Peter persist in his denial of Christ and cryed as naturally I know not the Man as if he had been nursed up in infidelity It was only the reflection upon his perfidious Crime and a clear view of it that brought him to himself and sprung in him such flouds of tears What cast St. Mary Magdalen into such rigours vvhich seem incomparable vvith humane Nature but a sense and knowledge of her transgressions What opened Heavens-Gate to the expiring Thief but this Nos quidem digna factis recipimus We truly receive a punishment which our crimes deserve In a word you shall find no remarkable change in the life of any person from Vice to Vertue which took not its first rice from a serious consideration of their former ingratitude and this is confirmed in the example of our Holy Petitioner vvho first cryes out he hath sinned and presently hears Nathan who proclaims a pardon after which assurance he sits not still nor returns to his Vomit but will for the future offer up as many holocausts as before he hath had unlawful delights he will convert the number of his sins into a greater number of vertues and whatsoever in him hath contributed to the contempt of God his Creatour shall be employed in his service by penitential acts that as now he sadly acknowledges his errours he may one day be transported in the praise of the Divine goodneâ—… divulge his satisfactions the first step to which ascent he will ever owe to this lesson Because I know my iniquity The Application St. Austin prescribing a remedy to siners gives them this short Recipe tu inde non avertas withdraw not thy sight from thy sins For if thou fix thy Eyes upon them God will turn his away but in case you throw them behind your back then he will take a full view of them and punish them severely in thee the Sun setting upon a dark Cloud makes it become bright and radiant so Almighty God laying open unto our holy penitent the foulness of his iniquity he cooperates with his merciful rayes surveys them and by a true sense of his ingratitude attracts the splendour of his pardon upon him Let us then in imitation of our Holy Penitent not become a stranger to our own misdeeds that so our great Judge may examine no other witnesses an humble confession will prove our best plea which we cannot exactly do unless we know them nor know them in all their colours of deformity without a high detestation of them so that if we make a careful inquisition after our guiltiness in this life we may hope to be warranted from a severe sentence in the next Learn therefore to alledge this powerful Topick here Quoniam iniquitatem meam ego cognosco because I know my iniquity Amen CHAP. VIII Et peccatum meum contra me est semper And my sin is alwayes before me AFter this declaration of our Petitioner how knowing he is in his own misfortunes next he layes open his condition hoping it may draw some beams of mercy and pitty upon him at least serve to warn others by his harms My sin sayes he is alwayes before me sometimes as an Accuser deposing with much vehemency every crime he hath committed and omitting no circumstance that may render it more odious sometimes as a Judge delivering exactly every statute he hath prevaricated either of Heaven Nature or Reason shewing the punishment ordained for his misdeeds And lastly pronouncing a Sentence against which he hath no plea nor evasion Whence St. Chrysostom sayes what pleasure alas can there be in sin when the necessary consequences of it are accusation reproach scandals and condemnations all other afflictions have a remedy this allowes no truce nor respit in other tribulations whilst our conscience is unstained we have a Sanctuary within us whether we may retreat and find God and in him all consolation but this once forfeited by sin what can we do If in the Country or City abroad or at home still this remorse attends us and having fled from all the World we find our Enemy and Executioner in our own selves which we alwayes dragg after us wheresoever we go What dreads and horrors besieged the Heart of Cain every shadow he beheld seemed to threaten Death and destruction to him so that his thoughts were alwayes lodged in a Sepulchre the memory of his crimes still rising up as witness against him with how just reason then did St. Austin cry Lord thou hast commanded and it is fulfilled that a vicious Soul proves to her self her own tormentour Plato sayes God hath given to the faculties of the Soul a certain Harmony which infinitely delights and recreates that spiritual substance now when by inordinate actions she dissolves this unity there must needs spring from this dissolution a great grief or anguish though the cause be not known as when any vital part is offended a smart pain is dispersed through the whole Body albeit we know not from whence it proceeds If then this great Philosopher gives affliction as a natural effect of sin what must he endure who hath the addition of a supernatural precept when he looks upon it infringed and made the Subject of his contempt when he weighs the loss he hath made of Grace the Abyss of misery wherein he is plunged certainly this must create within us a torment far beyond any impression of cruelty or malice from abroad This is the state of our Penitent let him go where he will he finds a Tribunal erected within him where his Case is scanned to the full and all his Exorbitances laid home to him whil'st he in the mean like poor Job not able to return one word for a thousand looks about at lest to fee some Councel but alas every one withdraws nay his own Conscience rises up against him Paschasius upon that place of St. Mathew where two possessed persons issuing forth from Monuments encountred our blessed Saviour wonders why the Devils should rather inhabit corrupted Vaults than pleasant Fields Gardens or stately Mansions and at last satisfies himself with this reason that it is a just return for those who would not relish Heavenly delights they should be fed with Carkasses nourished with Ordure and Putrefaction to the End their punishment may be suitable to their offence this stroke of Justice our Penitent acknowledges his senses take in nothing but the species of foul and cruel acts committed by him and every glance adds a new fuel to his consuming flames the Memory of them is so Ghastly that were it to be his sole penalty he should think the reiteration of his crimes purchased at too dear a rate My sin is alwayes before me We need seek no other Topicks to prove the terrour which remorse brings to a Conscience then our Penitent's own words in the 54. Psalm where he sayes Discedunt in Infernum viventes they descend alive into Hell He thought no allusion but to the state of the damned could
to those who use it in excess next he hints the reliques and dreggs it leaves behind that if God's grace joyned with a great resolution happen to dislodge this petulent Guest yet still some footsteps or impressions remain apt to reenter and claim an interest Wherefore he could promise to himself no security unless an inundation of mercy fall upon him to purify and carry away all the remainder of bad inclinations grown into a habit and become as it were a second Nature in him Cleanse me from my sin and as it was not a slight stain he had contracted but all circumstances weighed the most indelible that springs from inordinate acts in carnal pleasures For Lawes Divine Natural and Humane seem to be violated in Adultery Divine in that two persons by marriage are made one flesh and both pass into the incommunicable Nature of individuality becoming the essential part of each other whence violation cannot happen to one without destroying the life of the other and breaking that bond which God hath knit together Natural Law is likewise by an adulterous act infringed because Marriage consists not in the sole possession of the Body but also nay principally in the affections of a reasonable Soul For the bonds of Marriage are not wrought by copulation but mutual consent and under a sacred Vow never to be retracted who then infringes these engagements must needs contract a note of infidelity and consequently strike at the main Hinge of humane Society to preserve which Nature chiefly tends in all her principles and essential motions Lastly a breach is made in humane Law by Adultery in that Marriage is not a private but domestick