too long to insert here concluding with some observations on Spiritual Joy told him that by the vertue of this heavenly Balsam if he hindred not its working he trusted before the following day should go down to see him perfectly cured Adding that if on the morrow the nauseousness of his Stomach all impure Qualms that is all remanent affections to sin had left him he might then after a due and holy preparation feed on the miraculous and medicinal Bread of Life CHAP. VIII The Mystical Feast unto which Theosophus carries his Charge THe next day therefore being the great Christian Festival of Easter the young man arose betimes to welcome the Morning Sun of Righteousness that now began to dawn upon his Soul and to dart in thither his beams of Life He fancied himself new risen from the death of Sin freed from the corruption of the Grave and the eternal prisons of the nethermost Pit Of the Miracle of this day he had so great an Instance upon himself that ever after he used to commemorate it as the Festival both of his Lords and by the vertue thereof of his own Resurrection He was not long up before the careful Theosophus came to give him his customary Visit who perceiving in his smiling countenance the calmness and the serenity of his mind and from the evenness of his pulse the moderation and sedateness of his passions guessing at the regular reparation of his Health cannot now any longer forbear to congratulate this his so miraculous a Recovery You see my dear Youth says he stretching out his hands to Heaven in an holy amazedness the power of that Soveraign Balsam you know who made it and who has been at the expence of a Miracle for your sake and that also no ordinary one even the God of Nature he has you see condescended to form you anew and reinstate you in Grace by giving you another and a much better life Be thankful therefore good Son and pay your Vows this day at his Altar run forth I advise you and meet now the King of Glory the Prince of Salem the Emperor of the Holy Land If you do this he will pardon all your Misdeeds will cure all your Diseases and will enter you into the Bedrol of his Pilgrims Now he is preparing to feast you at his Table he expects to find you there that he may number you among his Saints and Followers the redeemed ones of Israel Methinks I see you dear Friend my Patient I will call you no longer prepared to entertain him within your heart and am glad to see that you need not my invitation Wherefore I shall reserve what I had to say to you for them that lack it more So he left him unto his private Meditations and Prayers When not long after having invested himself in an holy but penitential dress he was led by his reverend Guide to a very fair and beautiful Temple not far off in the midst of a gloomy religious Wood commodiously enough seated for the devout retirement of the persecuted Followers of JESUS It was elevated upon a small rising decently built and for the convenience thereof a long while resorted unto by Pilgrims of all Ranks and Conditions But since the Roads to Jerusalem began to be unfrequented this also was scarce ever visited unless now and then by a few old decrepit Beggars Hither they came and having entred this holy place they fell down prostrate upon their faces worshipping towards the East They had not lain long upon the cold Pavement breathing out their Souls after JESUS and the Delights which are at his right hand before their ears were touched with the Sighs and soft Ejaculations of some religious Devotes When casting their eyes off the ground they among the rest spied their dear Eubulus Very glad you cannot but guess they were and very glad was Eubulus to find the Youth whom he loved so affectionately and had so long sought after in such a place with such a Friend and to receive them both in safety whom he heard the wild Foragers of the Voisinage thereabouts had torn and devoured Nor was their Joy any whit allayed through the reverence of the place which hindred them from so much as speaking to each other but rather increased by their mutual assistance and servency of Devotion with all the increases that a religious Joy is capable of The first Solemnities were done and the Morning-Sacrifice offered up when Theosophus made so powerful and divine an Exhortation highly valuable for its Eloquence Solidity and Piety to usher in the Feast that nothing but the length could tempt me to omit One passage however I cannot forget for having excellently discoursed upon the Author and Dignity of that heavenly Treat he tells those few who were present That it was not meant to pamper their Lusts or make them proud or lazy in the way but to be their Viaticum and spiritual Repast in their Journey to Heaven whence the Israelites leaving the Brick-kils and slavery of Egypt to pass through the Wilderness unto the Land flowing with Milk and Honey received it in the posture of travelling with their Loyns girt Sandals on their feet and a Palmers Staff in their hands Exod. c. 12. v. 12. After which with what humble deportment and veneration did they approach the holy Altar With what ravishments of joy did they come to this Coelestial Banquet With what a steddy and firm resolution did they purpose to follow their prime Leader JESUS through all Difficulties and Hazards unto the happy Land of Promise But as soon as the blessed JESUS the glorious and peaceable Prince of Jerusalem descended with Myriads of Angels attending on him how did their hearts burn within them with what transcendency of Love and vehemency of Desire did they address him But here I am struck dumb with reverence and amazement unable to describe this sacred Mystery which the Angels do with awful admiration delight to look into CHAP. IX The Penitents Regeneration NEver was its effect more visible upon any than upon this young happy Convert Through the mysterious efficacy hereof he was wonderfully chang'd into another man It drove away his tyrannick Lusts and pleasant Torturers making them lose their hold made his curst Executioners flee frightened from him his vain Desires with every cruel Vice and Murtherer of his Soul disappear His Senses were released his Brain disenchanted all his filthy and hellish Inmates exorcised not so much as one left behind but all driven out by the Priests sacred Charm The Body of our Lord Jesus Christ those sweet those all-powerful words Thus set at liberty he became free to give himself unto him who had freed him And thus washed and cleansed in the bloud of the holy Lamb he presented his Body to be from thenceforth a pure and hallowed Temple and his Soul a chast devoted Sanctuary unto the divine Spirit the Spirit of Purity and Holiness Fresh and holy thoughts began forthwith
