Christians have with their gracious God by contemplation meditation or fervent prayers The first is a sudden and violent motion of the heart that causeth a great alteration in the body The definition of Joy See Theuphrast Boju in his Commentaties upon Aristotle Phys fol. 727. proceeding in the opinion of the Moralists from the possession or fight of some object much desired which is really good or reputed to be so by the imagination of men yet it will appear by the proprieties and effects of it that it doth not always come from the possession or injoyment of a beloved object or from an imaginary good but sometimes from relations scurrilous speeches ridiculous postures and deformedobjects for Joy is as I have said before an affection of the minde and is rather infused in the Heart by the Eye and by the Ear then by any of the other three Senses for those are more proper to the passion of Volupty of which Delight or Delectation is a branch however it is the fifth passion incident to the Concupiscible appetite and proceeds from divers causes as it will appear in the next Discourse Secondly The causes of worldly joy are either Publick or Private the Publick proceed commonly from the immediate hand of God or from his favor or by his permission and of these I shall speak in the first place first It was a great cause of publick joy proceeding from the immediate hand of God to the people of Israel presently after their coming out of Egypt to see the sea go back Exod. 14.21 to 31. and make a free passage for their host to pass through the midst of it and when they were all safe come to dry land to see the rowling waves of the sea to turn back and overwhelm Pharoah and all his Army secondly It was a cause of publick Joy when it pleased the Lord to deliver the people of the Iews from that bloody decree obtained by Haman from the great King Ahasuerus against the whole Nation of the Iews Esther 3.4 The causes of publick joy that were scattered through the one hundred and seven and twenty Provinces of the said Kings Dominions for which admirable deliverance the people of Israel made the 15th and 16th day of the moneth Adar days of Thanksgiving and of Feasting and Rejoycing from one generation to the other which were called the days of Purim See the Spanish and Turkish History thirdly It was the cause of publick joy to the Venetians and to all Christendom when God was pleased to give unto the Christian Fleet such a memorable victory over the Turkish Navy at the Battel of Lepantho for which after thanks given to God many days of Feasting and Rejoycing were kept at Venice and other parts of Christendom fourthly See Speed in the life of King James It was an incredible cause of publick joy for England when the Lord was pleased to deliver this Nation from the devillish plot of the Gunpouder Treason for which miraculous deliverance after hearty thanks given to God great Feasting Bond-fires and other expressions of joy were made in London and through the whole Land 1. It was a cause of private joy to the old Patriarch Jacob to hear by the report of his sons that his beloved son Joseph Gen. 45.26 who he thought had been devoured by wild beasts was chief Governor of Egypt and the next man in honor to the King 2. It was a cause of private joy for old Iesse The causes of private joy 1 Sam. 16.12 to see his youngest son David from a Shepherd to be promoted to be King of all Israel and specially to be reputed by God himself to be a man after his own heart 3. It was a cause of private joy for old Mordecay to see his Neece Esther Esther 2.16 from a Captive to be exalted to be the wife of the great King Ahasuerus and the greatest Queen in the world 4. It was a cause of incomprehensible joy to the Virgin Mary and to all mankinde to hear the blessed and glad tidings that the Angel Gabriel brought her from the Lord saying Behold Luke 1.26.46 thou shalt conceive in thy womb and bring forth a son and shall call his name Jesus He shall be great and shall be called the son of the Highest and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father David whereupon the Virgin Mary transported with joy and ravished in spirit sung some dayes after this excellent Song My soul doth magnify the Lord beginning at the fourty sixt Verse of the first Chap. of St. Luke Here was a true and real Cause of Spiritual Joy not onely for the Virgin Mary but also for all the Elected of God who by free grace have part in the merits of Christ By these Instances it appears that these causes of joy did proceed from the seeing and hearing which are the two Senses most proper to the passion of Joy There are divers other Causes of worldly joy which are not so well grounded as these but are most vain and ridiculous and they are these following The joy of private and worldly men suits with their inclinations first The Ambitious will rejoyce in the increase of their honors secondly The Covetous men in the abundance of their riches thirdly The causes of private mens joy The Voluptuous men will rejoyce in the injoyment of their pleasures fourthly The Merchants and Trades-men in the increase of their Trade fifthly The Lawyers in the multiplicity of their Clients and in the discord of their neighbors sixthly The prophane and Libertine in all manner of ridiculous Sports scurrilous Songs lewd Musick Dancing Valting and in lascivious Pictures and Postures and in Chambering Gluttony and Drunkenness and these are the common and ordinary causes of the joy of worldly men Let the Reader judg then whether carnal joy be not meer vanity and vexation of Spirit for the great vanity of it moved Solomon to say I said of laughter Eccles 2.2 it is mad and of mirth what doth it and the very truth is that men transported with immoderate joy are like fools and mad men Thirdly The proprieties of worldly joy are these first Worldly joy is of hot temper secondly It is of a dilative or spreading quality and these two proprieties are the cause that sudden joy doth bereave men of life for when some beloved object or glad tidings are unexpectedly represented to the eyes or ears of men this causeth a violent alteration in all the parts of the body but specially in the heart by means of the hot and dilative quality of this passion of Joy because the blood and the vital spirits that reside in it are with great violence driven from the inward parts to the extremity of the members of the body The proprieties of worldly joy whereby mens hearts are deprived of their natural heat and of their vital spirits and so fall into a swoon
Grief and Sorrow some say it is a passion of the soul proceeding from some sensible loss or displeasure received others say it is a perturbation of the minde and an anguish of the body others that it is a passion afflicting the soul by the apprehension of present and future evils but this last opinion seemeth to be the best The definition of Dolour according to the Bishop of Marseillis pag 302. Dolour is a passion of the soul proceeding from the dislike that men receive from the objects represented to their imagination by their Senses which are averse to their inclinations and irksome to their bodies Moreover It is the last passion incident to the Concupiscible appetite and the root of divers other passions and the great Antagonist of worldly Joy because all carnal Joy doth end in Sorrow there being none so pure but it leaves in the soul a sting of remorse and repentance but Spiritual Sorrow is one of the greatest motives that men have to induce them to beate with fervency the ways of righteousness For godly sorrow 2 Cor. 7.10 saith St. Paul worketh Repentance to salvation not to be repented of but the sorrow of the world worketh death Secondly There are divers sorts and degrees of Dolour for the very word of Dolour doth signify Anguish Grief and Sorrow and every one of these have their degrees Anguish doth properly signifie the Dolours Pains and Torments of the Body whether they be natural or accidental and Grief doth signify the Dolour of the Minde and Sorrow is an invetered grief of the Minde which is by long continuance turned into an habit of Sorrow The first of these which is Anguish hath a secret reflection to the Sensitive appetite of the soul by means of the communion there is between it and the senses yet the seat of Anguish is in the body or in some of the members of it but the seat of Grief and Sorrow is in the Minde The three different sorts of Dolour and this kinde of Dolour is invisible to the eyes of men because it is intellectual and hath but little reflection to the body except it become excessive in degree but when the grief of the minde is by long continuance turned into an habit of Sorrow then it hath a great influence upon the body for by flow paces and degrees it consumes the body the radical humor and the very marrow in the bones and therefore the inveterate Sorrow is accounted the worst Dolour of the three because it is in a maner incurable for it doth ordinarily reject all remedies that might ease and cure the same as for Anguish and Grief they are easily cured by removing of the cause of them the symtomes of the first being always visible and apparent by the paleness or the high colour of the face by the inflammation of the parts by the distemper of the pulse or by the pains that are felt in any of the members of the body to which remedies may be applied by learned Physitians and as for the grief of the minde which is recent and not yet inveterate the cause being known by such as frequent or are familiar with the grieved and afflicted party such arguments and seasonable consolations may be used that they may stifle this Cockatrice in the shell Thirdly The causes of these three different sorts of Dolour may be reduced to these Heads first To Publick secondly To Private thirdly To Natural fourthly To Accidental 1. The Publick causes of Sorrow should be more sensible to men then any other yet in these days they are not regarded although there never was greater cause first It was a cause of publick sorrow to the People of Israel when they were informed of the cruel and bloody decree that Pharoah King of Egypt had made to cast all their male children into the River Fxodws 1.22 that the Hebrew Nation might by degrees be utterly destroyed secondly It was a great cause of publick sorrow of weeping and lamentation for the whole Nation of the Jews Publick causes of of sorrow when they were advertised that their good and religious King Iosiah had been mortally wounded in the battel 's fought in the Valley of Megiddo against Necho King of Egypt 2 Chron. 35.23 and all their Army routed and defeated thirdly It was a great cause of publick lamentation and sorrow for the people of Israel when they saw before their eyes the Temple of the Lord to be burned the City of Ierusalem to be sacked 2 Chron 36.19 20. and the rest of the people to be carried captives into Babylon by the King Nebuchadnezzar for which great desolation the Prophet Ieremiah did wish that his head were waters Jer. 9.1 and his eyes a fountain of tears that he might weep day and night for the slain of the daughters of his people fourthly It was a great cause of publick sorrow for the people of the Iews that were scattered through the hundred and twenty seven Provinces of the great King Ahasuerus dominions Esther 3.12 13 14 15. when they were informed of the cruel decree that Haman their mortal enemy had obtained to put them their wives and children to the sword for which there was great mourning and lamentations in the said Provinces but specially in the City of Shushan 2. It was a private cause of sorrow to the old Patriarch Iacob when he was informed that his dear and beloved son Ioseph had been slain and devoured by wilde beasts Gen. 37.33 although he was living but had been sold by his brethren out of envy as a slave to the Ishmaelites Merchants that were travelling down into Egypt secondly Private causes of Sorraw It was a cause of private sorrow for King David to hear of the Rape of his daughter Tamar who was ravished by his own son Amnon and again of the murder of the said Amnon committed by his darling son Absolon 2 Sam. 13 14 and 29. in vindication of the Rape of his sister Tamar thirdly It was a cause of private sorrow for King Ieroboam and his Queen to see the best of all their children Abijah their elder son to be taken away by death in the flower of his age and the more because it was by a judgment of God 1 King 14.12 for the Idolatry of Ieroboam fourthly It was a cause of private sorrow for the great Emperor Augustus Cesar that his daughter Iulia by her impudicity was banished and that none of his grand children were thought worthy to succeed him in the Empire because of their vitious miscarriages but was inforced to adopt See Tacitus and Suetonius in his life or elect Tiberius Nero his wives son the worst of men for his Successor in the Empire 3. The causes of dolour of the Minde The causes of Dolour or Sorrow of the Minde may be these first The privation of the injoyment of mens desires may be the cause of their sorrow
Undantedness of Courage be abused and are not accompanied with Prudence and Justice that it is a destructive passion to mankinde and to the owners themselves But the good Effects of Valour and Undantedness that is guided by Prudence The good effects of undantedness that is guided by Prudence and Justice and grounded upon Justice are always honorable to their owners and profitable to the publike as it shall be proved by Instances first The undanted courage of David that was then but a young stripling in opposing the rage of the great Champion of the Philistins Goliah who was so presumptuous as to defie the Army of Israel and by consequence God himself 1 Sam. 17.10 was honorable to him and a cause of joy and comfort to all Israel secondly 1 Sam. 14.14 15 16. The undanted courage of Jonathan and of his Armor-Bearer who assailed a whole Garison of the Philistins and put them to rout was honorable to him and was the cause of a great deliverance to all the people of Israel thirdly The undanted courage of Scevola See Livius in the first Decade leb 2. who having attempted to kill the King Porsena killed his Secretary by mistake and having been taken and brought before the King burned his own hands in the flame of a torch with an admirable constancy to insinuate in the said Kings minde that there was three hundred young men more in his Camp that had vowed to kill him as he had essaied to do by which unparallel'd undantedness the King concluded a Peace with the Romans whereby Mutius Scevola obtained great honor and the Roman Commonwealth a great deliverance fourthly See Livius in the first Decade lib. 2. The undanted courage of Horatius Cocles another Roman Citizen who was so valorous as to oppose himself to the whole Army of the said King Porsena See Livius in the first Decade lib. 2. to hinder it from passing over a wooden bridge erected upon the river of Tiber which led into the City of Rome and made the same good till the bridge was broken down behinde him and then threw himself into the river and saved himself by swimming over by which noble action he obtained great honor See Plutarch in Themistocles life and preserved the City of Rome from ruine fifthly the undanted courage of a Greek souldier in the sea-fight that was fought between the Greeks and the Persians near to the Iland of Salamina is worthy of eternal fame for the Galley which he was in having boorded and grappled a Persian Galley the enemies having cut off the iron hooks he set his right hand to hold it and that being cut off he set his left hand and that being also cut off he held the Galley fast with his teeth till his head was cut off from his body sixthly The like undanted courage was seen in a Christian souldier when the City of Vienna was besieged by Soliman the Great Emperor of the Turks for in a great storm that the Turks gave to win a great Bastion or stone Bulwork which lieth next to the Gate that leads to Bressbourgh in Hungaria a Turkish Janisary having climbed the said Bulwork with a Turkish Flag in one of his hands to plant the same at the point of the Bulwork a Christian Souldier grappled with him and flung him and himself from the top of the Bulwork to the bottom of the Ditch and so were both slain chusing rather to sacrifice his life for the preservation of the City then to preserve the same by betraying the trust that was reposed on him See the Turkish History in Solimans life These are the laudable effects of true Valor and of an Undanted courage Fifthly The Spiritual Uses that may be made of this noble Passion of Undantedness may be these First Ephes 6.16 It may serve as a shield to cast back the fiery darts of the temptations of Satan Secondly It may serve as a precious antidote to expel the venome of all maner of Afflictions Tribulations and Persecutions that can befal a Christian in this life specially if it be grounded upon a true confidence in Christ for as the Prophet David saith Psal 56.4 In God I have put my trust I will not fear what flesh can do unto me And certainly if the Undanted courage of men proceed from a true confidence in God they shall never be moved but shall be like the middle region of the Air which is in a perpetual tranquility when the undermost is disturbed by impetuous Storms and Tempest Rom. 8.31 for as Saint Paul saith If God be for us who can be against us Thirdly This Undanted confidence in the mercies of God will comfort a Christian at the hour of death when all other worldly comforts do forsake him for that is the onely perillous time in which men have most need of this Grace of Spiritual Confidence and Undantedness because if Satan that roaring Lyon doth then miss of his prey men are for ever freed of his paws and therefore he doth then most bestir himself and uses the uttermost of his wiles to intrap the weak and sickly souls into his snares Fourthly This undanted Confidence made Shadrach Dan. 3.19 Meshach and Abednego to dispise the burning flames of a Furnace seven times more fierce then it was ordinarily heated and made the Prophet Daniel to contemn the rage of the hunger-bitten Lyons and 7.22 when he was cast into their Den by the malicious envy of the Princes Presidents and Governors of Persia Fifthly By Faith and this undanted Confidence all the ancient Heroes of the old Testament named in the eleventh Chapter of Saint Pauls Epistle to the Hebrews Heb. 11.26 did suffer with admirable patience those Anguishes of Body and perplexities of the Minde there specified because they had respect unto the recompence of the reward Sixthly This undanted Confidence caused the Apostle Peter and others to despise the threatnings and beating of the High Priest and to rejoyce Acts 5.41 because they were counted worthy to suffer shame for his Name And also it made all the Martyrs that suffered in Queen Maries days to bear with admirable patience the greatest torments that could be inflicted upon them It doth then appear by these discourses that an undanted Confidence in God serves as a shield in time of persecution to Gods children and that Valor and an undanted Courage guided by Prudence and grounded upon Justice is always honorable to the owners and profitable to the publike and that rash Undantedness is nothing but meer vanity temerity and vexation of Spirit c. CHAP. XV. Of the vanity of the passion of Fear AS nothing can be so good but it may be abused so nothing can be so evil but good use may be made of it Wine is excellent and good for it hath a natural propriety to rejoyce the heart Psal 104.15 and yet divers men abuse Wine and by the immoderate
