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A08047 Of the eternall felicity of the saints fiue bookes. Writen in Latin by the most illustrious Cardinall Bellarmine, of the Society of Iesus. And translated into English by A.B. Permissu superiorum.; De æterna felicitate sanctorum. English Bellarmino, Roberto Francesco Romolo, Saint, 1542-1621.; Everard, Thomas, 1560-1633.; Bellarmino, Roberto Francesco Romolo, Saint, 1542-1621. De gemitu columbae English. Selections. aut 1638 (1638) STC 1841; ESTC S113735 165,177 472

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preserued no tongue is able to expresse with what radiant splendour light those most holy impressions shall shyne seing all the glory of Saints compared to the Glory of Christ is lesse then the Beauty of the starrs with reference to the Beauty of the sunne But now what shall I speake of the Pleasures which the Eyes of the Blessed shall take in behoulding that most spacious and large City which Tobias and S. Iohn as aboue we haue proued as not hauing Words worthy inough to set out and proclaime its beauty said That it was all made of gould and garnished with rich Iewels Margarites and other precious stones Tob. 13. Apoc. 21. What lastly may I say of the New Heauen and the New Earth the which the Holy Scriptures do promise to vs after the day of Iudgment and of the renouation of all things into a better state For these things as they are vnknowne to vs so they shall delight the Eyes of the Blessed with a new and admirable ioy when their Beauty shall begin to be seene Of the Ioy of the Eares CHAP. VI. THat the sense of Hearing and the Instruments of speach shal be in the Kingdome of Heauen no man may doubt For the Bodies of the Blessed shal be true and liuing Bodies and in euery part perfect And such was the Body of Christ after his Resurrection as all the Apostles many disciples and others haue testified For they did heare him speake and he did answere to their demaunds And S. Paul himself did heare Christ speaking to him from Heauen he answered to Christ hearing him That there shal be Canticles and songs and chiefly of that Word Alleluia the aforesaid Toby and S. Iohn do witnes From hence then we may gather that in that Heauenly City there shall not be wanting many most sweet Sonnets with the which God may be praysed and the Blessed eares of Holy men may be wonderfully delighted And if these things ought to be performed in proportion and measure thē doubtlesly those songs ought to be the more sweet harmonious by how much the singers shal be more skilfull and he that is praysed more noble and sublime the place where the Musicke is made more high and the Company or presence of the Auditours more intelligent and in greater number What consolation therefore will it be in that most high peace and in the concord of soules and in that ardour and heate of Charity towards their supreme Benefactour to heare the most cleare voyces of those which shall sing Alleluia If S. Francis as S. Bonauenture hath left written was so rapt and moued at the sound of a Citherne played vpon but a very short tyme by an Angell as that he thought himselfe to haue beene in a new World what delights then shall our Eares enioy when millions of musitians with most concordant and sweet voyces shall with full accord and consent prayse God and other Millions with like melody and feruour shall many tymes repeate the said Prayses And perhaps in that Heauenly Citty not only the prayses of God shal be celebrated with Musicall voyces but also the Triumphs of Martyrs the Honour of Confessours the Glory of Virgins and the victories of all the Saints against the Deuill shal be extolled with Celestiall Musicke For we thus read Eccl. 31. Who is proued therein and perfect shall haue eternall Glory He that could transgresse and hath not transgressed and do Euill and hath not done it therfore are his good things established in our Lord and all the Church of Saints shal declare his Almes Although this may be vnderstood of the prayses of mortall men in the militāt Church here vpon Earth yet withall it may be meant of the immortall Citizens and of the triumphant Church in Heauen Since there the Saints shall haue truly eternall glory and that is truly and properly the Church of Saints And whereas our Lord in the Gospell sayth that the faythfull and prudent seruants shal be praysed of God in the Heauenly Kingdome Matth. 