he may behold Fire turning the labours of an hundred yeeres in one small houre into unprofitable ashes and perhaps many a gallant man and woman burnt brought almost to a handfull There Water breaking out by maine strength from the Sea and spreading it self over Towns Countries to the destruction of every living thing but such as God made to thrive in the water while the lost carcasses of poore Christians are carried in a great number from shore to shore from Country to Countrey all swell'd and torne till they are washt away into fruitlesse scum which remaineth here and there on the top of the water to obey all tides and to be tossed and tumbled with every winde Invention can assigne no other cause of all this but sinne All the punishments that ever were are or shall be inflicted upon men All the evils which ever did doe now or shall hereafter fall heavie upon Creatures be they sensible or unsensible appointed for mans use draw life breath strength sinewes and all their force from the foule sinnes and superstitions of the world Pause here a little and give place to a pious meditation If Almighty God did so rigorously punish those adulterate Cities of Palestine with Sodome the chiefe head of them that besides the present punishment of a sudden overthrow by fire and brimstone from Heaven as if justice could not stand quiet in such grievous crimes the Countrey which once was a second Paradise another garden of the world now at this day lies so pitifully desolate that nothing is to be seene but black and sutty ground ashes and stones halfe burnt there remaining in the middle a great Lake called by a scornefull name mare mortuum the dead Sea from which a darke smoke continually rises most pernicious to man and every living creature where are no trees but such as are hypocritically fruitfull Apples indeed hang openly and which in the judgement of the eye are ripe but come to them enticed with their colour presse them with the least touch they scatter presently into vaine dust The substance of this we read even in Heathen Authors Solinus Cornelius Tacitus but especially Solinus c. 84. Corn. Tac. l. 5. hist Joseph de bell Jud. l. 5. c. 5. and with a more free addition of circumstances in Josephus the Jew borne and bred up not farre from this unfortunate Countrey Behold here a wofull extremity It was a rainy morning with them and yet wondrous light The were burned to ashes before they could rise either from their beds or their sinnes And because they were such deserving sinners and yet were not quick in going to Hell Hell came to them in fire and brimstone Five great Cities and every part of them were all on fire together and it burnt so violently that all the Sea could not have quenched the flames And was not Gods Anger burning hot me thinkes now I heare the damned in Hell cry from all sides fire fire fire and yet no creature will ever be able to quench the least sparke of it O the goodnesse of God that holds me up over the great Dragons mouth and yet still out of his mouth though he does crave and whine and cry for me If I say God Almighty imprinted with an iron instrument these horrid markes of his anger on the hatefull forehead of one Countrey for the sinnes of some few people what O what will hee doe or in what strange and new kind of anger will he expresse himselfe in the black day of judgement for the sinnes of the whole world Especially since that sinne is now growne exceedingly more diverse both in the species and in the particulars then it was in the infancie or childhood of the world In the day of judgement when the Devill questionlesse as Saint Basil observes will say something before the Bench to aggravate the matter Heare great Lord of Heaven and Hell I created not these people nor could I bring them from nothing Nor did I engrave my great signe and Image in their soules I did not take their nature I did not sweat bloud nor die for them I did not send Apostles and Preachers to signifie my will to them in a most powerfull manner or give grace to effect it I never wrought a miracle to bring waight to my sayings Nor did I promise them a Kingdome or eternall blessednesse But truely prepared for them a dark Dungeon where they shall lie and die with me eternally And yet behold mighty Judge my cursed crew of reprobates is the greatest by infinites whom though I much hate yet I much love their company And if we looke before Sodome God in his dreadfull anger drowned all the world for sinne both man and beast behaving himselfe in regard of mans beastly sins as if he scarce knew which was the man and which the beast Had we beene as we might have beene in the number of those poore lost wretches wherehad wee beene this day Distressed creatures they climed the trees they flew to the tops of the mountaines to save their lives Happy was he or she that stood highest But all in vaine The waters rose by some and by some they waiting with trembling expectation the Floud gat up as high as they the waves tooke them roaring as loud as they and their sinnes sunke them Part of them cleaved to boards plankes and other floating moveables for a while the drunkard to the barrell the covetous man to his chest of mony as very desirous to stay in the world and sinne againe but no creature of God was willing to save his enemy And every one that is like to Vlysses praised by Homer with this elogie 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 hee knew the Cities and manners of many people may quickly give us to understand how strangely the world in many places is defaced and wounded for sinne Vae laudabili vitae hominum saith Saint Austin si remota misericordia discutias eam Woe to the good lives of men if thou O Lord shalt discusse them without mercie We then with our bad lives how many woes shall we undergoe And the rather because it is most true which the same Saint Austin teacheth Multa laudata ab hominibus Deo teste damnantur S. Aug. lib. 3. Confess c. 9. cum saepe se aliter habent species facti aliter animus facientis Many things praised by men are condemned by God because oftentimes the outward barke and appearance of the deed doth not correspond and fall in with the minde of the Doer O Sinne it is a great vertue to hate thee A Toad is a very pretty thing in comparison of thee And now I remember a Toad is Gods good creature and if it could speake might truely say Lord such a one as I am I was made by thee And howosoever I looke blacke and cloudy that I move hate in passionate men yet thou lovest me Yea verily the loathed Serpent might say if it had mans tongue
in it selfe but altogether in the exercise of it selfe CHAP. 12. IT is the course of the Jesuits at St. Omers to send every yeare in the time of Harvest two missions of English Schollers into remote parts of the Christian world one to Rome in Italy And another to Valladolid or Sevil in Spaine and these places in Spaine receive their missions by turnes In all these places are English Colledges Whereof the Superiours or Governours are Jesuits the rest Schollers chalked out for secular Priests By secular Priests I understand not regular Priests neither Jesuits nor Monks nor Friurs but Priests without any farther addition whose primarie charge in their Institution by which they differ from others is to teach and instruct secular people and to reside in Benefices and be Parish Priests Here I have a notable trick to discover and I shall ever stop and stand amazed and ponder the malice of the Jesuits when I think of it Their best and most able Schollers they send alwayes to Spaine and onely their weaker vessells to Rome in their ordinarie proceedings whereof some are lame some crooked others imperfect in the naturall part of speaking The reason of it is excellent knowledge The Schollers being with them and subordinate to them in their Colledges and now far from their Country it is a great portion of their labour to win them by favours promises threats in the by and much cunning to be Jesuits and so they never leave any if all they can doe will doe withall for the Secular Priests but the leane and bony end and the refuse of them For the Jesuits and the Secular Priests are great opposites and much contrary in their opinions and the weaknes of the one wil help negatively to the strength of the other The Pope being informed of this Jesuiticall device gave a command at Rome where his power is absolute in all kindes that every Scholler the yeare of his probation being expired should bind himselfe by an oath not to enter into any order of Religion till after three yeares durance in England And then they began to set on foot the trick I told you of But if one desires admittance into a mission who by reason of some defect for example the defect of having entred into an order and returned with dislike cannot according to their rules be a Jesuit if hee comes with strong and able commendations they will send him to Rome though he be a deserving man that he and such as he may stand like a good face or a fresh colour over the device that lyeth inward They have a very godly-fac'd answer to this objection and say these imperfect creatures are as God made them and they are sent over by their poore friends to be Priests and we that weare out our bodies and lifes in the education of Youth have good reason to chuse the sounder part and they which come to us are not taken from the Church but restored to it in a more excellent manner But first according to their own Principles they are bound to goe along with the Founders intention and the Founder intended the maintenance for able men Secondly they doe not performe their obligation of Charity towards the body of the Clergie which they notably maime and disable and yet in those places they are onely Stewards for the Clergie Thirdly they doe great injurie both to their Church and