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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A41038	The life of the most learned, reverend and pious Dr. H. Hammond written by John Fell ...	Fell, John, 1625-1686.; Waring, Robert, 1614-1658.; Allestree, Richard, 1619-1681.; Langbaine, Gerard, 1609-1658.	1662 (1662)	Wing F618; ESTC R35672	58,303	255

by the greatest violence and sharpest discipline whatever was displeasing in his Eyes and grant not onely patience but fruitfulness under the rod. Then by repeated acts of submission would he deliver himself up into God's hands to doe with him as seem'd him good amidst the sharpest pains meekly invoking him and saying God's holy Will be done And even then when on the wrack of torture would he be observing every circumstance of allay When 't was the Gout he would give thanks 't was not the Stone or Cramp when 't was the Stone he then would say 't was not so sharp as others felt accusing his impatience that it appear'd so bad to him as it did And then when some degree of health was given he exerted all his strength in a return of grateful recognition to the Author of it which he perform'd with a vivacious sense and chearful piety frequently reflecting on the Psalmist's phrase that it was a joyful thing to be thankful Which his transport whoever should attentively observe would easily apprehend how possible it was for the infinite fruitions of another World to be made up by the perpetual act of grateful recognition in giving lauds and singing praises unto God Upon this score he was a most diligent Observer of every Blessing he receiv'd and had them still in readiness to confront unto those pressures he at any time lay under In the intermissions of his importunate maladies he would with full acknowledgement mention the great indulgence That he who had in his Constitution the Cause of so much pain still dwelling with him should yet by God's immediate interposing be rescued from the Effect To facilitate yet more this his serenity and calm of Minde he lay'd this Rule before him which prov'd of great use Never to trouble himself with the fore-sight of future Events being resolv'd of our Saviour's Maxime that Sufficient to the day is the evil thereof and that it were the greatest folly in the world to perplex ones self with that which perchance will never come to pass but if it should then God who sent it will dispose it to the best most certainly to his Glory which should satisfy us in our respects to Him and unless it be our fault as certainly to our Good which if we be not strangely unreasonable must satisfyin reference unto our selves and private interests Besides all this in the very dispensation God will not fail to give such allayes which like the cool gales under the Line will make the greatest heates of sufferance very supportable In such occasions he usually subjoyn'd Epictetus his Dilemma Either the thing before us is in our power or it is not if it be let us apply the Remedy and there will be no motive for complaint if it be not the Grief is utterly impertinent since it can doe no good As also from the same Author he annex'd this consideration that every thing has two handles if the one prove hot and not to be touch'd we may take the other that 's more temperate And in every occurrent he would be sure to find some cool handle that he might lay hold of And to enforce all this he made a constant recourse to the Experience of God's dealing with him in preceding accidents which however dreadful at a distance at a nearer view lost much of their terrour And for others that he saw perplex'd about the manage of their difficult affairs he was wont to ask them when they would begin to trust God or permit him to govern the world Besides unto himself and friends he was wont solemnly to give this mandate Quod sis esse velis nihilque malis in his English to rather nothing not onely to be content or acquiesce but be resolv'd the present state to be the very best that could be wish'd or phansied And thus all private concernments he pass'd over with a perfect indifference the World and its appendages hanging so loose about him that he never took notice when any part dropt off or sate uneasily Herein indeed he was concern'd and render'd thoughtful if somewhat interven'd that had a possibility of duty appendant to it in which case he would be sollicitous to discern where the obligation lay but presently rescued himself from that disquiet by his addresses unto God in Praier and Fasting which was his certain refuge in this as well as other Exigents and if the thing in question were of moment he call'd in the devotions of his Friends Besides this Case he own'd to have some kinde of little discomposure in the choice of things perfectly indifferent for where there was nothing to determine him the balance by hanging even became tremulous and by a propensity to either side enclin'd to neither making useless offers but promoving nothing which condition of minde he was wont to call the deliberation of Buridan's Ass. Upon which grounds of all other things he most dislik'd the being left to make a choice and hugely applauded the state of subjection to a Superiour where an obsequious diligence was the main