all unto him that suffers for his name It is a Sacrifice of what is most dear unto us that is the Friendship of Men For Christ foretold his Servants that they should be hated of the whole World so that by this immolation we forfeit what is natural and of all things most delightful to us But whilst we are in this consuming task we must remember that the Husbandman expects not the fruit of his labours until the seed he casts into the ground be corrupted and thence a plentiful Generation spring forth So we must continue perishing to the last that so we may rise under a new form never more to be crushed by the Flail or Mill of grinding persecutors but to flourish in eternal quiet as the just recompence of a troubled spirit Amen CHAP. XXXVI Cor contritum humiliatum Deus non despicies A contrite and humble Heart O God thou wilt not despise ST Chrysostom sayes no fond Lover dotes so much upon his Mistress as God doth on a Soul truly Penitent and then making an Apostrophe unto Tears he cryes O happy streams all principalities and powers strike Sail to you The countenance of a Judge affrights you not your accusing adversaries are struck dumb before you It is you alone that finds admittance and are entertained by your Sovereign you only can overcome the invincible and tye up the Omnipotent When I read these words of this great Saint upon the efficacy of Tears I am startled at the slender Character our Petitioner gives in this clause A contrite heart sayes he O God thou wilt not despise An expression which falls much short of a Lovers passion for to have no other return of a present than barely not to have it rejected argues the gift very little prized by the receiver and is in the next door to a contempt But yet the addition our Penitent makes of humble speaks very much and helps out the sentence For it imports that humility teaches him the excellency of God and at the same time his own nothing so that not to find a repulse in the exhibition of any homage rendered to a Being infinitely perfect is an endearing beyond what a poor Creature could any wayes in Justice expect and therefore in these lowly thoughts it seems to him he sets out God's mercy in saying A contrite and humble heart thou wilt not despise Wherefore it is evident our Petitioner relyes upon sure principles and speaks he is well read in Divinity for if satisfactory and penal works be a Sacrifice pleasing to God as is demonstrated in the precedent clause much more a contrite heart must needs be highly acceptable which is a total destruction of all love to sin a detestation and dislike against it which involves a passion of sorrow consequent to this hatred and a firm purpose to avoid all future relapses But the motive of this sorrow must be in that we have offended the Majesty of God who merits all love honor and obedience from us and therefore meerly in that sin is displeasing to him we are to retract and abominate our past misdeeds Our Holy Penitent the more effectually to create within him this lively compunction considers that by sin we deny unto God the just tribute of ohedience as if in a manner we would wrest his Scepter from his Hand and in sequel reduce him to nothing for God cannot be God nor subsist without a soveraign Empire over all things it being an attribute immediately resulting from his Divine and Infinite Majesty Next he weighs how God hates sin even to death witness his Commandements imposed under such heavy penalties on the transgressors The rebellious Angels our first parent Adam the universal Deluge conflagration of Sodom c. are frightful examples After he had run over all these punishments it was easy for him to judge of sin's horrour and how much it is abominated by God nay he yet stooped lower and beheld many eternally doomed to the flames of hell and this perhaps but for one only mortal sin After these dreadful presidents he proceeds further and in his prophetick view contemplates the Son of God innocent undefiled and set at a great distance from any sin to pass through the highest rigours of Justice and this meerly because he had taken upon him our iniquities Hence he concludes if the eternal Father be so severe to the dear production of himself in chastising the prevarications of another he will certainly redouble his stripes on Man for his own proper defaults Conformably to this meditation St. Austin sayes If a Redeemer be so roughly handled upon the score of anothers transgression what may a sinner expect in revenge of his own miscarriage Lastly our Penitent layes down how by sin we are declared Enemies to God enslaved to Satan odious in the sight of Angels and doomed to suffer in Hell without end which infinitely exceeds all the disasters of this life Besides we lose the grace and love of God a treasure above all other imaginable and whose forfeiture we ought more to deplore than all other misfortunes joyned together Wherefore one mortal sin is more to be lamented than all the disgraces and hardships which possibly may befall us in this World Our Petitioner having by these remonstrances alarm'd all the faculties of his Soul and so disposed them for action just like Souldiers commanded to Arms he then instructs them how to redeem all their dammages they have sustained by sin First they must abhorr their past misdeeds that is have such an aversion as heartily to wish they had never been committed and since the birth and essence of sin springs from the will it must be ruined by the same power retracting disowning and as much as in us lyes breaking the force of sin in becoming unvoluntary This done he reads unto them the efficacy of contrition by which our Souls are sanctifyed and all the Characters of sin defaced So that from Children of perdition in an instant we are declared heirs to eternal felicity the reason of this is that contrition comprizes a love of God above all things and the nature of charity is to make an absolute destruction of all vice which other vertues do not as having a repugnance only to the opposite sins So that there is no medium 'twixt charity and sin Man hath the one or the other but cannot enjoy them both together This is confirmed by the Prophet Ezechiel Chap. 53. The impiety of the impious shall not do him harm whensoever he shall be converted For love saith St. Gregory is nothing else but a flame and sin may be compared to rust So that when Christ said Many sins are forgiven her because she loved much it imports her Soul enkindled with a fire of divine love had worn away all the rust of her sins But what need we seek for authorities to strengthen this Doctrine when our Penitent had this happy Truth wrought in himself for no sooner he had cryed peccavi
Idols and plunge themselves in transgressions of the highest nature However he did not here forget his promise but at the prayer of Moses reassumed them into his Sovereign Protection the same Night which was blest with the institution of the sacred Synaxis or Eucharist was also conscious of the horrid Treason of Judas and yet this Monster of ingratitude according to all Divines might have sheltred himself from God's wrath by a true Repentance Thus all along we see God justifyed in his Clemency towards sinners so that victory must needs remain to him when questioned by blasphemous Tongues for creating those who were to perish A Nabuchodonozer speaks for him a Thief upon the Cross a St. Paul a Magdalen and a Million of others that have redeemed by a few hours repentance what had been contracted in many years impieties and wickedness Our holy Penitent will also come in for a witness First he cryes what return shall I make to my God for all he hath done to me he praises blesses his holy name and then layes open his enormous crimes believing it is but reasonable to do him all right that hath dealt to him so much of mercy and though every thought of his sins afflicts him yet he glories that his Creatour's goodness will appear resplendent through his deformity he is content to become nothing that he might add the least tittle to God's Honour and greatness He values not his own confusion so God may be justifyed and this sweet experienced truth made good that the Divine will is that all shall be saved and to this end proportions sufficient means to all so that none can perish but through their own Impenitency and Perseverance in sin The Church would not style Adam's sin a happy sin if our Redemption and the merits of Christ's sacred passion were not extenedd to all even the highest offendour St. Paul sayes as Death found its entrance by the default of one so life was restored by one whence it is clear the remedy brought to us by Christ reached as far as the Disease St. John entitles him a Sun which enlightens every one that comes into this World there is none wrapped up in so black a Cloud of sins who may not if they will take in the Rayes of his Mercy and by their Deliverance justify God's Promises to Man In the production of every the least Creature saith St. Thomas the power wisdom and goodness of God are made manifest how much more then are they exalted in the Transmutation of a Soul from the Privation of Justice to the Possession of a Supernatural Gift of Righteousness whence St. Paul sayes God doth predestinate us according to the councel of his will that we may praise and diffuse abroad his glory Ah then let us give unto God what is his due as near as we can by despair we condemn our selves in rendring our Judge Inexorable and deaf to Mercy By Hope animated with Repentance we quit our scores of guiltiness and justify the hand that wipes them off To our justification by his grace he doth not only invite us to dispose our selves for it promising to refresh such as are oppressed c. But declares he is at the door of our hearts knocks solicits and expects but our consent to enter in at last defies the World to object the least failing on his side having done to his Vineyard what ever could be required to make it thrive To conclude God will be still justified that sinner who doth