their cause which suffereth oftentimes by such Martyrs of Nature and such unskilfull Defenders Some of which cannot read Latine nor yet hard English See how God worketh for us by their sins Fourthly they delude the Popes command concerning the oath and wholly frustrate his purpose and their fourth vow of obedience to his Holinesse stands for a cypher in this businesse And much more What remaineth now but that malice is predominant in the action and that they make themselves Gods and turne all to their owne ends CHAP. 13. AT St. Omers their manner is to make triall of every one that comes what nature and spirit hee is of and what progresse he hath made in learning partly by applying subtill young Lads to him which keepe him company and turne him outward and inward againe and make returne of their observations to the Jesuits and partly by their owne sifting him either in discourse or examination or in some other more laboured exercise Which triall when I had undergone an old Jesuit gray in experience and a crafty one and one whose name you have in your minde when you think Not being then Vice-provinciall of the English Jesuits look'd soberly upon me and told me of a spirituall exercise in use amongst them which would much preferre me in the service of God if I was pleased to make use of it I yeelded And the next day in the evening I was brought into a Chamber where the Curtaines were drawne and all made very dark onely a little light stole in at a corner of the window to a Table where stood pen ink and paper and order was given me by my ghostly Father a cunning man a man that did not walk in the light that I should not undraw the Curtaines or speak with any person but himselfe for certaine dayes and what the spirit of God should inspire into my heart concerning my course of life I should write there being pen ink and paper And he left a Meditation with mee the matter of which was indeed very heavenly and hee brought every day two or three more Hee visited me two or three times a day and alwayes his question was after how doe you childe and so forth What have you wrot any thing Feel you not any particular stirrings of the spirit of God And alwayes I answered plainely and truly no. Having beene kept in darknesse some dayes and alwayes left to a more serious and attentive listning after the holy Ghost and perceiving no signes of a releasement I began to suspect what the man aim'd at And I prayed heartily that my good God would be pleased to direct me Think with me Had these Meditations beene appointed meerely and precisely for the elevation of my soule to God they had beene excellent but perverted and abused to serve mens ends they were not what they were But I thought I would know farther e're long The holy man came againe and still enquired if I knew the minde of the Holy Ghost My answer was I did hope yes but I was loth because ashamed to speak it Being encouraged by him I said That in my last Meditation the spirit of God seemed to call me to the Society Hee knew the phrase and the sense of it was God moved me to be a Jesuit He presently caught up my words and told me I was a happy man and had great cause to blesse God for so high a calling with much to that purpose And when he had his end my Meditations had their end and the Curtaines were drawne and having beene enlightned from Heaven it was granted
encrease their blessednesse For where good and evill meet in combat as now after the dayes of Innocence there is opposition and resistance in the performance of good where is resistance there also is difficulty and where wee discover a difference and diversity as well in the measure as in the manner of resistance there occurre also degrees of difficulties and the greater the difficulty the more pretious the reward If wee are not sorry that he sinn'd wee are not sorry that God was abus'd and his very first command broken If we are sorry that he sinn'd wee are sorry that many faire vertues have entred upon our knowledge and practice which otherwise should never either have beene practised or knowne no patience of the best proofe but occasioned by an injury no injury guiltlesse of sinne the cleannest exercise of our Charity towards our neighbour supposes in our neighbour the want of a thing requisite and all want of that generation is the poore childe of sinne the most high and most elevated praxis or exercise of our charity towards God then flames out when we seale our beliefe with our blood in martyrdome no martyrdom but usherd with persecution no persecution free from sinne If we are not sorry that he sinn'd we are not sorry that millions of millions of soules shall now be lost eternally lost never to be found again which if Adam had stood upright had certainely shone with God in Heaven as long as hee And if we are sorry that he sinn'd wee are sorry that Christ joyn'd our flesh and soule to his Divinity expressed his true love to us by dying for us was seene by us here in the world and will feast even the corporall eye in Heaven with the most delightfull sight of his blessed body for ever And howsoever some think otherwise if Adam had not sinned Christ had not tooke our nature for he was not so much delighted with humane nature as hee was desirous to die for mankinde And if wee are not sorry that he sinn'd wee are not sorry that one sinne was the cause of all sinnes and all sinnes the cause of all punishments and that one punishment is behind and waits for us in another world with which all other punishments put together and made one punishment are in no kinde comparable and that I and my neighbours and he that is abroad and perhaps now little thinks of such a businesse are all ignorant how we shall dye now we are borne how wee shall end our lifes now wee are alive now wee are put on how we shall get off and when the Ax is laid to the root which way the Tree shall fall and what shall become of us everlastingly Be wee sorry or not sorry Adam sinned It being done God's will be done And yet because it was but his permissive will his will of sufferance and hee suffers many things against his will not of necessity but because he will I will be sorry that Adam sinn'd that is offended God God made the soule of man as uprightâ—â— his body and clothed it with the white garment of originall Justice God being the fountaine of all power grace and sufficiencie could have hindred 〈◊〉 but because he was not his neighbour nor obliged by any law for who should give a law to the first Law-giver and to demonstrate the full extent of his dominion over his creatures he would not and having left man in the hand of his owne counsell and set within the reach of his hand fire and water and man having wilfully plaid foule God strived to make the best of an ill game and therefore hee drew from the fall of Adam besides the former benefits a more ample demonstration of his power wisedome justice providence and chiefly of his charity the triall of reason the triumphs of vertue in all kindes and the greater splendour of his Church It is as plaine as if it were wrot by the finger of God with the Sun-beames which St. Austen saith speaking of God Non sineret malum nisi ex malo sciret Aug. de corrept et grat cap. 10. elicere bonum He would not suffer ill if he did not well know how to strain good out of ill and sweetnesse out of sowernesse O sweet God I have committed a great deale of sower evill come in thy goodnesse and draw good and sweetnesse out of it the good of Glory to thee and the sweetnesse of peace to mee both here and hereafter Thou hast held my hand in all my actions as well evill as good as a Master the hand of his Scholler whom he teacheth to write and in evill actions I have pulled thy hand thy power after mine to evill which was onely evill to me because I onely intended it in good actions thou didst alwayes pull hold and ove◠〈…〉 hand and truly speaking it was thy good for I of my selfe cannot write one faire letter And I know thou hast not suffered me to run so farre into evill but thou canst turne all to good An infinite wisedome joyn'd with an infinite goodnesse can joyne good in company with evill be it as evill as it can be MEDITATION VII ANd if now I clip away an odd end of ensuing time a little remnant of black and white of nights and dayes a small and contemptible number of evenings and mornings wee strong people that now can move and set to work our armes and leggs and bodies at our pleasure wee that look so high and big withall shall not be what now we are For now we live and pleasing thoughts passe through our heads We runne we ride we stay we sit downe we eat and drink and laugh We rise up and laugh againe and so dance then rest a while and drink and talk and laugh aloud then mingle words of complement and actions of curtesie to shew part of our breeding then muse and think of gathering wealth and what merry dayes we shall enjoy But the time will suddenly be here and it stands now at the dore and is comming in when every one of us from the King God blesse his Majesty to the Beggar God sweeten his Misery shall fall and break in two peeces a soule and a body And the soule be given up into the hands of new Companions that we never saw and be carried either upward or downward in a mourning weed or in a robe of joy to an everlasting day or a perpetuall night which we know there are but wee never saw to be nor heard described by any that saw them And when the body shall bee left behind being now no more a living body no more the busie body it was but a dumb deafe blind blockish unsensible carcasse and now after all the great doings not able to stirre in the least part or to answer to very meane and easie questions as how doe you are you hungry is it day or night and be cast out for carrion it begins to stink away with it for