ingredient of Duty as also he did the state of subjection unto pressure as a privilege and blessing And though he pray'd as much and withal as heartily as any person for the return of the Nation from Captivity he alwaies first premis'd the being made receptive of such Mercy by the intervention of Repentance He would often both publickly and privately assert solemnly That prosperous iniquity would not be deliverance but the most formidable judgement That the Nation during its pressures was under the Discipline of God given up to Satan by a kind of Ecclesiastick Censure and should the Almighty dismiss us from his hands and put us into our own give us up to our selves with a Why should you be smitten any more this were of all inflictions the most dreadful Though with admirable aequanimity he could run over the black Annals of this unhappy Nation while its Calamities were reckon'd up he could scarce hear the slightest mention of its incorrigible guilt without dissolving into tears especially when he happened to advert unto the impudence of that Hypocrisie which reconcil'd Godliness and Villany and made it possible for men to be Saints and Devils both together whereby Religion grew ruinous to it self and besides the scandal of such Enormities committed in the face of the Sun with such pretence to Zeal and Holiness our Faith became instructed to confute and baffle Duty the Creed and the Commandments Belief and Practice being brought into the lists and represented as incompatible while the flames intended for the Sacred Lamps the establishment of Doctrinals and Speculative Divinity burnt up the Altar and the Temple consumed not onely Charity but good nature too and untaught the common documents of honest Heathenisme And while this publick Soul in the Contemplation of the Mischief which our sins both were themselves and in their issues great in their provocation and fatal in their plagues indulg'd unto his pious and

had not courage to pursue his undertaking but voluntarily relinquished that infamous robbery and adhered to a less scandalous one in the Country And then the Officer who was commanded to take Doctor Sheldon and him into Custody upon their design'd removal Colonel Evelin then Governour of Wallingford-Castle though a man of as opposite principles to Church and Church-men as any of the adverse party wholly declin'd the employment solemnly protesting that if they came to him they should be entertained as Friends and not as Prisoners But these remorses prov'd but of little effect the Prebend of Christ-Church being suddenly supply'd by a second choice and Oxford it self being continued the place of their Confinement Where accordingly the good Doctor remained though he were demanded by His Majesty to attend Him in the Isle of Wight at the Treaty there which then was again re-inforced The pretence upon which both he and the Reverend Doctor Sheldon were refused was that they were Prisoners and probably the gaining that was the cause why they were so But notwithstanding the denial of a personal Attendance the Excellent Prince requir'd that assistance which might consist with absence and at this time sent for a Copy of that Sermon which almost a year before He had heard preach'd in that place The which Sermon his Majesty and thereby the publick receiv'd with the accession of several others delivered upon various Occasions Doctor Hammond having continued about ten weeks in his restraint in Oxford where he begun to actuate his designe of writing Annotations on the New Testament nor was it disproportionate that those Sacred Volumes a great part of which was wrote in bonds should be first commented upon by the very parallel suffering and that the Work it self should be so dedicated and the Expositor fitted for his task by being made like the Authors by the interposition of his Brother in Law Sir John Temple he had licence granted to be removed to a more acceptable confinement to Clapham in Bedfordshire the House in which his worthy Friend Sir Philip Warwick lived Where soon after his arrival that horrid mockery of Justice the rape and violence of all that 's Sacred made more abominable by pretending to Right and Piety the Trial of the King drew on and he being in no other capacity to interpose then by writing drew up an Address to the General and Council of Officers and transmitted it to them And when that unexampled VILLANY found this Excuse that it was such as could be pleaded for and men in cool blood would dare to own and justifie he affix'd his Reply to the suggestions of Ascham and Goodwin And now although he indulg'd to his just and almost-infinite Griefs which were transported to the utmost bounds of sober Passion the affectionate personal respect he bore unto that glorious Victime being added to the detestation due unto the guilt it self of which no man was more sensible then he who had strange antipathies to all sin he gave not up himself to an unactive dull amazement but with the redoubled use of Fasting Tears and solemn Prayer he resum'd his wonted Studies and besides his fitting the Annotations for the Press and his little Tract of the Reasonableness of Christian Religion he now composed his Latine one against Blondel in the behalf