how it becometh most useful towards consolation p. 348. s 1 2. Liberty of minde gained overpays the captivity of the body p. 354. s 1 2. Love of the world recovereth often after our having wounded it by Grace or Reason p. 376. s 1. Lecture proved necessary for the passage to Contemplation p. 394. Liberties of jesting how they are allowable p. 131. s 1. Liberties indecent though little disfigure the reputation of women p. 147. s 3 Liberties of scurrility excused by the presumers in them p. 137. s 2. Love though mercinary how to be accepted p. 182. M MAns nobility by creation p. 2. s 3. p. 3. Mans excuse of his fall p. 3. s 2. Mans self-deceit p. 6. s 1. Meditation conducent to peace of Spirit p. 58. s 2. Meditation on the changeableness of all the pleasures we enjoy serveth towards the securing our happiness p. 61. s 3. Moral Philosophy answereth not to the promises of Speculation in our necessities p. 62. s 1. Mans reason for his forgiving the first injury of women p. 275. s 1. Morality more studied at Court then Religion p. 117. s 1 2. Moral civility useful to improve the zeal of religious duties p. 118. s 1. Mirth a great disguise of Medisance p. 128. s 2. Morality single is insufficient for our support in great pressures p. 342. s 3. Moral Philosophy set in a due order for consolation in distresses p. 345. Meditations on the vain figure of this world p. 361. s 1. Meditation on eternity a relief against all temporary pressures p. 367. s 1. Mortification of the flesh requisite for all acts of pure Speculation p. 392. s 2. Medisance most entertained by the encouragement of great persons p. 129. s 1. Mercy of God misconâ—â—ived p. 156. s 2. more 158. s 1. Mercy rightly understood p. 158. s 〈◊〉 Mercinary love how far allowed p. 185. Mercinary love of the nature of dwarfs p. 185. s 1. N NVns eminent purity p. 18. s 〈◊〉 Nature gives some light towards the sight of God p. 1â— s 2. Nature discredited single for happiness p. 57. s 2. Naturalists shall rise up in judgement against ill Christians p. 277. s 3. O OPinion of Temporalities confuted p. 7. s 2. Order given by God for direction in Religion p. 28. s 1. Opinion why it prevaileth often above Truth p. 68. s 2. Obligation in point of love to enemies p. 283. s 2. Orders of Providence not discerned occasioneth all our wonder p. 305. s 1 2. Order described p. 327. Order for disposing our time pleasantly and usefully in Imprisonment p. 351. s 1. Order of the three Persons of the Trinity residing in a Contemplative Soul p. 389. Order of rising up to Contemplation p. 391. s 1. P PRide first introduced and how continued p. 3. s 3. Philosophers deceived in the Divinity p. 21. s 2. Piety advised in all religions p. 24. s 2. Passion it self maketh use of Religion to express it self p. 32. s 2. Passion transferred may honor God in a double respect p. 33. s 1 2. Piety doth the office of a Law-giver not of an Insulter p. 35. s 3. Piety not incompatible with pleasure p. 37. s 2. Pleasures allowed by Devotion p. 41. s 1 2. Propriety in temporal goods abateth the value and Piety repairs it p. 42. s 2. Philosophers variances concerning happiness p. 51. s 2. Prayer assigned for the way to finde truth and consequently happiness p. 79. s 2. Prayer must be sincere and fervent to become officious p. 82. s 2. Prayer is often accepted when the suit is not accorded p. 84. s 1. Princes vertues may make Courts schools oâ— Piety p. 91. s 1. Princes especially obliged to piety p. 91. s 2. Prudence for Courtiers p. 97. s 1. Praises allowable in many cases and how they are to be applied p. 110. s 2 3. Princes obliged to forgive personal injuries p. 280. s 1 2. Providence not to be judged of by pieces p. 295. s 2. Prayer against Gods menaces allowed the Prophets p. 301. s 1. Providence seemeth as it were disguised upon earth p. 359. s 2. Presumption on our power to resist the temptations of Beauty is dangerous p. 166. s 2. Q THe quality of peace expectable in this life p. 84. sect 2. The quality of private conditions towards the discernment of the worlds instability p. 105. s 1. Quarrels with the world do sometime occasion good vocations to sanctity p. 328. s 3. The qualities of prophane passion p. 152. s 2. The quality of temptations slighted at first as easily masterable p. 171. s 2. R REason much degenerated in our faln Nature p. 〈◊〉 sect 2. Reason injured by opinion p. 7. sect 2. Repaired Nature by Christ exalted above the original innocence p. 15. s 1. p. 16. s 2. Revenge contrived unto piety p. 17. s 2. Reasons course up to Divinity p. 21. s 1. Repentance may convert even our sins into good fruit p. 30. s 2 3. Remedies extractable out of the meditation of our frailty p. 60. s 1. Riches possessed and improved towards piety p. 70. s 2. Religion lightly considered may perplex us in the judgement of events but more profoundly looked into setleth on us p. 292. s 3. Religion the onely refuge in the perplexity of advers events to a good cause p. 302. s 2 3. Reason of distracting events not to be hoped for in this world p. 304. s 2. Retreats out of the world turned into delusions by the Devil p. 332. s 2. Reason single vainly overvalued by the Philosophers p. 340. s 2 3. Remedies drawn