God whom they saw not And even amongst Christians the devill who in other matters is alwayes the wilde Authour of Confusion and Disorder hath yet opposed the Articles of the Creed in order For first Simon Magus Marcion and others strove against the title of God the Father Almighty maker of heaven and earth Secondly Arius in the first generall Councell of Nice in Bithynia laboured against the Divinity of Jesus Christ his onely Sonne our Lord. Thirdly Macedonius planted his Engine against the Holy Ghost and was condemned in the Councell of Constantinople Which observation may be also made plain in the other Articles And because the Holy Ghost is the great directour of the Church and enemie to the devill in his oppositions of it hee still had a blow at the Holy Ghost first in Theodoret who denied the procession of the Holy Ghost from the Son and now in the Grecians But we shall heare more of him anon CHAP. 7. VVHat mervaile now if greene in Age and shallow in experience I gave up my soule into the black hands of errour The causes of my closing with the Church of Rome were three First a consideration of the great sinnes of this Kingdome and especially of that open scandalous and horrible sinne of Drunkennesse which my soule hateth And I weakly argued from a blemish of manners in particular persons to a generall and over-spreading corruption of Faith My thoughts represented a drunkard to me sometimes in this manner What is a Drunkard but a beast like a man or something lower then a beast When he is in his fit no sense will performe his fit office Spectacles in all figures appeare to him hee thinks he sees more shapes then God ever made A cloud settles in his eyes and the whole body being overflowne they seeme to float in the floud The earth seemes to him to nod and hee nods againe to it trees to walk in the fields houses to rise from their places and leape into the Aire as if they would tumble upon his head and crush him to a Cake and therefore he makes hast to avoid the danger The Sea seemes to rore in his eares and the Guns to goe off and he strives to rore as loud as they The Beere begins to work for he foames at the mouth Hee speaks as if the greater part of his tongue were under water His tongue labours upon his words and the same word often repeated is a sentence You may discover a foole in every part of his face Hee gâ—â—â— like-like what nothing is vile enough to suit in comparison with him except I should say like himselfe or like another drunken man And at every slip he is faine to throw his wandring hand upon any thing to stay him with his body and face upwards as God made him Vmbras saepe S. Ambr. lib. de Elia jejunio cap. 10. transiliunt sicut foveas saith S. Ambrose Comming to a shadow of a post or other thing in his way hee leapes taking it for a ditch Canes si viderint leones arbitrantur Idem ibid. fugiunt sayes the same Father if he sees a dogge he thinks it to be a Lyon and runs with all possible hast till hee falls into a puddle where hee lyes wallowing and bathing his swinish body like a hogge in the mire And after all this being restored to himselfe he forgets because hee knew not perfectly what hee was and next day returnes againe to his vomit And thus he reeles from the Inn or Tavern to his house morning and evening night and day till after all his reeling not being able to goe hee is carried out of his House not into the Taverne alas hee cannot call for what hee wants but into his Grave Where being layd and his mouth stopt with dirt hee ceases to reele till at last hee shall reele body and soule into hell where notwithstanding all his former plenty variety of drinks hee shall never be so gracious as to obtaine a small drop of water to coole his tongue Then if it be true as it is very likely which many teach that the devils in hell shall mock the troubled imagination of the damned person with the counterfeit imitation of his sinnes the devils will reele in all formes before him to his eternall confusion In vain doth S. Paul cry out to this wretch Be not drunk with wine wherein is excesse but be filled with the spirit For the same vessell Eph. 5. 18. cannot be filled with wine and with the spirit at the same time In vaine doth hee tell him that wee should live soberly righteously and godly in this present world Soâ—riè 2 Tit. 12. saith S. Bernard nobis justè proximis piè autem S. Bern. in Serm. sup Ecce nos reliquimus omnia Deo Soberly in our selves righteously or justly towards our neighbours and godly towards God alwayes remembring that we are in this present world and that it is but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the present point of Time and but one instant that we enjoy at once And somtimes in this manner my thoughts shewed me a drunken man Hee is a most deformed creature one that lookes like the picture of a devill one who stands knocking at hell-gate and yet it is not able to speak a plaine word and call for mercy one that could stand and goe but now lyes all along in his owne filthinesse one that is loathed by the Court and all the Citizens of Heaven one that for the time doth not beleeve that there is a God or that Christ died for the sinnes of the world one that may be lawfully thought a man of little wit and lesse grace one who is the Owle of all that see him and the scorne and abomination even of his drunken companions one who if he should then dye would certainly be a companion of devils in hell fire for ever one that is ready to commit adultery murder treason to stab or hang himselfe to pull God out of Heaven or doe any thing that is not good And if it be a firme ground that putting our selves into the occasions of such and such sins we are as guilty of them as if wee had committed them although we did not formally and explicitely intend them how many great sins hath one act of drunkennesse to answer for Drunkennesse is most hatefull to God because it putteth out the light of Reason by which man is distinguished from a beast and all better lights with it and throwes a man beneath Gods creation and therefore drunkennesse is more or lesse grievous as it more or lesse impeacheth the light and sight of Reason Natura paucis contenta Nature is contented with a little quam si superfluis urgere velis saith Boetius Boet. which if you shall urge and load with superfluous things you will destroy And one over-chargeth his stomack and vainely casteth away that for want of which or the like another daily crieth
that I should enjoy the light of the world and there was all the good man look'd for But had not the Holy Ghost spoke as he did hee would not have beene thought to speake like the Holy Ghost And now I was brought downe from my dark Cell with great joy and lightsomnesse and all the Boyes were unexpectedly sent abroad with me that afternoone to recreate their spirits and be merry with the new-borne childe Yet afterwards a performance being required of what I had promised my heart gave back For I had been counselled by some of the lesse Jesuited Schollers to goe in a mission and read farther in the practice of the Jesuits before I took their habit Which the Jesuits laboured to prevent telling me their numbers in their missions were full I stood to it and gave them no ground saying I would returne to England if I went not and so they sent mee in the mission to Valladolid in Spaine But I saw with both my eyes they were in good hope to gaine me afterwards Many are of opinion that a great cause of these great disturbances in the world is because men walk not in those vocations to which God hath called them The ordinarie vocation is when a man findes after a sit imploring of Gods help in the due examination of his heart that he can best and most proportionably to his abilities serve God in such an honest course lying within the reach and condition of his life And undoubtedly these soule wayes are so many wrestings of Gods spirit Me thinks now a man may throughly meditate every day if he please both whence hee came and whither hee goes in little England where hee may doe it freely and sweetly and where in the doing of it no man will have a plot upon Him or urge him to exact upon the Holy Ghost And lest the Jesuits should imagine wee are here altogether destitute of such helps and for the benefit of my neighbour I will set downe a Meditation in this kinde and he ownes it that desires with all his heart to serve God with all his might and by him they may guesse of others MEDITATION I. I Will fold my selfe inward and ponder seriously what and where I was some few yeares agoe what and where before my Father was borne or when hee was a childe If I lay aside an odde trifle of dayes if I take away a short course of running time No man or woman now living was alive Creeping things though they could but creepe did live and rejoyce in a comfortable being And other little creatures had wings and were able to flie readily here there and here againe and other wayes upwards and downwards And we vvho now goe vvith such a grace and look so full-eyde and build to our selves such Babels in our imaginations had no kinde of Being These Churches these Townes this Kingdome this heap of Kingdoms the vvorld vvere as vvee see them but vvee vvere not heard of not because vvee vvere a great vvay off but because vve vvere not Were not heard vvere not seene vvere no vvhere and all because vve vvere not Quae Arist lib. 4 Met. cap. 4. text 16. non sunt quomodò ambulabunt aut loquentur sayes the Philosopher The things vvhich are not how shall they vvalk or talk The very same Sunne that rises and sets for us did shine now red now pale upon the vvorld and constantly runne his dayes journey and keep the same times Such birds of the same colours did sing merrily to the same tunes and hop from branch to branch and flie from tree to tree as now they doe Beasts and Fishes in the