much as businesses of that nature would permit But her mother Alexandra touched to the quick to behold her self amongst so many spies she who was ever desirous to converse and live with all royall liberty resolved to play at double or quit to break the guyves of specious servitude or yield her neck to Herods sword if it should come to pass her calamity transported her into such extremity What doth she Cleopatra that Queen who had filled the world with her fame was then in Aegypt and naturally hated Herod as well for his barbarous disposition as for particular interests of her own person For she knew he much had entermedled in her affairs and given Mark Anthony counsel to forsake her yea to kill her This Tyrant was so accustomed to say Kill that he easily advised others to use the same medicine which was with him to his own maladies frequent It is a strange thing that Cleopatra one day passing through Judea he resolved to send her into the other world thinking therewith to gratifie Mark Anthony but was disswaded by his friends saying it was too audacious to attempt and able for ever to ruin his fortune The design was never published But Cleopatra had cause enough besides to hate Herod which much emboldened Alexandra to write to her in such like terms ALEXANDRA to the Queen CLEOPATRA Health Madame SInce God hath given you leave to be born the most Letter of Alexandra to Cleopatra accomplished Queen in all qualities it is fit your Greatness serve as a sanctuary for the innocent and an Altar for the miserable The wretched Alexandra who hath much innocency void of support and too many calamities without comfort casteth her self into the arms of your Majesty not to give her a scepter but to secure the life of her and her son the most precious pledge which remaineth of heavens benignity Your Majesty is not ignorant that fortune having made me the daughter and mother of a King Herod hath reduced me to the condition of a servant I am not ambitious to recount my sufferings which I had rather dissemble but whatsoever a slave can endure in a gally I bear in a Kingdom through the violence of a son in law who having stoln the diadem from my children would also deprive them of life We are perpetually among spies sharp knives and black apprehensions of death which would less hurt us if it were more sudden Stretch out a hand of assistance to the afflicted and afford us some petty nook in your Kingdom till the storm be over-blown and that we may see some sparkles of hope to glimmer in your affairs Glory thereby shall abide with you and with us everlasting gratitude Cleopatra having received these letters made a ready answer and invited her to hasten speedily into Aegypt with her son protesting she should esteem it an unspeakable glory to serve as a sanctuary and refuge for the affliction of such a Princess Resolution of departure is taken but the execution is a hard task The poor Io knows not how to withdraw Enterprise of Alexandra her self from this many-eyed Argus In the end as the wit of woman is inventive especially in matters that concern their proper interests she without discovering ought to any one no not to her daughter Mariamne fearing least her nature too mild should advise her rarher to rest in the lists of patience than to attempt ways so perilous she I say onely advising with her own passion in this business caused two beers to be made a matter of ill presage to put her self and son into thinking by this means to elude the diligence of the Guard and so to be carried to the sea where a ship attended her and by this way save her life in the power of death But by ill hap a servant of hers named Aesop who was one of those that were appointed to carry the beers going to visit one called Sabbion a friend to the house of Alexandra let some words fall of the intention of his Mistress as thinking to to have spoken to a faithful and secret friend of hers The perfidious Sabbion had no sooner wrung the worm out of this servants nose but he hasteth to open all to Herod supposing it was a very fit opportunity to work his reconciliation he having a long time been suspected and accounted to be of Alexandras faction Herod after he heard this news wanted not spies and centinels The poor Lady with her son is surprised upon the beers drawn out of the sepulcher of the dead to return to the living ashamed and disgraced that her Comedy was no better acted little considering that after her personated part had failed she could nothing at all pretend to life Herod notwithstanding whether he feared the great credit Cleopatra had or whether he would not wholy affright Alexandra thereby with the more facility to oppress her contained himself in the ordinary dissimulation of his own nature without speaking one sole word unto her Although very well in the face of this painted hypocrisie was seen that the clouds were gathered together to make a loud Thunder-crack raise an unresistable tempest The caytive after he had given so many deaths Pitiful death of young Aristobulus in the horrour and affrightment of arms would inflict one even as it were in sport upon a fair sommers day Being at dinner at the house of the miserable Alexandra feigning to have buried in deep oblivion all what was past saith that in favour of youth he this day would play the young man and invite the High-Priest Aristobulus his brother in law to play at tennis with him or some other like exercise The sides were made the elumination was enkindled The young Prince hot and eager played not long but he became all on a water as at that time happened to many other Lords and Gentlemen Behold they all run to the rivers which were near this place of pleasure where they dined Herod who knew the custom of Aristobulus and well foresaw he would not fail to cast himself into these cold baths suborneth base villains who under the shew of pastime should force him to drink more than he would All succeeded as this traiterous wretch had premeditated Aristobulus seeing the other in the water uncloathed himself quickly and bare them company There was no cause why he should swim sport and dally upon this element ever dangerous although less faithless than Herod The poor sacrifice skipped up and down not knowing the unhappiness which attended him But the accursed executioners remembred it well For spying their time in this fatal sport they smothered the poor High-priest under the waters in the eighteenth year of his age and the first of his High-priesthood This bright Sun which rose with such splendour and applause did set in the waves never to appear again but with horrid wanness of death on his discoloured visage Humane hopes where are you True dreams of Vanity and
perpetrated The tears of the disconsolate mother were not omitted in her absence Cleopatra made this whole Tragedie to be presented the combate was much enkindled and the battery was forcible Herod who wanted no eloquence in his own occasions replieth with a countenance very lowly and modest Prince and you Sirs who are of the Counsel I hold the Apologie of Herod full of craft scepter of Judea neither of Hircanus nor Alexandra never having had any purpose to flatter them for this end yea much less to fear them You know Most Illustrious Anthonie the Kingdom is in my hands I hold it of you from you all my greatness ariseth and in you all my hopes are concluded If you command I am at this present ready not onely to leave the scepter but my life also which never have I been desirous to preserve but for your service But it troubleth me the way of death being open to all the world the path of reputation which is more dear to me than life should be shut against my innocencie I am persecuted by women and much I wonder how the soul of Queen Cleopatra wholly celestial can nourish so much spleen against a King who never hath failed in any respect lawfully due to her merit For Alexandra it is not strange that she raise such a storm against me her fierce and haughty spirit hath always opposed my patience endeavoring by all means to disparage my government to pull a crown from me which a more puissant hand than her Ancestours hath placed on my head What apparence is there that being by the favour of the Romans a peaceable possessour of a Kingdom the which even by the consent of my adversaries I sought not so regular was my ambition I should attempt a horrible crime which cannot fall but into the mind of a monster No man will be wicked in chearfulness of heart the memorie of the recompence which man proposeth to himself ever beareth the torch before the crime To what purpose should I attempt upon the life of Aristobulus to settle my affairs They were already established your gracious favour most Noble Anthonie hath afforded me more than all their machinations can vanquish But I perpetually have kept back the bloud Royal from dignities What keeping back is it when I have cherished them in my own bosom as much as possible Every one knows Hircanus the prime man of this Royal family being held as a prisoner among the Parthians I bent all my spirits employed all my credit to have him set at libertie and to procure his return to Court where he now liveth in full tranquilitie enjoying all the priviledges of Royaltie but the carefull sollicitude of affairs It is known I have divided my crown and bed with his grand-child Mariamne making her both Queen of people and wife of a King I have given the High-Priesthood to her brother Aristobulus of my meer and free will not enforced by any constraint as being absolute in the mannage of my own affairs and if in ought I delayed him it was because the minority of his age ran not equal with my affections but in effect he hath been beheld High-Priest at eighteen years of age which is a favour very extraordinarie Alexandra his mother who maketh way to this business hath ever had all the libertie of my Court except the licence of ruining herself which she passionately pursueth For what reason had she to hide herself in a coffin and cause herself to be carried in the night as a dead bodie to steal from my Court and after she had wronged me in mine house to traduce me among strangers If she desired to make a voyage into Aegypt she needed to have spoken but one word it had been sufficient But she pleaseth herself in counterfeiting a false peril in a real safetie to thrust into the danger of life those who make her live in all reposed assurance I having discovered this practice did not let fall one word of bitterness against her desirous she should enjoy at her ease the sight of me as a spectacle of patience thinking all folly sufficiently punished with its own proper conscience Certain time after the death of this young Prince happened which draweth tears of compassion from me for I loved him and much it troubled me his mother perverted the sweetness of his exellent nature and cut more stuff out for his youth than he was able to stitch together He is dead not in my house but in the house of his mother dead by an accident which no man could prevent dead sporting in the water a faithless element where a thousand and a thousand have without any such purpose perished dead among the youth of the Court with whom daily be disported himself His own meer motion bare him into the water the bravery of his youth caused him to dally even in danger it self without any possibility to divert him and his own mishap hath drowned him It is to tie me to bard conditions if Alexandra will make me both accountable for the youthfull levities of her son as if I were his governour and of the frail inconstancy of elements as if I were Lord of them This pernicious spirit spake this with so much grace and probability that he gained many hearts So much force had eloquence even in the hands of iniquitie Behold him now on the shore out of peril remaining in Anthonie's Court in all liberty to attend the sentence of his justification In the mean time being as he was wise and liberal in all occasions by force of presents he purchased the hearts of the chief and made all the accusation of Cleopatra appear to be the passion of a woman ill advised Mark Anthony himself said to Cleopatra she did ill to intermeddle so much with forreign Kingdoms and that if she took this course she would raise enemies prejudicial to her estate That Herod being a King it was not fit to use him like a subject and that it would be her happiness rather to have him a friend than an enemie As these things were handled in Anthonie's Court the Queen Mariamne and her mother Alexandra ceased not to be observed by the sollicitous diligence of the mother and sister of Herod Joseph his uncle An act of great stupiditie in Joseph uncle of Herod played the Goaler and often visited Queen Mariamne sometime to treat some affairs with her sometime in the way of complement This man began to burn like a butterflie in the eyes of this incomparable beauty and much affected her although he saw himself far off from all manner of hope Notwithstanding he found some contentment to have fixed his affection in so eminent a place This passion made him foolish and full of babble having already rudeness enough of his own nature which made him utter strange extravagancies For one day there being occasion to speak of Herod's affection to Mariamne his wife Alexandra the mother mocked thereat in an exorbitant
