suitable unto the seeds they have sowed heere according to that saying of the Apostle quaecunque seminaverit homo eadem metet whatsoever a man hath sowed the same also he shall reap Let us examine the condition of one who hath abandoned himselfe unto his sensuall lusts and placing his chiefe good in them hath imploied all the affections and faculties of his Soule in compassing those objects of his wishes his stock of time is now exhausted whilest hee endeavoured onely to beguile it with the variety of choise delights and death finding him busie in the caressing of his body hath violently snatched it from him The stately Pallaces vast Treasures and ravishing beauties whereof he thought himselfe the owner are now in the possession of another and the poore Soule is exposed naked upon the confines of Eternity Let us with the eyes of contemplation accompany her thither and see what are her thoughts what are her entertainments in that Countrey wherein as yet she is a stranger This rude alarme hath rous'd her now out of that pleasing slumber wherein she retchlessely consumed the time allotted her to labour and shee is come unto the land of rest wherein shee must for all Eternity subsist upon the stocke shee hath brought with her she now begins to take a view thereof and summing her accounts she findes that all her large possessions sumptuous Buildings Friends and Riches have parted with her at the houre of Death that all her pleasures are vanished like a Dreame that her body for whose solace and delight all these were coveted is mouldring into dust and ashes and that in fine of all that shee hath done of all that shee hath seene suffered or enjoyed there remaines nothing with her but her owne inordinate judgements and affections which like a raging fire burne her without consuming whilest all her powers and faculties are racked incessantly when shee considers the excellencie of what shee hath forgone the unworthinesse of what she hath pursued and the impossibility to retract her choice All that which a most violent passion is able to produce in the most capable subject is nothing in comparison of her afflictions Wee read that Pompeys wife shee who was daughter unto Julius Caesar died suddenly with the excesse of griefe caused by the love she bare unto her husband upon the sight but of a bloudy garment which shee knew had beene that day worne by him and if we may believe the Poets that same passion drew Orpheus to Hell among the Ghosts and Fiends in search of his Euridice as being company much more supportable unto him then were his cares and sorrowes occasioned by her absence but alas what comparison is there betweene the cause of their afflictions they sorrowed for their seperation from those they loved but for a time as being well assured that although time would not restore life to those had lost it yet hee would certainly unite them to their loves by giving death to those that sought it whereas Eternity though infinite and boundlesse cannot in all the vastnesse of extension furnish this soule with the least ray of hope that she shal meet again with those deceitfull pleasures wherin she had established her contentment The miseries wee suffer during our union with our bodies have ever with them this double comfort viz. that either they themselves wil change their Nature or wee change our opinions touching the Nature of them The course of things wee see is variable and wee may probably imagine that as our joyes have passed so also will those things that do afflict us or else that the acquaintance wee shall make with misery will in time so farre alter the Nature thereof that wee shall bee no longer troubled at it The strongest Poysons do in tract of time become naturall food to those that are accustomed to them as heeretofore wee read it happened unto that King from whom we have the name and use of Mithridate whereas the miseries of an Eternall condition can never receive ease by any alteration either in the things themselves or in the mindes of those that suffer them Because Eternity is nothing else but a fixed instant allwayes permanent and time is so essentially necessary unto change that it cannot bee wrought but by his meanes according to the before recited Maxime In instanti non fit mutatio The torment which Mazentius mentioned by Virgil in his Aeniods used to his captives hath some imperfect weake resemblance of this poore soules condition that Tyrant used to fasten them unto dead bodies ioyning their hands their feet their mouths their eyes and all their other parts with those of putrid carcasses Let us consider what were the thoughts of those poor miserable wretches who though living in themselves were by this union hindred from exercising any the actions of life and notwithstanding their natural aversion from stench from rottenness and from corruption were yet forced to converse onely with them exchanging all the happinesse of life to entertaine those dismall objects which presented them with nought but ghastlienesse and terrour That unto which those wretches were compelled by outward violence is an imperfect representation of what happens to this soule by