same the very same diversity of shapes followed their severall instincts of nature The Bees made honey that differed nothing from ours but onely because it vvas not the same The vvindes blew cold and vvarme and vvarme and cold againe The Beech and Poplar the Cedar and Oke did grow upwards and downwards and every one vvas knowne by the leafe by vvhich vvee distinguish them Brooks took their courses The Sea ror'd Men and vvomen such as vve are did as vvee doe And vvee vvere nothing O vvonderfull A little vvhile before yesterday the best of us all and the most knowing knew not that there vvas a vvorld that there were Angels that there is a God that such as wee were afterwards to be because we had no knowledge no being the foundation and ground of knowledge MEDITATION II. OPretious peeces that we are we were all as it were borne of the Night and call'd from a dark Nothing And yet truly the most unworthy and most contemptible matter that is yea the Devils and Damned in Hell the lowest in the present order of Spirits are placed many steps of vvorth above nothing as being Gods creatures and bearing his colissons though branded with the foulest marks of dishonour For God is honoured even by the Being Punishments and Dishonour of the damned in which the divine Justice triumpheth But from Nothing no honour can rise to him onely that hee made something of nothing Nothing is so base that for it 's meere basenesse we cannot conceive it nor speake of it but in disgrace by denying it to be any thing which neither sense nor understanding can apprehend It hath no figure shape or colour and is no where because it is nothing It cannot be painted and though the Devill is painted under the forme of another thing yet that cannot that what nothing because it is the meere negation of a thing O cursed negation God never made thee For had God made thee thou hadst beene something And hadst thou been any thing there had beene as many things for ever with God as things had been possible by the power of God It cannot be described but by saying it is not and of nothing we cannot say it is but by adding nothing Of which now thinking or speaking or writing I think or speak or write of nothing And so we being and yet truly not truly being but being nothing God gave us the noble being we have and made us Kings and Queens of all corporal things when hee might have made us with his left hand Toads Vipers or Snakes Spiders to be alwayes watching in catching Flyes and to weave out our bowells to fill our bellies Snails to passe over all our time in creeping and in our passage from place to place to linger in the way and wait for our destruction wormes to be trod to peeces without any pitty or thought of what is done or that such a step was the death of a worme Flyes to play in the light and presently perish by day in a Cobweb by night in a candle leafes of sower grasse or fading flowers unworthy peeces of wood to be carved into any yea the vilest shape or perverted to the basest use Wee might have bin Idols or Images set up in dishonor of God which every one that loves him would not have been for all
Virgin Mary with her breasts running The Bishop in the middle is made with a divided countenance and these words are drawne in a long roll from his mouth quo me vertam nescio I know not to which of these two to turne my selfe either to the bloud of Christ or to the milke of the Virgin Mary And was not this an ignorant Bishop and was his flock like to thrive They lead their people strangely by the eares also They send letters very commonly to their Colledges which are read in the Refectories and recreations as their letters of newes are and wherein passages are farre otherwise related then they weredone When I was a Spaniard a Priest having beene put to death in England there came presently a relation that the quarters of the Priest being brought to the Judges house he commanded them to be laid by a hanch or two of Venison which by chance had beene then presented to him and most unhumanely compared the one with the other jesting and scoffing at them The English Jesuits have beat the Spaniards into such a stupidity by perswasion that they scarce either see them or the Schollers even in the streets but they run to them and kisse their garments thinking they will all very suddenly be Martyrs And somtimes they runne upon confessed sinnes that they may please and flatter the senses of people Michael Angelo a Painter of Rome having enticed a young man into his house under the smooth pretence of drawing a picture by the sight of him bound him to a great woodden Crosse and having stabbed him to the heart with a Pen-knife in imitation of Parrhasius that had tortured an old captive in the like cause drew Christ hanging and dying upō the Crosse after his resemblance yet escaped without punishment And this picture because it sets forth Christ dying as if the picture it selfe were dying and with a shew of motion in every part and because it gives the death of Christ to the life is had in great veneration amongst them And that their Churches may not want singers they take somewhat from their children in their cradles which if many of their Priests did misse they would not be so much mischievous neither should I and others have had ground to suspect the young English Jesuits in their Colledges that are so full of sport and play with the fairest amongst the boyes One example in a kinde will suffice it hath beene often in the mouth of an English Monk that he hath wrought more conversions of ours to their way in Tavernes then ever any of his Order hath done with all their observances of times and places But he more loves Tavernes and Women then soules or the tongues of his fellow-Monks are not true to him Surely this Monk deserves not to be kneel'd to when he is first seene for a blessing as the Papists of England are wont to behave themselves towards their Priests He will give a curse rather by drawing his humble suppliants if men to the Taverne if women to his chamber It is no hard matter to varnish over these abuses Reader be carefull Arts are wondrous things they will make new things change old things doe all things If you be not very wise and wary they will deceive you with excuses glosses pretences professions expressions accusations And he that suffers himselfe to be deceiv'd by another is his foole O how easie it is with a word a gesture a countenance to make men ridiculous It is not possible to write but many things will lie faire to the stroke of a troubled and carping disposition Their way is known they joyn their heads hearts pains and pens together Some Index-men looke into Authors some invent the matter What pertaines to severall Sciences is distributed to severall Masters of those Sciences One disposeth the matter another cloaths it in language On my part there are but two I and my selfe and one of these two knowes no more then the other They know me and the secrets of my life their Authours and their personall faults shall escape my knowledge Thus indeed they stand on the higher ground But Christum loquenti linqua nunquam defuit saith Prudentius a tongue was never wanting to Christs oratour And every Christian hath lived in open warre ever since he was christened with all the Devils in Hell CHAP. VII NOw that I may take my leave mannerly I shall turne with an Apostrophe to the Papists First my old friends pray leave to stile your selves Catholiques at least for this reason If you be Catholiques our great ones that are very great and yet more good then great differing and dissenting from you in many and those waighty points of faith as it is confessed on both sides what are they you thinke mischievously but speake if you dare And what differeth it to call them I know the tearme in expresse words and to call them so by necessary consequence Well well goe and leave it It is too common with you to blurre and stigmatize whole States and like the Jtalian to wound deeply even when you crouch humbly Secondly bee not so importunate for Mercie before you deserve it For Mercie being more neerely allied to goodnesse then to power is not so much engaged in the illustration of power as in the preservation of Goodnesse And Goodnesse will not be Goodnesse if it concurre with Mercie in giving way to the propagation of Evill of Idolatry and the doctrine of Devils or in countenancing the professours of superstition and prophanenesse The Prophet David proclaimeth that hee was alwayes an enemy to Gods enemies And Mercie hath no proper object I meane both divine Mercie and all other Mercie regulated by it but those mournefull conditions by the repeale of which either true Innocencie may be restored or Gods holy truth and service advanced and that either in the fruit or in the flower either in the perfection or in the preparation or God glorified not in the by but directly God is mercifull to sinners else I am in a miserable case but upon supposition of their future amendment not upon a demand that they may remaine inwardly in statu quo prius in their former perverse estate Thirdly doe not pretend a submission of heart except you be heartily submitted For men will not think that you who erewhile were generally I will not say so insolent but stirringly disposed that it was not easie for a serious Protestant to walke on his way without reproaches and afaffronts from some of you are now grown so humhle and submissive on a sudden except they worke as you doe by enforcement and force their understandings to which they are never bound but in matters of Faith when they leade them captive in obsequium fidei in obedience to Faith Fourthly doe not promise onely that to lawes you humbly will submit but doe it For hitherto you have not Which I thus make strong by proofe You have fostered and cherished many thousands of