finally perish is the Author of his ruine by his own impenitency rejecting graces abundantly sufficient offered to him So that in the height of his misery when it is too late he will be forced to acknowledge crying O Lord thou art just and thy judgements equitable That sinner again who hath imitated our Penitent in having had timely recourse to the throne of mercy will not blush to unfold his wickedness since he now breaths a new life of grace which obliges him to proclaim how just God is in his promises and glorious in his Mercies That thou mayest be justifyed in thy words and overcome when thou art judged The Application In this clause we read the clear view our Holy Penitent had of the unquestionable proceedings of God with Man for beholding in his all-displaying Eye the ingratitude of Millions of Souls who would abuse his favours yet did not this restrain his munificence to them he first gave them a Being added to this Being the exhibition of his Graces all sufficient nay in a greater proportion than to many of the elect and to the acquisition of these benefits he made his only Son instrumental by whose blood is conveyed to them a capacity of Salvation Now if afterwards they come to perish it is through their own malice in misusing his gracious endearments and proving refractary to his commands for since he had conducted them indiscriminately with the predestinate by a supernatural Providence with which all along he obliged them what wisdome prudence or justice were it to gratify Traytors obstinate even unto death in rebellion with his Glory So that the motive of their reprobation is a foresight of their final perseverance in Sin their guiltiness gives matter of God's hatred and eternal damnation the effect of their impenitency 'T is true it was not in their power to be born or not be born but to fight generously or be vanquished by the Devil this depends on us It seems unreasonable that a King opening a Tournament and proposing a reward to the Conquerour should admit onely that person into the list whom he feresaw would be victorious So God in Creating an infinity of persons whereof the greater part would become reprobate is not to be blamed no more than that Prince who lets all run at the ring though it cannot be gained but by one for if we be foyld it is by our own Cowardize and remissness Thus the goodness of God appears in the Creation of Reprobates and no less his justice in pouring vengeance upon them so that he would be justified in his words and silence any blasphemous Tongue nay though these unfortunate wretches miss of their particular end that is paradise to which they are created yet the general design of their Creation to wit the promotion of his Glory will take effect for after his patience hath been strained if it may be so expressed in supporting their insolencies he will give lustre to his Saints Glory by the opposition of their misery just as a Moor sets off a great beauty Wherefore let us keep consort with our Holy Penitent avowing his just providence and submitting to all his Decrees as most equitable and worthy our Adorations Amen CHAP. XI Ecce enim in iniquitatibus conceptus sum For behold I am conceived in iniquity OUr Penitent here appeals to the World whether he hath not reason being reinvested with the rich ornament of Grace to stand up and maintain Gods proceedings with his
in his Throne drawing from thence the eternal Son of God O who can be so wicked to behold the lines of this merciful proceeding drawn forth and not presently joyn issue with our holy preacher to abandon the pernicious wayes of sin and become a Disciple in the Rudiments of vertue To behold a Redeemer living in the Hearts of Men before he came to live upon Earth to see all the Sanctity of the World addressed to him to speak of nothing but him and all conspire to his glory If before he came he had so many tongues and voices to set him forth and that the Law and service of God had no other aim than to engrave the Messias in the Hearts of Men what expressions ought to enflame our zeal after his birth life cross and triumphant glory These are the wayes our Graduate will distill into the Minds of the wicked and certainly he did it with an excess of fervour and delight helped on by the consideration that out of his seed the Saviour of Israel was to be born And it is clear he kept close to this Theam even to the last making it his Testament and the subject of his expiring words to his Son Solomon That he should be sure to walk in the wayes of the Lord that in the exact observance of his judgments and Commandment written in the Law of Moses were fastned the succession of his Crown saying This done thou shalt not want one of thy posterity to sit upon the throne of Israel These are the wayes if happily taken will preserve the wicked from ruine give them eternal life secure them from Hell and open a passage to all the delights of Heaven as St. John sayes To the end that all who believe in the should possess eternal bliss Wherefore our Penitent egged on by so many powerful motives to the discharge of his task will never fail in what he hath promised to teach the wicked the wayes of God The Application Our Penitent instructs us here by his example that there is no employment so acceptable unto God as to disperse in our Neighbour the clouds of Ignorance and imbue him with principles of wisdome His Son Solomon was perhaps taught by this clause to address so happily his petition And Joel the prophet makes it the great subject of good tydings he foredeclared to the Church Be glad yea Sons of Sion and rejoyce in the Lord your God who hath given you a teacher of righteousness Aristotle being asked why Commonwealths did not assign pensions for Masters that taught and instructed others as they did to other offices of the State made this reply because there could be no reward answerable to their desert if he thought certain notions in natural knowledge to be so valuable what a price would he have set on such as convey the sublime mysteries of heaven unto us Let us then instruct our Neighbour by good example by doing charity to the distressed and by wholesome Documents every one according to his Talent and Ability And in doing this we follow the steps of a great Saint who believed he could in nothing better express his gratitude and zeal for God's honour than in the Reduction of Souls to the way of Salvation Amen CHAP. XXVIII Et impii ad te convertentur And the impious shall be converted to thee BY this clause our Penitent destroyes the Opinion of some in those modern times who assert that Christ died not for all Men but only for the elect for if the impious be not excluded from the participation of his precious Blood surely there is none that are impiety being a crime that directly strikes against the honour of God and is a complaet rebellion against his Divinity Now if our Divine by his preaching was confident to reduce such offendours whom can we imagine shall be excepted nor can they say we are put into a worse condition by the Evangelical Law in which a plenitude of benedictions are showred down upon us and which as far exceeds the Mosaick as a thing real the type and figure that represents it St. John Chap. 1.2 sayes Christ is a propitiation for our sins and not only for ours but for the sins of the whole World First Christ satisfied for Adam's disobedience and original sin witness St. Paul ad Rom. Chap. 2. As death entered by the default of one so life by the justice and obedience of one Again St. John sayes Behold the Lamb of God that taketh away the sins of the World that is original sin for the Greek version puts it in the Singular Number so Bede Theophilact and St. Thomas understand it The Angelical Doctor adds that the Son of God was incarnate rather for original sin which was an universal evil whose venome infected all Mankind than for the actual and personal sins of the World but as no sin is irremissible to an infinite mercy by consequence after original sin he made satisfaction for all actions and transgressions which were mortal The reason is that mortal sins not only deprive the Soul of the vision of God for all eternity but likewise exposes it to the everlasting torments of Hell the Son of God then whose nature is all goodness considered the misery of these sins and offered up his life and death for their expiation For without sanctifying grace our works are not meritorious nor can they satisfy for any venial sin Wherefore deprived of grace by original sin we could not by our selves no not by the assistance of the blessed Angels satisfy for the least venial sin Because though they be endued with grace yet no pure Creature can merit condign grace Wherefore it was necessary that Jesus Christ should make satisfaction for our least failing as St. Austin sayes excellently well that to save an infinity of VVorlds we ought not to cast one glance of the Eye contrary to the will of God Whence it is clear no Creature can satisfy for the least sin since to do it we must offer up something more valuable than the whole VVorld If then we could not free our selves from the least deviation without the interposition of his merits much less were we in a capacity to relieve our selves from the guilt of Enormous Crimes and if as to these the fruit of his passion was not applyed unto all it must be either from the inefficacy of satisfaction or a defect of commiseration and goodness towards his Creatures It cannot be the first for his merits are infinite by reason of the divine person from whence they proceed for actions belong to the person according to Philosophy It was likewise infinite in regard of his humanity because it was sanctifyed and deifyed by the divinity which was like a certain sanctifying and deifying form unto that sacred humanity now as the greatness of merit is not only measured by the quality of the work but also by many circumstances and especially in consideration of the dignity of the person that