good which concerns not one but infinite Families strengthened by the Laws of the Church and publick Faith of Nations From hence Nature finds those who carefully cultivate her plants hence Commonwealths are enriched with Citizens the Church with Children By this we may see the malice of Adultery that drawes along with it the violation of so many Laws Christ enjoyns us a love of our Enemies and that the Sun should not set in our anger Yet in the treachery of Marriage-Bed permits a separation between Man and Wife how strictly soever united by indissoluble tyes as if such crimes surpassed the limits of pardon as if an evil so destructive that remedies could find no place and that this individual life once dissolved could no more be recalled than habit from privation Many Tyrants have subdued to therage of their cruelties the wealth liberty and lives of their Subjects who looking upon this power as given from Heaven over them patiently sustained all those depredations but if once they touched upon their wives and would involve them in the Mass of their impurities this rowsed up their fallen spirits cast them into rebellion nay pushed them to that extremity as never to desist untill they had deprived those of life who had ravished from them what was more dear than life untill they had reduced unto ashes the Authors of their infamy and taught them for the example of posterity this violence of all others will not be left unrevenged in this World There hath scarce been any Nation though Pagan or Infidel which hath not punished Adultery with Death or exquisite Torments Some by fire others by wild Horses some by the Halter others in pulling out their Eyes cutting off their Noses some by stones as in Moses Law Whence 't is clear that even the light of Nature taught there ought for the good of humane Society that a stop be made to this disorder Our Penitent having in his thoughts lay'd open all those Enormities of an Adulterous Act is surprised to see himself plunged in so many abominations to have heaped up to himself so much ignominy and infection as the reproach of them would last as long as time How sparingly do good Men treat of carnal subjects either in Writing or in the Pulpit lest the very articulate sound or Characters in this matter might offend chast Ears or cause worse effects in Hearts already tainted If then this poyson carry with it so much of malignity in the very name or lightest thought what corruption and noysomness must the sin it self produce Oh! how strong did this scent breathe in the Nostrils of our Penitent when once his understanding was awake and beheld with an Eye free from passion his Body dissolved into so many contaminations no wonder than if he so oft repeat in this Psalm the cleansing from his sin Every glimps of his past foul delights casts him into a blush beholding no other consequence of them than shame confusion and the threats of eternal destruction notwithstanding all this he sues for a Vesture of innocence and he does it to him who with a fiat or blast from his Mouth drew out of a dark Chaos that glorious Body of the Sun which so revives us To him who hath promised to let fall all the darts of his anger upon the true repentance of a sinner on this basis he fixes his Petition and doubts not but at last to find a happy issue to be drawn out of the mire of his sensualities and his leprous condition changed into the consistence of restored grace after this he sighs and groans nor is capable of any consolation untill that happy moment arrive which shall put a period to this longing demand Et à peccato meo munda me cleanse me from my sin The Application We must consider that God is purity it self who hath nothing more in abomination than an impure Soul That Heaven inhabited by Angels is a place of honour where nothing defiled can have access Wherefore we ought to apprehend any stain of lubricity because most obstructive to our final Beatitude First in that it is according to St. Thomas peccatum maximae inhaerentiae a Sin that clings like Bird-lime to our Souls and of all others most hard to be clawed off it resembles a Phoenix who renews her self with the fire enkindled by the motion of her own Wings so a person inured to that vice even when he would give it over and bury it withall occasion of incentives doth often find the Coals to be blown afresh by the wings of thoughts so that whilst we live we ought never to be secure since 't is a combat of all others the most hazzardous and where the victory is most rare next it is a sin of impudency and when a Soul is devoid of shame what hopes can there be to reclaim her St. Hierom advises to a private admonition of our neighbour and gives this reason lest he break the curb of shame and dwell in his sin for ever By baptism we are made members of Jesus Christ and the chiefest homage we can pay to him as our Head is to preserve it unspotted from any smut of impurity A virginal integrity is so acceptable unto God that the Angels were they permitted would translate them Body and Soul into Heaven that
by the Heavens examine what Splendour hath issued from your Actions by which your Subjects might steer the course of their lives and be guided free from Shipwrack to the Haven of eternal rest For if they lose themselves on the Sands of misbelief or dashed upon the Rock of Vanity unlawful pleasures and the like for want of your directing beams their ruine will be laid to your charge and were it permitted you to hear the sad complaints and dire invectives those perished Souls do vomit forth against their Leaders who have deceived and tilled them on into misery it would certainly have influence upon you and oblige you to a greater circumspection in your wayes and manner of life If you own Nobility and Honour which the Mountains personate remember you are the Object of many inferiour eyes you are looked upon with respect and indeed as the Glass which should convey unto them the true representation of their Prince For he being but one and consequently not so communicable it is your parts who are dispersed through Kingdoms to supply what he cannot do to shew by your Justice Piety Devotion Charity and other Christian vertues that the practice of them can onely maintain your greatness and is the Foundation of all your hopes in another life which Principles lively set forth in your actions cannot but fix your dependants in a strange passion towards goodness and ground them in a Belief that it ought to be the ultimate scope of all their endeavours and enterprizes in this world Nor are those of the meaner rank hinted at by the Valleys exempt from all obligation in this kind There is not a Master of a family but is as it were a Sovereign to those who depend on him He ought to be the first at every pious duty to see his little flock fed with all necessary instructions in order to what Christianity obliges them to know and believe to carry a watchful Eye over them that he may know their faults to correct their vertues to reward and encourage if they fail in this they may say with David I have sinned against thee alone Though there be none under their roof can be a competent Judge yet this will not render them innocent and this our holy Penitent confesses who in this expression acknowledges the excellency and multitude of God's favours in being a King and consequently the highest ingratitude on his part towards the Author of them The Application By this clause we are further taught that if at any time we fail in our duty the principal motive of that ressentment must be in that it is displeasing to God whose onely frown we apprehend For when we trespass against our Neighbour the evil is in reference to God who forbids it whence every sinner may justly say I have sinned against thee alone So that we ought not to regard our temporal but eternal Penalties due to sin for that concerns our Soul which alone is the source of all our transgressions Wherefore our chief solicitude ought to be for its preservation Wherein we are to imitate St. Mary Magdalen who pressed in her spiritual necessity had a personal recourse to her dear Saviour but when concerned in the loss of her Brothers life she contented her self to dispatch away a letter by a servant insinuating by this the distinction she made between a soul and Body I wish we might all in this