bee not so rough wipe it off gently remember thy Creation and part of it perhaps was once part of as tall a body as thine owne And for my soule it was made of nothing and if God should step aside and forsake it one posting minute of time it would presently give backe and fall to nothing and nothing can be so vile as nothing Conservatio say the Philosophers est continuata generatio Conservation is a continued generation and therefore where the continuance of generation is interrupted conservation ceaseth The fire in the furnace did not burne the three children because God as he is the worker of miracles ascending as it were above himselfe as he is the Author of Nature denyed the continuance of generation to the power of burning in the fire and so the conservation of it ceasing it perished for a time but the three children being removed God quickly remembred that he was the Authour of Nature and the fire burnt againe And here was another miracle For God having suspended his concourse and held it from that part of the fire where the children walked doubled it above Nature upon that part of the fire which destroyed the Persecutors which now was elevated above the ordinary condition of fire And thus it is evident that my soule now something once nothing hath offended the best thing in the worst manner upon which it and all things hang both in being and operations and by which onely it is the hopefull thing it is as if some good and mercifull man should hold me up from being swallowed into a gulfe or a deepe Well and in the meane time I should enrage him with foule words and stab at him It is part of the first massage which God sent by Moses to the children of Israel I AM hath sent me unto you He Exod 3. 14. cals himselfe I AM because he onely is ens per se subsistens a thing subsistent by himselfe he is the fountaine of all kindes of being he onely stands without a prop. And I AM is Gods most ancient name because Being is the first thing conceiveable in him And I AM had best authority to send because his power cannot be derivative or ministeriall I AM could not be deputed as a Delegate to the office of sending The quality of the injury is alwaies proportion'd to the quality of the person injured and alwayes measured by it with reference to the condition of him who offers the injury It was said long agoe by Aristotle injuria crescit ex indignitate personae Arist lib. 5. Ethic. c. 5. illam inferentis the injury is more great when it is offered by an inferiour person And I a person of no account have injured most highly three most high persons what high persons the three greatest highest persons in one God whereof all are so great that all being most great one is not greater then the other Lord helpe me CHAP. XIII BUt how have I injured God by sin the onely meanes by which he can be injured Now to aske what a kind of thing sinne is is to pose all kindes of learning Logick from which we require the nature of a thing by a definition confesses that she is altogether ignorant how to define it Divinity stands amaz'd and is troubled at the sight of she knowes not what breaking within her holy bounds it is so blacke so deformed such a monster as being halfe something and halfe nothing and wanting due parts not to it selfe but to a good thing and being imperfect beneath all comparison It is no easie taske exactly to tell what is darknesse blindnesse lamenesse sicknesse death But to tell what sinne is is so hard how hard so hard that it cannot be done For as the worthinesse of God cannot be sufficiently expressed for its singular prerogative of excellence so neither sinne by reason of its particular unworthinesse It hath a title or a short description rather and that is malum infinitum It is an infinite evill because extreamly opposite to an infinite good 'T is a thing not a thing which God who is omnipotent and made all things we ever saw and a great deale more and who is able to make more perfect creatures then we have yet seene yea then the Angels cannot with all his heavenly power be the cause of For although impotencie which includeth weaknesse may not touch him that is omnipotent yet some things God cannot doe either because he followes the ordinary law to which he hath obliged himselfe from all eternity or because he is tyed by a Decree or by a promise or because himselfe hath necessarily bound himselfe to himselfe to doe nothing contrary to the perfection of his Attributes and the commission of evill would be most contrary to the perfection of his goodnesse Nam quid saith Saint Ambrose impossibile est Deo non S. Ambro. annot in c. 23. Num. quod virtuti arduum sed quod naturae ejus contrarium Impossibile istud non infirmitatis est sed virtutis majestatis What is impossible to God not that which is simply hard with relation to his power but that which is contrary to his nature This impossibility is not an argument of his weaknesse but of his most perfect power and most high Majesty Mali nulla natura est saith Saint Austin disputing against the Manichees The evill of sinne hath no S. Aug. lib. 11. de civit Dei cap. 9. nature for had it had a nature God had made it Sinne is a mischiefe so malitiously grievous and so grievously malitious that no man not the greatest Doctor that ever flourished in the Church of Christ that no Angell no not the greatest Seraphin of them all notwithstanding all their deepe and searching knowledge sufficiently ever knew the malice and grievousnesse of one sinne And yet I desperately commit many sins and many sorts of sinnes every day O good Lord what doe I when I sinne God onely knowes how venemous a thing sinne is And the reason is as plain as the doctrine is strange God onely knowes knowes perfectly his owne infinite goodnesse and therefore God onely perfectly knowes all extreme opposition to his owne infinite goodnesse For how can we or any power under God made or possible to be made exactly know the nature of a contrary as contrary or that we call the nature of it when wee cannot fully graspe the perfection of that to which the contrary is contrary But sinne is only and wholly contrary to God and in the first place to his infinite goodnesse and that which is contrary to all an infinite must be infinitely contrary to it Hence it is not deduced but runs of it selfe that all Gods Attributes of which every one is all his Essence his Goodnesse Wisedome Providence Mercie Justice Power Purity Infinity Immensity Eternity and all are exceedingly struck at in every sinne Struck at struck beaten buffeted so that no little part as I may say of the
death the grave Ecclesiasticus 28. 21. were better then it The words will beare another sense utilis potius infernus quam illa Hell were more profitable then it And this is proved as easily as written or spokē For the evils of punishment bereave us only of limited and finite goods as sicknesse depriveth us of health death of life But sinne depriveth us of God the onely Good that is infinite And the privation is alwayes by so much the more grievous by how much the good is more good of which we are deprived The evils of punishment come from God flow naturally from him as from their true source cause Go aske the Prophet Amos he will say as much Amos 3. 6. Shall there be evill in a City and the Lord hath not done it God hath nothing to doe with sinne but foure wayes in all which he stands off and comes not neere it In the hindrance in the sufferance in turning it to good ends and in appointing the punishment And all the evils of punishment which God ever heaped upon man on earth and in Hell or is able to heape are not fit punishment my drift is not equall to the mischiefe of one sinne though the Papists thinke otherwise of their veniall sinnes God alwayes punishing under the desert of sinne as he alwayes rewards above vertue as being more prone to the acts of mercie then of justice And neither all Gods Creatures nor God himselfe be it spoken with due reverence and respect to his omnipotencie can shower downe so great evils upon man as he daily pulleth upon himselfe For they can onely sting his body with the evils of punishment he staineth his owne soule with the evill of sin And therefore Saint Chrysostomes Paradox out of which he hath dreined a most learned Homily is not a Paradox Nemo laeditur nisi a seipso No man is hurt but by himselfe For it is plaine that matters of punishment may be turned to vertue which doth not hurt but alwayes from sinne comes dammage and hurt because more is lost then gain'd though all the world bee gain'd it being sure that by sinne God is lost and cannot be gain'd Sinne to speak gently is the sleepe of the soule For as he that sleepeth feares oftentimes what is not to be feared As to be drowned in deepe waters to fall from the top of a high rock into the Sea to be devoured by a Beare or a Lion or some such vaine thing of which he dreames but the Thiefe who comes now in earnest to cut his throat he feares not So the sinner feares some few shadowes of danger but not the sinne that kils him O foolish Horse that starts at the shadow of a tree and when the Drums and Trumpets sound runs gladly among the Pikes thrusting himselfe upon true danger And as he that sleepeth beleeves oftentimes that he is in full possession of that which hee hath not He dreames of gold and of a Palace and in the act the cobwebs of his poore Cottage drop upon his face and wake him The sinner being in danger dreames of safety and wakes environed with danger And lastly as he that sleepeth performes oftentimes the worke of a waking man but imperfectly He speakes but brokenly and with little sense He rises and walkes but seldome without a fall So the habits of vertues being destroyed in a sinner have left a warmth and facility behinde them which seeme vertuous when they are not and therefore delude