the smaller and unworthyer the object is the more shamefull is the despaire about it but in recompense it is more curable For then one is easily brought to consider in cold blood that the thing was not worthy either of his affliction or affection But when the object is great and worthy the despaire is more guilty and lesse curable Wherefore the worst Despaire of all is when one despaireth of the grace of God so farre as to hate him for nothing can be worse then to hate the Soveraine good onely worthy to be beloved with all the soul Many distrust the grace of God who are not therefore desperate though they think themselves so to be Let them aske of themselves whether they hate God and let them know that as long as a graine of Gods love remaines in them there is together a graine of faith though opprest and offuscated by melancholy For it is impossible that God should be their enemy and their Soveraine evill while they love him To them this comfort is addrest Prov. 8.17 I love them that love me and those that seeke me early shall find me And this likewise 1 Joh. 4.19 We love him because he first loved us If then we love him we must be sure that he loveth us and we must fight against the temptations of despaire saying with Job Though God stay me yet will I trust in him Job 13.15 and with Isaiah Isa 25.9 Loe this is our God we have waited for him and he will save us This is the Lord wee have waited for him we will be glad and rejoyce in his salvation Confidence is good according to the goodnesse of the subject that it reposeth upon Wherefore Confidence in God the only Soveraine good perfect solid and immutable is the best of all and the onely that can give assurance and content to the soul He that is blest with that confidence is halfe in Paradice already He is firme safe meek serene and too strong for all his enemies Psal 84.12 God is to him a Sunne to give him light heate life and plenty of all goods and a shield to gard him and shelter him from all evills ver 13. He gives him grace in this life and glory in the next O Lord of hosts blessed is the man that trusteth in thee CHAP. XVIII Of Pitty PItty is a Passion composed of love and sorrow moved by the distress of another either true or seeming And that sympathie is somtimes grounded upon false love because we acknowledge our selves obnoxious to the same calamities and feare the like fortune Pitty is opposite to Envy for Envy is a displeasure conceived at another mans good but Pitty is a displeasure conceived at another mans harme The Passion of Pitty must be distinguished from the vertue that beares the same name for they are easily confounded The Pitty of the vulgar which is imputed to good Nature and Christian charity comes chiefely out of two causes The one is an errour in judgement whereby they reckon many things among the great goods which are good but in a very low degree and likewise many things among evills which are not evill Hence it is that those are most pittied that dye and the best men more then any as though death were evill to such men and they that lose their moneyes which are called goods as though they were the onely good things and they that lose their lands which are called an estate as though a mans being and well being were estated in them The other cause of the Passion of Pitty is a sickly tendernesse of mind easy to be moved wherefore women and children are more inclinable to it but the same tendernesse and softness makes them equally inclinable to choller yea to cruelty The people that seeth the bleeding carkasse of a man newly murthered is stricken with great pitty towards him who is past all worldly sorrowes and with great hatred against the murderer wishing that they might get him into their hands to teare him to peeces But when the fellon is put into the hands of Justice condemned and brought to execution then the heat of the peoples Passion is altogether for pitty to him and that pitty begets wrath against the executioner when he doth his office So easily doth the passion of vulgar soules pass from one contrary to another from pitty to cruelty from cruelty to pitty againe and from compassion for one to hatred for another But all these suddaine contrary motions proceed from one cause which is the tendernesse and instability of weake soules whose reason is drowned in passion and their passion is in perpetuall agitation But the Vertue of Pitty which is a limb of charity is a firme resolution to relieve our neighbour that stands in need of our help and it hath more efficiency then tenderness This is the Pitty of generous and religious spirits aspiring to the imitation of God who without feeling any perturbation for the calamities of men relieveth them out of his mercy And whereas the Passion of pitty is for the most part caused by the ignorance of the goodness and badness of things he that is lesse mistaken in them is also lesse inclined to that passion for he calls not that misery which others call so Nec doluit miserans inopem aut invidit habenti Or if a wiseman pitty one dejected by poverty it will not be his poverty but his dejected spirit that he will pitty And so of him that is weeping for a slander a wiseman will pitty him not because he is slandered but because he weepes for it for that weeping is a reall evill though the cause which is slander be but an imaginary evill He will labour to get such a firme soul that neither the good nor the evill that he seeth in or about his neighbours be able to worke any perturbation within him The world being a great hospitall of misery where we see wellnigh as many miserable persons as we see men if we were obliged to have a yearning compassion for all the miserable we should soone become more miserable then any of them and must bid for ever Adieu to the peace of the soul and contentment of mind It is enough to give power to our neighbours to command our counsell our labour and our purse in their need but to give them power over the firmeness of our soul to shake and enervate it at their pleasure it is too much Let us depend of none if it may be but God and ourselves Let none other have the power be it for good or evill to turne the sterne of our minde at his pleasure It must be acknowledged that Pitty as weake as it is hath more affinity with Vertue then any other Passion and turnes into vertue sooner then any That way weake soules handled with dexterity are brought to meekeness and charity and that way many Pagans have bin brought to the Christian verity We owe the great conversions to the sufferings of Martyrs
devotion is making a glory of the matter of our shame as if a fellon had the ambition to weare the halter about his neck with a good grace The sorrow of repentance is an ill passage which we must of necessity go through if we will be saved but we must not make that passage a dwelling place After we have used it to make our peace with God we must be comforted and rejoyce in that peace For God hath not called us to sorrow but to peace and content And the Gospell is the Doctrine of peace and assurance OF THE PEACE OF THE SOVL AND CONTENTMENT OF MINDE SECOND BOOK Of Mans Peace with himselfe by Rectifying his Opinions CHAPTER I. The Designe of this Book and the next THe sence of our peace with God may be distinguished from the peace with our selves but not separated for the peace with God being well apprehended setleth peace in the heart betweene a man and his own conscience which otherwise is his inseparable accuser and implacable adversary We have spoken in the first Book of the ground and principal cause of our inward peace which is also the end and perfection of the same and that is our Union with God We have treated also of the meanes altogether divine and effective of that end which are the love of God and our neighbour faith hope and a good conscience active in good workes We intend now with Gods helpe to speake of those subordinate causes and meanes where Prudence is a servant of Piety to keep peace and good order within In this great work the handmaide shall often need her Mistrisses help for reason not sanctified by piety is as dangerous to use as Antimony and Mercury not prepared The two great workes of sanctified reason to keep inward peace and content are these Not to be beaten down with adversity or corrupted with prosperity going through both fortuns with vertuous cleare and equal temper making profit of all things and fetching good out of evill To frame that golden temper in our minde we must lay downe before all things for a fundamental Maxime That all the good and evill of mans life though it may have its occasions without hath truly and really its causes within us excepting onely some few casualties where prudence hath no place and yet there is no evill but may be either prevented or lessened or turned into good by a vertuous disposition Hence it followes that not without but within us our principal labour must be bestowed to take an order for our peace and content To keep us from falls in a long journey if wee would send before to remove all the stones out of the way we should never have done but the right course is to get an able and surefooted horse and to sit fast on him It would be a more impossible undertakeing in the wayfairing condition of this life to remove all temptations and oppositions out of our way but against these two sorts of obstacles we must provide a firme spirit able to go through all and stumbling at nothing but keeping every where a sure and eeven pace To that end let us acknowledge within us two generall causes of all our content and discontent and all our order and disorder The first cause is the Opinion that we conceive of things The second is the Passion moved or occasioned by that opinion Take a good order with these two causes you shall be every where content tranquil wise and moderate But from the disorder of these two causes proceeds all the trouble of