misery so likewise it might unto his happiness For doubtless the Combats which a virtuous Man sustains amidst so many Head-strong passions which abound in this mortal frame of ours are no small advancements to eternal Glory nor mean Engins to work our Freedom from the slavery of Sin Hence he takes up arms proclaims Warr against himself and abjures any future compliance with his unbridled appetite He will make his Body a Sacrifice into pennance which before had been a lump of ordures and sensuality His will shall become a Tyrant and check every the least inclination to Evil which till then was agitated and born away with every breath of Vanity and foul delights and if withall these rigours he can break the stamp of his iniquity he will prize that Action beyond all his former Victories and raise more Trophies in Memory of this deliverance than ever were consecrated to the most Heroick enterprize of any person in the World The monstrous shape of his iniquity so confounded him that 'till it was defaced he could not ask any blessing for it is the greatest of evils and wherein all misfortunes are Centered When Rheuben importuned his Father Jacob that Benjamin his darling might go into Egypt he offered his two Sons as pledges for his return and adds for a further engagement ero peccati reus he would be guilty of sin that is exposed to all the miseries imaginable if he falsifyed his word St. Paul expressing how severely God fell upon his only Son sayes he who knew no sin was made sin for us that is he discharged upon him the Tempest of his wrath rendring him the most despicable of Men as a Testimony of sins deformity and the deplorable State of him that lyes under the guilt of a mortal transgression Whence a great Doctor allowing the truth of St. Austin's assertion that one drop of the water of Paradise will be sufficient to quench the flames of Hell yet will it not suffice says he to wash away the foulness of sin Our Holy Penitent knew well that Death concludes all our merit and demerit that though the Just after this life shall perform many glorious actions yet these will not purchase to them any new Crowns no more than the reprobate shall not become more criminal by their abominations acted in Hell Wherefore during the time of this transitory life wherein we are to fix our choice of an eternity good or bad our penitent resolves to play the industrious Merchant whilst he lives his extinguished light of Grace may be enkindled and the hideous Character of his iniquity worn out but if Death surprize him in the obscurity of sin he must eternally remain in darkness deformed with the ugly stamp of his iniquity Wherefore having a clear view both of his present state and danger of delay he will both importunely and opportunely redouble his Note Dele iniquitatem meam blot out my iniquity The Application We may learn by the example of our penitent to work whilst the day of this life endures for the Night of Death approaching our lot is cast As the Tree falls so it will lye no skipping from vice to vertue nor from vertue to vice after Death if here you claw not off the stamp of your iniquity it will be fixed as an eternal reproach unto you and 't is but just where there is a capacity of perfection that a place time and state should be allotted for its acquisition The Angels who excell Men compassed their Felicity by one sole Motion by one simple operation But Man who is more gross and set at a greater distance from Beatitude must usually speaking gain it by several reiterated operations for the period of our merit or demerit takes its beginning where we surcease in the use of our senses for as in flattering their inclinations we offend so in curbing and wisely ruling them for the love of God we perform acts of Piety and Vertue so that in Death the matter of Vice and Vertue expiring with the loss of our senses Man remains confirmed in that State he is then found be it of good or evil Wherefore let us imitate our penitent and whilst our Petition may be heard cry out with Holy David Dele iniquitatem meam blot out my iniquity Amen CHAP. V. Amplius lava me ab iniquitate mea Wash me more from my iniquity OUr distressed Penitent rowses up his Spirits believing he hath already a grant of part of his Petition but he fears lest some relicks may yet remain of his sin that is bad inclinations and proneness unto wickedness contracted by many reiterated peccaminous Acts and therefore he thinks good to stick close unto the same subject till he compleat his design Wash me more from my iniquity It is natural to Vegetables simply to covet a Being to sensitive Animals to seek a well Being and to reasonable Creatures to thirst and long after a Soveraign Being which only can satisfie their God-thirsting Souls So that we see our Petitioner by an impulse of nature is carryed on to his first demand but when with this tendency in nature are joyn'd the seeds and beginnings of Divine love the least stain supervenes not without a sequel of a strange horrour and trembling arising as well from an apprehension of losing the rich Donative of Grace as from a restless ambition of improving it every moment to God's Glory He knowes our life is here as it were between privation and existence between light and darkness by how much we recede from one Extream we approach nearer to the other and to make a hault or stop in this mean is to slide back into that part we would avoid this made our Petitioner not satisfied with a bare remission and to press for a further exemption from his iniquity Amplius lava me wash me more He beholds the Sun to cheer the World with his light not by one continued constant ray but by a perpetual emission of Spirits from his luminous Body Even so he wishes that splendor of the eternal Father which hath already visited with comfortable beams his happy Soul might incessantly oblige him with new influences that if the least exhalation of Sin arise it may in an instant fly and disperse it self before this purifying Globe amplius lava me wash me more His anxiety continues but with this difference before he feared to dye an enemy to God now he dreads to dye not his friend Before his care was to clear himself of sin now it is how to preserve and purchase an encrease of grace He begins to wonder that this spiritual resurrection allayes not all his desires but forthwith he checks himself with the reflection of Man's condition in this life where he is alwayes to seek and never to find because he proposes to himself the Idea of an Entity beyond his reach and hath only this support to hold up his hope that he seeks a thing incomprehensible an Object on Earth designed for our
contribute to the drift of his Petition which is to appear every minute with a greater purity in the Eyes of his Creatour Amplius lava me wash me more from my iniquity The Application St. Bernard observes that if at any time God deprives us of what is good it is but to gratifie us with something that is better upon this reflection he reckons it a happiness in St. Paul that he was struck blind for immediately upon that stroke he was raised to the third Heavens and admitted unto secrets unfit to unfold to Man and afterwards receiving the sight of his Body with that restitution was superadded the clear Eye-sight of his Soul God sent Jeremy to the Potters shop that he might see how the broken Vessel was to be new moulded and come out better than before if then the Clay frequently recieves a better form and fashion than at first let us in imitation and with the same confidence of our holy penitent after our failings cry Lord wash me more Let our past harms warn us not to presume of our own strength this humble opinion will separate much of the dross of our actions and teach us to rely more upon God than our selves Let us oft lay before us the Seal of God's pardon this cannot but enflame our love and enfire our Hearts in the zeal of his service nay Christ seems to set it down as a rule that we proportion our love to our Obligations He little loves to whom little is forgiven that where a large score is struck off by his Mercy there must needs succeed an ambition to a more supereminent perfection wash me more from my iniquity In fine this quadrates with Habakkuk's prophecy If heretofore thou madest one step in the way of Death thou shalt now tread for it ten in the way of life So that every sinner is encouraged not only to recover his innocence but to improve it throughout the remainder of his life never ceasing to repeat Amplius lava me ab iniquitate wash me more from my iniquity Amen CHAP. VI. Et à peccato meo munda me And cleanse me from my sin IN the Series of Acts inordinate and deficient from that rectitude required to give them a denomination of good We find some which relate immediately to God as when with contempt we strike at things directly ordained to his glory and service these pass under the name of impiety Others there are whose first tendency levells at our Neighbour as when we traverse the light of Nature in doing to another what we would not have done unto our selves and these are styled by the appellation of iniquity Lastly there are certain treasons whereof we make our Bodyes instrumental and by which we are corrupted depraved and wrought into strange habitual Frailties these are properly expressed by the term of sin because by them we act against our selves Our Holy Penitent drawes the exordium of his Petition from a sense of his impiety when in this first verse he said have mercy on me O God for there he owns his Frailties as a Creature in respect of his Creatour and beggs his Gracious pardon In the next verse he confesses his iniquity whose full discussion as to injustice towards his Neighbour I reserve for another place In this third verse he surveys his own person beholds the Havocks and corruption made there by sin and now would feign apply a Salutary Medicament to which end he inserts this clause in his Petition A peccato meo munda me cleanse me from my sin that is from the filth and ordure which accompany sins of