of Episcopacy As to the first of which his Annotations the manner of its birth and growth was thus Having written in Latine two large volumes in Quarto of the way of interpreting the New Testament with reference to the customs of the Jews and of the first Hereticks in the Christian Church and of the Heathens especially in the Grecian games and above all the importance of the Hellenistical Dialect into which he had made the exactest search by which means in a maner he happened to take in all the difficulties of that Sacred Book he began to consider that it might be more useful to the English Reader who was to be his immediate Care to write in our vulgar Language and set every Observation in its natural order according to the guidance of the Text. And having some years before collated several Greek Copies of the New Testament observ'd the variation of our English from the Original and made an entire Translation of the whole for his private use being thus prepar'd he cast his work into that form in which it now appears The reasons of it need not to be here inserted being set down by his own Pen in his Preface to his Annotations The Tractate against Blondel grew to its last form and constitution by not-unlike degrees having a very different occasion from the last performance The immediate antecedent cause is own'd and long agoe presented to the World in that writing the more remote Original is as follows The late most Learned Primate of Armagh having receiv'd from Dav. Blondel a Letter of Exception against his Edition of Ignatius he communicated it to Doctor Hammond desiring his sense of several passages therein contained relating to the Valentinian Heresie Episcopal and Chorepiscopal power and some emergent difficulties concerning them from the Canons of several ancient Eastern Councils To all this the Doctor wrote a peculiar answer promising a fuller account if it would be useful Upon the receipt whereof the Archbishop being highly satisfied return'd his thanks and lai'd hold of the Promise which being accordingly discharg'd became the provision and gave materials to a great part of the Dissertations The Primate's Letter ran in these words I have read with great delight and content your accurate Answer to the Objections made against the credit of Ignatius his Epistles for which I do most heartily thank you and am moved thereby farther to intreat you to publish to the World in Latine what you have already written in English against this Objector and that other who for your pains hath rudely requited you with the base appellation of Nebulo for the assertion of Episcopacy to the end it may no longer be credited abroad that these two have beaten down this Calling that the defense thereof is now deserted by all men as by Lud. Capellus is intimated in his Thesis of Church-government at Sedan lately published which I leave unto your serious Consideration and all your Godly labours to the blessing of our good God in whom I evermore rest Rygate in Surrey Jul. 21. 1649. Your very loving Friend and Brother Ja. Armachanus Now in this request the Archbishop was so concern'd that he re-inforc'd it by another Letter of Aug. 30. and congratulated the performance by a third of Jan. 14. Both which though very worthy to see the publick light are yet forborn as several of the like kinde from the Reverend Fathers the Bishops of this and our Sister Churches as also from the most eminent for Piety and Learning of our own and the neighbouring Nations which course is taken not onely in accordance to the desires and sentiments of the Excellent Doctor who hated every thing that

generous Griefs yet even then considering Judgement not to be more just then useful to the sufferers he found out means from that unlikely Topick to speak comforts to himself and others In that last Crisis of our gasping hopes the defeat of the Cheshire forces which promis'd all the Misery consequent to the sway of a Senate gorg'd in blood and yet still thirsting more and of a veterane Army compos'd of desperate Fanaticks engag'd in equal guilts among themselves and equal hate against the other and therewithal the Religion Liberty and Being of the Nation he thus addresses himself to the desponding sorrows of a friend SIR Sept. 2. I have received your last and acknowledge the great fitness of it to the present opportunities under which God hath pleased to place us If we look about us there was never any louder call to lamentation and bitter mourning and the sharpest accents of these are visibly due to those continued Provocations which appear to have wrought all our woe yet is there not wanting some gleam of light if we shall yet by God's grace be qualified to make use of it It is the supreme Privilege of Christianity to convert the saddest evils into the most medicinal advantages the valley of Achor into the door of hope the blackest Tempest into the most perfect 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and it is certain you have an excellent opportunity now before you to improve and receive benefit by and you will not despise that affection which attempts to tell you somewhat of it It is plainly this That all kinde of Prosperity even that which we most think we can justifie