Religious Free-booters The whole Earth appears unto him blasted with a Curse empoysoned with the Devastations Venom of the Serpent overgrown with hurtful Weeds with bad Manners and evil Dispositions Whithersoever he looked he saw the Lands foraged and ransacked defiled with Bloud nought but a frightful Landscap of Desolation and Ruine a Golgotha of dead mens Sculls A destroying Pestilence took its range through the Territories of profest Christians which carried all before it and scarce one cared to avoid the Infection The Fields were torn and rifled of their Beauty the Air clamorously ringing with Mutinies and Tumults the loud roaring of Cannons the doleful shrieks of departing Ghosts still pierced his ears Here were two Princes fighting for a little spot of Ground and there an ambitious Monarch devoting no less Ambition than thirty or forty thousand lives to the satisfying one single Lust Here a proud Conqueror reeking in Sweat and Wounds exchangeth his Laurel for a Wreath of Cypress descends down into the Pit to converse with those he had afore sent thither and he whose desires but some short while agon could not be confined within the borders of a Kingdom is now sufficed with a few feet to cover a vile putrified Carcass These were they who could alter Empires do what they pleased and turn the World topsie-turvie But they who erewhile thought themselves unconquerable now are crushed into the Grave and thrown aside by their Friends and their Adorers into the place of Forgetfulness there to impart their Conquests with the Worms they go from the Palaces of the Sun and of the Day of Mirth and Light into the black dismal Chambers of Death to inhabit with Toads and Serpents Stench and Corruption leave behind all their joys and their good things for them that come after and turn from the spoils of their Enemies to be preyed on by every as despicable and proud a Worm or as foul an Insect as themselves This did he see and wept for them he saw havock by such hot-spirited men as these universally made and waited therefore till he saw their unhappy falls But these were not a near so formidable Monsters or so destructive as the Religions Makers and the Disturbers Hell-inspired Founders and Innovators of Religion Now he came to have the greatest need of his Telescope to discern these the Exhalations being so very thick Through which he could see the broad Road to Perdition thronged by full Caravans of silly men decoy'd in by the over-hot Zeal or officious Cheats of either blind or malicious Guides Unto his sad consideration there appears a third part of the World lamentably deceived by an Impostor a vile Epileptick person bewitched to the most ridiculous absurdities that ever Imagination could invent or the blackest Melancholy give credit to Another third part and more under Idolatry walking in thick darkness and the shadow of Death the Worshippers of the cruel King of Darkness And that which of it remains not of one Religion but divided into above a thousand different Sects besides a Vagabond Nation retaining their antiquated Rites hated by all because they had most barbarously murthered their Prince the great Messiah and those also who professed to be and those who lived as if they were not of any Where could he cast his eye if upon the Country that alas was vitiated Universal Wickedness with sordidness and narrowness of mind base and mean Vices if upon the Cities they too with fraudulent dealing and deceit in Wares with pride and discontent the Court with ambition and faithlesness cogging Parasites and false Friends the Bench with injustice and wrong bribery and subornation private Families with dissimulation and eye-service strife worldliness and grudgings either an Epicure or a Churl or an effeminate wanton the Master thereof publick Societies with Self-interest and Fraud the Schools with contention Houses of Prayer made Dens of Thieves converted into Stables and polluted with all manner of profaneness and extemporary extravagancies These Territories were wasted by foreign Incursions the other by distractions at home and intestine Wars far more miserably depopulated Tyranny lorded it in this place Confusion in that And so Desolation and Sin not content with one took their range thorough every Quarter Nor was the Land onely but the very Sea enriched with the Wrecks and the The Sea Spoils of wretched Mortals There was a Ship split against a Rock another struck on a Quick-sand or a Syrtis and a third sunk in the very Haven There might he see the Hull of a rich Carrack broken by the violence of a Tempest and there a Merchant-man carelesly coasting whilst the Winds whistle sweetly upon its Sails and the curled Waves seem to sport with the Vessel overtaken by another which boards it kills the men or if so cruelly merciful as to spare them 't is perhaps for a more insupportable slavery either to tug at the Oar or labour in the Mine Next moved huge floating Islands built onely for destruction for as if the Sea the Storms and fury of meeting Winds Hurricanes Travadoes Swallows Whirlpools Rocks Quick-sands Banks Washes Oaz Leaks and all Mischances with Pyrates both Mahometan and Christian were not enough bloudy Battles must be fought even there lives perish which the guiltless Element consents not unto and all sorts of death made to combine with mans wickedness fire it self to rage upon the Waters for no other end but that more Bloud may be so shed than the very Ocean can purge away Yet notwithstanding all this he could descry whole Fleets Indian Navigation farther off contemning such-like dangers as these and seeking the utmost corners of the Earth to lade themselves with clods of * Hab. c. 2. v. 6. thick Clay a little yellowish and a little whitish Earth silver or gold sun burnt in the bowels of the Eastern Mountains and dryed up into the hardness of a metallick substance so much baser than common Mould as it hath more of Care and more of Vice in it He saw that which was but just now a Disease in the Shell-fish made a Pearl in this Ladies Ear and Stones that sparkle Pearls like a Glow-worm or a piece of rotten Wood rated at the Mortgage of a whole Mannor He saw stately Palaces and rich Villa's built by that great man Vanity in Building empty uninhabited by any whereof he was not so much Possessor thought the good Contemplator as the Rats and Mice were Another there was who The Covetous buried his Soul with his Treasure as if he meant to descend alive into Hell the gripling Usurer and the cold decrepit Hoarder dug their way down thither apace But another wiser he thinks than his cramp-finger'd and slovenly Father now gone to receive his doom The Spendthrift just come of age throweth away his Inheritance upon Taverns and the houses of Impiety and Looseness and by and by is poor and old forsaken despised thrust out from