follow her Example that is espouse the Souls interest as the main concern Since in relation only to that we are to pronounce tibi soli peccavi I have sinned against thee alone CHAP. X. Vt justificiens in Sermonibus tuis vincas cum judicaris That thou mayest be justified in thy words and overcome when thou art judged OUr holy penitent tells us in this clause why he brought his guiltiness as King upon the Stage because by it the petitioned will be justified in his words which are these that he will never reject a truly repenting heart and he thinks they were never put more home to the Test than in his Person for who can despair after his admission into favour who had broken all the chains and tyes of duty wherein a Creature is linked and obliged by a most loving and liberal Creatour Besides the pardon of his ingratitude will serve as a fence against the rash judgements of the impious who are apt to lay severity to God's charge upon the reprobation of a sinner this makes our penitent to add that thou mayest overcome when thou and judged that is when his case shall be alledged it will stop and silence any blasphemous Tongue I believe also he reflected on the promise made by God that out of his lineâ— should issue forth the hope of Israel the Redeemer of mankind and lest his sin might divert the streams of God's mercy and frustrate his succeeding stemms of that glorious off-spring he minds him first of his promise to receive with open arms the most enormous if repenting Soul nextt his Foundation laid he would insinuate since by an act of mercy he was again planted in the Region of grace his hopes now are that the promises made by Heaven to him and his posterity might stand good that their accomplishment would be a confirmation to him of a plenary indulgence and a pledge that his punishment should not reach to so heavy a Confiscation in order to his temporal satisfaction But you must know when he sayes that thou mayest be justified c. This particle that imports not the efficient cause of the precedent verse to wit he had sinned against God alone to the end God may be justifyed as if the motive of God's justification gave rise to his sin No no it means only this that the eminency of his condition rendered him guilty of the highest ingratitude and since the torrent of God's mercy had born this clear away the publication of this pardon must needs exalt the divine goodness and testify to the World there is no iniquity so monstrous which may not if we will be overcome by his mercy whence he is justified in his words never to be a stranger to those who return with Repentance unto him How many times hath God been irritated by Man's ingratitude nay so touched to the quick as to declare he repented to have made him that is if God were capable of defect or change this exorbitancy in man might well deserve such a repentance have we not seen a Pharaoh prodigiously unmoved insensible as a statue at the sight of miracles which confounded all his inchanters and false Gods yet had not this unbelieving Prince hardned his own heart God had reserved one greater wonder to work in his behalf that is upon his sumission to receive him unto mercy what can be thought of more indulgent than his amarous care and conduct of his people through the desart and yet even when he was prescribing a Law and Rule for the observance of their Duties they frame
that Trophies were erected with this Inscription To the August Caesar Diocletian by whom Christian Religion is abolished and the worship of the God's improved These were the flinty soyls which gave life and growth to Christian Religion amidst these stony tryals the Church hath still kept herself firmly rooted in despight of all the storms tempests and whirlwinds of persecution The third property of Hysop that it is medicinal may justly be consigned to the furious assaults framed and put in Execution against the Church as St. Austin sayes Tyrants could never by obsequiousness and favour have so much contributed to the good of Martyrs as they did by their bloud-thirsting cruelties St. Paul glories in his tribulations and makes of them a ladder to lead him as it were by degrees unto Christian perfection whither he is no sooner arrived but his thoughts are filled with the expectation of a reward Nay he terms it a Crown of Justice as if every stroke of Persecution had contributed to the making up of his Crown unto which he had a right and just claim since hammered and compleated by his patient sufferings This same Apostle bids the Hebrews look back upon those past dayes wherein they had sustained immense Combats for the name of Christ as if those pleasing remembrances had been able to charm the most bitter afflictions Nay he thinks it a happiness when no burden was laid upon themselves if they did but converse and hold Society with the oppressed as if from them must needs issue forth some communication of what is good When our blessed Saviour had foretold to his Disciples the scandals of his passion and how the World would allot the same measure to them he gives the reason why these sharp decrees are made because sayes he you should fly to me for Sanctuary and only within my arms seek consolation and security St. Austin conformably to this Doctrine confesses Job to have lost all that God had given him yet he retained him from whom he had all to wit God our Lord sayes he hath given our Lord hath taken away the name of our Lord be praised Afterwards St. Austin rapt as it were into admiration cryes behold a Man with a Body mangled yet entire full of corruption yet comely wounded yet without a sore sprawling on a dunghil yet powerful in heaven Hence you may gather the exuberant Fruit of this sprinkled Hysop not a drop of it falls which carryes not along with it a vertue that transcends the malignity of persecution and the rage of Tyrants Who would then repine at adversity since Heaven hath laid it as the foundation at least medium to eternal felicity You that are poor tell me what you do want if you have God and the rich what possess they without God St. Paul relates how the Hebrews with joy sustained the rapine of their goods because they knew there is a more lasting and incomparably better inheritance prepared for them You that bewail the loss of a Friend remember he was not born to live alwayes here and perhaps was taken away lest malice might have seized him Besides if you truly love God you cannot be afflicted at your Friends Death since you know if he perish not to God he cannot perish to you and he alone can never be deprived of what is dear to him who makes God the Center of his happiness and places all that is precious in him since he is not lost unless we will If you groan under an infirm constitution know you should not desire to enjoy life but according to the tenour of its grant we breath under constellations which by their several influences create different humours and distempers and this is convenient to the good of the Vniverse unto which particular and private interests must give place Besides we learn by experience that since we can break and thwart our inclinations upon the score of health we may likewise do it from the motive of vertue and piety we hold it an act of Religion to wean our selves from sensual delights for the love of God let then resignation make that voluntary which accident or some providential decree hath reduced to a necessity you ought not therefore to calumniate this or that cause of your sickness but take it as a present from a most merciful and benign Parent ordained either for chastisement of your sins or tryal of your vertue this flatters not the unhappy humour of Avarice Ambition Lubricity and the like every access of a Feaver or other smart pain sets before us the lively Image of mortality and gives assurance we must one day quit all our Wordly interests It were not amiss also whilst our indisposition renders us unfit for humane Society that we fancy our selves as dead and consider what will be done in the World without us it subsisted before we were so will it remain when we are gone Who now seem so united in friendship that the thought of separation is horrid as Death will when a few dayes are slipped over after your Funeral seek other alliances and if by chance your memory be revived by any Casual discourse they will afford you a sigh