the Evening was expulsed In a word Humane felicities are no other then moments They for the most part find their Coffin in their Cradle and their death in their birth Whilst he was departing the Sunne retired to shroud himselfe in the Ocean as if externall darknesse should have seconded the spirituall of sinne An Angell increased the griefe and terrour of his sadnesse which armed with fire and sword kept the entrance into Paradice in that he saw himselfe wholly excluded from all hope who flattering his sorrow might be able to promise a returne to his lost delight In placing an Angell with fire and armes in his hands his Divine Majesty intended to impede the entrance of Men and Divells into Paradise And to teach us that to enter into Paradise we must passe through the fire and sword of penitence with the consent of the Angell which is Christ Or else represented to us an Hieroglyphick of Hel the sword signifying the paine of guilt and fire the paine of sense Adam not omitting his sighes and complaints gave the woman the name of Eve which signifies Life because she was to be the mother of all Living Or oppressed with his owne sorrow he would allude to the voice of infants which they make when they cry Shee being the cause of teares and through her all mankind having occasion of weeping Or else would call her Life because seeing nothing but emblemes of death he hoped to comfort himselfe with this name Or it may be haply that he did as men now a dayes who having death before their eyes speak of nothing but life He could not neverthelesse so abstaine through griefe but that the sense mis-led him with its allurements As often as he was incircled in the embraces of Eve who manifested her selfe an interessed companion in his misfortunes he received no small content And it 's probable that she some times served herselfe of such like sentiments as these It 's not necessary Adam because thou must repent that therefore thou must dispaire Let us not undervalue the mercy of that God who with so gentle a hand hath so favourably punished our enormous crimes by shewing more of cowardise then contrition in our tears Let not him sin that hath not courage to undergo chastisement And its true that the soule dissolved into teares though it should evaporate by the eyes would not be able to remove the misery of our losse and it is withall an effect of a great prudence to conforme ones selfe to those things which have no other remedy then sufferance Let 's indeavour to recover what we have lost by the procuring of children Sleight comforts in our infelicity but yet necessary because God hath commanded them Let 's sin no more in disobedience Replicated sinnes as they admit not of excuse so they provoke Mercy it selfe to anger Let us endeavour the procreation of mankind for so we shall conforme to the will of God If Death triumph over this masse of flesh we shal survive in dispight of him in our Children Nephews and the memory of our Progeny I intend not by all this that we should leave off our teares The sorrow for my sinne shall dye with my heart which I believe shall be the last part of me alive I speake it that we may not incense with a new transgression that God in offending whom I know not which is greater the danger or the impiety Adam with a smile begot by the stimulations of sensuallity thus replyed I need no longer now to feare your company my Eve since you become to mee an incentive to good To perswade me that I bemoan not the miseries into which sinne hath brought me is to desire me to assume the quality of flocks and stones I have lost too much ever to feare weeping It s an effect of stupidity and not of prudence not to accompany great losses with great greifes It is yet true that there is a necessity to cheare up the sense to propagate Nature and obey God Thus saying with glances and kisses haveing throwne his armes about his wive's necke they gave themselves wholly up to delight which peradventure for the time begot in them an oblivion of all the accidents past There is not any thing more estrangeth the soule from afflictions than the complacencies of sense In that act a man not only communicates himselfe transformes himselfe but goes out of if not besides himselfe Greifs give way torments vanish discontents are forgotten in those amorous games which admit of no other companions then laughter sport and audacity Till this instant Adam had been kept a Virgin to intimate unto us that Matrimony fills the earth but Virginity Paradise Scarce had Eve satisfied the instinct of nature and appeased in part the allurements of sense when with the signes of pregnancy she was assaulted by repentance the indivisible companion of fleshly delights Here I will not mention the extreams of her passions in loathing and longing for every thing in the burden of her belly in her vigils and in the acerbity of those pangs the more grievious by how much the more strange because the most that I can speak would be the least part of what they were Much lesse will I speak of the sufferance of Adam because it is known that to