and inflamed with curious fare There are many who tread vpon couetousnes and it is layd aside by them as easily as their purse A reproachfull tongue is mended by imposing silence vpon it To reforme the habite and order of our cloathing doth but cost an houres work All other sinnes ar◅ without the man and that which is without is soone cast away Only lust to which we are enable ◅ by God for the procreation of children if i◅ passe beyond the due boundes proues vicious by a kind of course of nature it striues to breake out into copulation It is therefore a point of great vertue and requires a carefull diligence to ouercome that to which you are borne and not to liue in flesh after a ◅shly manner to fight daily with your selfe and to ha◅e the hundred eyes of Argus which the Poets ◅aigne vpon that enemy who is shut vp within our selues This is that which the Apostle deliuers to vs in other words All sinne which a man commits is without the body but he who commits fornication sinnes against his owne body The Phisitians who writ of the nature of mans body and especially Galen sayth in those bookes which are intituled Of preseruing bodily health that the bodies of youthes and young men and of men and woemen of perfect age boyle vp through their inuate heate and that such food is hurtfull to them at those years as doth increase their heat that on the other side it conduces to their health to take such other meate and drinke as cooles the blood And so also old wine and warmer food is good for old men who are subiect to crudities and fleame Whereupon our Sauiour also sayth Looke to your selues that your har◅s be not oppressed through gluttony drunkennes and with the cares of this life And the Apostle speakes of wine wherein there is luxury Neither is it any maru◅ile that the Potter framed this iudgment of the poore little pot which himselfe had made when the Comedian whose end was no more then to describe the conditiō of mankind sayd that Venus grew could without Ceres and Bacchus First therefore if yet the strength of your stomacke will endure it let water be your drinke till you shall haue passed ouer the heat of your youth Or if your weakenes will not admit of this hearken to Timothy Vse a little wine for your stomacke and for your frequent infirmities In the next place you must in your food auoyd all kind of thinges which are hot And here I speake not only of flesh vpon which the vessell of election pronounces this sentence It is good for a man not to drinke wine nor to eate flesh but also euen in Pulse to auoyd all those things which are windy and heauy and know you that nothing is so good for Christians as the feeding vpon kitchin herbes Whereupon he saith also in another place He that is infirme let him eat herbes and so the heat of our bodies is to be tempered with this cooler kind of cates Daniel the three children were fed with Pulse They were but young were not yet come to the fiery paine wherin that Babylonian King fryed those old iudges By vs that good fayre state of body which euen besides the priuiledge of Gods grace appeared in them by theyr feeding vpon such meates is not esteemed but the strength of the soule is sought by vs which is so much the stronger by how much the flesh is weaker From hence it is that many who desire to lead a chast life fall groueling downe in the midest of their iourney whilest they attend only to abstayne from flesh and load the stomacke with pulse which being taken moderately and sparingly is not hurtfull But if I shall say what I thinke there is nothing which doth so much inflame a body and prouoke the partes of generation as meate when it is not wel digested but makes a kind of conuulsion in the body through windynes I had rather O daughter speake a little too plainly then that the matter we speake of should be in danger You must thinke all that to be poyson which makes a seminary of pleasure A sparing diet a stomacke which is euer in appetite I preferre before a fast of three daies and it is much better to take some little thing euery day then to feed full at some few times That rayne is the most profitable which descends into the earth by little and little A sudden and excessiue shower which fals impetuously turnes the field vp side downe When you eat consider that instantly after you must pray and read Rate your self to a certaine number of verses of holy Scripture and performe this taske to our Lord and allow not your body to take rest till you shall haue filled the basket of your breast with that kind of worke Next after holy scriptures read the writings of learned men of thē I meane whose faith is known There is no cause why you shold seeke gold in durt but you must sell pearles to buy that one Stand according to the aduise of Ieremy neer many wayes that you may meet with that one which leades to our country Transferre your loue of iewels and gemmes and silken cloathes to the knowledge of holy scripture Enter into that land of promise flowing with milke and hony Eate flower and oyle and apparayle your selfe with the variously coloured garments of Ioseph Let your eares be boared through with Ierusalem that is to say by the word of God that the pretious grayne of new corne may bow downe from