THE Situation of PARADISE FOUND OUT Being an HISTORY Of a Late Pilgrimage UNTO THE HOLY LAND With a necessary APPARATUS prefixt Giving Light Into the whole DESIGNE I have chosen the Way of Truth Psal 119. v. 30. LONDON Printed by J. C. and F. C. for S. Lowndes over against Exeter-Exchange in the Strand and H. Faithorne and J. Kersey at the Rose in St. Paul's Church-yard 1683. Doce me Domine viam tuam ut ingrediar in veritate tua Teach me thy WAY O Lord I will walk in thy TRUTH Ps. 86. 11. Doce me Domine viam tuam ut ingrediar in veritate tua Teach me thy WAY O Lord I will walk in thy TRUTH Ps. 86. 11. AN ADDRESS TO The Gentry Of both SEXES And the Youth In this Kingdom FRom as many of You as have either Estates too Narrow and Limited for the Greatness of Your Minds or are delighted with curious Inquiries and new-found Lands or know how to divert Your selves with the Tales and the Legends of Love can be pleased in reading a Cleopatra or a Parthenissa these Papers may hope for a favourable Reception Though their own Worth may not be great what they present You with I am sure is justly valuable The Ambitious and the Covetous may here feed both their Desires the one may be ennobled the other enriched You are told how to seek and invited to lay hold on Crowns of Glory and Riches not to be exhausted You are taught how to adde to an Earthly Inheritance conveyed down to You by Your Ancestors an Inheritance better and safer a Land flowing with Milk and Honey with the richest Abundance and the delicious Overflowings of unbounded Joys In the next place to all them whom Discoveries please here is given the Greatest and the Noblest and the most Necessary besides And lastly if they chance but to meet with Sanguine Readers such as are taken with Composures of this nature and are of a Temper that is Soft and Passionate as they are the most proper for so are they the most likely of any to move these Yet if this cannot be done it will be well enough if they can do no more but detain such Persons a little while from what is worse LADIES You among the rest may challenge no small Propriety herein Unless You are out of love with Your Beauty You cannot be displeas'd at One who directs You to a Fountain that will render You far more lovely and beauteous that will make You attract even Angels for Your Lovers and all the blessed Choir of the fairest and the chastest Spirits holily inamour'd on You. Whereas if You wash not in this Fountain rising out of Paradise it is impossible for Your Beauty either to be perfect or not to fade I doubt not also but that Pilgrims Habit will become You as well as another Dress and the Virtues fit upon You like so many incomparable Jewels But that which most of any thing commends it to You All this is not as is frequently so a Present of dry Ethicks or of troublesome Speculations but what may better sute Your Age and your Degree and which now and then may serve at least to pass the idle time away as delightfully and more innocently than is now usual 'T is an honest Policy a Stratagem to make You in love with Religion a Counter-treason to betray You into Felicity a Designe to render You Happy against Your Wills Without any Fucus this shews You true Happiness and true Pleasure and I may presume I know You better than that You can be angry at me for shewing You the last Nay forasmuch as this mean Essay comes upon such an Errand though it 's sent not forth perhaps in so rich Dress as it deserves it will be no more I hope for this despised than the poor Labourer who opens You a wealthy Mine nor will such a Proffer I believe be rejected by any onely for that the Tools and Pick-Axes are not of Gold Besides it requires somewhat of favourable Allowance as coming from one that is no Ecclesiastick Nor can it hence be thought the Foolishness of Preaching Nay he is so far removed from Envy or Interest and so much Your Friend that he would not for all the World rob You even of one small paultry Pleasure but to give You a thousand to give You Pleasures better and more refined more real and satisfactory And he hopes You will not esteem it in him so unpardonable a Crime of Profane to make You Christian Epicures Who if he can but thus insensibly snare You and before You are aware draw You back from the Vale of Death and the Pit of Eternal Burnings he fears not at all but that in the other Parts which he hopes will be abundantly more delightful than this first You will be ready to bear him company unto the Land of Endless and Unconceivable Delight But in good earnest till You have gone so far You must not think to take Heaven by Violence or leap over the Mound into the Paradise of God to find a Place out which You never so much as sought after However he is confident he hath done his best and what he can and heartily wishes in the * * Da portionem meam in horto Eden munda me in seculum futurum justis destinatum notam fac mihi semitam vitae satia me laetitiâ vultus tui gloriosi Lit. Jewish Form of Comprecation that Your Portion whatever it be before upon Earth may be in the Garden of Eden THE CONTENTS of the Apparatus Sect. 1. Of PARADISE THE Pardés Hachócmah and Hanéshamoth Four believed by the Jews to have entred the former and Three the latter Great Multitudes there Four Rabbinical Acceptions thereof The Paradise of Nature and of Scripture Four Paradises Terrestrial Paradise 1. Whether or no known to the Heathens their Fables concerning it consider'd Elysian Fields Gardens of Alcinous Adonis the Chaldaean Paradise 2. Whether it yet exists 3. It s Site Several Opinions Moses â—seth the names given after the Floud Burnet's Hypothesis The generally received Opinion of Steuchus Opinion of the Antients revived by Nicolaus Abram 4. The Original and Reason of the Allegory Paradise taken for the State of Blessed Souls before the Resurrection and in a more general sense An Expostulatory Conclusion Sect. 2. Of the PARABOLICAL Style The General Reason of the Miscarriage of Pious Discourses History and Allegory Chosroes Mythology of the Antients Several Allegorical Writers Antient Poetry Fabula Romana Pilgrimage Scala Paradisi De Sorbona Bonaventure Bernardine Giraldus De Nerveze Gracian Parable of the PILGRIM B. Taylor Earl of Orrery The Authors Designe A List of some Characters and Persons in the History The Parables of Christ Story of Tobit Judith Apocryphal Books Susanna Romish Legends Chimerical Phancies of Ariosto and Spencer The Scene of the History Not guilty of Satyr AN APPARATUS OR Preliminary Discourse OF PARADISE THE Authors Designe and manner