have a wife and a wife pregnant is a species of martyrdome In the end with all those payns that accompany the gravidnesse of women the time of delivery drew neere Adam playing at one time the parts of the Mid-wife Nurse and Husband Eve brought forth two births Caâ—n was the name of the male and Calamana that of the female Adam full of joy and with eyes big with teares betook himselfe to praise and returne thanks to his Divine Majesty Lord said he thy goodnesse be praised who not altered a jot by the injuries of my sinne hast condescended that I continue a man Mercifull God glorious God immense God since thou ceasest not to do good to those that offend thee I acknowledge that I merited grown odious to the aire earth and all creatures and lost amongst the clouds of oblivion to be made my owne sepulcher as not being able to imagine a viler place Thou on the contrary giving me a power of using all the elements vouchsafest me to be the father of mankind and permittest me to live ever famous to the memory of all Ages Lord I will not go about to commemorate all thy favours for they are infinite I beseech thee only to continue unto me the assistance of thy grace that so I may not fall into those sins which have made me to deserve death Eve afterwards bore Abel and Delbora whereby she increased the joy of Adam Children are doubtlesse the delight of their Parents the fathers seeing their lives renewed in their children whom they look upon as their other selves grown young Poore Adam had neverthelesse little cause of rejoycing whilst he saw borne more subjects of humane misery
Yet he might withall receive a more then ordinary content since it is a great part of felicity to have companions in infelicity Abell was elected in the beginning of his adolescence to the care of Flocks and Cain was destinated to the tilage of the ground the prudence of the Parents being bound to set their children to some imployment Youth beares a resemblance to wax which is plyant to every impression so that he that ingageth it not to callings wherein worthily to imploy either the minde or body lazily wanders out of the right path and consumes or looseth it in idlenesse Those excercises grieve not disquiet not that being learnt in the more tender years come to be held almost naturall Adam saw himselfe â—n the meane while dayly consume under the burden of labour whilst without incessant culture he was denyed sustenance The earth would not yield him obedience unlesse it was struck and opened with a thousand wounds or wonne with the profusion of seed And with so much the more difficulty did he produce his harvest in regard that humane wit had not as yet introduced into use plows harrows mattocks and other rurall instruments It was a very admirable sight to see the Proto-Monarch of all the world to labour for his living in the most just and lawfull imployment I might add also the most vile had it not been honoured by the sudors of so many Regall fronts Adam not content with what the Earth repayd him with interest for the seed received imployed himselfe also in continuall grafting He transplants wild trees into the meliorated makes the sterill fructiferous and dulcorates the insipid He transmutes one species into another and inoculates many species upon one sole stock Poore Adam sheltered himselfe necessity constraining him in certaine Cavernes the palaces of Nature Necessity it selfe furnished him with the meanes of building certaine petty Cottages which were afterwards augmented by industry and according to occasion He learnt for his greater shame this first Architecture from the Swallow in that though he was indowed with all the degrees of wisdome he was forced to receive from irrationall creatures the instructions for his convenience and safty When he would recreate himselfe after his greater toils he betook himselfe to Hunting not so much for the delight he took in the flight and destruction of beasts as for the benefit accrewed to him from the exercise it self and from the getting of vestures To say the truth there is not an exercise more noble for a man not obliged to any other calling then that of Hunting Generous souls are stimulated by this Royall exercise whilst they accustome the body to hardship the life to dangers and the hand to conquests The Chace is a warre in times of Peace so that he that triumphs in this is so much the more commendable by how much the more right he hath over beasts than over men Cain and Abel were come to that age which makes men capable of reason when Adam spake unto them to this or the like purpose Children though I know that as the light of reason and the instinct of nature point you to the knowledge of one sole God Lord and Maker of all things so also they teach and command you the veneration of this great God with all the acts of humility and adoration that may possibly proceed from internall and externall operations yet neverthelesse as the Production of God and a Father I cannot but satisfie my self though I had no regard to your necessity Children acknowledge God first out of an