perhaps and say you were good or wise or valiant or fair or some such Epethite you might deserve and is this worth all the labours and hazzards we run amidst a Million of designs in this uncertain life how blessed then is that sickness whose pains lead to Salvation and how fortunate that war which ends in eternal peace If the walls of a Prison affright propose to your self those immense spaces above the Heavens designed as a praemium of your restraint 't is true for the present you are deprived of a little fresh Air and of some other contentments depending on Liberty but he that trafficks for so great a purchase as eternal felicity may well venture something on the score of persecution How many disasters and Ambuscado's of Enemies have been avoided by Captivity what a change hath it wrought in many who by a necessity of Recollection have become supereminent Contemplatives and enlarged their Minds by Spiritual entertainments more than they could forfeit by the denyal of their Bodies liberty You are there free from Envy or detraction it being rare to find malice or cruelty to rage upon the prostrate A life in such a place is seldome attended on by scandals because adversity is the Companion a Mistress excelling in the wayes and maxims of goodness Nay could we fancy the World as really it is but a Prison we should rather think we have made an escape from Thraldome than lost our liberties Thus we see the sprinklings of Hysop that is the Seeds of Humility Patience and Constancy in the profession of Christ have furnished the Church Universal with Champions and every her particular Souldier in all encounters with Rules which if exactly observed cannot but end in Glory So that our Penitent hopes if once bathed in these purifying streams he shall be cleansed
of Justice which is the End we tend to in this motion Besides justification is not bestowed on us by God meerly to avoid punisment it is designed as well to fit us for Heavenly rewards this St. Paul testifyes ad Rom. 8. That God glorifyes whom he hath justifyed of which glory a simple absolution cannot be the Subject since no person by a judicial sentence clearing him from guilt is thought by that to merit a reward but to exchange the condition of an enemy for that of a friend of a domestick nay of a childe this must needs be wrought by something more than a bare condition In this Petition then he implores virtually the infusion of justifying grace a divine quality inherent it the Soul which like a bright ray of the Sun disperses all the Clouds of sin before whose presence without a miracle it cannot subsist one sole moment It likewise enclines the Soul to Christian duties and from that source do flow all the vâ—rtuous and pious action we perform For as sin expells justice being opposite to habitual grace not only by way of privation but contrariety So a supream act of love opposes habitual sin and by a contrary working as an efficient cause destroyes it Whence infusion of grace and deletion of sin do as infallibly succeed to such an act of love as the infusion of a rational soul into a Body after humane generation Thus our Petitioner like a quaint Pen-man so couches his demands as to comprize in them much more than the letter seems to express Wipe away all my iniquities This word all is emphatick and expresses with some energy a desire not only to have those sins which appear before him and reproach his ingratitude to be remitted But also what ever are set upon his score in that eternal Book of accounts and contracted by him either through ignorance inadvertence or oblivion in not discharging what he owes for their expiation Our Petitioner had reason to add this Particle and frame his Petition full if we reflect upon what Solomon sayes Ecclesiast ch 8. That all things concerning another life shall here be wrapt up in doubts and uncertainties No security of our state whether markt out to punishment or reward For were there any means to this discovery the benefits of God would lay it open yet we find these indiscriminately dispenced to the just and impious to preserve some in humility he loads them with afflictions lest others should despair he fills them with abundant consolations some he draws by the Lure of temporal blessings so to buoy them up from despair or in reward of some moral vertue others he steeps in the bitterness of wants and disgraces to stop the Carreer of pride and excess and by a paternal correction he presents an opportunity by which they are either deterred from sin or may satisfy in this life for their transgressions Sometimes again the doom of punishment begins here which is to last for eternity so that neither adversity nor prosperity give us any light into the state of Men's consciences whence our Penitent fearing lest any unknown guilt may stain his Soul petitions that all his iniquities may be taken away St. Paul confesses after a severe inquisition of himself though he found no matter of accusation yet he durst not trust to his own justification knowing well the judgments of God and Men are very different and if we groap so much in our own concerns what madness upon every slight conjecture and surmise to pass sentence of condemnation upon our Neighbour This savours not the Spirit of an Apostle who would have no other Vmpire than Christ the true searcher of hearts and the same maxime was fixed in our Holy Penitent who not daring to secure himself from all imputations cryes out wipe away all my iniquities that no sin upon what account contracted may escape the Seal of God's pardon How many have been seen who beheld themselves with an Eye of satisfaction as patterns of innocency as possessing within themselves the treasure of grace to a great proportion and yet brought to the Test were found empty Vessels and poor Objects of frailty and malice St. Peter told his blessed Master he was ready to attend him unto Prisons nay even to Death it self but the event proved he had not the Ground-work of such a fortitude within him St. Paul whilst he played the fierce Lyon preying upon the Blood of Christians believed all his flames were enkindled by a just zeal of God's Holy Lawes and how do we know but many actions of ours may proceed from a gross ignorance which will not render us inexcusable at the latter day what greater Evidence of integrity than to Sacrifice life in any cause and yet this we have seen done on either side of two opinions diametrically opposite to each other Both these propose unto themselves Almighty God above all things amiable as the motive of their sufferings yet without dispute one of the two must needs be involved in errours and in the total privation of grace Hhw justly then doth our Penitent suspending all judgement of his condition beg that all his iniquities may be taken away that if he have not perfect Charity he may obtain it if he go astray he may be reduced into the right path if in darkness he may be filled with light and since we are ignorant of our own state and that God hath reserved the knowledge of this Truth to himself he is resolved in his petition never to omit this clause Et omnes iniquitates meaâ— dele and wipe away all my iniquities The Application In pursuance of this design we are in regard of our own infirmity and indisposition never to Lull our selves in security since God's promises in order to the remission of sins require on our part that we be worthily disposed for the reception of the Sacraments Now to have an infallible assurance of this fitted disposition or that we are not guilty of some secret pride some mortal sin undiscovered some inordinate cleaving to the World and the like is by God's Providence locked up in his own Breast so to keep us humble wary and in fear of his judgments Wherefore all we have to do is to hope in the mercy of God in the merits of Christ's passion and efficacy of the Sacraments and then conclude with the same Prayer of our Penitent that all our defects and transgressions whether known or concealed to us may be blotted out Amen CHAP. XXI Cor mundum creâ— in me Deus Create in me O God a clean heart OUr Holy Penitent in the Ten precedent Verses working like an expert Carver by way of defalcation had still desired he might be brought into shape by cutting off all those Excrescencies which made him monstrous in God's Eye Now he petitions believing his whole frame vitiated and unfit for his design that a new model might be drawn up of him and new materials inserted in the whole structure