the inward polity of our minds and all the misrule and misery that is in the world It must bee then our labour to order aright these two Principles of our good and evill within us and in the order here set down which is essential to the matter Imploying this second Book to get right Opinions of the things of this world from which men usually expect good or evill And this will prepare us matter for the third Book whose task will be to set a rule to passions For that which sets them upon disorderly motions is the wrong opinion wherewith the mind is possest about the objects And whosoever can instruct his mind with right opinions may after that rule his passion with little labour CHAP. II. Of the right Opinion I Said that things exteriour are the occasions of the good and evill of man but the causes of the same are the interiour Opinion and Passion Now to treat of the causes we must also treat of the occasions as subjects of the opinion and objects of the passion Not to examine them all for they are as many as things in the world and accidents in mans life there is none of them altogether indifferent to us but are considered either as good or evill We will stay onely upon the chiefe heads and endeavour to finde the true price of things that men commonly desire and the true harme of those things which they feare In this search I desire not to be accounted partial if I labour to give a pleasant face to the saddest things It is my profest intention For my work being to seek in all things occasion of peace and content why shall I not if I can borrow it even from adversity And is it any whit material whether I find it indeed or devise it so I can make it serve my turne Is it not prudence for one to be ingenious to content himselfe yea though he cosen himselfe to his owne content My readers may beare with me if I use them as I use my selfe who next to the care of pleasing God make it my chiefe study to content my mind and in all the several byasses that God puts upon the rouling course of my life strive to behold all accidents by the faire side or to give them one in my mind if they have none Wherein I hope to justifye the ingenuity of my dealing to ingenious mind and shew that I give no false colours to evill things to make them looke good For since the good and evill of most things consisteth in opinion and that things prove good or evill as they are taken and used if I find good in those things which others call evill they become good in my respect It is the great worke of wise men to turne all things to their advantage subjecting exteriour things to their mind not their mind to them et sibi res non se rebus submittere This truth then ought to be deeply printed in minds studious of wisdome and their own content That they beare their happinesse or unhappinesse within their breast and That all outward things have a right and a wrong handle He that takes them by the right handle finds them good He that takes them by the wrong indiscreetly finds them evill Take a knife by the haft it will serve you take it by the edge it will cut you Observe that all sublunary things are of a compounded nature
is dreadfull when it is assisted with power It is an impetuous storme overthrowing all that lyeth in its way How many times hath it razed Citties turned Empires upside downe and extermined whole nations One fit of anger of Theodosius one of the best Emperours of the whole list slew many thousands of men assembled in the amphi-Theater of Thessalonica How many then have bin massacred by the wrath of wicked Princes And what slaughter should there be in the world if meane fellowes had as much power as wrath What disorders anger would worke abroad if it were backt with power one may judge by the disorder which it workes within a mans soul for with the overflowing of the gall into the mass of the blood wrath at the same time overflowes all the faculties of the mind suffocates the reason maddes the will and sets the appetite on fire Which is to be seene in the inflammation of the face the sparkling eyes the quick disorderly motion of the limbs the injurious words the violent actions Wrath turnes a man into a furious beast If man be a little world wrath is the tempest of it which makes of the soul a stormy Sea casting up mire and foame and breaking it selfe against rocks by a blind rage In the heat of such fits many get their death or do such things which they repent of at leasure afterwards for wrath brings forth an effect fortable to its cause it comes out of weakeness and it weakens a man there being nothing that disarmes body and mind more and exposes a man more to injuries Indeed when anger is kept within mediocrity it sharpens valour and awakes subtility and readinesse of wit But when it is excessive it makes the sinewes to tremble the tongue to stutter and reason to lose the free exercise of her faculties so that a man out of too much will cannot compasse what he wills Latin Authors calling that weake violence ira impotens impotent anger have given it the right epithete for it strips a man of his power over his owne selfe and of strength to defend himselfe In that tumultuous overthrow of the inward polity what place remaines for piety charity meeknesse justice equity and all other vertues for the serenity of the soul is the temperate climat where they grow but the heat of choller parcheth them they are not plants for that torrid Zone I know that many times vertue is a pretence for choller Angry men justifie their Passion by the right which they maintaine thinking that they cannot mantaine it with vigour enough Thus whereas other passions are corrupted by evill things this it corrupted by good things and then to be even with them it corrupteth those good things for there is no cause so good but it is marred by impetuous choller The great plea of anger is the injustice of others But we must not repell one injustice by another For although an angry man could keep himselfe from offending his neighbour he cannot excuse his offence against God and himselfe by troubling the serenity of his soul which is expelling the image of God for it is not reflected but in a calme soul and bringing in storme and confusision which is the devills image As when a hogshead of wine is shaken the dregs rise to the top and when the sea is raging the mire doth the like a fit of raging choller doth thrust up all the hidden ordure which was settled before by the feare of God or men The wrong done by others to piety and justice is no just reason for our immoderate choler For they have no need of such an ill champion which is rather a hinderance then a defense of their cause and to maintaine them transgresseth against them To defend such reasonable things as piety and justice there is need of a free reason and a sober sense And whether wee be incensed with the injury done to them or that which is done to us wee must be so just to ourselves as not to lay the punishment upon us for the faults of another or make ourselves miserable because our neighbours are wicked To that end wee must remember that in the violation of justice God is more interessed then wee are and knoweth how to punish it when he sees it expedient And if God will not punish it as yet our will must not be more hasty then his and it becomes us not to be impatient for our interess when himself is patient in the wrong done to his owne Let the cause of our anger be never so holy and just the sentence of St James is of perpetual truth Jam. 1.20 The wrath of man worketh not the righteousnes of God If it be the cause of God that we defend we must not use that good cause to bring forth evill effects the evill that incenseth us can hardly be so grievous as the losse of humanity and right reason of which a man is deprived by excessive wrath for Wrath is cruell and anger is outragious Prov. 27.4 It resteth in the bosome of fooles saith Solomon Eccles 79. Our good opinion and love of ourselves which when all is sayd are the chiefe causes of anger ought to be also the motives to abate or prevent it for would any man that thinks well of himselfe and loveth his owne good make himselfe vile brutish Now this is done by letting the raines lose to choler whereas the way to deserve the good opinion of ourselves and others is to maintaine ourselves calme and generous never removed from the imperial power over ourselves by any violence of passion Pro. 16.32 He that is slow to anger is better then the mighty and he that ruleth his spirit then he that takes a citty I account not Alexander the Great a great Conquerour since he was a slave to his anger A man that never drew sword and is master of himselfe is a greater Conquerour then he That calme disposition shall not want many provocations from those with whom wee must of necessity live servants especially and servile soules like unto cart horses that will neither goe nor drive unlesse they feel the whip or be terrified with a harsh angry tone Seneca gives leave to the wiseman to use such varlets with the words and actions of anger but not to be angry A difficult taske It is to be feared that by counterfeiting anger wee may become angry in good earnest and a man hath need of a sound premunition of reason and constancy before he come to use those wayes so easy it is to slip into anger when one hath cause for it and is persvaded that the faults of an idle servant cannot be mended without anger But anger is a remedy worse then most diseases and no houshold disorder is worth the disordering of our soules with passion Better were it to be ill served or not served at all then to make our servants our Masters giving them power to dispossesse us of the command of ourselves whensoever