exceedingly both the person and all the witnesses of his carriage And such a person is more dangerously sicke then the Hypocrite who knoweth his errour or may be soone convinced of it by the light of nature Phoenix in Homer under whose government Achilles was brought up to that great height and perfection of knowledge was directed by the rules of naturall prudence to be two Masters to him For the Poet describes him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a director not onely of his words but of his deeds also But he that is warmed with such a heate when the fire is gone beleeves that he is hot rejoyceth in it and little thinkes what kinde of warmth it is wherewith he is heated From these promises I gather what I had lost I had lost the princely robe of justice the rich garment of needle-worke wherewith the Kings daughter was adorned after the losse of which my soule was not the Kings daughter I had lost the name dignity and credit of Gods good childe the speciall providence and protection with which he shrouds as a Hen her Chickens covers and spreads himselfe over the just O t is warme being under his wings and all the more speciall helpes which imparting to them he denies to sinners I had lost I had lost faith and except hope all infused vertues which are the strength veines and sinewes of the soule by which she is enabled to doe well and orderly in order to salvation and which are as it were the faire pearles with which she is beautified I had lost O I had lost the most unvaluable benefit of Christs merits Christ could not say then to his Father of me Father give him me I have bought him I had lost God and therefore was robbed of all good He that is every where was gone from me He was out of my reach out of my call and hee would not heare me but called by earnest repentance a hard taske and not possibly to bee compassed without his powerfull assistance that was farre from me And which is the top of admiration I had lost my selfe and could by no meanes learne whither I was gone Had I gone out into the streets and asked all passengers if any good man or woman could tell where I was Had I said neighbour pray have you found me I am lost Whatsoever my neighbours had said all sound Christians would have answered that I was lost and so lost that I could never be found but by an infinite power and that for their parts they knew not where I was Indeed I neither know nor shall ever know fully what I had lost Go now all Merchants and Tradesmen henceforth hold your peace speak no more of your losses by Sea or Land I had lost more thou Land and Sea themselves And having lost all good I staid not there but also was over-whelmed with all evill It is a great evill of disgrace to be the childe of a wicked man or willing to serve him Sin had made me the childe of the Devill and more subject then a childe a slave to him and sinne And therefore Christ said to sinners Yee are of your Father the Devill He said likewise Verily verily I say unto you whosoever committeth sinne is the servant of sinne Sin then being all over evill and all the evill that is and I having committed sinne and so being the willing servant of sinne what a strange kinde of evill was I that served so great an evill when
teaches of all that ever hee taught And what is it that here we have no continuing City but seeke one to come Heb. 13. 14 Could we sinfull creatures fore see our own ends and the lamentable chances that lie watching for us as we passe by such a day and such an houre the hardest of us would weepe let us weepe then for the cause of all our misery our execrable sinnes Christ wept over Jerusalem because he saw the hearts and fore-saw the ends of all the people in the City He saw perhaps one stretched out with pride that should after two months die like a Dog in a ditch He saw another pawning his very soule for honour that should not live out the fourth part of a yeare to enjoy it What silly fooles the Devill makes us Here he saw one catching and scraping for mony that he was certain should be call'd to a strict account and cast into Hell within the short space of a month There another cheering up pampering his flesh with dainties and still the tother cup that the wormes were within lesse then seven dayes to enter upon Here he heard one swearing and tearing God the holy name of God and there presently he heard God also swearing in his wrath that he should not enter into his rest And here another venting as many lies as sentences while he heard God say cut him off let him speake no more it is my course for the longer he lives he will be the more wicked He might see two goe reeling in their drunkennesse one of whom the same night should break his necke from a window and the other be stab'd to death in a riot Two more following the vile motions of their owne filthy lusts and in league with base women that the same weeke should cut their purses and throats together He saw the greatest part of them pursuing earnestly their owne sinfull desires and either diseases gathering to a head inwardly in their bodies or Gods judgements outwardly mustering their forces to send them to Hell out of hand These mournefull passages Christ saw and being very sorry to see them wept He pronounces the sentence of destruction against the City and he weepes while he does it Hine illae lacrymae Hence came those teares He wept not put on with the thought of his owne passion though very nigh but of their destruction And therefore he sayes Daughters of Jerusalem weepe not for mee for whom then Lord but weepe for your selves and for your children Doe we love our children our pretty little Babes let us weep for our sins that we may not weepe for them And can we see Christ weep him that died for us weep and not offer our service to wipe the teares from his eyes Saint Gregorie Nazianzen rapt out of himselfe in consideration of the poore condition of the poore cried out 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 O my dainties and their misery And thus we may cry of the soules in Hell of some of our friends and neighbours that died lately O our joy our quiet and their miserable torments which we ought not to pity which God pities not When I have wrote all I can write I feare all will end here There is a blessed repose in God for good men and a cursed prison for wicked livers But we are so busie in the world betwixt both that we have no time to thinke of either to looke upwards or downewards Yet know that we cannot stay betwixt both for ever We are certainely appointed for one where we must reside for ever and ever Good Reader stand firme against the Devill and against his two Factours the Flesh and the World Beware you that thinke your selves to be morall men and women of little sinnes Of sinnes little in our weake estimation because they canker not our credits nor cast upon us the staine of wicked livers Doe wee give to our endeavours in their commission a command to please God or men Saint Austin speakes like himselfe Noli quotidiana peccata contemnere quia minima sunt sed time quia plura sunt Plerunque minimae bestiae si multae sint necant Doe not contemne thy daily sinnes because they are small but feare them because they are many Small beasts if they bee many many times kill And the smallest sinne that can be committed but once committed troubles exceedingly and offends the most cleane cleare eyes of God If you are still obstinate the Devill is more good then you the blacke Devill of Hell For Grace is not offered to him and therefore he cannot lay hold upon it It is offered to you with entreaties and you refuse it And moreover the Devill is confirmed in his obstinacie you are not God invites you I am sure of it I am sure I came from him The Angels and Saints from Heaven all the chosen of God from all parts of the world pray you as very desirous of your company The holy Church entreats you for I came likewise from her to you Lissen to your thoughts marke there your own poore soules beseech you trembling like the Hart shot neare the heart and strucke with the fear of eternall damnation crying to you we were made for God O put us into his hands Our hearts are very sicke of a very dangerous disease worse then the Plague chilnesse in Gods service Let us write upon the dore in red letters as they doe upon the dores of houses infected with the Plague the pen being dipt in the bloud of Christ Lord have mercie upon us Yes yes have mercie upon us and not for our sakes not for our Fathers sakes not for our Ancestors sakes not for the Saints and Angels sakes not for the Virgin Maries sake but for Jesus Christ his sake CHAP. XIX EXtraordinary occasions require extraordinary proceedings The Copie of a Letter sent to my Lodging in Thames-street Mr. Carpenter AN old acquaintance of yours sends his hand accompanied with his heart to you although he dares not trust you either with his person or name Especially considering that you traduced an innocent man before the Bench as a seducer because he lov'd you and therefore desired you to remember from whence you had fallen and repent of your errour Poore man I pitie you and therefore I pitie you because I love you Whither so fast Looke backe God is a Father still and his Church still a mother and each hath many bowels of compassion You seemed to us a man of a good nature and religiously enclined And I remember when your Pen also was imployed in the behalfe of the Catholike Church And yet I understand that you are not contented to speake but that you have wrote also and are now ready to speake from the Presse the dishonour of her that was your own Mother and is Christs own Spouse Thinke without passion Is not this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to fight with God And with what weapons when you fight with him can you wound him