must return to these kind of spoils to content us But we have to do with few things and for a little space I swear unto you that from the time I betook me to this retirement it hath seemed that all the elements were for me and that I never was more powerfull more rich or contented I have found all that which I sought for health repose truth wisdom arts and the Gods Go not now about to colour your specious oration with pretexts of the publick good I well know where your ambition itcheth believe me he is nearest to heaven who least careth in whose hands the earth is What importeth it that young Constantine Maxentius and Licinius divide the world I shall see them strive together like arâ—s about a grain of earth If the world must be lost as it is very likely I had rather it were in their hands than mine I very well see the Empire is sick to the death I have for saken it like an old Physitian wil hear no more speech of it than of a body in the coffin Believe me neither you nor I can do any thing for its health but to witness our inability All those who have admired our resolution in forsaking the Diadem wil be the first that will cast the stone against our inconstancy if we weakly go about to require again that which we so generously have abandoned God forbid I should enter into a fantasie to despoil my self of a glory that never any one Monarch had before me which is the contempt of a world when I had it in mine hands If you be resolued to loose your self do it without company your frindship ought to pretend nothing upon me to the prejudice of mine honour and conscience And whereas you propose unto me the danger of my person I do not think that envy will extend it self over the coleworts and lettice of this little garden planted by mine own hands and should they come thither I have already lived long enough according to the course of nature enough to satisfie the desire which I had if glory and too much to see the miseries of the world I will not think much to render up this life which I have upon my lips to him who gave it me We must needs say this man had a great understanding and goodly Maxims For had not mischief given him the spirit of a hangman against Charistianitie he might be accounted in the number of the greatest Emperours Maximian was much amazed at the constancy of his resolution Notwithstanding the desire he had to return to his former honour being insatiable he spared not to take the purple again and bear himself as Emperour protesting it was the desire of publick good which put the Scepter into his hands It is an admirable thing how his ambition was Maximian the baloon of fortune discountenanced He who promised himself much respect was hissed at by the souldiers as a man vain unconstant and shallow was chased out of Italie and Sclavonia and other places which he sought to possess and reduced as it were to such terms as to see himself at the mercy of his son which he apprehended as the last of his afflictions Although some have thought there was collusion between the father and the son for the accommodation of their affairs He wished now to be in the bottom of a cave with his Diocletian but since he had begun the play he must finish his act The subtil man who well foresaw that Maxentius a brain-sick Prince was upon ruin resolved to league himself firmly to the fortune of Constantine Behold why being retired in haste towards him having engaged his house in the Empire it was not difficult for him to find access there as also for that the new Emperour in this great concourse of arms and affairs was very willing to make use of the counsel of a man refined in policie Maximian entereth so far into the heart and judgement of Constantine that to tie him the more to himself and wholly cement up his own affairs he gave his daughter Fausta in marriage to him whom the young Prince espoused in his second wedlock having first of all been married to Minervina by whom he had two children Crispus and Helena This marriage of Fausta was solemnized with much magnificence and the son rendred so much honour to his father-in-law that he seemed to retain nothing of the Empire but the name and habit dividing with him the rest of his power We may well say the spirit of Maximian was turbulent 3. Disposition and insupportable for not satisfying himself with all this excellent entertainment he thought he was nothing if he wore not upon his forehead the Diadem which he had forsaken He began to set things in order at the Court and to prepare factions in such sort that he seemed to have no other purpose but to set his son and his son-in-law together by the ears to enjoy both their spoils In the end he put his design very far upon the fortune and life of Constantine being as he was vain to talke of his enterprizes namely to his daughter Fausta whom he esteemed to be of a good disposition he opened himself so much to her that he made as saith the Wiseman of his lips the snare of his soul For the young married wife having more affection in store for her husband than her father and who having already the tast of Empire would not yield it up to him to whom she had owed her birth hastened to tell all to Constantime advising he should take heed of his father-in-law and that he was a wicked man who would if it were possible deceive all the Gods of Olympus for the desire he had to reign Maximian well perceiving that his daughter had discovered the plot and that there was no further safetie for him at the Court of his son-in-law secretly stole away and endeavoured to regain the East but was taken tardy at Marsellis and there strangled to give an end to his life all his designs Some have written that he hanged himself through despair of his affairs others that it was by the commandment of Constantine Others have said that his son-in-law Eusebius was willing to save him but the publick hatred born against Maximian prevented clemency which I think the more probable Verily I would not disguise the exorbitances practised by Constantine before his entrance into Christianity for he cannot be justified upon some disorders But since Zosimus the historian who pardoneth him in nothing chargeth him not with this death I see no cause why we should accuse him Behold the desperate end of Maximian after he Victor Nazarius Non omnia potes Dij te vindicant invicem had persecuted the Church embroiled Empires all armed the whole world by the extravagances of his ambition an infamous halter taketh a little air from him which he thought he could not freely enough breath whilst
summons you shall have from the will of God It is not perfection not to care for life through impatience nor to have an ear not deaf to death through faintness of courage This resignation was most excellent and very admirable in our Ladie for two reasons First the great knowledge she had of beatitude Secondly the ineffable love she bare to her Son For I leave you to think if our desires follow the first rays of our knowledges and if we be so much the more earnest after a good as we are the better informed of its merit what impatience Patience of our Lady to endure life must our Ladie needs have of life since she received a science of beatitude strong powerful and resplendent above all other creatures God giving her leave to see in Calvarie the abyss of his glories in the depth of his dolours It is no wonder we so very easily affect life seeing we are as the little children of a King bred in the house of a shepheard as the gloss upon Daniel reporteth touching the education of Nebuchadnezzar We know not what a scepter Kingdom or crown is in this great meaness of a life base and terrestrial But had we talked onely one quarter of an hour with a blessed soul and discoursed of the state of the other life our hearts would wholly dissolve into desires Which makes me say It was an act of a most heroical resolution in the blessed Virgin in those great knowledges she had of Paradise to have continued so many years in this life and if you consider the most ardent love she bare her Son who was the adamant of all loves you shall find the holy Virgin who had born all the glory of Paradise in her womb more merited in this resignation she made to see her self separated the space of thirty years both from Paradise and her Son than all the Martyrs did in resigning themselves to deaths strange bloudy and hydeous There is nothing comparable to the martyrdom of Martyrdom of love love It is an exhalation in a cloud It is a fire in a myne a torrent shut up in ditches a night of separation lasteth Ages and all waxeth old for it but its desires Now this holy Mother to be thirty years upon the cross of love without repining without complaint or disturbance peaceably expecting the stroke of her hour what virtue and how far are we from it So now adays throughout the world you see nothing Worldly irresolutions of death Boet. Carm. 1. Eheu cur dura miseros averteris aure Et stentes oculos claudere saeva negos but mourners who are loth to live or faint-hearted that would never die Some crie out Come to me O sluggish death thou hast forgotten me what do I here I am but a living death and an unprofitable burden to the earth Ah death hast thou ears of brass and diamond for me alone Canst thou not shut up mine eyes which I daily drown in my tears Much otherwise when we see one die young fresh flourishing in honour wealth health prosperity we crie out upon death as if it were cruel and malicious To take saith one this young betrothed this poor maid this husband intended this excellent man who so well played the Rhodomont to lay hold of one so necessarie for the publick in the flower of his age Why took it not away this cripple this beggar who hath not wherewith to live Why took it not away this other who daily dies yet cannot die once O our manners O dainty conceits O fit language Were it not some little humane respect we would take Gods Providence by the throat Whom do we contend withal The indifferency we daily see in the death of men where as soon the young is taken as the old the happie as the miserable the Emperour as the porter is one of the greatest signs of Gods Providence to be admired Why then complain we that God maketh us to leave life when he pleaseth It is not a punishment but a wholesom doctrine by which we learn the power of the Divine Wisdom First when we entered into life our advise was not required whether we would be born in such or such an Age such a day such a year such an hour so when we must be gone from hence there is no reason to ask our counsel Let us onely yield up this last loan and not murmure against the father of the family Let us not say this man should go before and this after Who knows them better than God You complain this miserable creature lives so long how know you whether he accomplish the years of his purgatory How know you whether God suffers him to become a spectacle unto you of his patience Why gnash you your teeth for anger that this man rich that man fortunate and that other so qualified is taken hence in his flourishing youth How know you the misadventures and shipwracks which attended him had he still continued in the world You say he was necessary why God will shew there is not any thing necessary in the world but himself Vnâ— aâ—ulso non deficit alter aureus Poor eyes of a bat which see nothing but darkness you would give eyes to Argus and light to the Sun If you desire to take part in the prudence of the just handle the matter so that for the first sign of a good death you be ever indifferent to live or die accordding to our Ladies example Daily expect death stand perpetually on your guard Do as the brave bird the Grecians call Onocratalus which is so well practised Instinct of the Onocratalus Constancy of faith to expect the Hawk to grapple with her that even when sleep shuts up her eyes she sleepeth with her beak exalted as if she would contend with her adversary Know we are continually among rocks and dangers that there needs but one hour to get all or loose all that the day of Judgement comes with the pace of a thief and that we must be ready to receive it and resolute to combat with death to gain immortalitie Hold this concluding sentence of Tertul. Idol c. 2. Hos inter scopulos velisicata spiritu Dei fides navigat tuta si cauta secura si attonita Caeterúm ineluctabile excussis profundum inexplicabile impactis naufragium irrespirabile â— devoratis hypocriphium Second quality of good death Philo l. 3. de vita Mosis in fine Notable speech of Philo of Moses his state 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Tertullian as an Oracle Amongst the rocks and shelves of this sea called life Christian faith passeth on breaking the waves filling the sails with Gods spirit ever assured yet ever distrustful and perpetually fearless yet still carefull of the future As for the rest it sees under its feet an abyss not to be passed by swimming and inexplicable ship wrack for those who are drenched a gulf which suffocates all such as it once swalloweth The second
surprized by King Ptolomey courting a Mistris of his for which contempt in that instant the Ladie was enforced to drink poison and the unfortunate Courtier was hanged before his own lodging Another minion of the Emperour Constantius after he had mannaged the Julius Capit. affairs wars revenues houshold and person of the Emperour was disgraced and put to death because he presented to his Master at that time incensed with choler a pen ill made for writing to sign certain dispatches withal Macrinus a hunter a fencer Eunapius in Aedes a scrivener became an Oratour then a Fiscal next Pretour of the Palace then Emperour and lastly was massacred with his son Piadumenus Ablavius most powerful under Constantine torn in pieces under Constantius as a victim What circumvolutions what comedies what tragedies what examples to those who in this world have no other aim but to become great casting under foot all laws both divine and humane Out alas It is said that Cambises King of Persia to teach Herod l. 5. justice to a certain President of his who newly then entered into office commanded him to cover the chair of judicature with the skin of Sesamnes his father put to death and flayed because he had been an ill Judge What should he do being seated on this Note woful Tribunal upon the bloud of his father but become wise by a dreadful experience An infinite number of ambitious men are in office and magistracie mounted upon the ruins and bloud of their Predecessours who have made most wicked and deplorable trials and have pursued the same ways without fearing the like event I. Learn O Noblemen that all the greatness of Instructions the world cannot make you great if not by contempt of it All therein is little and yet to despise that little is a great matter II. Know that your fortunes ought to be as the Sixtus in bibliotheca Patrum Non est minimum in humaenâ vitâ negligere minima halcyons nest which seemeth sowed to her bodie Matters most aptly proportioned to our nature are the best What face soever a man sets upon it he is little Much turmoyl of government and affairs may well hinder him but never make him happy III. You must use the honour which God hath Semper circumveniunt montem Sir nunquam ad terram promissionis perveniunt Petrus Blesensis p. 40 allotted you as the coyn of his coffers for which you in his last judgement are accountable and must limit your pretenses and desires with mediocrity otherwise you shall be as they who wandered perpetually about the mountain of Sir without ever arriving at the land of promise Conclusion of the Second Book That the life of a bad Courtier is a perpetual obstacle to virtue TO approve good by words and pursue evil in effect to condemn the world and adore it to desire heaven and be fixed to the earth to love ones self excessively and live perpetually contrary to the better part of our self to seek for peace and live in an everlasting warfare to lodge in one same heart fire and ice sickness and health joy and sorrow death life To command imperiously and obey faintly to be ever abroad and never out of prison to dream without sleep and sleep without repose to be divided to all the world and never within ones self To wish that which cannot be had and contemn what is possessed To seek after that which hath been despised and hourly to change resolution To exercise no piety but by constraint nor reason but by fits Not to avoid one sin but by another and to descend into the precipice with open eyes To take up the buckler after the wound received and to be cured by the overthrow of health To slake thirst with salt water and quench fire with sulphur To have no constancy but for evil nor amity for any thing but that which deserveth it not To have sottish actions and glorious pretexes as much faith as the ice and assurance as the wind To be the slave of a thousand false Deities and not to reflect on the true Divinity To prefer the fetters and onions of Aegypt before the liberty and palms of the heavenly Sion To leave Paradise to follow the gardens of Tantalus and those enchanted Islands which recoyl backward according to the proportion we think to approch them To carry under a smooth countenance a heart spotted as the skin of a panther To joyn a voluptuous life to a penurious avarice to prodigality servitude to predominance nobilitie to baseness pride to misery and envy to pitie To promise without faith swear without regard command without reason appoint without order affect without choise hate without cause walk without a path and to live perpetually banished from ones self so to become too much tyed to ones self This is the life of a Courtier who hath alienated himself from the life of God Adde hereunto that vice is commonly waited on with a most painful life wherein if endeavour be not used to sanctifie it by virtue there is found a hell anticipated where a Paradise is imagined Petrus Blesensis Chancellour to the Archbishop of Epist 4. Canterhury having some time attended in the Court of the King of England recounteth the evils he there found by experience in a letter which he addressed to the Chaplains of the same Prince There he complaineth the Courtiers many times suffer for hell all those pains which S. Paul endured for Heaven For they are exposed to dangers both of sea and land rivers and mountains thieves and false brothers to fasting and watching to weariness and to all the incommodities of human life He hath seen saith he bread and wine served up which one could not put into their mouthes without shutting their eyes such loathing it enforced and viands that killed men under the shew of nutriment He hath known Lords draw their swords for a cabbin which deserved not a battel among hogs He hath seen a Prince who delighted to be attended by officers suddenly surprized to whom he gave notice of his remove when they had physical drugs in their bellies and made them oftentimes run themselves out of breath through forrests and darkness and at other times to pine away in expectation of all that which would but frustrate their hope He hath seen harbingers troublesom before they received gifts and most ungrateful after they had them who made no scruple to put an honestman out of his lodging and to pull him both from table and bed that he might lie in the streets He hath seen at Court porters worse than Cerberus with whom the memory of a benefit lasted not three days and who took pleasure to make those stand in the durt and rain that had obliged them Buffons and jesters found ever free passage nothing but virtue and honesty had a wainscot face shewed them Finally all the plagues of Aegypt dwelt there frogs flies ulcers rivers of