power of the Concupiscible appetite to make the children of God commit such sins as the Prophet David and St. Peter did but it was because God was pleased to give them over to themselves to make them know that the perseverance in grace is a free gift of his neither is it in the power of the Irascible appetite to infuse such a continency as was found in Joseph nor such an unparallel'd undantedness as was in Shadrach Meshach Abednigo and in Daniel but it was the blessed Spirit of God that did infuse in their hearts that admirable fortitude c. CHAP. VI. Of the vanity of the passion of love AS after a hard winter the Sun is not onely seen to give a new life to all the Vegetative Sensitive and rational Creatures upon earth but also by the heat of his beams to penetrate the very bowels of the earth for to purifie the insensible creatures from their dross as the silver gold and precious stones even so after mens passions have by their natural commotions clouded their mindes with a Winter of anxiety and sorrow supernatural Love doth not onely revive their Spirits but doth also purifie them from the dross that these perturbations had left behinde them in their souls Love being then the most noble passion of men it is fit it should have the precedency in these Discourses sith without love all humane society should be extinguished and by it men deprived of all content and comfort in this life for the greatest comfort that men can attain to in this vale of Tears is to have a constant friend or a faithful consort in whose brest they may confide their greatest secrets and be partaker with them of their prosperity honor and glory or sympathize with them in their afflictions and miseries It is recorded that Fpamonides the Commander in Chief of the Thebanes a man as free from vain-glory as any one we read of did not glory in any thing but in this See Plutarch in his Moâ—is that his father was living when he won three famous battels against the Lacedemonians that were then held for their valour to be invincible regarding more the content and honor that his father whom he loved intirely should receive of it then his own and certainly the greatest fruit that men can receive of their prosperity is when their friends rejoyce and partake of it and the greatest comfort they can have in their afflictions is when they are assured to have friends that sympathize with their miseries Now the passion of Love being of such concernment I will for the better description of it speak in order of these particulars first of the definition of Love secondly of the essentiall cause of Love thirdly of the variety or kinds of Love fourthly of the end or interest of mens Love fifthly of the qualities required in men for to obtain Love sixthly of the good and bad effects of Love seventhly of the Love of God towards men eighthly of the Love of men to God First Love is nothing else but to wish good to another not for mens own interest Definition of love according to Aristotle and Senault but for the good and merit of the party beloved to whom men are to procure all the good and content that shall be in their power Upon which definition observe these four Particulars first that Love doth ever unite the Heart and Will of men to the party beloved And therefore the ancients said commonly that Alexander and Ephestion had but one soul in two distinct bodies because their joy and glory sorrow or disgrace was mutuall to them both secondly Mens love is not to be grounded upon the pleasure or profit they may receive by them they seem to love for it can be no love except their love be grounded upon the vertues and merits of the party beloved thirdly Lovers are to wish and procure the good and honor of their beloved and to require nothing of them but what they may do with honor and equity fourthly The goods and lives of men are to be at the disposing of the party beloved Honor Religion and Loyalty onely excepted for true friendship doth not oblige men to blemish their honor rack their conscience nor to betray their Prince at the request of their beloved because these requests are beyond the bounds of love which is only to be confined within the limits of Vertue See Plutarch in his Moralls and therefore the ancient Moralist highly commends this saying of a Heathen who said to his friend who did require him to perjure himself I am saith he thy friend untill the Altar and the like answer was given to Charls Duke of Burbon See Du Belay Commentaries when he did intreate his noble friends to side with him against his and their natural Prince Francis the first King of France Secondly The cause of Love is conceived by some to be a sympathy or natural inclination that inticeth men to love one man before another for it is often seen that when a man comes in the company of other men he never had seen before he will affect one of that company more then any of the rest which proceeds say they from a sympathy of affections that is between these two men Others conceive that the cause of Love doth consist in the influence of the Planets and for proof of their Opinions say that the love of Achilles to Patroclus See Homer See Quintius Curtius and of Alexander to the Amazon Queen was because they were born under one and the same Planet Others conceive the cause of Love to be the intimate conversation and familiarity of the parties which by an habit and custom begets love between them Others conceive that the goodness and beauty of the object is the cause of love and with these I concur in Opinion for God who is the Beauty and Goodness it self is certainly the essential cause of true love Thirdly All sorts of love may be comprised under natural and supernatural the natural hath divers branches that may all be reduced under the love of Interest and the love of Friendship of which I shall speak hereafter when I have set forth the Opinion of those who maintain there is five severall sorts of Love first the love of the innanimate creatures secondly the love of the sensitive creatures thirdly the love of the rational creatures fourthly the love of Angels fifthly the love of God first The love of the innanimate creatures is apparent in the prosecution of the perfection of their beeing the light ones ascending upwards and the heavy ones descending downwards as to their center secondly The love of the sensitive creatures is an impression wrought by the senses in their imagination by the objects it conceives to beuseful unto them which begetteth a desire to injoy them and this passion is not onely incident to the bruit creatures but also to the rational who are overcome by the sensitive appetite
exorbitant degree of Self-murdering but draw men off from their vain hopes and rash enterprises of which I shall have occasion to speak in the Effects of this passion of Despair The Causes of Moral Despair proceed from the fatall events from generous and Martial achievements or from the managing of affairs of State first after the Battel of Cannae that Hanibal won upon the Romans the young Nobility that fled and saved themselves from the rout of it were so transported with Despair that they resolved to fly out of Italy and had done so but for Publius Scipio who hearing of their resolution See Titus Livius in his third Decade lib. 3. came amongst them and after a sharp censure for their pusillanimity made them swear never to forsake him till he had been avenged upon Hanibal for the shame the Romans had received at Cannae And by their means was he elected by the voyce of the People to go as General into Africa to inforce Hanibal by a diversion of war to withdraw his forces out of Italy secondly The Carthaginians were so transported with Fear and Despair after the last overthrow that Scipio gave them not far from Carthage where he routed Hanibal and Iuba King of the Numidians that they lost all hope and courage and made a most shameful peace with the Romans for they did deliver up unto them all their shipping But contrarily after the loss of three famous battels that Hanibal won upon the Romans Hope inflamed their courage and by it from a conquered People they became Conquerors A good caveat for Princes or States to disswade them from Despairing in the dismal events of war but to foment hope in their breast in their greatest disgraces for if Despair creap in mens hearts that hold the Helm of the ship of the Common-wealth See Titus Iavius in his third Decade lib. 3. all goes to wrack thirdly Charls the seventh King of France was for sometime so possessed with Despair by the evil events that his men of war had daily with the English Armies that were under the Command of the Duke of Bedford that he suffered his own and publick affairs to go to ruine till his Concubine La bella Agnes by the perswasion of the French Peers See du Halian in his French History and some of his chiefest and most faithful Commanders of war infused Hope into his heart by saying unto him that she was minded to leave him for she had been told that she should be the Mistress of the most valourous Prince in Christendom and she saw nothing but pusillanimity in him for he did suffer the English to rent his Kingdom in piece-meals This coming from a woman filled the King with indignation and with the hopes that the Pucelle of Orleans as they called her gave him to raise the siege of Orleans that was then besieged by the English he took from that time forward his and the publick affairs to heart and became a valorous Prince fourthly In the beginning of the reign of Henry the fourth King of France the true French Nation was brought into such a plunge of Despair by the conspiracy of the Chatholick league and the association it had with Spain with the general revolt of the greatest Cities in France against their lawful King that had not God filled the heart of Henry the fourth with Hope and undanted valour that Kingdom had been rent and torn in pieces by forraign Princes fifthly Ahitophel fel into such a deep Despair 2 Sam. 27.23 because his Councel was rejected and Hushaies Councel was accepted that he went and put his house in order and then hanged himself sixthly The Cardinal Ximines See the Spanish History in the beginning of the reign of Charls the fifth who was Viceroy in Spain during the minority of the Emperor Charls the fifth died with Sorrow and Despair because his faithful services to the Crown of Spain were rewarded with an ingrateful dismission from the Court and all publick afairs First Apostacy is the cause of spirtual Despair for Saul King of Israel fell into Despair for disobeying the Commandment of the Lord Four causes of spiritual Despair in not cutting off all the Amalekites and for repairing to the Witch of Endor in stead to ask counsel of God and being wounded by the Philistins and his Army routed upon Mount Gilboa 1 Sam. 31.40 he fell upon his sword and killed himself secondly Iudas Iscariot that betraied our blessed Saviour fell into Despair for his Apostacy and disloyalty and brought again the thirty pieces of silver to the chief Priest and Elders and said I have sinned in that I have betrayed the innocent blood Mat. 27.3 4. and so went out and hanged himself thirdly Francisco Spira fell into Despair for his Apostacy for having imbraced the Protestant Religion he was by large promises of great preferments seduced to return to Popery but the worm of Conscience did so rack him See the book of Martyrs that he often cried out he was in in hell because the torments of hell as he said could not be greater then those that he did suffer fourthly The persecuting of Gods children is a cause to beget a spiritual Despair in men as you may see at large in a Treatise called The Iudgments of God upon Persecutors Thirdly The worst effect of Self-murdering Despair is that it deprives men of Repentance and by consequence of salvation for Repentance is a gift of the free grace of God neither can men repent when they will Six pernitius effect of De-Despair sith it is not their own gift but Gods and how can they repent when their Understanding and their Will which are the noblest faculties of their soul are perverted and so distempered with this furious passion of Despair that they are rather like mad then rational men and worse then the bruit creatures for none of them will destroy their own kinde much less themselves Repentance is a gift of God and is not at mens disposing and must be attained by prayers and not to be deferred to the hour of death for Self-murdering is an action contrary to the Law of Nature for Nature strives in all its Effects to preserve its own beeing besides it is expresly prohibited by the Law of God that one man should murder another but suppose he do yet if he murder the body of a man he cannot murder his soul but he that murdereth himself doth murder his owne body and his own soul and therefore deserves a far greater punishment then a common murderer secondly This kinde of Despair proceeds from a distrust of Gods mercie and what greater injury can be done to God by man then to distrust of his infinite mercy and to be a wilful rebel to his blessed Commandments thirdly It deprives men of all Reason Judgment Compassion and Humanity for they are more cruel to themselves then their greatest enemies can be to them as it
inlarge my self upon these particulars 1. On the Definition of this Passion 2. On the Causes of it 3. On the Nature and Proprieties of it 4. On the evil and good Effects of it 5. On the Spiritual Use of it First This Passion hath several names some call it Confidence and have good reason for it because it is its unseperable companion others call it Audacity but this terme doth blemish the true Nature of it The definition of the passion of Undantedness for audacious and presumptuous men are held to be under one and the same predicament other call it boldness but this word is often taken for Impudency but the French call it Hardiesse which doth express most properly the nature of it which is Undantedness in the English Tongue And here is the definition of it according to the judgment of the best Moralists Boujou fol. 7 23. Vndantedness saith one is an affection and assurance to eschew an evil and to overcome all the difficulties of it Vndantedness The Bishop of Marseilles in pag. 401. saith another is a Passion of the soul which strengtheneth the same and makes it confident it can overcome the most difficult evils that can befall it in this life and doth also incourage it to prosecute the good that is most difficult to obtain And to this last definition I assent as concerning the same the best of the two for it doth truely express the nature of this passion which is the third passion incident to the Irascible Appetite 2. The Causes of it are many but they may be reduced to these six the two first are Natural the two middlemost accidental and the two last supernatural The first natural cause of undantedness is a hot and moist temper of the body The first Natural cause may be a moist and hot temper of the body for the Naturalists have observed that all such as are of that constitution of body have ordinarily an undanted spirit The Natural reason of it is that this hot and moist temper doth suppress the Melancholick humor and its evil proprieties and effects whereby the blood that is hot and airy an ful ofvital spirits and the bilia that is dry and fiery and the flegm that is cold and moist being thus mixt become of a dilative nature and by the motion of the heart spread themselves into all the utmost parts of the body and inableth the minde to undertake and the body to execute all maner of generous designs be they never so difflcult or perillous The second natural cause of Undantedness may be the largeness of the heart of men for it hath been observed by the Physitians when they have opened the bodies of valiant and undanted spirits that their hearts were larger then the hearts of ordinary men See Plutarch in the life of Themistocles and King Xerxes King of Persia having caused the body of Leonidas King of Sparta to be opened partly out of admiration of his valour and in part out of curiosity The second natural cause of undantedness is the largeness of the harts of men to see whether the heart of such an undanted spirit was larger then the hearts of common men he found the same to be as big again and hairy all over a natural propriety incident to such as are of a hot and moist constitution of body to abound in hair The Natural reason why men with larger hearts then others should be addicted to Valour and Undantedness is this that the larger the heart is the morevital spirits it can contain which are the essential