gnashing of teeth that burning fire and that gnawing and never-dying worme is Envy biting the damned to the quick while they are thinking of the glory and felicity of God and how the Saints whom they have despised opprest in the world are filled with joy and crowned with glory while themselves are infamous and miserable That comparison is a maine article of their misery The envious man cannot suffer as much as he deserveth since he sets himselfe against God and all that God loveth controuling His distribution of his goods He that is grieved at the good he seeth deserveth never to have any good it were pitty he should have any if he can get no good but by his neighbours harme Besides the causes of envy which I observed before there are two more that are great contributours to that wicked vice The one is want of faith for a man becomes envious because he beleeveth not that God hath enough in his store to doe good to him and others or that God doth wisely to give him superiours or equals Which unbelecfe makes him to murmure and fall out with God Matth. 20.15 His eye is evill because God is good The other cause is Idleness It makes men envious but it makes them poore before for when they are growne poore through idlenes they look upon the wealth of their neighbours with envy The soul of the sluggard desireth and hath nothing and the thing he desireth is his neighbours estate which he lookes upon with an evill eye Hence warres robberies and piracies For while diligent men grow rich by their industry idle and envious men study onely to have strength on their side to rob the industrious or at least to put a stop to their increase This search of the causes of envy opens us the way to the remedies Since all disorder in the appetite begins by errour in the understanding wee must before all things heale our understanding of that errour and ignorance which occasions envy even that false opinion that the wealth and honour of the world make a man happy whereas they are instruments of wickednes and misery unto weake souls and to the strong hinderances and seeds of care They are the ropes wherewith Satan drawes men into perdition For one that useth them well a thousand are corrupted and undone by them And who would envy slaves and miserable persons Then wee must beate downe pride and the excessive love of ourselves with the study of humility charity and meekenes Let nothing be done through strife or vaine glory but in lowlines of mind let each esteeme other better then themselves Looke not every man on his owne things but every man also to the things of others Phil. 2.3 If once wee can get an humble opinion of ourselves and a charitable opinion of our neighbours wee shall not be vexed with envy seeing their prosperity for we shall think that they deserve it better then we In stead of an envious comparing of our neighbours estates with ours let us compare what we have received of God with what wee deserve of him and that will quell our pride and envy An especiall care must be taken to cut our desire short which is the next cause of envy He that desireth little shall envy no body For so little as he needs he would not strip another to cloath himselfe If sometimes the luster of worldly advancements dazle our eyes and breed in us some motions of envy let us consider what those advancements cost them that have attained them how much time money and labour they have spent how many doors of great persons they besieged how many frownes from their superiours how many justlings from their emulatours Then how many temptations how many shifts were they put to even to disguising of truth and wresting of justice Let us think well whether we would have bought preferment at that rate and that if we have it not we did not spend for it what others did We have not broken our sleep with cares we have not bin many yeares tottering betweene feare and hope We have given no thankes for affronts We have not courted a porter and a groome We have not purchased with gifts a Clarkes favour We have not turned the whole bent of our mind from the service of God to the service of the world In a word if we have not the wares we have not payd our money for it And if we would not have spent so much about that advancement we have no reason to envy them that have bought it so deare The chiefe remedy against that fretting disease is faith in the power goodnesse and wisedome of God with an entire submission to his holy will Why should we afflict ourselves for Gods gifts to others Rom. 10.12 The same Lord over all is rich unto all that call upon him He hath enough to enrich us all Let us not looke what he gives to others but let us humbly aske him that which he knowes to bee fit for us and thankfully receive what he giveth us being sure that all that he gives is good because it comes from his good hand If we can truly say with Davids faith The Lord is the portion of mine inheritance Psal 16.5 how can we after that looke upon our neighbours portion with envy It is also an antidote against envy to be alwayes well imployed for idlenesse makes a man to leave his busines to looke upon his neighbours worke and doing nothing controule them that do well As for the envy which others beare to us we have reason to rejoyce that our condition is such as deserves envy at least in the opinion of others It is true we must not referre ourselves to the opinion of others but to our own selfe about the happinesse or unhappinesse of our condition but because we are not sensible as we ought of Gods benefits towards us and many times complaine when we should praise God our neighbours envy serveth to awake our sense of Gods mercies and to move us to thankfullnesse CHAP. XIV Of Jealousy JEalousy is much like Envy In Greeke one word serveth for both Yet are they of different nature For a man is envious of that he hath not but he is Jealous of that he hath Besides they are of different extractions Envy is the daughter of Pride for to pride the envious man oweth the opinion he hath to be more worthy of the advantages conferred upon others but Jealousy is the offspring of a base mind that judgeth himselfe unworthy of that which he possesseth and feareth that another be more worthy of it Jealousy is a various and phantastical medley of love distrust revenge sadnesse feare and shame But that compound is not lasting for love soone turnes into hatred feare and shame into fury and distrust into despaire Solomon saith that jealousy is the rage of a man Prov. 6.34 The predominant passions in Jealousy for Jealousy is many passions together are feare not to possesse
fortune hath her inconstancy as well as the good and the calme will come after the storme The proper exercise of vertue in Adversity is to imitate God who fetcheth good out of it and makes it a discipline of godlines wisedome and tranquillity to his children It is not enough to hope that after the storme the calme will come wee must study to find tranquillity in the very tempest and make profit of our damage Having spoken of the particular Adversities in the second booke I will endeavour here to set downe general remedies for all sorts of Adversities saving one the Adversity which a delicat man createth to himselfe out of a conceited tendernes for to such wilfully afflicted persons the counsells of reason are uselesse till they be afflicted in earnest They have need of real afflictions to be healed of imaginary To them that are sick with too much ease a smarting Adversity is a wholesome plaister As to the hypocondriaque who had a false opinion of a wound in his left thigh the surgeon made an incision in the right to make him feele the difference betweene real wounds and imaginary Indeed the most part of persons afflicted are more so out of opinion then any true ground but the wanton melancholy of some that were all their time dandled in fortunes lap addeth to that epidemical disease Wee will let them alone till they have reason to complaine and desire them that groane under some apparent Adversities to examine seriously whether they be such as they appeare For there are some Adversities or called so which rather are prosperities if they that complaine of them can obtaine of themselves rather to beleeve their owne sense then the opinion of others and to have no artificial and studied sense but meerely the natural Thus he that is fallen into disfavour whereby he hath lost wealth and honours and hath kept liberty and bread enough to subsist retired remote and neglected is very much obliged first to the envy and after to the contempt of the contrary prevailing faction if God give him the understanding to enjoy the prosperity created by his adversity It is a happy misfortune for a little barke to be cast by the storme upon a smooth shore where the Sea ebbing leaveth it dry but safe while the rest of the fleet is torne by the tempest The wave is more favorable if it thrust the ship upon the haven Now the godly wiseman finds a haven any where because God is every where Sitting under the shelter of his love and providence he lookes with compassion upon the blinde rage of parties flesht in the blood of one another praising God that he was hurled downe from a stage where they are acting a bloody tragedy that he may be an actour no more but a beholder onely disinteressed from the publique contradiction His ruine cannot equal his gaine if by the losse of his estate he hath bought his peace and the uninterrupted contemplation of God himselfe and the world It would be a long taske to enumerate all the commodious adversities for which neverthelesse comfort is given and received with great ceremony Many accidents bitter to us for a time turne afterwards to our great conveniency Some should have missed a great fortune had they not bin repulsed in the pursuite of a lesser Many teares are shed upon the dead but more would be shed if some of them should rise againe God hath so enterlaced good and evill that either brings the other If wee had the patience to let God doe and the wisedome to make use of all wee might finde good in most part of our Adversities Many persons ingenious to their