which are so many just Apologies for my Vndertaking I am of the opinion that Religion and Good Manners are not to be taught just like a Science by Rules and Precepts or in a Scholastick dress but rather by Examples I never yet heard of any whom Aristotle ' s Ethicks converted This is the difference the one way is dead and without any Spirit liveless and unmoving but this is animated and full of vigor having a soul and life in it and powerfully affecting The Learned and the Ignorant are both alike moved hereby it is so cogent that 't is able to work upon the most judicious and the most wise and yet so plain that 't is apt to take with the most Rude and Vulgar fit for every one but chiefly for the Ingenious § 4. This was the antient Poetry before ever it was confin'd to Verse At length it was brought not onely into the Drama but also the Epick Poem whence of the last sort Homer and Hesiod Virgil and Ovid have two of them given us the most noble and the most adequate Images of Heroick Vertue and the other two not less delightful and instructive Figments Wherefore I cannot agree to those who make it as late as the irruption of the barbarous Nations into Italy It is true that then it grew into greatest credit with the Souldiers but I no-where learn that the wild Germans brought it along with them thither or that any besides the Italians themselves used it whence it is said to receive the name of Romanzo and Fabula Romana I have already exceeded the measure of that Discourse I intended and therefore cannot stay to give you an account of its progress from the Jews Egyptians Indians Persians Arabians Moors Spaniards The last I named were so addicted to this sort of Wit that one of them I mean the Author of Quichot hath in the same stile writ a Satyr against them Which in Spain growing so in vogue hath passed thence into most of the Nations of Europe though still made worse by transplantation and very much abused to wanton and mean Subjects And if we may take an estimate from the mischief it hath done now it is corrupted the good must certainly be very great which we are to expect when once it is reformed That which hath done the Devil such service will I hope if wrested from him do God as much and it will be a cunning artifice thus to wound him with his own Weapons § 5. The Reader has now seen the Motives and the Reason of my putting Pen to Parer Wherefore I call this a PILGRIMAGE is from the frequent comparison in the holy Scriptures of Gods Law to a Way which leads to everlasting Life This has been heretofore attempted by several tho they have not kept closely to the Metaphor There is extant the Scala Paradisi of an uncertain Author in the ninth Tome of S. Austin ' s Works and Robertus de Sorbona Penitentiary to Lewis the Ninth of France surnamed the Saint and Founder of the Sorbon Colledge in the Bibliotheca Patrum calls a little Tract of his Iter Paradisi Bonaventure has besides his Itinerarium the Seven Journeys of Eternity Bernardinus hath writ De Paradisi Acquirendi Viâ But herein they have proved unhappy and are not worth much The Itinerarium Paradisi of Giraldus in Italian which I have not seen I guess to be much after this manner onely more like a Journal or an exact Diary than this and like unto the Victory of Divine Love a short Romance written by the Sieur de Nerveze Secretary of the Chamber to Henry the Fourth of France wherein he handsomely draws the Loves of Polydore and Virgine under them two representing the Skirmishes of worldly Pleasure against Seraphical and divides into seven Days or Sections But truly nothing that I have yet met with in this kind is in the least able to compare with the Critick of Gracian or the Pilgrim of our Dean of Peterburgh But this last worthy Person limiting himself to the Needs of a private Friend is not of so general use as could be wish'd Perhaps there was never one better accomplisht for such a designe than the late B. Taylor whose extraordinary Eloquence and Sweetness must here needs have been very proper The last Lord Orrery had indeed a Genius fitted for this his handsome Stile Fancy and Piety are by as many as read those excellent Composures of his not unworthily applauded and had not Death prevented we might probably have seen such Productions from his noble Muse But our great disparity has not disencouraged me from setting about and laying this Foundation to a much bigger Superstructure In which my intent is to handle otherwise than by any Pen hath yet all the Vertues Moral and Divine their contrary Vices the Passions the rise of Errors the discovery of the Truth both the Pleasures of and the Instruments wereby to attain an Habitual Piety with all or most the Cases that can befal not onely a private Christian but the whole Catholick Church and every Order of Men within it The Reader therefore must not think strange if he meets with some Passages here and there which are little more than References to the following Parts § 6. Now if this finds not a too hard reception hereafter may be expected under the person of Theosophus the Character compleated of a holy and wise Prelate under the persons of Orthodoxus and Eubulus of an Apostolick and pious Clergie under Uranius of a Divine Poet Euistor of a Sacred Critick Ephorinus of a Contemplative Philosopher for a loyal Souldier Cratander for a worthy Statesman Nestorius for a just Judge Diceus for a good Physician Lucas and Spudeus and Philoponus for honest Plebeians The highest Love of God exemplified in Theophilus Humility in Chamalus Temperance in Sophron Chastity in Parthenius Vigilance in Nephalius Charity and Hospitality in Eleutherius an aged Piety in Eusebius and on early Piety in the Child Erastus Devout Widowhood in Priscilla Holy Virginity in Parthenia and Parental Care in Christina and so in the rest For it is a common truth the very sad experience of every day that we are sooner prevail'd upon by Examples than by never so excellent Precepts and Discourses And certainly our Saviour as a late ingenious Writer hath it could as well have given the moral common places of Vncharitableness and Humbleness as the divine Narration of Dives and Lazarus or of Disobedience and Mercy as that excellent Discourse of the lost Child and the gracious Father but that he knew the Estate of Dives burning in Hell and Lazarus in Abraham ' s bosome would more constantly inhabit both the Memory and Judgment As for me I can conceive nothing more moving than to have a Prodigal represented feeding upon the Husks and the Wash of Swine Nay methinks it should make every one that has run so far parallel with him as to waste their Estates with riotous living Luke c.