God is only permissive and accidentally concurring unto final impenitency that is in not imparting his grace dissolving Hearts unto such as will not receive it for since they obstinately cleave unto sin he is not obliged to violence the liberty of Man's free-will which he hath in his Creation decreed unto him Nor prodigally throw away his precious grace upon those who contemn it Wherefore the penal substraction of his grace springs not from the slow current of mercy to a sinner For it is alwayes ready to flow where the Channel is cut out and prepared to receive it but from the malice of Man by which he is totally averted from God opposite and refractory to his holy inspirations When therefore he begs not to be sequestred from his face far be it from his thoughts to impeach God as Author of obdurateness it would only speak he is cause of the punishment not the fault That if by the prevarication of our first Parent we were reduced to such a condition as God might justly leave us to our selves much more by actual sin do we deserve it and in this dereliction we can never rise nor frame a supernatural act without which it is not possible to attain unto Salvation So that if God will use his own right and divert his face that is the effects of his goodness and mercy from him he gives himself for lost and so justly lost as not to have the least matter of complaint against his Judge Nay on the contrary he joyns issue with the Prophet Esay saying Lord if all the Nations thou hast made should perish who can blame thee If God hath drawn some out of the gulf of perdition to issue forth the Marks of his goodness even in the height and fury of their malice this is no warrant to our Petitioner that for his sake he will break the ordinary rule of his providence he rather apprehends he may be made an Example of his Justice and be abandoned to his corrupt inclinations wherefore he petitions that he would daign to cast a benign Eye upon him nor throw him away from his blessed face Another dismal thought occurs which eggs him on to this demand and it ought certainly to be very dreadful to a sinner that is there is a certain period set to every Man's transgressions which is called the measure of his iniquities and if this be once compleated such a Cloud of obstinacy and perseverance in evil involves him as he never will be cheered with the Sun-shine of God's mercy This proceeding hath been evident in the downfall of several Nations and Cities whose excess of wickedness hath drawn upon them the exterminating hand of God Our Holy Penitent first places before his Eyes the universal deluge where it is declared that the World had accomplished their malice and by it so prepared the divine Justice as there wanted nothing but his avenging Rod to fall heavy upon them Again as to the Land of promise designed to the Seed of Abraham God told him he could not yet perform it and his patience awaited the space of four hundred years untill the Amorites and Canaanites had summed up their iniquities after which they were made a prey to the Children of Israel In sequel of this our Holy Penitent concludes that though these examples in a vast multitude were remarkable and terrifying yet God's judgements hold the same method in the concern of every particular Soul Besides his fears encrease when he considers that God's patience is spun out longer with some than others and whether his last sin might not be the upshot and close of all God's special favours to him he knowes not Wherefore in this suspence and just subject of apprehension he petitions not to be thrown away from his face Our Holy Penitent finds notwithstanding some glimmerings of comfort when he revolves in hes Mind the marks of this helpless desolation First he remembers when the Sodomites were consumed in the flames of his anger the Harbinger of their destruction was their notorious and publick commission of their crimes and this joyned with such impudence as to vaunt and boast of their impieties Our sad Penitent found himself not guilty of this for what contrivances had he nol framed to conceal his sin and when reproved by Nathan presently with shame and confusion he owned his miscarriage The next presage of Reprobation is obstinacy which was laid before him in the person of Pharaoh whose hardned heart not all the importunities of Moses nor the prodigious wonders he wrought could in the least mollify nor work him to the dismission of God's people When therefore you behold a person so bent upon his wicked wayes as no remonstrance entreaty promise nor threat can prevail you have reason to believe as St. Paul sayes they are given up to a reprobate sense which insensibly and unawares will bring them to endless ruine Our Petitioner cannot likewise accuse himself of this prelude to perdition this present Psalm which he composed immediately after the Prophet from the part of God had denounced unto him his ingratitude sufficiently evinces he was not deaf to the workings of God's inspirations nor impenetrable against the power of exciting grace Another cause of God's dereliction is an habitual application to a certain sin to which one is so fastned as his ordinary grace hath no effect to draw him from it and God is pleased not to gratify him with any thing extraordinary in punishment of his transgressions having so often abused his mercy This habitual malice was evident in the Jews who from age to age had persecuted the Prophets sent to mind them of their duties insomuch as St. Stephen laid it to their charge and defied them to name any one who had escaped their fury and this they continued untill at last they laid their hands on the Saint of Saints Christ Jesus after which Sacrilegious act arrived at the utmost pitch of their demerits they were given up to the Tyranny of the Romans who totally subverted their City and Nation Our Penitent had reason to hope his deviation was an effect of frailty rather than malice having not continued any space without repentance when once his sin was represented to him by the Minister of God's word yet knowing the web of Man's Salvation to be wrapt up in the secret of the Divine Providence that though he had revealed to many of his Servants the glad tidings of their predestination yet never had he to any communicated the doom of reprobation lest it might cast them into despair therefore he thinks it the wisest course to sail between hope and fear and in all events to implore that he may not be excluded from his sight Some again weighing the subsequent verse where our Penitent petitions God not to take away from him his holy spirit are of Opinion that this demand imports not a dread of reprobation for he seems to thinks himself in the possession of grace but argues
that grand ballancing of all their good and bad deeds and by this means who knowes whether he hath not only disjoyned and torn the Soul from the Body but even from God for all eternity These dismal thoughts prompt him to fly for Sanctuary and it is no where to be found but at the Throne of God's mercy which he implores Free me from blood c. Again he considers with what a severe Eye God looks upon the sin of homicide commanding in Moses Law that blood alone should be the price and satisfaction for blood nay he extends it even to irrational Creatures that if any happen to be the cause of Man's death the Beast what ever it be should lose its life It was to prevent this unnatural violence that he prohibited the eating of blood so to cut off any practice which might diminish the horrour of it Besides the remorse and tortures of conscience which alwayes attend this sin sufficiently evidences that though in other Crimes his patient Justice seems for a while to lye asleep yet this he alwayes revenges upon the place For if the Thunder-bolts of his anger do not immediately fall upon their heads as to the publick view at least he begins the execution from the first moment of the Fact committed disturbing their sleep with frightful Phantomes and filling their awakened hearts with dreads and terrours that their life is even a burden and Irkesome to them of this are extant innumerable examples both in sacred and prophane Histories too long here to