causes of Valour and Undantedness and therefore it may very well be that the largeness of the heart is a natural cause of Undantedness That tall and burly men are commonly less valorous then short and middle stastured men Divers men are of opinion that tall and burly bodied men are more addicted to Valour and Undantedness then short and middle-statur'd men but they are mistaken for tall men have smaller hearts then others and are also commonly more faint-hearted then other men and the Naturalists give this reason for it If their hearts say say were proportionable to their body they might have reason to be of that opinion but it is commonly smaller because Nature extended its vertue to the utmost parts deprives the inward parts of it Besides all the vitall spirits reside in the bloud and in the heart and by its motion they are dispersed through all the parts of the body Now the farther distant these parts are from the heart the longer time are the vital spirits a going to quicken and vivifie them and by consequence tall and burlybodied men are fuller of Flesh then of Spirits and less couragious then others It is true that they have a presuming undantedness because of their strength but what is done by strength proceeds from Strength and not from Valour which doth reside in the heart and in the minde and not in the arms and in the sinews And the most valorous and undanted spirits of this Age and of other Ages were for the most part short or at the most of a middle stature Leonidas See Plutarch in Peleopidas life and Peleopidas were but short men and Sir Francis Veere and Sir Francis Drake and the Marshal de Biron and the Marshal Gastion were all short men I conclude then that Valour and undantedness doth reside in the heart and minde and not in the strength of the body and that some of all statures may be valiant and undanted The first accidentall cause may be the innocency of men and the justice of their Cause for as Salomon saith Prov. 28.1 The wicked flee when no man pursueth but the righteous are bold as a a Lyon and it is daily seen that three true men will overcome half a dozen of theeves And when men fight for the preservation of the Liberties of their native Countrey and the lives of their wives and children and all the means they have they fight commonly like Lyons The second accidentall cause of Undantedness may be The relations support or alliances that men have with potent and powerful Princes or States for the confidence they have to be backt and supported by them doth make them undertake with undanted courage difficult and perillous enterprises The two accinentall causes of the undantedness of men for Instance The Hollanders a small Commonwealth being at the first supported by Elizabeth Queen of England and afterwards by Henry the fourth King of France have for many years together undantedly waged war with the great King of Spain and likewise the Kingdom of Sweden a petty Kingdom in comparison of the Empire of Germany being supported by Lewis the 13th King of France hath with an undanted courage waged war many years with the House of Austria See the Histories of Germany England and France Thirdly The first supernatural cause of the undantedness of men may be their zeal to Religion for
fear and tempt them 1 Cor. 6.15 To make of the members of Christ the members of a Harlot It is also one of the most prevailing snares of Satan by which he draweth more millions of souls into the Pit of destruction then by any other sin whatsoever And therefore give me leave to enlarge my self upon these particulars 1. Upon the definition of this passion 2. Upon the nature of it 3. Upon the causes why some are more addicted to it then others 4. Upon the evil proprieties of it 5. Upon the pernitious effects of the same 6. Upon the judgements that God doth inflict upon voluptuous men 7. Upon the means or remedies which are to be used to avoid the venome of it 8. And lastly Upon the express prohibition of the same by the Word of God First Volupty is a composed passion of love and desire The definition of Volupty arising from a tickling delight of the senses when men enjoy really or by imagination such objects as seem pleasant to their phansie It is so general that all such as are under the state of Nature are more or less addicted to it Nay the regenerate are sometimes ensnared by it by the temptations of Satan and their original corruptions the difference between them is that the unregenerate by their impenitency die in their sins and the regenerate by the free grace of the sanctifying Spirit of God are awaked out of this spiritual lethargy and by an unfained repentance are converted and reconciled to God Secondly It is of a feminine nature for all such as are overmuch addicted to this passion loose their masculine generosity and become effeminate Hercules did cast off his Club and Lyons skin to vest himself and spin like a woman before Omphale his Mistress And it is daily seen that voluptuous men imitate in their gestures carriage and fashions the Courtizans of these days for they powder their hair wear black patches and paint their Faces as they do It was not then without cause that the ancient Poets did represent volupty under the shape of the old Witch Circe for as she transformed the Passengers who sailed through the Straits of Sicilia into Swine if they listned to her Charms Even so Volupty doth transform into brute beasts rational men if they converse long and let themselves be ensnared by the alluring Charms of Harlots for as Zerubbalel proved it before King Darius the Charms of a beautiful woman are more powerful then strong Wine Esdras 3. from the 14. ver to the 32. or a mighty King Thirdly The Causes why some men are more addicted to this passion then others may be natural accidental or artificial such as are naturally more addicted to it are commonly of a hotter and moister constitution then others and these are of a sanguine complexion for the Bilious are hot and dry the Flegmatick moist and cold and the Melancholike cold and dry which are not so apt to the Venereal delight as the Sanguine The Accidental Causes are The hot Climate where men live for Heat dilates the spirits outwardly and Cold restrains them inwardly And Experience doth shew that the Africans Spaniards and Italians whose Climate is hotter then the Germans Dutch English are the most addicted to Venery And yet they are not so apt to generation as the last because the desire of the reiteration of the Act doth weaken their bodies and doth waste their spirits Idleness Pride and Fulness of bread is also an Accidental Cause why one Nation may be more addicted to Venery then another For this was the Cause why the Sodomites as the Prophet Ezekiel saith were so vitious Ezek. 16.49 and transported with Lust The Artificial Causes are Sophistical meats Delitious Wines and enticing Simples Drugs and Amber-gris over-much used in these days to provoke Men and Women to Lust See Guicciardine in the Emperor Charls the Fifth his Life Guicciardine records that a King of Tunis being at Naples spent five hundred Ducats in enticing Drugs and Amber-gris to dress a Peacock to incite himself and the company that supped with him that night to Lust But these Means are destructive to the Soul and Lives of Men. For Instance the Queen of Arragon gave Ferdinand her Husband an inticing Love-Drink to make him more apt to the Venereal sport See the History of Spain in Ferdinands Life but it cast him into an incurable Consumption which brought him to his grave And Van-Dick an excellent Dutch Painter lost lately his life by these inticing Drugs provoking to Lechery Alass Men are too prone of themselves to sin without Artificial Means to provoke them to it Fourthly The evil Proprieties of this vitious Passion are so numerous that I should be over-tedious to speak of them all and therefore will speak but of some of them First It is insatiable and may be compared to the horsleech to the barren womb and to the Grave for the Desires of Voluptuous men are never satisfied with their carnal Delights their bodies being sooner tyred with the reiteration of the Act then their Lust can be exstinguished For many have been found dead in their Mistresses Armes by endeavoring to satisfy their Lust beyond their Natural Abilities The Reason of it was because overmuch evacuation of the spirits exstinguisheth life Secondly it is as inconstant as the wind for they delight in nothing more then in changes because their judgement is so depraved by the Spirit of uncleanness which besots them that they cannot discern the beauty of one Object from another and do often forsake the most lovely to dote upon the most unworthy and deformed conceiving erroneously that stollen waters are the sweetest Thirdly It hath a Destructive quality for it provoketh men to commit the most abhorred sins that can be named Gen. 12.15 By it the Sodomites were inticed to commit with the very Angels the sin against Nature Gen. 19.5 It moved Pharoah and Abimelech to take away by violence Sarah Abrahams wife Reuben to defile his Fathers bed Gen. 35.22 Gen 34.2 Judg 19 25. Sechem to deflour Dinah The Gibeahnites to abuse brutishly the Levites concubine David to commit Adultery with Bathshebah and to vail his sin to murther Vriah her husband Amnon to ravish his own sister Tamar Sueton. in his Life Augustus to take away by force Livia from her husband Tacitus in his life Caligula to commit Incest with his two Sisters Nero to defile himself with his mother French History Faragonde to murther King Clotair her Husband that she might the more freely enjoy her Paramour English History King Edgar to murther his Favourite to marry his Wife And King Roderick to ravish Duke Godfreys Daughter Spanish History which was the cause of the Conquest of Spain by the Moors And a thousand like abhorred sins which should move Christians to abhor and flee from this most accursed and sinful passion as from a Serpent Fifthly The Effects of
to be the richest Citizen of Rome became so proud and insolent as to dispute and contest for the preheminency with Caesar The sixth propriety of it is That this sordid passion doth encrease by age and is most eager and insatiable when men have one of their feet upon the brim of their grave then when they are in their virility and the strength of their youth Whereas divers other passions as wrath ambition audacity and volupty do diminish by age which pernitious quality should move men to abhor the same sith no passion is more opposite to the tranquillity of the minde then it because when antient men should only have their minde fixed upon the means appointed by God to make their calling and election sure and to attain to that assurance of eternal bliss without which they can have no true peace joy nor content then is it most of all vexed and perplexed with the carking cares to encrease and preserve this Idol of theirs I mean their gold and silver Seventhly The Effects of Avarice are rather more then the Proprieties of it First They who are addicted to the same are never loyal to their Prince nor native Countrey And this moved Philip King of Macedonia to say that no Garison was impregnable See Plutarch in Paulus Emylius Life if a Mule laden with gold could enter thorow the gate of it And the Duke of Memorancy high Constable of France told his King Francis the First See the History of France that the Governour of Metz was the Phenix of that Age for loyalty sith he had been tempted with a great sum of gold by Charls the Fifth Emperour of Germany to deliver that strong hold into his hands But the Governour of Calice in Henry the Fourths dayes was not so faithful for being possessed with Avarice he yielded up that Garrison that is one of the Keyes of France into the Archduke Alberts hands for the sum of thirty thousand Crowns for which disloyalty he and his posterity were degraded of their Nobility The second Effect of Avarice is That it perverteth Justice and Judgement Cambises King of Persia caused one of his Judges to be flead alive See Herodotus in his Life and his skin to be nailed upon the Judgement Seat because he had been seduced by a Bribe to condemn the Innocent And the annihilation of the power of the Roman Decemviri Livie in his 1. Decade hapned because they took Bribes to pervert Justice And the two Sons of Samuel Joel and Abiah who were Judges of Israel 1 Sam. 8.2.3 out of Avarice walked not in the ways of their Father but turned aside after luere took bribes and perverted judgement And this moved Jethro to give this counsel to Moses his Son-in-law to provide out of all the people able men Exod. 18.22 fearing God and hating Avarice to make them Judges over Israel for wheresoever Judges and Magistrates are possessed with Avarice the Laws are trampled under foot and Justice is utterly perverted The third Effect of it is That Avarice doth foment divisions and contentions in all places wheresoever it raigneth 1. It was the Avarice of the Roman Patricians See Livie in his 1. Decade that was the only cause of all the divisions and commotions which hapned and continued for so many years together between themselves and the Plebeians or common people of Rome for Avarice is the mother of Usury Oppression and Extortion The fourth Effect of it is That it maketh Princes and private men as cruel as Lyons and Tygers 1. See the conquest of the West Indies The Avarice of Ferdinando King of Aragon moved him to undertake the discovery of the West Indies and with a barbarous cruelty to cause two or three millious of the poor Indians to be slain with the sword and to be torn in pieces with Mastiffs that his Spanish Subjects might have a freer possession of the gold and silver Mines that are there 2. It moved Philip the second King of Spain to exile out of his Dominions all the Christian Moors that were in Spain See the History of Spain in his Life the number of men women and children who were thus cruelly banished amounting to above three hundred thousand and all to add to his own demains their Lands and Inheritances under a false colour of zeal to Religion 3. It moveth Marriners and Merchants to venture their lives into the furthest and the most cold and hotest Climates of the World to encrease their Wealth many of them losing their lives in the prosecution of it 4. It moveth the most profane and debaucht sort of men to become Rovers and Murtherers upon the Roades and High-wayes to break open Houses and to carry away mens goods by force and violence The fifth Effect of it is That Avarice hath ever been the Incendiary of Civil Wars 1. See Caesars Commentaries and Plutarch in his Life The Avarice of the Plebeian Tribunes of the City of Rome in the days of Caesar was the cause of the Civil Wars which hapned between himself and Pompeys for by the extraordinary bribes he gave to some of them they bought the voyces of the Centuries of the people to make him continue in his Office of Lieutenant-General of the Roman Legions that were in France longer then it was appointed by the Law by which means he attained to such power and reputation that with the same Army which had been given him by the Senate and People to defend and enlarge the demains of the Roman Commonwealth he changed the Government of it and overthrew their Liberties 2. See Guicciardine in his History The Avarice of the chiefest Magistrates and Officers of the Commonwealth of Florence in the dayes of Peter de Medecis was the cause of all the Civil broyls which hapned in that State 3. The extream Avarice mixt with cruelty of the Duke D'Alva Deputy Governour for the King of Spain in the Low-Countreys was the cause of the death of many Nobles and of the miserable end of thirty thousand Protestants he caused to be drowned hanged and slain See the History of the Low-Countreys to confiscate their goods and of the rent of seven of those Provinces from the obedience of the King of Spain 4. The Avarice of the sixteen Zealots who had the Government of the City of Paris in the time of the Catholike League as they called it was the cause of all the Civil Commotions Murthers and Rapines which were committed in Paris See the History of France and in divers other Parts of France The sixth Effect of Avarice is That it endangereth men souls for men who are possessed with this passion care not what indirect courses they take to enrich themselves For he who maketh haste to be rich Prov. 28.20 saith Solomon cannot be innocent Intimating that his many sins and transgressions make him run hazzard to be cast into the Pit of eternal destruction which is confirmed