28. Well farre thee good and faythfull seruant because thou hast beene faythfull ouer a few things I will place thee ouer many things Enter into the ioy of thy Lord Why may we not thinke that those words of our Lord shal be celebrated with the singing of the whole Celestiall Court shall againe and againe be most sweetly repeated Certainly the Catholike Church doubted not thus to speake of S. Martin Martinus hic pauper modicus diues Caelum ingreditur hymnis caelestibus honoratur Martin being but poore and temperate did enter into Heauen rich and is honored with Celestiall Hymnes To conclude S. Austin affirmeth the same point in expresse Words l. 22. de Ciu. c. 30. saying There shal be true glory where no man shal be praysed through the errour or adulation of the Prayser True Honour which shall not be conferred vpon any not worthy Neither shall any vnworthy seeke after that Honour where none but he that is worthy shall be permitted to be O therefore thrice Happy Soules who in that place where all flattery is banished and exiled and no lye is found to be shall heare their owne Prayses and Trophees to be celebrated without danger of Pryde but not without increase of ioy and comfort Of the Ioy of the sense of smelling CHAP. VII TOuching the other senses litle is to be said not in that they want their great Pleasures but because what Pleasures those shal be the Holy Scripture hath not declared Neuerthelesse this is euident to vs that many Bodies of Holy Saints haue after their deaths braathed out a most sweet Odour This S. Ierome testifieth of the Body of S. Hilarion For he affirmeth that ten Months after the Body was interred it was found entyre as if it were then liuing and did cast from it such a fragrant smel as if it had beene imbalmed with sweet oyntments The like doth S. Gregory witnes of the body of S. Seruulus the Palsey-man His words are these l. 4. Dial. c. 14. The soule departing such a fragrancy of smell did rise as that all there present were replenished with incredible sweetnes And a litle after Till the Body was buried the sweetnes of that smell did not depart from their Noses Neither are there wanting many other such like Examples both of former later tymes from all which we may gather that if the Bodies of the dead Saints after the Soule is glorifyed do send forth such sweet smells then much more the liuing and glorifyed Bodies of the saints shall breath forth a most delicious and sweet Odour I will adioyne hereto that which the said S. Gregory relateth of the liuing and most glorious Body of our Sauiour Thus he writeth lib. 4. c. 16. hom 38. sup Euang. Tarsilla the Virgin then looking vp sow Iesus comming and suddenly there was as it were sprinkled such a fragrancy of a wounderful Odour as that the sweetnes therof did assure all that
who by their word shall belieue in me that they all may be one as thou Father in me and I in thee that they also in vs may be one O most blessed Citty which being seated vpon a most high mountaine dost enioy a most pure ayre Which art founded vpon a Rocke as being supported with eternall stability and firmenes Whose gates doe shine like Margarites and euer stand open for Holy Soules to enter into Whose wall is God encompassing thee about with his vigilancy and protection and as a precious Ia●per-stone doth adorne thee Whose street is Charity more bright and glorious then all gould more white then any Crystall Which maketh all the inhabitants to be of one heart of one mind replenishing them with an inutterable ioy and placing them in an interminable and euerlasting tranquillity and peace Concupiscit deficit anima mea my soule coueteth and euen fainteth vnto thy streets Psal 9● What is more gratefull and more wished for by our labouring and lamenting in the midst of a wicked Nation among false brethren and in that world which is wholy placed in malignity wickednes then euen in all hast to flye to that place in which only Charity reigneth VVhen shall I come and appeare before the face of God Psal 41. What greater consolation and comfort can be to a s●ule louing our Lord then to see his beloued and to be seene of his beloued and through an inward and most sweet connexion reciprocally to dvvell the one in the other It is insufferable bouldnes O Holy Citty that dust and ashes should dare to aspire to thy Pallaces and it is greater bouldnes that a vile and deiected soule should dare to approach to the fruition of his Creatour But he vvill excuse and pleade for this boldnes vvho gaue it vvhen he prayed to his Father that vve all might be one and that as the Father is in the Sonne and the Sonne in the Father so vve may be but one in one another Of the Temple of the Citty of God CHAP. VII VVE are heer further to inlarge