owne torment are like the boulter that lets out the flowre and keepes the bran they keepe disgraces and misfortunes in their thoughts and let Gods benefits goe out of their minde It had bin better for them to resemble the rying seeve that lets out ill seedes and keepes the good corne taking off their thoughts from that which is troublesome in every accident of their life unlesse it be to remedy it setting their mind upon that hath which may yeeld profit or comfort Thus he that received some offence in company by his indiscretion in stead of making that offense an occasion of quarrel must make it a corrective of his rashnes He that is confined within the limits of a house and garden instead of grieving that he hath not the liberty of the street must rejoyce that he hath the liberty of a walke And how many crosses come upon us which being wisely managed would bring great commodities if anger troubling our judgement did not make us forgoe the care of our conveniency to attend our appetite of revenge Could wee keepe every where equality and serenity of spirit wee might scape many Adversities or make them more tolerable or turne them to our advantage All afflictions are profitable to the wise and godly Even when all is lost for the temporal there wants never matter for the principall Advantage which is the spiritual There wee learne to know the perversity and inconstancy of the world and the vanity of life that wee may not repose our trust and bend our affection upon it Since a curse is pronounced to the man that trusteth in man and to him that trusteth in his riches the way to the kingdome of heaven is as impassable as the going of a cable through a niedles eye and we notwithstanding these divine warnings are so prone to trust and love the world God therefore in his wisedome and mercy suffers that unsound reed which wee leane upon to breake in our hand and our love of the world to be payd with its hatred that wee may learne to settle our confidence and love in a better place Hereby also a man comes to know his sin and Gods Justice Though we be prone to attribute the good and evill that comes to us unto second causes there is such an affinity betweene sin and punishment that even in the most obdurate hearts affliction brings sin to mind and gives remorse to the conscience But in godly soules that remorse is salutary David having sayd to God Psal 32.5 Day and night thy hand was heavy upon me my moisture is turned into the drought of summer addeth I acknowledged my sin unto thee mine iniquity have I not hid I said I will confesse my transgressions and thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin And whereas the appetite will run wilde when prosperity opens the broad gate of licentiousnesse Adversity comming upon that holds a short hand upon the appetite and awakes piety and wisedome David speakes of this experimentally Psal 119.67 Before I was afflicted I went astray but now have I kept thy word ver 71. It is good for me that I have bin afflicted that I might learne thy statutes Prosperity is an evill counsellour and all her adresses are to the appetite but Adversity crossing the appetite calls upon the judgement
divisions and disputations whether it be a vertue moral or intellectual contemplative or practical Whether the actus elicitus of prudence be to know or to will and what difference there is betweene acting and doing Goodly instructions to forme a Councellor of State and to underprop a tottering Commonwealth Could these Doctors have done worse for themselves if they had undertaken to justifye the ordinary reproach against learning that prudence lyeth out of the circuit of Schollership and that it is incompatible with learning This they justifye more yet when they passe from contemplation to practise For in Councel though but a meane corporation tradesmen many times will speake more pertinently thet great Scholars Of this the fault lyeth not in Learning which is the right way to Prudence but in not choosing the right learning for prudence and applying ones mind to other things For neither Transcendents nor Modals not Hesychius nor Suidas nor Apogees nor Excentriques teach a man wisedome It were a wonder if they that never learned wisedom understood it There are two wayes to get it Science and Experience These men have neither that have spent all their study about Syllogisms or Horoscopes But take me a Scholler that hath made prudence his study and bent all his learning to that marke seeking it first in Gods Book the spring of all wisedome then in the writings of wisemen both antient and late and in history which is the Mistriss of life Let him study men and business as well as Bookes Let him converse with the wisest and best versed in the world and consummate himselfe in experience When such a man shall speake in a Councell of State among unlearned men it will appeare how rash and injurious that sentence is that learning and prudence are incompatible and how farre the learned go beyond the ignorant for deepe insight into businesses and healing or preventing publique evills Because we seek here the just price of things we must not attribute too much unto Science and Prudence These two together make a goodly match By knowledge and and wisedome a man differeth from a beast But both are subject unto vanity For knowledge take the verdict of two the most learned of all the Canonical writers Solomon and St. Paul The first will tell you He that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow Eccl. 1.18 The other Knowledge puffeth up 1 Cor 8.1 Sorrow pride are the ordinary effects of Learning but when it meets with a strong and meek spirit upheld with Gods grace Pride will easily get into those that have some but little learning for it is a point of ignorance for one to think he is learned when he is not But when we are advanced in learning we learne that we know nothing and discover the uncertainty of sciences that they performe not what they promise that new writers give the lye to the old Eccl. 12.12 that of making many Bookes there is no end and much study is a wearinesse of the flesh A wise man that will reape from learning utility and content must expect no more of it then it can afford He will deale with learning as with money he will not be a servant to it but make it his Servant When he is past the drudgery of the Schoole he will if he can make his study his pastime not his taske Prudence is no lesse subject to vanity then Learning but rather hath more uncertainty For sciences have certain objects since they consider universals which are alwayes the same what change soever happen in the particulars But prudence having no object but particular things casual and uncertaine cannot have but an uncertaine seat upon such an unstayed bottome for though there be generall rules of prudence they must continually be bowed and made longer or shorter according to the accidents and circumstances which being every where different require also every where a different manner of conduct After a wise deliberation an industrions managing of a businesse an unfortunate end many times will follow How oft hath the most mature prudence bin overcome by folly and precipitate rashnesse Of which the principal cause is the provocation of Gods jealousy by humane wisedome when it grows to presumption Isa 24.15 Woe unto them that seeke deep to hide their counsell from the Lord and their workes are in the dark and they say Who seeth us and who knowes us For God who is called onely wise by St. Paul Rom. 16.27 for which he will have him to be glorifyed for ever is highly offended when any pretends to share in that title which is his onely and takes a delight to blow upon projects made up with great art to shew to the wise of the world that they are but fooles To judge wisely of the businesses of the world we should see the wheels inward motions of them but they are hidden from us We can hardly pry into the counsels of men how can we penetrate into the Decrees of God those great and secret motions lockt up in the closet of his wise providence In the greatest revolution of our age we are eyewitnesses how the wisest counsels of a party have alwayes turned to their ruine and the faults of State on the contrary party have alwayes bin fortunate To one side prudence and imprudence have bin alike pernicious To the other prudence and imprudence have bin alike advantageous Let us looke up to God whose wayes are not our wayes and his thoughts are not our thoughts and against whose will no strength and no counsel will hold The future being to us a dark empty space where we see nothing no wonder that humane prudence seldome hits right in her forecast for the future The prudent man hath as much advantage over the imprudent as one that hath good eyes over a blind-man but when both are in the darke one seeth no more then the other Many future events are as dark to the wise as to the unwise And when wisedome is most cleare sighted it can but regulate the counsels but cannot dispose of the events The wiseman hath this benefit of his wisedome that if his counsels succeed well he can make good use of prosperity And if his good counsels have an unhappy successe either he declines the blow or gets a lenitive to it by prudence and patience or he makes advantage of it for some good and which way soever the staffe fall he never repents of a good counsell Of all the acquisite endowments of the understanding Prudence is the best therefore beyond all comparison more precious then all the goods of body and fortune But together let us acknowledge that it hath a short sight and a tottering bottome Wherefore the great precept of wisedome is to mistrust our wisedome and repose ourselves upon Gods wisedome and love Let our prudence depend altogether upon his providence It is a great abatement of the price of humane prudence that death cuts it off with the thred of life Eccl.