the flesh Amongst all the irregular motions whereof Man is capable there is none which leads unto Labyrinths so inextricable into precipices so disastrous as this unhappy sin of carnality In the first place it drawes a Cloud over the understanding and so depresses the faculties of the Soul as she becomes in a manner terrestrial that is unable to elevate her self beyond the objects of sense for the operations of the Soul are more perfect as they are more abstracted from materiality Now this sin wholly drowns and takes us up in the pursuit of sensible things and consequently must needs debilitate and weaken the Mind in her natural functions In other passions as Anger Fear Joy and the like there are still extant some Seeds of reason this destroyes all that is Man in us and makes Man by a thousand homages and venerations subject to that Sex which God and Nature have designed Mans inferiour as if it aimed not only at Mans destruction but to resolve the World into another Chaos For what shafts of Gods vengeance have fallen heavy upon Mankind that were not directed to the chastisement of this sin It was an inordinate appetite to mix with the Daughters of Gentiles that first gave birth to Monsters and Gyants and from their accursed off-spring the Earth became such a sink of abominations as no less than an universal inundation was able to wash away the stanch and infection of their impieties It was this foul pleasure which ministred Fuel to the consuming flames of Sodom and Gomorrah this blind passion led Israel ensnared by Madian Women in Idolatry a foundation to all the Calamities and derelictions by God which befel that chosen Nation At one time twenty four thousand Hebrews were punished with Death for Adultery and what a slaughter of sixty thousand persons did our sad Penitent behold and this in revenge of his own libidinous Acts as if the stains they had left behind could not be drawn out by a Sea of blood When his affrighted thoughts had layed before him all these dismal passages he trembles expecting every moment to be shivered and dispersed into Ashes by the decrees of a just avenger he approves the fancy of those who compose Venus of the Froth of the Sea brackish perfidious and the Seat of hazzards and disquiets the pleasure he hath had appears to him now but like a Froth or bubble which if not born away as easily it is by every blast will certainly of it self soon dissolve and work its own ruine and however the substance be fleeting it leaves notwithstanding a remembrance behind so bitter and distastful and so hardly clawed off as one would think that alone were a sufficient punishment for a trespass of so little satisfaction and for the storms and wastes it often makes in Kingdoms and private Families scarce any age hath not furnished many sad examples I am sure our Holy Penitent felt the smart of this bitter Truth in the desolation of his house in the dishonor and death of his Children in the rebellion of his Subjects and above all in the forfeiture of those large promises made by Heaven to him and his posterity all which found not their Tomb but in the corruption of this unhappy sin So that in this request to be cleansed from his sin he first declares the foulness of it evident in the horrid Disease Nature gives
Death might not prey on a treasure that deserves to be immortal wherefore let us never cease to cry with our holy Penitent à peccato meo munda me cleanse me from my sin Amen CHAP. VII Quoniam iniquitatem meam ego cognosco Because I know my iniquity AFter all these supplications our Petitioner now comes to give a reason why so confidently he requires an Act of Grace At the first view it seems a strange one and to imply his greater guilt It is this because he knowes his iniquity Ignorance where the fact is palpable makes a great plea in offendours our criminal on the contrary acknowledges his trespass declares he knowes what he has done and from thence claims and pretends a rationality in his petition had he in lieu of this inserted a Repentance of his misdeeds a detestation of his past failings this might have carried some weight in order to a remission But we must reflect injuries done to God and Man are things very disparate and quite of another nature For I may consider many disobligations I have thrown upon my Neighbour and yet not retract in my will those ill Offices because I may have received the like from him and many humane Lawes have allowed this retaliation so that to retain a memory of the harms I have done to Man may signifie nothing of vertue or pious amendment But when I look upon any miscarriage in my Duty towards God this glance must needs reproach me of ingratitude there can be no pretence or shadow of excuse to justifie any failing towards the Divine Majesty Since we are overwhelmed on all sides with his favours and benedictions whence the Sequel of such a consideration inevitably will humble confound and cast us upon the storms of Repentance Our Petitioner therefore knowing his iniquity virtually declares by it he disowns what he hath done or rather owns it to be exorbitant and from this confession layes claim to his Justice which upon the conversion of a sinner engages to abolish and raise out of his memory all past iniquities Because I know my iniquity This knowledge evidences the return of Grace to his Soul In the 35. Psalm he describes his own condition in the state of sin My iniquities surrounded me and I could see nothing St. Austin exclaims against that day wherein he committed sin and questions whether he may call it day since he was involved in a profound obscurity and then he goes on saying he will rise and disperse the mists of his iniquities that he may see the fountain of all goodness Our Petitioner again in the 48. Psalm gives Man when enslaved by sin the title of Beast nay with something of aggravation assimilating him to a Foolish Beast He remembred how Adam after his fall was cloathed with Skins of Beasts which attire was but a Symbol of his Mind bestiatized and made Savage by transgressions St. Thomas speaking of those Clouds of darkness wherein poor sinners lye groveling sayes it proceeds from a propension bent upon evil aversed from God and deprived of grace The opposite beams then which fill our Souls with light and serenity must needs draw their source from a love of what is good an adhaesion to God and a sweet repossession of grace and in these splendours our Petitioner finds himself First they raise his Soul to an Object infinitely good and amiable and after vehement affections enkindled towards this Sovereign felicity his Eyes are unsealed and beholds the Ghastly shape of his sins which cast him into exclamations against his own unworthiness upon reiterated addresses for mercy and pardon and at last admitted into favour he learns by that inestimable gift under whose Dominion he now lives what it is to offend God how monstrous a thing sin is and therefore will not conceal his new acquired notions but proclaim Quoniam c. because I know my iniquity It was not an abstract knowledge of his iniquity he alledges for this may consist with the most innocent and spotless Soul and was found in Adam before his fall But 't is what he had learnt by dear experience he had tasted that Tree which imports knowledge of good and evil but alas far different from those pure Idaeas which reside in Souls that were never involved in the shades of sin for such survey with an intellect as it were Angelical the commands of God and in obedience to his Law make use of their knowledge but to avoid the prevarication But our Petitioner looks upon the deformity of sin in all its circumstances of the Abyss of ruine it drawes upon us and having with the Cananean cryed for mercy then he confesses his nakedness then he layes open his failings and blushes not at the knowledge of his iniquity because they are now washed in a Christal stream and their past horrours serve but to raise in him a detestation of them and to invite him at the same time to admire the Wisdom of God that thus by his penitential acts will manifest his Justice and lastly to praise his mercy that hath given him a perfect knowledge of his iniquity as a certain Land-mark to preserve him from future Shipwrack because I know my iniquity I remember the Prodigal Son when languishing in misery and perishing for hunger pitched only upon this remedy that he would tell his Father he had sined against Heaven and him In like manner our Petitioner layes aside the thought of any good he may have done offers to the view of his eternal Father all the wounds of his cauterized Soul and that he might engage himself to a compleat discovery confesses he is not ignorant but knowes all the Windings and extravagant progressions of his iniquity how they had led him from Adultery to Homicide thence to Pride Vanity and Sole reliance on his own greatness and power and when he had summed up all his ingratitudes he gives this account Domine opus tuum vivica illud Lord I know my Sin So likewise I know the temper of the delinquent how he is composed of frailties unable of himself to set his hand to any good vvork to any supernatural motion Wherefore he hopes this consideration may something take off and render his deviations less irregular Yet on the other side he will not flatter himself into a blameless condition he knows a support of Grace ever attended him amidst his predominant passions and smartest tryals by whose means he might have been victorious This brings him on his Knees and drawes from him an humble confession Because I know my iniquity It was this knowledge fixing him on the basis of humility which prepared him for those sublime and supernatural communications he afterwards received from his dear Creatour What are his Psalms but a Series of raptures and coelestial ravishments a Tabernacle of sacred mysteries vvith vvhich his understanding was fed that vve may see to vvhat pitch Man is capable of arising from this knowledge of our Sins How confidently did St.