her depraved habits and affections shee hath made choice of bodily delights and pleasures as her chiefest good she hath imployed during her life the faculty of her understanding in the contemplating and that of her will in the enjoyment of them the often reiteration of these acts and judgements have powerfully imprinted them within her and being thus disposed her temporall union with the bodie hath beene dissolved and shee s becom a dweller in Eternity where as I have already shewed shee is not capable of alteration shee very well perceives the base unworthinesse and vanity of those delights and the impossibility of ever comming to enjoy them but cannot quit her inclinations to them which not permitting her to exercise her faculties on objects worthy her selfe fill her with notions of earthly fading and corruptible things whereon beginning to bee now sensible of her owne naturall perfections shee cannot cast a thought but doth replenish her with horrour with confusion and afrightment The condition of a soule puffed up with pride of humane knowledge or the ambitious desire of Power and Command after her seperation from the bodie is yet much more deplorable then that of the other The failings of the one have proceeded from a grosse ignorance of the true good was to be followed and from a soft compliance with the bodie whereas this other hath offended out of malice and contempt of the first cause from whom shee hath received her being the one is to bee looked on as a simple Malefactor whereas this other cannot be considered but as a Traytor and a Rebell who hath attempted to invade the rights of her Creator and indeavoured to find out a wisdome and establish a power which should bee independant of him Their passions are proportionable unto the
command unto a Page of his to wake him dayly with this admonition that hee should call to minde hee was a man fearing lest hee might otherwise bee transported by the false lustre of his greatnesse and prosperities as to mistake which his Sonn after did what himselfe was and forget the condition of humanity wherein hee had beene placed by God and Nature And the great Doctor of the Church Saint Jerome thinkes it a matter of that consequence for us to imploy our selves in the consideration of what is future that hee assures us confidently by warrant of the sacred Scripture wee should never sin did wee but carefully ruminate on the last things that doe attend us Memorare novissima tua et in aeternum non peccabis See here the true condition of our being during the succession of time Let us now alter the Scene and from this theater of confusion and disorder raise up our thoughts unto the contemplation of Eternity It is an instant alwayes present never decaying whose infinity comprehends all times past present and to come and whose simplicity presenting us at once with whatsoever can be good or perfect united in their first cause whereof unlesse our sinns debar us from his sight the Divine Nature wee shall be then made glad beholders cleares up the foggy mists of ignorance of forgetfullnesse and of mistake which hang betweene our understandings and the truth of things fills all the powers and faculties of our soules with the enjoyment of their desired objects and doth establish us in the secure possession of our blisse beyond the reach of fortune or of time which shall not there have power to traverse our contentments with the desire of ought that 's past or the apprehension of ought to come When we have once maturely waighed these sollid truths wee shall begin to loath this prison of our bodies subject to the perpetuall injuries of time and death and shall cry out with the Apostle Infaelix ego homo quis me liberabit de corpore mortis hujus unhappy man that I am who shall deliver mee from this body which belongs to death and with the same Apostle fixing all our affections and thoughts upon Eternity wee shall continually desire to bee dissolved that we may live with Christ in his Eternall habitation and when wee shall receive the summons to dislodge hence brought us by age diseases war famine pestilence or any other officer of time clad in the hideousest dresse that death can weare wee shall with joy prepare our selves unto the journey and with the Prophet David say Laetatus sum in his quae dicta sunt mihi in domum domini ibimus I am rejoyced in that which hath beene said unto me we will goe into the house of the Lord It seemes being a man according unto Gods owne heart hee had well studied the Nature of that celestiall mansion whose quallities hee doth so excellenty describe in the 2 following verses Stantes erant pedes nostri in atriis tuis Jerusalem Jerusalem quae aedificatur ut civitas cujus participatio ejus in idipsum Our feete were standing in thy Courts Jerusalem Here they are running forced to accompany the motion of time but they shall there be fixed in an Eternal rest never to bee disturbed by time or fortune Jerusalem that is builded as a City whose portion consisteth in the thing it selfe All other places are but Innes where we are entertained as passengers during our pilgrimage and therfore have their buildings subject