recite It is not unworthy our observation that a murdered Body should bleed afresh as it hath been often experimented at the presence of the murderer It is true many give natural reasons of the thing attributing it to the vital spirits not yet extinguished in the remnants of the blood retreated into several Cranies of the Body which by an Antipathy at the approach of their adversary fall into a Commotion and by this disturbance occasions the blood again to flow Others say it may proceed from a simpathy supposing the murderer to have upon his weapon wherewith he gave the wound or in some other part about him certain dropps of blood of the deceased by which Sympathetick vertue it receives motion in order to its reunion But my design not being to insist on Philosophical disputes I will not labour to weaken the force of their Arguments and only assert my Opinion which is that it speaks simply the extraordinary way of God which he holds sometimes in one kind sometimes in another to manifest and publish offendours of this nature Our Holy Penitent may be brought in for an instance unto whom it was declared by God's own command that notwithstanding all his Artifices in contriving Vriah his Death it should be exposed in the view of the whole World that future ages might see he whom he had chosen as the delight of his heart should have no priviledge in this particular and though he would abate something of his wonted rigour in not exacting his life for a satisfaction yet he would bring it near to his door by the rebellion of his Children with the Enmity and Machinations of many Conspiratours against him and that the Law of retaliation was not executed against him perhaps he owes it to this clause of the petition which he seems with more than usual fervour to have preferred repeating O God God of my Salvation We may here reflect how pernicious a thing passion is when once it hath got the Mastery and how soon it gets strength with the aid of dangerous occasions Our Penitent knew well that the Divine precept Non occides thou shalt not kill did not only forbid the taking away of our Neighbours life but likewise all rancour or malice towards him all injury by word or deed which may touch upon his honour or person all disputes contest or impetuosity of Choler these are the seeds of that monstrous fruit homicide as St. John sayes who hates his Brother is a homicide For by nourishing within you a little spark of animosity this from the heart appears in the Eyes which are the glass of the inward temper thence it breaks into words and at last sadly ends in his destruction Behold our Kingly Prophet and now an humble petitioner in his own behalf he is said to have been the meekest of Men and in consideration of his lenity and mildness in Government God spun out his reign to the Term of Forty years which was granted to few or none of the Jewish Kings with what patience did he sustain the reproaches and maledictions of Semei with what an admirable temper the long and restless persecution of Saul how tenderly issued he forth his orders touching Absalom that though he were actually in arms against him and thirsted after nothing but his life and Throne yet he commanded a hair of his Head should not be touched Notwithstanding all this upon a suddain seized with a passion of love both his sweet temperament and all his former habits of vertue proved of little use unto him The Christal of his understanding was blemished with gross vapours arising from brutish pleasures the purling stream of his inclinations which was wont to flow softly without noise and from the source of vertue is now grown into a storm of fury it is so deprived of reason as to imagine his own good and safety to depend upon the ruine of his Neighbour and therefore hastens to take vengeance upon him who never gave him the least shadow of real offence O what a Tyranny is the Rule of passion to make us love what is not amiable and hate what is not odious to push us on to desire what we should abhor and fly from vvhat vve ought most to covet Our holy penitent hath served under this oppression and novv petitions a release Free mee from blood c. Novv the Latins not using the vvord blood in the plural Number though the Greeks do hence it is that some infer and with reason that our Penitent aims at the remission of Adultery likewise because all carnal acts unlawful carry along with them a corruption both of flesh and blood this appears in Deut. Chap. 21. Where it is said that rotteness and worms shall be the inheritance of a luxurious person and as the one that is homicide destroyes the species of Man so adultery subverts those rules which are set down for his education a design which nature intends and drives at as well as Generation The one injures his Neighbour in his person the other in his honour and this not only of himself but casts an infamy upon his posterity It is storied of Vlysses that he met in his Travails with Circes the Enchantress vvho promised to make him immortal in case he vvould be naught with her and though he believed she was able to make good her promise yet he refused her less valuing immortality than fidelity to his Wife Susanna far less esteemed of
sin All other reasonable Creatures in this sense are mortal and if the blessed in heaven be impeccable it is not by their nature but by the power of glory communicated in which they were invested by God after they had given proof of their vertues whilest they were Viatours and under their Tryal Now as to Man the experience of his frailty helps him on to discern more clearly as the obscurity of the Night renders a fair Day the more resplendent and reverence this excellency in God Next he ought not to repine that he is not here glorious for this life is his place of Combat and the Crown is not given till the Victory be gained wherefore as long as he lives he enjoyes a liberty by which he may sin and be overcome and by which he may vanquish Lastly God decreed this liberty to Man and gave him a faculty by which he might with a full swinge of his Will be take himself to good or evil to the end he might be capable of merit or demerit for if he acted by the impulse of necessity he could merit no recompence for his vertue nor punishment for his sin no more than a tree which bears good or bad fruit and by this means the divine Justice could not be discerned either in the condemnation of the wicked or in the reward of the just Our great Penitent in the issue of this meditation hath reason to set his Tongue a work and spend it self in exalting this powerful and remunerating Iustice of God which happily converts to our advantage what at the first glance appears the Subject of our ruine and resign himself to those dangers wherein the perfection of his free will may involve him since by his grace which he implores he may embrace and practise what is pleasing to him And if to the end he carry on this noble resolution he hath an assurance to bless his Iustice for all Eternity And my Tongue shall exalt thy Iustice. St. Austin upon this place is of Opinion that our Penitent means the Messias whose Justice he will extoll in that by his merit both Men and Angels are rescued from the slavery of sin To which I agree nor do the premises any waies derogate from this interpretation for the merits of Jesus Christ are the source and cause of Sanctifying grace which grace dignifyes the works of the just and raises them to the degree of merit Now that which is cause of the cause is likewise cause of the effect and consequently the merits of Jesus Christ are cause of the merits of Saints as St. Paul to the Galatians Chap. 1. He hath blessed us with all spiritual benediction in Jesus Christ Next the merits of Jesus Christ contribute to the merits of Saints in that he hath obtained by his actions and sufferings a promise from God to accept the merits of Men in order to Heaven for it was in consideration of him and upon the score of his torments that this promise was made unto us It is this St. Peter in his Second Epistle Chap. 3. hints at when speaking of Christ he sayes by him he hath made us great and precious promises to the end we might by them be made partakers of the Divine Nature Now as Grace is the Fountain of the merits of Saints and God's promise the accomplishment both the one and the other proceeding