〈◊〉 to say death iâ—… we take it as the argument giues it I answere That if there bee a great difference not to haue beene 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be he haâ—… the 〈◊〉 â—…nefit that is no more for hee hath this aboueâ—… the other that he hath enioyed life and the fruits thereof which the other haâ—… vnlesâ—… you will deny that hâ—… which hath bin admitted into the Kings Chamber 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 assâ—… 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 â—…th not any 〈◊〉 abâ—…ue â—…im that hath not beene admitted at all and that hee which hath beene a Maior or a Consul in a free Citie is not more honored then hee which hath neuer beene But the Obiector supposeth one thing which is not That this life is adorned which most excellent gifts being full of most sharpe agonies as is iustified in the 18. Argument and theâ—…fore I deny the consequence of his Minor and to prooue the falsehood I produce that which Salomon saith Eccles. 4. that hee more esteemes the dead then those which bee liuing yea hee esteemes him that hath not beene more happy then the one or the other Secondly the losse of fight of sences of the habit of sâ—…iences is grieuous to a liuing man who hath enioyed them for a time for that he is capable of sorrow but to make it a conclusion to a dead man who should be more grieued to haue lost all this and life it selfe there is no consequence for that death is incapable of sorrow and mourning wherein the Prouerbe of Hesiodus may be verrified The moitie is more then the whole the losse of sences and reason are more grieuous and more to bee lamented then the priuation of life Thirdly I deny that man dying loseth any thing hee was but Vsufructuarie of life God the proprietarie demands it and he restores it what losse Thou art not angry if any curious sercher of the most exquisite rarities of the world if hauing suffered thee to see his Cabinet he afterwards drawes the curtaine thou wilt take it patiently how great soeuer thou art If the Seigneurie of Venice hath done theâ—… the honour to see their stately treasure haue dazled thine eyes with the glistering of those 14. Pearles of their Ducall Bonet of the 12. Crownes of gold and of other most rich ornaments wouldest thou not take it patiently to giue place after some houres Know then that it is reasonable that the Lord of Lords hauing brought thee into his house there to behold the golden studdes which adorne the firmament to obserue the diuers motions of the 7. Planets and among the rest of the Sunne the eye of the world to touch and comprehend the 4. Elements and other infinite goodly creatures if it be his pleasure and hee make signe vnto thee to giue place to others that suruiue it is reason thou shouldest dislodge and thanke the Lord for his fauour Finally I maintayne that the depth and horrour is as great to reason to liue perpetually here without end the same life which wee now breathe for our discourse is of this life as great I say and greater then to bee dead depth for who can perfectly comprehend a life without end horrour for who would alwayes liue with the feare of a hundred millions of horrible miseries which may happen in a hundred millions of yeeres not making mention of the vices and sinnes whervnto man is subiect which a good man should feare more then death As for the authoritie of S. Paul it is not nature only but the heauenly grace which makes him to speake so and they that shall be partakers of this grace in the same degree may braue death with S. Paule and say vnto him O death where is thy victory O graue where is thy sting And if S. Paule in this place did contemplate in spirit the excellent ornaments which hee had seene in the third heauen in his extacie and on the other side toucht to the quicke with the venemous sting of sinne he makes no mention but of the simple deliuerance as if it had beene sufficient for him O wretched man that I am sayth he who shall deliuer me from the body of this death Hee makes mention of deliuerance for that he felâ—… Coâ—…bate in himselfe and found himselfe prisoner to the Law of sinne as the verse going before doth declare But you will reply There is nothing to be compared to life it is a naturall desire and common to all men Ansâ—… Man desireth not only to be and to liue but to beeâ—…t ease else what is hee that like to Ixion in the Poet would alwayes liue to be fastened to a wheâ—…le Who would alwayes liue the damnable life of Satan and his angells in the middest of an vnquenchable fire but mad men and fooles And in truth the desire wee haue to roule on alwayes from day to day is that by an abusiue hope we promise vnto our selues some future pleasure and content The Apostles desire better ordered and grounded was to put off this mortall body and to put on one that was bâ—…essed and immortall not vpon earth where it is not to be found but in heauen and by a diuine and celestiall power But that doth contradict this assertion That man desires as much or more to end the miseries of this life as to continue this miserable life and therefore certaine wise men of the world did settle their resolution vnto death vpon this Dilemma saying Either we shal be happy in death if the soule escapes or else we shal be without paine or misery if all remaine No small aduantage doubtlesse seeing the greatest point of happinesse in this life is to beeleast vnhappy The 11. Argument taken from two resemblances of Death Sâ—…ounding is a kinde of Death and the shadow of the body is an Image of it But in swounding there is no paine nor in the shadow any amazement BY Syncope I vnderstand the strongest and most extended swounding not that which is gentle which happeneth sometimes at the opening of a veine in the which the patient neither loseth feeling nor speech but that which carries away all the forces of a man his natural I say and principally his vitall Sleepe is nothing to represent death in regard of this symptome for it is death it selfe only there is in this sometimes a returning to life and there none I haue seene it and obserued it in my father being an old man I haue conferred it with some that were apparantly dead yet could I not finde any difference he lay without any shewe of soule in any of his â—…ects notwithstanding that he was continually rolled vp and downe in a chamber his pulse was not to bee felt he was in a cold swet ouer all the extreamities of his body were exceeding cold And these are the very signes of a right Syncope by the which the truth of our Maior is iustified that to fall into the Syncope is to fall into death for as death is a cessation
apparitions shadowes and walking spirits to wrestle with them The statue of Nicon the wrestler borne at Tasos did witnesse it without words when as one who had enuied and hated Nicon at the sight of this statue fell into his old spleene which he had borne him liuing who taking a staffe layd vpon the image to despight the memory of Nicon the image to bee reuenged of this affront fell vpon him with all his weight and crusht him to death This was an accident but it was well and iustly ordained But behold another more euident Fabia wife to the Emperour Heraelius Being carried dead to her tombe it happened that a maiden by mischance did spit out at a window vpon the body for which she was taken burnt in the same fire that was prepared to reduce the body of Fabia to ashes In such recommendation they had in those dayes the honor of the dead The rage of Sylla is iustly held detestable who not content to haue done all the violence he could to his enemies whilest they liued after their death would draw their bones out of their graues and cast them into the riuer The death of the Saints is pretious before God let vs also say the death of vertuous men is pretious before men and if any one hath bene blemished in his life it should be buried in his graue Lewis 11. of France a great King hath verified it in his owne person towards his enemy the faire Agnes whom some of those times supposed that the Kings Father had entertained After her death she was intoÌ„bed in the Church of the Castle of Laches and by reason of a certaine rent shee gaue vnto it her body was layd in the middest of the Quire Lewis comming thither some time after there was suite made vnto him by a Priest that hee would suffer them to remoue that Tombe to some other place for that it did incomodate them The King beeing informed who lay there answered That which you demand is vniust although this woman were in her time very opposite vnto me yet will I not violate her Sepulcher Moreouer I cannot conceiue that you haue laid this body in so eminent 〈◊〉 place without some rich present performe that to your Benefactor being dead which you promised her being alâ—… and remooue her not from thence to bind you more strictly towards her I giue you for an increase sixe hundred pounds starling If this were done in a life which was blemished what shall it bee in one that is all pure and vntainted If it be obserued towards them that dye a drie death how much more towards them that are vniustly slaine by Tyrantâ—… Behold a memorable history among many which intimates that God hath a watchfull eye ouer them Perdinand fourth Mâ—…g of Spaine transported with choler vppon a suspition ill grounded for a murther committed commanded two bretheren of the house of 〈◊〉 to bee throwne headlong from the top of a rocke Going to their execution these Gentlemen protest and crie out that they dye innocents and seeing the Kings eares were shut vp to their iust defence they cited him to apear within 30. dayes before the soueraigne Iudge The dayes run on and the King is carelesse vntill that vpon the 30. day hee found himselfe seazed at the first but with a light infirmity but it increased so suddainely as hee dyed the same day Consider hereof you to whom honour is more pretious then life and who liuing feele the stings of Enuy and slander more then your bodies are followed with their shaddowes Take comfort heerein for God by your death will preuent these vniust pursuites and make an end of these iniurious taxations Enuy assaults the man liuing but lying in the bed of death she leaues him at rest as the Poet saith and then due honour is giuen to men of merit O you which meditate day and night on your learned writings writings either to chase away ignorance or to reforme men deformed with all sorts of vices in this debaucht age faint not for any malice they beare you liuing death will smother this rancor consume this enuy we see it daily and before vs Cate the Cenfor did taxe it sharpely I know saith hee that many ignorant of true honour will traduce my writings if I publish them but I let their babling fall to the ground meaning the graue whereas the sharpest stings of slander are abated and buried and the bookes which during the life of their Authors durst not looke vpon the light no more then Owles after their death flie out like young Eagles and behold the Sunne Obiection Whatsoeuer God and men hold to be euill is euill God and men iudge death to be euill Ergo c. THIS Argument is grounded vpon the Diuine Oracle pronounced to Adam That day thou shalt eate of the fruite of the tree of knowledge of good and euill thou shalt die the death the Apostle saies that Death is the reward of sin As for men in Cities wel gouerned their lawes impose the punishment of death for theeues murtherers sedicious c. I answer That death in her beginning is bad but not in her deriuation but it is good in respect of his power and wisedome who drawes light from darkenes good from euill life from death for now by the blessing of God death serues as a ladder to the faithfull to ascend vp into heauen So the diuersity of tongs sent at the building of the Tower of Babel proceeded from the fury of God kindled against the builders to frustrate their enterprize Yet the same tongs haue bene since imparted to the Apostles vpon White-sonday by the fauour of God thereby to haue the mysteries of the Lord declared So garments were inuented in token of the losse of our naked Innocency and yet in continuance they are become an honorable ornament for our bodies as wee see Euen so in the beginning God sent death in his fury and since he sent it in fauour to Enoch to Iosias and to all them hee loues The holy Ghost speaking by the penne of Salomon sayth that hee more esteemes the dead which are already dead then the liuing which are yet liuing As for malefactors death is not inflicted vpoÌ„ theÌ„ as it is simply death but for two reasons adiaceÌ„t the one is that depriuing them of all motion it makes them cease to commit any more euill frees the Country of such vermine The other that it is imposed for a publike infamy and therefore they are set vpon scaffolds and gibbets in publike place this deserued infamy is the true torment of the punishment death is but an accident and do wee not see many delinquents desire an honorable graue more then life the which they would not do if they held death to bee the worst of euills and not rather an extreame dishonor in which they feele their soules to suruine Bias therefore did answere wittily being demanded which of all
be not directed and animated from aboue he followes that which he should fly and flyes that which he should follow so as he shall neuer hit the white now win the Crowne of Iustice which is the true felicitie of man Let vs then conclude with S. Iohn That what we shal be doth not yet appeare with S. Paul That our life is hidden in Christ That it is in safe keeping and that the ende of this mortall life is the beginning of the immortall Let vs say in the ende that all things haue their Periode that wee are borne to liue We liue to die and wee die to liue againe but without any more turning for the Circle shal be returned to his point and the light of the bodie shall suffer no more eclipse Come then O gentle death which doest make an end of the miseries of this world and beginnest the happinesse of Heauen which dost free vs from mortall paine and bringest vs to enioy immortall good which doest conuert our teares and toyles into ioy rest which doest change our fantasticall treasure into that which is certaine and our temporall into spirituall and eternall Retire then O you deceitfull vanities for the charme of your pleasures cannot preuaile with me who am resolued to die hold your tongue also O vaine deception of Philosophie and humane tradition for I am taught by the death of my Sauiour by his resurrection that my greatest perfection is to acknowledge my imperfection my blindnesse my death in my sinnes and that my greatest happynesse in this world is to obteyne remission of my sinnes and to mortifie my corrupted members to the end that a good death may soone bring mee to the hauen of saluation and eternall life Amen The second Argument taken from the vicious fruits of the extreame feare of death That which breedes many inconueniences in the spirit bodie of man must bee speedily pulled away The extreame feare of death causeth great inconueniences Therefore that must be speedily pulled away SOme one sayed truely speaking of the excessiue apprehension of death that it is the ordinary obiect which troubleth the vnderstanding of man makes him to lose his Iudgement to abandon all duety and to cast himselfe into a shamefull forgetfulnesse of himselfe Let vs. see how Hee that feares death vnmeasurably he must of necessitie feare euery thing that may bring it that is all that hee sees and what he cannot discerne whereas death lyes in ambush whereby it happens that this man doth easily fall into many errours as into foolish superstition thinking by his voluntarie submissions by mâ—…toring of words not vnderstood by adoring of stocks and stones to moue God to pitty him and to turne away death which hee imagines vpon the least accident the flying of a bird or the croaking of a Crow should take him by the throate So we reade of Arislodemus King of the Messeniens who being in warre against his subiects the dogs howled like Woolues and an herbe called Dogstooth grew neere vnto his Altar the which being interpreted by his Soothsayers to bee an ill presage he concoiued such a feare as hee died And as this disordered motion of feare makes men credulous to the words of Satan so doth it make them incredulous to the assured promises of the Eternall the which prouoking the wrath of God in the end hee doth execute vpon them his sentence pronounced against the fearefull incredulous casting them into the Lake burning with fire and brimstone which is the second death Apocal. 