to hurt him Or did he ever fight and at last went not away conquerour As God hath furnished you with gifts of nature which you by his helpe have bettered with labour so he requires the imployment of them in his owne service And if the imployment or use be not reasonably paid a severe account must be rendered Can you without a pressure of conscience call that a Church in which you are a thing so torne and distracted Can your soule which hath hungred after heavenly things feede now with the swine upon such huskes God for his Christs sake open your eyes that you may see and know him and his Church and also your selfe Which he prayes day and night that loves you night and day The Answer Sir VVHereas you stile your selfe my old Acquaintance without any farther illustration I have greater reason to feare and to flie then to hope and pursue because amongst my old Acquaintance more have beene evill then good And by the sequell it appeares that you stand in the ranke of the evill ones And that you are my old Acquaintance in the same construction as the World is old of which one sayes Mundus qui ob antiquitatem sapere deberet c. The World which because it is so old ought to be wise growes every day more unwise as it is more old A hand I have received and a good one but that as good a heart came with it will not sinke into my heart The hand is faire but how shall I know the heart is not foule Indeed Aristotle sayes that speech is the picture or image of the minde But hee meanes when the speech is the mindes true Interpreter You cannot be ignorant that it is a received though a close principle amongst the Jesuits We may be free of faire words because they goe not from us as drops of bloud or money with losse or expence O the riches of experience Both the Indies are poore compared with them That you dare not trust me with your name or person gives evidence for me that I am more true to my Superiours then to you And good reason Because I conceive there mediates no reall tie betwixt you and me but the worne and old tie of old Acquaintance And I never learned that God obliging a man to his old Acquaintance joyned them with the bonds of extraordinary love in the least degree or bound them to a performance of the acts depending upon it But I am glewed to my Superiours by the firme tyes of extraordinary love and subjection and therefore of duty and obedience I am in reference to them as an inferiour part in respect of the head and shoulders And therefore if my old Acquaintance shall strike at the head or annoy the body of which I am a foote I shall kick him down if I can even to the ground and say there lies my old Acquaintance The man whom you propose to me under the title of an innocent man and a lover of me and of my soule would have beene more truely described if you had said A wilde Priest a swaggarer a lover and haunter of the Taverne even when the sword of death hung by a small haire over his head It was my chance to meete him in the Kings high-way attired like a Knight or Lord travelling alone in a faire Coach drawne with foure great Horses towards the house of a Lady whose Priests have beene the pernicious cause of many grievous disorders in the Countrey where I live and this in a most dangerous and suspected time And having there endeavoured to pervert me and breake the bonds and ligaments of my duty to God and of my Allegiance to the King besides the concealement of such a treason in regard of the Law how should I have answered such a concealement in foro interno in the inward court of my heart and at the Bench of my conscience Occisio Animarum the murder of soules is the highest breach of the Commandement Thou shalt doe no murder Was not this a murderous attempt in the Kings high-way And pray does he that attempts to murder the soule of a man love the man If he lov'd me hee lov'd all me or he lov'd not me I confesse we argue differently because our arguments proceed upon different grounds and suppositions If my grounds stand fast my discourse will prove irrefragable You call me poore man And I am so or I am sure was so when you knew me And you pitie me and your pitie is baptized the childe of your love Saint Gregory Nazianzen hath a pretty phrase when he sayes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Many speake golden words but their speech though it points at the practique and the object be some practicable thing is both in the act and in effect all speculative that is both the intention and execution end and vanish away in speculation It seemes then that your love is not unlike the water of Aesculapius his Well which no commixtion or approximation can urge to putrifie Let those beleeve it to be sweete that have not tasted of it The bitternesse is scarce yet out of my mouth I am going in hast and you call after me whither so fast And shall I tell you whither Shall I in good earnest I will then I am going and my businesse requires hast to see if I can finde any Priests or Jesuits lurking in the secret corners adjoyning or neighbouring to the Parliament house I know that their life though it be mixt hath so much of action in it that they must alwayes bee doing You desire me to look back At your entreaty I do so And looking back I still finde that every where there are whole swarmes of waspish and turbulent Papists For that which followes God is a Father still and so forth I learned all that lesson in my conversion to the Church of England And I hope I shall never forget it You tell me that I seemed to your people a man of a good nature and religiously enclined Here is a plaine Jesuiticall flattery with a sharpe sting in the taile of it Why now you seeme too seeme to praise when you dishonour But how will you make it seeme that I did onely seeme It is very naturall and proper that bonum reale a reall good should be also bonum apparens should appeare to be good For otherwise it would not trahere in amorem sui draw men to love it But it is an Ethicall observation that men used to foule sinnes are so conscious of them and yet so desirous to disavow them that their guiltinesse still hammering upon their sinnes their obstinacie helped with their cunning presently takes their tongues off from acknowledging them to bee in themselves and because if they be being accidents they must be in convenient subjects fastens them upon others You remember one thing and you understand another I remember likewise that being a young stripling I was active in bestowing my service upon your Church
praeelegit Nativitati S. Leo serm 1. de Epiph. Hierosolymam passioni Present thy selfe before the Babe and offer with the three Kings Gold Frankincense Myrrhe Gold as to a King Frankincense as to God Myrrhe as to a man liable to a bitter passion the gold of Charity the Frankincense of Devotion the Myrrhe of Sufferance Rise away travell into Egypt and help to carrie the childe and in the way talk of the Messias Up againe come back goe into the Temple Sit down and heare him dispute amongst the Doctors and observe God in a little Doctor triumphing over the greatest Doctors Thrust Judas out of Christs company then follow as one of his Disciples and make the number full With admiration heare his doctrine and be witnesse to his miracles Look upon him in his Transfiguration and admire the beautifull glimmerings of his Godhead Cast thy garments in the way and throw boughes before him strip thy selfe of all and submit both them and thy selfe to Christ Be present in the Chamber wait upon him at the great Supper and communicate in spirit with him and the Disciples And kneeling hold the Towell and Water in the washing of the poore Fisher-mens feet Follow into the Garden and conceive that as Adam and wee were made slaves in a Garden So Christ his Father having promised was took and arrested for the payment of the ransome in a Garden Chide the three Disciples for sleeping and say fie fie can you not watch one houre with your Saviour and then look with a pittifull eye upon him and wipe the sweat of bloud from his browes and cry Alas poore Saviour Go after him when almost all the Disciples flie Goe with him from Pilat to Herod and considering that hee speaks not to Herod even urged by a question Call to mind that Herod had killed his voyce Iohn the Baptist who said of himselfe I am the voyce of one crying in the wildernesse and think his voyce being gone how could he speak And from Herod back againe to Pilat Behold his purple robe his reed his crowne of thornes and ponder what gay robes indeed rich Scepters and crownes of gold and jewells that is robes scepters and crownes of glory and immortality he hath purchased for us Watch with him all the night and feare it will never be day he is so tormented And suppose that thou seest hearest feelest what he saw heard felt and that thou smellest and tastest the sweetnesse of his patience Accompany him the next day and help to carry his heavy crosse to mount Calvary And there as if thou hadst beene frozen hitherto thaw into teares Run with all thy might into his armes held out at their full length to receive thee whilest he hangeth as he did with his back towards the ungratefull Citie Ierusalem Think profoundly that he hath suffered his feet to be nail'd together to demonstrate that both the Jew and Gentile goe now in one path Waigh the matter Because sinne entreth by the senses therefore his Head in which the senses most flourish is crowned with searching thorns O marvailous what King is he or of what Country that weares a crowne of thornes Surely the King of all afflicted people wheresoever they dwell Because the hands and feet are the outward instruments of sin therefore his hands and feet are nail'd to the Crosse for satisfaction Because the heart is the inward Fountaine of ill thoughts therefore his tender heart is pierced for thee And hence learne if thou