Spanish History 8. Philip the Second King of Spain caused Prince Charls his eldest Son to be put to death by the Inquisition of Spain out of an ambitious jealousie that he did aspire to bereave him of his Crown Seventhly The Effects of Ambition are worse then the Proprieties of it for Paracidies Murthers Rebellions Mutations of States Annihilations of Laws intestine and forraign Wars with all the desolations and mischiefs that follow them at the heels are the fruits of mens ambition and of these I will speak in order and by instances confirm the same For the first Andronicus the younger See the History of the Emperor of Constantinople See the Turkish History out of ambition to raign did most cruelly put out the eyes of his Grandfather and famished him to death in Prison 2. Sylimus out of ambition to raign did most unnaturally poyson his Father Bajazeth and flew all his brethren 3. 2 Chron. 2.10 Athaliah out of Ambition to raign slew and destroyed all the Seed-Royal of the House of Judah 4. Richard the Third King of England out of Ambition to raign See the English History caused his two Nephews to be murthered in the Tower and in hope to settle the Crown upon himself and his Posterity he put his Wife to death to marry the Lady Elizabeth his own Niece Incests being accounted no sin by ambitious men So they may as the House of Austria do daily uphold and advance by it their ambitious designs For the Second 2 Sam. 3.27 Joab out of ambition to remain still the Commander in Chief of the men of War murthered perfidiously under colour of friendship Abner and Amasa by stabbing of them under the fifth rib 2. Baasha out of ambition to raign murthered Nadab his Lord and King 1 King 15.27 3. Zimri out of ambition to raign murthered Ela his Lord the Son of Baasha 1 King 16.10 1 King 16.18 4. Omri out of ambition to raign rose up against Zimri and enforced him to burn himself in the Kings Palace For the Third Absolom out of Ambition to raign rebelled against his Father King David 2 Sam 26.21 and did endeavour to deprive him of life from whom he had his being 2. Zedechiah out of ambition to raign as an absolute King rebelled against his benefactor King Nebuchadnezzar 2 King 24.20 which was the cause of his miserable end 3. Otho out of ambition to raign rebelled against Galba who had made him his second favourite See Tacitus 4. Pippin the short out of ambition to raign rebelled against his Lord King Childerick and by force and violence caused him to be shaven as a Monk See the French History and to be shut up into a Monastery For the Fourth The ambition of Nebuchadnezzar was the secondary cause of the destruction of the Assyrian Monarchy And the ambition of Cyrus was the cause of the overthrow of the Babylonian Monarchy And the ambition of Alexander was the cause of the annihilation of the Persian Monarchy And the ambition of the Roman Commanders was the cause of the utter subversion of the Greek Monarchy See Sir Walter Rawleighs History of the World And the ambition of Caesar was the cause of the mutation of the Democratical Government of Rome into a Monarchical And the ambition of the Rulers of the Gauls Goths Visgots Vandals and Lombards of the utter ruine of the Roman Monarchy for they rent the same in pieces as a Kite rends a young chiken I say the secondary Cause for the secret will and Decree of God is the first and efficient cause of all the mutations of States or Monarchies And that is the reason why Saint Paul giveth this charge Rom. 13 1. Let every soul be subject to the higher powers for there is no power but of God the powers that be are ordained of God For the Fifth From the mutations of one kinde of Government to another Government See Plutarch in Caesars Life and Caesar in his Commentaries proceeds annihilation of the antient Laws of either of them It hapned so at Rome upon the change that Caesars ambition brought in that Commonwealth for the ancient Laws were annihilated and new Laws were established and likewise after the coming of William the Conquerour into England the antient Brittain Laws were annulled See Speed in his Historie of England and the Norman Laws confirmed This proverb being not more common then true viz. From new Lords new Laws and this might be proved by divers instances out of the antient and modern Histories but these two alledged will serve for brevity sake For the Sixth Ambition breeds divisions and divisions beget intestine and forraign Wars and from these Wars proceed the mutations of States and Monarchies and from these mutations the Annihilation of antient Laws Now the inseparable companions of forraign and intestine Wars are Atheism Schisms in the Church and a Laodicean luke-warmness in Religion and great effusions of blood injustices oppressions and desolations And all these mischiefs proceed from the exorbitant and irregular ambition of men and therefore I conclude that the passion of ambition is nothing but vanity and vexation of spirit and more destructive to mankinde then any other passion But before I speak of the means which are to be used to restrain the fury of this violent passion give me leave to examine the justice or injustice of the Wars which have been meerly undertaken out of an ambitious desire of vain-glory It is certain that if the actions of the most ambitious Princes and Common-wealths that have from the creation to this day bin upon the Earth were examined without prejudice or partiality that they would be found more injurious then just If men set aside the secret will Decree of God who had ordained from the beginning that these four great Monarchies here spoken of should be so successful in their encrease they would wonder how injustice and oppressions could have such prosperous events I will only speak of the Actions of the Romans and Greeks 1. Because they have been more clearly demonstrated to us by their Authors then the actions of the other two 2. Because the Actions of the Assyrians and Babylonians were guided by a special providence of God for the punishment of the sins of his own People the Jews As for the Actions of the Romans men may clearly see that from their very beginning until the days of Caesar they have for the greater part been unjust oppressive and injurious although they with much cunning and art did palliate them under the cloak of Justice and the right of the Laws of Nations And as for the Civil War undertaken by Caesar against his native Countrey it was voyd of all humanity and Justice and Ambition only gave him the audacity to resolve to enslave under his yoak those to whom he had been a servant for seven years together Nay with that very Army that they had given him and
Sam 23.8 to 39. from the 8 verse to the 39 verse Many other testimonies might be produced out of ancient Histories to prove that divers of the Heathen have attained to honor by their strength as three or four of the Hercules Hector Aiax Milun and divers others but in regard that the naturall strength of men is little accounted in these days when a youth of fifteen years of age can with a musket shot kill the strongest man upon earth I will onely say That strength is meer vanity and that honor obtained by it can not be grounded but upon a sandy foundation The third means to attain to honor is Beauty and Comliness sith strength is subject to many accidents and mutations For the third which is an extraordinary stature comliness and Beauty divers have attained to honor by these gifts of Nature l Sam. 10.23 24. Saul for his extraordinary stature and personal parts was chosen King of Israel as it appears in the tenth of the first of Samuel 23 24. verses And they ran and fetched him thence and when he stood among the people he was higher then any of the people from the shoulders upwards and Samuel said to all the people See ye him whom the Lord hath chosen that there is none like him among the people And all the people shouted and said God save the King but for as much as the personal representation of the body without the gifts of the minde is not sufficient for the discharge of the honorable function of a King it is said in the 9. verse that God was pleased to adorn him after he was chosen with the spirit of Government viz. with Prudence and Wisdom the chiefest ornament of a Prince And it was so that when Saul had m 1 Sam. 10.9 turned his back to go from Samuel God gave him another heart Contrarily it might be proved by divers instances that the deformity of body a small stature and the want of personal representation is a great impediment to Princes because the common people do always more regard the outward gifts then the intellectual as it doth appear in the lives of n See Plutarch and Quintius in their lives Agisclaus of Leonidas Philopoemen all wise and valourous Princes and Commanders that were despised of the vulgar sort because they were of a short stature and of no representative Majestie but the comliness of Alexander Alcibiades and of Pompeius the great made them to be honored and respected above others o 2 Sam. 14.25 Absolom was also much beloved of his father and honored of the people of Israel for his comliness and natural indowments for from the soal of his feet to the grown of his head there was no blemish in him And the comely feature and excellent beauty of p Esther 1.1 and 2.17 Esther made her from a Captive attain to that superlative honor to be the Queen of the great King Ahasuerus who raigned from India even to Ethiopia over one hundred and twenty seven Provinces and the King loved Esther above all the women and she obtained grace and favour in his sight more then all the Virgins so that he set the royall Crown upon her head and made her Queen in stead of Vesta It is then apparent that personal representation comliness and beauty are means whereby men and women attain to worldly honors but how sandy the foundation of these honors is I leave it to the consideration of the Reader for nothing is more casuall and subject to mutation then comliness and beauty and therefore these honors are meer vanity and vexation of spirit Fourthly The fourth means to attain honors is by riches Riches are an ordinary means in this vicious age whereby men attain to worldly honors for honors that are the onely recompence of wisdom prudence fidelity and valour are now sold for ready money and the honorable titles of Earls Barons Knights Esquires and Gentlemen are obtained for a lump of clay gold or silver the base excrements of the earth this is one of the secondary causes of all our distractions and present miseries and hath ever been the overthrow of Kingdoms and Common-weales as long as the Roman civil Magistrates Senators and Commanders of Armies were chosen in to such places of honor and trust for their noble q See Livius Decades descent their prudence and valour their State did flourish and did inlarge its dominions more in one century of years then it did in three after these places of honor became to be venal and purchased by concession for then men of no parts were for money promoted to highest dignities whereupon civill contentions were fomented factions increased and continuall bloudy r See Appian in the Roman civil wars intestine wars maintained by which the ancient liberties of that State were suppressed and the last government of it changed into an Imperiall Monarchy As long as the chiefest Officers of the Crown of France and the places of Judicature of the Realm were given by Charls the fifth surnamed the Wise to men of learning of wisdom and valour in recompence of their loyalty vertue and merits that Kingdom did flourish with peace honor and prosperity and the Courts of Å¿ See the History of France Parliaments of France had the honor for their Justice and Equity to be the Arbitrators and Umpires of all the differences that hapned in those days between the greatest Princes of Christendom but when these places of honor and trust were made venal in the reigns of Francis the second Charls the ninth and Henry the third and sold for ready money to such as gave most for them then was Justice and Equity banished and that flourishing Kingdom reduced to the brim of ruine and desolation by variety of factions and a bloody civill war And the selling of places of honor and Judicature of late years in this Kingdom hath been the spring of all the discontents divisions and distractions which have somented this unnatural war because of the injustice rapines and oppressions that followed at the heels the sale of these places of honor and trust for such as bought them by the great sold them to their Clients by retail whereby it appears that honors bought for money are destructive to the Sellers to the State and to the Buyers and that such as injoy them carry upon their foreheads rather ignomy then honor For the fifth Concerning favors many have been promoted to worldly honors The fifth means to attain to honors is by the favor of Princes by favor of the Prince or such as are in authority for their vertue and merits but of these commendable favors I intend not to speak of as being out of fashion in these days but undeserving favors proceeding from vicious services t Esther 3.5 Haman the son of Amedatha the Agagite was promoted by King Ahasuerus to the greatest honors of his Court for he advanced him and set his
hundreds over fifties and over tens to disburden himself of the heavie burthen he had taken upon him to Judge the people of Israel for by this councel he eased Moses and the people and made the Elders of Israel to be sharers with him in the honor of the rule and government of the Commonweal whereby he was much beloved and honored of all the people It was a wise Policy and and a wholsom counsel that the wise g 2 Sam. 20.16 22. woman of Abel gave to her Citizens to cut off the head of Sheba the son of Bichri and to cast it over the wall to Joab for by it she preserved the whole City from sack and ruine that might justly have been destroyed by Joab if they had persisted to be the abbettors of the rebellion of Sheba who received but a just reward for his treachery and rebellion for endeavouring to raise a new War against his lawful Prince the anointed of the Lord. And it was a Councel grounded upon true prudence and policy which was given to h See the French History in the life of Charls the seventh Charls the seventh King of France by his grave and faithful Counsellors of State to conclude a peace with Philip Duke of Burgundy although he should yield into his hands his Favorites who had by his assent murthered the Duke John of Burgundy father to Philip as he was treating a reconciliation with the said King about the murder the said John had committed upon the Duke of Orleance the Kings Uncle for by this counsel the Kingdom of France was preserved from ruine and restored again to its former flourishing condition and the murtherers had but their due deserts it being more just that half a dozen of guilty persons should perish then a whole Kingdom should be undone these Counsellors justly maintaining that these Favorites were not to commit such an act although they had a Warrant from the King Subjects being not bound to obey the commands of their Prince in things that be contrary and forbidden by the Law of God as murder is and so these Counsellors were for ever after much honored of the King and of the whole Kingdom for their wisdom and fidelity It was a wise Counsel grounded upon humanity and sound Policy that the Bishop of i See the History of Spain in Charls the fifth's life Osma gave to the Emperor Charls the fifth after Francis the first King of France became his Prisoner at the battel of Pavia that he should for his own glory and the future good of Spain set the said King of France at free liberty without ransome or capitulations at all and have him conducted with an honorable Train to the Borders of his own Kingdom but this good counsel being traversed by the Machavilian policy of the Duke d'Alva they made a prey of the said King which was the cause after the Kings release of a bloody war that was fatal to the Emperor and the Kingdom of Spain whereby it appears that by Prudence and just Policy men may attain to worldly honors and that Machavilian policy is ever destructive and subject to shame and ignominy For the eighth and the last which is Valour it hath ever been one of the first steps to worldly honors and is a commendable means so mens valor be exercised in the service of their Prince and propagation of the true Protestant Religion and for the desence of the Liberties of their native Countrey for by their valour in such cases they attain to the personal Nobility which is as I have said before the spring of the Nobility of race or descent for the Nobility obtained by valour in any of these three cases is the most honourable Nobility of all neither is it true valor to kill any one in duel but rather an effect of an inconsiderate wrath and of a desperate vindication and a meer murder in the sight of God for true valor appears onely in the Field against an open enemy and not to kill our friends for a word spoken unadvisedly or unawares and it hath been observed that these k Roarers are 〈◊〉 vâ—liant roaring Gallants that make a trade of killing of men for punctillios of honor in duels are commonly cowards and are the first that trust to their spurs in a pitcht Field by which it appears that their valor is rather a raging Passion then a vertuous valor which is always guided by Reason and Judgment Now by these eighth means by which minds most commonly attain to honour in the world the Reader may judge whether there by any probability that worldly honors should afford men any true content sith the means by which they are obtained are subject to so many accidents and are so vain and full of vanity and vexation of spirit For the second branch of this Discourse concerning the persons that deserve to be honoured I will be very brief because all rational men are acquainted with this duty first in the first of S Peter Chap. 2. ver 17. there is a general charge Honor all men love the brotherhood fear God and honor the King and Solomon in his l Prov. 39. Proverbs goes further for we are not onely to fear God but we are also to honor him Honor the Lord saith he with thy substance and with the first fruits of all thine increase and next to God and the King we are to honor our Parents m Exod. 20 12. Honor thy father and thy mother that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee God to induce men to honour their Parents makes here a precious promise to obedient and respective children the next to our Parents we are to honor civil Magistrates and the Messengers and Ministers of God and next to them the grave and ancient men n Levit. 19.32 Thou shalt rise up before the hoary head and honor the face of the antient and yet who are more despised then old men in this corrupt Age for young men are now preferred to places of Dignity Profit and Trust contrary to former Ages for Solomon by these words As snow in Summer and rain in Harvest so is honor not seemly for a fool intimates that young men are not to be honored with places of Trust in Church or Commonweal because they are for want of experience no better then fools and yet they account themselves generally out of a vain presumption wiser then old men whom they call doting fools for want of the knowledge of this Proverb Before Honor is Humility for were they truly wise they would be humble and not presumptuous for presumption is the companion of Folly besides vertuous learned wise prudent and valiant men are to be honored I distinguish Learning from Prudence and Wisdom because learned men are not always wise nor prudent although Learning is a means to attain to Wisdom but Learning is the theorical part of Wisdom and without a