To repress all the desires and concupiscences of flesh and if one have any feeling thereof not to give consent thereunto IV. Never to stay at all upon thoughts and imaginations of things dishonest but so soon as they present themselves to chase them away and extinguish them in your heart no otherwise than you should quench a burning hot iron in a fountain V. To mortifie your senses which are most commonly Eyes Oculi patellae luxuriae Isidor apud S. Bern. tom 1 serm de luxuria Salvian l. 3. de gubernat Oculi tui videbunt extranea cor tuum loquetur perversa Prov. 23. 3. the fore-runners of sin and above all to restrain your eyes which according to the opinion of S Isidore are as dishes wherein luxurie serveth up the viands of voluptuousness They are the windows the alurements the snares the conduits of love It buddeth in the eyes that it may at leasure blossome in the heart And therefore it is fit to stand upon your guard with so subtile and vigorous a sence which often filleth the soul with appetites and flames I do not say that one should look upon nothing and always live as if the soul were buried alive in the flesh but I affirm you must divert your sight from objects which dart a sting into a mind sensible of such penetrations As for the ears there is no doubt they may serve as handles for love and that it hath taken many that way An evil word hath fingers to incite the flesh He who heareth it and he that willingly speaketh it is not innocent before God Smelling blasteth chastitie and tast roughly assaulteth but kisses and unchast toucheâ— cut her throat VI. To flie idleness reading of love-books comedies stage-plays immodest pictures feasts private familiarities loose companie and all occasions of sin VII To have in detestation even the shadows of impuritie To speak to proclaim in every place the praises of chastitie and for this purpose to love penance mortification of the bodie labour rough and harsh apparel modestie even to the seeming somewhat wayward the Sacrament of the Eucharist the meditation of the four last things devotion towards the most blessed Virgin and all that may conduce to the maintenance of honestie VIII To remain firm in great and forcible temptations is verily the trophey of chastitie Since as Plato hath said the triumph of virtue is to have the power not the will to sin It was a notable act of Chastitie of Charls the 8. continencie in Charls the eigth ardently to love a maiden endowed with an exquisite beautie to have her at his dispose and yet to abstain for one sole word Lyps in monitis politic lib. 2. cap. 17. Exemplo 12. addit datos puellae 500. aureos which this poor creature spake to him brought even into his chamber For she by chance perceiving the picture of our Ladie cast her self at the Kings feet shewed him this image crying out with a face all bathed in tears Sir I beseech you for this Virgins sake preserve the honour of a silly maid At this word spoken for a young King enkindled with love and absolute in power to conquer the motions of lust is it not a matter that meriteth much applause IX To contemn great rewards and high advancements of fortune for the preservation of chastitie Johannes Moschus in prato A couragious Ladie As did that noble Lady of whom John Moschus speaketh who seeing her husband consume in perpetual prison for debt not able any way to relieve him was reduced to terms of extream and miserable want and besides pursued by a man of prime note with all sorts of allurements offers and accommodations which might shake and stagger an afflicted heart and enforce her to condescend to a sin which seemed to have necessity for a patroness she notwithstanding stood firm like a rock preferring chastitie poor and patient before a rich and delicate dishonour I could also nominate creatures as pure as strong adorned with most excellent natural parts more chaste more wise more fortunate than Lucrece who with as much industry as courage have refused powerful and passionate men that sought them with such excessive benefits as would have overwhelmed any inferiour chastitie But they not to commit one onely sin covered under the curtain of the night have despised treasures to guard another jewel in an earthen vessel who for this act deserve to be raised above the stars X. To withdraw the chastity of others from this sink with liberal alms great labour infinite incommodities As that worthy Hermit Abraham Abraham the Hermite did of whom Surius speaketh who loaden with years and merits went into a brothel-house in disguised habit to reduce a Niece of his that went astray as at this day many honest matrons worthy of eternal memory spare nothing to gain poor abused doves out of the faulcons tallons and dedicate them to Altars where soon after they work wonders in matter of virtue XI To suffer in your body great torments yea Hieron in vita Pauli Sabel l. 5. c. 6. death it self for the defence of chastity as many holy virgins have done As that youth reputed the son of a King of Nicomedia who fast tyed on a bed of flowers and wooed by a Courtizane with intention to corrupt him spit out his tongue like a dart of fire and bloud in the face of this she-wolf A tongue Lingua silet clamatque silens loquiturque pudorem sanguine quae pinxit sola pudicitiam A bold attempt of Didymus which in dumb eloquence speaketh to all posteritie and proclaimeth the honour of chastitie XII To expose your self to great sufferings for the preservation of others chastitie As that brave Didymus a young beardless Gentleman who beholding a poor Christian maid named Theodora thrown into a brothel caused her to escape by giving her the habit of a man and himself remained for pledge in the attires of a woman expecting the fury of executioners Ambr. lib. 2. de virgin Quasi adulter ingressus si vis Martyr â—grediar Vestimenta mutemus conveniunt mihi tua mea tibi sed utraque Christo Tua vestis me verum militem faciet mea te virginem Bené tu vestieris ego melius exuar who gave him the crown of Martyrdom Saint Ambrose makes him speak to the maid to this effect Sister I am come hither as an adulterer and if it please you I will go out a Martyr Let us change habits I pray you we are as I perceive both of one stature My apparrel very well fitteth you but yours will set much better upon me and both will agree in the service of Christ Jesus My attire shall make you a virgin and yours me a Martyr You shall be most fortunately clothed and I more happily despoiled It was so done Didymus was apprehended and Theodora understanding it run back like a lyoness amidst the swords to die with him The twenty
and they shall oppose you in the land of your abode Cruel father that thou art who quite dead and turned into ashes afflictest the Common-wealth by children ill instructed thou woundest and tearest Christianity Were it not justice thinkest thou to break up thy tomb and disturb thy ashes for having voluntarily bred a little viper for thy countrey to which thou art accountable for thy life And from hence it cometh to pass that fathers who have carried themselves so negligently and perfidiously in their childrens instruction are the first who drink down the poyson they mingled for others over-whelmed with toyls and miseries for the continual disorders of these extravagants O how often they make complaint like the Eagle in the Emblem of Julian when strucken by a mortal arrow partly framed out of her own wings she said Out alas wretched bird that I am must I breed feathers to serve as a swift chariot to the steel which transfixeth my body Must I bring forth children to give me the stroke of death What remedie then for this unhappiness which creeping into the bowels of the most flourishing Monarchies depopulates and deprives them of good subjects and furnisheth them with shadows of men What remedy but to observe three things in this matter First to give a good tincture of Religion to your children pious apprehensions of God and a filial fear of his judgements Secondly to manure them with arts suitable to their understanding and condition to settle them in the world upon some good employment lest having nought to do they become fit to act any evil Thirdly to accommodate them as much as possibly and reasonably may be with exteriour moveables called the blessings of fortune that necessity open not them the gate of iniquitie and then leave the rest to the providence of God whose eye is alwayes open over his work Behold the course most fit to be observed Pietie goeth foremost for as the eloquent Prelate of Cyrenes saith It Cynes ad Arcad is not onely the foundation of houses but of whole Monarchies Parents now adays seek to do quite contrary and set the cart before the horse they voluntarily imitate the stupidity of those Aegyptians who prepared Altars to a Reer-mouse for no other reason but that she is weak-sighted and is a friend of the night Now they preferred darkness before light by right of antiquity but these do much worse for putting Heaven and earth into one ballance they set an estimate upon terrene things to the villifying and confusion of celestial Nay there are mothers to be found so malicious as was one named Clotilda not the Saint but a mad woman who being put to her choice either to consent her sons should enter into a Monastery to become religious or resolve to see them loose their lives Kill kill said she I had rather behold them dead than Monks How many are there now adays who for a need would suffer their children to become Pages to Antichrist to make a fortune at the least would well endure to see them preferred to honour in the great Turks Court with ship-wrack of their Religion There are few Queen Blanches either in courage or worth who rather desired to behold her children in their grave than in sin They must now adays be either Caesars or nothing None fear to put them into infamous houses into scandalous places to give them most wicked Teachers to thrust them into snares and scandals under hope of some preferment Nay with how many travels and services crouchings and crimes do these miserable creatures purchase their chains All Non omnes curia admittet castra quos ad liborem pericula recipiant fastidiosè legunt bona mens omnibus patet Senec. Ep. 44. cannot find a fortune in Court Warfare picks out those with a kind of disdain whom it entertains for labours and hazards of life Onely virtue shuts not the gate against any yet it is daily despised Vnfortunate fathers and wretched mothers live on gall and tears rise and go to bed with gnawing care to set an ungratefull son on the top of fortunes wheel who quickly grows weary of them and after their deaths gluts himself with the delights they with so much industrie prepared for him mindless of those who obliged him Nay far otherwise he unfolds the riots of his unbridled youth even upon their tombs God grant this evil may pass no further and that the father and son do not one day reproach one another in the flames of hell that the one ministred matter of damnation and the other gave accomplishment William the learned Bishop of Guliel de Lugdun tract de avarit rubric 11. Lions relateth that a young Hermit retiring into a horrid wilderness to attend the exercise of penance saw his father and brother whom he had left in the world embroiled in ill causes at that time deceased and buried in everlasting fire who made hydeous complaints the son questioning his father as authour of his ruin by amassing unjust riches for him and the father answering the son was the source of all his calamities since to make him rich he had spent his miserable life in perpetual anxiety and now suffered eternal punishments in the other world for loving a disloyal son more than Almightie God Cursed blindness to buy tortures and gibbets with afflictions and crosses O fathers and mothers let your first care extend to those whom you begat to teach them virtue rather by your example than others instruction These young creatures are your shadows your ecchoes they turn and wind themselves easily to imitate those who gave them life and from whom they hope both wealth and honour Wo to the father and mother who make their children witnesses of their crimes and not content to be evil make their sin immortal in the immortality of their descent An infant though but two years old should be used with much regard as if it were an intelligence enchased in this little body It is a great sacriledge to impress the first tincture of vice on those who as yet rest in the innocency of baptism The good Eleazar being advised to dissemble his Religion to save his life or at least to make semblance of eating hogs-flesh beholding round about him many youths who expected the end of this combat pronounced these worthy words couched in S. Ambrose God forbid I should serve for an incentive Ambrose l. 2. de Jacob. Nequaquam contingat mihi ut sim senex incentivum ju venilis erroris qui esse debet forma salutaris instituti Adulterio delectatus aliqui◠Jovem respicit inde cupiditatis suae fomenta conquirit Julius Firm. de error profan to the vices of these young people who should rather be a pattern of wisdom God forbid I defile my gray hairs with this execration and that posterity may take notice I opened the gate to impiety by my example That is undoubted which Julius Firmicus spake Nothing hath