from the merits of Jesus Christ it followes that the merits of Saints subsist not but by those of Christ Nor have they a dependency only by way of simple condition or necessary circumstance but they flow from them as from the root fountain and principal cause without which they would have no Being Our Holy Doctor therefore will praise and set forth the divine Justice under several Notions First as he is the Principium or Off-spring whence all remission of sin and collation of grace is derived and without which all Mankind had been eternally wrapt up in the darkness of sin so that the just and superabundant ransom he hath paid for us merits the Adorations and praises of all hearts and tongues Next he will extoll him under the title of a remunerating Iustice in that after he hath taught us how to fight put arms into our hands and hath stood by us to confirm our courage exacting only a firm will to overcome doth yet dispense his Crowns with applause as if we had done all our selves O who can then asperse and lay a charge upon this Opinion as if it injured Christs merits doth the fulness of a stream dishonour the source from whence it flowes or the excellency of any fruit injure the Root that gives birth to it so the merits of the just being only the rivulets and fruit of Christ's superabundant satisfaction cannot certainly in the least derogate from his they only serve in an inferiour degree to extol and do homage to the infinity of Christ's merit Wherefore Our Penitent will incessantly tune forth And my Tongue shall exalt thy Justice The Justice of God beholds Creatures in three several relations First it is distributive by which he allots unto every Creature faculties proportionable to carry them on to the End for which they were created To the Soul which he hath designed to contemplate and love him he hath given an understanding and will the Body doomed to labour he hath framed with Arms and Hands The Sun whose Office is to enlighten the World he hath vested with a lasting brightness which never fails to perform its task in fine every animal Tree Plant or what ever is existent in the World hath a vertue proper to the designment of its Creation Whence St. Dennis sayes that God is communicable in his Justice distributing to every one according to the dignity of its nature and bounding within limits most equitable the manner beauty order Ornament the inequalities and proportions of all Creatures accommodating every thing with that which is proper to it Our Penitent will not be silent in order to this his distributive Iustice he will admire the works of God give his approbation without the least Censure and confess that this wise Architect hath ballanced all things with equity and justice and if he may be so happy as to manage his individual Being conformably to those proprieties and qualities he hath received from his Creatour he will with confidence proclaim that his tongue shall exalt his justice In the second consideration his punitive justice hath place by which he inflicts a punishment on sinners the reason of this is that a sinner living contrary to the wil of God and disobedient to his order setling his contentment on things forbidden by his Sovereign doth by these his wayes throw a contempt upon him Wherefore it is most just reparation should be made and since he hath rebelled in breaking the Commands of his Creatour it is fit he should be afflicted with torments and enslaved by that will he hath so much scorned and set at naught
in this life If you consider the immense obligations you owe to your Redeemer you will lament in that you have but one life to Sacrifice for him that hath lost his own so worthy upon the Altar of the Cross for your sake You will repine that nature allowes you but a term of sixty years or thereabouts in this world to spin out in his service since he hath surrendered up his life for you of which one moment is more to be valued than all the duration and existence of Men and Angels This is the Sacrifice of Calves which our Penitent had in his prophetick view and it leaves a sweet relish in his Mind with which he concludes his petition It was doubtless matter of great joy to our Penitent to consider the powerful operation of Christ's Spirit that would draw Men from sensual pleasures and baits of this World induce them to contemn riches honors and Earthly glory and exchange these for hair-cloths fasting disciplines and other mortifications of the flesh and this to be acted by persons great in dignity swimming in a full plenty of wealth and endued with intellectual parts even to admiration Millions of these have shrowded themselves within the Walls of a poor habitation where cloathed with a course habit they have led a life wholly Angelical and made themselves a daily Sacrifice unto God beautifyed with a religious simplicity which surpasses all the wisdom of the World and so fulfilled the prophecy of our happy Penitent Then that is in the Church to be established and founded by the Messias they will lay Calves on thy Altar The Application Our Holy Penitent here entertains himself with the grateful returns which Christians were to make in consideration of Christ's eternal Sacrifice and certainly there is no state speaks so much a generous love to God as that of a contemplative life where we behold Men devested of all self love to become perfect slaves to the divine will freed from all adhesion to created things that in charity they might be united to God avoiding the World's conversation the better to enjoy God's presence that since they cannot live without him at least they might live with him as much as the condition of this mortal life will bear To contemplate so many thousand Families where Creatures anticipate their felicity by praising God incessantly and who seem not to subsist but by the dew of a Holy Love like the Seraphims in Heaven Ah let us then conclude with our Holy Penitent and bless the divine Providence who hath in the revolution of so many ages received the perfume of prayers and thanksgivings from an infinity of pure innocent Souls consecrated in a peculiar manner to his glory and service Amen FINIS A TABLE Of the principal matter of this BOOK A. Affliction WHy God conducts Souls by way of affliction Pag. 8 Adversity foundation to eternal happiness p. 143 Why God lengthens out our afflictions p. 380 381 Affliction of David p. 282 Anger Means hovv to avert God's anger p. 178 Adultery All Lavves violated by adultery p. 56 57 Punished by death and great torments by all Nations p. 58 It subverts the rules set dovvn for our education p. 303 It is a vvrong not to be repaired Ib. A passage of St. Paul terrible concerning adultery p. 304 The civil lavv permits parties interessed to be Judges Ibid. It is a kind of Sacriledge p. 305 306 B. Body It is fit the Body should share in the punishment of sin p. 36 Saints Bodies alvvayes had in veneration both in the old and nevv Lavv. p. 170 Divers examples of this subject ib. Why God favours Saints Bodies with the working of miracles p. 168 What David means by humbled bones p. 167 Beatitude To anticipate our Beatitude is here to think alwayes of it p. 248 249 Why we cannot be happy here p. 249 How sweet the thoughts of Beatitude p. 290 Good works the means to Beatitude ibid. C. Carnal Sins Carnal sins destroy both Body and Soul p. 52 53 Punishments of Heaven for carnal sins p. 53 54 Why carnal sins are most dangerous and most abominated by God ibid. Church A pillar of truth c. p. 127 Upon what terms God founded his Church p. 138 seq God punishes such as violate Temples or Churches p. 409 410 The sublime institution of the Church p. 422 seq Christ Christs presence how amiable p. 234 Christ loves to be with men p. 235 Christ dyed for all p. 280 seq Christ's Revelation to St. Bridget p. 283 Christ the source of all merit p. 316 Christ supream pastour of Souls p. 415 Christ Sovereign Bishop of the Church p. 416 Christ a true Holocaust p. 433 434 Christ a true oblation of Justice p. 431 Charity Order of charity p. 403 404 Conversion Of an Indian in Japonia p. 328 Sometimes wrought by outward preaching ibid. Sometimes by the inward operation of his spirit p. 329 D. Mystick Divinity It s definition and several operations from p. 259. unto 263 David Why David begged to be freed from temporal punishment p. 48 49 David