in this plight all he can say for himself is my Mother hath conceived me in sin The Application We are here to deplore with our Penitent the sad consequences or penalties of original sin First it is from thence that Men become Enemies to one another without this sin we had known no Tyrants Robbers by Sea or Land no corruption in Officers no oppression nor injury from any person From hence it is that the Beasts of the Earth and Fowl of the Air as if absolved from their Fidelity are in a manner no more awed by the Majesty of Man's Face The Elements malignant Planets and other insensible Creatures as if let loose to our destruction occasion an infinity of disasters unto us It is from hence we are stupid in our own concerns that being in a condition even beyond imagination dangerous we yet sport and vainly pursue our pleasures as if all things were according to our wish It is from hence we are filled with self-love pusillanimous in struggling with vice inordinate in our pursuit of fading objects never satisfyed with our state and alwayes seeking a change Our sences distract us from the meditation of heavenly things our fancy taken up with illusions disturb our sleep and after a thousand other discommodities and infirmities which usher Death at last it comes to resolve us into corruption worms dust and as it were to nothing and all this because my Mother hath conceived me in sin Ah let us therefore submit our selves under the powerful hand of God who alone is able to conclude all our misery in Beatitude Amen CHAP. XIII Ecce enim veritatem dilexisti For behold thou hast loved Truth OUr Penitent having dissected the Anatomy of Man and left no Cranny whereinto misery might creep undisplaid Now seems to Apologize for his discovery and pleads for excuse God's love to truth And in this point he believes he hath discharged his duty nor doth it a little satisfie him to have done it since it is the only thing he can now perform to repair the failing in his duty First he hath made an ingenuous confession ripping up every thought that could any wayes intrench upon God's holy Law and having thus emptied his unhappy store without the concealment of the least corrupted grain hear what he expects in return of this his faithful Narrative or rather what a Sequel depends upon it Dixi confitebar injustitiam meam Domino tu remisisti impietatem peccati mei no sooner sayes he had I pronounced that I would lay open my iniquities but I found my shackles unloosned and the impiety of my sin wholly rased out whence we may see how the meer intention of doing well never falls to the ground unrewarded Which imports God presumes we will not trifle with him and therefore at the least overture of rendring a just account of our misdeeds he makes us no more impious that is takes away all the obstacles to Remission as impenitency obduration habitual impression of evil and the like So that if we keep touch in our promise he will be faithful in compleating his act of grace because dilexisti veritatem thou hast loved truth Hugo Cardinal prescribes unto us verity under three considerations that is a verity of life a verity of Doctrine and a verity of Justice Verity of life consists in a conformity with those Laws which God and Nature have set down for the Rule of our actions this our blessed Saviour sufficiently asserts when he gives the lye to him who pretends to love God and yet not observes his commands St. Thomas sayes there is a law eternal residing in the Divine intellect by which the World is governed and that humane lawes are more or less just as they participate of this eternal rule Hence our life if not squared out by this directive original must needs wander fall into errour nor can be called a life of verity nay I know not whether we may call it a life since Lactantius affirms that whosoever strayes out of this line flyes from himself despises humane nature and consequently will suffer the torture of an erroneous conscience which is not small though other punishments escape him The First Principle then of a life of Truth is to steer our Course in order to this universal guiding spirit imprinted in us by the light of nature next we are to look upon positive Lawes dictated by the Holy Ghost and the adorable example of our Lord Jesus whose life and actions were all directed to our instruction So that any structure erected upon this foundation cannot prove Sandy nor fail the builders expectation We find in holy Scripture frequently eternal felicity promised as a reward to good works this the penny agreed on with those who wrought in the Vineyard insinuates no less doth the Crown prepared for those who faithfully combat in this life the Triumph also of Resurrection speaks as much assured to the real not ideal supporters of Christ's Cross Nor is the name of Christian given us as bare lookers on but because actually made a spectacle to God Angels and Men. By acts therefore of Temperance Patience Humility Resignation and other Christian vertues we shake off as it were our old Natures and become a new production created in Justice and Truth and so become the object of God's Love because Veritatem dilexisti he hath ever loved Truth If we look upon the unwearied labours of Men in pursuit of what may render them happy in this life we shall find Truth to be the main scope of their aims First it is a priviledge of Man's Nature there being no Creature in the World but Man capable of truth so that whilst we toil in the inquisition we comply with an appetite or desire engrafted in us which eggs us on towards the thing that can only make us happy For Beatitude is defined a joy in the possession of truth unveiled and clearly discovered to us Secondly the delight we derive from the knowledge of Truths far surpasses any other satisfaction we can have in this World because depending meerly upon the intellect it is depurated from the dreggs of sense and so more intimately affects and transports the Soul When by study we have attained to a Demonstration how quiet is the understanding freed from all mists of doubts and uncertainty and securely rests in the acquisition of the said truth Thirdly if I covet a Friend I propose in this design an object of truth and fidelity and if I find a breast sealed with this sacred stamp how pleasing a Sanctuary is it where in all distresses I fly as to an Oracle unfolding the secrets of my heart resolving in that consistory between us two what to act and how to steer the course of my affairs If the tye of marriage leagues between Nations and Friendships are held sacred from the obligation they impose upon us of sincerity and truth how much ought verity it self to be valued which gives life and
rather a fear to have stopt the sacred stream of God's extraordinary favours towards him For he was so well versed in the wayes of perfection as he knew the foundation of a life of Sanctity consists in the good management of divine inspirations and that the greatest Saints have from thence derived their happy success in a spiritual life We see no King nor Common-wealth if they find any person unfaithful in a slight Office that will entrust to him a more weighty charge and why should we think that God will be less prudent in the Government of Souls St. Prosper sayes that God imparts his graces in order and by degrees First distilling into them some little dropps of his grace and then a greater quantity in case those first be carefully improved it being a good earnest that he who acquits himself with fidelity in ordinary things will in matters of greater perfection come off with no less honour Whereas on the contrary the first step to the misfortune of a sinner is made by the neglect of God's early inspirations in the beginning For there is not any Pagan misbeliever or Christian whom he stirs not up to the common practice of vertue as obsequiousness to our Parents the avoiding Theft Luxury and the like and if they comply with these he fails not to enflame them with desires and gives them abilities to arrive at more sublime perfection Wherefore our Penitent fears he may have demerited in this Nature and begs not to be excluded from his face that is not to be deprived of those endearments wherewith he is wont to overwhelm such Souls as correspond with his inspirations and if hitherto he hath played the Coy one and scorned his dalliances for the future he will change his humour and cherish every the least motion of his dear Creatour He will aim at a perfect resemblance of his beloved in imitation of his wisdom he will discern good from evil and distinguish 'twixt the less and greater good alwayes embracing that which is best In order to his purity as much as is consistent with frail nature supported by grace he hopes to preserve himself from all stain and imperfection That some sparks of his charity may shine in him he will love that which God loves and love nothing but what he loves and upon the same motives whereon his love is grounded In a word he will unite all his faculties with God in as strict an alliance as this present condition of mortality will bear provided he be not exiled from his Face nor the flood-gates of gracious communications shut up in punishment of his past offences Whilst the person offended admits the offendour to his presence it argues there is not an utter breach between them wherefore till a sentence of banishment be passed he still retains some hope his aim then in this petition is to put a barr to this extremity of rigour He confesses it is a bitter thing to leave God but yet a far greater to be left by him and a main appearance of this is when he leaves us to the desires of our own heart like a Physitian who permits his patient in a desperate condition to eat and drink what he please He knowes the anger of God is great when he is not angry with a sinner and that it is a stroke of his goodness when his temporal chastisement immediately followes the offence so that if he