the most importunate pursuance of the flourishing of a Church and Monarchy is treacherous and dangerous and might very probably tend to our great ills and nothing is so entirely safe and wholesome as to be continued under God's disciplines Those that are not better'd by such methods would certainly be intoxicated and destroyed by the pleasanter draughts and those that would ever serve God sincerely in affluence have infinitely greater advantages and opportunities for it in the adverse fortune Therefore let us now all adore and bless God's wisest choices and set vigorously to the task that lies before us improving the present advantages and supplying in the abundance of the inward beauty what is wanting to the outward lustre of a Church and we shall not fail to find that the Grots and Caves lye as open to the Celestial influences as the fairest and most beautified Temples We are ordinarily very witling to be rich and flatter our selves that our aims are no other then to be enabled by much wealth to doe much good and some live to see themselves confuted want hearts when Wealth comes in greatest abundance so those that never come to make the experiment have yet reason to judge that God saw it fit not to lead them into temptation lest if they had been prov'd they should have been found faithless And the same judgement are we now oblig'd to pass for our selves and by what God appears to have chosen for us to resolve what he sees to be absolutely best for us and it must be our greatest blame and wretchedness if what hath now befaln us be not effectually better for us then whatever else even Piety could have suggested to us to wish or pray for And then I pray judge candidly whether any thing be in any degree sober or tolerable in any of us beside the one great necessary Wisdome as well as Duty of Resignation and making God's choices ours also I have been these three weeks under restraint by the Gout and other pains and am not yet on my legs yet blessed be God have all causes of thanksgiving none of repining And I shall with confidence pray and hope that the great multitudes of persons and families that are now under far sharper exercises will finde as much greater allayes and sweetnesses and the black Cloud as oft it hath done vanish undiscernibly And when this most unlikely Prophecy became fulfill'd when that black cloud he spoke of contrary to all humane expectation broke not in Tempest but the fairest Sun-shine that ever smil'd on this our Land when our despairs and resolute despondencies became unravel'd by a miracle of Mercy which after-ages will be as far from giving credit to in its endearing most improbable circumstances as this of ours pardon the harshness of a true comparison is from esteeming at its merited rate our Excellent Patriot and best of men seeing the dawnings of this welcome day paid down at once his greatest thanks and heartiest deprecations as a tribute to it passionately fearing what he had more passionately wisht for suspecting his own hopes and weeping over his fruitions As to His Sacred Majesty he look'd on His Return with pity and compassion as bringing Him to that uneasy if not insuperable Task of ruling and reforming a licentious people to that most irksome sufferance of being worried with the importunities of covetous and ambitious men the restless care of meeting the designes of mutinous and discontented spirits resolving His most wisht Return could onely be a blessing to His people but unto Him could not be so but onely on the score by having opportunities through glorious self-denyals to doe good And for all other persons he said that having seriously considered what sort of men would be better for the Change he could not think of any As for the Church 't was certain Persecution was generally the happiest means of propagating that she then grew fastest when prun'd most then of the best complexion and most healthy when fainting through loss of blood As to the Laity in all their several stations and estates they had so much perverted the healthfull dispensations of Judgement that it was most improbable they should make any tolerable use of Mercy And lastly in reference to himself he resolv'd though sure on weaker grounds Affliction most conducible During the current of that Tyranny which for so many years we all groan'd under he kept a constant aequable serenity and unthoughtfulness in outward accidents but the approaching Change gave him somewhat of pensive recollection insomuch that discoursing of occurrents he broke forth into these words I must confess I never saw that time in all my life wherein I could so chearfully say my Nunc dimittis as now Indeed I do dread Prosperity I do really dread it For the little good I am now able to doe I can doe it with deliberation and advice but if it please God I should live and be call'd to any higher Office in the Church I must then doe many things in a hurry and shall not have time to consult with others and I sufficiently apprehend the danger of relying on my own Judgement Which words he spake with the greatest concernment of earnest melting passion as is imaginable Accordingly it pleas'd Almighty God to deal and having granted to his servant the satisfaction of a full