as are those they harbour unto decay and ruine but this City being the permanent place of our aboade hath its foundations laid upon the never fading basis of Eternity And if you aske what is the stocke or treasure of the inhabitants in that blessed country he forth with tells us that their portion consisteth in the thing it selfe what is the thing it selfe but that which is without dependance upon any other and what is that but hee who being to declare himselfe unto the Patriarch Moses saith hee is hee that is even God himselfe in whom is comprehended the fulnesse of all things and without whom is nothing but the privation of good and happinesse Let us endeavour then so to comport our selves that wee bee not engaged amid these fading transitory things but may bee able to say with the Apostle our life is laid up with Christ in God and let our onely trafficke and negotiation be to hoord up treasures according to the counsell of our blessed Lord and Saviour where neither rust nor mothes can come to wast them nor thieves breake in to steale them from us Wee neede not be to seeke where that should bee since hee informeth us that t is in Heaven the onely proper seat and mansion of Eternity In the precedent discourse I have endeavoured to describe although imperfectly the Nature and condition of Eternity which is the true and proper habitation of our soules who have no commerce with time but onely by their union with our bodies A blessed country but such a one as doth not equally agree with all constitutions to some it is an Ocean of pleasure rest and happiness to others an abisse of everlasting horrour trouble and confusion the reason of which difference proceedes from the diversity of those severall dispositions and affections wee carry with us at our parting hence For the cleare understanding whereof it is necessary that wee consider the Nature of our Soules and examine what are those things which subsist in and together with them after the dissolution of our bodies The Heathen Philosophers guided only by the light of nature did some of them believe the soule of man to bee immortall they perceived well that shee was capable of many operations even in this life without the mediation of the bodie that shee gave a being within her selfe unto an infinite number of thinges abstracted from the severall notions of time place figure or any other property incident unto materiall things which kinde of being because it sorted not unto the things themselves in their owne Nature they must necessarily receive from her and they did thence inferr that shee could not communicate such a being unto them unlesse shee had an immateriall being in her selfe They saw the act of judging was an action purely her own whereby she produced severall conclusions which are new beings out of those premises that present themselves to our imaginations and knowing the infallibility of this argument ex nihilo nihil fit that of nothing there comes nothing they were fully satisfied the soule had a being independant from the body since it was able to communicate a being unto other things without the helpe of any Organes which depend upon her From the assurance of her being they collected also her immortallity for having by the strict observation of all naturall causes found out that nothing whatsoever could lose its former being and acquire a new one which wee terme death
that shee hath beene enabled to discover some little glimps of those admirable perfections of her Creator the sight whereof hath ravished all her Powers so that enamored on his Celestiall beauty she hath conversed during her union with the body onely in Heaven all her thoughts wishes and affections being continually present there where she had placed her onely treasure Death whose grim visage affrights the most couragious spirits is welcome to her and shee doth quit with joy the base attire of flesh and of corruption that she may put on immortallity Let us a little consider the blessednesse of her condition in this state of seperation Knowledge whose object is the true Nature and cause of things is so hard to be attained unto during this life that the Philosophers who have imployed themselves in search of it have a great part of them despaired of being able to find it out The Academicks a sect of them much renowned in antient time pronounced boldly that there was nothing whatsoever could be knowne the Scepticks proceeding something more warily held that no demonstration could bee made and did therefore continue doubtfull denying their assent unto the truth of any proposition And those Philosophers who following Aristotle have established in our Schooles a forme of learning doe by a tyranny they exercise over our reason command us to admit without proofe so many grounds or principles upon which they establish the Doctrine they deliver that divers of our choicest modern wits have thence taken occasion to dispute against them and to endeavour the overthrowing of all that structure they have built upon them This inextricable laberinth wherein truth is shut up being impervious by mortall men caused Socrates after all his study in search of