2.17 This was a cause why Solomon hated life even because the wiseman dyeth as the foole Yet had he wisely pondred the matter before ver 13. I saw that wisedome excelleth folly as farre as light excelleth darknesse The wisemans eyes are in his head but the foole walketh in darknesse but I perceived also that one event happenth to them all It is enough to disdaine the vanity of life and of human wisedome better then life to see a great Statesman that made a Kingdom to flourish and the neighboring States to tremble to be cut off in the midst of his high enterprises and deep counsels all which dye with him Psal 46.4 His breath goeth forth he returneth to his earth in that very day his thoughts perish That plotting braines from whose resolution the fortune of an empire depended shall breed wormes and toades And truly it should be unreasonable that this kind of prudence which hath no object but worldly and perishable should remaine permanent But it is very consonant to reason that a higher prudence which applyeth itselfe to permanent things remaine permanent It is that permanent wisedome which our Saviour recommends unto us Luke 12.33 Provide yourselves baggs which waxe not old a treasure in the heavens that faileth not It is that wisedome which Solomon calls a tree of life to them that lay hold on her because she lives after death and makes the soul live for ever Judge you of the price of these two sorts of wisedomes the one that perisheth and many times makes men perish the other that endureth for ever and will certainly make them that embrace her eternally blessed CHAP. XIX Of the acquisite Ornaments of the Will THe end of the instruction of the Understanding is the ruling and ordering of the Will in a constant goodnesse so much better then science and prudence as the end is better then the meanes unlesse by prudence we understand that wisedome which is employed about mans duty to God and comprehends all vertues for as in God all vertues are but one which is his Being likewise when we take vertues in a divine sense one vertue comprehends many as having some participation with the divine nature Commonly by vertue we understand uprightnesse of the will because without it the vertues of the understanding science intelligence and prudence deserve not to be called vertues and the more able they are the more pernicious Vertue of all acquisitions is the most precious without it the goods of body and fortune become evills serving only to make a man guilty and miserable for then the goods of the body give the faculty and the goods of fortune give the opportunity to do evill but without them Vertue alone is good and fetcheth good even out of evill By vertue man is made like God who is the originall vertue Vertue gives glory to God utility to the publique tranquillity and joy to the conscience reliefe to some counsell to others example to all Vertue is respected of all even of them that envy it They that love not the reality of vertue yet study to get the name of it and to put upon their false coyne the stamp of vertue All the hypocrisie in the world is an homage that Vice payeth unto Vertue A vertuous man may be stript of his estate by his enemies but of his vertue he cannot Because he keepes it he is alwayes rich Vertue strengthneth him in adversity moderates him in prosperity guides him in society entertaines him in his solitarinesse adviseth him in his doubts supports him in his weaknesse keeps him company in his journeyes by sea and land If his ship sink vertue sinkes not and he whether living or dying saveth it and himselfe By vertue he feares neither life nor death looking upon both with an equal eye yet aspiring to depart and to be with Christ but bearing patiently the delay of his departure because he is already with Christ by a lively hope Vertue steering the soule makes it take a streight and safe course to heaven and there abides with him eternally for vertue as well as glory is that treasure in heaven where neither the moth nor the rust corrupt and where theeves do not breake thorough and steale Math. 6. Philosophy considereth three vertues in the wil Justice Fortitude and Temperance excellent vertues the first especially which in effect containes the two others for it is the right temper of the will not drawne aside from the integrity of a good conscience either by oppositions of adversity against which fortitude stands fast or by allurements of prosperity from which temperance witholds the appetite Good conscience of which we have spoken in the first Booke is nothing else but justice For these vertues wherein mans duty and happinesse consisteth it were hard to find Elogies equal to their worth But there is great diffecence between the excellency of Vertue in it self and such vertue as is found among men The exactest justice that man is capable of is defective and infected with sinne All our righteousnesses are as the defiled cloath Wherefore the description of a just counterpoise of the will never swarving either on the right hand or the left never shaken from his square cubus either by afflictions or temptations is a fair character fit to set before our eyes to imitate as neere as we can as faire pictures in the sight of breeding women But truly such a perfect vertue subsisteth not in any subject under heaven In this world to be just is only to be somewhat lesse evill then others If a perfect Justice cannot be establisht in the private policy of a mans soul it is not to be lookt for in publique Policies Justice being pure in her original becomes impure and maimed being kneaded by the weak and uncleane hands of men Job 14.4 Who can bring a cleane thing out of an uncleane Of this it were easy to give instances out of the formes of Justice out of the very Lawes in all States But it is a point of justice to respect her in those hands to which divine providence hath intrusted her and to adde strength to her weakenesse by our voluntary deference Man being weake in justice cannot but be so in her appurtenances fortitude and temperance The highest point unto which human precepts endeavour to raise fortitude is to make patience a remedy to evills remediless But how short the bravest men come of that remedy in their paines and griefes daily experience sheweth it The vulgar placeth the vertue of fortitude in striking and massacring which is rather a barbarous inhumanity and if it be a vertue tygers are more vertuous then men As for Temperance her very name sounds weakenesse For he that is not subject to be corrupted by evill suggestions hath no need of temperance That man is temperat that knoweth how to keepe himselfe from himselfe who therefore is naturally evill and prone to vicious excesses Wherein men are inferiour to beasts which are not tempted
a child should be used to be contradicted and as soone as the light of reason beginns to dawne in his young soul he must be taught to subject his will unto reason Growne men hardned in that vice by ill breeding and the flattery of men and fortune yet may be healed if they will remove the causes of the disease Since then Obstinacy is a compound of ignorance and pride they must strive against both Good instruction will expell ignorance and as knowledge growes especially that of God and themselves Pride will decrease and they will become docile and susceptible of better information And whereas Obstinacy puts reason out of her seat subjecting her to passion her naturall subject they must endeavour to restore reason to her right place and authority forbidding the will to determine before reason hath given her verdict or to give a resolution for a reason for if the resolution bee unreasonable one must go from it the sooner the better It is unworthy of a man to have no reason but his will and custome and being asked why he persisteth in this course not to give his reason for answer but his Passion Indeed obstinate men will give many reasons of their fixednesse in their opinion but let them examine soberly and impartially whether their opinion be grounded upon those reasons or whether they alledge those reasons because they will be of that Opinion While wee goe about weaning of our mind from obstinacy wee must take heed of falling into a contrary evill a thousand times more dangerous which is to betray truth and righteousnes to complie with the time For wee must never ballance whether God or men must be obeyed We must not follow the multitude to do evill though the world should charge us with Obstinacy If our conscience tell us that wee deserve not that charge wee may rest satisfied for wee are accountable to God of our opinion not of the opinion that others have of us It is Constancy not Obstinacy to maintaine truth and good conscience even to the last breath despising publique opposition and private danger I joine truth with good conscience because if the question be of a truth which may be left undefended without wronging a good conscience it would be a foolish Obstinacy to swimme against a violent and dangerous streame to defend it But if it be such a truth as cannot be baulked without breaking faith with God and turning from a good conscience wee must persist in it and resist unto blood when wee are put to it And better it is to be called opiniatre then to be perfidious CHAP. XI Of Wrath. I put Wrath among the retinue of Pride as descended from it To this one might oppose that wrath is attributed to God in many texts of Scripture And that the Apostle saith Eph. 4. Be angry and sinne not And therefore that anger is not evil and must be fathered upon a better Authour then Pride These objections will helpe us to know the nature of wrath It is certaine that there is no passion in God But it is certaine also that if anger were a vice it should not be attributed unto God The wrath of God is an indignation declared by effects shewing a resenting of the offense offered unto his glory As then the anger of God proceeds from his glory so the vicious anger of man proceeds