21. O how fitly then did Saint Augustine say that by too much fearing the temporall death they did ingulfe themselues in the eternall a fearefull man not onely makes himselfe a slaue to fantasticall diuinity but also a bondman to any one that is subiect vnto him said King Lew. 11. who to assure himself against death shut himselfe vp solitarie at Plessis neere Tours yet could he not bee confident the opening of a doore amazed him he hated all those he suspected and he suspected all the world his most confident were dismisss and put from his person and hee remayned alone melancholie dreaming froward and chollericke nothing pleased him but onely displeasure he grew iealous of his sonne-in-law of his owne Sonne and his Daughter only his Phisitian possest him controlled him and kept him in awe with his words threatning death I know well said hee swearing a great oath that one of these mornings you will send mee away with the rest but you shall not liue eight dayes after Thus this imperious seruant kept his King captiue Thus this King lost his liberty more pretious then his life for maintaining whereof good men should alwaies striue Wherunto Seneca had reference when he sayd that the vilest death was to bee preferred before the honestest seruitude for that this liberty cannot safely confish but in the contempt of death as Agis King of Lacedemon taught him that demanded an assured liberty of him and in truth â—…hee that feares not death may passe freely like a Knight without feare who shall hinder him seeing the extremâ—… dangers of death cannot amaze him Moreouer fearefull persons are the ruine of States and Commonalties for in the least daÌ„gers through feare and the threats of great men they yeeld easily to a mischiefe and subiect themselues to the fauour of the wicked and the will of the base multitude Thirdly a man that trembles so at the apprehension of death runnes into assured misery which depriues him of all pleasure of life makes his facewrincle and grow pale before his time Which the Italian Gentleman will verifie who being imprisoned vpon a certaine accusation and receiuing newes that without all doubt he should lose his head the next day the feare of one night did so trouble his braine and distempered his body with shaking as he became all gray and worne But ô miserable men after all your shifts and escapes in the end you must come and yeeld your selues at the Port of Death So much the more miserable I do not call you miserable for that you are subiect vnto death but for your extreame feare that many thinking to free themselues from death haue run head-long into it some thinking to escape haue cast themselues out at a window and broken their neckes others flying their pursuing enemies swords haue leapt like fishes but without fins into a deepe riuer as into an assured Sanctuary where they haue beene drowned Nay besides all this they which thinking still to delay and escape that which they feare so extreamely when they see themselues in the bed of death then doe they vomit out their rage against heauen and exclaime iniuriously against the true God and being desperate they cast themselues into the infernall gulph Let vs conclude with Seneca That the feare of death will neuer profit any liuing man but drawing him into many miseries which are much more to be feared then death it selfe will make him in the
end insupportable and offensiue to all kind of people yea to himselfe For hauing his nose groueling to the ground like a hogge hee will neuer bee able to lift vp his eies nor his spirit to heauen where all perfect and assured contentment is to bee found If yeelding to all this you will aske me the meanes how to bee freed of this fearefull terror I will tell you that it is to know what Deathis as it is taught in the 13. 14. and 20. Arguments and not to rely vpon doubtfull and false opinions An Obiection Euery roote bringing forth fruits worthy repentance should be carefully preserued The feare of death bringeth forth fruits worthy of repentance Therefore the feare of death should bee carefully preserued WHatsoeuer thou sayest or doest remember thy end and thou shalt neuer sinne sayth the son of Syrach Answ. the continuall meditation of death to him that knowes it rightly helpes wonderfully vnto vertue And Seneca sayeth that man is neuer so diuine as when hee doth acknowledge himselfe to bee mortall Yea it auailes in Christian duties but that the feare of death is profitable to any thing I cannot comprehend I will not deny but that many haue bene wonderfully stirred vp to piety by the feare of death as among others the historie makes mentiō of Peter Vualdo in the yeare 1178. who in the city of Lyons sometime being assembled with many of the chiefe of the Citty to recreate themselues it so happened that one of them fell downe suddenly dead Vualdo a rich man was more mooued then all the rest and seized with feare and apprehension he addicted himselfe more to do penance and to meditate true piety But who doth not see that it is not properly death which causeth this inclination to pietie but the iudgement of God which wee discerne through death as through a glasse that it is the worme of Conscience which doth awaken vs by the contemplation of Death and stirres vp sinners to iustice sanctitie It is the ignorant confusion of the second death with the first which doth so strongly amaze men Finally it is a seruile feare and not commendable yea condemned of the Pagans themselues to forbeare to doe euill for feare of punishment Let vs conclude then That this first death which is naturall and common to all men seeing that her poyson hath beene quenched in the bloud of Christ as Tertullian speaks seeing that the Crosse of Iesus Christ hath pulled away her sting triumphed ouer her and giuen a counter-poyson for the poyson of sinne it is not euill but the greatest good that can arriue to mortall men and to feare to obtayne so great a good is a vice and no vertue before all vpright Iudges The Third Argument drawne from the Impossibility That onely is to bee feared that lyes in the power of man Death lyes not in the power of man Therefore not to be feared VIce onely should hee feared to be auoyded but nothing that is without the power of man is vice as Epictetus saith in his Enchiridion Moreouer that feare is good that can preuent an imminent danger but to that which can neither bee remedied nor foreseene feare serues but to aduance it Man may preuent and auoyd that which hee holds in his owne power and will as the approbation of vice the hatred of goodnesse and of true honour rashnes passions vnlawfull loue vnrestrained heauinesse excessiue ioy vaine hope damned despaire c. But all that which blinde man by his opinion doth affect or feare so much as wealth pouertie the honour or dishonour of the world life and death are not tyed to his will nor subiect to his scepter And therefore the Philosopher will rightly say that neither pouertie nor sicknesse let vs also adde death nor any thing that flowes not from our owne mallice are to bee feared let vs follow the Doctors of wisedome saith Heluidius in Tacitus which hold honest things onely to bee good and dishonest bad power nobilitie and whatsoeuer is without the spirit of man reputation riches friends health life and all things that depend of the free will of man flow necessarily perpetually from the decree of the Eternall and to seeke to hinder their course were to striue to stay the motion of the heauen and starres This prouidence of God dispersed throughout all the members of this Vniuerse hath infused into euery mooueable thing a secret immooueable vertue as Boetius saith by the which shee doth powerfully accomplish all things decreed in its time and place and order To seeke to breake the least linke of these causes chayned together were as much as to runne headlong against a rocke to ouerturne it I will that thou knowest the howre place of thy deceasse that to auoyd it thou flyest to a place opposite vnto it that thou watchest the houre yet shalt thou find thy selfe arriued and guided to the place at the houre appointed there to receiue thy death and that which is admirable thou thy selfe insensibly wouldest haue it so and diddest make choice of it To this force let Iulius Caesar oppose all his Imperiall power let him scoffe at Spurinus his prediction of the 15. of March the day being come hee must vnderstand from his Sooth-sayer who was no lyer that the day was not past he must come to the Capitoll and there receiue 23. wounds and fall downe dead at the foote of Pompeys statue Let Domitian storme for the approching of fiue of the clocke foretold yet must he die at the houre and for the more easier expedition one comes and tells him that it had strooke sixe he beleeues it with great ioy Parthenius his groome tells that there is a pacquet of great importance brought vnto him he enters willingly into the Chamber but it was to bee slaine at that very instant which hee feared most But if these histories seeme ouer worne with age who remembers not that memorable act at the last Assembly of the Estates at Blois of that Duke who receiued aduertisement from all parts both within and without the Realme that the Estates would soone end with the ending of his life euen vpon the Eue one of his confident friends discouered the businesse vnto him going to dinner he found a note written in his napkin with these words They will kill you To which he answered They dare not but they failed not Oh God how difficult is it to finde out thy wayes Let vs then cōclude that the houre of death appoynted by the immoueable order of God is ineuitable so that as one saith We shal sooner moue God then death So the Pagans who erected Altars to all their counterfeit Deities did neuer set vs any to death This firme decree of all things gane occasion to the Pagans to figure the three Destinies whose resolution great Iupiter could not alter no not to draw his Minion Sarpedon out of their bonds Let vs speake more properly God can
doe it but he wil neuer do it or very seldome to shew his infinit power by miracle Let vs in the end say That seeing death is ineuitable it must needs follow that the feare of it is vnprofitable On the other side let vs adde that mās life is not to be cut off before the time therefore a carefull waywardnesse to prolong it auailes nothing the Destinies which haue resolued immutably to spinne it out till such a time they will doe it feare it not and in the danger of death will rather shew a miracle to preserue thee as to the Poet Simonides who supping with Scopas in a Towne of Thessalie word was brought him that two young men were at the dore to speake with him the Poet went forth but found no body at the doore but hee heard a great noyse of the chamber which sunke downe and smothered Scopas and al his guests in the ruins We reade that Gelon then a young Infant but appointed to liue longer to gouern Sicile was drawne out of the like but a stranger danger for as hee was at schoole in the presence of his master and many of his companions behold a great Wolfe enters into the school comes to Gelon layes hold of his booke and drawes it by the one end Gelon without amazement holds fast and rather suffers himselfe to bee drawne forth by the Woolfe then to let goe his hold and in the meane time the building happened to sinke and ouerwhelmed both Master and schollers Thus God shewes his prouidence preseruing by his Angels those whom he pleaseth from present and most eminent dangers So would hee saue Lot and his family from the fire of heauen almost against their will For it is written that the Angels tooke them and thrust them out of Sodome yea it is written that the Angell executioner to shew the force of prouidence told Lot that he could not doe any thing vntill hee were retired into a towne adioyning which was afterwards called Zohar into the which he was no sooner entred but the Eternall powred downe fire and brimstone vpon Sodome and Gomorah We reade of Titus Vespasian that two famous knights had conspired to kill him whereof he was aduertised but making no shew thereof he tooke them by the hands led them forth to walke and hauing called for two swords he gaue to eyther of them one as prouoking them to that which they had resolued but being amazed both of the manner and of the Emperours courage You see sayth he that destinie doth iustly hold the principalitie of the world and that in vaine men practise murthers against it be it through hope to purchase greatnesse or for feare to lose it Let vs therefore acknowledge that it is not of vs but of the word of destinie which God hath pronounced that the lengthening or shortning of our liues depends The great God is to vs a God of strength to deliuer vs and the issues of death belong vnto the Eternal therefore the Apostle sayd that Christ is dead and risen againe that he might haue power ouer the dead and the liuing and therfore this vexing care of life nor that great horror of Death cannot profit vs any thing Let vs then leaue these things and finishing our course resolutely ioyfuly let vs yeeld al into the hands of our soue raigne Master neither to tempt him nor to despaire of him for both the one and the other are equally hateful vnto him and if our soule puft vp with the vent of temptation be desquiet within vs let vs say vnto it with Dauid My soule returne vnto thy rest feare nothing Euery kinde of death of them that are beloued of God is precious in his sight verie precious sayeth S. Bernard as being the ende of labour the consummation of the victorie the port of life and the entrie to perfect felicitie The first Obiection If Death did flow from the enchayned order of destinie we should not see it without order sometimes to goe slowly sometimes to runne headlong But that is vsually seene Therefore it seemes not to flow from destinie THe vnequall Issue of life which we see happen to men doth not alter but rather corroborate destinie it is the immutable decree of the Eternal he sees who should amend or impaire in this life he that hath made all for his glory euen the wicked for the day of calamitie And therefore he soone tooke vp Enoch to himself lest that malice shold corrupt his spirit sayth the text Contrariwise if Constantine the Great who was cruel in his youth had beene cut off he had not bin a Christian neither had hee so much extended the kingdome of Christ. There is yet another reason which is the deliuerance of good men from the miseries of the world when death comes I will gather thee vp with thy fathers sayd God to Iosias the good King to the end thy eyes may not see all the miseries which I will bring vpon this place On the other-side a long life is a great languishing to the wicked So Caine after his parricide committed was cursed of God and liuing so pursued by the Iudgement of God as he often cried out that his punishment was insupportable and therefore hee should wander vpon the face of the earth and that whosoeuer should finde him would kill him but God prouided setting a brand vpon his fore-head to the end no man should slay him But how comes it that the death of some is suddaine as the shot of an harquebuze cānot bee more suddaine and so long in others which languish of some long infirmitie I answere that to search into the Counsells of God which is properly the destiny wherof we speake is more infinite then to seeke the bottome of a gulph That great Apostle rapt vp to the third heauen finds nothing but depths incomprehensible Iudgements and wayes impossible to be found out Rom. 11. Moreouer I do not see to speake truely that death is more suddaine to one then to an other is it to them that being sound and vigorous are so strooken as they die presently Yet being thus strooken they know not whether they should suruiue it or no seeing some one hath escaped being thus stroken Wherefore I do not see that death is more slow to one then to an other Is it to them that lie bedred 10. or 20. yeares yea and what know they whether they shal die the first day they take their beds To conclude I say that seeing the comming of death is imperceptible and that it is impossible for any man to say assuredly I am dead or I shal suruiue that death cannot be suddaine or slow to any man other men iudge after the euent but not before And therefore it seemes to mee that the question which is made whether a languishing death or a suddaine be most to be desired is in vaine for that we shall find that death is suddaine to all men seeing it comes
