Selected quad for the lemma: death_n
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A28660
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A relation of the fearful estate of Francis Spira, in the year 1548 compiled by Natth. Bacon, Esq.
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Bacon, Nathaniel, 1593-1660.
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1649
(1649)
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Wing B357; ESTC R9731
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21,936
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82
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justly punished for it Your estate quoth Gribauldus is not so strange as you make it Iob was so farr gone that he complained God had set him as a mark against him and David that was a man after Gods own heart complained often that God had forsaken him and was become his enemy yet both received comfort again comfort your self therefore God will come at length though he now seem far off O Brother answered Spira I believe all this the divels believe and tremble but David was ever elected and dearly beloved of God and though he fell yet God took not utâ—erly away his holy Spirit and therefore was heard when he prayed Lord take not thy holy Spirit from mee but I am in another case being ever accursed from the presence of God neither can I pray as he did because his holy Spirit is quite gone and cannot be recalled and therefore I know I shall live in continual hardness so long as I live O that I might feel but the lest sense of the love of God to me though but for one small moment as I now feel his heavie wrath that burns like the torments of hell within mee and afflicts my Conscience with pangs unutterable verily desperation is hell it self Here Gribauldus said I do verily believe Spira that God having so severely chastised you in this life correcteth you in mercy here that he may spare you hereafter and that he hath mercy sealed up for you in time to come Nay said Spira hence do I know that I am a Reprobate because he afflicteth me with hardness of heart O thâ—t my body had suffeâ—ed all my life long so that he would be pleased to release my soul and eâ—se my Conscience this burtheâ—ed Conscience Gribauldus being desirous to ease his mind from the continual meditation of his sin as also to sound how for the present he stood affected to the Romish Church asked him what he thought became of the soules of men so soone as they departed out of the body to which he answered Although this be not so fully revealed in Scripture yet I verily believe that the soules of the Elect go presently to the Kingdome of glory and not that they sleep with the body as some do imagine Very well said one of the spectators why do the Scriptures then say that God brings down to hell and raiseth up seeing it cannot be meant of the estate of the soul after death which as thou sayest either goeth to heaven without change or to hell without redemption it must be understood of the estate of the soul in this life like that wherein thou art at this present and oftentimes we see that God suffers men to fall into the jawes of despair and yet raiseth them up again and therefor despair not but hope it shall be even thus with thee in his good time This is the work quoth Spira this the labour for I tell you when I â—t Venice did first abjure my profession and so as it were drew an Indenture the spirit of God often admonisht mee and when at Cittadella I did as it were set to my seale the Spirit of God often suggested to me do not write Spira do not seal yet I resisted the Holy Ghost and did both and at that very present I did evidently feele a wound inflicted in my very will so although I can say I would believe yet can I not say I will believe God hath denied mee the power of will and it befalls mee in this my miserable estate as with one that is fast in irons and his friends comming to see him do pitie his estate and do perswade him to shake off his fetters and to come out of his bonds which God knows he would fain do but cannot this is my very case you perswade me to believe how fain would I do it but cannot O now I cannot Then violently grasping his hands together and raising himself up Behold said he I am strong yet by little and little I decay and consume and my servants would fain preserve this weary life but at length the will of God must be done and I shall perish miserably as I deserve rejoyce ye righteous in the Lord blessed are you whose hearts the Lord hath mollified Then after some pause It 's wonderful I earnestly desire to pray to God with my heart yet I cannot I see my damnation and I know my remedie is only in Christ yet I cannot set my self to lay hold on it such are the punishments of the damned they confess what I confess they repent of their loss of heaven they envie the Elect yet their repentance doth them no good for the cannot mend their waies As hee was thus speaking he observed divers flies that came about him and some lighted on him Behold said he non also * Belzebub comes to his banquet you shall shortly see my end and in mee an example to many of the Iustice and Iudgement of God About this time came in two Bishops with divers Schollers of the Vniversity one of them being Paulus Vergerius having observed Spira more then any other being continually conversant with him told him his estate was such as rather stood in need of prayer them advice and therefore desired him to pray with him in the Lords Prayer Spira consented and he began Our Father which art in heaven then breaking forth in to teards he stopped but they said it is well your grief is a good signe I bewaile said he my misery for I perceive I am forsaken of God and cannot call to him from my heart as I was wont to do yet let us go on said Vergerius Thy kingdome come O Lord said Sprit bring me also into this kingdome I beseech thee shut mee not out Then comming to those words Give us this day our daily bread headded O Lord I have enough and abundance to feed this carkeise of mine but there is another bread I humbly begge the bread of thy grace without which I know I am but a dead man Lead us not into temptation seeing Lord that I am brought into temptation help me Lord that I may escape the enemie hath overcome help me I beseech thee to overcome this cruel Tyrant These things he spake with a mournful voyce the teares trickling down abundantly and expressing such affection and passion as turned the bowels of those there present with grief and compunction they then turning to Spira said You know that none can call Christ Iesus the Lord but by the Holy Ghost you must therefore think of your self according to that soft affection which you express in your prayers inferring thereby that God hath not wholly cast you off or bereaved you of his Spirit utterly I perceive said Spira that I call on him to my eternal damnation for I tell you again it is a new and unheard of example that you find in mee If Iudas said they had but outlived his dayes which by nature hee might