c 2 Sam. 15.6 stole the hearts of the people of Israel from his father Divers other qualities might be produced which abstract Love from others but these shall serve for this time Sixthly The effects of Love are either Good or Bad according to the end of it for if the end of mens Love be Good the effects of it are always comfortable but if the end of their Love is to satisfie their lust it is always destructive and fatall and so proved the love of d Gen. 34.2 Sechem to Dinah and the love e 2 Sam. 13.14 28. Homers Illiades Livius Decade 1. lib. 2. of Amnon to his sister Tamar and the rape of Helen by Paris was the cause of the ruine of Troy the Rape of Lucretia by Tarquinus was the cause that Rome from a Monarchy fell into a Democracy the violence committed by the f Judg. 19.25 Gibeathites to the Levit's Concubine was the cause of the death of fourty thousand Israelites and almost of the utter ruine of the whole Tribe of Benjamin and the love of Antonius to Cleopatra was the cause of their lamentable end but sith a volume would not contain all the examples that might be produced of the evil effects of lust varnished over with the name of Love I will now speak of the effects of true Love first See Plutarch in the two young Graccus lives The love of Tiberius Graccus towards his vertuous wife Cornelia was such as he slew the male Serpeut and spared the femall on purpose that he might save her life by the loss of his own secondly The love of Antonio Perez's wife to him was such as she ventured her own life to save his See the Spainsh History in the raign of Philip the second thirdly The love of Portia daughter to famous Cato and wife to Martius Brutus was so vehement and passionate that being informed of his death at the battell of Philippi See Bâ—utus life in Appian she smothered her self by casting a handful of burning coles into her mouth fourthly The love of Artemisa Queen of Caria towards her beloved husband Mausolus was so violent that being dead See Plutarchs Morals it could not suffer his body to have any other grave then her own bowels for she caused the same to be burned and drank a portion of his ashes at every meal in commemoration of their constant love See the Italian History fifthly The love of an Italian Gentleman to his betrothed Mistress is to be commended for hearing she had been taken at sea by some Pirats of Tunis and sold for a Slave he went over into Africa and redeemed her with an incredible sum of money sixthly The incredible love and fidelity of Damon and Pythias two Sicilian Noble men is to be admired for Dionysius the Elder King or Tyrant of Syracuse having upon some jealousie of state caused Damon to be cast into prison and to be condemned to death Damon presented a petition unto him desiring to have leave for eight days to go into the Countrey to set his houshold in order See old Dionisius life promising to return Dionysius granted the same upon this condition that some other Noble man of his means and degree should bail him body for body and life for life and should remain in durance untill the day appointed for his return Pythias his intimate friend bailed him of his free accord and yeelds himself prisoner in Damons stead but the day being come and almost the hour appointed at hand and Damon not appearing Dionysius began to deride Pythias for his credulity of the constancy of his friend yet before the hour went out Damon came in and presented himself to the King desiring his friend might be discharged at whose love fidelity and constancy Dionysius was so astonished that he set them both at liberty and required to be accepted for the third of their society yet all these admirable effects of Love are as much inferior to the Love of God towards man as the finite is inferior to the infinite as it will appear by the insuing Discourse Seventhly The Love of God towards men is altogether incomprehensible as it will appear by these expressions of the blessed Spirit For God saith St. Iohn g Ioh. 3.6 so loved the world that he gave his onely begotten Son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have eternal life and Christ saith himself h Ioh. 10.10 That he is the good Shepherd who hath given his life for his sheep And St. Iohn saith i 1 Ioh 4 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 Beloved let us love one another for love cometh of God and every man that loveth is born of God he that loveth not knoweth not God for God is Love In this was manifested the love of God towards us because that God sent his onely begotten Son into the world that we might live through him Herein is love not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins Beloved if God so loved us we ought also to love one another no man hath seen God at any time if we love one another God dwelleth in us and his love is perfected in us hereby know we that we dwell in him and he in us because he hath given us of his spirit And we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Saviour of the world These words of St. Iohn and divers others to the later end of this Chapter do confirm the Point that Gods Love is the Adamant stone that draweth our love to him and that we cannot of our selves love him before he be pleased to love us Eighthly As for the love of man towards God it comes infinitely short of Gods love towards them for if any love God it is a gift of his free grace and God hath loved his elect before the creation of the world and St. Paul a Rom. 9.13 doth give us a clear instance for it Rom. 9.13 For God saith he loved Jacob and hated Esau from their mothers womb and the heart of b 1 Sam. 13.14 David was framed after Gods own heart and that is the reason why this holy man hath such rare expressions in his Psalms of his unfained love towards God And to confirm the choise and election of Gods faithful ones we have divers instances of it in his Word for Moses c Numb 16.5 was a chosen servant of the Lord as it appears by these words Even him whom he hath chosen will he cause to come near unto him And Aaron d Deut. 18.5 was a chosen servant of the Lord as appears Deut. 18.5 And Cyrus King of Persia e Isai 44.28 was a chosen servant of the Lord to execute his will as it appears Isai 44.28 And St. Paul f Act. 9.15 was a chosen vessel of the Lord as it appears Act 9.15 But
Plutarch in Marcus Antonius Life and Augustus Cesar for which Antonius was advised by an Astrologian that the good Angel of Augustus would at last prevail over his and the great antipathy there was between Socrates and his wife who had lived one with another live Cats and Dogs if the unparallel'd temperance of Socrates had not mitigated their debates And it is seen daily that men hate the company of some other men that never did them wrong nor give them occasion of offence and I have known my self a man and a woman of good means that had such an natural aversion one against the other that they were inforced to live asunder and yet neither of them could shew a just cause from whence this antipathy of affections did proceed There is another sort of Humane Hatred that is accidental but the description of it will be more proper in the next Discourse Thirdly some of the accidentall causes of the Hatred of men are these for they are so numerous that I cannot speak of them all first An inveterate wrath is oftentimes the cause of an everlasting Hatred for when Wrath cannot vindicate it self at the present it becomes an incurable Hatred because Wrath is a suddain and fiery distemper of the Heart which is but like a lightning if it may freely vent it self but if it be restrained in the brest it becomes an irreconcilable Hatred It is a common saying That Cholerick men never sleep upon their anger and that it is but a flash that passeth away but if this Choler hath not some vent it is changed into such a hatred that all the precepts of Philosophy can hardly extinguish the fire of it secondly One of the greatest causes of Hatred is the deniall of Love or more properly of Lust the denial that Joseph gave to his Mistress b Gen. 39.17.20 changed her love to a cruel hatred for she caused him to be cast into a dungeon and in stead of imbracements to be fettered with irons thirdly Self-Love is an ordinary cause of Hatred for such as are possessed with this vanity think themselves never sufficiently respected nor honored and nothing doth sooner engender Hatred in men then misprision fourthly Calumnies and false Reports that blemish a mans Fame and Reputation are cause of an inveterate Hatred for Honor is dearer to some men then their own lives and many have constantly indured all other injuries that have been cast into great distempers by Calumnies which have also bred such a hatred in their hearts that they have shunned all familiarity with men See Plutarch in his Life as it may appear in Tymolions Life fifthly The infidelity of men is often the cause of mens hatred for Confidence and Trust abused is a great motive to Hatred and the reason why Hatred is so predominant in these days is that men are so much addicted to betray the Trust that others have confidently deposed in their hands for like Weather-Cocks they change their friendship upon the lest occasion of their friends disgrace nay Religion it self that should be the greatest link and the strongest bond to knit the fidelity of men together is as subject to mutation and change as the Windes for look as the current of the Times goes these Camelions Religion is according to that which is most in fashion sixthly Jealousies of Hate and jealousies of Love are great provokers to Hatred The jealousies that the Turkish Janisaries did conceive See the Turkish History in his Life that their Emperor Osman would change his Militia and remove the Seat of his Empire from Constantinople to Damasco begot such an implacable hatred in their hearts that they caused him to be strangled in the black Tower of Constantinople The jealousie that Mecaenas had conceived of the inconstancy of his wife did not onely deprive him of sleep for three years together but did also ingender such a hatred in his heart against women that he ever after abhorred the sight of them And that is the reason why the hatred proceeding from the jealousie of Love is held to be the most implacable Fourthly Princes Favorites are addicted to Hatred as it may appear by the carriage of Haman the Agagite towards Mordecai c Esther 3.2 3. because he did not worship him as the other Officers that sate at the King Ahasuerus gate and his hatred was so cruel that conceiving Mordecai to be too base an object for his hatred he made sute to the King that all the Jews living in his Dominions might be destroyed in one day secondly Envious men are always addicted to Hatred and upon the most unjust and ridiculous occasion that can be imagined viz. for the prosperity of their intimate friends or next neighbours whose good and wellfare they are obliged by the Commandments of God to prosecute with all their might and yet the malice and corruption of mens hearts is so vile and so base as to hate those who never injured them for no other reason but because God is pleased to bless them more then they exceeding in malice those murmuring labourers who envied at the goodness and liberality of the Father of the Houshold that sent them into his Vineyard yet they had some colour for their discontent because they had born the burden and heat of the day but these have none at all and therefore their censure will undoubtedly be greater at the last day then that which was given to these Labourers viz. d Matth 20.11 12 13 14.15 Is it not lawful for me to do what I will with mine own Is thine eye evil because I am good thirdly Effeminate and vicious Princes are addicted to Hatred It is recorded by Dion that as the Emperor Commodus was riding over the stone-bridge that crosseth the River of Tiber at Rome he saw six noble Gentlemen who were discoursing together upon the bridg and having sent for them he inquired of what they discoursed they answered they were talking of the noble Acts and vertuous Parts of his father Mark Aurelius See Dion in his Life whereupon he commanded that they should instantly be cast into the River saying They could not speak well of his father but they thought ill of him Such a hatred did this effeminate and cruel Emperor bear to the Vertue of his deceased father and it is daily seen in this age that the base and profane People doth hate extreamly vertuous and religious men fourthly Ambitious and high Aspiring men are much addicted to Hatred for they hate mortally their competitors and all their abettors witness the irreconcilable hatred that was between Marius and Sylla See Plutarch in their Lives and their adherents and the horrid hatred that was between Antonius Caracalla and his brother Geta See Herodion in their lives that did at last transport Antonius with such rage that he slew his brother in his mothers arms fifthly The common people are addicted to hate the Favorites of Princes because they
their brethren and hate sin I hate every false way m Psal 119.104 I hate vain thoughts but I love thy Law saith the Prophet David And again I hate and abhor n Psalm 119.163 lying but thy Law do I love Do I not hate them O Lord o Psal 139.21 22. that hate thee and am not I grieved with those that rise against thee I hate them with a perfect hatred I account them my enemies The fear of the Lord p Pro. 8.13 saith Salomon is to hate evil Pride and arrogancy and the freward mouth do I hate Hate the evil and love the good q Amos 5.15 saith the Prophet Amos. To conclude with the Apostle St. Peter r 1 Pet. 2.1 2. Let us lay aside all malice hatred env e and hypopocrisies and all evil speaking as new born babes desire the sincere milk of the word that ye may grow thereby c. CHAP. VIII Of the vanity of the passion of desire AS the billows of the Sea rowl one after another till they break themselves into fome against the clifts or rocks of the adjacent shores even so the desires of men drive away one another till they vanish away into the smok because the objects of their desires are for the greater part but vanity for not one man of a thousand doth fix his desires upon the right object that can satisfie his desires and fill his heart with joy and content and although mens desires be as free as their thoughts for the greatest Tyrants have no power over them yet there is an Eagle eye above who searcheth the reins that knows their desires as well as their thoughts Men should therefore be very cautious in their desires sith they proceed from the concupiscible appetite and are properly called Cupidity and in plain English Coveteousness and how dangerous it is to desire or covet any thing prohibited in the Law of God I leave it to the judgment of the Reader sith in the Interpretation of our blessed Saviour who was the best Interpretor of the Law that ever was upon earth He that coveteth a woman to lust after her hath already committed adultery with her If evil desires then be so criminal men should be very wary how they fix their desires for they have a hand in all their passions Senault in his use of passions pag. 273. either to furnish them with weapons or with strength to afflict them And among all the rest of the passions there is not any which hath more branches proceeding from one and the same root then this passion of Desire for if all the desires of men were limited by their objects the number of passions proceeding from the general passion of Desire would be as numerous as a Swarm of Bees I have already spoken of three of its branches viz. first Of the desire of worldly honors secondly of the desire of worldly riches thirdly Of the desire of worldly pleasures the first being the passion of Ambition the second the passion of Avâ—rice the third the passion of Volupty And now I shall speak of the fourth branch called Cupidity which is of greater concernment then any and therefore give me leave for the better description of it to speak of these particulars in order 1. Of the definition of mens desires 2. Of the two essential causes of them 3. Of their effects and proprieties 4. Of the comfort that proceeds from the spiritual desires First All the desires of men may be reduced to these two heads or comprised under Necessary and Superfluous The Necessary are limited but the Superfluous have no bounds because they cannot be numbred And this is the most approved definition of mens desires Desire is nothing else but a passion that men have to attain to some good which they possess not which they conceive to be convenient for them The Bishop of Marsulles pag. 206. And not withstanding mens desires are commonly fixed upon objects that seem good but are really evil because the Senses delude their Imagination and often-times their Reasion and Judgment Now the passion of Dâ—sire differs not onely from the passion of Love but also from the passion of Delight because Love is the first motion or passion that intice 〈◊〉 to prosecute the good The definition fâ—nens desires whether it be present or absent but the dâ—sire is a passion that enduceth men to prosecute the good that is absent and the passion of Delight is onely a sweet content of the possession of the good See Senault pag. 27. after men have obtained the same Senault saith That the passion of Desire is nothing else but the motion of the soul towards a good which she already loveth but doth not as yet possess whereby it appears that mens desires are ordinarily fixed upon uncertainties and that is the reason why I said formerly they often vanish into smoke Secondly The two most essential causes of mens Desires The impotency of men is a cause of their desires is their Impotency and Discontentedness for God who is Omnipotent hath no Desires and in the fruition of his blessed and glorious presence is the end of mens desires And suppose he had desires yet the end of them would be his own incomprehensible Beauty and Goodness If God doth but Will he hath the injoyment of his Desire as it is apparent in a Gen. 1.3 Genesis And God said or God willed Let there be light and there was light But it is not so with the greatest Monarchs in the world for through their impotency they are inforced to desire and their wishes and desires all are oftentimes rejected by him who is alsufficient to grant them the injoyment of their desires See Plutarch in Aâ—â—randers lite Alexander the Great was the greatest Monarch upon earth and yet his wishes and desires nay the prayers he made to his Idols or imaginary gods for the recovery of his dear and beloved Ephestion were rejected and these desires did manifest his impotency See Suetonius in Augustus life Augustus Cesar was the greatest Monarch in the world he wished and desired that the overthrow given to his Legions in Germany might be vindicated and out of impatiency of the performance of his desire he often like a mad man stamped with his feet upon the ground Crying out Varro Varro give me my Legions again and yet in his life time he did never obtain his desire It appears then that the impotency of men in the most eminent is a cause of their desires The discontentedness of men is a cause of their desires secondly the discontentedness of men in their Station and Calling is the cause of many fond desires for there is not one of a hundred that is contented with his condition because there are but few Diogenes in these days that are contented with a Tub to keep them free from the injuries of the air See Plutarch in his Morals or with a wooden-bowl