please to afflict him and like a Jealous God issue forth his indignation upon the place for every misdemeanour He is ready to embrace with open arms what ever affliction he shall send and is willing to expose his breast to the direst shafts of his fury so it may but divert this great subject of his fears as to bee ternally cast out from his presence Neprojicias me c. The Application We behold by this clause how all along in this petition our Penitent hath been terrifyed with the ugly shape of sin and now he begins to apprehend the effects of sin which is Death For Death and sin considered apart are very frightful but once joyned together that is to dye in sin there is nothing more dreadful and this dismal stroke he fears when he sayes cast me not away from thy face St. John Damascene observes two derelictions of God the one seeming when he permits the just to fall into sin that by experiment of their frailty they might rise more humble and more watchfully attend to their Salvation This happened to our Penitent St. Peter and divers others The other is absolute and a final cashier for ever and this happens when after all remedies applyed a Soul remains stupid and incurable even to the last by his obstinate perseverance in wickedness so that God foreseeing this obdurateness withholds his special grace and so lets him end in his impenitency we are here therefore to joyn with our Petitioner and beg we may not come to this period or consummation of our iniquities but timely lay hold on the shield of his mercy Amen CHAP. XXIV Et spiritum Sanctum tuum nè auferas à me And take not from me thy holy Spirit THe workings of God's Holy Spirit in our Souls are great secrets and if to our selves unknown no wonder that to others they lye hid and though he be in us after a quite different manner than he is said to be ubiquitary by his essence presence and power yet his approach or recess is so insensible as the best persons during this life are left in suspence ignorant whether they be in a condition of love or hatred with their Creatour Of this blessed Job seemed to complain saying Chap. 19. If he come I shall not see him and when he retires I am in the same Cloud Notwithstanding God is pleased sometimes though rarely to dispense with his ordinary proceeding as to give such marks of his grace and friendship to a Soul that it is apparent even to the Eye of the Body Of this we have an example in the Feast of Pentecost when the Holy Ghost descended upon the Apostles in form of fiery tongues so replenishing their Minds with knowledge and enflaming their Hearts with charity as the whole World was in a short time laid prostrate to the power of their doctrine and miracles In this clause of the petition we have likewise reason to pass the same Opinion of our Holy Penitent that he had been gratified with the like visible communication of this divine gift The past transactions 'twixt God and his once happy Soul were fresh in his memory and how he had designed to reveal unto him many secrets of his Providence Nay had given him so many proofs of inhabiting grace as one must be strangely stupid not to acknowledge it Now here he seems to cheer himself with a confidence that after his petition for a clean heart and right understanding he is again in the enjoyment of his blessed presence by grace and charity wherefore he begs
merits Hence it is that Jesus Christ being infinite in consideration of his person and his humanity being infinitely holy his actions are of an infinite value and merit If it be said his goodness is deficient in this ransom and that he contracted it only to some few St. John confounds them for speaking of the incarnation he seems transported with wonder and expresses it with a sic that is God so loved the World as he gave unto it his only Son Can we imagine then he loved it so little as to select a certain small number no no he loved it so much as he died for all There is no good person upon Earth who desires not out of charity all Men's Salvation and shall Jesus Christ the Saint of Saints be limited in this his charity St. Bridget in her Revelations recounts how Christ our Lord said once unto her I am much offended with those who say my Lawes are hard that I give not sufficient Grace to their observance and that my passion is to some no wayes beneficial by which they would ravish my goodness from me but at the latter day I will justify my self before the Angels and Saints and make it clear as the Sun there was no want on my part that there is not one Soul for whom I would not have endured as much as I have done for all and that the sole fault consists in the obliquity of their wills alwayes rebellious and contrary to mine St. Peter in his second Epistle Chap. 2. speaking of certain Reprobate Hereticks sayes They deny him by which they are redeemed and St. Paul 1 Cor. c. 8. Thus thy Brother will perish for whom our Lord and Saviour dyed Whence it followes a person may be damned for whom Christ offered up his death by consequence he dyed for the Reprobate The councel of Trent Sess 6. c. 3. Christ dyed for all though as to the benefit of his death those only receive it unto whom his passion is applyed The price of his blood was given then for all Men though the success be different some more some less partaking the fruit of his passion He is a Saviour then to all in some degree of redemption even to those he shall judge and condemn as St. Austin on the 53. Psalm He shall judge all the VVorld who hath payed the ransome for all the VVorld In which appears his magnificence and copious redemption that would dye for Souls whom he foreknew would resist the charms of his grace to the last and as much as lyes in them render his passion fruitless nay he gloryes in that he came for the greatest sinners promising cure to the most desperate diseases nay to the impious in case they will comply with his prescriptions To bring this a little more home St. Thomas sayes the passion of Jesus Christ is like to a ray of the Sun which though it be created for the benefit of the whole World yet all reap not advantage by it there being some of a melancholy reserved humour who effect darkness and shut up their doors and windowes against his beams so the passion and death of our Saviour is offered up for the universal good of all Men but many loving the darkness of sin keep themselves barricadoed from his benign influence resisting the light of Faith and other attractives of his love Thus you see all have power to save themselves though such only are effectually saved unto whom the passion of Jesus Christ by our happy concurrence with his sufficient Grace is communicated and applyed as in the Fifth Chapter to the Hebrews he is cause of Salvation unto all those who obey him Our Learned Doctor upon these grounds hath reason to hope that when he shall have deciphered unto the wicked the wayes of God how full of mercy and obliging sweetness they are they will lend their cooperation and consent to the movings of his grace bear part with their Saviour's passion that they may likewise share in his glory acknowledging with faith and love all that is done or to be done by them the effects of his grace and so apply to themselves Christ's merits and satisfaction And the impious shall be converted to thee Impiety in the strict acceptation imports Atheism and a shaking off all acknowledgement of a Deity its usual mates are prophaneness and impurity by which all things sacred are contemned and Man degenerates into a brute What a task is it then to reduce an impious person Whom neither the fear of a divinity doth awe nor the charms of holy things allure nor finally the shame of a base action can move St. Austin treating of such as are enslaved to this vice sayes they resemble in nature to a Feaverish Distemper which still creates a thirst though you throw in an Ocean of liquor so where the flames of impiety have once taken hold to stop the wastes of its fury passes the art of reason or eloquence for the impious have neither Eye nor Ear nor any sense which is not depraved and turns all into the malignity of its own humour I remember St. Chrysostom makes a query why Herod fell so barbarously upon the massacre of so many Infants for sayes he he either believed the Prophecy or believed it not if he gave no credit to it it was sottish in him to embrue his hands in so much blood any spark of judgement would have dictated he ought to have contemned and slighted it Again if he believed it was a real prophecy issuing from the decree of Heaven it must needs be inviolable and could not want its effect At last he solves the question and throwes it upon this that a Soul drenched in impiety is above all things the most infatuated she is so unhappy as where there is no impulse from abroad to precipitate herself into inevitable ruine nay fruitlesly to attempt odious and impossible things It is of these impious holy Job speaks when he gives a relation of their Maxims They say unto God retire from us we scorn the knowledge of your wayes what is the Omnipotent that we must serve him and what benefit arises if we pray unto him These are the familiar blasphemies which the impious belch forth the presence of God they decline shutting up all the Avenues of Faith and Charity by which he may enter unto them The knowledge of his wayes and Commandements they abhor because they are contrary to their works to his power they submit not faigning to believe he is not omnipotent because he is merciful Finally they offer not up their supplications unto him because they would ask what is not fit for his supream wisdom and goodness to accord Our great Minister in despight of all these exorbitancies promises yet to himself the reduction of these Monsters and hopes to shape them to the resemblance in which they were created in which undertaking we need not doubt but he used all the Topicks of authority and reason apt to convince and