thence You haue holy Exuperius a man of fit age approued faith who will often instruct you with his good aduice Make friendes for your selfe of the vniust Mammon who may receiue you into those eternal Tabernacles bestow your riches vpon them who eat not pheasants but browne bread who driue hunger away and who do not call lust home Haue vnderstanding of the poore and needy giue to euery one that askes of you but especially to the houshould of faith Cloath the naked the hungry visit the sicke As often as you stretch forth your hand thinke of Christ. Take heed that when your Lord God is begging of you you increase not the riches of other folkes Fly from the conuersation of young men and let not any roof in your house be able to see these dapper curious and loose fellowes there Let the musitian be sent away like a ma◅efactour and thrust you rudely out of your house all Fidlers and minstrells and such quiers of the Diuell as you would anoyd those Syren songes which bring destruction Goe not ◅orth in publicke be not carryed vp and downe according to the liberty which widowes takes with that army of Eunuches going before you It is a most wicked custome that a frail sexe and a weake age should abuse power and should thinke that all is lawfull which they list Though all thinges were
himselfe to haue a chast hart The starres are not cleane in the sight of our Lord and how much lesse are men cleane whose very life is a temptation Woe be to vs who as often as we haue impure desires so often do we commit fornication My sword sayth he is inebriated in heauen and much more on earth which breedes thornes and brambles That Vessell of election whose mouth did sound forth Christ doth macerate his body and makes it subiect to seruitude and yet he findes that the naturall heat of his flesh doth so resist his mind that he was forced to that to which he had no mind to cry out as suffering violence and to say Miserable man that I am who shall deliuer me from the body of this death And doe you thinke that you can passe through without any fall or wouÌ„d vnlâ—…s you keep your hart with a most straight custody and 〈◊〉 you say with our Sauiour My mother and my brethren 〈◊〉 they who do the will of my Father Such cruelty is piety Oâ—…rather what can sauour of more piety then that a holy Mother should keep her sonne holy She also desires that you may liue and that she may not see you for a tyme to the end that she may euer see you with Christ. Anna brought forth Saâ—…ll not for her selfe but for the Tabernacle The sonnes of Iâ—…nadah who drunke neither wine nor any other thing which could inebriate who dwelt in Tents and had no other places to rest in then where the night layd hol d vpon them are sayd in the Psalme to haue beene the first who sustayned captiuity and were constrayned to enter into Citties by the Army of Calâ—…ans which ouerran Iudea Let others consider what they will resolue for euery man abounds in his owne sense To me a towne is a prison and a solitude is a Paradise Why should we desire the frequent concourse of men in townes who are already sayd to be single Moyses that he might gouerne the people of the Iewes was instructed forty yeares in the Wildernes from being a pastour of sheep he grew to be a pastour of men The Apostles from fishing the lake of Genesereth passed on to fish for men Hauing then their Father their net and their ship they followed our Lord they left all thinges outright they daily carryed their crosse without so much as a sticke in their handes This I haue sayd that if you be tickled with desire of being ordained Priest you first may learne what you are to teach and may offer a reasonable sacrifice to Christ that you esteeme not your selfe to be an old souldier before you haue first carryed armes and that you be not sooner a Master then a scholler It belonges not to my poorenes and small capacity to iudge of Priests or to speake any thing of ill odour concerning such as minister to the Churches Let them hold their degrâ—…e and ranke to which you also arriue that booke which I wrot to Nepotianâ—…s will be able to teach you how you are to liue therein We do now but consider as it were the cradle and coÌ„ditions of that Monke who being instructed from his youth in liberal sciences hath layd the yoke of Christ vpon his neck And first it is to be considered whether you were best liue in the Monastery alone or in the company of others For my part I shall like well that you haue the society of holy men â—…hat you do not teach your selfe nor eÌ„ter vpon that way without a guide which you neuer knew for so you may decline either to one hand or other and be subiect to errour and that you may not walke either faster or slower then is fit least either running you be weary or loytering you be sleepy In solitude pride creeps on a pace and if a man grow to fast a little and then see none but himselfe he will thinke he is some body and forgetting both whence and to what end he came his hart wanders within and his tongue without He iudges the seruant of an other against the Apostles mind he reaches â—…orth his hand as farre as gluttony bids him he sleepes as much as he will he feares no man he doth what he lists he thinkes al men to be his