effect of gratitude and obligation of thankfullnesse and afterwards for the interests of your beeing and for your owne safeey The not-acknowledgement of benefits is towards every one ingratitude but towards God that hath blessed you with a such excessive mercies it is impiety The slighting of favours provoakes our equalls to hate us Imagine then what it will do to a Superiour to a God whose power is equall to his will Take heed my Sonnes that you provoke not the formidable anger of his Divine Majesty by your ingratitude for his favours As for the displeasure of God take it upon my report that have experimented it If you be wise learne from my evill to prevent your owne from others harmes extract arguments of safety and resolutions of sublime prudence God is your Lord and King your Monarch and your All. Strive to acknowledge his Soveraignty and your vassallage by the offerings and sacrifices of the first incomes and first fruits He will multiply your substance showr all felicity upon your heads Believe me my sons that without the good pleasure and mercy of God we cannot avoyd those things that afflict us nor obtaine those goods which our minds desire nor arrive to that eternity of life that is promised to us in eternall beatitude I have spoke this my Children not that I doubt of your judgements but to satiate a desire which I have of your good and the Glory of God With these or the like conceptions Adam instructed his children who remembred all his examples and commands and admonitions with all possible reverence adored his Divine Majesty But the malice of the Divell impoysoned these holy operations being the cause of the Earth's polluting it selfe with the first humane blood God was pleased with the sacrifice of Abel both because he had chosen the fattest firstlings of his flocks as also because at the same instant he offered his heart together with the Victime The offerings of Cain on the contrary who brought the fruites of the earth were not honoured by the eye of God whereupon together with his remorse a tormenting envy seased upon his heart Envy is really a great evill That soule discards reason and disbands all judgment that hath not strength to resist it's assaults It 's a Serpent which not onely impoysons but stupifies It is a vice so execrable that it brings into the hearts of the envious the torments of a thousand Hells The Sacrifices of Cain please not God who offered the fruites of the earth to denote unto us that his divine Majesty aggradeth not those things which proceed from the Earth for all the actions of wicked men savour of the Earth And who knows if God intended not by this act to detest Avarice since that Gold lyes in the bowells of the Earth and God rejected those sacrifices which are produced from the earth it becomes execrable by haveing gold and treasures in its bosome Or else haply it might be for that it was accursed the Lord not being pleased to receive the fruits of a thing which once had incurred his displeasure What then can that sinner hope from his prayers and his sacrifices who hath by his sinns many and many a time provoked the maledictions of God It is not recorded that Adam sacrificed perhaps because it was against reason that he being the original of sinne there should also first be found in him the beginnings of Piety
the true foundation of all humane societies The Laws of Adam were all directed to the union and conservation of the people to the correction and direction of manners to the maintainance of obedience and fidelity towards the Prince and to the acknowledgments and devotions towards God Yet Adam would not divest himselfe of the gift received from God Almighty of the universall Empire over all things created so that he reserved to himselfe the reformation alteration and interpretation of his Laws He knew very well that all garments and all meates agreed not to men of all ages The beginnings augmentations and declinations of a disease are not cured with the same remedies With the alterations of times there 's a necessity of varying the institutions Adam divided those primitive people into many Cantons or Corporations to each of which he assigned for Super-intendent one of his sons both because he would ease himselfe of so many imployments as also because he would perpetuate the sole command in his owne line It is then no marvail that this desire is innate in the minds of the Greatest since it is an evill that hath extracted its originall from the first Man of the World Though the command was parted amongst his sons he neverthelesse reserved the Supremacy of all to himselfe partly to restraine the licentiousnesse of his sons and partly that he might not seeme to dispise that gift of the universall Empire received from God which is the most desirable in the world He that renounceth Command confesseth himselfe for the most part either unable to exercise it or unworthy to retaine it In his latter days Adam understood the progresse of his sonne Cain He had news that he lived in the Orientall parts and that he had built a Citty calling it by