from his pride which is a bastard glory As for the other objection out of St Pauls precept Be angry and sinne not whence it followes that one may be angry and not sinne wee must distinguish betweene good and evill anger The vicious anger comes out of pride which is the evill glory of man The good anger comes out of the glory of God for the anger of Gods children when they heare his name blasphemed or see some horrible crime committed with the ceremonies of devotion and justice is a sense which they have of Gods glory whose violation moveth them to jealousy It is good to be angry for such occasions but because anger is prone to runne into excesse and to mingle particular animosities with the interesse of Gods glory the Apostle gives us a caveat to be angry and sinne not Then the vicious and the vertuous anger differ in the object chiefely the vertuous regards the interesse of God the vicious the interesse of a mans selfe but both proceed from glory and have their motions for the vindication of glory For as religious anger hath for its motive the glory of God the motive of vicious anger is particular glory and the resenting of private contempt true or imagined The proudest men are the most cholerick for being great lovers of themselves valuing themselves at a very high rate they deeme the smallest offences against them to be unpardonable crimes Truly no passion shewes more how necessary it is to know the nature and price of things and of our selves above all things for he that apprehends well how small a thing he is will not think the offenses against him to be very great and will not be much moved about them The certainest triall to know how proficient we are in humility is to examine whether we have fewer and easier fits of choller then before Ignorance of the price of things and owning things that are none of ours are the chiefe causes of disorder in all Passions but they are more evident in the Passion of anger because it is more violent and puts forth those errours to the outside which other Passions labour to hide Besides these causes Anger flowes out of more springs as great and rapid rivers are fed by many sources Weakeness contributes much to it for although a fit of anger looke like a sally of vigour and courage yet it is the effect of a soft spirit Great and strong spirits are patient but weake and imbecill natures can suffer nothing and like doors loosely hung are easily gotten off the hookes The wind stirres leaves and small branches seldome the bodies of great trees Light natures also are easily agitated with choller solid minds hardly All things that make a man tender and wanton makes him also impatient and chollerick as covetousness ambition passionate love ease and flattery The same effect is produced by the large licence given to the wandering of thoughts curiosity credulity idlenesse love of play And it is much to be wondered at that anger is stirred by contrary causes prosperity and adversity the replying of an adversary and his silence too much and too little businesse the glory to have done well and the shame to have done evill so phantasticall is that passion There is nothing but will give occasion of anger to a peevish and impatient spirit The causes of anger being past telling our labour will be better bestowed to consider the effects sufficient to breed an horrour against that blustering passion even in those that are most transported by it when they looke back upon that disorder in cold blood Fierce anger
resolution of mutual forbearance Above all things wee must remember that wee are all guilty before God and stand in need of mercy and unlesse wee forgive them that trespasse against us wee pray against ourselves and aske our condemnation every time that wee say the Lords Prayer The meditation of death will conduce much to lay downe hatred To wish one dead is among the vulgar an expression of the greatest hatred If then wee may be satisfied with the death of our enemies we may be sure that all our enemies shal die but wee must be sure also that they may expect of us the like satisfaction The worst wee can doe the one to the other is to bring us to the end which Nature leads us unto As while two little fishes are fighting for a flye the Pyke comes that devoures them both while wee quarrell about small things death is coming which will swallow him that is in the right and him that is in the wrong the victor and the vanquished Looke upon the broyles of the age of our fathers What is become of the long and opiniatre quarrel of the Leagve in which all Christendome was involved death hath decided it It hath cooled the * Titles that the Leagvers assumed Ardent and the Zealous It hath stopt the full careere of hatred assisted with valournd power It will do the like to the quarrels of our dayes Let us not be so hot in our dissensions Death will quench our heat within a few dayes and send us to pleade our causes before our great judge It will goe ill with us if wee appeare in that judgement before wee have made peace with our judge by a true repentance and faith which without charity with our neighbours cannot subsist Why should our hatred be long since our life is short The same consideration will serve to temper the hatred of iniquity which for the most part is a pretence whereby wee cozen ourselves and others to palliate personall hatred If we take Gods cause sincerely in hand we must conforme ourselves to his will and wisedome expecting till he send his messenger which is death to attache the wicked before his judgement Psal 37.8 Cease from anger and forsake wrath Fret not thy selfe in any wise to do evill for evill doers shall be cut off 10. Yet a little while and the wicked shall not be If we hate wickednesse we may be sure that God hates it more yet and he will punish it but in his owne time to satisfie his justice not our fashion Certainly if we hated iniquity in good earnest we would hate it in ourselves Though our enemies be wicked we must love them for Gods sake and because we also are subject to the like infirmities we must love them for our sakes CHAP. XIII Of Envy HEre is one more of the Daughters of Pride and therefore a grandchild of Ignorance and Selfe love She is much like Hatred her elder Sister In this they differ that Hatred is bent against the evill and Envy against the good But to shew herselfe descended from Ignorance she mistakes the false goods for the true For no man will envy the Christian vertues of his neighbours nor the riches of his minde but the goods of fortune which often deserve rather to be called evils Let a man grow in learning holinesse let him be a Saint upon earth let him have Seraphicall raptures no man will envy him for it but let him once get favour at Court let his degree and his rents be augmented presently the arrowes of envy will be shot at him on all sides Indeed great Oratours great Warriours and men eminent in civill prudence are much envied by idle droanes but if you looke to the ground of that envy it is not the vertue and capacity of those brave men that begets it but the fame and credit which they get thereby Think not that Satan envieth God because he is good wise if he did he would endeavour to be so He envieth God because he is Almighty and because he is worshiped by men and Angels whereas himselfe would have all power in heaven and earth and every knee to bow unto him It is not vertue but the reward of vertue that moveth envy If it were in an envious mans power to distribute all the wealth spirituall and temporall which is among men he would not dispute to his enemies the possession of all the vertues but he would keepe to himselfe all the rewards This is the cause of that disposition When an envious man seeth others enjoy wealth he feareth there will not be enough left for him But as for Vertue he is sure that the plenty of it with others will not hinder his owne possession of the like So he doth not envy it For nothing moveth envy but such things as have moved cupidity before Cupidity is for light glittering stuffe and envy keepes pace with cupidity Vertue is a substance too dark and solid for their turne Learne we then to store ourselves with those goods which provoke no envy and which we may possesse no body being the poorer by our riches Envy is a great enemy to tranquillity of the suol It is the rottenness of the bones saith Solomon Prov. 14.30 which is a pregnant character of a passing malignant and corroding passion It hath two unnaturall effects The one that an envious man is afflicted with the prosperity of others the other that he punisheth himselfe The first effect is particular to Envy and herein it doth not enter commons with any other Passion The envious man is sick because his neighbour is well He groweth leane because another growes fat he thinkes that he loseth all that another gets and makes of his neighbours prosperity his adversity He is directly opposite to Christian sympathy and the commandement of the Apostle Rom. 12.15 Rejoyce with them that rejoyce and weepe with them that weepe for he is weeping with them that rejoyce and rejoycing with them that weepe Whereas the Apostle saith that Charity is not envious 1. Cor. 13.4 wee may invert the termes and say that Enuy is not charitable yea of all vices it is most incompatible with charity Envious men are the onely kind of men to whom without forme of justice without breach of charity wee may doe harme since to doe them harme wee need but doe good to their neighbours But it is needlesse to doe harme to an envious man or wish him more harme then he doth to himselfe vexing his mind and drying up his body by a continuall and just punishment This is wisely exprest in the CXII Psalme where after the promise made to the just that his righteousnes endureth for ever and his horne shall be exalted with honoùr the text addeth The wicked shall see it and be grieved he shall gnash with his teeth the desire of the wicked shall perish And it is very probable that in the outward darknes where there is weeping and