inferiours and is oftener in Citties then in his Cell And yet when he finds himself among others of his owne profession he takes vpon him to be so maydenly as if the crowd of the streetes pressed him to death But what Do we reprehend a solitary life No for we haue often praysed it But we desire that such men may go out from the discipline of Monasteries as the hard lessons of the wildernes may not fright they who haue giuen a long allowable testimony of their conuesation who made themselues the lowest and least of all and so grew to be the greatest who haue not beene vanquished eyther by eating or abstayning who reioyce in pouerty whose habite speech countenance gate is the very doctrine of piety who know not how after the custome of some fonâ—… people to deuise certaine phantasticall battailes of Diuells as if they were fighting against them that so they may grow to be woundred at by the ignorant vulgar and make some commodity thereby We saw lately and we lamented that the goods of Craesus were found vpon the death of a certen man that the almes of the Citty which had beene gathered to the vse of the poore was left by him to his posterity and stocke Then did the iron which had lyen hide in the bottome swimme vpon the top of the water the bitternes of Myâ—…h was seene to be among the palmes Nor is this strange for he had such a companion and such a Master as made his riches grow out of the hungar of poore men and the almes which had beene left to miserable persons he reserued for his owne misery For at last their cry reached to heauen and did so ouercome the most patient eares of God that an Angell Nabal Carmelo was sent who sayd Thou foole this night shall they take thy soule from thee the goodes which thou hast prouided whose shall they be I would not therefore vpon the reasons which I haue declared already that you should dwell with your Mother especially least wheÌ„ she offers you delicate fare you should either make her sad by refusing it or adde oyle to your owne fire if you accept it And least also among those many woemen you should see somewhat by day which you might thinke vpon by night Let your booke be neuer layd out of your handes and from vnder your eyes Learne the Psalter word for word Pray without intermission haue a watchfull mind and such a one as may notlye open to vaine thoughts Let both your body and soule striue towardes our Lord. Ouercome anger with patience loue the knowledge of Scripture and you will not loue the vices of the flesh Let not your mind attend
shew the antiquity of his nobility some few yeares since when he had the prefecture of the Citty ouerthrowe breake downe burne that denne of Mithra and all those prodigious Idols wherby C◅rax Niph◅ Nilon Leo Perses Helios and father Bromius or Bacchus are dedicated to those vses and hauing sent these hostages before him did he not obtayne the Baptisme of Christ Gentility suffers a kind of desolation of a wildernes euen in the Citty The Gods which heretofore we adored by the Nations of the world are now onely remayning in the tops of houses with skrich Owles The Ensignes of the Crosse are now become the standa◅s of the campe The healthful picture of the same Crosse serues to beautify the Purple Robes of Kings the bright burning gemmes of their diademes Now the Egyptian Serapis is turned Christian Marnas who is shut vp in Gaza mournes and perpetually trembles for feare of the euersion of that Temple Out of India Persia and Ethiopia we daily ◅nterteyne whole troopes of Monckes The Armenian hath layd his quiuers aside the ◅uns learne the Psalter the frozen Scythia doth euen boyle vp through the heat of faith The red and yellow Army of the Getes carry Churches like Tents round about and therefore is it perhaps that they make their part good against v◅ by way of Armes because they embrace our Religion I am almost fallen away into an other matter the wheele running round whilest I was thinking vpon a little pitcher my hand hath made a great tankerd For my purpose was to direct my speech vpon the request of holy Marcella and you to a Mother that is to your selfe and to teach you how you are to instruct our Paula who was consecrated to Christ before she was borne and whome you conceiued in your vowes before you did it in your wombe Somewhat we haue seene in our tyme of the propheticall Bookes Ann◅ exchanged barrennes for fruitfullnes and you haue now changed your said fruitfullnes for hopefull children I speake it confidently you shall haue more children you who haue payd the first borne to God These are those first borne which were offered in the law So was Samuel borne and so was Sampson and so did Iohn Baptist reioyce and exult vpon the arriuall of Mary For he heard the words of our Lord thūdering in his eares by the mouth of the virgin and he stroue to breake forth of his Mothers wombe that he might haue met him So that she who was borne by repromission must obtaine such instruction from her parentes as may be worthy of her birth Samuel was brought vp in the Temple Iohn was prepared in the desert The former was venerable by his sacred haire and druncke neither wine nor any other thing which could inebriate and whilest he was yet but a little one he had