her conclude that hee was ignorant of all things else save onely this that hee knew nothing and the despaire of being able to find her out made Aristotle throw himselfe headlong into the Ocean after hee had long sought in vaine to find the reason of its Ebbs and flowings But she who doth so carefully conceale her selfe from those that live exposeth freely all her beauties to bee viewed over by this seperated soule and fills her with the fulnesse of that knowledge in one instant whose smallest portion wee scarcely gaine by the continuall study of many ages the contemplation whereof is a contentment infinitely surpassing all those pleasures which wee are capable of during this life The Queene of Sheba upon the fame onely of Salomons great wisedome thought it well worth her labour to quit the pleasures of her Court and exposing her selfe unto the trouble toile and dangers incident to a long voyage came from the farthest part of all the East to finde him out that she might have the satisfaction to become a hearer of it Alexander the great prised at so high a rate those notions of Philosophy he had received from Aristotle during the time he was his Pupill that he was used to say hee had a greater obligation to his Tutor then to his Father Phillip and yet he had from him received his being power sufficient to make himselfe the wonder of succeeding ages by reason of his glorious victories and conquests and Archimedes the great Artist had all his powers and faculties so wholly taken up by the contentment hee found in speculating of those demonstrations he had invented touching the Symetry and proportion of bodies that all the rage and fury was practised at the taking in of Siracusa the destruction of these innocent inhabitants which peopled that unlucky City whereof himselfe was one could not divert him from the pleasure of it or once afford him leasure to make answer unto a Souldier who asked his name with an intention to have presreved him If this small dawne of knowledge hath appeared unto the eyes of the beholders with so glorious a luster as made it preferrable before the sumptuous magnificences of a splendid Court the glittering brightnesse of a Crowne and Scepter or life it selfe what shall we say of that excesse of pleasure wherewith this soule is filled when shee enjoyes the fullnesse of all knowledge and clearely sees the causes Nature properties and qualities of all the workmanships of God when she beholds his admirable Wisdome Power and Providence exercised in the continuall upholding of this huge fabrick and how from the great contrariety and strife there is betweene the parts whereof it is composed he drawes the preservation of the whole by a perpetuall Series of generation and corruption how death which seemes to bee ordained for destroying the society of humane kinde is the maine Basis whereupon it restes because the feare thereof witholds vitious persons from falling headlong into the depth of wickednesse and the hope of it animates vertuous men to persist constantly in the rough craggy wayes of good and vertue Those rare effects of Nature that puzzle all our choicest wits in searching out their hidden causes are then made easie to her and shee doth plainly understand whether the fluxes and refluxes of the Ocean are guided by the motion of the Moone or the impulse of that continuall winde raised under the Equator by the Sunne whether that constant inclination of the Loadstone towards the North whereby wee are enabled to make discoveries of the remotest creekes and corners of the Sea is caused by an attractive quallity residing in the poles of the earth which being somwhat different from those wee fancy in the Heavens produceth that small variation we observe dayly in the Compasse or by those streames of atomes drawne by the Sunnes great heate betweene the Tropickes which flowing ever more from North to South and penetrating all the subtile pores whereof the stone is full while it remaines within the Earth in that position doth in continuance of time beget this property which wee can imitate by often heating of an iron and placing it to coole while yet the porâ—… thereof are opened by the fire dâ—â—… North and South Or lastly whether that quallity together with the power whereby the same is by a touch communicated to the needle and that whereby it attracts iron to it selfe depend on causes whereof as yet mankinde is ignorant whose knowledge is by providence reserved to the discovery of posterity in that age which shall succeede us as the experience was to those in that which went before us Whether the cherefull light which wee see darted by the Sunne from East to West is but a quallity communicated by him in an instant to all the aire throughout the vast extent of our horison or is the body of the fire it selfe which being the most active Element and flowing from the Sunne as from its fountaine into the liquid Element of aire prevents by its vast distance from us huge expansion and active swiftnesse our feeling and our sight from being sensible of any thing which might informe our understanding touching the measure of its heat and motion Whether the never