evill then upon the good except the nature and propriety of them be changed by divine Grace The effects of mens desires As for the effects of mens desires they are as I have said before Good of Evil according to their objects but sith it hath been proved that they are commonly fixed upon evil objects their effects must of necessity be rather evil then good If the honors of this world be their object the fruits and effects of Adhbition is the desolation of Kingdoms the shedding of innocent blood and the miseries that follow civil and intestine wars If their object be the riches of this world their effects are carking cares moiling and toyling and vexation of minde in their acquisition and fears and apprehensions in their keeping and grief and sorrow in the losing of them If the pleasures of this world be their object the effects wil be the wasting of their means the impairing of their health and the indangering of their souls But if the object of their desires be the glory of God then their effects will be comfort in this life and eternal bliss in the life to come The fruition of Gods presence is the onely object that can satisfy the desires of men So that upon the good or bad election of the objects of mens desires depends their happiness or woe in this life and their torment or glory in the life to come It behoveth men therefore to be wary upon what objects they fix their desires sith there is not any thing under the Sun that can satisfy them for if all the excellency of the creatures were abstracted into one yet it could not satisfy the desires of men sich their soul is a spark of the divine essence that can never be free of the anxiety and perturbations of minde that proceed from the inconstancy and restlesness of mens desires till by grace it doth injoy the sight of the glorious presence of God the original Spring of it who is the fulness and perfection of all bliss for that object onely can satisfy the wishes and desires of their souls Fourthly The comforts that Christians may receive in this life of their godly desires are many as it shall appear when I have perswaded them to indevor to banish from their minde the swarms of vain desires that disquiet the tranquillity of their souls which may be done by these means first To hate and abhor all carnal desires for as long as they have a predominancy in their souls it is impossible for them to have a feeling of the comforts proceeding from the spiritual desires for the flesh having the mastery over the spirit it keeps these effects under hatches Allusion upon the 19. Psalm ver 9 10. But if men desire the sear of God and prefer his Statutes and Judgments before the refined gold and hold them sweeter then hony or the hony comb they will by degrees obtain the dominion over their carnal desires The second means is to indevor to obtain a contented minde for discontentedness is the cause of the extravagancy of mens desires But godliness a 1 Tim. 6.6 with contentment saith St. Paul is great gain for the daily discontent of men makes them desire they know not what but when they are contented with their estate and condition in this life Four means to contain mens desires within their limits their desires aspire higher and endeavor to attain to the supream good as the onely object of mens desires The third means is to purifie their hearts for as clean and pure streams cannot proceed from a foul and muddy Spring even so it is impossible that godly desires should spring from the hearts of men except they be purified and sanctified by the Spirit of God for as our blessed Saviour saith b Matth 15.19 Out of the heart proceed evil thoughts murders adulteries fornications c. and these are the effects of mens desires whose hearts are not purified by grace because the Concupiscible appetite resides in the heart and this appetite is the spring or root of all the desires of men The fourth means is for men to set a watchful Centry over their eyes for by the eye men perceive the objects and the objects are the moving cause of mens desires and Cupidities by the eye King David saw the beauty of c 2 Sam. 11. ver 2. Bathshebah by which he was tempted to lust Therefore men must make a covenant with their eyes as Job did d Job 31.1 for they are the windows whereby mens lascivious desires are conveied into their hearts and by these means and the free grace of God men will be able to keep their desires within the limits prescribed in his Word from which wil proceede first Six comforts proceeding from the spiritual desires of men A true and real contentment of minde which cannot be obtained as long as their vain desires do interrupt the peace of their souls for being freed of their extravagant desires of Cupidity They may as St. Paul saith be contented with that they have sith e Heb. 13.5 God hath promised that he will never leave nor forsake them secondly An unspeakable inward joy for being free from the continuall vexation proceeding from the irregularity of their desires whereby they have more liberty to beat the ways of righteousness and make their f 2 Pet. 1.10 calling and election sure from which they were distracted by their worldly desires thirdly A far greater consolation by the familiar communion they will have with their gracious God then they had before At whose right hand saith the Prophet David g Psal 16.11 there are pleasures for evermore fourthly A fervent desire to walk in the ways of righteousnes and to seek the Lord in the night and in the morning as the Prophet Isaiah saith h Isa 26.9 With my soul have I desired thee in the night yea with my spirit within me will I seek thee early fifthly A certain assurance that their desires shall be granted sith they have banished their former vain and extravagant desires as Salomon saith i Pro. 10.24 The fear of the wicked shall come upon him but the desire of the righteous shall be granted sixthly A hunger and thirst after righteousness whereby they shall be in love with all righteous duties and be induced to k Psal 1.2 meditate day and night in the Law of God and by their constant habit in the ways of true piety they shal be made partakers of this blessing of our blessed Saviour l Matth. 5 6. Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness for they shall be filled viz. with incredible joy and unspeakable comfort It is then apparent that worldly desires are but meere vanity and vexation of spirit and that there is no true comfort but in the Spiritual c. CHAP. IX Of the vanity of the passion of Flight or Eschewing GOd out of his infinite love to
this world would imbrace all manner of desperate resolutions and make themselves away to be rid of the continual anguish grief and sorrow they are subject unto in this life And I am perswaded that the want that the Heathen had of this spiritual hope of the eternal joy to come was the cause that so many of them laid violent hands upon themselves for some to be free from the imperious insultations of their mortal enemies or disdaining out of a manly courage to be oblieged for their lives to their clemency have ripped up their own bowels with their swords See Plutarch in Cesar and Catoes lives as Cato did rather then he would fall alive into the hands of Cesar and others to be rid of the excessive grief and sorrow which did rack and torture their souls for the loss of their beloved husbands or intimate friends have drunk Poyson or stifled themselves with burning coals as did Portia for her dear husbands death Martius Brutus See Plutarch in Marcus Brutus life But Christians being supported by this spiritual Hope and with an assurance that all worldly disgraces and afflictions are not for continuance but like unto a vapor arising from the earth which is suddenly annihilated by the beams of the Sun accounts these things unworthy to be regarded in comparison of the eternal joy and glory that is reserved in the highest heavens for such as suffer with patience the crosses and tribulations of this life for righteousness sake This passion being then of great use for all true Christians I will for the better descriptition of it extend my Discourses on these particulars 1. On the Definition of worldly Hope 2. On the Causes of it 3. On the Objects of it 4. On its Proprieties 5. On its Effects 6. On the Excellency of spiritual Hope First There are diverse Definitions of Hope some say it is but an expectation of the good The definition of worldly Hope others say It is nothing but a confidence that men have that such things will happen to them which they have conceived in their imagination The Bishop of Marseillis pag. 500. Theophrastus Bojou pag. 723. Others say It is a passion of the soul whereby upon the impression that men have of some future good which is represented to their imagination by the senses as difficult to obtain whereupon they addict themselves to an eager prosecution of it conceiving to be able of themselves to obtain the injoyment of the same Hope saith another is a motion of the soul that inticeth men to expect and seek after a good that is absent in which they see some probability to be obtained and Senault agreeing with these two last Opinions adds that there can be no real hope except there be an apparent possibility it may be obtained Hope is then the first passion incident to the Irascible appetite of great use to men if they fix their hope upon vertuous or religious objects Secondly The causes that beget worldly Hope in the heart of carnal men are these first a continual prosperity in their understandings doth puffe up their hearts with vain and deluding hopes that the same prosperity will still continue and accompany their designs to the end See Plutarch in Pompejus life Pompejus the great was deluded by this hope for relying overmuch in the prosperous events he had formerly had in war having never been foiled by any of his enemies he neglected to raise a sufficient Army to hinder Cesars coming into Italy as he was counselled to do by his intimate friends but hoping on his former prosperous success he said unto them If I do but stamp with my feet upon the ground souldiers will issue out of it in all parts of Italy to side with me against Cesar but this vain hope was the cause of his utter overthrow for he was inforced to forsake Italy to the mercy of Cesar and to fly beyond the seas where his Army was defeated and himself constrained to save his life by shipping into Egypt where he was basely murdered secondly Might and Power doth fill the hearts of carnal men with vain hopes Xerxes King of Persia relying upon his numerous Army of a million of men hoped to over-run Greece See Plutarch in the life of Themistocles and to dry up the very rivers with the incredible number of his foot and horse but he was deluded in his hope and in the straits of Thermopilae his whole Host was stopped and foiled by Leonidas King of Sparta who had but three hundred valiant Lacedemonians with him and presently after his invincible Navy was utterly routed by Themistocles by the Island of Salamine and he himself inforced out of fear to fly into Asia with a great part of his Army thirdly Youth Strength and a sanguin Complexion fills the hearts of young Gallants with vain hopes and makes them undertake things that seem impossible See Quintius Curtius in his Alexanders life as Alexander the Great did the Conquest of the greatest part of the world with an inconsiderable Army of fouty thousand foot and twenty thousand horses in comparison of five or six hundred thousand that Darius brought into the field and this passion of Hope was so predominant in him that before he departed out of Greece he gave away to others his Patrimony estate and reserved nothing for himself but the uncertain hope of the conquest of Asia The natural reasons why young strong and sanguin Complexions are more addicted to this passion of Hope then others are Six causes of the worldly Hopes of men first that they abound in spirits for the Sanguin have more blood and spirits then the Cholerick Flegmatick or Melancholick men secondly they have time by their young age to prosecute the injoyment of their hopes thirdly they have strength and activity to overcome all difficulties that seem to bar them from the injoyment of their hopes whereas ancient men are more addicted to the passion of Fear then to Hope Three reasons why young men are more addicted to Hopes then ancient men first Because their natural strength and vital spirits are wasted with age secondly because their long experience hath made them more considerate then young men thirdly because they have one foot in the grave and have not time to prosecute the injoyment of their hopes and are better acquainted with the incertitude of the undertakings of men fourthly Men that are versed in the affairs of the world have their hearts filled with vain hopes because they think nothing impossible unto them by reason that their long experience in the affairs of this world hath drawn them out of the snares of many perplexities fifthly Men that have been divers times in great dangers by Sea and by Land have their hearts filled with Hope when they fall into danger hoping then to avoide the same as they have done formerly sixthly Men of undanted spirits have their hearts filled with vain hopes because the
daily the fears and apprehensions of death which is worse then death it self and die for one death a thousand deaths Yet if men will dive into the nature and effects of this passion of Despair without partiality they will finde that good use may be made of it so it doth not attain to that exorbitant and horrid degree of Self-murdering Give me leave therefore to extend my Discourse upon these particulars 1. On the definition of this passion of Despair 2. On the diversity of the Causes of it 3. On the bad and good Effects of it 4. On the Remedies to allay the fury of it There are divers sorts of Despair which may be reduced to these three first Worldly secondly Moral thirdly Spiritual The worldly Despair is nothing else but a conceit of an impossibility in the acquisition of the vain hopes of men as it will appear in the Causes and Effects of that kinde of Despair The definition of the Moral Despair is according to the opinion of the best Moralists as followeth Despair saith Boujou Theophrast Boujou Lord of Beaulieu fol. 723. is a passion of the Soul withdrawing men from some good much desired because it is represented by the Senses to their imagination as impossible to be obtained Senault in his use upon the passions pag. 344. Despair saith Senault is a violent motion of the soul that keeps men aloof from the prosecution of some good in which they see no probability it can be obtained Now this good is not always a real good for the Senses do oftentimes delude the Reason and Judgment of men but suppose it be a real good then it is Vertue it self or some vertuous Object Action or Design which they conceive impossible to be obtained or performed for Moral Hope hath no other object then Vertue or vertuous and generous actions and by consequence Moral Despair must have the same objects The definition of worldly moral and spiritual despair for divers of the ancient Moralists held Self-murdering no Despair as I have given a hint of it in the last Discourse but an action of fortitude and of magnanimity of courage And this Moral Despair is the opposite and great Antagonist of Moral Hope and the second passion incident to the Irascible appetite which doth mitigate the extravagancy of mens Hopes as it will appear in the insuing Discourses yet men often times despair of things in which they imagine impossibilities when there is none as it will appear by these two Instances About sixscore years past it was a thing thought impossible to sail with a ship round about the circuit of the earth and yet Magalen a Portugais See the Spanish and English History and Sir Francis Drake an English man have shown by experience that it was possible to be done secondly In the days of Charls the ninth Henry the third and Henry the fourth Kings of France It was a thing thought impossible to take the City of Rochel by force or by famine and yet the Cardinal de Riche-lieu by the Art of a French Enginere See the French History hath shown by experience it was possible to be done for by a floating bridge that he made over an Arm of the Sea upon which he planted Ordinances and erected two Towers and with a land Army Lewis the thirteenth King of France took that City by famine in less then a year whereupon I conclude that men Despair of things by imagining impossibilities where there is none and this proceeds from want of judgment power or experience for it is daily seen that