that grand ballancing of all their good and bad deeds and by this means who knowes whether he hath not only disjoyned and torn the Soul from the Body but even from God for all eternity These dismal thoughts prompt him to fly for Sanctuary and it is no where to be found but at the Throne of God's mercy which he implores Free me from blood c. Again he considers with what a severe Eye God looks upon the sin of homicide commanding in Moses Law that blood alone should be the price and satisfaction for blood nay he extends it even to irrational Creatures that if any happen to be the cause of Man's death the Beast what ever it be should lose its life It was to prevent this unnatural violence that he prohibited the eating of blood so to cut off any practice which might diminish the horrour of it Besides the remorse and tortures of conscience which alwayes attend this sin sufficiently evidences that though in other Crimes his patient Justice seems for a while to lye asleep yet this he alwayes revenges upon the place For if the Thunder-bolts of his anger do not immediately fall upon their heads as to the publick view at least he begins the execution from the first moment of the Fact committed disturbing their sleep with frightful Phantomes and filling their awakened hearts with dreads and terrours that their life is even a burden and Irkesome to them of this are extant innumerable examples both in sacred and prophane Histories too long here to recite It is not unworthy our observation that a murdered Body should bleed afresh as it hath been often experimented at the presence of the murderer It is true many give natural reasons of the thing attributing it to the vital spirits not yet extinguished in the remnants of the blood retreated into several Cranies of the Body which by an Antipathy at the approach of their adversary fall into a Commotion and by this disturbance occasions the blood again to flow Others say it may proceed from a simpathy supposing the murderer to have upon his weapon wherewith he gave the wound or in some other part about him certain dropps of blood of the deceased by which Sympathetick vertue it receives motion in order to its reunion But my design not being to insist on Philosophical disputes I will not labour to weaken the force of their Arguments and only assert my Opinion which is that it speaks simply the extraordinary way of God which he holds sometimes in one kind sometimes in another to manifest and publish offendours of this nature Our Holy Penitent may be brought in for an instance unto whom it was declared by God's own command that notwithstanding all his Artifices in contriving Vriah his Death it should be exposed in the view of the whole World that future ages might see he whom he had chosen as the delight of his heart should have no priviledge in this particular and though he would abate something of his wonted rigour in not exacting his life for a satisfaction yet he would bring it near to his door by the rebellion of his Children with the Enmity and Machinations of many Conspiratours against him and that the Law of retaliation was not executed against him perhaps he owes it to this clause of the petition which he seems with more than usual fervour to have preferred repeating O God God of my Salvation We may here reflect how pernicious a thing passion is when once it hath got the Mastery and how soon it gets strength with the aid of dangerous occasions Our Penitent knew well that the Divine precept Non occides thou shalt not kill did not only forbid the taking away of our Neighbours life but likewise all rancour or malice towards him all injury by word or deed which may touch upon his honour or person all disputes contest or impetuosity of Choler these are the seeds of that monstrous fruit homicide as St. John sayes who hates his Brother is a homicide For by nourishing within you a little spark of animosity this from the heart appears in the Eyes which are the glass of the inward temper thence it breaks into words and at last sadly ends in his destruction Behold our Kingly Prophet and now an humble petitioner in his own behalf he is said to have been the meekest of Men and in consideration of his lenity and mildness in Government God spun out his reign to the Term of Forty years which was granted to few or none of the Jewish Kings with what patience did he sustain the reproaches and maledictions of Semei with what an admirable temper the long and restless persecution of Saul how tenderly issued he forth his orders touching Absalom that though he were actually in arms against him and thirsted after nothing but his life and Throne yet he commanded a hair of his Head should not be touched Notwithstanding all this upon a suddain seized with a passion of love both his sweet temperament and all his former habits of vertue proved of little use unto him The Christal of his understanding was blemished with gross vapours arising from brutish pleasures the purling stream of his inclinations which was wont to flow softly without noise and from the source of vertue is now grown into a storm of fury it is so deprived of reason as to imagine his own good and safety to depend upon the ruine of his Neighbour and therefore hastens to take vengeance upon him who never gave him the least shadow of real offence O what a Tyranny is the Rule of passion to make us love what is not amiable and hate what is not odious to push us on to desire what we should abhor and fly from vvhat vve ought most to covet Our holy penitent hath served under this oppression and novv petitions a release Free mee from blood c. Novv the Latins not using the vvord blood in the plural Number though the Greeks do hence it is that some infer and with reason that our Penitent aims at the remission of Adultery likewise because all carnal acts unlawful carry along with them a corruption both of flesh and blood this appears in Deut. Chap. 21. Where it is said that rotteness and worms shall be the inheritance of a luxurious person and as the one that is homicide destroyes the species of Man so adultery subverts those rules which are set down for his education a design which nature intends and drives at as well as Generation The one injures his Neighbour in his person the other in his honour and this not only of himself but casts an infamy upon his posterity It is storied of Vlysses that he met in his Travails with Circes the Enchantress vvho promised to make him immortal in case he vvould be naught with her and though he believed she was able to make good her promise yet he refused her less valuing immortality than fidelity to his Wife Susanna far less esteemed of
give life to them and truly it is rational that since God threatens punishment to the wicked deeds of Men he should likewise propose a recompence to vertuous actions otherwise he might be said to be more enclined to severity than sweetness which is much repugnant to his nature Again sanctifying grace is a quality so sublime that it dignifies and exalts the works of that subject it informs above all the Worlds greatness Now there being nothing but eternal glory which surpasses grace a meritorious action animated by grace cannot be recompenced to the worth but by glory whence it followes that grace by a title of right and condignity merits eternal glory Lastly sanctifying Grace is communicated by God unto a Soul with the circumstance of an affectionate Amity by which in the first place he loves her and this love of friendship moves him to pardon all her offences to receive her into his favour and adorn her with the incomparable Ornament of this Celestial quality This done Man becomes a Friend of God in his first justification is raised to a pitch of greatness so transcending as his works are worthy of Heaven as performed by a friend of God who hath an affection for her and by that will render her compleatly happy Upon these motives and supposition of a grant to the preceeding clause of his petition he will blazon forth the Iustice of God not in the remission of his sin for this he acknowledges to his pure mercy but upon the score of a recompence which his goodness hath promised This consideration awakens him from sluggishness and as the Labourer endures patiently the fatigues of his task in hopes of his salary at Night so will our Petitioner unweariedly sustain the traverses of this life and amidst his tribulations every thought of Paradise shall move his Tongue to exalt O Lord thy Justice Merit is defined a service which obliges to a retribution or a good work done freely and which God accepts of as the price of eternal life Now albeit good actions arising from grace by which they are supernaturallized are in a certain manner rendered worthy of eternal life even without the promise of God yet they can no wayes oblige God to give it unless he first engage his word to this effect For he is the Sovereign Lord of the World and most particularly of just Men and their good deeds yet can they not so much sway with him as to put a constraint on his will to let them share with him in his Heavenly Kingdom For when all the just had consecrated to his honour all the good works imaginable he might justly say I accept of these in discharge of your past debts and obligations due to me for your Creation conservation grace and power I have given you to act So that when any one makes an oblation of his person fortune or any other his goods unto God he must not present it in way of a gift but with humility as in satisfaction of a debt nor yet as if he would clear all scores but as a small parcel of that great Summ which he owes Wherefore that Man may have an unquestionable right to Heaven by the value of his good works being so engaged to God as he is it was necessary a contract or stipulation should pass by which God should please to declare he would give him Heaven in recompence and upon this ground he should have a title to demand and obtain it In this proceeding his Mercy