much more dreadfull Herod in few days after he had tried in vain and worn out all humane remedies was reduced to that horrible state of maladie which is rightly described Fearful maladie of Herod by Josephus and Eusebius of Caesarea God would have him in this life tast in long draughts the cup of his justice wasting that caytife carkass with lingering torments Behold the cause why he was touched with a manifest wound from Heaven and assaulted with a furious squadron of remediless dolours He who from his young days had been enflamed with a desperate ambition felt at his death a fire which devoured his marrow and entrails with a secret and subtile flame He who all his life time had an enraged hunger to heap up treasures even to the opening of David's and Solomon's sepulchers to extract booty from thence was afflicted with dog-like hunger both horrible and shamefull which caused him day and night to crie out for meat yet never was satiated He who had made so many voyages and gone so many paces to make himself great saw then his feet swoln with bad and phlegmatick humours He who in his life had caused so many tortures to be inflicted felt outragious and intollerable collicks which racked him He who had taken life away from so many men was seized with an Asthma which hindered his breathing He who esteemed prudence and humane policy for the sinews of his estate felt in his body cramps and convulsions of sinews which gave him many shakes He who shed the bloud of the poor Mariamne who slew her sons to make the kids as saith the Scripture boyl in the milk of their damme briefly he who wallowed in the bloud of about fourteen thousand innocents of purpose to involve therein the Saviour of the world died in his own bloud afflicted with a cruel fluxe He who abused his body with prodidigious luxuries had dying his secret parts filled with lice and vermine with an ignominious Priapism a maladie not to be named Shall we then say the Divine Providence of God hath no eyes to be wakefull for the punishment of the wicked This desperate wretch in stead of adoring the justice of God at his death and kissing the rod which had chastised him dreameth of new slaughters publisheth an Edict by which he sendeth for the principal of the Jews of every Province to Jerico whither he caused himself to be carried and shutting them up in a Theater calleth his sister Salome and her husband Alexas and then speaketh to them in these words It troubleth me not to die and tender the tribute Notorious crueltie which so many Kings have paid before me but I am afflicted that my death shall not be lamented as I desire if you assist not Know then for this purpose I have sent for all the Nobilitie of Judea whom you have in your hands As soon as my eyes are closed put them all to the sword and let not my death be divulged till first the fortune of these same people be known to their friends by this means I hope to fill Judea with tears and sighs which shall make my soul leave my bodie with the more contentment The wretch in saying this with many scalding tears besought his sister by all that which she esteemed in the world most glorious most sacred as if he had asked Paradise of her and that necessarily she must promise it to content him at that instant with oath though afterward it were never executed In this act alone he well declared he had the spirit of a ravening wolf in the skin of a man and that the thirst of humane bloud was become natural to him As he was framing this notable Testament letters Death of Antipater were brought him from Rome written by Caesar's command which certified him that Aâ—me a Jewish Ladie of Livia's train the wife of Augustus had been condemned for sinister intelligence with Antipater and for that cause punished with death as concerning his son he wholly left him to his disposition This man in the very point of death still sucked vengeance with marvellous sweetness Vpon this news he taketh courage again and calls for an apple and a knife busying himself in the paring of it But in these employments as his pains redoubled he waxed weary of life which he so much had loved and at that instant one of his Grand-children named Achiabus who stood near to the bed perceiving he roled his eyes full of rage and made a shew as if he would have stabbed himself with the knife he had in his hand which much affrighted the young Prince held back his arm as well as he could and began to make a terrible out-crie as if his Grand-father had yielded up the Ghost whereupon the whole Palace was in an uproar Antipater who from the prison heard all this tumult supposing Herod was at the last cast his feet itched in his fetters and did not as yet despair of the Crown offering as one would say mountains of gold to his Keeper to set him at liberty But O the judgement of his God! his Goaler in stead of giving ear to all his rewards went directly to his Father and relateth to him how Antipater used all possible means to get out of prison and take possession of the Kingdom Herod houling and knocking his head How saith he will the parricide murther me in my bed I have yet life enough left to take away his Then lifting himself up and leaning on his pillow he calleth one of his Guard Go you immediately saith he to the prison and kill this parricide and let him be buried in Hircanus castle without funeral pomp This was incontinently executed and such was the end of this wicked wretch who had disturbed earth and hell to place himself in his fathers Throne according as certain Mathematicians had foretold him Few days after his death Herod having declared Archelaus for Successour of the Kingdom contrary to his first will which was disposed in the behalf of Antipater after he had accommodated his two other sons with such shares as seemed good to him and given End of a Politician most disastrous large legacies to Augustus Caesar yielded up his wicked soul in rage and despair in the LXX year of his age and XXXVII of his reign A Prince saith Josephus who all his life desired to be Master of his laws and a slave of his passions and who notwithstanding all his great felicities ought to be reputed the most miserable on the earth Behold in what tearms this Authour a great statist speaketh it to teach humane policie there is no prudence wisdom counsel greatness nor happines where God is not present For laying aside eternal torments of the other life wherewith this barbarous man dying in punishments was encompassed I assure my self there is neither peasant nor handi-crafts man if he be not mad would give one day of his life for the thirty seven years of Herods reign which
he passed in continual apprehensions thornie affairs perilous voyages sinister distrusts frosty fears of death barbarous cruelties remorses of conscience the forerunners of hell leaving besides a short and unfortunate posterity Behold his Picture and Elogie HERODES ASCALONITA HERODES ASCALONITA VULTU FERUS ANIMO BARBARUS LUTO ET SANGUINE MACERATUS A QUO NIHIL AD SUMMAM CRUDELITATEM PRAETER DEICIDIUM ABFUIT DEICIDIO VOLUNTAS NON DEFUIT VULPINA FRAUDE REGNUM JUDEAE INVASIT AN. MUNDI TER MILLESSIMO NONGENTESSIMO SEXAGESSIMO QUINTO REGNAVIT IRAE SERVUS JURIS DOMINUS FORTUNA FOELIX CYCLOPAEA VITA INFOELICISSIMUS DESIIT CAELESTI PLAGA FERALIS MORBI ANNO REGNI TRICESSIMO SEPTIMO VITAE FERME SEPTUAGESSIMO CHRISTI OCTAVO Vpon the Picture of HEROD A man no whit with civil grace indu'd Of visage hydeous of manners rude A monster made of massacres and bloud That boldly God Heav'n Natures laws withstood Ill words within no certain limits fall But who once mentions Herod speaketh all BY the carriage of this Court one may see whither vice transporteth great fortunes In the person of Aristobulus and Hircanus you behold that the canker is to a body less dangerous than the discord of brothers to a state In the person of Antipater a friend for advantage who seeketh to fish in a troubled water in the end fisheth his fill but is drowned in the act to teach you there is no policie so great as to be an honest man and that he who prepareth snares for another diggeth his own grave In the person of Pompey an Aribitratour who worketh his own ends under the colour of justice who buildeth his ambition on the ruins of state in the end the earth which faileth him for his conquests denieth him a sepulchre He found no more Countries to conquer and scarcely had he six foot of earth to make him a tomb In that of Hircanus too much credulity too much facility to please others humours too much pusillanimity in the government of Justice which head-long threw him into a life as miserable as his death was cruel and bloudy In that of Anthonie a passionate Judge who turneth with all winds and suffereth himself to be carried along by the stronger without consideration of Justice In that of Joseph and Sohemus that it is perilous to treat with women though free from ill purpose and much more dangerous to reveal a secret which who will safely keep must make his heart a sepulchre for it In that of young Aristobulus how the most beautifull hopes are storm-beaten in the bud and that you must walk upon the prosperitie of the world as on ice that it must be handled like glass fearing always they break not in the lustre of their brightness In that of Alexandra a boundless ambition designs without effect afflictions devoid of consolations torments without patience and a death without deserts and all this because she gave not a good temper of virtue to her soul In that of the sons of Mariamne innocency perfecuted and a little vanity of tongue desperately revenged In that of yong Antipater policy deceived the cloud of humane hopes cracked punishment and revenge ever attending an offender In the person of Herod an enraged ambition which giveth motion to all his crimes a double soul crafty cautelous politick mischievous bloudy barbarous savage and withal in the best of his tricks benummed doltish dall thinking to make a fortune to the prejudice of religion and conscience A goodly fortune to make himself great and live in the hatred of all the world in the remorses of a Cyclopean conscience a thousand times aday to call upon death not being able to die and in the end to die in a body leaprous stinking louzey and death to tear his soul from him with scabs stench and lice to make it survive its torments in an eternity of flames See you not here fair fruits of humane wisdom impiety and atheism In that of Mariamne a soul raised above the highest sphere of true greatness a soul truly royal holy religious courteous mercifull wise affable and endowed with an incomparable patience who as an Eagle strong of wing and courage soaring above the storms of the world maketh her self Mistress of tempests and thunders which for that they had served as an exercise of her constancy and perpetual battels for her life shall through all Ages attend the immortality of her glory THE FIFTH BOOK Fortunate Pietie WE have hitherto beheld a Court which rather resembleth Polyphemus cave than a Kings Palace to teach Great-ones there is no bruitishness so savage wherinto ingratitude towards God and vice doth not precipitate a forsaken soul Let us now see that as unbridled passions are of power to make a hell of a Princes Court so the practice of piety and other virtues make it a true Paradise Behold the Court of Theodosius the Younger a Prince who seemed to be born for nothing else but to allye the scepter to virtues and manifest what royal greatness can do guided by the rules of pietie It is no small miracle to behold a holy King If Ring of God God affected the curiositie of wearing a ring as well in effect as the Scripture attributeth it to him in allegorie the most agreeable characters he would engrave therein were the names of good Kings who are his most lively representations as those who wed together power and goodness two inseparable pieces of God but very incompatible in the life of man such are the corruptions of this Age. Some live in Four sorts of life the world transported with the torrents thereof and that is weakness Others flie the world and in flying oft-times carry it along with them and this is an illusion Others separate themselves as well in body as affection and this is prudence But few are found who bearing the world on their shoulders through necessity do tread it under-foot by contempt of vanities That is it which this great Prince hath done whose Court we here describe for being seated among people he built a desert in his heart and in a vast Ocean of affairs he lived as fishes which keep silence within the loud noise of waves and preserve their plump substance fresh in the brackish waters I go not about to place Theodosius the Younger in the rank of the bravest and most heroick spirits you hereafter shall see others more couragious and warlick but I purposely have selected this history drawn from the Chronicle of Alexandria Zonaras Zozomen Raderius and others to teach certain vain-glorious people who make no account but of those trifling spirits fierce mutinous and unquiet stampt with the coyn of impiety how much they miss of their reckoning seeing this Emperour with the sole arms of piety and modesty carried himself in a very long and most prosperous reign amidst horrible tempests which seemed ready to rend the world and other rash Princes who made shew to swallow earth and seas were drowned in a glass