we no harme there is need of a great measure of charity and discretion To that end a wise man will not be the chiefe speaker in an unknowne or dangerous company but be content to second those that are more able or more willing to speake unlesse the discourse be like to turne to a contentions matter for then it will be prudently done to put the company upon some innocent discourse acceptable to all But companies are apt to speake of that which hath the vogue of points of State in factious times and of points of religion almost at all times As for points of State any man may be bold to interrupt the discourse saying Let us leave State businesses to Statesmen The discourse of religion the great occasion of falling out must be turned if we can to the use of comfort and amendment of life rather then arguing about points of beleefe Indeed we we are commanded to be alwayes ready to give an answere to every man that asketh us a reason of the hope that is in us 1 Pet. 3.15 Which when we are called upon we must doe it as the text modifieth it with meekenes and feare not with bitternes contention And the Apostle requires of us to be ready to answere not eager to question Reason serveth to convince but charity is the chiefe and welnigh the onely way to perswade Vehemence will make an adversary stiffer for even the force of an insoluble argument though calmely propounded makes no other impression upon prejudicate spirits but to make them startle and finding no helpe in reason to leane the more fiercely upon passion Though you stop your adversaries mouth you shall not thereby convince his reason and though you convince his reason you shall not turne his beleefe For that you must winne his affection and affection is not wonne with Syllogisms for I speake of men not such as they should be altogether ruled by right reason but such as they are for the most part blinde and heady having their reason enslaved to custome and passion There is great difference betweene convincing and converting The first may be done by the goodnes of the cause or the subtility of the disputant But converting is the worke of God onely It is enough to perswade us that spirit and soule are too different things when we see spirits capable of the highest Philosophical reasons to be unable to understand plaine reasoning about matters that concerne their salvation In vaine shall you convince the spirit with reason unlesse God open the eares of the soule In such meetings in stead of seeking wherein we differ and falling out about it we should seeke wherein we agree and praise God for it If newes were brought to us of the discovery of a great Christian Empire in Terra Australis where they beleeve the holy Scriptures and the Creed and receive the foure first General Councels No doubt but it would rejoyce us much and we would love them though they differed from us in the doctrines built upon those common grounds And why doe we not beare with our neighbours and countrey-men who agree with us in so many fundamentall points who worship the same God Father Sonne and Holy Ghost who embrace the promises of the Gospel in Jesus Christ and endeavour by the love of God and the exercise of good workes to glorifie God and attaine to his kingdome Could we abhorre one another more if one partie worshipped Christ and the other Mahomet Even where the quarrel was onely about points of Discipline the dissension was heated even to confiscations battells and sacking of townes So furious is superstition and funest in its effects what party soever it take for it is found in good and evill parties being natural to all weake and passionate soules If it maintaine falshood it dishonoureth the truth by putting a wrong byasse upon it It is a compound of ignorance pride rashnes and cruelty All which moulded with a bastard zeale and infused in black choller make up the most malignant venome of the world For one that is of the stronger party it is insolence to provoke him that is of the weaker in the most sensible point of all which is conscience And for him who is of the weaker party to provoke him that is of the stronger it is both insolence and folly In a milde and well composed spirit the dangerous errours of others moove pitty not hatred And if pitty sets him on to reduce them to the saving truth prudence will take him off betimes from that designe when he seeth it impossible And it is impossible when charity will not doe it which must not be violated for any pretence whatsoever Psal 85.10 Mercy and truth shall meet together righteousnes and peace have kissed each other Truth cannot be establisht without mercy nor righteousnes without peace Making breach in charity to preserve faith is demolishing the roofe of the Church to mend the walls Having found by the trial of a hundred yeares that battells and syllogisms will bring no general conversion let us fight no more but by prayers and let all parties strive for the palme of charity and moderation The two rivers of Danubius and Sauns falling into one channel goe thirty leagves together unmingled If the difference of our opinions will not suffer us to mingle yet we may joine Let us goe quietly together in our common channel the State where we live tending to the same end the publique peace and the glory of God This conceit I owe to that blessed sonne of peace that rare teacher and high patterne of moderation and tranquillity of minde the right Reverend Bishop Hall who hath not written one onely booke of Christian moderation but all his learned and gracious workes and the whole course of his wise and religious life are a perpetual comment upon that golden vertue When we conferre of any matter with persons of a different tenet our end must ever be to find the truth not to get the victory And that end must be sought with a meeke and moderate way That milde course will yeeld us a double benefit for it will preserve the liberty of our judgement which is taken away by the heate of dispute and precipitation A hasty disputant will soone be brought to non plus Besides when good sense is assisted with moderatiō it sinks better into the adversaries reason as a soft showre soakes the ground better then a stormy raine A moderate rational man either shall win the assent of his adversary or his good opinion Railing and insultation are offensive more to him that useth it then to them that are misused by it for when passion riseth high in words it giveth a prejudice to the hearers that reason is out of combat Anger is an ill helpe to reason for it disableth reason from helping itselfe Dogs that bark much seldome bite for it is feare that makes them barke Great and good workes are done with little noise So was the
to our industry and keep us from mending the incommodities of our condition for God putting us in an uneasy condition doth not oblige us thereby not to seek to be better Those to whom God hath given no other stock but their industry have reason to think that God will have them to make the best of that excellent patrimony Piety and Philosophy are no counsellours of lazinesseand neglect of ourselves A poore man is content with his condition when he is pleased with that necessity which God layeth upon him to maintaine himselfe by his diligence and supply by his vertue the want of an inheritance A condition commonly more happy then that of great heires whose intellectuall parts are many times dulled or corrupted with plenty which puffeth them up with Pride and enflames them with lust He that is kept in humility and temperance by his short meanes must praise God for it and make the best of the benefits of poverty the chiefe whereof is that it helpes a man to weane his heart from the world and raise it unto God The rich and great having more cause to be contented with their condition have neverthelesse more need to be exhorted unto it because they are more subject to be discontented for ease breeds wantonness and makes a man to be incommôded with his owne commodities This is that sore evill which Solomon saw under the Sunne namely riches kept for the owners thereof to their hurt Eccles 5.17 Many rich men eate their bread in darknesse all their dayes and with a covetous or envious sorrow make their plenty their crosse That ungratefull sorrow proceeds from an excessive love of ourselves and the world We love ourselves so much that we think nothing good enough for us And the world so much that we can never have enough of it Now al immoderate love is accompanied with great care and that care sowreth all the svveetnesse of our life These two loves then must be cut very short He that will love and esteem himselfe but little will be content with little And he that withdrawes his love from worldly things shall soon have as much of them as he needs To weane ourselves from the love of ourselves and the world we must study to get a strong perswasion of the wisedome and goodness of God and a firme confidence in his love Suppose that God should spread with his rich and liberall hand all the treasures of the world before us and give us our free choice to take what we would Could we do more wisely then to put the choise to him againe and beseech him to choose for us because he knowes what is fit for us better then we do and loves us better then we love ourselves Well this is our condition God hath chosen for us Let us stand to his choyce with humility and thankfullnesse and rest contented It is an appurtenance of the condition which God hath allotted us that we must continually labour to mend it though we should have no designe to raise it for our temporal is condition like our houses which must often be repaired else they would sinke downe All humane things are in a continuall decay But God hath given prudence to man to underprop his tottering fortune or to build it anew and make it more commodious So much we may do and yet be content with our condition gently submitting our minds to that generall law of