our discourse of the Citty of God in shewing the Temple therein to prayse God the meate drinke which there is to be eaten and drunkē for as for cloathing the Inhabitants need not to be sollicitous For if Adam and Eue needed not any cloathing in the terrestriall Paradise much lesse shall the Saints in the celestiall Pararadise need any such who shall be all cloathed with splendour and light as with a vestment Now concerning meate drinke Adam and Eue could not want them neyther doe the Angells themselues want them according to those words of the Angell Raphael I vse an inuisible meate drinke which cannot be seene of men Tob. 12. And first touching the Temple S. Iohn thus speaketh in the Apocalyps 21. And temple I saw none therein for our Lord God omnipotent is the Temple thereof and the Lambe That S. Iohn did not see any Temple in the Citty may not seeme strange since Temples are erected in the Militant Church for foure ends to wit that the Word of God may be preached in them to the faythfull that the Sacraments and Sacrifices may be celebrated in them that Publike Prayer may be in them offered vp to God And finally that due praises with singing ioy may be performed to him Now the preaching of the Word of God shall cease in Heauen seeing there the increated VVord himsefe shall manifestly speake to all And according to the preaching of Ieremy the Prophet cap. 31. Man shall no more teach his neighbour or his brother saying Know our Lord for all shal know me from the least to the greatest Sacraments in lyke manner and Sacrifices shall not be necessary in that Citty since neither Sins shal be there expiated neither shall signes be there required where things signifyed shall manifestly appeare Prayers and Laudes to God are heer vpon earth performed in Churches and Temples dedicated vnto God because himselfe hath promised that in such sacred places his eyes shal be open eares attēt for thus he speaketh to Salomon Paral. 7. Myne eyes shal be open and mine eares erected to his prayer that shall pray in this place But now seeing in the Celestiall Citty God wil be openly seene and heard of all men therefore not any Temple seemeth to be necessary in that place Hence then we may easily gather why S. Iohn said And I saw no Temple in the Citty But h●er it may be demaūded why S. Iohn subioineth these words The God omnipotent is the Temple thereof and the Lambe For if no Temple be required in that Citty why then is God himselfe said to be the Temple thereof and not only the Temple but also the Lambe Or what explication can it haue to say that God and the Lābe shal be called Temples in Heauen Or to what vse shall this Temple be in Heauen In answere heerto we are to recurre to the custome of the holy Scriptures where one text or sentence doth comment and explaine another and the more darke and obscure passage receaues its illustratiō from that which is more perspicuous and cleare Well then we thus reade in the 90. Psalme He that dwelleth in the help of the highest shall ab●d● in the Protectiō of the God of Heaue● 〈…〉 sense and meaning of which Words is this Who by a firme Confidence Hope is ioyned with God he as it were maketh to himselfe a house in God in the which he may securely liue as being exempt and free from all euill The same may be said of Prayses and Prayers to God For he that through an inward reuerence is conioyned with God doth in lyke sort build to himselfe a place of Habitation in God the which he inhabitating in that sort as he ought to doe may therein pray and offer vp his prayses vnto God So heer we say that our Lord the Omniporent God of Heauen is the Temple of the holy Citty because all those holy Cittizens most intensly and with a strong bent of feruour meditating on the omnipotency of God and so by this meanes ioyned to him by an inward reuerence do dwell in him and exhibit to him due prayses and when they pray for vs they are heard with a most willing and ready care In lyke manner when they seriously contemplate the merits of Christ who as an innocent Lambe deliuered himself vp in oblation and Sacrifice to God 〈…〉 odour of sweetnes they being firmely vnited by loue and dwelling in him as in a Temple doe powre out their Prayers and impetrations for vs and doe doubtlesly find the eyes of God open and his eares attentiue that they may obtaine in our behalfe any thing for which they pray But if those blessed Cittizens be accustomed to dwell in God in Christ as in a Temple thereby to offer vp their prayses and prayers for vs what are we poore men to doe who neither see God nor Christ O would to