it slept as the Providence of God shewed it self affectionate in the conservation of these elevated souls Observe the persons precisely and consider each in particular What happiness in the Empress Eudoxia whilest she laboureth for the glory of Altars God gave the heart of her husband into her hands the world in honour at her feet and a little Theodosius by her fide who in his infancy maketh all the hopes of his mother to bud But as soon as this poor Princess forgetting her duty and self contended with S John Chrysostom behold her cut down with the sythe of death carried away in her flower deprived of the contentment and glory which she possessed Behold she received a breach in her reputation which cannot in the memory of all Ages be repaired Her bones are in horrour and dread till such time as S. Chrysostom banished by her commandment and returning dead to Constantinople came to serve as an anker for the floating ashes of this unfortunate Empress Consider this little Theodosius who even at his birth maketh the Idols to fall the Pagan temples to sink and hell to howl under his feet What glory was it to bury the remainders of Idolatry what a trophey to extirpate under his reign so many monsters of heresies What celestial comfort to see in his time so many learned writings to be laid at his feet to see so many worthy men flourish so many Saints as Leo's Cyrils Chrysostoms Simeons Stilites to see the Church all garnished with stars and lights to sway a Scepter more than fourty years in a peaceful Kingdom among so many tempests and which is more to fall into some defects by sudden surprizal and expiate them by a happy repentance to see himself drawn by a powerfull hand from the brink of a precipice and in the end to yield up his soul in the midst of Palms and good odours of a glorious life See you not a Fortunate Piety Behold Pulcheria as an Eagle on the top of apyramide which ever hath her eye on the Sun and seeth all storms broken and confounded under her feet Was there ever a more fortunate Piety To say that a maid at fifteen years of age swaying Emperours and Empires enchaining all hearts of the world to make herself on earth a Crown might boast to have had the Universal Church for trumpet of her praises and from the government on earth to mount to Heaven by so happy death born as on a Chariot of liberality and magnificence Where may one more manifestly see the happiness of true and solid piety Behold Athenais a silly maid who had not so much as a poor cottage for shelter as soon as she embraceth piety and offereth the faculties of her soul to the honour of Altars behold her raised upon the throne of the prime Empire of the world afterward as she came a little to forget God he sent her a very sharp affliction but as soon as she hath again recourse to the arms of devotion the cloud of calumny cast on her forehead dissevereth the storm passeth away and her face all glittereth in glory and which is most admirable God layeth hold of her even in the gulph of errour whereinto a wicked hypocrite had cast her reconducteth her to Altars receiveth her soul in peace and causeth her to reign both in herself and bloud in all the three parts of the world for she held in person the Scepter of Asia her daughter Eudoxia was married to the Emperour of Rome the Capital Citie of Europe and her Grand-child was Queen of Africk miraculously finding a Kingdom in her own captivity Is not this a fortunate piety Adde also hereunto Martianus a poor peasant who now had his neck under the sword of the executioner falsely accused of a crime whereof he was innocent and God taketh him by one hair of the head delivereth him from shame and peril marvellously guiding him to the government of a great Empire giveth him innumerable prosperities and indeed maketh him another Constantine Ought not impiety to burst with rage and confess that happiness greatness benedictions and favours of Heaven are for piety Here it may be you will also have some rememberance of the Court of Herod where you have seen the poor Mariamne in virtue so ill intreated and will think that piety in this creature was unfortunate But if this thought occur would it not condemn all the Martyrs and all the Saints whose lives notwithstanding we ought to judge most happy since that vanquishing the petty misfortunes of the world she hath fallen into the bosom of felicity Tell me one hour of life in patience and tranquility of soul which this good Queen had among so many strange accidents is it not more worth than the thirty seven years of her husband all clouded with crimes disturbancies and fury Tell me is it not a happiness and an incomparable glory that God would pertake in persecutions with this good Princess suffering himself by this self-same man to be pursued who had been the hammer of all her afflictions Is it nothing to die in the Amphitheater of patience in the Theater of honour by the same sword which was afterward unsheathed against Jesus Christ Is it nothing to give up the life of a Pismeer in exchange of an immortal glory on earth and a happy repose in Heaven And if you besides desire to see her fortunate piety according to the world is it not a blow from Heaven to say that all the race of Herod issued from his other wives was unlucky miserable execrable deprived of their fathers Scepter chased away exiled scourged with whips from Heaven and the Grand-children of Mariamne remained last in royal thrones Tigranes her Grand-child descended from Alexander was King of Armenia crowned by the hands of the Roman Emperours Agrippa the Great issued from Aristobulus who having been fettered with an iron cain through the cruelty of Tyberius was sent back to his Kingdom by Caius Caesar and honoured with a golden chain of like weight with the same of iron wherewith he had been fettered Agrippa the youngest under whom S. Paul pleaded his cause was preserved from the horrible sack of Jerusalem as Lot from the flames of Sodome and reigned in Tyberiade and Juliade even to decrepit age Berenice grand-child of Mariamne was extreamly courted by the Emperour Titus entituled the worlds darling Another called Drucilla was married to Faelix Governour of Judea of whom is spoken in the Acts God likewise recompencing the virtue of the mother in the children by some temporal favours and all those who disposed themselves to virtue were fortunate to make it appear by evident testimonies that unhappiness ariseth from nothing but impiety These two Courts the histories of which we have here represented in my opinion sufficiently shew the unhappiness of impiety and fortunate success in the lives of Great-ones when they are guided according to the laws of Heaven If I hereafter shall continue this work I will
out but what hand hath ever drawn a false opinion out of the brain of one presumptuous but that of God All seemeth green saith A istotle to those who look on the water and all is just and specious to such as behold themselves in proper love Better it were according to the counsels of the ancient fathers of the desert to have one foot in hell with docibilitie of spirit than an arm in Paradise with your own judgement Augustine not to acknowledge his fault would August I. deduabus animabus contra Manachaeos ever maintain it and thought it was to make a truth of an errour opinionatively to defend it He had that which Tertullian saith is familiar among hereticks swellings and ostentation of knowledge and his design was then to dispute not to live Himself confesseth two things long time made him to tumble in the snare the first whereof was a certain complacence of humour which easily adhered to vicious companies and the other an opinion he should ever have the upper hand in disputation He was as a little Marlin without hood or leashes catching all sorts of men with his sophisms and when he had overcome some simple Catholick who knew not the subtilities of Philosophie he thought he had raised a great trophey over our Religion In all things this Genius sought for supereminence for even in game where hazards stood not fair for him he freely made use of shifts and were he surprized he would be augry making them still believe he had gained as a certain wrestler who being overthrown undertook by force of eloquence to prove he was not fallen This appeared more in dispute than game For having now flattered himself upon the advantages of his wit he was apprehensive in this point of the least interest of his reputation and had rather violate the law of God than commit a barbarism in speaking thereby to break the law of Grammer to the prejudice of the opinion was had of him It was a crime to speak of virtue with a solecism and a virtue to reckon up vices in fair language When he was publickly to enterprize some action of importance the apprehension of success put him into a fever so that walking one day through the Citie of Milan with a long Oration in his head and meeting a rogue in the street who confidently flouted him he fetched a great sigh and said Behold this varlet hath gone beyond me in matter of happiness See he is satisfied and content whilest I drag an uneasie burden through the bryers and all to please a silly estimation The ardent desire he had to excel in all encounters alienated him very far from truth which wils that we sacrifice to its Altars all the interests of honour we may pretend unto and besides it was the cause that the wisest Catholicks feared to be engaged in battel with so polished a tongue and such unguided youth Witness this good Bishop whom holy S. Monica so earnestly solicited to enter into the list with her son to convert him for he prudently excused himself saying the better to content her That a son of such tears could never perish Besides the curiositie and presumption of Augustine 3. Impediment The passion of love the passion of love surprized him also to make up his miserie and to frame great oppositions in matter of his salvation But because this noble spirit hath been set by God as the mast of a ship broken on the edge of a rock to shew others his ship-wrack I think it a matter very behovefull to consider here the tyranny of an unfortunate passion which long time enthraled so great a soul to derive profit from his experience The fault of Augustine proceeded not simply from love but from ill managing it affoarding that to creatures which was made for the Creatour Love in it self is not a vice but the soul of all virtues when it is tied to its object which is the sovereign good and never shall a soul act any thing great if it contain not some fire in the veins The Philosopher Hegesippus said that all the great and goodliest natures are known by three things light heat and love The more light precious stones have the more lusture they reflect Heat raiseth eagles above serpents yea among Palms those are the noblest which have the most love and inclination to their fellows These three qualities were eminent in our Augustine His understanding was lightning his will fire and heart affection If all this had happily taken the right way to God it had been a miracle infinitely accomplished but the clock which is out of frame in the first wheel doth easily miscarry in all its motions and he who was already much unjoynted in the prime piece which makes up a man viz. judgement and knowledge suffered all his actions to slide into exorbitancy As there are two sorts of love whereof the one is most felt in the spirit the other predominateth in the flesh Augustine tried them both in several encounters First he was excessively passionate even in chast amities witness a school-fellow of his whom he so passionately affected He was a second Pylades that had always been bred and trained up with him in a mervellous correspondence of age humour spirit will life and condition which had so enkindled friendship in either part that it was transcendent and though it were in the lists of perfect honesty yet being as it was too sensual God who chastiseth those that are estranged from his love as fugitive slaves weaned his Augustine first touching this friend with a sharp fever in which he received baptism after which he was somewhat lightened Whereupon Augustine grew very glad as if he were now out of danger He visited him and forbare not to scoff at his baptism still pursuing the motions of his profane spirit but the other beholding him with an angry eye cut off his speech with an admirable and present liberty wishing him he would abstain from such discourse unless he meant to renounce all correspondence He seemed already in this change to feel the approaches of the other world for verily his malady augmenting quickly separated the soul from the body Augustine was much troubled at this loss insomuch that all he beheld from heaven to earth seemed to him filled with images of death The country was to him a place of darkness and gyddy fancies the house of his father a sepulcher the memory of his passed pleasures a hell All was distast being deprived of him for whom heloved all things It seemed to him all men he beheld were unworthy of life and that death would quickly carry away all the world since it took him away whom he prized above all the world These words escaped him which he afterwards retracted to wit That the soul of his companion and his were expreslie but one and the same surviving in two bodies and therefore he abhorred life because he was no more than halfe a man yet
prosperitie and so much glorie I ow this acknowledgement both to the publick and your particular amitie for you have granted me the repose of my Church you have stopped the mouthes of the perfidious and by my good will I wish you had as well shut up their hearts and this have you done with marvellous authoritie fortitude and faith The holy Emperour ceased not afterward to oblige the Church in all occasions by the favour of his Edicts and shewed himself so openly zealous that even he first of all the Emperours merited the title of Most Christian given afterward to our Kings His Predecessours who professed Christianity ever suffered their reputation to be dishonoured with many blemishes which much weakened the worth of their actions but Gratian was the most royal and sincere of them all for he so little complied with the Zeal and virtue of Gratian by the direction of holy S. Ambrose Gentiles that their Priests coming together to offer him the title and habit of Great Pontife which all the Christian Emperours had yet for ceremony and reason of State retained this good Prince confidently refused it by the counsel of Saint Ambrose and although the Gentiles were so much moved they could not abstain from words of menace he contemned all humane respects where the glory of God was interessed As for the rest to consider further the energy of the discretion of this holy Bishop it is to be noted that the faith of Gratian his tender plant was not a languishing and idle faith but much employed in the exercise of good works which Ausonius a worldly man could not sufficiently admire in his schollar well seeing he knew much more than his Master He who observed the most particular actions of Singular qualities of a young Prince the life of this Emperour hath left in writing that from the time of his childhood never did he let any day pass without praying to God most devoutly daily rendering some vow to Altars and that those who knew his most secret thoughts gave assurance he lived in unspeakable purity of heart and moreover he was very sober and abstinent in his ordinary course of life and for as much as toucheth and concerneth chastity it might well be said that the Altar of Vestal Virgins where perpetually burned a sacred fire which purged all was not more holy than the chamber of Gratian nor the couches prepared in the Temple for ceremonies more chaste than his Imperial bed He had the heart of a mother towards his poor subjects and the beginning of his Empire was consecrated by the comfort of the people for whom he much sweetened the taxes and subsidies freely cutting off what was due to his own coffers and to take away all cause of enquiry in time to come upon that which he liberally had granted he commanded through all Cities papers and obligations of publick debts to be burnt Never bon-fire more clearly blazed than the same not a creature complained the smoak hurt his eyes Every one praised the Emperour beholding that as his benefits were not frail and transitory so the evils he took away were never to return How could he but do well for the publick seeing Admirable charity in an Emperour he was most liberal towards particulars He was not contented to visite the sick but himself led Physitians along with him thither causing them to minister at his charge and in his own presence that which was necessary for their recovery He was seen after the defeat of the Barbarians which I spake of to run into the Tents of his souldiers to enquire the number of the hurt and himself with his own victorious hands to touch the wounds and cause them instantly to be drest hastening and encouraging the surgeons And if any poor souldier through distast refused to take broath he would sit down by him and charm him with such sweetness of words till he obtained of him that which conduced