himselfe gouernes himself enioies his worthy thoughts as Seneca saith And how can hee bee happy who beeing subiect to anothers command is not master of himselfe Let him drag after him fetters of gold yet hee shall stil be in fetters We wil not heere commend the Stiloons Timons and other haters of mē which like wolues fled from all company but those that offering themselues to company and seeking their friendship are wretchedly chased away and being forsaken of others retire themselues into themselues lose nothing but augment their felicity So as Seneca said rightly thinke and desire this thing aboue all the prayers which thou shalt make vnto God to bee content with thy selfe and with those things that may spring from thy selfe What felicity saith he can be neerer vnto God Whereunto Saint Ambrose subscribeth In what Desart saith hee is not that man accompanied that doth enioy a happy life He then that can liue alone wil neuer grieue to be abādoned by men in death being accompanied by Angels by his Sauiour the true God Thirdly Physitions Surgions and other expert men imploy themselues for thee are about they to assist thee and to restore thee to thy health Thy wife thy children thy friends with their teares would bathe thy bed increase thy sorrow and be infected with thy disease It this then better both for thee and them that they be absent Thou hast proued their affection in liuing why wouldst thou try it in dying thou doest leaue thy worldly friends in death but thou goest to purchase more faithfull and better in heauen euen Iesus Christ the Angells and the Saints whereat then doest thou complaine thou a Christian whereas a Pagan reioyceth Mercurius Trismegislus by the report of Calcidius sayd when he dyed that he returned into his countrie where his kinsfolkes and best friends were Finally thou accusest thy disease for that it takes from thee means to dispose of thy affayres A wise man should not forbeare to settle his estate vntill the extreamitie of an in curable disease for he hath then other matters to thinke of then worldly affayres he should haue foreseene it and prouided in time a good souldier when the trompet sounds to battaile doth not begin to discourse of his house and to thinke of some peece of ground but prepares to fight for his life is in question Euen so a wise man at the point of death should not once thinke of the world but of the conflict which he hath against the Diuell and sinne there is question of his conscience of the life of his soule of the inheritance of heauen which he loseth if he be vanquished our life is vncertain many other diseases besides the plague may cut it off sodenly the Apoplexie Lethargie Catarre Squinancie and many others when they come leaue no place for affayres Therefore during the time of health let vs compound our quarrells with our neighbors and dispose of our estates with our children kinsfolks that we may bee ready at the first sommons of our God prepared at the first signe of that spirituall Combate which shal be giuen vs to fight well to liue or to dye as it shall please the Lord. Watch and pray sayd Iesus Christ to his Disciples for you know not when that time shall be And Let your loynes bo girded and your candells light The sixt Obiection The losse of that which is happy and ioyful causeth horror Life is happy and ioyfull Therefore the losse of life causeth horror PLato is cited to proue the Minor who writes that man may enioy felicitie in his body and that he is happy aboue all the Creatures therefore Gallen in his booke of the parts of the body doth wonderfully extoll the author of nature for hauing delt so bountifully with man And Dauid of more authoritie then all these seemes to sing the praises of the Eternall for the good he hath done vnto man saying Thou Lord hast made him little lesse Then Angells in degree And thou hast crown'd him in like sort With glory state and dignitie ANswer All the Philosophers except Plato Gallen and some few others being dazeled with the brightnesse of some guists remaining in man after his shipwracke in the beginning of the world did not poure forth such prayses of the condition of man but in a manner all with one voice haue called nature not a mother but a cruell stepdame for the many miseries wherewith shee hath ouercharged man as we see in Tully and as Saint Augustine reports Euen so Aristotle who is held the Ensigne bearer of Philosophers being demanded what man was he is sayeth he the patterne of Imbecillity the booty of time the sport of fortune the image of inconstancy the ballance of enuy and calamity the rest is nothing but spittle and choller Demccrites also required to giue his aduice of the condition of man answered that it was a miserable fortune seeing that the goods which were carefully sought after hardly came vnto him but miseries which were not sought for nor any way expected nor suspected ranne vnto him Wherefore the Comedian Neoptolimus being demanded what admirable thing hee did obserue in Aeschilus Sophocles and Euripides Nothing sayeth hee in their words doth amaze mee but that which I haue seene touching Philippe who celebrating the marriage of his daughter Cleopatra and being at a stately supper honored with the name of the 13. god was the next day stabbed and cast vpon a dunghill But you will say This life wants no pleasures Without doubt if you obserue them well they are poore pleasures bitter pinching and intermixt with displeasures yea in laughing the heart shal be grieued his ioy end with care sayeth Salomon in his Prouerbes He also running ouer breefely in Ecclesiastes the vanity toyle of the body vexation of mind and heauines of soule concludes That he thinkes him more happy that was neuer borne then the liuing or the dead for sayeth hee he hath not seene the bad workes which are done vnder the Sunne As for that passage of the Psalme alledged it makes nothing to the purpose for that he considers not man as he is but as he was in his integrity and innocencie in the earthly Paradice or as hee is restored in Iesus Christ man as the Apostle expounds it in the Epistle to the Hebrews That no man was for his transgression degraded from the rancke he held and lost the priuiledges he had it appeareth by the comparison of that which he is with the titles which are giuen him 1. God had made man 2. Sinne had vndone him and all his naturall life is but a spirituall death Ephes. 2. 1. 3. That is to say with a true perfect and healthfull knowledge of God of his wil and of his workes 4. Hee hath lost all that and there hath succeeded ignorance blindnes strange darkenesse 5. His desire and actions were conformable to the lawes of God 6.
All that is depraued and there is nothing but a horrible confusion in his will and actions 7. He was absolute Lord ouer all Creatures which trembled at his looke and brought him fruits according to his desire 8. Now they rebell and assaile him yea the earth instead of good corne brings forth nothing but thornes thistles 9. He had frequent conuersation with God inspired of him and breathing by him 10. Now the Prince of the power of the aire the vncleane spirit workes powerfully in the children of rebellion which are all the sonnes of Adam Ephes. 2. 2. 11. A glorious angelical and diuine Maiesty did shine in his face 12. Now they couer their shame with leaues they hide themselues among the trees and crie out Mountains fall vpon vs and couer vs. To conclude there is no greater contrariety betwixt day and night then of these famous qualities to the infamous blemishes of man as he liued in this world before his regeneration in the which by little and little hee recouers this Iustice holinesse and trueth Ephes. 4. 24. But the fulnesse thereof is reserued to heauen whither death leades vs and therefore to be desired The Fourth Argument taken from the efficient cause All that a good and wise mother giueth vnto her Children cannot be hurtfull Nature our good and wise mother giues vs death Death then cannot be hurtfull THe first proposition of this Argument cannot bee denyed after the experience which wee haue seene after the comparison which God makes of himselfe with a mother who cannot forget her child nor he his people After that Iesus Christ had said No man giues a stone instead of bread nor a Scorpion for fish to him that he loues And how then can nature the liuely spring of so liuely a loue giue any thing that is very hurtfull and fayle at neede and in the principall hauing neuer fayled vs in all the course of our life Now to proue that the second proposition is true and that nature hath ordayned death for her children Seneca doth teach vs saying That death is a Law of nature yea that our whole life is but a way vnto it S. Cyprian also doth affirme that it is a decree intimated vnto the world that whatsoeuer is borne should haue an end and from whom is this decree from God the Authour of nature the executioner of this decree but it is a fauourable decree to such as Heauen fauours It is a generall Law to restore that which is lent vs this life is but a loane wee must restore it at the end of the time it is a tribute wee owe for we entred vpon condition to depart when it shall please the master Moreouer what is this life but a harmony rising from the mixture of the foure elements which are the foure ingredients of our bodie and what is death by the censure of Hippocrates but a diuorce of marriage of these foure Elements This diuorce is as naturall to man as it is naturall that fire should be contrarie to water and ayre to earth for their contrarietie is the cause of this diuorce which is death I know that it is not sufficient for humane life to haue a body well tempered with his Organes and to haue the power of life but he must also haue a fist Effence as a Lute well strung and well tuned is not sufficient to make it sound vnlesse there bee a hand to play vpon it And I also maintayne that as the Musitian ceaseth to play when the Instrument is vnstrung so the soule ceaseth to giue life vnto the body yea flyes out when it is destroyed but this destruction is naturall and by consequence death and to that end Nature hath planted this body vpon pyles which take vent vpon boanes not very solide caulkt ouer with soft flesh glued with a viscous humour which may easily melt with heate or dissolue with rayne full of transparent veines easie to pierce watered with vnholesome water tempered with contrarie qualities which a certaine temperature keepes at quiet for a season but when euery one desires to command his companion and time in the end presenting the occasion the common right being forced the body sodainely falls And this force is of nature who must needes effect the words of the Lord spoken vnto man Thou art dust and shalt returne to dust Sonnes of men returne but whither From whence you came to the earth to death death then is of nature and therefore Thales the Milesian said that there was no difference betwixt life and death for that they are both equally according vnto Nature and as one demanded of him why he was in life and dyed not For the same cause answered he that the one is no more excellēt then the other It is also the reason why the Emperor Antonin the gentle seeing his seruants weepe lying sicke in his bed hee sayed vnto them Why weepe you for me and not rather the naturall and mortall condition of all the world that is to say Why doe you not rather weepe for life which is of a mortall condition The answere of Anaxagoras was more vertuous who being aduertised of the death of his deere and onely Sonne sayd O Messenger thou bringest me no vnexpected newes I know well I had begotten a Sonne that was mortall hee was not insensible like a stone but he considered that nothing had chanced to his sonne but what he had foreseene from his birth his long foresight and his sodaine con sideration of the condition of all men for to die had tēpered all sorow in him and brought him to reason which should alwaies holde the helme of this little world man Like was the answere of Lochades father to Siron vp on the like report of the death of one of his children I knew well sayth he that he should dye VVe shall see others hereafter to the ende they may haue no cause to say that this resolution was monstrous in the world To conclude nature to make vs resolue ioyfully vnto death seemes to direct vs to the sweete song of the Swanne a presaging bird consecrated to Apollo by Antiquitie the which dying nature gathers together about the heart the purest and sweetest bloud which makes him Iouiall and to sing a happie presage to whom Socrates Plato and Tully send them that haue so great feare of death An Obiection Satan Man and Sinne are the causes of death Therefore it is not Nature ANswere When it is said in the holy Scripture that Satan holds the empire of death that by one man sinne entred into the world and by sin death finally that death is the reward of sinne we must not vnderstand it of the naturall death whereof the question growes but of the spirituall and eternall death as many of the ancient fathers doe expound it And how else could the threatning of God against Adam be vnderstood touching the tree of knowledge of good and euil Thou shalt not eate