hast sinned more grievously in any part of thy body or faculty of thy soule with a speciall diligence to estrange that part or faculty from pleasure Wonder that the Thiefe confessed Christ on the Crosse when even the Apostles either doubted or altogether lost their Faith of his Divinity Here unburden thy heart of all the injuries ever offered to thee with a valiant purpose never to speak of them againe Lay downe all thy sinnes at the foot of the Crosse whither the bloud droppeth with a firme confidence never to heare of them againe and say from a good heart with S. Austen Ille solus diffidat qui S. Aug. lib. de vera falsae poenitentia c. 5. tantum peccare potest quantum Deus bonus est Let him onely be diffident who can sinne so much as God is good See him as farre as thou canst for weeping shaking and dying and mervaile that thy owne heart shakes not and dye with him by a most exact mortification Looke pale like him when hee was dead with sorrow for thy sinnes Behold him layed in the Sepulcher and though the Jewes hide him and binde him downe with a great stone and a strong chaine over it fastned in both ends to a rock as old History mentioneth and though the foolish Souldiers watch there in Armour yet doubt not but thou shalt see him again even in his body let him not shake thee off by dying Come running and having out-runne thy company finde white Angels in the Grave and pray that by thy Grave thou may'st passe to Angels Be with him even upon the mountaine where hee ascended and there kneele before him mark how his wounds are closed and be glad they are heal'd againe kisse the very print of his feet in the ground looke upon his face talk to him pray for a blessing upon thy selfe and the world confesse thy faults uncover thy weaknesse and say Lord I am very tender in this part begg the divine help then as it were dye for love and ascend with him crying O Lord leave me not hitherto I have followed thee now take me with thee to thy Kingdome and after this give thy selfe gently up into heaven and there see and heare those things which neither eye hath seene nor care hath heard and especially the things which concerne the entertainment of Christ RULE 8. THat you may proceed with more cheerefulnesse both in your speculations and in the part of practicall performance If you desire to know whether you now be in the grace and favour of God know it by this which is more easie to be knowne whether God be I dare not say in grace I hope I may say in favour with you If he be he can stirre and turne you as he pleaseth and it is your daily care to give him full content and satisfaction If you love God he loveth you for his love is alwayes the first Mover and it commeth from his love of you that you love him Indeed God loveth his Enemies as we likewise ought to doe but his enemies doe not love him neither doth he love his enemies intimately and familiarly as hee doth his friends For there is little commerce little communication which is both the exercise and recreation of love betwixt God and his enemies You love God truly if prompted by the love of him you preferre him and his law in all cases in all causes and when you rightly fit and order the acts of your election
not giving place to creatures or sins which as they are sinnes are not creatures before God and in a manner defie them It would be strange above ordinary and extraordinary that God should command me to love him and stirred by this love to keepe his commandements and moreover to give thanks continually for the spirituall good which by his grace he worketh in me and yet I should never be able to know when I or others did love God though perhaps it might prove a knot in respect of others And certainly he that loveth God truly is highly in his favour For the true love of God virtually containeth Repentance in which the soule is united by Grace to God and the love of God it selfe is nothing but a close Union of the soule with God And that I may raise my discourse to an infinite height The holy Ghost being the love of the Father and the Sonne is a firme knitting of them together RULE 9. VVHen you see or learne by relation that another is oppressed with sicknesse or misery goe aside presently and as it were take God aside with you and pray for the distressed party And presently if occasion give way visit the party And afterwards when you are gathered up together body minde and all in some private place of Recollection imagine your selfe stuck fast in the like misery or acting the mournfull part of a dying man with a certaine feeling of grievous paine with a serious consideration of the comfortlesse behaviour of your friends of the Physitians weaknesse and wretched ignorance in respect of Death and her power and policy and of the fickle nature and transitory condition of riches and how you poore man shall be carried away in a sorry sheet layd in the cold ground and there left alone while those who accompanied your body will returne cheerefully almost every one to his owne home and now and then talk of your past life and especially your sinnes but little think either of your present solitarinesse desolation or rottennesse And then let your better and more sublime thoughts triumph and insult over the vanity of the world For alwayes when you would more fully contemplate the greatnesse of Gods benefits take a full sight of his lesser favours and of the persons upon whom the greatest benefits are not bestowed And when thou beholdest one overflowne with drink or otherwise offending God laugh not for laughing is ordinarily the childe of delight but if it be possible looke pale upon him and loath his beastly practises And bee truly sorrowfull that so good a God whom thou lovest and desirest to love above all things should bee so foully dishonoured And let a chiefe part of thy daily griefe be that God is every day so much and so basely injured in all places and hath beene and shall be in all places and in all Ages And whisper to thy selfe in a corner of thy heart Now now wicked men sweare lye prophane Gods blessed Name drink themselves to the base condition of beasts love beastly women more then God These blowes upon the sweet face of God rebound upon my heart I would give my life and all that I have to preserve God's honour And be glad againe because some few doe serve him and because the Saints and Angels in Heaven doe perfectly honour him though not with honour equall to his perfection And say I would no man had ever sinned did now sinne or would sinne hereafter And for you that love God goe on with comfort double the heat of your affection towards him and let the burden of the song still be O God I love thee But beware that in hating a sinner you doe not hate the man lying under the sinner Hate sinne in it selfe and also hate it in such a person but hate not the person You ought to make an incision betwixt the marrow and the bones love the men but hate their manners For thy enemies hate them with a perfect hate and let the highest point of thy sorrow be that they are enemies to God that in being enemies to thee they crook thee to their devices use thee to forward them upon the downfall of eternall damnation It is a sinne as black as the devill to hate the devill if we doe not seperate and distinguish the object of our hate from God's white creature in the devill Yet make a broad difference betwixt the imperfections of men and their foule enormities Beare the burden of another's imperfections for so thou shalt fulfill the law of Christ and move God and thy neighbour to beare with thee In a presse of people one giveth way to the other Bricks are made square to lay the pavement even God's dearest children have their imperfections and their skarres even in their faces that they may be humble and acknowledge themselves to bee what they are which imperfections are as it were the drosse and earth of the soule And yet wee may not consort with knowne and professed sinners The Minister is not true to his Religion that is a silent Companion of Popish Priests and it is not a good signe or symptome that Franciscus à Sancta Clara alias Damport admitted him to a perusall of his Deus Natura Gratia before it was printed and yet he so farre went on with that wicked and unworthily insinuating Book that hee suffered it to take it's course without a discovery How can this be characterized but A holding of Counsell with Gods enemies He is my neighbour but the more holy and more excellent Obligation may not be broken to set free and save the meaner when the one in reason and religion inferres the destruction of the other Hee and I are Pastors and Pastors are so called à pascendo because they must feed their flocks Of strangers the Shepherds being admonished frō heaven did first adore the good Shepherd and in the time when the Shepherds watched over their flocks news came to them of a Saviour It is not the Shepherds place where the Wolves haunt except his businesse be to catch them or chase them away RULE 10. HAve a most vigilant care that neither your cloaths ordained onely to cover nakednesse and to put you in minde of originall sin and the first Garment of fig-leaves nor diet bee curious What doth it availe thee whether thy meat or drinke be sweet or bitter it stayeth but a little in the taste Doe not over-load your selfe in eating or drinking but when you are at the Table leave always some speciall thing which indeed you could well and safely eat or drinke but will not because you will understandingly bridle your owne will and sensuall Appetite Let not sleepe hold you long in her armes but shake her off and rise cheerfully to performe the will of him that sent you into the World Let not your recreation be more choice neither flow in a greater measure then due and fit necessitie requireth For so you may please God as truly in the