conuersation with our Lord. The later flyes from Citties he was bound in by a girdle of haire he was fed with locusts and wild hony and in type of the pennance which he was to preach he was apparelled with the spoile or skine of the Camel that most crooked beast So must that soule be instructed which is to become the Temple of God Let her learne to heare and speake nothing but that which belongs to the feare of God Let her not vnderstand a fowle word and let her be ignorant of the songes which the world is wont to sing Let her tongue be enured to sweet Psalmes whilest it is young Away with the vsuall wantonnes of children and let the girles and waiting maides be remoued from secular conuersation least what they haue learned ill they teach worse Let some Alphabet of letters be made for her either of Boxe or Iuory let them be called by their names Let her play with them that so her very playing may be learning and let her not only learne the order of the letters that the memory of names may passe into the tune of some songe but let euen that very order he inuerted and let the last letters be mingled with them of the middest and they of the middest with the foremost that she may not only know them by roat but by vse But when she beginnes with a weake shaking hand to draw her stile vpon waxe let either the tender ioyntes of her fingers be ruled by the casting of some hand ouer hers or els let the letters be grauen vpon some little table that the lines may be drawne still shut vp in margens by the same hollowes so they may not wander abroad Let some reward be propounded to her when she beginnes to ioyne the sillables and let her be animated by such kind of Presents as are wont to take the most flattering hold vpon that tender age Let her also haue companious in learning whom she may enuy and by whose prayses she may be stung If she be at all slowe of wit let her not be chidden but you must raise it with comendation of her that she may be glad when she hath conquered and be sorry when she is ouercome You must chiefly take care that she be not brought to mislike learning and that the bitter way of teaching her in her infancy may not be remembred by her whē she shall haue passed beyond those tender yeares Those names whereby she shall accustome her selfe by little and little to knit words together must not be casuall but appointed and industriously compiled namely of the Prophets the Apostles let the whole series of the Patriarkes from Adam be brought downe as it is deliuered in Matthew and Luke That so whilest she is about this other businesse a preparation of matter may be made for her memory to be layd vp thereby for after tymes Some Master must be chosen of fit yeares for her and of good life knowledge And I hope a learned man will not thinke much to do that in the behalfe of a noble virgin which Aristotle did for the sonne of Phillip who tooke the office of clarckes or booke wrighters away by teaching him first to reade Those thinges are not to be contemned as little without which great thinges cannot stand The very ayre or manner of the letters and the first teaching of Rules doth sound after one fashion out of a learned mouth and after another if the man be ignorant and rude And therefore you must prouide that through the foolish dandlings of woemen your daughter get not a custome of pronouncing certaine halfe wordes Nor to play with gold or gay cloathes though it be but in iest for the former of these two things hurts the tongue the latter hurts the mind and she may chance learne that when she is young which afterward she must be fayne to vnlearne The māner of Hortensius his speech was gotten by him in his fathers armes That is hardly scraped out which young vnfashioned mindes haue drunke in Who shall be able to reduce purple wooll to the former whitenes A new vessell long
you tell me what good do these second marriages produce which may serue to counteruaile so great miseryes Would we know what kind of thinges widdowes ought to be Let vs read the Ghospell according to Luke And Annâ—… the Prophetesse sayth he was the daughter of Phanuel of the tribe of Asser. Phanuel in our tongue signifyes the face of God Aser is translated to signify both riches felicity Because therfore she had endured the burden of widowhood from her youth til she came to be fourescore and foure yeares old and departed not from the Temple of God insisting day and night by fasting prayer therefore did she deserue spirituall grace and to be stiled the daughter of the face of God and to be endowed with the riches and felicity of her ancestours Let vs remember the widow of Sarepta who preferred the hunger of Elias before her owne or her childrens health So that she being to dye with her sonne that night resolued to leaue her guest safe behinde her and choosing rather to loose her life then her giuing of almes did in that handfull of floure prepare for her selfe the seminary of a haruest from our Lord. The floure is sowed the vessels of oyle springes out In Iury there was scarcity of wheat for the graine of corne was dead there there flowed great fountains from the widowes oyle We read in Iudith if men be yet disposed to receaue that booke of a widow who was defeated by