dost thou adore and how thou cam'st to be thus enamour'd with the World O miserable and unsatisfying World whom the whole is not able to content even the least dust is enough to trouble and discompose a small Atome or Mote in thy eye every trivial Mischance and every uneasie Accident death of thy Friends the miscarriages of thy Child or of thy Servant are of more force to afflict thee than all the rest of it to ease thee And is it for this goodly Vanity that so many Wars are commenced Conspiracies hatched civil Broils fomented and carried on by ambitious Spirits Is this the Prize of so many noble Actions Let the vainglorious Victor now boast his strength and leave engraven in brass the Monuments of his fortunate Cruelty If to kill be so great honour why should not the Wolf the Lion and the Bear challenge it as well as Man Is it because they fight with less courage or with less force If so go proud Murtherer and if thou canst grapple with one of these and then acquaint me which is the weakest thou that art so strong dost thou not fear the Trunk of the Elephant and the Tusks of the wild Boar Believest thou not that Diseases Dearths and Plagues can dispatch quite as many as thou Yet who praiseth the Pestilence for depopulating whole Towns or worshippeth the Fire for being more terrible and burning down the Houses of some and Palaces of others or hath learnt yet to flatter the Surfeit for snatching away so many young men in the spring of their flourishing years With these therefore now go and share thy ill gotten Praises unto these that much better deserve it than thou communicate thy Fame let these I say partake of thy Triumphs and together with these erect the Trophies of thy redoubted Valour O monstrous Inhumanity of Men thus to destroy one another and what is more even glory in that destroying But wherefore call I them so Are these men it cannot be them I always took to be another sort of Animals more divine more rational Creatures Who can tell me where to find a Man one that has not put off himself nor lost the image of his Creator How can my eyes behold this the blasted Earth made the Habitation of Devils Cities the retreat of the Elk and the Lion the Beasts of the Forest and impure and raging Spirits What do I see every where but a Wilderness of wild Beasts but that alas now I think on it Tygers and Pards are less cruel do never prey upon their own kinds Is it then a Map of Hell or is it Hell it self but even there the very Devils divide not against themselves How are the Northern Isles laid waste the European Coasts stain'd o'er with humane bloud What is it that makes the wretched Natives strive thus to out-vy the years past and the years to come both in their Crimes and Punishment Must all the Wickednesses and Calamities of all Ages be amassed together in this one * Therefore mine Psal 119. v. 136 139. Lam. 3. v. 48 49 50. eyes O God gush out with water they gush out with water because men keep not thy Law continually cast forth Rivers of water for the approaching destruction of this People yea my Zeal has even consumed me because mine enemies have forgotten thy Words Without any intermission mine eye trickleth down and ceaseth not till the Lord look from Heaven Behold Lord look down upon and pity pity most gracious Jesu the madnesses of those silly wretches those who by their evil Guides are infatuated to so high a degree as to embrace under a shew of Sanctity the deadliest sins and embrew their hands in bloud that so they may appear the meek followers of thee the Prince of Peace Wilt thou let Schism and Heresie with all their vile monstrous brood thus rigorously persecute O horrid Barbarity thy most holy thy most lovely Spouse the Church Wilt thou not support her under the Cross thou hast laden her with Crosses and Martyrdoms are nothing to this Persecution She now feels within her own bowels more than a thousand Diocletians the most exquisite tortures and enraged cruelties of Superstition and Hypocrisie and Profaneness Behold Lord and pity behold the Giants of the Earth the mighty men how they labour to o'erturn all things to shake the very foundations of the Earth and shatter this same goodly frame of the Vniverse into Confusion Discord and Chaos into that which is many degrees worse than its primitive Nothingness Behold even how Heaven it self is again assaulted by their enormous Villanies their huge Gigantick Crimes Crimes that are always attended on by Famine Plague War and all the meagre train of Deaths which we poor silly Mortals both court and dread So that Virtue is now by many thought to be but an imaginary Being a pious Dream a vain phantastical Chimera of some dull Brain the dotage of a morose stupid Ascetick and made the Worlds Fucus to the foulest Vices Fury and Madness Sedition and Murther usurp the milde and sacred names of Zeal and Godliness In this lamentable decay of Piety where shall one find a good man or an honest Pilgrim He would have proceeded but that some Herdsmen driving their Beasts by that way to the Market here disturbed him The Beasts were very plump and skittishly played as they passed by not knowing whither they were driven Alas said he to himself how unconcernedly do these poor Cattle now go to be slaughtered They who drive them have onely fatted them for this that they may now sell them to the Butchers and their Deaths bear a greater rate Thus fares it with the Pilgrims of these unhappy times who after that they suffer themselves to be transform'd into Beasts and to be fatted and stall'd with irrational beastly pleasures are by themselves or their interested Guides soon sold over to destruction and the slaughter After these passed by others also of the Country thereabout that had labour'd very hard all that day in whose looks one might read an honest and rough Simplicity Whom the good man therefore thought he could easily enough perswade to seek their own Welfare and to go along with him leaving the toilsome and barren Earth unto the more fruitful Plains of Paradise And to this end he used the most sweet and most prevailing means discoursed very plainly with the poor Drudges dealt with all the openness and sincerity possible concerning their removal and the way thither and left nothing unattempted to make them happy But all in vain he met with so fierce so much the more fierce as the more unexpected opposition from these besotted Clowns Instead of Simplicity he meets with Bluntness and a resolute ill-grounded Refusal so far are they from being perswaded by the plainness and the truth of his Discourse or at all better'd by his sober Admonitions that some of them revile and others jeer and every one despiseth him Though the most noble-minded