for on that day thou shalt eate of it thou shalt die the death obserue the words from that day for he died not that day but liued long after but from that day being fallen from grace he dyed the spiritual death then what doth this Hebrew phrase to die the death mean but the principall death which is the eternall the second death But this death brought in by Sathan by sin by man hath no power ouer the children of God good men to whom this discourse is onely directed since that it was subdued bound and confined into hell by Iesus Christ our Sauiour as Athanasius hath wel obserued that as the waspe strikes violently against a stone but hurts it not by her incursion but rather bruzeth her selfe and looseth her sting euen so death incountring Christ furiously who is life she could not hold him in her bands but she hath lost her sting so as they whom shee terrified before insult ouer her now So then death simply the laying of the bodie into the ground there to be putrified the way to heauē is good to the good is giuen of God by nature life death are of the Lord sayth wise Ecclesi 11. vers 14. It is he that giues life and death that maks vs to descend into the graue to rise againe saith the Prophetesse Anna. 2. Sam. 2. It is then our good mother that calls vs to death let vs follow and obay her voice seeing we can receiue no harme and how can it bee hurtfull seeing it is the sepulcher of vices and the resurrection of vertues sayth S. Ambrose and how how can it bee dangerous seeing it is that Toad-stone which by his fecret vertue expels and rectifies all vncleane things And in truth as Toades when they are growne olde and heauy with a fat poyson are set vpon by an infinite number of Ants which sucke him and deuour him so as nothing remaines but the said stone which afterwards they may freely handle yea profitably So death hauing beene purged from sinne is now by the almighty power of the Eternall conuerted into a most souereigne remedy against sinne The second Obiection There is not any thing ingenerate in all Creatures by nature in vaine But the feare of death is ingenerate in all Creatures Therefore the feare of death is not in vaine FOr the proofe of this Argument shall suffice the approbation of all Creatures great and small which flye from death the same reason is for man whom the complexion of his flesh being proportionable to the quality of the Elements inclines him to loue the world he may be where he will yet his naturall disposition will draw him towards his countrey although in stead of some sweete liquor which he promised to himselfe hee should drinke wormewood So man beeing borne in the world and accustomed vnto it can hardly leaue it Answer The nature of man doth sometimes affect and abhorre one the same thing but for diuers considerations if he beholds death nakedly there is great feare as we may discouer in many but if he can haue the iudgement and patience to see her attired in her precious ornaments with vertue with heauen gates by the which onely we are brought in of the assured ioy and rest of the minde in the possession whereof shee sets the soule then doe wee affect it and desire it and this desire should be held more natural in man for that it is more proper vnto him seeing it proceeds from the true iudgement of reason which makes him man Moreouer for a more cleare solution of the argument we must distinguish the vniuersall nature from the particular vniuersall nature is that vertue that admirable investigable proportiō infused by God into the Vniuerse the proper Instrument of the principall agent of this soueraigne essence which hauing insinuated into this Chaos the first matter hath brought it in six dayes too this goodly ornament and hath preserued it many thousand of yeares of this nature we de nie that she plants in beasts the feare of that shee giues them that is to say death but as to shew vnto the beasts of the earth al the lights of heauen as well the fixed stars as wandring she turnes about the heauens so to shew vnto heauen all the Creatures she hath giuen the passage returning of life death else it were impossible if as in a tree the dry leaues falling giue place to green that spring so in beasts the first should not giue way to them that follow As for particular nature the very cōplexion of euery one to whom death is so terrible I say it is an ill ordered feare The Order is preposterous when as the particular doth not follow the Law of the generall and it is the ruine of States when as the priuate good is preferred before the publike The Romaine Empire did flowrish when as the Popilij Scipios Fabij and others did choose rather to be poore in a rich estate then rich in a poore estate Euen so is it in the societie of mankind taken in all ages euery one must dispose himselfe to follow this generall order of supreme nature and whosoeuer shall contradict it shall shew himselfe a bad Cittizen of this great Cittie of the world and opposing himselfe let him not therfore think to escape the inexorable destinie of his end but as the bird takē in the limetwig thinking to free her selfe by striuing is caught the faster so man which is ensnared by death the more furiously hee torments himselfe the more he shall aduance the obiect of his torment Let euery one therefore looke vnto his dutie to his children and to them that shall come after to prepare himselfe to giue them place here to tends that great desire the issue of particular nature to ingender that great care of fathers mothers in the nourishing preseruation education and bringing vp of their children to the end they may sucoted them and why then hauing prouided for all left yong oliue plants in our old stock hearing the bell sound a retre◅t wherefore I say should we shew our selues deafe vnwilling faynt hearted The fat all bird drawn by the sent of thy Carcase is perched ouer thy window art thou still restie doest thou not feele thy seditious guests with in thee which cōspireth thy infallible ruine Nature will haue it so she commands thee to depart feare not folthy good mother and thou shalt do well Let vs therfore conclude that although our particular nature our complexion makes vs to abhorre death yet wee must not beleeue her no more then the seruant of the house which is borne to obey It is the mistresse the vniuersal vertue of the world which commands vs to depart and to suffer others to enter let vs follow and obey all our trembling and horror is in vaine But to what ende is it will you say for me to haue flourishing children if in the meane time I become worms
the refutation in the meane time for witnes of my saying I propound that great Diuine S. Augustin writing that which followeth The present life is doubtfull blind miserable beaten with the flowing and ebbing of humors weakened with paines dried vp with heate swelled with meate vndermined with famine coÌ„founded with sports consumed with sorrowes distempered with cares dâ—…lled with pride pufâ—… vp with riches deiected with pouertie shaken in youth made crooked in age broken by diseases and tuined by 〈◊〉 c. Many great men who haâ—… not wanted any thing for the enioying of all pleasures yet would they in their life time haue writteÌ„ vpon the Marble which should couer them dead for a conclusion of the Epitaph these last words The life and biâ—…h of mortall men is nothing but toyle and death as one waue driues on another so one miserie thrusts on another the one is no sooner flying but the other followes him And as in the eye one teare springs of another so one sorrow riseth out of another as Buchanan hath learnedly written in his Tragedie of Iepthe The 3. Obiection It is not lawful of himselfe and without other some Command to remaine in a place that is bad and troublesome Life is a place bad and troublesome It is not therefore lawfull of himselfe without other command to remayne in life THis long Iliade of calamities of this present life seems to perswade man to the doctrine of the Stoicks which is to depart when it is too troublesome so speaks Seneca A wise man liues as long as he ought not solong as hee could he will see how with whom how he should liue and what he should doe if many things fal out troublesome crosse his tranquillitie he frees himselfe and he doth it not only in the vrgent necessitie but as soone as fortune seemes suspect vnto him he coÌ„siders that it imports not whether he giue himselfe his ende or that he receiue it Moreouer that it is wretched to liue in necessitie but there is no necessity to liue in necessitie Diogenès meeting one day with Speusippus being sickly causing himselfe to be carried by reason of the Gout he called vnto him in these tearmes God giue thee a good day Diogenes to whom he answered But God giue you no good day that being in this estate hast the patience to liue With the sharpnes of these Cynicall wordes Speusippus was so moued as contrarie to the precepts of his sect he ended his owne life But let vs produce if you please some reasons by the which these men haue debated there follie The 1. Life and death say they are indifferent things and therefore man acoording to his commoditie may vse them indifferently Wherefore saith 〈◊〉 As one that is inuited hauing feasted taken his refection retyres himselfe so being glutted with life why dost thou not depart O foole why doest thou not imbrace a pleà fing rest what interest hast thou that death should come vnto thee or thou goe vnto it Perswade thy selfe that this speech is false and proceeds from an indiscreet man It is a goodly thing to dye his death for it is alwayes thy death and especially that which thou hast procured to thy self The 2. Death is the goodliest port to libertie which is the fruite of wisedome I will not serue said that LaeedemoniaÌ„ child cast him down a precipice who learned to dye in contempt of seruitude he is free from all power what doth a prison a dungeon or fetters touch him he hath an open port The 3. Wherefore hath nature giueÌ„ so streight an entrance vnto life and hath preseÌ„ted vnto man so many large issues vnto death if it shal not bee lawfull for him to depart when he pleaseth On which side soeuer said Seneca thou shalt cast thy miseries thou shalt finde the end of thy miseries doest thou see this precipice by which they descend to liberty doest thou see this sea this riuer this pit there is liberty in the bottome doest thou see this little tree crooked cursed Liberty hangs at it Doest thou see thy throat thy heart These be the fruits of seruitude Plinie saith that the earth our common pareÌ„t hath for pitties sake ordained poysons to this end that beeing able to swallow them easily we may with equall facility dislodge out of this world So in old time Kings and great men did keepe certaine poyson ready for any suddaine vse in the doubtfull euents of fortune as Titus Liuius reports and therefore many haue poysoned themselues being valiant and esteemed great personages Zeno being 98. yeeres old yet strong and lusty returning from the Schoole hee stumbled and fell and being down hee strooke the ground with his hand saying â—…re I am what wilt thou And being come to his house hee layd downe his life of himselfe Cleanthes hauing an Vlcer in his mouth and hauing abstained two dayes from meat by the aduice of the Phisitions was cured Beeing then perswaded by them to eate againe Oh no said he hauing past the greatest part of the way I will not I will not returne againe and so he died of abstinence We could produce many others much coÌ„mended as Lucrece Cato and others if they were not sufficiently knowne Answer I deny that the swarme of miseries of this present life is a sufficient cause to depart when wee please the great God which hath placed vs here must first come and take vs away Pythagoras in Tully forbids to leaue the Corpes de guarde without commandement of the Captaine as a prisoner breaking prison agrauates his crime so the spirit violating his body makes himself guilty of a double torment And he that hath so strictly forbiddeÌ„ to kil meant it as well of himselfe as of others And therefore Virgil platonizing sings vnto vs that they which haue inhumanly slaine themselues hold the first place in hell As for the vertue which they pretend in it the most quick sighted Philosopher hath seene nothing but feare and foolishnesse thus he speaks It is the part of a coward and not of a valiant man to dye by reason of pouerty of loue or for any other thing that is troublesome it is a faintnesse to flie difficult things and after He suffers not death as a good thing but flying the euill Finally he that murthers himselfe wipes himselfe for euer out of the booke of life for that he dies impenitent in the act of sinne neuer to haue remission after this life nor as Saint Augustine sayth any indulgence of correction But to come neerer to our Stoickes wee will first appeale srom Seneca to Epictetus O men sayth hee haue patience attend God vntill hee giue the signe that hee hath dismist you from this ministery then returne vnto him But for the present support couragiously inhabite this region in the which he hath placed you this habitation is short easie not burthensome c. The 1. reason inferring that life and death
are indifferent is false for it is to teare in pieces the sacred communion of the soule with the body of man with his neighbour to kill himselfe Man is not borne for himselfe but after God for his Country which hee depriueth of a good son such as he ought to bee Aristotle hath seene it and hath written it saying That he that kils himselfe doth wrong vnto the Comonalty but to doe wrong is no indifferent thing Moreouer it is a sinne against nature for euery man loues himselfe naturally 〈◊〉 and desires to preserue his being also wee do not see any other Creature but man to kill himselfe through impaciency of paiue The 2. reason which speakes so much of li berty is friuolous and ridiculous for what liberty is there in a dead man who hath neither the power nor the will to chase away a fly that stings him who is made subiect to all sorts of wormes rottennes and stench what is liberty but a power to do what we list but death neither hath will action nor my power it a â—…s mosâ—… dry in my opinion to produce this defence As for the third poysons are giuen by the earth rather to preserue life theÌ„ to destroy it to make antidotes preseruatiues against malignant and venimous diseases and a thousand vnexpected accidents by the biting of mad or venimous beasts omitting the true cause of diuines that the sinne of man hath infected all powring forth his poyson vpon the Creatures which eâ—…uiron him therefore as Saint Paul sayth they sigh and long after their future restauration Finally examples binde vs not but rules wee liue not according vnto others but as we ought the Law of God is plaine sealed in the particular nature of euery one Thou shalt not kill by the which we are forbidden the simple homicide of our neighbor for that he is of humaine blood next the parricide of father or mother for we are their blood which doth much augment the hainousnes of the offeÌ„ce 3. The murthering of our selues which exceeds parricide in a degree of horror To this we must haue regard not vnto what Zeno or Cleanthes haue done And the Stoickes who in all other places so much recommend vnto their Disciples seemelines honesty and duty seeme to me in this point forgetfull blind preuaricators what shal we then do That which a wise Pagan did aduise vs It is for valiant men sayd he rather to contemne death theÌ„ to hate life Many times faint hearted meÌ„ are driuen to a base coÌ„tempt of theÌ„selues throgh the wearines of labor but vertue will trie al things Seeing theÌ„ that death is the end of all things it is sufficieÌ„t to go ioyfully vn to it To his words we adde That our inteÌ„t is not to take away life but the terror of death when it comes a wise man wil liue ioyfully so long as it shall please the Lord of life He wil die also more ioyfully when it shall please the same Lord. This is that he ought to do and doubtlesse man may without sin desire yea pray vnto the Lord that hee may liue long for many reasons but especially for 2. The one concernes the glory of God in the administratioÌ„ of the charge which hee hath committed vnto vs therefore the Son of God in dying would saue his Disciples by that voice full of vertue which he vsed to the Romaine souldiers and Iewes If you seeke me let them go the which preserued them long