affections but desires rather they may turne from their perversions and live and to perswade their conversion offers that to them in this life which is promised to us but in heaven namely to have our bodies changed from corruptible and passive into immortall and inpassible for Devotion offers to transfigure our affections from their impure and passive shapes into immuculate and imperishable formes raise them up from infirmity to virtue and make those desires which have beene the image of terestriall figures to beare only that of the celestiall Neverthelesse our minds seeme to be like fond mothers which are lamenting their children given over by the Physitian and will scarce hearken to the consolation of Gods Minister who promiseth so much a better state as a change from weak infants into Angels In this manner our fond and effeminate mindes seeme to bewaile this tranfiguration of their affections which Devotion proposeth according to the Apostle viz. the raising their conversation up to Heaven and changing their vile body so that it may be fashioned like unto the glorious quality of the love of God And certainly unlesse our affections be cut off from the carnall stock of our nature and set by way of ingrafting and incision upon the stem of the holy Vine they doe beare but sowre Grapes such as will set reason's teeth on edge which is their mother since our corrupted nature puts forth many sharp and unripe cupidities and fancies which are truly rather corrasive then cordiall to the minde God hath planted affections in our sensitive nature not with a purpose that they should be fixed in the earth and bear only terrene cupidities but hath rather set them there for a while only as in a seminary or nursery where he doth not meane they should take any deepe root for our reason as soon as it is able is ordained to remove and transplant our affections into spirituall scituations into that garden for which they were first planted so that although our loves grow at first while they are little tender slips only in the terrestriall part of our nature they are designed to be removed in their due season into the celestiall portion and to beare fruites spirituall and intellectuall which order is intimated by the Apostle when he saith as the first man is of earth earthly so the latter must be of heaven heavenly But because in this warfare of our lives upon earth between these two parties the sensitive and the rationall our sensitive nature is not easily perswaded to render up her affections wherein she accounts her selfe so strong unto right reason upon discretion let us examine what faire conditions grace which alwayes taketh Reason's part offereth her and indeed if the offers be well judged of there will appeare a truer freedome gained by this surrender then that which the loosenesse of our nature would maintaine when our affections being made free from sinne are become the servants of righteousnesse for if we examine the impositions and constraints our passions lay upon us it is easie to convince that to he a reall servitude which we doe familiarly but in wantonesse tearme so and thus our loose passions like the Jewes to whom our Saviour proposed freedome by the knowledge of truth will hardly confesse their inthralment but I may fitly say to them as he did while you commit sinne you are the servants of sinne If grace by Devotion set you free you shall be free indeed Therefore I will procure to manifest how grace may give nature great conditions of freedome and how the best proprieties of our affections are rather improved and secured then alienated and spoiled by this surrender to Reason and Devotion And to treate first of the interests of love which seemes to be the commander of all the strength of our passions when love renders it selfe to Devotion then is it so farre from being restrain'd as it is continued in the command of all the power of our pieties and is trusted so much as it is allowed to hold faire correspondence with beauty though that were the party love had served under against grace for then our love commerceth with the creatures only to improve his owne estate and faculty of loving which is all assigned to the honour of the creatour And surely when love by a rectified perswasion of the blessings of the creature brings beauty into the service of Devotion by a right admiration of the workes of the creatour such objects may forcibly concurre to excite us to the love of the maker in honouring of whom consists all Devotion Beauty may be truly honoured by the rights of her nature without being flattered by that meanes to be solicited against her maker for she may be confessed one of the best of all mixed creations since pure spirituall substances when they will put on a materiall vaile take beauty for their vestment The Angels expose themselves to us alwayes in the forme of beauty because that is the readiest note our sense acknowledges of Divinity and when the Son of God vouchsafed to be clothed with materiality the holy Spirit that made him this Garment exposes it and recommends it to us in this forme of being beautifull above the sonnes of men and he drawes the image of the spouse he came to take in the figure of perfect beauty as the best sensible Character can be made of her and makes this quality the object of Christs love As she is all faire and no spot to be found in her and thus as beauty is chosen for a simbol of spirituall purity the allegory of it as I may say not the letter is to be studyed by us since that attention will reflect to us the fairenesse and integrity we ought to preserve in our soules and so possesse us against that perverted sense which is often drawne out of the out-side or letter of materiall beauty In the Book of Gods Workes Saint Paul tells us the Divinity of the Author is legible by some little study of the Character and certainly there is no so faire part of this edition as that of beauty but we doe most commonly like children to whom books are given in fine prints and graced with gay flourished letters and figures they turne them over and play with them and never learne the wordes thus likely doe our childish mindes that are kept at play by our senses looke wantonly over the specious figures of beauty and seldome study them to learne Gods meaning in them which if they did seriously inquire they might learne that the excellence and perfection of their true meaning renders the perversion the more reproachable for as crimes are the greater the neerer they come to the violation of the person of the Prince so if beauty be the neerest sensible image of the soveraigne of nature the betraying it to his professed enemy must needs be the most capitall offence how this infidelity is committed is but too much