less but greater far and nobler if any Comparison can be made betwixt a Coelestial Substance and an Earthly one Thus his stony and obdurate heart which the Thunders of the Law could not shiver is now softned with the Bloud of the Passover He who but a little while afore matter'd not the Threats and Terrors of Mount Sinai is now touched and moved with the sweet Gospel-Messages of Love and Peace Whence ever after he related great things of this Evangelical Feast how it was the Seal of his Pardon the Christian Pasport of his Heavenly Pilgrimage and the beginning of his Vnion with God And how it gave him all things even by removing him from them and making him desire nothing but JESUS and to be with him in PARADISE CHAP. X. An Eucharistical Meditation AS soon therefore as he was returned back again with the Eremit into his Cell and shut himself up in a close apartment thereof his Soul by rapturous flights of Joy strove to ascend upward and exert her self in these following Acts of devout Acknowledgment I. I am well pleased that the Lord hath thus heard the § 1. An Act of Thanksgiving and Adoration voice of my Prayer Blessed is he that now cometh in the Name of the Lord Hosanna in the highest Blessed is he that cometh in the Name of the Lord Hosanna here below Thrice hail most triumphant Prince of Heaven Hail holy wonderful eternal King great Deliverer successful Combatant the Redemption of the Captives and the Oppressed and upon this day the First-Fruits and Hopes to those that sleep of a glorious Resurrection Hallelujah Salvation and Glory and Honour and Power be to the Lord our God Blessed is he that cometh in the Name of the Lord Hallelujah I adore thee I worship thee I love thee I magnifie thee O thou Conqueror of Hell and Death victorious Champion over the Infernal Forces I will magnifie thee as much as I am able and will still strive to magnifie thee more All hail welcome sweetest Saviour Jesus welcome Lamb of God the Life-giving Sacrifice the spiritual Refection the holy and accepted Peace-Offering the Deliverance and Comfort of all faithful Souls Welcome victorious Lamb all the mighty Hosts of Heaven fall down before thee and with everlasting Praises delight to celebrate the glories and triumphs of so strange a Love And here below under their feet I would do the same Thou art the powerful and wise the Lord of Hosts the King of Loves thou art called and thy Conquests are spread abroad as far as the ends of the World When the terrours of Death encompassed me round when the nethermost Hell threatned to devour me quick and Satan was ready to grasp my polluted Soul then found I deliverance then saw I my returning Victor laden with their spoils and having trampled on and crushed their power bidding me live Behold even he whom I fought against has obtained for me the victory and has overcome me with his love and with his love has made me overcome The great God the mighty Saviour of Nations hath pitied a poor perishing wretch he hath snatched my life from out the paws of the devouring Lion and the sulphurous stench and horrors of yonder black Abyss II. But who can tell me how all this came to pass what § 2. An Act of Contrition or Humility was there in me that I should be thus highly honoured or my life worth that it should be ransomed at so dear a rate as the death of my God Why should God the Father whom I had offended send his Son to die for me Why should God the Son whom I had so sinned against bear the load and punishment of that sin Tell me what could the Creator see worthy of so great savour in such an abominable and filthy Creature or the Lord of all things in his proud presumptuous Vassal the Holiest in a sinner wallowing in his Lusts How came Vnworthiness and Pride Rebellion and Sin perverse Dust and Ashes to find thus instead of the heaviest curse and dreadfullest execution of a just and fiery Indignation so extraordinary a Blessing so far not onely above my merit but my comprehension This is all Prodigie of Mercy Shall the careless and disobedient the refractory and murmuring Servant be rewarded be feasted with his Master Shall the wilful and obstinate offender be pardoned the despicable and haughty Villain be pitied Who can believe there is so great Charity for an Enemy or such Honours as these for the vilest of the children of men This was indeed too great for me to expect or wish for will take up all the wonder of Men and Angels Ah! have have not my Crimes crucified him my Passions made him bleed and could he yet do and suffer so much for me Has not my Pride alas stript him naked my Intemperance and Luxury forced him to fast And did not my Covetousness make him poor my Ambition a slave But he hath covered my Nakedness and Folly he hath feasted me with his holy ones he hath filled me with the Riches of his Grace and hath freed me from the slavery of sin The bitterness of my Spirit hath been worse to him than the very Gall he tasted my Peevishness and Malice than the Vinacre he drank my Honours have wreath'd him a Crown of Thorns The rude Souldier pierced but his side when I pierced his very heart with sorrows My Jollity was that anguish which made his Virginal Body to be drained all over bloudy droops of Sweat My Scoffs at Religion have been far more intolerable have entred deeper into his Soul than the Contempt and Mockeries of the Pretorian Band. Nay my very Devotion and Piety has murthered him my Addresses have been criminal and traiterous and with Judas have I studied to betray him with a kiss O Prodigie of Villany But neither is this all Ah me I can scarce utter that which is still more black Oft would my Wickednesses have offered Violence even to his glorified Body and ripped up his Wounds afresh Thus have I open'd his side by violating those mysterious Sacraments which proceeded thence my best works put him to shame Nor indeed could I any otherwise have claimed his infinite Mercy but that I am infinitely vile and infinitely sinful III. Dearest Jesu how admirable are the effects of thy § 3. An Act of Wonder Goodness How glorious and condescending is thy Love that could do all this for me and how disproportionate are the Returns of thy soveraign Bounty to the deserts of a perfidious disloyal wretch I came not unto thee of my self but thou hast drawn me with Cords though I refused yet found I protection My Guilt was thy Condemnation yet through thee am I saved Thou hast reached forth to me the Scepter with the same hand which my Vanity had mocked with a Reed Could I ever expect to receive life from him whom mine Iniquities bruised and even robbed of his a Cure through his