especially his well-beloued S. Iohn whom he retained in life vnto ninety yeares The other respects our children parents and friends of whom we may and ought in conscience haue a care seeing that by the censure of the Apostle hee which hath not a care of his family hath denied the faith and is worse then an Infidell But besides these reasons and some others which doe simbolize I say that the desire to liue were not fit if there were no other reason sor there is no ceasing from finne so long as life doth last so as the longer wee liue the more â—…lpable we are before God So as I maintaine that the feare to vndergo death I meane death simply is alwayes vicious foolish and ignorant But to be a Murtherer of himselfe without comparison it is much more execrable the Lawes of euery well gouerned Common-weale haue thundred against it yea the Grecians in the midst of â—…rmes whereas lawes are silent would not in signe of indignitie burne the body of Aiax according to their custome for that hee had slaine himselfe The virgins of Milesia for that they had furiously straÌ„gled themselues were drawne by publike ignominie through the streets of the Citie and in such cases God doth vsually shew visible signes of his reuenging wrath So in Parthenay a towne in Poitou a certaine woman in the absence of her husband was taken with a deuilish despaire she tooke the little children when shee had smothered them and hanged them then she came vnto her selfe went vp on a stoole and hung her selfe and and thrust awaie the stoole with her foote but the rope brake and she falling downe halfe dead found a knife the Diuell is a readie officer to furnish instruments to doe euill which she takes and thrusts into her bosome The next day the matter being knowne all the world ranne thither with the iudges who caused her bodie to be cast out vpon a dunghill neere vnto the towne wall Not far from it there was a corps de gard and neere it a place for a sentinell the gard being set for it was in time of warre the sentinell heard a fearfull noise in the ayre right against this Carcasse and after a long stay was forced to leaue his stand the gard also amazed with this noyse thought to flie awaie Thus the Diuells made sport with this poore desperate woman The 19. Argument taken from the contradiction of man touching Death Not any thing that is sometimes called for by vs with ioy being come should be trouble some Death is sometimes called for by vs with great ioy THe Pagans to describe the pittifull estate of man in this life haue fained that Prometheus mingling the slime of the earth with tears made â—…antherof wherunto a Latine Poet hath alluded saying Teares bâ—… the our Births 〈◊〉 all inteares we liue And Death in teares Many alarums doth giue But what need of testimony but the continuall feare and feuers which spring from the apprehension of those infirmities wherof we haue made mentioÌ„ Thy bowells wroung with the cholicke a thousand gripes and throwes at euerie child bearing if thou beest a woman the pinching cares that trouble the mind make thee by interruption soden exclaming to desire death not without reason seeing that the Prophet Elias serues thee for a patterne who not knowing how to auoyd the ambushes that were layed against him did wish to dye But let vs cast our eyes vpon those miseries that make vs
to desire Death not as wee propounded them nor as we haue found them but as they make themselues known If we shall indge of the streame by the spring what may we hope for of the life of man conceiued betwixt the vrine and excrements borne naked all in tears but only a perpetuall flux of corruption pouertie and calamities therefore it is not without reason that S. Bernard sayd That man is but a stinking sperme a nourishment for wormes a sacke of excrements and such should wee see him within if the skinne did not stay our sight outwardly Doe we doubt of it seeing of this liuing substāce there are ingendred wormes about an ell long and being dead serpents in the pithe of the backe as Plinie writes and experience teacheth Plutarke reports that the king of Egypt hauing caused the body of Cleomenes to be hanged and the garde hauing discouered a great serpent wound about his head they called the people who running to this spectacle called Cleomenes as a demy-God The like happened to a young man a Germaine who would neuer suffer his picture to be drawn in his life time but onely granted to his kinsfolkes who importuned him that some dayes after his interment they might take him vp and draw him as they found him Being taken out of the graue they saw about the Diaphragma the pith of the backe many little Serpents to verifie what the authour of Ecclesiasticus faith When man dyerh he becoms the inheritance of serpents The life of man is a candle exposed to all winds saith Epictetus His body is a store-house of all sorts of diseases saith another his flower his most excellent point of glory is such as he is alwayes in paine and martyrdome and this point passeth away dazling the eye like a flash greatnesse and worldly riches are no more sssured then the waues of the sea they flowe suddainely and ebbe no l◅sse violently Sesostris King of Egypt causing himselfe to bee drawne in a Chariot of pure gold by foure Kings his prisoners one of them held his eye fixed vpon the wheele which did rolle vp and down by him Sesostris obseruing it demanded of him the cause of his countenance who answered That looking vpon the wheele and obseruing the spoaks to bee sometimes aloft and suddainely downe againe I call to minde the rolling change of my selfe and my companions Sesostris considers hereof abates his pride and giues liberty to his Captiues Such is the estate of the affaires of this world like vnto a marke subiect to infinite darts of aduersity No man knowes what the night brings sayd one in Titus Liuius the pleasures are vncertaine but the displeasures most certaine Nature giues vs a taste at our comming into the world where wee enter weeping And according to this instinct of nature the Thraci ns wept at the birth of their children numbring what miseries they should suffer in the world For the same reason the Getes a religious people held that it was better to die then to liue therefore they lamented at their child-birthes and sung at their burialls And wise Salomon saith that the day of death is better then that of birth Looke into Erasmus vpon the prouerbe Optimum non nasci Sophocles in like manner giues aduice that it is more reasonable to weepe at the birth of their children as beeing entred into great miseries and beeing dead to carry them ioyfully to the graue as freed from the miseries of this life And who will doubt any more of this seeing he that neuer lies calls this life death Ioh. 5. saying Hee that heares my words and beleeues in him that sent me shall passe from death to life The Lycians law ordayned that they which wold mourn should put on womens robes for that it did in no sort befit graue and discreete men to weepe for the dead but for passionate women Vpon this law a Lawyer of Padoua groūded his testament although he be taxed by another First hee charged his heire vpon great comminations to banish all blacke cloth from his Funeralls and that he should prouide singers and players on Iustruments to sing and play going among the Priests both before and behinde the Corpes to the number of fifty to euery one of which he bequeathed halfe a Ducate for his paines Moreouer hee ordained that 12. young virgines attired in greene should carry his body vnto Saint Sophias Temple in which he should be interred suffering them to sing ioyfull songs with a loud voyce and for a reward hee bequeathed them a certaine summe of money to helpe them at their marriage All sorts of Priests and Monkes might assist except such as were barred with blacke lest that colour should darken the beauty and cheerefulnesse of his Funeralls he had seene with Heraclitus that during the dayes of this miserable life there is no subiect but of teares and that at our departure we should reioyce with Demoeritus And therefore Plato doth rightly call death a medicine for all miseries and Seneca esteemes it the end of seruitude Let vs seale vp this discourse with the memorable aduice which Epictetus gaue to the Emperour Adrian enquiring why they set garlāds vpon the dead It is in signe answered he that at the day of their death they haue triumphed ouer the diuers assaults of this life Let vs then dye when it shall please the prince of this life to cease the teares and alarmes of this life and to beginne the life of heauen whereas God will wipe away all teares from our eyes whereas death shall be no more and there shal be no more mourning crying nor labour Obiection If men call for death and being come refuse it so much it is a signe that it is very horrible But the antecedent is true Therfore the consequent is also true IT is reported in Laertius that the Philosopher Antisthenes tyed to his bed by a greeuous disease and the more grieuous the more he loued his life was visited by Diogenes who knowing the man had taken a naked sword vnder his gowne Antisthenes perceiuing him cried out O God who shall deliuer me from hence Diogenes answered presently that shal this shewing him his sword But Antisthenes replied more sodainly I meane from these paines and not from my life It seemes that most of those crier sout for death make that their refuge when she approcheth neere them Esope in the Apologue hath naturally described it by that old man who being laden with a great burthen and falling into a Ditch he grew to despaire and calling for death death came and commands him to follow him O no said he I call thee to helpe me vp with my burthē that I may returne Answer I know well that many feare death much not for any desire to liue nor for the pleasures they haue in life for the two examples obiected shew the contrarie but for that they know not what death is And thereunto tends this
Combate to kil this feare of death in man I therefore persist in my opinion that it is nothing but the feare which man hath to fall into some greater miserie as we haue shewed doth make him so much apprehēd death But there is no euill in this as appeares in the following argument Therefore there is no reason of feare which reason should gouern a reasonable man Let vs not trust to those distrustful spies which being returned from the point of death cry out Horror horror for they faile more in corage then in bodie and deserue the like punishment to them that went to discouer the land of Canaan who being returned brought nothing but bad and slanderous tydings to al the people as the holy Scripture doth witnes Let vs rather beleeue wise and valiant men produced heereafter vpon the Theater who like vnto Iosua◅ spies depose ioyntly that God hath deliuered death into our hands that it is quencht for our sakes Next it is not true that all men flie death being called many haue bin greeued returning to health after some great sicknesse which they thought should haue swallowed vp their life Giue me leaue to speake this truth of my selfe being 120. leagues from my parents about 14. yeares since studying in a towne streightly besieged and famished I fell sicke of a bloudie flux whereof many dyed whereof my master was dead In this estate I was resolued to dye but when I found that God gaue me force to vanquish my disease I was verie melancholike in the beginning held it a losse to be recouered And therefore notwithstanding this opposition wee will close vp our discourse with Seneca saying That death is the cause that life is no martirdome The 20. Argument taken from the remouing of the euill of death No euill consisting in a falfe opinion and nothing in effect is to be feared Death is an euill consisting in a false opinion and nothing in effect c. IT is a great aduantage as great Captaines say to haue obserued and measured his enemy from head to foote Let vs in like manner obserue and measure death and we shall find it is but an Anatomy a vaine name a Picture and Image a scar-crow a bable a fantasticke feare an imaginary fire which some men see in an euening walking in Church-yards An ideot at the sight thereof would be amazed sweare that hee hath seene a spirit walking but a wiseman will vnderstand that it is an oyly exhalation which by agitation takes fire Ignorant opinion makes man beleeue that death is very euill when it is a priuation from all euil hee is amazed with a false alarme So women and weake spirits dare not remaine alone in their Chambers for that they imagine they shal see spirits and apparitions little children are afraid to see their parents masked Astianax could not endure the sight of Hector armed but lay aside these armes take away the maske you shall conuert their feare into assurance and their cries into ioy So pull away these false maskes of hideous lookes and the trembling cries of them that die they are but fained or sorrowes grownded in the aire of an imaginary euill So Cassander did tremble at the sight of Alexanders picture dead long before the table would not bite him yet hee quaked as if it had beene some furious beast the reason was that his imagination being impayred hee thought that Alexander was wonderfully in choller against him Wil you haue an apparent signe that in this horrible apprehension of death mans iudgement is troubled and therefore suspected to bee false The strongest and most vigorous the yongest and most iust do least feare the losse of life who in reason should apprehend it most if it were to be feared hauing more interest in it but old men and such as are subiect to the cholike stone and malefactors feare it without measure Maecenas tormented continually with a feauer was content to bee cut and mangled so as with all his paines hee might prolong his life How many Messales offenders would liue in torture or broken vpon the wheele so as they might not end their liues What is the reason of this but that his iudgement is peruerted beleeuing that all the paine he feeles shall be doubled in death If he be a reprobate and vnderstands it of the second death and not of the first whereof wee now discourse his iudgement is right but for a good man to thinke that there is any great paine in a naturall death hee erres much It is not the death said Aeschines but the violent passion against death which is horrible If they thinke there bee any discomodity in death sayd the old man Bassus let them know it comes from them that die not from death which frees them of all paine Pindarus sayth of man that he is but the dreame of a shaddow but let vs speake it and with more reason of death a dreame is false and a shaddow the opposition of a sollide body to the light So death the priuation of life is an euill dreamed and false Good God who can represent that which is not vnder what idea can the Painter imagine to draw it he will present vnto vs bones bound with sinewes without flesh and naked hauing a sythe in his hand this is something but be well aduised to thinke that death doth subsist beyond this representation as a liuing man doth subsist longer then his picture you should bee foully deceiued for take away this representation and all other imagination and you take away all that is of death for it is nothing at all therefore the portrait is false May a man paint a voice the which although it be inuisible yet it falls vnder the sence of hearing but death in what sence so euer you take it is incapable of all sence and by consequence not to bee drawne by any pencel What is death then it is a word of few letters which hath no subsistāce but in imagination nothing in nature nothing in effect We laugh at the Bourgondian spies who in their war against the French King Lewes 11. being sent to discouer the Country fled at the sight of certaine Thistles as if they had discouered a troupe of men at Armes If we had the vnderstanding to know death as the sight hath to distinguish thistles we should find that they are more ridiculous which fly amazed from the incounter of death for it is nothing at all whereas thistles are at the least pricking plants Let vs then say boldly That to feare that whereof neuer any man yet felt the sting to draw from a wandering fantasie proceeding from an vnsetled braine a true and sensible paine is a meere folly Oh God! what paine can there be at the very instant when life flies away in a body depriued of all sence Let a sicke body endure all the extremities of paine yet in death there is none at all doest thou not