which seems to be impossible to one man is easie and facile to another Spiritual Despair is nothing else but a distrust of Gods mercy which by the temptation of Satan do intice men to be the murderers of themselves which is the next sin to the sin of the Holy Ghost Secondly The causes of worldly Despair may be these first The death of a beloved party See Bandel in his Tragical Histories Romelio supposing his beloved Mistress Iuliete to be dead when she was but in a swound slew himself upon her body and when she came to her self again she seeing her Sweet-Heart had killed himself for her sake she stabbed her self with his Poynard secondly The infidelity in love is a cause of Despair See Virgils Aeneads Dido Queen of Carthage slew her self because Aeneas a Trojan Prince forsook her and sailed into Italy but if this be a Poeticall Fable hear a true Relation A proper young maiden being secretly betrothed to a young man living here in London who broke his faith and married another whereupon the maiden being transported with Despair poisoned her self and died the next day this hapned within this twelve moneth I could relate a hundred such instances to prove that of all the passions Love being abused or extinguished by death doth sooner then any other thing beget Despair but I pass them over for brevity sake thirdly Avarice is the cause of Despair A Merchant in London of good means having had some losses at sea and having received the tidings of it on the Saturday he being transported with Despair hung himself on the Sunday morning when his servants were at Church and it is a common thing among the Cormorant Farmers when they have Monopolized all the corn of a County into their hands to hang or drown themselves if the next year prove to be a fruitful year fourthly Famine is a cause of Despair 2 Kings 6.29 for in Jehorams days such a famine was in Samaria that two women boiled a childe and did eate the same the mother of the childe out of Despair consenting to it and whosoever will be pleased to read Iosephus will see the horrid actions of some of the Iews committed out of Despair because of the great famine that was at Ierusalem when it was besieged by the Romans fifthly The fear to fall into the hands of a cruel enemy causeth Despair some of the richest of the Saguntines rather then they would fall into the hands of Hanibal and his cruel Carthaginian and Numidian souldiers See Titus Livius in his third Decade lib. 1. pag. 34. did carry all their wealth with their wives and children into their Market place and having made a great heap of their rich moveables they set the fire in it and slew their wives and children and having cast them into the fire they slew themselves afterwards sixtly Shame is a cause of Despair Cleopatra Queen of Egypt being informed that it had been resolved in the Counsel of Augustus Cesar that she should be led as a captive after the triumphant Chariot of the said Emperor when he should make his entry into Rome out of Despair to avoid that shame See Plutarch in Marcus Antonius life she applied two Vipers to her two breasts and so died There are divers other causes of worldly Despair but they are of another nature for they attain not to that
Senault pag. 405. is nothing else but a violent motion of the sensitive appetite provoking men to seek revenge for some offence received However it is the last passion incident to the irascible appetite for I am of the Opinion of those that maintain it hath no opposite and is distingushed by these three names Anger Choler and Wrath. Anger is as it were the infancy of it Choler its adolescencie and Wrath its virility or maturity and the highest and superlative degree of the distemper of this fiery and destructive passion of Wrath. Secondly The causes of Wrath are numerous but I will reduce them to these four Heads 1. To the Pride 2. To the Impatiency 3. To the indiscretion 4. To the over-credulity of men For the first It was Pride that moved Simeon and Levi to slay in their wrath under colour of Piety and Religion Hamor and Shechem and all the innocent Males of their City because of the dishonor they conceived to have received by the rape of their sister Dinah but the reward of their wrath was this heavy curse of their Father Jacob Cursed be their anger Gen. 34. v 25.497 for it was fierce and their wrath for it was cruel I will divide them in Jacob and scatter them in Israel And it was Pride that moved Nebuchadnezzar King of Babylon to command in his fierce wrath that Shadrach Meshach and Abednego should be cast into a burning Furnace heated seven times more then it was wont to be because they had refused to obey his imperious command viz. to worship the golden Image he had caused to be set up But the reward of his unparalleld pride and wrath was this that he was deposed of his Empire driven away from the company of men and enforced to live amongst the beasts of the field till he was humbled Dan. 3.20 and 4.32 and did acknowledge that God was the King of Kings For the Second The ambitious Impatiency of Joab moved him in his wrath to slay perfidiously Abner and Amasa that he might still continue cheif General of the Armyes of the People of Israel But the reward of his wrath and ambition was this that king David at his dying hour charged Solomon his son that he should not suffer Joabs hoary head to go down to the grave in peace 2 Sam. 27. 20.10 And the natural impatiency of Charls Duke of Burgundy was by Custom changed into such an habit of wrath that upon the smallest misdemeanor of any of his servants there was but a word and a blow But the reward of his inconsiderate wrath was the cause he was betrayed and slayn at the rout of the Battle of Nancy by a Neapolitan Commander See Philip de Commines in his life to whom he had given a box on the ear For the Third The indiscretion of Clitus and of Callisthenes two intimate freinds of Alexander in their out-braiding speeches See Plutarch in Alexanders life moved this Prince to such a wrath that he slew them with his own hands And the indiscreet and unadvised answer that Zeno gave to Dionysius the Tyrant of Syracuse when he lovingly required he should give unto him his two Daughters in marriage viz. that he would rather see them carried to their graves then they should be married to such a Tyrant See Plutarch in his Morals did kindle such a wrath in the heart of Dionysius that he caused those two innocent Ladyes to be slayn and then invited their Father to their Funerals For the Fourth The over-credulity of King Ahasuerus in believing the false reports that Haman his Favorite made unto him against the Jews kindled such a wrath in his brest Esth 3.8 that he caused presently a Decree to be passed for the utter destruction of all the Jews that were scattered throughout the hundred and seven and twenty Provinces of his Dominions And the over-credulity of the good Emperor Theodosius in believing the false reports of some of his Courtiers concerning an uprore and mutiny that had happened in the City of Thessalonica See the Ecclesiastical Histories did beget such a wrath in this good Princes heart that he instantly passed a Decree that all the Inhabitants of that City both men women and children should be put to the sword But after this Decree had been put in execution he was truly informed that very few had a hand in this mutiny for which inconsiderate wrath of his he was much afflicted and penitent all the days of his life Thirdly The Proprieties of Wrath are these 1. It is of an ayrie fiery quality as proceeding as I have said before of an overflowing of the gall the seat of the yellow Choler therefore it must of necessity be fiery sith the cholerick humor is compared to the fiery Element and daily experience doth shew that bilious complexioned men are most addicted to Anger Choler and Wrath. The Proprieties of Wrath. It is also of an ayrie quality because the mixture of the bloud which is compared to the Element of the Ayr maketh the same as light and swift as the Ayr. 2. Wrath is of a spreading and dilative quality for as a small piece of Leven doth dilate it self in a short time thorow a great lump of dow and make the same rise and swell so this cholerick humor mixt with the bloud dilates it self thorow all the parts of the body and inflames them all with Anger and Wrath. 3. Wrath hath a changing or altering quality for it changeth the coulor of the Face sets the eyes on fire and makes the members of some mens bodies to tremble like a leaf Again in some other men it will make their Face as white as a Clout their Tongues to stammer and their Eyes to roll in their Heads all which symptoms and qualities do confirm the violent fury of this passion And that is the reason why it is compared to the flashof Gun-powder or to the over-boyling of a Pot. 4. Wrath opposed and hindered to vent it self doth in time turn into an inveterate hatred or at the best into a deep and incurable sorrow and sometimes it induceth men to despair and to lay violent hands upon themselves when they cannot be revenged to their mindes upon their enemies Fourthly The evill effects of Wrath are as destructive as the proprieties of it are precipitate The pernitious effects of Wrath. 1. The virulency of this passion is so pernicious that it blemisheth the graces of Gods dearest Children and extinguisheth all moral vertues in civil and moral men Nay it deprives them of reason and judgement and makes them go astray from Justice and equity King David was a man after Gods own heart yet by the means of this passion he committed a great injustice in suffering the false Accusator Ziba to have half the land of the Innocent Mephibosheth as it appears by this unjust sentence 2 Sam. 19. vers 27 29. And the king sayd
Florence was slain in his bed as he waited for the coming of a Gentlewoman he had allured to his lust 16. A Counsellor of the Court of Parliament of Paris slew a Gentleman and his own Wife as they lay abed together for he struck them both thorow the body with a Stiletto as they were upon the very act And from thence went to the Court and without perturbation pleaded the Case under fained names and obtained a definitive sentence of absolution from the said court for the murther by him committed For as Solomon saith Prov. 6.34 Jealousie is the rage of a man therefore he will not spare him in the day of vengeance These instances and many others that might be produced of the judgements of God inflicted upon whole Nations and particular men for the punishment of their lascivious volupties should refrain them from this destructive passion and make them flee from it as from a Serpent induce them to leave no remedies unattempted to mortifie the same But before I come to speak of the moral and spiritual remedies which are to be used to curb or to subdue this sinful passion give me leave to answer an Objection which some Moralists make to palliate the sin of it Voluptie say they is but a venial sin Object and the most innocent Passion of all others for it is the Darling of Nature and all men and women are naturally inclined to Delight neither could they subsist in the midst of so many woes and sorrows to which they are incident if it were not for these natural refreshments that you call Volupties And sith the fire and heat of this passion is cooled or utterly extinguished by old age men need not be so copious in the description of the evil nature proprieties and effects of it Nor so tedious in the manifestation of the remedies that may mortifie the same For Volupty doth not encrease by Age as Avarice and drunkenness doth I answer Answ that in regard of the actual act of Volupty old age may quench the flames of it But as for the intellectual desires I say that old men who have from their youth been addicted to this kinde of Volupty will long as much after that delight as the Avaricious men do after the encrease of their Treasures or the Drunkards after the taste of delicious Wines except they be sanctified both in body and soul by the sanctifying Spirit of Gods Free-grace for old age nor all the precepts of Morality cannot cast out of a mans heart this spirit of uncleanness if once he hath taken possession of it because it is of the same kinde Which goeth not out as our Saviour saith himself but by prayer and fasting Math. 17.21 that is to say by the meer and immediate operation of the sanctifying Spirit of Grace as it shall be proved by Instances and divers Passages of the Word of God when I shall speak of the spiritual remedies which are to be used to mortifie this passion As for the moral remedies that I am now to speak of they are these first men are to endeavor to attain to an habit in these four Vertues or Graces 1. Continency 2. Temperance 3. Fortitude 4. Sanctification Secondly they are to eschew these four splitting rocks or great inticers to all lascivious Volupties 1. Idleness 2. Alluring Objects 3. Suspected places 4. Evil company And in so doing they will undoubtedly by the help of the sanctifying Spirit obtain the victory over this spirit of uncleanness that is the greatest Opposite to the grace of sanctification for there is a greater antipathy between holiness and pollution then there is between fire and watter the Lyon and the Cock the Dog and Cat or between Vice and Vertue These things considered I will begin with those things which are to be eschewed for it were to small purpose to endevor to attain to an habit in these four Graces If men do not eschew the four things above spoken of by which the use of these Graces would be soon annihilated First Idleness is to be eschewed for if mens minds be not bent upon laudable employments they will busie themselves in unlawful things because their spirits are naturally active And as standing waters become loathsome even so men who have no employment become vitious And daily experience sheweth that such as are rich and have no calling are more addicted to Volupties then the meaner sort The Lacedemonians of all the other Greeks were the most active and valorous and the Athenians the most voluptuous because the first were kept under a strict Discipline gold and silver being prohibited in their Common-wealth and all manner of volupties banished and Military Atchievements cherished But the second were rich and by consequence Idle and did nothing as the Apostle S. Paul saith but hear or tell news Act. 17.21 or did employ themselves in all kinde of carnal Volupties Therefore such as will be continent must addict themselves to some lawful calling and are to be diligent in the same Prov. 10.4 For a slothful hand saith Solomon maketh poor but the hand of the diligent maketh rich Fulness of bread and Idleness were the cause saith the Prophet Ezechiel of the abhorred lusts of the Sodomites And for this cause the Emperour Severus made a Decree that all men whatsoever living in the City of Rome should imploy themselves in some lawful calling See Herodian in Severus life and wear upon their Apparel the badges of their profession that all idle persons might be banished out of the Commonwealth because Idleness is the mother of all vices The point might be proved by many instances but two shall serve for brevity sake 1. As long as King David addicted himself to Martial Achievements he never was carryed away by the temptations of Satan to lust after other mens Wives but when he was Idle and walking upon the Leads of his Palace he was ensnared into sin by the beauty of Bathsheba the Wife of Vriah the Hittite 2 Sam. 11.2 2. As long as the Prodigal Son was employed about the mannaging of his Fathers Houshold affairs he carryed himself like a dutiful Son but as soon as he was Idle and had obtained his Portion he wasted the same among Harlots Luk. 15.13 and by riotous living for Satan desireth no better opportunity to tempt men to sin then when they are Idle Secondly alluring Objects are to be eschewed and specially those of the feminine Sexe for many are bewitched by the glances of their eyes and that is the reason why King David after his fall prayed unto God he would be pleased to turn his eyes from beholding vanity Psal 101.3 as conceiving the beauty of women to be the greatest vanity under the Sun for the glances of their eyes are as destructive to mens souls as the glances of the eyes of a Basilisk are to their bodies Prov. 4.25 And that is the cause why Solomon saith Let thine