I be a whit dismayed at the cloudiness or inconveniencies of my Passage so at last I arrive at the calm and quiet Regions of Paradise there to be eternally blessed with the sight of thee For have I not this day to my unspeakable satisfaction and refreshment tasted of the Fruit of the Tree of Life which groweth in the midst thereof and how can I be any longer detained from seeking out this place the place that thou inhabitest or be at rest before I gain admittance into this same Spiritual Eden restored us by thee the second Adam Not all the fiery Tryals I must expect to suffer nor * Gen. 3. 24. the Angels with their flaming Swords shall terrifie or drive me back shall obstruct my passage or keep me from laying hold on thee who art both the Truth of the Tree and Giver of that Paradise I have tasted and seen how gracious the Lord is and surely if not for the Miracles sake yet for the Loaves I cannot chuse but follow him unless I make my self worse than the worst of all his Followers leave him sooner than the Multitudes that followed him for Bread I know that my divine Soul is to be satisfied with no other Food than this that she can never hereafter be contented with the husks and the draff of Swine the sordid delights of the World How can I any longer relish the Apples of Death or find pleasure in reaching out my hands after the forbidden Fruit after unlawful Lusts and the desires of a disordered Appetite I will not depart from this holy persons Cottage afore he has instructed me in the way and shewn me the Path in which alone thou art to be found How do I already long and burn with desire to begin my Pilgrimage and follow thee through this thorny and briary World I come Lord Jesus I come I can no longer resist the Charms of thy Almighty Goodness I am heartily sorry that ever I offended thee or countenanced thy hated Rivals preferring a common Morsel before the holy Bread and a Lust before my God But now I am resolved as far as weak humane nature will permit never more to sin against my gracious Lord or with my Transgressions to wound the merciful and holy Jesus who was wounded for them to caress and entertain his Enemies or joyn my self with those that afflicted his Soul Farewel all my past Delights farewel ye impure and accursed Lusts that have slain the Lord of Life I bid you all eternally farewel From henceforth I hope we are never more to meet My sins those vile Assassins that went along in combination with the high Priests and bound themselves together in an horrid Confederacy against his life I can no longer endure to see except it be to crucifie them upon his Cross My unjust Violences that have pierced his hands and his feet my wicked Pleasures that have pierced his Soul I will lay down at the foot of his Cross and there put them to a most just and deserved death They even they were the Nails that wrenched the tender Body of my Saviour They have crucified that just One have slain the Lords Christ and hanged the great Prophet and Saint of Israel upon a Tree For this I will detest and abhor them I will dash them in pieces upon the stones and throw them down headlong from the Rock of my Deliverance Adieu ye sweet and traiterous Vices the Murtherers of my Lord are no fit Companions for me I received you into my breast but ye ingratefully betrayed me and if he had not sustained your fury ye had delivered me up to everlasting Burnings XI An HYMN of Eucharist 1. Rejoyce with me now all ye Heavenly Hosts who take delight in the Conversion of a Sinner for I who was dead am alive again and who was lost am found I will rejoyce greatly in the Lord and my Soul shall be joyful in my God For he hath clothed me with the Garments of Salvation and covered me with the Robe of Righteousness He hath decked me like a Bridegroom and as a Bride tireth her self with Jewels Behold God is my Salvation I will trust and will not fear for my Lord God is my strength and my song I will magnifie thee O Lord Thou hast exalted me and hast not made my Foes to rejoyce over me O Lord thou hast maintained the cause of my Soul and redeemed my Life Thou hast delivered me from the choking of the Fire on every side from the depth of the Belly of Hell Bless the Lord O my Soul and forget not all his Benefits who hath now forgiven all thy sins and healed all thy infirmities Who saveth thy life from destruction and still crowneth thee with Mercy and Compassions Who hath satisfied thy mouth with good things and renewed thy Vigour like the young Eagles He hath given Meat to them that fear him and is ever mindful of his Covenant He hath prepared a Table before me against them that trouble me He fed me also with the finest Wheat-flour and with Honey out of the stony Rock hath he satisfied me He made a Feast of fat things a Feast of fined Wines and fat things full of marrow of Wines fined and purified He brought me into the Wine-Cellar and stay'd me with Flagons His left hand is under my head and his right hand doth support me He hath trodden the Wine-press and there was none to help and hath given me thereof this pleasant Wine to drink a Cordial drawn from his bleeding heart He shall shew me the Path of Life in his presence is fulness of Joy and at his right hand are Pleasures for evermore He strengtheneth the weak hands and comforteth the feeble knees He will make my feet like Hinds feet and will make me to walk upon high places So shall I run and not be weary and shall walk and not faint Thou my Soul shall dwell on high Thy defence shall be the munitions of Rocks Bread shall be given thee and thy Waters shall be sure Thine eyes shall see the King in his glory they shall behold the Land afar off Everlasting joy shall be upon thee thou shalt obtain joy and gladness and sorrow and mourning shall flee away 2. Thou hast brought me O God out of the horrible Pit out of the Mire and Clay and set my feet upon the Rock and ordered my goings and hast put a new Song in my mouth a Song of Thanksgiving to my God Mighty Jesus great are the wondrous works which thou hast done like as be also thy thoughts which are unto me sweetest Saviour I would declare and speak of them but they are more than I am able to express The Snares of Death compassed me round the Pains of Hell gat hold upon me I found trouble and sorrow but thou hast heard the voice of my cry and saved me My Soul thou hast delivered from Death mine Eyes from Tears and my Feet from Falling I cryed unto thee and