it c. ANswere Neither Dauid nor Ezechias nor the other seruants of God feared death as it was death simply alone considered but for that God threatned them in regard of their sins by reason whereof it seemes they had some confused apprehension of hell which is the second death Doubtlesse my fault is great sayd Dauid but I pray thee saue mee by thy great bounty These are the words of God to Ezechias Dispose of thy house for thou shalt die shortly and shall not liue We must note that Ezekias heart was puft vp with glory God would humble him by the consideration of death wherewith he threatned him But these two and all other the seruants of God setting aside these threats being in the fauour of God haue with Saint Paul desired to die and to be freed from this mortal body to be with Christ with God Man here below should not apprehend any thing but the conscience of another life a life which dying without repentance grace leades to death eternall as that of Saul and Iudas who being desperate slue themselues quenching the match of a vicious life to kindle it in the fire of hell where there is a Lake of fire and brimstone As for the death of Christ the great difference it hath both in the cause and the effects from that of the faithful Christians makes it to differ a world The reason is Gods Diuine Iustice to reuenge the iniury which hath beene done him by the diuell in the nature of man the which not able to do in him without his totall ruine hee hath done in his surety in Iesus Christ his Son whom to that end hee sent into the world to take humaine flesh in the Virgins wombe It is he that was wounded for our offences broken for our iniquities censured to bring vs peace and slaine to cure vs as the Prophet speakes and the Apostles testifie The fruites first the glory of God is manifested in his loue in his bounty and in his mercy towards vs to haue so loued the world as to giue his owne Son to death for it to the end that whosoeuer did beleeue in him should not perish but haue life euerlasting as the same eternal Son doth witnes Secondly it is our saluation the redemption of the Church from sinne and death for it is the Lambe of God which taketh away the sinnes of the world And these are the reasons why Iesus Christ was terrified in death feeling the wrath of God vpon him for our sinnes But the death of the faithfull is nothing like for in the greatest torments which Tyrants can inflict vpon them it mortifies the sence and takes away all paine by the abundance of his consolation as Ruffinus writes of Theodorus and as our Annales testifie of the smiling death of Martirs in the middest of burning fiers for God is satisfied the passage is open the venimous teeth of death are pulled out seeing that the Lord wrestling with her hath slaine her as S. Augustine speakes and like a most expert Phisition hath made a wholesome Treacle to purge our bodies of those corrupt burning stincking and deadly humors and to make it sound holy impassible and immortall The second Obiection Euery iust reward is proportionable to the paine The reward of Martyrsis great Therefore their paine is great THe holy Writ and the ancient Fathers vpon it beare witnesse of the honour and great triumph which the Martyrs obtaine in heauen if their conflict against death bee answerable to this triumph as equity requires it must bee exceeding great and therefore it is no easie thing to dye the which S. Augustine seemes to confirme Si nulla esset mortis amaritudo non esset magna Martyrum fortitudo If saith hee there were no bitternesse in death the Martyrs valour should not be great Answer He is truely a Martyr who for the honour of God and for the loue of his neighbour doth constantly seale the contract of the alliance of God with his owne bloud and the true cause of Martyrdome is to suffer death for iustice and for the name of Christ as Christians and in doing well This bloud thus shed is the true seede of the Church the very Commentary of the holy Scripture the Trompet of Gods glory the true Victory of the cruelty and obstinacy of Gods enemies the holy Lampe to lighten and draw to the Kingdome of Christ those which are in the shaddow of death c. In consideration whereof these holy Champions of the faith are honored in heauen with a Crowne of gold clothed with white garments c. Vpon earth in the primi tiue Church vpon the day of their suffring which they called their birth-day the faithfull assembled vpon the place of their Martyrdome did celebrate their happy memory repeated their combates commended their resolution exhorting the assistants to doe the like if they were called to the like combate as well by reading of their bloody history as by the sight of the place where their blood was newly spilt It is that which Cyrillus in the epistle to Smyrne the Paraphrase of Rufynus doth teach vs wherein we may see that it was not the death but the cause of the death which made them to bee so recompenced and recommended And whatsoeuer they haue had in heauen shall bee giuen to all others which shall haue the like will to serue their master though not the effect the like Crowne nor the like garments To mee saith that great Martyr S. Paule the Crowne of Iustice is reserued which the Lord the iust Iudge shall giue mee in that day and not onely to me but vnto all those that shall loue his Comming And what Christian is it that desires not the comming of Christ It is also written that all the Armies which are in heauen wherein all the faithfull are followed the faithfull the true the Word of God vpon white horses clad in white Cypres Finally in this inestimable reward which God giues vnto Martyrs there is not so great a regard had to the merit and grieuousnesse of their death as to the most precious blood of his Sonne Iesus Christ and to his free promise wherefore this Obiection is to no purpose and if it were it doth incite men more to desire then to refuse death if it bee true that the enduring of the first death in the Saints is a freeing frō the second as Saint Augustine teacheth The third Obiection It is impossible but man should be toucht with a great apprehension of euery sharpe combate he is to endure Such is death MAn hath three cruell enemies which present themselues vnto him at his last farewell a sensible paine at the dissolution of the foule from the body sinne represents vnto him heauen gates shut and hell open and Satan tempts him and lets him see his criminall Inditement whereof he is ready to execute the sentence Answer It is
impossible that at the soules departure from the body there should be any great paine the soule leaues the body as the light doth the ayre which it doth inuest as Viues speakes after S. Augustine Wee must not then imagine heere a grosse tearing of the soule from the body as of a piece of cloth for the vnion of the soule with the body is spirituall and incomprehensible But of the pretended paine in death there is sufficiently spoken in the Obiection following As for the two other enemies it is true that the conscience presents vnto a dying man the foulenesse of his sinne and it is true that Satan tempts man to despaire to precipitate him into eternall perdition But for all this must a man that feares God feare death and feare to lose the battaile No but hee ought rather to assure himselfe of the victory and present himselfe boldly to the Combate as a valiant fortunate Champion against one that is weake and vnfortunate They that are for vs are stronger then they that are against vs God which hath begunne continues his worke in vs and ends it to his glory the faith which he hath prāted in vs wil quench the inflamed darts of the wicked spirit the full assurance of the remission of sins by Iesus Christ dead for our sinnes and risen for our iustification will pacifie the conscience and shew him Iesus Christ in heauen sitting on the right hand of God and stretching out his armes to him Thirdly the seales of the holy Ghost in vs for by it we are sealed to the day of Redemption Baptisme the Communion of the body of Christ and the Spirit of sanctification will terrifie Satan and make him flie Finally the good Angels which from our birth and throughout the whole course of our liues haue administred vnto vs guided and comforted vs will redouble their loue and courage in the like offices at our greatest need and at our last gaspe Let vs not feare seeing we haue such assurance in the Word of God which doth plainely witnesse that the Angells are administring Spirits sent to serue for their sakes that shall receiue the inheritance of saluation Here then is no subiect of desperate feare but rather of an assured resolution The 4. Obiection All paine is euill In dying there is paine EPicharmus by the testimony of Cicero sayd that he would not die but to be dead he cared not The reason is in my opinion for that he feared the passage of death not death it selfe which hee thought with vs had no paine There are many at this day of this opinion abhorring death like an internall gulfe for that they conceiue there is some sharp and violent paine which they endure before it comes and thereunto tends the prouerbe He is in bad case that dies And S. Augustine seemes to attribute I know not what sharpe feeling and force against nature in the diuulsion of the soule from the body which were vnited together Answere If death be terrible by reason of the paine we apprehend in it then life by the same reason should be more for in it some man endures more by the cholicke the stone the sciatica yea by the tooth ach and by many other infirmities without death then an other hath felt in dying And there is this aduantage in death that it comes but once wheras the aboue mentioned infirmities are often reiterated in life But to haue a perfect view if this paine bee so great as opinion a bad counsellor doth make vs beleeue let vs search with reason into the immediate cause of that which doth engender this paine in our bodies The pathes which leade man to death are infinite but all bend to one of these foure high wayes outward force subtraction of meate and drinke inward sicknesse and old age These foure kinds of death may happen to al men yea to wise men although by iniustice touching the first by some rare accident as touching the second concerning the third by ordinary corruption of humors and by an infallible defect of nature touching the fourth Paine according to the definition of learned Phisitions is the feeling of some thing that is offensiue and troublesome to the nature of the body for that it is contrary to the health thereof the which happens either by the dissoluing and cutting of his continued substance or by the alteration thereof which alteration proceeds from the intemperate heate or cold for as for humidity and drinesse they are rather passiue qualities then actiue whose operation is very slow and the paine in the member that is altered is suddaine not gentle as if you be exceeding cold and come to a very sensible paine cold settles his paine in disioyning heate in burning and it is to bee noted that any sence may be wounded yet little or nothing is his paine in comparison of that of touching the which is dispersed ouer the whole body from which no other vessell of the sences is exempt which is the cause that wee sometimes feele prickings in the eyes and shootings in the eares c. Let vs now come to the application Death which comes to man by extreame age can be no cause of paine there being nothing in him that tortures his body nothing that doth suddainely alter and change him by extreame cold or heate but his life goes out presently like vnto a Candle that wants tallow by the losse of his radicall humour deuoured by little and little since his birth by his naturall heate and although this heate doth yet striue as it hath formerly done to conuert the meate which is familiar and fit for the body into radicall humor to repaire his losse yet she can worke no more her vertue failes her euery agent hath his vertue limited what soeuer doth act suffers in acting through vse and in continuance of time this heate decayes dissolues is lost and death ensues So as it hath bene disputed in vaine whether life might bee continued this radicall humor being restored by some fit nutriment for that humor being at the first a certaine ayery onely portion of that seede which doth reside in all the sollide parts it is impossible that such an humour and so much as is needefull should be supplied in it's place The only fruite of the tree of life which was in Eden had this secret vertue by the diuine ordinance to make man immortal that shold eate therof and therefore according to the opiniō of the Fathers God suddenly after the sin chased Adam and Eue out of Eden least they should lay hold of that fruite and become immortally miserable with the diuells In processe of time there happens two notable changes to this radicall humour the one in the quality for that it degenerates by little and little of naturall becomes strange the other in the quantity for that it is wholy wasted whereunto man being once reduced he can suffer no paine if hee complaines