and Justice meet his mercy in that he accepts the works of the just for more than the bare discharge of their obligations His Justice in that he is pleased to give the rate of Heaven in return of their good works by this means Saints are humbled in the excellency and value of their merits for by it they know that Heaven is so bestowed by way of Iustice as they are notwithstanding unspeakably obliged to the Divine mercy which passing over the debts accepts of their works for Heaven this certainly will give them immortal resentments of gratitude for which they will powre forth an infinity of praises and benedictions throughout the vast spaces of eternity to a Benefactour who treats them so nobly with such signal favours as to become a Debtor even to his own debtors St. Austin admiring this Mystery sayes God hath made himself a Debtor to us not by receiving any thing from us but by promising what he pleased unto us For all things are depending on him nor can they oblige him but as far as he will oblige himself by his incomparable Charity and inviolable Fidelity Our great Penitent ravished in the contemplation of these truths cannot but unloose his Tongue to celebrate the praises of the Divine Iustice which so attempers the circumstances of our Salvation that we may claim it as our due He hires us into his Vineyard and if we prove faithful to our task he will not fail in his promise to give us a salary he often reflects what a comfort it will be to a beatifyed Soul to have contributed something to her own happiness In this liberty and free will which God hath given us he beholds the perfection and greatness of the Soul that neither the most charming beauties the most ravishing delights the most glorious dignities the most amiable vertues in spiritual entertainments nay nor the most eminent hopes of glory can work any impression or impose any necessity upon her actions but according to the mtasure of her will Again she hath a vigour impregnable fortifyed with God's grace against all sin and misfortunes that neither the allurements of what is lovely nor the horrid face of what is frightful can make any entrance by force for the Soul is above all the machinations of Men can resist them and meerly because it pleases her so to do Let them speak fair let them bribe threaten weep attack thunder lighten muster the Elements into storms and fury nothing finds admittance but at her disposal So that these words in the Apocalips may justly be applyed to her I have been dead and am living She was dead by Original sin and is revived by the Grace of Jesus Christ she hath put into her Hands the Keys of life and death that is free will which may open to her either Paradise or Hell After this survey of Man's liberty in this life by which he is free either to the acting of what is good or bad he makes a pause upon the apprehension that Man would have been more perfect were he limited to vertue and incapable of any vitious action as God himself is and all the blessed by a clear vision But he solves this objection considering that God alone by nature is impeccable it is a priviledge wherein none can share with him as being infinitely perfect and can admit of no imperfection St. Ambrose sayes that only the substance of the Divinity is a Being that cannot dye to wit by the death of
sin All other reasonable Creatures in this sense are mortal and if the blessed in heaven be impeccable it is not by their nature but by the power of glory communicated in which they were invested by God after they had given proof of their vertues whilest they were Viatours and under their Tryal Now as to Man the experience of his frailty helps him on to discern more clearly as the obscurity of the Night renders a fair Day the more resplendent and reverence this excellency in God Next he ought not to repine that he is not here glorious for this life is his place of Combat and the Crown is not given till the Victory be gained wherefore as long as he lives he enjoyes a liberty by which he may sin and be overcome and by which he may vanquish Lastly God decreed this liberty to Man and gave him a faculty by which he might with a full swinge of his Will be take himself to good or evil to the end he might be capable of merit or demerit for if he acted by the impulse of necessity he could merit no recompence for his vertue nor punishment for his sin no more than a tree which bears good or bad fruit and by this means the divine Justice could not be discerned either in the condemnation of the wicked or in the reward of the just Our great Penitent in the issue of this meditation hath reason to set his Tongue a work and spend it self in exalting this powerful and remunerating Iustice of God which happily converts to our advantage what at the first glance appears the Subject of our ruine and resign himself to those dangers wherein the perfection of his free will may involve him since by his grace which he implores he may embrace and practise what is pleasing to him And if to the end he carry on this noble resolution he hath an assurance to bless his Iustice for all Eternity And my Tongue shall exalt thy Iustice. St. Austin upon this place is of Opinion that our Penitent means the Messias whose Justice he will extoll in that by his merit both Men and Angels are rescued from the slavery of sin To which I agree nor do the premises any waies derogate from this interpretation for the merits of Jesus Christ are the source and cause of Sanctifying grace which grace dignifyes the works of the just and raises them to the degree of merit Now that which is cause of the cause is likewise cause of the effect and consequently the merits of Jesus Christ are cause of the merits of Saints as St. Paul to the Galatians Chap. 1. He hath blessed us with all spiritual benediction in Jesus Christ Next the merits of Jesus Christ contribute to the merits of Saints in that he hath obtained by his actions and sufferings a promise from God to accept the merits of Men in order to Heaven for it was in consideration of him and upon the score of his torments that this promise was made unto us It is this St. Peter in his Second Epistle Chap. 3. hints at when speaking of Christ he sayes by him he hath made us great and precious promises to the end we might by them be made partakers of the Divine Nature Now as Grace is the Fountain of the merits of Saints and God's promise the accomplishment both the one and the other proceeding from the merits of Jesus Christ it followes that the merits of Saints subsist not but by those of Christ Nor have they a dependency only by way of simple condition or necessary circumstance but they flow from them as from the root fountain and principal cause without which they would have no Being Our Holy Doctor therefore will praise and set forth the divine Justice under several Notions First as he is the Principium or Off-spring whence all remission of sin and collation of grace is derived and without which all Mankind had been eternally wrapt up in the darkness of sin so that the just and superabundant ransom he hath paid for us merits the Adorations and praises of all hearts and tongues Next he will extoll him under the title of a remunerating Iustice in that after he hath taught us how to fight put arms into our hands and hath stood by us to confirm our courage exacting only a firm will to overcome doth yet dispense his Crowns with applause as if we had done all our selves O who can then asperse and lay a charge upon this Opinion as if it injured Christs merits doth the fulness of a stream dishonour the source from whence it flowes or the excellency of any fruit injure the Root that gives birth to it so the merits of the just being only the rivulets and fruit of Christ's superabundant satisfaction cannot certainly in the least derogate from his they only serve in an inferiour degree to extol and do homage to the infinity of Christ's merit Wherefore Our Penitent will incessantly tune forth And my Tongue shall exalt thy Justice The Justice of God beholds Creatures in three several relations First it is distributive by which he allots unto every Creature faculties proportionable to carry them on to the End for which they were created To the Soul which he hath designed to contemplate and love him he hath given an understanding and will the Body doomed to labour he hath framed with Arms and Hands The Sun whose Office is to enlighten the World he hath vested with a lasting brightness which never fails to perform its task in fine every animal Tree Plant or what ever is existent in the World hath a vertue proper to the designment of its Creation Whence St. Dennis sayes that God is communicable in his Justice distributing to every one according to the dignity of its nature and bounding within limits most equitable the manner beauty order Ornament the inequalities and proportions of all Creatures accommodating every thing with that which is proper to it Our Penitent will not be silent in order to this his distributive Iustice he will admire the works of God give his approbation without the least Censure and confess that this wise Architect hath ballanced all things with equity and justice and if he may be so happy as to manage his individual Being conformably to those proprieties and qualities he hath received from his Creatour he will with confidence proclaim that his tongue shall exalt his justice In the second consideration his punitive justice hath place by which he inflicts a punishment on sinners the reason of this is that a sinner living contrary to the wil of God and disobedient to his order setling his contentment on things forbidden by his Sovereign doth by these his wayes throw a contempt upon him Wherefore it is most just reparation should be made and since he hath rebelled in breaking the Commands of his Creatour it is fit he should be afflicted with torments and enslaved by that will he hath so much scorned and set at naught