the name of his son Enoch But he rejoiced not knowing very well that building of Cittyes could only proceed from a soul very timerous or excessively ambitious Adam considered by his owne example how dangerous it was for one to hide himselfe He knew full well that the nature of Cain was tyrannicall and enclined to extort the goods and wealth of others and bent upon the murther and destruction of people No lesse then a Citty is sufficient to secure a wicked man All these considerations disquieted the mind of Adam so that his long life was but a daily death He grieved to see that the more men increased in number the more they multiplyed in vice That justice was abandoned of those in particular who ought most to love it That goodnesse was only known for an imaginary thing That Avarice was the first of mans affections That Luxury accompanyed by the most infamous debaucheryes tryumphed in all hearts upon which occasion it is more then probable that he many times with more then ordinary sentiments supplicated his divine Majesty to take him out of this torrent of the world wherin there was nothing but Sin and Misery Adam was ready to pay the last debt to nature having now seen the seventh generation when he called to him all his sonns and daughters which were many in number and taught them what they were to do for the service of God and salvation of their soules Children saith he the time is approaching that I must pay the Earth its tribute These hoary haires tell me that I am in the Winter of my life These limbs that can no longer sustaine themselves that I must shortly fall Thus my fin hath resolved and thus That God hath decreed which commandeth that all things returne to their principles Before therfore that I depart from you I will leave you in testimony of my affection all those records that conduce to the good either of your soules or bodyes Nor think that my words are overswayed by my affections since he that speakes is a dying Father My Children above all other things remember to love one only God Trine in person and One in essence You are obleiged to this not only by your duty but by your interest He either is no man or deserves not that name who consecrates not all his affections to that God who hath given him a beeing and that daily communicates to him temporall and spirituall blessings and who allwayes appropriates punishments to vice and rewards to virtue Know that he requires sole adoration and for this very thing I foresee that he will showre down miseryes upon my posterity yea blind progeny an infinite of miseries foolish posterity that shall so far dote as to adore the things which thou thy selfe hast formed The Idolatry I say that shall come into the world shall snatch the thunderbolts out of Gods hands and violently force his mercy to the punishment of infinite generations As also lasciviousnesse dishonesty and luxurie These Children are sinns that will constrain the fire to forsake its sphere not only to chastise sinners but also to root out the memory of them Keep your selves my Sonns keep your selves from Anger which is an undomable passion that hurries the hands to imbrue themselves in the blood of innocency it selfe And these homocides how displeasing they are to God is evinced in the example of your brother Cain Though the blood of the slain be not polluted yet it contaminates the hands and consciences of the murtherer And to shew how execrable a thing murther is note That even he is culpable that kills those who implore death Corne and Cattle and other the more esteemed sorts of things you ought not to steal no nor covet for from this is ingendered that cursed serpent of Envy which hath been the cheif cause of all humane misadventures See that ye do not too much flatter the inordinate appetites of your senses with a complacenciall indulgence for they will lead you into a thousand cursed sinns The senses are for the more part fallacious guides negligent sentinels and the ruiners of the soul These teach you pride the first of all sinns and a crime so execrable that it hath polluted heaven with its filthinesse They teach you covetousnesse which is an insatiable desire that depraving faith and goodnesse openeth a door to all wickednesse They teach you Luxury which is a furious passion that perverting the reason makes man rebell against himselfe They teach you Superfluous Gluttony which is a concatenation of a thousand Vices This transports the will fomenteth love and hatred extinguisheth the memory distracteth the understanding and is the high way to all evills In short he that obeyes his senses cannot be a lover of God The senses affect only their owne delight and many times rave giving credit to themselves alone My sonnes the mercy of God which will have his Advertisement precede his Chastisements illuminating your souls commands that I denounce your miseries The vengeance of Heaven my Children shall set open the Abysse and shall drown the earth the waters shall surmount the Hills fishes shall possesse the places of birds in brief all mankind except a small number of