death which was miserable which if we feare what is all the life said he but a path tending vnto death And S. Augustine aboue named means no other thing whilst they haue feeling they are yet liuing if liuing they are rather sensible before death then in death by whose comming all sense is lost The 25. Argument taken from the indignity That which is repugnant to one of the principall vertues is vnworthy of man The extreame feare of death is repugnant to fortitude one of the principall vertues WE meane not here to speak of bodily force but of that of the minde by the which Caesar but of a weake body did more braue exployts thē Hercules There is nothing more worthy of a man then Fortitude a vertue whereunto he should aime al the actions of his life for that alone doth neuer faile to yeeld a recompence either aliue or dead saith Seneca Epist. 81. and hee doth not perish that dies adorned with vertue saith another Saint Augustine confirmes this when he attributes the disdain of life and the contempt of death to the force of the minde The greater and more desperate the danger is the more doth magnanimity increase in a generous minde to free all difficulties that hee shall encounter And seeing that the end is better and more excellent then that which tends vnto it hee will conclude with reason That hee were better to lose his life then vertue But Fortitude one of the foure cardinall vertues besides the generall hath a particular reason why man should seeke to preserue it in her greatest perfection for by it hee enioyes the true tranquility of the minde the which as Cicero reports is nothing else but a quiet sweete and pleasing disposition of the soule in all the euents of life Which carries two Crownes patience in paine resolution in death By which the confirmation of the Minor is inferred there beeing nothing that doth more oppugne and in the end ouerthrow all force and resolution then the extreame feare of death Feare and especially that of death beeing destitute of reason iudgement wounds the soule with amazement alienates his right sense makes it idle and without action it doth waste him vndermine him and consume him as rust doth Iron and the worme an apple A man alwayes shaking with feare is without heart and courage but halfe a man such as histories report Claudius Caesar the 5. Emperour to haue beene whom nature had begun but not finished for that hee was base and faint-hearted Moreouer feare by the terrible obiect of death causeth the heate which is the chariot of force to retire into the bottome of the belly in stead of drawing it about the heart as courage doth so as the heart is alwayes panting and which is worse whereas it should extend it selfe by dilatation in his natural motion hee shrinkes himselfe vp against nature whereby there followes a great debility in all the members of the body and sometimes death as it happened to Lycas who vppon the very report of Hercules force was so terrified as beeing retired into the corner of an Altar dyed there But a generous man resolute to death will not feare any thing that shall present it selfe to crosse him in the course of his duty like vnto Anaxarchus whom Alexander threatning to hang he said Threaten thy Courteours who feare death for my part I care not whether I rot aboue or vnder the earth Socrates also beeing blamed by one for that hee did a thing which would cause his death he answered My friend thou art not well informed if thou thinkest that a man of honor shold apprehend danger yea death in his actions but only consider whether they bee iust or vniust good or bad Such was the courage of the Prophet Micheas when he resisted King Achas and told Israel of his sinnes being filled with vertue by the Spirit of the Eternal with iudgement and with force as he himselfe speakes Thirdly feare not onely hurts it selfe causing his arms to fall out of his hands and laying him open to his enemies darts but like vnto the plague it infects others And therefore King Agamemnon would not that a rich man and a fearefull should goe to the warres of Troy but to stay him he would haue sent him a distaffe if he would not eouer his shame honestly But on the other side a valiant man finds meanes to free himselfe in the greatest dangers So Aristomenes a Lacedemonian being taken prisoner and deliuered bound to two souldiers hee found meanes to burne his bonds and his flesh to the quicke then falling couragiously vpon his guardes hee slue them and so escaped It is a common saying among men That vertue hath no vertue if it be not in paine and the greatest paine in the opinion of man is when hee is at the point of death then should a valiant heart shew his inuincible courage to vāquish this terror of death It is this courage which made Saint Paule to say That if he did serue for an aspersion vpon the sacrifice seruice of faith hee was ioyfull It is the same Spirit that made Ignatius to say beeing condemned by Infidels to be cast to wild beasts I am the wheate of God I shall bee ground in the teeth of beasts to bee made pure and cleane bread If the Trumpet which sounds an alarme be pleasing to a valiant Souldier what shall death bee to a vertuous man when shee shall sound with her siluer Trumpet ordained by God to call the assembly the Church to heauen and to make men leaue the earth where they haue no a biding place what feare we They that haue the chollicke and the gout are not so much terrified with the returne of their paine and can vertuous men so much feare death which hath not so much paine no none at all seeing that what we feel whē death approcheth is of the re mainder of life not of death to what end serues this cowardly feare Fly an honorable death of the one side and a shamefull end will find thee of the other So Sisera left his Armie and fled into the house of Iahel but when he thought to take his rest Iahel came and draue a nayle of the Tabernacle into the temples of his head and slue him But to haue this courage and resolution to resist the terror of death it is not sufficient to speake in the time of health as Souldiers do of their valour at the table learned discourses sayth Seneca make no demonstrations of true magnanimity the most feareful will sometimes speak more boldly then they shold We must meditate seriously of death according to the obiects which are presented vnto vs and not make any difficulty to go and comfort our dying neighbours for it is better to enter into the house of mourning then of seasting sayth the wise man To offer ourselues to al dangers of death when our vocation doth call vs like
vnto Iesus Christ who being disswaded by his Disciples from going vp to Ierusalem he sayd vnto them There are 12 houres of the day after the example of the Apostles namely of Saint Paul who was thrice whipt with rodds continued whole dayes and nights in the bottome of the sea c. We ought to do it for Christ is a gaine to vs both in life and death for that dying we change the drosse of the world for the gold of heauen we going out of life as out of a deepe pit of darknesse and ignorance and wee ascend vp into the heauenly Vniuersity whereas the deepest sciences are learned and wee passe from a miserable seruitude into a most happy freedome of spirit Let vs then quicken our spirits and take courage and not be like vnto the skoÌ„me of the world to whom dying Nature makes this reproch which is read in Seneca What is this I haue put you into the world without couetous desires without feare without superstition without treason and without any other such infections As you entred into the world so depart this life without apprehension feare vexation or passion which torment your soules But especially let vs be carefull to depart without feare of death which among all humaine passions is most desperate it is done if we once put on a Christian courage and magnanimity and shall not flie but offer our selues following our vocation to the greatest dangers As good Macedonius did who seeing two Captaines march to reuenge the irreuereÌ„ce done to the statue of Placilla by the expresse and vnworthy commandement of Theodosius her husband seeing them I say runne to a great Massacre meetes them stayes them pulls them from their horses and by more then humaine authority commands them to desist from such cruelty to tell their master That the greatnesse of his estate shold not make him forget that he is a man that hee seekes to teare that a sunder which he cannot put together deface liuely Images which hee cannot repaire and that this outrage should touch the Creator By the boldnesse of his words and by his constancy he amazed these Captaines with the feare of Gods reuenging wrath and makes them returne towards the Emperour who hauing heard them pacified his rage Obiection Whatsoeuer is a guift of nature cannot be gotten by art Fortitude is a guift of nature c. ANswere It is true that fortitude hath her foundation in the irascible faculty but her culture her instruction and increase is purchased by labour study and continuall exercise If Alexander Caesar and other valiant Captaines had not bene continually thrust into armes hazarded themselues in warre and cast themselues into battailes they had neuer purchased the habite of valour nor gotten so many triumphes vpon their enemies In like manner if wee desire to conquer our selues and our owne passions which are most dangerous enemies wee must exercise our selues continually in these listes of vertue and weede out of our hearts two contrary vices the one is dull negligence which lulling vs asleepe in the world will not suffer vs to consider what this life is how miserable how vaine wauering although wee suppose it be perpetuall contrary to that which experience doth teach vs shewing vs dayly that either necessity doth pull it away or vanity doth swallow it vp or hasty nature doth end it The other extreame vice is feare which is the cause that wee cannot once thinke of such necessity but with trembling and horror And as the eye viciated with some yellow humour or looking through a yellow glasse thinkes all it sees to be yellow yea the purest white So our soules being infected with this terror increased by faintnesse and fortified by cowardise takes quiet things to be horrible the safest port and secuâ—…est from winds to bee more dangerous then the Rocke Capharois and finally death the happy end of all miseries to bee the beginning of most horrible paines But let vs purge this peccant huâ—… â—…ast off this 〈◊〉 scart and clothe our selues with this force with this resolute vâ—…reue and wee shall visibly see and iudge with reason that wee haue beene miserably deceiued taking our friends for enemies the greatest safety for horror and 〈◊〉 happinesse 〈◊〉 death for misery The 26. Argument taken from the instrumentall cause In euery expedition the meanes must be proper vnto it A good conscience is the proper meanes to the expedition of death Therefore we must haue a good conscience IF we consider profoundly of the cause of this terror which man hath of death we shall finde it is a naturall feeling though dull and some what brutish to haue offended his Lord thinking that he attends nothing but death to lay open the volumne of his faults to indite him criminally to pronounce sentence of condemnation against him and to deliuer him ouer to Satan the executioner to cast him into a fire which is neuer quenched Man hath a confused apprehension of all this he sees nothing in life hee feares it in death his conscience within accuseth him and serues for a thousand witnesses It is that which makes the wicked to tremble when the leaf of a tree doth fall and liues no more assured then if his life were tyed to a thread it is the Worme which neuer dies but gnawes the wicked continually It is a bad conscience said Diogenes which keepes man from beeing couragious and without feare Let a man bee by nature hardy yet a bad conscience will make him most fearefull said Pithagoras yea he added that the torments which hee shall suffer will bee much more sharpe and painefull then whipping to the body the diseases of the minde being far more grieuous then of the body which gaue occasion to Poets to paint the Furies armed with burning torches to burne the wicked So was the Emperor Caligula intreated for his cruelties terrified with feare waking awaked suddainely sleeping alwayes troubled neuer in quiet Nero was in the same estate hauing slaine his mother So Saule being forsaken by the Eternall was possest by an euill spirit hauing bad newes of his speedy death he trembles for feare forsakes his meate and drinke is much perplexed falls downe vppon the ground as the Scripture doth obserue for then the Iniustice committed against Dauid whom he had confest with his mouth to bee more lust then himselfe came to his minde Wherefore if we will liue without feare of death let vs liue without wounding of our coÌ„sciences for it alone in life doth neuer feare said wise Bias It is it that makes men liue in tranquility finding theÌ„selues not guilty of any thing Periander sayd that a good conscience made Agis King of the Lacedemonians triumph ouer his enemies in death for as hee was led to execution by the Ephores seeing some moued with compassioÌ„ to weep Weepe not for me said hee for it is against equity and reason that I am led
It is the excesse of the feare of death I striue to prune and root out shewing that vanity and corruption is so vnited to life that all which liue yea the greatest spirits wallow in this mire and therefore death which giues an end to this vanity and corruption should cause no feares to reply that it is the abuse and not the life we may answer againe that the abuse is generall since the fall of the first man no man can be exempt if hee be well obserued Let Diogenes go suddainely with a torch lighted into the most frequent market of Athens nay into the most famous royall Faire of France to search yet shal he not find one and I know not whether hee himselfe which could so taxe others will bee found without blame and whether he as it hath bene reproched vnto him did not more glory in his Tub then Alexander in his Empire Oh how easie it is to speake and lie Vertue consists in practise and action there will not any one be found in this age that is not tainted more or lesse with one of the aboue named vices or with all three wee can giue no instance All men suffer themselues to be led to some vaine hope which they attend from day to day which in the end deceiues them and death deliuers them from this deception why then should it be so terrible vnto them But represent one out of ten thousand who hath learned wherein the true end of life doth consist that is to say in the tranquillity of the mind in continuall action according vnto vertue yea according vnto piety as hee knoweth and striues to haue the spirit of a wise man whereof Seneca speakes epist. 60. that is like vnto the world aboue the Moone alwayes cleere Yet must he confesse that he is in a wondeful cōbate yea in insupportable paine being tossed with contrary windes of diuers passions which neuer leaue him no more then his body or flesh Sometimes the immoderate loue of transitory things stings him sometimes the hatred of eternall things sollicites him or prophane ioy or the melancholy of the minde layes hold of him and consumes him if vaine hope leaue him then furious despaire gets hold or boldnes thrusts him on to mischiefe or feare retires him from good and furious choller transports him beyond the bounds of reason so many passions so many cords to bind him so many assaults so many paines if it succeed not wel and most commonly it proues contrary to his proiect for this heauy flesh this sensuall concupiscence which hee is to incounter dawes him stil to the ground But harken how that great Apostle more vertuous then all the Philosophers together for that hee had the gift of the Spirit of God in a higher degree heare how in the like conflict he cries out Miserable man that I am who shall deliuer mee from the body of this death If this seruant of God liuing the life of Iesus Christ yet for the mortal assaults which he felt tearmes this present life death and were death a deliuerance what feare wee in death that wee do not salute it rather as the safe port from all the stormes and tempests of this life full of baites and snares as S. Augustine sayth Let vs feale vp this discourse with the ring of Seneca which is That the condition of all men imployed is miserable and that most miserable which attends no other thing but his imployments hee taxes the greatest part of men who like vnto Liuius Drusus from their infancy to their dying day giue themselues no truce alwayes in action in trauell of minde or body if they meete with any pleasure they passe it ouer lightly without taste if with displeasure they are toucht to the quicke Finally they run so swiftly as they looke not to their way they thinke not of their life and cannot say what it is all actions shall bee pleasant but that which is proper to man which is to haue the spirit purged giuen to Philosophy and to the meditation of that which concernes man in the world Let vs then say with reason O vanity of vanities this is nothing but vanity The 30. Argument taken from the restoring of mankind Whatsoeuer being lost shal bee powerfully restored to vs againe should not trouble vs in the losse Life being lost shal be powerfully restored c. IF thou beest a Christian