to his health He ceased not to comfort the most afflicted to congratulate with the most happy to enquire into the necessities of all the world even to the making the packs of a poor subject to be carried by his own mules and all this did he indefatigably with singular promptness and alacrity void of oftentation giving all and reproching no man Behold the fruits of the good education of S. Ambrose which well sheweth that in making a good man of a great Prince the whole world is obliged The twelfth SECTION The death of the Emperour Gratian and the afflictions of S. Ambrose OUt alas Eternal God who art elder than the beginning of time and more durable than the end of Ages must great gifts be so freely given to the world to become so short My pen abhorreth to pass beyond the bloud of this poor Prince in whom the earth had nothing to wish but immortality Behold what a wound it is for the Empire what sorrow in the Church and a touchstone to the virtue of S. Ambrose Gratian after the death of his father had reigned about seven years when behold a monster started up in England to dispossess its natural Prince and cast fire and confusion into the Empire It was Maximus who according to the relation of Zosimus was a Spaniard by Nation companion of the great Theodosius and Captain of the Roman troups which were then in great Britain This wicked man vexed to the quick that the Emperour Maximus rebelleth against his Prince and his wicked disposition Gratian had associated Theodosius in the Empire without ever mentioning himself at all resolved to enter into the Throne by tyranny since he could not arrive thither by any merit Never Tyrant used more industrie to cover his ambition than did this man Never hath any sought more support from the dissimulation of sanctity and justice yet I beseech those who make account by the like ways to bring their purposes to pass to learn by the success of Maximus that if the arm of God sustain not an affair the more exaltation it receiveth the deeper ruins it findeth Maximus then a son of the earth who had nothing great in him but the desire of reign made himself sometime an English man other-while a Spaniard ever leaning to that side where he saw most support for his affairs As an English man he laboured to have it thought he had some correspondence of affinity with Saint Helena mother of great Constantine and he was so impudent as to take the very name of that family causing himself to be proudly called Flavius Clemens Maximus As a Spaniard he would be reputed the allye of Theodosius whom he saw to be powerfull in the affairs and whose force he more feared than loved his advancement As for Religion he well discovered by the effect that he had no other God but honour Notwithstanding like those who provide oyl to burn in the lamps of Idols as well as in that of the living God he embraced all sorts of
can ought avail me Ruffinus notwithstanding insisted protesting he would instantly perswade the Bishop what ever he pleased He failed not to find out the Bishop but the Saint gave him a very sharp reprehension advising him rather to dress his own wounds than intercede for others for he partly understood that he had a hand in this fatal counsel Ruffinus notwithstanding plyed it all he could and endeavoured to charm this man with fair words saying finally for conclusion he would immediately accompany the Emperour to the Church S Ambrose who was ever very serious answered If he come thither as a Tyrant I will stretch out my neek but if in quality of a Christian Emperour I am resolved to forbid him entrance Ruffinus well saw the Bishop was inflexible and went in haste to advise the Emperour not yet on this day to hazard his approach to the Church He found him on his way as a man distracted that had the arrow in his heart and hastened for remedy and he saying he had dealt with the Bishop It is no matter saith Theodosius let him do with me what he please but I am resolved to reconcile my self to the Church S. Ambrose advertised that Theodosius came went Aedicula jaculatoria out and expected him at the door of a little Cell seperated from the body of the Church where ordinarily salutations were made Then perceiving him environed with his Captains Come you oh Emperour saith he to force us No saith Theodosius I come in the quality of a most humble servant and beseech you that imitating the mercy of the Master whom you serve you would unloose my fetters otherwise my life will fail What penance replieth the holy man have you done for the expiation of so great a sin It is answereth Theodosius for you to appoint it and me to perform it Then was the time when to correct the precipitation of the Edict made against the Thessalonians he commanded him to suspend the execution of the sentence of death for the space of thirty days after which having brought him into the Church the faithfull Emperour prayed not standing on his feet nor kneeling but prostrated all along on the pavement which he watered with his tears tearing his Psal 118. Adhaesit pavimento anima mea vivisica me secundùm verbum tuum hair and pitifully pronouncing this versicle of David My soul is fastened to the pavement quicken me according to thy word When the time of Oblation was come he modestly lifted up himself having his eyes still bathed with tears and so went to present his offering then stayed within those rayls which seperated the Priests from the Laity attending in the same place to hear the rest of Mass Saint Ambrose asked him who set him there and whether he wanted any thing The Emperour answered He attended the holy Communion of which the sage Prelate being advertised he sent one of his chief Deacons which served at the Altar to let him understand that the Quire was the place of Priests and not of the Laicks that he instantly should go out to rank himself in his order adding the Purple might well make Emperours not Priests Theodosius obeyed and answered that what he had done was not on purpose but that such was the custom of the Church of Constantinople Yea it is also remarkable that returning afterward into the East and hearing Mass at Constantinople on a very solemn festival day after he had presented his offering he went out of the Quire whereat the Patriarch Nectarius amazed asked him why his Majesty retired in that manner He sighing answered I in the end have learned to my cost the difference between an Emperour and a Bishop To conclude I have found a Master of truth and to tell you mine opinion I do acknowledge amongst Bishops but one Ambrose worthy of that title Behold an incomparable authority which was as the rays of his great virtue and sanctity from whence distilled all that force and vigour which he had in treating with all men I imagine I hitherto have exposed the principal actions of S. Ambrose to the bright splendour of the day and so to have ordered them that all sorts of conditions may therein find matter of instruction It hath not been my intention to distend them by way of Annals but historical discourses proper to perswade virtue So likewise have I not been willing to charge this paper with other particular narrations which may be read in Paulinus Sozomen Ruffinus and which have exactly been sought out by Cardinal Baronius suitable to his purpose I conclude after I have told you that Paulinus his Secretary witnesseth he writing by him a little before his death saw a globe of fire which encompassed his head and in the end entered into his mouth making an admirable brightness reflect on his face which held him so rapt that whilest this vision continued it was impossible for him to write one word of those which Saint Ambrose dictated As for the rest having attained the threescore and Death of S. Ambrose fourth year of his age he was accounted as the Oracle of the world for they came from the utmost bounds of the earth to hear his wisdom as unto Solomon and after the death of Theodosius Stilicon who governed all held the presence of Saint Ambrose so necessary that he esteemed all the glory of the Roman Empire was tied to the life of this holy Prelate In effect when on the day of holy Saturday after his receiving the Communion he had sweetly rendered up his soul as Moses by the mouth of God a huge deluge of evils overflowed Italie which seemed not to be stayed but by the prayers of this Saint Let us I beseech you pass over his death in the manner of the Scripture which speaketh but one word of the end of so many great personages and let us never talk of death in a subject wholly replenished with immortality Oh what a life what a death to have born bees in his first birth on his lips and at his death globes of light in his mouth What a life to be framed from his tender age as a Samuel for the Tabernacle not knowing he was designed for the Tabernacle What a life to preserve himself in the corruption of the world in a most undefiled chastity as a fountain of fresh water in midst of the sea What a life to arrive to honour and dignities in flying them and to have enobled all his charges by the intefrity of his manners What a life not to have taught any virtue before he practised it and to become first learned in examples before he shewed himself eloquent in words What a life so to have governed a Church that it seemed a copy of Heaven and an eternal pattern of virtues What a life to have born on his shoulders the glory of Christendom and all the moveables of the house of God! What a life to have so many times trampled the head of
impatience She to appease him excused herself upon the necessity of the accident happened but this notable Astrologer hearing speech of the birth of a child forsooke the pot and glass which he dearly loved and endeavoured to set the Horoscope of this Ablavius newly come into the world And thereupon said to the hostess Go tell your neighbour she hath brought forth a son to day who shall be all and have all but the dignity of an Emperour I think with Eunapius that such tales are rather made after events to give credit to judicial Astrology than to say they have any foundation upon truth It is not known by what means he was advanced but he came into so great an esteem that he governed the whole Empire under Constantine who freely made use of him as of a man discreet and vigilant in affairs though much displeased to see him too eager in his proper interests And it is said that walking one day with him he took a stick in his hand and drew the length of five or six foot on the earth then turning towards his creature Ablavius why so much sweat and travel In the end of all neither I nor thou shall have more than this nay thou dost not know whether thou shalt have it or no. He was the cause by his factions that Constantine almost caused one day three innocent Captains to be punished with death being ill inform'd had it not been that S. Nicholas then living appeared in a dream the same night to Constantine and Ablavius threatning if they proceeded any further God would chastise them which made them stay execution Ablavius notwithstanding was so tyed to the earth that the words and examples of his Master had small power over his soul in such sort that he had an unhappy end ordinary with those who abuse the favours of God For after the death of Constantine Constantius who succeeded in the Empire of his father taking this man as it were for a Pedagogue so much authority had he assumed unto himself and thinking he could not free himself of his minority but by the death of Ablavius caused him miserably to be butchered sending two for executours of this commission men suborned who saluted him with great submissions and knees bended to the earth in manner of Emperour He who before had married one of the daughters of the Emperour Constans brother of Constantius thinking they would raise him to the dignity of Caesar asked where the purple was They answered they had no commission to give it him but that those who should present it were at his chamber dore He commandeth them to be speedily brought in These were armed men who approaching near unto him instead of the purple inflicted a purple death transfixing him with their swords and renting him as a Sacrifice If the poor man following his Masters example had been willing to set limits upon his fortune and taken shelter at least in the storm to meditate upon the affairs of his conscience he would the less have been blamed but natural desires have this proper that they are bounded by nature which made them The fantasies of ambition which grew from our opinions have no end no more than opinion subsistence For what bounds will you give to the falsehood and lying of a miserable vanity which filleth the spirit with illusion and the conscience with crimes When one goeth the right way he findeth an end but when he wandereth a-cross the fields he makes steps without number errours without measure and miseries without remedy The thirteenth SECTION The death of Constantine IT seemeth great men who have lived so well should never die and that it were very fit they still did what they once have done so happily But as they entred not into life by any other way than that of birth as men so must they issue out from this ordinary residence of mortals as other men Constantine had already reigned thirty and one years and was in the threescore and third of his age living otherwise in a prosperous old age and having a body exceedingly well disposed to the functions of life for he incessantly travelled in the duty of his charge without any inconvenience ordering military matters in his mind instituting laws hearing embassages reading writing discoursing to the admiration of all the world This good Prince earnestly desired the conversion of all the great-ones of his Court. Behold why not satisfied with giving them example of a perfect life he inflamed them to good with powerful words which were to souls as thunder-claps to Hinds not for the delivery of a beast but the production of salvation A little before his death he pronounced in his Palace to those of his Court a very elegant Oration of the immortality of the soul of the success of good and evil of the providence of God in the recompence of pure souls of the terrour of his justice upon the incredulous and reprobate This divine man handled these discourses with so much fervour and devotion that he seemed to have his ear already in heaven to understand mysteries and enjoy an antipast of Paradise A while after he felt some little inequality of temperature in his body which was with him very extraordinary so sound and well composed he was Thereupon he was taken with a fever somewhat violent and causing himself to be carried to the baths he remained not long there for little regarding the health of his body in comparison of the contentment of his soul he was possessed with a great desire to go to Drepanum in Bythinia a Citie which he surnamed of his good mother where was the bodie of S. Lucian the Martyr to which he had a particular devotion He being transported into this desired place felt in this heart an alacrity wholly celestial and for a long time remained in the Church notwithstanding the indisposition of his body fervently praying for his own salvation and the universal repose of his Empire From thence he went directly to a Palace which he had in the suburbs of Nichomedia where feeling the approaches of death he disposed himself for his last hour with the marks of a piety truly Christian His Princes and Captains who heard him speak of death being desirous to divert his mind from this thought said He was become too necessary for all the world and that the prayers of all men would prolong his life But he Of what do you speak to me as if it were not true life to die to so many dead things to live with my Saviour No this heer is not a death but a passage to immortality If you love me hinder not my way one cannot go too soon to God This spoken he disposed of his last Will with a constant judgement and couragious resolution declaring in his Testament the estate of affairs he would establish even in the least particulars and very well remembring all his good servants for whom he ordained pensions and rewards for every one