tumultuously compast round by the Giddy Rabble who cried up his Nonsence for Gospel and those Doctrines in which was Death yea though in never so plain legible Characters there was written on them the Curse Thou shalt die the Death for Soul-saving ones Amongst these was a poor paltry Fellow who had somewhat in him I know not what it was which he named Conscience for Conscience it was not that could unhinge Governments overthrow States and tumble down Scepters and Crowns that so all being turn'd topsie-turvy the first last and the last first he might be advanc'd to the top With him joyn'd such as were of Levelling Principles and such as were any whit discontented setting up the Standart of Reformation A little further I met with a quaint Controvertist in the Rear of these RELIGIONS who bandied all this about and even raised Objections by his answering them As also a slie Favorite who had learnt from him how to make his Praises to be Accusations and by putting off Doubts to bring Doubts into ones head I had the company afterwards of a rich old Chuf who having read that the Glod of the Land of Havilah was good came this way to seek out Paradise Having travelled thus far such was the effect of the Air and of our Travel that now every one became light-headed Also the Ways which before did seem curiously laid with Tarras and the rich sorts of Cement now appeared to be paved with dead mens Sculls And though we now began to view the blazes of the Fire yet one would have perswaded us that it was onely a glimpse of the Coelestial Light and that we were not far from the bright Mansions of the East from oâ—… delightful Eden placed near the Sun-rising Some of us were willing to believe 〈◊〉 and some to believe that all things were made and govern'd by Chance which Supposition being hard to maintain others holding a fatal Necessity said they did not go but were carried The Presumptuous thought he continued on as fast or faster than any of us still cried God was merciful and he should at last arrive at Paradise But the Desperate leaping into the Gulf of Flames which we now plainly saw said it was impossible for him to do otherwise or to avoid the same by running back No Tongue can express the Horrours and the Pangs that I already endur'd Whereupon I stepped a little out of the Road to ease my Grief But being unable to move far I fell down expecting there I should die I could discern that they were Baboons and Monsters in the shape of Men with whom I had all this while conversed could see the Devils preparing their Torments and ready to fetch away my Soul Then first opening a Book which I had hitherto kept that was given me by my forgotten Friend Theosophus I began to read but Despair and dreadful Dismayedness of Mind closed up mine Eyes in an horrible affrighting Sleep CHAP. XIV The VISION of Tophet I Remember to have somewhere read a very remarkable Story of a melancholy Pilgrim in the first Ages of this Institution who having seen HELL but in a Dream said he would rather chuse to suffer a thousand Deaths than see the same again or for one half hour more the short turn of a Glass feel what he had felt And such effects had this saith the Historian upon him that of a debauched lewd Liver he became the greatest Saint the most resolute Professor of Christ and immediately separated from the World putting on such Weeds as this poor well-meaning Tract would fain cloth its Pilgrim-Reader in I do most heartily wish O that Wishes were not vain that what the brave Timotheus in the same case hath seen may as on him it did so which he prayed for all the days of his Pilgrimage with unutterable Groans on all those to whom the Relation thereof ever cometh work the like effect O that hereby I could frighten the stupid out of his Lethargy of Sin and rouse him up into a sense of his Condition O that if such an one shall turn over these leaves he would sit down and consider a while to what place he is travelling ask himself whether he can dwell with Everlasting Burnings That he would do so much if not out of Religion yet out of Prudence lest he come to feel the same at long run not in Vision but Reality greater too perhaps than this and far beyond all Hyperboles of Pain My Sleep was such said the noble and truly pious Convert as I verily believed it to be Death and a Devil I thought taking me up with his Claws carried me toward the Burning Lake Which as I drew near appeared to me to be bounded with seven high Banks of solid and unconsumed Fire and on a spatious sevenfold Gate of rocky and impenetrable Adamant which open'd to us of its own accord I read with a sorrowful cast of mine Eyes these words TOPHET IS ORDAINED OF OLD YEA FOR THE WICKED IT IS PREPARED HE HATH MADE IT LARGE AND DEEP THE PILE THEREOF IS MVCH FIRE AND MVCH FVEL THE BREATH OF THE LORD LIKE A STREAM OF BRIMSTONE DOTH ENKINDLE IT Isai c. 30. v. 33. As soon as I was entred I heard a Voice like the Voice of Thunder and the Voice of many Waters saying KEEP THESE SOVLS BOVND IN CHAINS OF DARKNESS VNTIL THE GREAT AVDIT OF THE LORD and another LET HOT BVRNING COALS FALL VPON THEM LET THEM BE CAST INTO THE FIRE AND INTO THE PIT THAT THEY NEVER RISE VP AGAIN And looking back I saw great Multitudes behind me rushing in at the Gate who were bound presently and cast into the Lake A wild Wast methought it was of inextinguishable Sulphur and Naphtha whereon as far as ever I could ken lay rowling hopeless Peoples and Nations that striving to blow it out made it burn the more and kept it burning Whence intolerable Smoak with gloomy Flakes of unlightsome flame were scattered upwards and darkened round the wide Coast There are perhaps some subtile Wits who will say 't is impossible for Flame not to be light but let them subtilize as they please before they know the nature of this Flame they are not very competent Judges It was I remember every where so black and dismal a Night as plagu'd Egypt sure felt not such a Night as could not be brooded even on the face of Chaos an obscure a smart a boundless and a never-ending I concluded Night palpable almost to the Touch. But how vain am I that I strive to describe it For it was greater far than I can express to you nay certainly than any one can dread or Poetick Phant'sie imagine Which yet was render'd more terrible if any thing possibly could adde to such Terror by flashes of Lightning breaking it and horrid Shapes that continually passed through the thick substantial Darkness By those dreadful gleams of Light I could discern sooty deformed Ghosts every moment flying by me and sundry black