Christ commands thee thy faith doth bind thee to beleeue the Resurrection of the flesh in the which by the powerfull voyce of the Creator raysing them vp which sleepe in the dust the life which thou hadst left shal bee restored vnto thee againe with most pretious interests But if depriued of the eyes of this faith thou canst not see the beginning of the creation of the world seeing that by faith as the Apostle doth witnesse wee vnderstand that the ages haue bene ordained yet as a miscreant thou doest beleeue the eternity and fatality of the world let vs admit this supposed truth to bee true know then that the limited reuolution of the heauens being ended and al the order of causes chained together returned to the same point in the which they hold all things ballanced in an equal weight know I say that this same concatenatiō of causes by a necessary reuolution wil restore thee to life yea to the same estate in the same place in the same positure thou art in at this present so as you which reade these things or heare them read shall be the same at the same time reading or hearing It is the true extraction which moued that great Zoroastres to assure that one day al men should take life againe Plato was of the same opinion saying That after the returne of the eight spheare which was in thirty six thousand yeares all things should in like manner returne The reason there is nothing made new vnder the Sun and there is nothing but what hath bene and may returne hereafter So the Sun withdrawing his quickning influence with his body from our Zenith the trees being withered remaine without fruit without any verdure without leaues If thou hadst not seene it the yeares past yet thou mayest in some sort beleeue that the Sun should returne and by his returne giue that vegetatiue vertue that springing sap sweete smelling spirit to herbes and trees which thou didst hold depriued of that power and so they were for this life which is in them in the beginning of Winter descends from the branches to the body and so to the roote but the same gracious Star which by his retyring had caused this death returning drawes backe by a wonderful regression and reuolution of nature this vegetatiue vertue from the earth to the roots to the body and to the branches and makes it to be seen and smelt by the buds blossomes leaues and fruites A dead man and one liuing is all one sayd Heraclitus hee that watcheth and the sleeper
Olaus Magnus by certaine Venetian Ambassadors by a Iacopin of Vlmes others but I leaue the interpretation free to the iudgement of the reader Thirdly if it were a worke without the compasse of reasō Plutarque Herodotus nor Plato wold euer haue beene credited in writing that one Thespesius Aristeus and Erus were raised vp againe Plinie who beleeued nothing but what hee saw among many that were raysed vp he reports of a woman which was dead seuen dayes and raised againe and that one Gabienus a valiant souldier of Caesars being put to death by order of iustice and left vpon the publike place was found afterwards speaking and asking for Pompey who came vnto him and had much speech with him Melchior Flauian makes mention of a woman whom hee had seene whose name was Mellula neere vnto Damas in Syria raysed vp againe the 6. day after her death in the yeare 1555. God will bring such tokens to assure the world of a future and vniuersall Resurrection As for the Maxime that there is no returning againe to the habite it is abusiue not only to God who can do all but euen to nature and to the order of the world which hath his forces limited So in a little child whose teeth haue beene pulled out the vegetatiue vertue will bring vp new So we reade of a certaine Abbesse who being an 100. yeares olde grewe young againe had her monethly courses her teeth put forth againe her haire grew black the wrinckles of her face filled vp Finally shee became as fresh and as faire as shee had beene at the age of 20. yeeres And if wee may beleeue histories she was not alone but followed and preceded by many others The naturall vertue at a certaine time as trees in the Spring did renue her worke euen foure times as to that man seene in the yeere 1536 by the Viceroy of the Indies who examined it carefully and found out the truth Fourthly that which shewes an insenfible impression of nature of the future Resurrection is the earnest and generall care to burie the dead honorably yea to keep them from corruption by balmes and Aromaticall sents by images of brasse and nayles fastened in the bodies for that brasse hath a speciall vertue against corruption There are yet other deuices which the Egyptians haue and doe vse and particularly obserued by thē of Arran an insularie region whereas the bodyes hang in the ayre and rot not so as the families without any amazement know their Fathers Grandfathers and great-grandfathers and a long band of their predecessors Peter Martir of Milan writes the same of some West-Indians of Comagra Moreouer I deny that man may alwayes see the tayle of that wherof he sees the head the resurrection of the body seeing the immortality of the soule that he must needes see the consequent if he discouers the Antecedent for the one hiding it selfe the other appeares sometimes to the sight of the vnderstanding And to conclude I deny not but that it is true which mans reason cannot verifie vntill it hath found out why the Adamant doth so powerfully draw iron vnto it and holds it fast by an vnknowne vertue why forked sticks of Elder are proper to discouer veines of gold and siluer Why long aftrr a man is dead the bloud will gush out if the murtherer approcheth Why if some desperate man hang himselfe will there rise suddaine stormes and tempests Why the stone called the Amede drawes iron to it on the one side and reiects it on the other with infinite other secrets of Na ture The third Obiection We onely feare that which wee think should be hurtfull vnto vs. The soule feareth death Therfore the soule thinks death should be hurtfull vnto her SOme make a question how the soule can be immortall seeing she hath so great feare of death Men laugh at the attempt of little children be they neuer so in choler for that they cannot hurt them why should not the soule thē mock at death Doth she not in like manner see the immortality feele it in her selfe without giuing so great apprehension to the poore◅ body which of it selfe without her should neuer feare death no more then a bruit beast Why is not the power of death dissolued whereas the authority of immortality intercedes as Tertullian speakes in the first booke of the Trinity Answer This is a most euident signe not of the mortality of the soule but that man is degenerate and corrupt That her Port is no more so free and braue But casts her eye downe like a fearefull slaue He seeles in his Conscience that he is guilty of high treason to God that this voluntary offence must soon or late bring a necessary punishmēt he feels in this life some smal touch he fears not without reason if by faith repentance his pardon bee not inrowled and his absolution sealed that at the departure from this life the executioner of diuine vengeance should stand lurking behind death to take him by the throat and to punish him according to his merits Wherefore if corruption did not generally possesse al men she would suppresse this fear reuerence her Creator and do her duty vnto him and then she should see that by that respectiue feare to offend her God she should be fully deliuered from all other feare shee should see that fearing onely the death of the soule which is onely to be feared shee should not feare that of the body which is to be desired But for that most men as S. Augustine doth teach feare the separation of the soule from the body and not the true death which is the separation from God it happens that fearing that they fall often into this So the soule beeing willing to shake off this feare of the Creator she must needes feare euery creature euen the smallest frogs mice and flies which flying about awake him suddainely and many times trouble him much but in the end death is aboue all extreame feares the most fearefull And why is this if like vnto bruite beasts all dyed in him and if in death there were nothing to bee feared Wherefore Propertius saith The spirit is something death leaues it in store The palest shadowes scapes to the burning shore But to conclude The soule hauing beene too familiar with the flesh shee hath gotten a habite she hath drawne such corruption as being ignorant of the happinesse which attends her in heauen shee cannot leaue this valley of misery this obscure prison but with great griefe being like vnto the man which being carried away an Infant by a she wolfe was nourished by wolues did houle with them and did liue and would liue among them and if hee were taken by other men he would leaue them to returne to his wolues as the History makes mention of one verifying the Prouerbe That nourishment passeth nature The sixt Argument from the efficient cause of Immortalitie The eleuation aboue time and place is the
kind of death was the worst That sayth hee which the Lawes haue ordained inferring thereby that a naturall death is not euill but that which crimes haue deserued the which is not giuen by nature but by a hangman and yet not so much by the execu tioner who is but the instrument as by a villanie perpetrated which is the true cause So sayd S. Peter Let none of you suffer as a murtherer theese malefactor or too curious in other mens affaires But if any one suffer as a Christian let him not be ashamed but let him glorifie God in that behalfe The 24. Augument taken from the testimonie of wise men All wise men in the conflict of Death depose that death is not euill But that is true which all wise men depose c. THe troupes of Christian Martirs heathen Philosophers marching so boldly vnto death are so many witnesses without reproch to conuince them of falshood which hold death to be so great an euill Let vs be carefull lest this blasphemie creep into our thoughts that they were in despaire or mad No no their verie enemies dare not speake it haâ—…ng knowne that they were for the most part men famous in pietie iustice vertue and wisedome and for such as were recommended by all men The Ecclesiasticall Historie is gored with thousands of such Martires the author of the tables hath set downe some in the end of his first booke of whom I make no mention But behold the manly courage of Blandina who by her ioyfull countenance doth summon vs vnto death whereunto she doth march with such a grace and state as if she had gone to a nuptiall feast Then followes happie Tiburtins conuerted vnto Christ by Vrban in the yeare 227 who marching vpon burning coales seemed to tread vpon Roses These Christians with infinite others as well ancient as moderne had neuer any horror of death but haue desired it yea sought it as a refreshing and refection to their bodies soules but for that no man doubts but the zeale of Christians hathmade them continue constant vnto the death and the diuine power had so fortified their resolutioÌ„s that neither their reason could be swallowed vp nor drowned by the horror of persecution Let vs come to others of a multitude let a few suffise Socrates accused by the Athenians to thinke ill of the Gods for that he reiected pluralitie adored an vnitie was condemned to dye before the which he would first censure his iudges saying To feare death O my Lords Areopagites is to make shew to be wise and not to be for it is to seem to know death to be euil which they vnderstand not He did so little apprehend death as when as eloquent Lisias had giuen him an Oration artificially penned which hee should vse for his Apologie whereby hee should be absolued he read it and found it excellent yet he sayd vnto Lycias If thou hadst brought me Sicionian shoes admit they had beene fit for my foote yet would I not vse them for that they were not decent for me So thy discourse is most eloquent and fluent but not fit for men that are graue and resolute The executioner then presented him poysoÌ„ in a cup which Socrates tooke with a constant hand and demanded of him as a sicke patient would doe of the Physition to recouer health how he should swallow it then without any stay drunk it vp after which he walked a little then tooke his bed his boy vncouering him felt his parts to grow cold Socrates being wak't directed his speech to Criton who aboue all others wished him a longer life and to make him thinke of it had propounded vnto him his children his deare friends that for their sakes if not for his owne hee would preserue his life which was necessarie for them No no answered hee God who hath giuen me my childreÌ„ wil care for them when I shall be gone from â—…ce I shall finde friends either like vnto you or better neither shall I bee long depriued of your company for you must soone come to the same place Then as if he had by this potion recouered his health hee cried â—…ut O Criton we owe a Cock to Aesculapius be not forgetfull to sacrifice vnto him Let vs obserue that in the last passages of life he was in no sort amazed but dying ioyfully comforted his suruiuing friend and let vs not doubt but hee who was the first among the seuen Sages of Greece knew before Demosthenes that which this Orator spake couragiously to Phiâ—… King of Macedon who threatned him to cause his head to be câ—…t off Well saith hee if thou giuest mee death my Countrey will giue mee immortality And doublesse Socrates liues and will liue eternally so the suruiuing hauing seene the assurance of his death held him most happy as going to liue another life and in another place And Aristippus that ioyfull Philosopher beeing demanded in what sort Socrates was dead In that manner said he that I my selfe desire Inferring that death was more to bee wished for then a happy life Let vs heare a second that is Theramenes to whom they presented a great cup of poyson the which he dranke resolutely and returned the cup to Critiâ—… the most cruell of the 30. Tyrants which had condemned him Theramenes therein alluding to the manner obserued at this day in Germanie which is that hee which drinkes to any one sends him the same glasse full of wine that hee may pledge him These deathes are full of courage but behold a woman dying who exceedes them all and that onely to incourage her husband to dy it is Arria the wife of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This woman being aduertised that Petus was condemned to what death hee would choose went vnto him to perswade him both by word the effect to dislodge out of this life she had a naked dagger vnder her gowne and giuing her husband heâ—… last â—…well shee thrust her selfe to the hart and drawing it forth againe with the like courage she held it vnto Petus and spake these her last words vnto him Pâ—… non doleâ—… Pete O my deere Petus it doth not paine mee and then dyed Let vs seale vp these examples with two women who commonly doe passionatly loue the presentation of their children yet a certen Lacedemonian hauing heard that her Son fighting valiantly had beene slaine in battaile O sayd shee this was a braue Sonne not lamenting the death of her Sonne but reioycing at his vertue Another hearing that her Sonne returned safe from battaile and that hee had â—…d shed cryed out vnto him There is a bad report of thee thou must eyther deface it or not liue holding it better to dye then to suruiue an Ignominie Obiection If the greatest fauorites of God haue feared death it is to bee feared But Dauid Ezechias and others fauored by God feared Death and especially Iesus Christ the only and wel-beloued Sonne of God feared