with it quoth they I cannot tell you said he what this minde would move me to upon occasion nor what I would do They perceiving small effect of all this their labor but rather that he grew worse For the avoiding of concourse of people for every day seldom fewer then twenty continued with him and to stop the course of fame which was continually blown abroad of him they consult to carry him back again into his own Countrey and those his friends that came to comfort him began to take their leaves of him Vergerius amongst the rest required that at their parting they might pray together with him Spira hardly consented and as unwillingly performed For he said My heart is estranged from God I cannot call him Father from my heart all good motions are now quite gone my heart is full of malediction hatred and blasphemy against God I finde I grew more and more hardned in heart and cannot stoop nor help my self Your Prayers for me shall turn to your own benefit they can do me no good Vergerius came to take his leave of him whom Spira embracing said Although I know that nothing can bring any benefit to me a Reprobate but that every thing shall tend to my deeper condemnation yet I give you most hearty thanks for your kinde office of love and good will and the Lord return it unto you with a plentiful increase of all good The next day being brought down to his intended journey by the way looking round about him with a ghastly look he saw a knife lying on a Table to which he running hastily snatched hold of as intending to mischief himself but his friends laying hold of him stopped him in his purpose whereupon with indignation he said I would I were above God for I know he will have no mercy on me Thus went he homewards often saying that he envyed the condition of Cain and Judas He lay about eight weeks in this case in a continual burning neither desiring nor receiving any thing but by force and that without disgestion so spent that he appeared a perfect Anatomy expressing to the view nothing but sinews and bones vehemently raging for drink ever pining yet fearful to live long dreadful of Hell yet coveting death in a continual torment yet his own tormentor And thus consuming himself with grief and horror impatience and despair like a living man in hell he represented an extraordinary example of the justice and power of God And thus as far as appeareth within a few days after his arrival at his own home he departed this present life Yet an occasion to make us remember That secret things belong unto the Lord our God but charity to man to teach him to hope all things EXtraordinary Examples of Divine Justice God never intended for a nine days wonder else would he when he exemplified Lots wise have turned her into a statue of melting snow not of lasting salt which stood as Josephus tels us till his age after the destruction of Jerusalem and as some Travellers report till at this day ut quoddam hominibus praestares condimentium quo sapiant unde illud caveatur exemplum Aug. de civic Dei lib. 16. cap. 30 for a season against corruption a preservative against Apostacy This Tragedie when fresh and new was the conversion and confirmation of sundry Worthies Vergerius a daily spectator thereof forsaking a rich Bishoprike of Iustinopolie and tents of Antichrist went to Basil and dyed a worthy Protestant many Nations had Eye-witnesses of their own Students then in the Vniversitie of Padua who penned the Story the Copies whereof are frequently revived our English ones were very defective and now worn out of shops and hands sundry Manuscripts of this abroad imperfect which mooved me to compare this labour of a worthy Gentleman who faithfully translated it out of Italian French and Dutch letters with the Latine of Coelius Secundus Curio Mattheus Gribaldus professors of the Civill Law in Padua Sigesmond Gelous a Transilvanian Henricus Scotus all daily visitors of Spira and find it accord with them Touching Spira's person I find most learned writers do incline to the right and hopefull hand moved by his sweet humble and charitable speeches some few desperate ones excepted that fell from him in some little agonies which kept him fasting and watching about sixe moneths space eating nothing but what was forced down his throat The summe of Calvins and Borrhaus their counsels who writ largely of the use of this patern is that all learn to take heed of backsliding which God soul abhors and not to dally with Conscience and hell on earth if justly incensed more to be feared then the Spanish Inquisition or all the Strappadoes and torments in the world and to take heed of Spira's principall Errors which were to dispute with Satan over-busily in time of weakness especially to reason and conclude from present sense to Gods past Reprobation and future Damnation both which is hard if possible for any man to determine in his own much more in others cases so commending thee to his grace who is able to establish thee to the end I bid thee farewell and hope well while the space of Grace lasteth Dum spiras spera so mayest thou take good and no hurt by the reading of this terrible Example FINIS Imprimatur Tho Wykes R P Episc Lond Cap domest. Decmb 2. 1637. Luk. 21.61 Mat. 10.33 Rom. 9.11 and Rom. 4. Jam. 2 10. Rom. 9.18 Psal. 32.11 * Signifies the god of flies Psal. 109.7 Psal. 6.5 Psa. 89.30 Pro. 24.16 Psal. 37.24 Eccles. 9.1 Psal. 88.14 Psal. 36.6 Rom. 11.33 1. Cor 10.12 Psal. 50.12 Rom. 8.16 1. Cor. 11.33 Rom. 12.28 Iohn 18.42 Mat. 7 22. 1 Cor. 11.33 Heb. 6. and 10.26 1 Pet. 2.21 Luk. 16. Matt. 27.4 Revel. 9.6 Luke 9.61