fasting and defaced by mourning weedes who lamented not her dead husband but sought the coming of a new spouse by the extreme neglect of her owne person I see that she appeares with a warlike sword and with a bloody right hand I perceaue she hath the head of Holophernes which she hath brought euen from the middest of her enemies A woman ouercomes men and chastity cuts off the head of lust and changing suddenly her habit she comes backe to that conquering neglect of her selfe more glorious then all the ornaments of this world could giue her Some there are who ignorantly reckon Deborah among the widowes thinke that Barach the Captaine was the sonne of Deborah though the scripture speake otherwise By vs she shall be named in regard that she was a Prophetesse and is reckened among the number of the Iudges And because she could say How sweet are thy wordes to my throat more then hony or the honycombe to my mouth she tooke the name of a Bee being fed by the flowers of holy Scripture and being imbrued by the odour of the Holy Ghost and composing the sweet iuyce of Ambrosia with her Propheticall mouth Noemi which signifyes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and which we may interpret The comforted her husband and children being dead in foraigne parts brought bake her chastity into her country and being sustained by that prouision she had a Moabite for her sonnes wife that this prophecy of Isay might be fulfilled Send forth O Lord the Lambe the subduer of the earth from the rocke of the desert to the mountaine of the daughter of Sion I com now to the widow of the Ghospell that poore widow more rich then all the people of Israell who taking a grayne of Mustard-seed and putting leuen into three cakes of flower did by the grace of the holy Ghost temper a confession of the Father and the Sonne and did cast two mytes into the Treasury Whatsoeuer she could be worth in all the world and all her riches without exception she offered in both the Testaments of her fayth These are the two Seraphims who thrice did glorify the Trinity and are layd vp for a treasure to the Church whereupon a burning coale being by the â—…onges of both those Testaments doth purify the lippes of a sinner Why should I repeat these auncient particulars and produce the vertues of woemen out of books when you may propose many to your selfe in the Citty where you liue whose example you ought to imitate And that I may not seeme to speake of them in particular by the way of flattery the holy Marsella will serue your turne who corresponding with the stocke wherof she came hath presented vs with some what out of the Ghospel Anna liued seauen years with her husband froÌ„ the tyme of her virginity Marsella seauen moneths The former expected the coming of Christ this later holdes him fast whome that other receaued The former saw him crying the later preaches him triumphing The former spoke of him to all such as expected the redemption of Israel the later cryes out thus with the nations which are now redeemed A brother doth not redeeme a man shall redeeme And out of another Psalme A man is borne in her and the most high hath founded her I remember that almost two yeares since I wrote some bookes against Iouinian wherein by the authority of Scriptures I fully satisfyed the questions which came against me where the Apostle grants liberty of second mariages And there is no necessity to repete them here at full length since you may haue what I haue writen there And now that I may not exceed the measure of an Epistle I will only giue you this lesson Remember daily that you must dye for then you will not be thinking of a second mariage Saint Hierome to Paulinus about the institution of a Monke A Good man bringeth forth good thinges out of the good treasure of his hart and the Tree is knowne by his fruit-You measure vs by your owne vertue and being great you extoll vs who are little and you fill the lowest roome ar the banket that you may be aduanced by his direction who makes the Feast For what is there in vs or how little is there that we should deserue to be praysed by learned wordes that we who are poore and meane should be commended by that mouth wherby that most religious Prince is defended But do not my deare brother esteeme of me according to the number of my yeares value not my wise dome by my age but my age by my wisedome according to that of Salomon A mans wisedome is his grey haires For Moyses was commaunded to choose seuenty six such Priestes as he knew to be Priestes that is to say such as were to be esteemed according to their wisedome not according to their age And Daniel whilest he was yet a youth gaue iudgment vpon aged men and their lasciuiousnes condemned them of vnchastity I say you must not iudge of a mans sufficiency after the rate of his age nor must you therefore thinke me to be more vertuous because I began to serue in the campe of Christ before you Paul the Apostle was changed from being a persecuter to be a vessell of election and being last in order he became first in merits because though he were the last he laboured more then they all Iudas of whome it was sayd But thou O man who diddest eate fainlliarly with me and wast my captaine and we walked