civil life which happeneth to them through depraved habits and inordinate idleness whereinto they have suffered themselves to slide from their tender years or by some other corruptions of a melancholy spirit which they soment to the prejudice of their repose These kind of natures are good neither in the countrey citie house-keeping nor in religion For we find that in all things we must use endeavour and that we came into the world as into a galley where if one cannot manage either the stern or oar he must at the least make a shew to stir his arms and imitate the Philosopher Diogenes who roled his tub up and down wherin it was said he inhabited to busie himself For my August l. â— de Civit. Dei Philo de sacri Abel Cain part I like well those people who banished all idle gods out of their walls and retained such as enjoyned travel For to live and take pains is but one and the same thing and that which the nourishment we take operateth for the preservation of life labour doth the like for accommodation thereof In the fifth station you have women of the sea who Non est ira super iram mulieris Eccles 15. much deceive the world by their fair semblances for they at first appear quiet and peaceable as a sea in the greatest calm having no want of grace or beauty which promiseth much good to those who know them not but one would not believe how they shift away upon the least wind of contradiction which is raised how they are puffed up and become unquiet with anger love avarice jealousie and other passions very active Such an one seeth the flower of the thorn who knoweth not the pricking thereof and such an one beholdeth with admiration those excellent beauties who cannot believe how many pricks and stings they cover under these imaginary sweetnesses You shall therein ordinarily observe very great levity and impatience which maketh them hourly to change their resolution in such sort that they think nothing so miserable as to remain still in one and the same condition I have seen young widows who had washed S. Zeno Hoâ— de continent the bodies of their husbands with their tears wiped them away with their hairs and as it were worn it by force of kisses and who not content with these ardent affections discharging the surplusage of their passion upon their own proper bodies tore their hair pulled their cheeks were rather covered with dust than apparel They died every hour saying they could not live one sole moment without their best-beloved and filled the air and earth with their complaints which was the cause why such as came to the funerals knew not whether they should bewail the dead or the dying Notwithstanding presently after these goodly counterfeitings they began again to reform their hair and change the dust of the pavement into the powder of Cypress to put painting upon their tears to adorn with a carcanet of pearl the neck which they seemed to destine to a halter to seek for Oracles from their looking-glass and to do all things as if death and love conspired to make their feast in one and the same Inn. I have observed others who being yet under the yoak were the best servants in the world but as soon as they saw themselves at liberty there were no worse mistresses than they There are noted to be in the heart of a woman the passions of a tyrant and should they continually have wheels and gibbets at their command the world would become a place of torture and execution Never have I seen passions more hard to vanquish for in the end the sea which threateneth the world to make but one element suffereth it self to be distinguished into ditches by little grains of sand which stayed it with the commission they received thereupon from God but when a woman letteth the reins of her passion go there is not as it were neither law divine or humane which can recal her spirit to reason Fair maids take ever from the modesty of your hearts the laws which may be given you by justice In the sixth degree are the natures of the Ape who Custodi te à muliere mâ—lâ— Prov. 6. have a certain malice spightfull and affected and such spirits may be found of this kind who day and night dream on nothing but mischief They are filled with false opinions sinister judgements disdains smothered choller discontents acerbities in such sort that the ray of the prosperity of a neighbour reflecting on their eyes makes them sigh and groan And as those Apes which sculck in the shop of a Trades-man mar his tools disturb his works scatter his labours and turn all topsie-turvie So these malicious creatures spie occasions to trouble a good affair to dissolve a purpose well intended to overthrow a counsel maturely diliberated to cause a retardation on the most just desires and frustrate the most harmless delights How many times do we behold the sun to rise chearful and resplendent in a bright morning and every one is abashed to see a mist arise which in this serenity doth that which blemishes on a fair body It is said it sometimes proceedeth from a sorceress which darkeneth that glorious eye of the day with her charms And how often have you observed prosperities more radiant than the clearest summers day which have been cloyed with duskie vapours by the secret practises of a woman who biteth the bridle in some nook of a chamber Fair maids malice is an ill trade It ever drinketh down at least the moity of the poison which it mingled for others In the seventh Region there are some kind of owls Mulicrum penus avarissimum or wild-cats certain creatures enemies of day of all conversation all civility and all decorum who having received from God many honest enablements to adorn life and to do good to persons necessitous so lock up their entrails that you may sooner extract honey and manna from flints than get a good turn out of their hands How is it possible they should be courteous to oblige their likes since they are many times cruel to themselves defrauding themselves of the necessities of life which are as it were as common as elements to satisfie a wicked passion of avarice that gnaweth them with a kind of fury For they endure in abundance part of that which the damned suffer in flames perpetually and fearing lest the earth may fail them they bewail what is past they complain of the present they apprehend the future they love life onely to hold money in prison and fear not death but for the expence must be made at their funerals Let us take heed we resemble not those fountains Fountain Garamant Holunicus S. Bonaventura in dieta which are so cold in the day that they cannot be drunk and so hot in the night that none dare come near them Let us do good both in life and death
expence above his ability The mother was extreamly troubled at it and restrained what she might her sons purse but he ever found ways to open it again till such time as she dying and the son seeing himself at liberty he flew into exorbitant expences and became indebted a third or a fourth part more than he was worth This is it which ordinarily overthroweth young A pretty touch of Lewis the twelfth to Francis the first men who expect great fortunes and mighty favours They think to be presently in the midst of the City when they afar off see the band of the dyal They suppose they possess blessings which will never be had they promise are engaged much turmoyl and passionately hoping ruin all their hopes Behold a little the goodly support may be expected from men of the world Drusus the Emperours son who bare all glory in bloom is taken into the other world without making any mention at all of his favourite Agrippa falls from the chariot of favour and found there was nothing got by the service of his Master but debts and discontents He reflects on the father to see if any ray of compassion Affiction of a Courtier frustrated of his hopes will dart from his eyes But Tyberius commanded him to be gone from the Court saying for a full reason he could not endure to look on what his son had loved without renovation of his memory and grief The young Prince returneth into Judaea where though the grand-child of a great King he found himself so needy that he wished to die not having wherewith to live There is nothing more bitter to men of quality Poverty the chief scourge amongst all the scourges of the world than poverty which ever draweth along with it four evil companions dependence upon another contempt shame and misery This generous heart thought that death would better his condition But Cypre his wife a Loyalty of a wife to her husband good Princess chased away this melancholy humour and descending so low as the shame of begging for him procured some little money that he the more sweetly might pass this miserable life for verily he sometimes lived at Herod the Tetrarchs charge sometime upon Flaccus Lieutenant of Syria But this kind of life being beggarly waited on with much reproach he grew impatient and resolved to return to Rome to bury himself in the shadow of favour since he could not touch the body of it The poor Princess his wife seeing there was not any would lend him money unless she bound her self for him did it couragiously exposing her person to all the persecutions of creditours to help her husband But a man much indebted is like one possessed Miseries of a man indebted round beset with a Legion of devils no sooner went one out but ten tormented him Agrippa saw himself assaulted by creditours Provosts and Sergeants which more terrified him than arms or warlick Engines The most powerful of them all was a Controuler of the Emperours house who required a huge summe of money from him whereof he was accountable to Tyberius his Exchequer To this he answered very coldly he was ready to satisfie if he pleased to be patient but till the next day but that night he stole away and went towards Rome to draw more near to the flame must burn him Notwithstanding before his coming he wrote to Tyberius who was in his Island of Capreae to sound the likelyhood of his welcome The Emperour who long before had his wound throughly skinned for the death of his Son wrot back again very courteously giving him assurance of welcome and the truth is he found Tyberius who entertained him with extraordinary favour and lodged him in his palace All his businesses went well had it not been this Controuller whose shadow he still saw before his eyes wrote speedily to the Emperour That Agrippa was endebted to his Exchequer in great sums which he had promised to discharge presently but fled like a faithless man and discovered by his proceedings there was nothing but imposture in his actions This unlucky letter at the first destroyed all his Generous act of Antonia credit For the old man who for all his friendship was resolved not to loose a denier caused him shamefully to pack out of his palace and forbad his Guards to admit him any enterance before he had satisfied his creditours The miserable Agrippa seeking out a God of money to make his vows unto went directly without any fear to the Princess Antonia to acquaint her with his misfortune and beg her favour The Lady was so generous and bountiful towards him that she discharged the debt lending him money in remembrance of his dead mother and for that he had been bred with her son Claudius besides she took singular pleasure in his humour This man whose fortune ebbed and flowed saw himself suddenly raised so that entering into amity with Caesar he made a streight league with Caligula by the express commandements of Tyberius who appointed he should follow him These were two notable ramblers whom chance had so very well coupled together as well for conformity of their humours as the encounter of their hopes They began a life wholly sportive not thinking on the time to come but to hope well of it nor dreaming of any thing but that which might make them merry Agrippa persisting in his ordinary delights undertook Flattery of Agrippa one day as he went in coach with Caligula to speak of Tyberius saying That he was as old as the earth and that it seemed death had forgotten him That it was high time he payd tribute to nature as for himself he wished nothing else in the world but quickly to see Caligula Prince of the world in his place well knowing he should lay hold on a good portion of the felicities which all men were to have under his Empire He found not that Caligula although ardently desirous to see himself suddenly Maister shewed to take any pleasure in this discourse so much he feared the Emperour Tyberius He kept his thoughts in his heart not trusting his tongue with them least stones and bushes might have ears It happened by chance that Eutyches Agryppa's coachman heard all his Master said was some space of time without shewing any appearance of it but afterward being brought before the Provost of the City at his Master Agryppa's request for a pilfery committed by him in his house he said he had many other things to speak which concerned the Emperours life whereupon the Provost carried him to Capreae where Tyberius plunged in his in famous pleasures was sometime without seeing him Agrippa who would needs excuse himself before he was accused wholly forgetting the discourse he had held with Caligula earnestly pressed this servant might be heard so far as therein to employ the credit of Antonia who was very powerful with Tyberius The Emperour answered Agrippa need not fret himself so much in