extraordinarily violent in all its operations It is also of an insatiable and sordid nature by the means of the passion of desire that hath an insatiable proprietie and is most base because this desire hath no other object then the excrements of the Earth Avarice is of a violent insatiable and feminine nature for Gold is nothing but a yellow and Silver nothing but a white clay calcinated and refined by the beams of the Sun by a long continuance of time It is likewise of a timerous quality by the means of the passion of fear that is of a feminine nature so by the mixture of these ill-qualified ingredients Avarice is one of the most base passions incident to men Fourthly These kinde of men are most commonly addicted to it 1. Low and base minded men 2. Old men are more addicted to it then the young 3. Those who have in their youth been riotous and prodigal are much inclined to it when they become ancient 4. Such as have been in great want in their youth become avaritious when they are old out of fear to fall into the like straits For the first all generous spirits disdain to be avaritious for their thoughts soar higher then the excrements of the Earth whereas the low-minded are like the Swine who never rise nor lift up their eyes to Heaven but are still fixed and routing with their snout in the muck-hils of the Earth See Plutarch and Dion in their Lives I mean by using all vile and base means to enrich themselves as Crassus and Vespasian did Secondly the antient are more addicted to Avarice then young men and this proceeds of fear and from the experience they have of the mutability of all worldly things besides they consider their weakness disabilities of body to labor as they did in their youth therefore hoard up what they can against the day of need hope being then utterly extinguisht in their breast by the cold blast of timerous fears which doth possess decrepit aged men yet this consideration that they have one of their feet upon the brink of their Grave should induce them to make use of the blessings of God sith they have but short time to live and less need of them then younger men Thirdly such as have lavished their means by profuse prodigalities fall when they are recalled from these courses from one extream to another and from great Prodigals become great Usurers avaritious Misers Fourthly Princes who in their youth were of a generous spirit yet having been brought by mutation of state into great wants and necessities become when they are antient out of fear to fall again into the same straits extreamly avaritious and prone to hoard up Treasures as it appears by the Lives of Peter de Medecis Duke of Florence See Guicciardine and the English and French Histories in their Lives and by Henry the Seventh King of England and Henry the Fourth King of France Fifthly The causes moving men to affect Avarice may be these 1. A base distruct of the providence of God suggested in their hearts by Satan through want of Faith to believe these precepts of our blessed Saviour * Math. 6 25 26 27 28 29 30. Take no thought for your life what ye shall eat or what ye shall drink nor yet for your body what ye shall put on Is not the life more then meat and the body more then rayment Behold the fowls of the air for they sow not neither do they reap nor gather into barns yet your heavenly Father feedeth them Are ye not better then they Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit to his stature And why take you thought for raiment consider the Lilies of the Field how they grow they toil not neither do they Spin. And yet I say unto you that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these Wherefore if God so clothe the grass of the field which to day is and to morrow is cast into the oven shall he not much more clothe you O ye of little Faith 2. This diffidence doth beget in them a faint-hearted fear to fall into poverty if they scrape and heap not by hook and crook some heaps of Gold or Silver for although poverty of it self be innocent yet in these depraved days it is held criminal and the greatest vice and misery upon earth Prov. 14.20 For the poor saith Solomon is hated even of his neighbour Notwithstanding saith he in another place Prov. 19 1. Better is the poor that walketh in his integrity then the rich that is perverse in his ways 3. Because none are regarded in this age but the rich yet rich men without wisdom and piety should be no more regarded then fools for as snow in Summer Allusion upon Prov. 26.1 and as rain in Harvest comes unseasonably even so honour is as unseemly to rich men that want understanding It was an ingenuous comparison of a modern Author who said that a wise vertuous and religious poor man was like a good horse with a leather Saddle on his back and a vitious profane and foolish rich man like a Jade that had an embroydred Saddle on his back Men respecting in these days more the rich and gay apparel of men then their worth and vertue 4. Because they may enjoy by riches all carnal volupties from which the poorer sort are debarred by their poverty 5. Because they erroneously conceive that riches make them have many friends but they are commonly Sycophants and Table-friends for all such whose friendship is grounded upon riches and not upon the vertue and merites of the party are time-servers and of a base and mercenary spirit and as fickle in their love and friendship as the wind and at the least blast of disgrace or adversity forsake them These two instances shall prove the point Haman the great Favourite of King Ahashuerus had many friends who bowed their knees daily before him when he had the favour of the King but as soon as his wrath was kindled against him they acquainted the King he had erected a Gibet of fifty Cubits high to hang up Mordecai the preserver of the Kings life Esth 7.9 10. and were the first upon the Kings command who cast a Cloke upon his face offered to hang up Haman upon the same Gibet See Sejanus Life 2. Sejanus the beloved Favourite of the Emperour Tiberius had many friends as long as he was graced by the Emperour for he was more courted by the Senators and men of War then Tiberius himself but they all forsook him when he fell into disgrace and were more eager and active then any to draw his body through the kennels of the Streets of Rome Whereby it appears that the rich mens friends are like a broken bow or a bruised reed 6. Because they falsly believe that riches will rescue them out of many dangers but they are deceived for the smaller
Joseph the meekness of Moses the zeal of Phineas the fervency of David and the holiness of our blessed Saviour were the objects of mens ambition ambitious men would carry away the garland and be reputed as the only excellent upon earth Psal 16.3 But to be excessively ambitious after the fading and momentary riches honours and glory of this world or after the conquest of a Mole-hill for the greatest Kingdom in Christendom in comparison of the whole Globe of the World will appear but like a Mole-hill it is a meer vanity Eccles 6.2 and an evil disease Socrates being informed that Alcibiades was proud and ambitions and boasted of the great demains he possessed in Attica a Province of Greece See Plutarch in his Morals of which Athens was the Metropolitan City brought him into a place where there was a Map of the whole Earth and prayed him to shew him where stood his Possessions Alcibiades after an exact view of the same found out at last the Province of Attica which was no bigger then a great pins-head but could not see any sign of his demains whereupon Socrates said unto him Why are you then so proud and ambitious for a thing of so little Continent that it cannot be seen in this Card. Even so Princes and Commonwealths who out of ambition contend for enlargement of their demains will finde at the end when they have shed their subjects blood and exhausted their Treasures that they have only obtained with much ado a small Mole-hill of ground And will be enforced to say See the History of France as Charls the Fifth and Philip the Second Kings of Spain did who through their Ambition had been the cause of the death of a million of men and of the exhausting of all the Treasures that came out of the West Indies which did amount in threescore years to above two hundred millions of Crowns by the Wars they made about the Conquest of France viz. That with all this blood and incredible Treasures they had not won a Foot of ground in France and were further from the Conquest of it then they were the first day of their War And verily if the seventeen Provinces of the Low-Countries were represented in a Map and compared to the whole Globe of the Firmament of the Seas and the Earth they would not seem to be so big as a Mole-hill And yet they have this threescore years and ten been the object of the Ambition of him that stiles himself the greatest King in Christendom And notwithstanding his might and power See the History of the Netherlands and the innumerable lives of men that have been lost and the incredible Treasures that have been exhausted in the Conquest and preservation of them yet hath he been enforced to acknowledge seven of these Provinces to be free-States and at this very hour courts them by his Embassadors to obtain an offensive and defensive League with them For although the Ambition of Princes and Commonwealths have no bounds yet are they bounded by the Lord of Hosts and shall extend no further then he hath Decreed The beginning the encrease the decay and utter annihilation of Empires Monarchies and Commonwealths being wholly at his disposing Notwithstanding the desires of Ambitious men are never satisfied and are alwayes projecting to enlarge their bounds although they are ignorant of Gods will and pleasure therein these ambitious desires of theirs being oftentimes the fore-runners of their ruine and annihilation See Herodotus in his Life Croesus King of Lydia desiring ambitiously to enlarge his dominions made War against Cyrus who deprived him in one day of his Kingdom and of his incredible Treasures And Antiochus the great ambitiously desiring to enlage his Kingdom declared War against the Romans who took from him Armenia See Plutarch in the Lives of Lucullus and Pompeius and confined him beyond the Mount Taurus And because this fiery passion of Ambition is as predominant in all parts of Christendom in these dayes as it hath been in former Ages give me leave to enlarge my self upon these particulars 1. On the definition of this passion 2. On the composure of it 3. On the nature of the same 4. On those who are most addicted to it 5. On the Causes that move men to be Ambitious 6. On the proprieties of the same 7. On the pernitious effects of it 8. On the means to subdue the same First The definition Ambition is nothing but an exorbitant and irregular desire of worldly honour and glory Secondly It is a mixt passion composed of these The composure viz. of Audacity of Hope and Desire 1. Audacity expels the fears that might disswade Ambitious men from undertaking any perilous enterprises 2. Hope infuseth in them a confidence they shall attain to their ends 3. Desire gives them wings to prosecute with indefatigable labour the fruition of that which they aym at Thirdly It is of a fiery restless and insatiable nature 1. It is fiery because such as are more ambitious then others are of a bilious hot and dry constitution 2. It is restless because the bilious humour which is the most predominant in their bodies doth usually ascend up to their brains which makes them active in all their actions and sudden in all their undertakings The nature of Ambition And of this natural constitution were Caesar Henry the Fourth King of France and the last King of Sweden who were all three extraordinarily ambitious 3. It is insatiable because of the great predominancy the passion of desire hath over the other passions of which it is composed nothing being more insatiable then the desires of men Fourthly Those who are most ambitious are commonly of a haughty spirit envious and impatient when they see any other excel them in valor honor glory It was Ambition that moved Alexander to reject the fair offer that Darius King of Persia made unto him of the half of his Kingdom and of his eldest Daughter to be his wife if that would have satisfied his ambition so he might enjoy peaceably the other moity the rest of his days See Quintus Curtius in his Life but this answer of Alexander made unto Darius upon this offer did proceed from a haughty and imperious spirit viz. That as there was but one Sun in the Firmament so there could be but one Monarch upon Earth See Plutarch in Caesars Life And this saying of Caesar did proceed from a haughty and ambitious heart viz. That he would rather be the chiefest Magistrate in a petty City of Italy then the second in the City of Rome And this other that he spake to the Master of a ship in the midst of a storm Fear not saith he For thou dost carry in thy ship Caesar and his Fortune as if the Winde and the Sea had been bound to obey and comply with his ambitious designs But his passion of Sorrow when he wept seeing the Figure of
it appears that goodness and vertue is the common object of envie Give me leave therefore to enlarge my Discourse upon these particulars to discover the venome of this vitious passion 1. On the definition of Envie 2. On the nature causes and proprieties of it 3. On the evil Effects of Envie 4. On the means or remedies for the curbing of it First Envie is a mixt Passion composed of cupidity wrath and hatred cupidity makes it vile and base wrath fiery and furious and hatred makes it loathsome and odious And by the mixture of these three pernitious ingredients it becomes one of the worst passions incident to men for where it raigneth it produceth nothing but anguish grief and sorrow of heart and no profit joy or pleasure at all Envie saith the Bishop of Marseilles is a sordid passion See p. 369. of the Book upon this Passion begetting a repining grief and sorrow in the hearts of men who are possessed with it 2. The Nature Causes and Proprieties of this passion of Envie may be these First The nature of Envie Envie is by accident of a cold and dry nature having a shrinking quality like unto that of Fear and Sorrow for although Wrath of which it is composed be hot and fiery yet being turned into Hatred it loseth its natural heat becomes cold by accident as the humor of the yellow Choler which is hot being burned changeth its nature and is turned into a cold melancholy humor Secondly the causes of Envie are these 1. Pride 2. Self-love 3. Malice First Pride-begetteth Envie for all such as are proud repine and grieve to see others to excel them in honours The causes of Envie riches pleasures or in moral Vertues and spiritual graces Secondly Self-love is the cause of Envie for such as are possessed with self-love cannot endure that others should be accounted more valiant nor more learned vertuous or righteous then they Thirdly Malice breeds Envie for malitious men cannot see without grief and sorrow their Neighbours prosperity and all these shall be proved by instances when I shall speak of the malitious effects of this passion of Envie The first proprietie of Envie is The evil Proprieties of Envie that such as are transported with it never envie those who are of a lower degree then themselves for Envie doth ever ascend and never descend because Envie is not like Hatred which continues till death and sometimes after death as it hath been proved in the Chapter of Hatred but it encreaseth or decreaseth according to the prosperity or adversity of those that are envied by others for if the party envied become poor or fall into misery the envious party will change oftentimes his envie into compassion and pitty The second Propriety of Envy is That men of different Callings seldom envie one another But Princes envie Princes Commanders envie Commanders Learned men envie the Leaned Merchants envie Marchants and Artificers envie Artificers of their own calling for a Smith will not Envie a Carpenter nor a Carpenter a Smith Marius did envy Sylla Pompeius Caesar Francis the First King of France did envie the Emperour Charls the Fifth See Plutarch in their lives and the French and Spanish Histories and all these were Competitors of honour and glory And likewise learned men never envie Generals of Armies but they envie such as they fear will outgo them in the Sciences they profess Orators envie Orators and Divines envie Divines for the objects of this malitious passion are those that excel others in Valour Prudence Honors Riches Pleasures Sciences Arts and Piety The third Proprietie of Envie is That it enticeth men to cruelty for if Might and Power happen to be in the hands of envious men to satisfie their envie they will commit all manner of injustice and Tyrannicall cruelty 3. The effects of Envie have from the Creation to this day been destructive to mankinde And the Painter that did first represent this Passion under the shape of a woman having a wrinkled face squint-eyes a crown of Snakes on her head The evil effects of Envie and a Vultur gnawing her breast was well acquainted with the evil nature and pernitious effects of Envie For the Feminine Sexe first intimates the pusillanimity of this Passion Secondly her wrinckled face represents the grief and sorrow that is incident to such as are possessed with envie Thridly her squint-eye demonstrates the indirect objects of this passion Fourthly the crown of Snakes on her head signifies the anxieties of their minde Fifthly The Vultur gnawing her breast is a lively emblem of the wracking tortures wherewith Envie doth continually afflict the hearts of envions men The first effect of Envie proceeding from Pride was the cruel murder of Abel for the pride of Cains heart did beget in him this envie because his Sacrifice was rejected of the Lord and Abels Sacrifice was accepted as it appears by these words Gen. 4.5 And the Lord had respect unto Abel and to his Offering But to Cain and to his Offering he had no respect The second effect of Envie proceeding from Pride was when the hearts of the Pharisees puffed up with pride did out of a malitious envie slander our blessed Saviour saying unto him Joh. 7.46 That he did cast out Devils by the power of Belzebub the Prince of the Devils because they could not endure to hear their own Officers say Never man spake like this man The first effect of Envie proceeding from self-love was this Dionysius Tyrant of Syracuse caused the Poet Philoxenus to be sold for a slave See Plutarch in his Morals because he was generally reputed to be a better Poet then he The second effect proceeding from self-love was this That the Emperor Adrianus caused Favorinus and Melisius See Spartianus in Adrianus Life two Learned men to be banished because they were generally reputed to be more learned in the Liberal Sciences then he The first effect of Envie proceeding from Malice was this that Josephs brethren sold him to the Midianite Merchants to be carryed and sold as a Slave into Egypt for being transported with Envie and Malice they said amongst themselves Come now therefore Gen. 37.20 and let us slay him and cast him into some Pit and we will say some evil beast hath devoured him and we shall see what will become of his dreams But God who had in his secret Decree otherwise disposed of him caused Judah to perswade them he should be sold and not slain The second effect of Envie proceeding from Malice was the malitious Envie of Saul against David And for no other cause but forasmuch as God was pleased to bless him in all his designs and undertakings And this Malice and Envie was so inveterate 1 Sam. 29. that when all his wiles miscarryed he perswaded Michal his Daughter to betray her own Husband but she abhorring so base an act out of love saved his life by a wile Fourthly Tyranny and Cruelty