the life of our vanity as Solomon calls it which binds us to toyle continually to maintaine ourselves In that toyle if the successe smile upon us and invite us to advance though we were content with our condition before we may better it If notwithstanding our industry our fortune go back our desire also must go back with our fortune and be content with lesse in both conditions looking up to the good hand of God whose actions are all mercy to them that love him and trust to him To that end we must aske of God a meek religious equall constant mind not seeking content in things that are about us but in things within us labouring to have God there for when all is sayd and tryed it is the onely way to be content in all conditions God being alwayes the same he that possesseth God is partaker of that divine attribute in his measure and in the ebbings and flowings of his temporall condition remaines alwayes the same because the possession that makes him happy is within him and in heaven together not subject to exteriour changes not tyed to things under the Sunne As he that hath a vigorous body and the noble parts sound wil eat browne bread grosse meat with good appetite but to a sick man pheasants are unsavoury So to him that hath a sound conscience and God abiding in it the meanest condition is pleasant but a man of an ill conscience that hath the burning fever of covetousness and ambition taketh delight in nothing though he had all things He that possesseth God hath this advantage above all other men that he he is content with much and with little and with nothing Therefore to speake exactly we should not say that he that possesseth God is content with but in his temporall condition for it is not from his condition that his contentment ariseth it is from God CHAP. II. Not to depend upon the Future THis Counsell is part of the precedent for that we may be contented with our condition it is necessary for us not to depend upon the future He that can bring his mind to that shall not live suspended with desires and expectations and shall not lose the enjoyment of the present to catch at that which is to come When the sufferings of the present makes us long for the future it is lesse strange and more pardonable But it is ordinary that covetousnesse curiosity wantonness produce the same impatience in some men as extremity of paine in others Many sick of too much ease will speak like Job in his torments Job 7.4 When I lay downe I say When shall I arise and the night be gone And I am full of tossings to and fro unto the dawning of the day Is the day dawned they wish it were done This perpetual agitation is a most evident signe of a sick mind which makes his sicknes worse with that only thing whence he hopes for amendment which is change The future which afarre off seemed pleasant unto him displeaseth him when it is become present neither doth any thing please him but what he hath not and cannot have By this expectation of the future a man hath his head torne betweene feare and hope as a stagges head betweene two hounds so sore they bite and torment the minde There is no condition more miserable and no state of the soule more contrary to the nature of God whom his children ought to imitate Nothing sets a man further from God who expects no new thing from the future because all is present
before Moses having made that high request to God Exod. 33.18.23 I beseech thee shew mee thy glory God answered him Thou shalt see my backparts but my face shall not be seene A mysterious Text which being well understood assigneth the just extent and sets the certaine limits to humane reasoning in divine matters It is allowed to seeke God à posteriori by his effects they are Gods back parts It is the just extent of our contemplation But to seek God ab anteriâ—ri by his counsels which are the first causes it is attempting to see Gods face an undertaking no lesse unlawfull then impossible My face shall not be seene That limitâ—ne sets to our contemplation Were this well studyed and comprehended aright more labour should be bestowed upon the meditation of Gods workes of nature and grace of his revealed will for by these onely it is possible to man living in the flesh to see God in some measure And the darke questions of Gods eternall counsell should be layd by The doctrine of predestination settleth the soul in a stedfast assurance when it is apprehended by faith but the same brings trouble and perplexity to a mans heart when one will fathom Gods counsell with the plummet of reason In that poynt Reason is prone to frame objections against the justice and wisedom of God Wherefore ere it go too farre the bridle of piety must give it this short stop Rom. 9.20 O man who art thou that replyest against God If about the actious and decrees of God you cannot satisfye your reason remember that reason was made for man not for God and be ye quiet Likewise these in incomprehensible points of the concurrence of Gods grace with mans will how his invariable decree may consistwith the free actions of men reason must altogether silense her inquiry acknowledging that in that meeting of the finite with the infinite reason being finite can comprehend nothing but things of her kind Since then there is something of infinity in that meeting the comprehension of it must be left to the infinite God to whom alone it belongs to know his infinite workes In that meeting all that belongs to us is to have no other will but Gods embrace his grace with a free and ready heart trust in his promises and commit ourselves to his providence A wise counsell easier to observe then to comprehend is this That in the worke of our conversion and sanctification we must give to God the whole glory and to ourselves the whole taske And so of the resistence of so many mens wills against Gods will which neverthelesse they promote even by resisting it that holy will having no part in the evil which they doe And of the wisedome of that high moderatour who for his glory tolerateth the kingdome of the devill in the midst of his kingdome we must acknowledge that they are matters for admiration not inquisition It is a goodly study to be a disciple of Gods wisedome and providence but where we find our contemplation brought to non plus we must be contented to beleeve that God is all wise and all good Let him doe his pleasure and let us doe our duty The holy Scriptures are the cleare spring of life Our Lord Jesus commands us diligently to search them because in them we hope to have eternal life Ioh. 5.39 The texts lesse perspicuous as they require more study they require also more modesty And better it is to say of a hard text I understand it not then to wrest it with a forced interpretation The writers of Comments upon whole bookes of Scripture are often put to that choyce Yet how few are extant that will say ingenuously This text is above our understanding and we must expect till he that hath lockt up the sense of it give us a key to open it Scripture must be put to the uses attributed to it by St Paul doctrine reproofe correction instruction in righteousnes That the man of God may be perfect thoroughly furnished unto all good worke 2 Tim. 3.16 For these uses there be so many cleare texts that we need not beate our braines against the hard ones It is a commendable study to seeke to understand Canonical prophecies God himselfe gave them to the Church to be studied And seeking the intelligence of them is obeying Christs command to search the Scriptures drligently But in that command he meanes the prophecies fullfilled which speake of his first comming not the prophecies yet to be fulfilled Which yet we may search but with that reservation that we content ourselves with so much as is clearely revealed and presume not to seeke into that which is hidden Wherein the style of prophecies is a sure guide for we must beleeve that the Holy Ghost hath hidden them in obscure termes that they should not be understood and if God will not have us to understand them it is folly and arrogancy for us to goe about it Why should we fecke to see that which God hath hidden he hath hid it because we should not see it I am inclined to beleeve yet submitting to better judgements that the end of most prophecies is not so much that we might foreknow things to come as that we might admire the wisedome and preordination of God when they are come and to comfort us in the assurance that the whole course of the conduct and trials of the Church and her deliverance and glory in the end is fore-ordained in Gods counsell Let us stay a little Events will expound predictions As we must not curiously examine the word of God we must not scrupulously search the worke of his Spirit Many devout soules yeeld a wrong obedience to this precept of St Paul Examine your owne selves whether you be in the faith 2. Cor. 13.5 for instead of examining their owne selves they examine God seeking with a trembling and overbuzy care what degree of comfort and assurance of their salvation they feele in their hearts which is the worke of God not of men And as in the searches of jealousy when a man seekes for that which he feares to finde they draw upon them that which they feare by seeking it with too much curiosity and frame doubts to themselves by examining of their confidence To heale themselves of that timorous curiosity they should not take for Gospel whatsoever godly men have written of the manner how the holy Ghost is working in the conscience for it is certaine that he worketh diversly according to the diversity of natures and doth vary the dispensation of his graces according to his good pleasure Wherefore when we examine whether we be in the faith it is not the worke of God that we must examine but our owne And we must call ourselves to account whether we love God and our neighbours and what care we take to serve him whether we keepe his commandements and receive his promises with obedience of faith In these things where the worke of Gods