the most accomplished Prophet p. 131 The world's creation revealed to David p. 131 132 The Incarnation Nativity and Passion revealed to David p. 133 134 135 The state of his conscience in order to God was revealed to him p. 135 David desired to be a Martyr p. 150 What means he by the joy of his Salvation p. 251 He was very meek and humble p. 3â—7 Death Death concludes all our merit p. 38 39 40 Desire Why our desires are never satiated in this life p. 43 44 Despair Why we should never despair p. 293 E. Men of all conditions are bound to give good example 86 87 seq F. Fear Difference of fear in the good and bad p. 43 Friend Loss of a friend not to be lamented p. 143 144 Faith Springs from God p. 126 and 216 Moral vertues c the way to faith p. 127 Faith teaches what we owe to God and our Neighbour p. 205 Faith of all things ought to be the most unquestionable ibid. God proceeds like a Soveraign in matter of faith ibid. This his proceeding a stroke of his goodness ibid. Christ our Master in matters of faith p. 207 208 The mysteries of faith our greatest comfort p. 208 209 What habitual faith is and its effects p. 210 211 G. God If God deprives us of one good it is but to give us a better p. 49 50 God never rejects a truly repenting heart p. 90 91 seq God will be justifyed in his proceedings with man p. 97 God a primary and essential truth p. 128 God is not the efficient cause of obdurateness p. 218 219 What sign of God's leaving us p. 226 Two derelictions of God p. 227 How God is lost by sin p. 232 God still gives more than we ask p. 231 235 How to escape God's anger p. 236 237 How comfortable the belief of God p. 288 Grace Definition of grace and
indevotion and an indiscreet Zeal Fortitude between rashness and cowardise so of the rest Wherefore the art is so to steer your course as to keep at an equal distance from them both yet alwayes mindful that if one be more dangerous than the other you are most to decline that as if I would embrace the vertue of hope which is beset with presumption and despair and my complexion cold and melancholly drawes me on the extremity of despair this certainly most threatens my ruine and therefore I am to look upon every spark of that with more apprehension than a fire which issues from presumption Our Holy Penitent knew that whilest he sailed in the Ocean of this World he must needs be flanked with two dangerous Rocks that is two opposite vices to any vertue he would embrace so that if he keep not a steady hand to the helm by the least diversion he is cast upon a shelf which will destroy him Wherefore it behoves him to fit himself with a right spirit a Spirit of vertue which leaning upon the Principles of reason might preserve him in that degree of honour wherein he is ranked amidst created Beings For as knowledge makes one knowing so vertue gives us the title of good and as the good of any thing consists in the just measure and proportion unto it he concludes this right spirit of vertue to be a purchase worthy his ambition since doubtless nothing to Man as Man is more sutable and agreeing than such actions as are produced conformable to a reasonable nature he anticipates his Son's Declaration and thinks nothing profitable pleasant or great which is not made so by vertue This right spirit will shower down spiritual comforts settle him in peace with God Angels and Men shelter him under the wings of God's Providence which never fails to cherish those who live according to the rules of vertue and after a life attempered with the Harmony of delightful actions it changes into sweeâ—…ss the grim face of Death making it a secure passage unto eternal Beatitude He is resolved to put in execution the practice both of intellectual and moral vertues and that they may prove meritorious he begs they may be infused into him that when he considers the infinity of God's Being and the immensity of his perfections he may forthwith pay him the just tribute of glory respect and submission all worship praise and possible endeavours of Piety That his omnipotency may never pass his thoughts without an entire obedience to his will that his inexhausted and unerring wisdom may draw him to acts of faith and firm assent to his divine word That the fidelity of his never failing promises may fix a reliance and assured hope in him That his unwearied goodness may ravish him into a charity and love never to be extinguished That his incomparable greatness may work him into the annihilation of himself before him and give him a true feeling of his own vileness That a terrour of his judgments may throw him into a course of rigid pennance for his misdeeds and his unspeakable favours be met with all the Testimonies of gratitude which a poor Creature can give He knowes that had he a Million of hearts lodg'd within his own person yet could they never reach that love his goodness merits and should he stoop even unto Hell nay lower were it possible it would still be short of that submission due to his greatness Wherefore though he be hopeless to pay what he owes he will shew at least he hath a will to be just nor doth he blush at his impotency since it springs from the excellency of his Creditour from whom likewise he expects to be enabled towards the discharge of his arrears and he conceives no treasure can be more effectual than that of a right spirit and therefore he incessantly repeats renew in my bowels a right spirit The Application God will be adored in spirit and truth wherefore man is to serve and honour him by a certain knowledge sutable to his intellectual nature now in the essence of God are contained wonders not to be comprehended by the natural force of our understanding Whence we are with our Holy Penitent to Petition for a right spirit that is the excellent light of faith by which we are raised to a more eminent knowledge of the Divinity than all the activity and vigour of our reason could ever reach In this knowledge consists eternal life in the ignorance of this eternal death For with what Face shall he one day ask Heaven of the adorable Trinity who hath never known that mystery Or claim a share in the fruit of our redemption who hath been ignorant of Jesus Christ Let us then beg for this heavenly wisdom by which we are taken off from the low affection to Creatures to fix our Eyes upon the greatness of our Creatour the wonders of his works and amidst a Million of ravishing objects which this right spirit presents to our meditation let us insist with a particular gust on this that our Souls are created for eternal bliss Amen CHAP. XXIII Ne projicias me à facie tua Cast me not away from thy face OUr Holy Penitent seems here to question the success of his precedent petition by which he had sued for a right understanding this argues how unsetled the mind of a sinner is that no sooner he had aimed at this irradiation but immediately he is struck with a terrour of his demerits and fancies his doom is to be eternally banished from the Face of God wherefore he cryes cast me not away from thy Face St. Hierom conceives this clause levels only at the communication of his Divinity in order to the Hypostatick union which he apprehends in punishment of his sin might be concealed from him and therefore he sayes cast me not away from thy face that is deprive me not of the knowledge of thy divine nature as it relates to Man in the great Sacrament of the incarnation It is this mystery he fears to be ravished off which brings along with it a fulness of time and wherein all the groans and labours of many longing Souls will cease and be at rest But the more vogued opinion layes this expression upon his anxiety touching his eternal reprobation He knew he was unworthy of eternal life through the forfeiture of grace he had made and whether being now a Vessel of dishonour the divine Artist will not leave him eternally in this reproachful mould is the just motive of his fear He remembers a passage in Exodus where our Lord threatens to obdurate the heart of Pharaoh and it is no less affrighting what St. Paul declares that God is merciful on whom he will have mercy and in the Fourth Chapter to the Corinthians God hath cast an obcaecation on the Minds of unbelievers Yet our Petitioner is too good a Divine as entertaining these reflections to make God the efficient cause of Man's obdurateness he knowes that