of his power in the misery of mortals but with the Scripture that he separateth light from darkness with a diamond to wit a most strong and resplendent knowledge of the merit and demerit of men What sense is Notable passage Adamante diserevit lucem tenebras Eccles 16. 14. Secundum 70 there to make a power which takes its glory from ignorance and is potent in contempt of reason Is not this to make all terrible even to its own favours What sense is it to appoint a Judge to satisfie the whole world according to desert and to make him sign Decrees irrevocable in favour of some one before knowledge of all merit Cannot we make him potent unless we make him unjust Adde also that in the feeling we have of Praedestination Goodness of God the mercy of the most mild Father shineth with visible marks For we do not make him to damn him through a negligence of thoughts and coldness of affection which cannot be in a God so active or a heart so loving but we believe his goodness extendeth to Cain and Judas and would they have endeavoured they had the means to gain beatitude which never fails any man if he want not correspondence In the end we likewise acknowledge in this point Si voluisset Esau cacurrisset Dei adjutorio pervenisset Aug. ad Simp. l. 4. 2. the most prudent government of God who will have nothing idle in nature nor grace He could enlighten us without the Sun and afford us fruit without the earth but he will his creatures operate and that one unfold the rays of his substance another supply with the juice of its bosom In like manner he is pleased we make his grace to profit us to raise our riches out of his favours and derive our glory from his bounty He will give a title of merit to our happiness to advance the quality of his gifts He will crown in us what comes from himself as if it were wholly ours Why shall we shut up the eyes of his wisdom why tie up the hands of his liberality An Ancient said He more esteemed the judgement of certain men than their proper benefits God will we value both in him that we enjoy his bounty by favour and his judgement by merit The actions of the Sovereign Monarch are free from controul as his gifts from repentance I will leave you now to conclude what quiet we Third point Repose of Conscience may have in our consciences upon the matter of Praedestination I leave you to think whether a good soul have not cause to say O be the Divine Providence praised for evermore since it so worthily hath provided for me I cannot adore its counsels unless I love its goodness It sweeteneth my pains it comforteth my cares when it teacheth me my eternal happiness depends on him and me on him who loveth me tenderly and on me who cannot hate my self unless I derogate from my essence after I have failed in all virtues Courage then we roul not under this fatality which writeth laws on diamonds and ties us to inevitable necessities The fodder is not cast we have yet the mettal boyling apace in hand we may appear on the mould of virtue we may make our selves such by the grace of God as to put our salvation in assurance our life into repose and death into crowns I cannot fear God with a slavish fear since he is nought but goodness but I will ever dread my works since I am frailty it self Let us hereafter live in such sort as we would be judged Let us consecrate our life to innocency and banish all sin Let us undertake piety humility obedience alms and devotion towards the Blessed Virgin which are most assured marks of Praedestination Let us not presume of our own forces nor despair likewise of Gods mercy If we stand upright let us still fear the declining of nature which easily bendeth to evil and if we stoop let us quickly raise our selves again making all avail to our salvation yea our proper falls We have a great Advocate in Heaven who openeth as many mouthes for us as we have inflicted wounds on his body We have inflicted them through cruelty and they will receive us through mercy serving us towards Heaven for a chariot of triumph as they were to us on earth a mirrour in life and a sepulcher in death The sixth EXAMPLE upon the sixth Drawn out of Simeon of Constantinoplâ— MAXIM Of the secret Power of Praedestination PROCOPIUS PRaedestination is an admirable secret wherein Marvellous secret of Praedestination experience teacheth us there is nothing which the happy ought not to fear nor any thing the miserable may not hope Stars fall from the firmament to be changed into dung-hills and dung-hills of the earth mount to Heaven to be metamorphosed into stars The graces of God insinuate themselves by secret ways and the impressions of the will are extreamly nice all that past is a dream and the future a cloud where thunders murmur in the dark We tremble when we read in the History of holy Historia Patrum orientis Raderus Fathers that an Hermit grown white in the austerities of Religion understanding a notable thief had gained Heaven by a sigh he cast forth in the instant of his death was much displeased and presently became nought because God was good blaming his mercy to trie his justice For one sole censure made him loose forty years of penance and drew his foot out of Paradise to deliver his soul to hell I purpose here consequently to produce a singular conversion that you may admire and fear the secret ways of God Simeon of Constantinople is the Authour of it who enlarged it with many words but I will abbreviate it into good proportion which shall render it no whit the less effectual The Emperour Diocletian having pacified Aegypt sojourned sometime in Antioch of purpose to destroy Actor 12. the name of Jesus Christ in the same place where the faithfull began to be called Christians Theodosia a Procopius presented to Dioclesian great Ladie came to him bringing her son along with her named Neanias in very good equipage with purpose to prefer him in Court and satisfie her ambition To make her self the more acceptable she freely protested her deceased husband died a Christian that she had often attempted to work him to forsake this superstition adverse to Gods and men and that being unable to prevail upon his inveterate obstinacy she had manured this young plant speaking of her son carefully training him in the service of the gods and Prince with infinite detestation against Christianitie Diocletian who was much delighted with such accidents loudly praised the Ladie and casting his eye on Neanias he found him of handsom shape good presence understanding and valiant whereof he conceived great hope he might prove hereafter a principal instrument of his desires That which also pleased him the more
not if an enemy he hath done according to the world what he ought If he were wise he hath not done it without reason if simple he deserves compassion Who ever bit a dogg because he was bitten by a dogg Or who ever entered into a combat of kicking with a Mule If he did it in anger let us give him leisure to come to himself and he will correct himself without our trouble to give assistance If it be a superiour or man of eminent quality let us suffer that which God hath set over us if a person of base condition why by striving against him shall we make him our equal What pleasure hath a woman whose hands are so delicate to seek to foul them with crushing flies and catterpillars Let us reflect on the carriage of humane things we are all faulty and live among errours There is no wise man whom some indiscretions escape not We shall never live content if we learn not to excuse in another what our selves are Are we not ashamed to exercise in a life so short eternal enmities Be hold death comes to separate us although we forcibly hold one another by the throat let us give a little truce to our reason light to our understanding and rest to our ashes JESUS in his last words recommended forgiveness to us moistned with his tears and bloud Go we about to tear his Testament that we afterward may pull his Images in pieces The bloud of Just Abel still bubleth on the earth and is unrevenged shall we then seek to revenge it O my God we utterly renounce it with all our hearts and are ready to seal peace with our bloud that by thy bloud thou maist sign our mercy The twelfth EXAMPLE upon the twelfth MAXIM Of Reconciliation CONSTANTIA THere is nothing more certain than that he who seeks revenge shall find the God of revenge It followeth those who pursue it and when they think to exercise it on others they feel it falling on their own heads It is onely proper to base and infamous spirits to endeavour to glut themselves with bloud and to delight in the miseries of mortals but souls the most noble are ever beautified with the rays of clemency Theophilus one of the most bloudy Emperours that Zonar Theophilus a bloudy Emperour ever ware the diadem an enemy both of heaven and earth of Saints and men as he had lived on gall would end in bloud He felt his soul on his lips flying from him and saw death near at hand which he could not escape It was time he should now yield up life to others when it appeared he could no more take it from them But this wicked man holding at that time Thephobus one of his prime Captaines imprisoned in his own Palace upon certain jealousies conceiv'd he was too able a man and well worthy of Empire commanded a little before his death to have his head cut off and causing it to be brought to his bed side he took it by the hair held it a long time in his hands so much was he pleased with this massacre then seriously beholding it he cried out It is true I shall no langer be Theophilus nor art thou any more Theophobus And many times repeating these words he yielded up his damned ghost like a ravenous wolf which passed from bloud to infernal flames although certain revelations spake of his deliverance Behold how having taken in his youth evil habits of cruelty and revenge he persevered in them to his death being besides most unfortunate and infamous in all his enterprises But contrariwise it is observed all great-ones disposed to clemency have been very glorious and most happy before God and men I could here reherse very many yet pursuing our design I rest contented with relation of a notable pardon given by a Queen to a Prince on a Friday in memory of our Saviours Passion It cannot be said but so much the greater and more outragious injuries are so much the more difficult is their pardon especially when one hath full power of revenge in his hands Now the injury whereof we Conradinus speak was the death of poor Conradinus which well considered in all its circumstances rendereth this clemency whereof I intend to speak much more admirable Know then this Prince son of the Emperour Conradus went into Italy with a huge army to defend the inheritance of his Ancestours pretending it to be unjustly usurped by the wily practises of Charls of Anjou He stood at that time in the midst of his armies sparkling like a star full of fire courage when Pope Clement the fourth seeing him pass along with so much Nobility said Alas what goodly victims are led to the Altar His valour in the tenderness of his age was as yet more innocent than wary and he had to do with a Captain whom warlike experience had made more subtile in this profession Charls being ready to give him battel resolved it He gave battle to Charls of Anjou was best to weary out this young vigour to afford him the bait of some success in appearance the more easily to draw him into his snare He gave the leading of one part of his army to a Captain of his called Alardus commanding him to bear all the royal ensings as if he had been Charls of Anjou's person Conradinus thinking he had nothing to do but to conquer what he saw before his eyes for decision of the difference advanced his troups which falling like a tempest upon the enemies quickly dispatched Alardus who was slain in the battel as some histories record carrying from all this ostent of regallity a fatal glory into a tomb This young Mars supposing the war ended by the death of his Adversary presently proclaimed victory at which time Charls of Anjou who lay hidden in a trench with the activest troups as yet very fresh came suddenly upon him He did all that for his defence which a brave spirit might in an evil fortune But his army being cut in pieces he was enforced to save himself after the loss of twelve thousand dead in the place His calamity caused him to change the habit of a King into that of a horse-keeper for his greater security so much he feared to be known by those who would decide the dint of war by his bloud He embarked His taking with his cousin Frederick of Austria to pass unto Pisa committing himself in this disguised habit to a Pilot who much importuned him for his hire He had not then about him either bread or money so that he was constrained to pull off a ring and leave it in pledge to the Pilot to assure the debt He seeing these young men of a graceful garbe and considering this jewel was not a wealth suitable to their habit doubted some trick and gave notice to the Governour a crafty man who complying with the times laid hold of the Princes and put them into the hands of the Conquerour
COURT That it is to no purpose to think upon death so far off and that it always cometh soon enough without thinking on it That the best employment of life is to bewel prepared for death and that good thoughts of death are the seeds of immortalitie 1. IT is a strange thing that men being all made out of one and the same mass are so different in beliefs in reasons in customs and actions as the Proteus in Poetical fables Our manners daily Diversitie of men teach us a truth which says There is not any thing so mutable upon earth as the heart of man Yet we see in the world many honourable personages and good men who travel apace to this triumphant Citie of God this Heavenly Jerusalem looking on the blessings of the other life with an eye purified by the rays of faith and expecting them with a hope for which all Heaven is in bloom But there Opinion concerning the other life are an infinite number of black souls marked with the stamp of Cain who consider all is said of the state of the other world as if it were some imaginary Island feigned to be in the Ocean to amuze credulous spirits and fill them partly with pleasing dreams partly with irksom visions If these people could find some apparent proofs they would easily perswade themselves there were no death but their senses convinced of the contrary from experience of all Ages they believe that which they dare not think on and commonly die after so bruitish a fashion that a man may say They had converted the lights of an immortal spirit wholly into flesh But you generous souls whom at this present I intend to guid through the hopes and terrours of the other life observe this first step you must make to enter into a new world with constancy not unworthy a soul sensible of its immortality 2. Life and death are two poles on the which all Life death the two poles of the world creatures rowl life is the first act moveable and continual of the living thing death the cessation of the same act And as there are three notable actions in things animated the one whereof tendeth to nourishment and increase the other to sense the third to understanding so there are three sorts of lives Divers kinds of life the vegetative the sensitive and the intellectual the vegetative in plants sensitive in beasts the intellectual which onely appertaineth to God Angels and men The intellectual life is divided into two other which are the life of grace and glory In Heaven the place of things eternal reign those great and divine lives which never die and which are in a perpetual vigour being applied to the first source of lives which is God But in the more inferiour rank of the world are dying lives of which we daily see the beginning progress and end Here properly is the dominion of death and our onely mystery is to die well Some do it of necessity others every day anticipate it by virtue Now it is my desire here to shew you That death in the state wherein the world is at this present is a singular invention of Divine Providence whether we consider the generality of men whether we look on the vicious or fix our thoughts on the just 3. Some complain of death but you would see Providence of God concerning the sentence of death in the generality of men much other complaints if in such a life as we live there were no death You would see men worn with years and cares daily to charge altars with vows and prayers men insupportable to all the world irksom to life inexpugnable to death men old as the earth incessantly calling upon the hour of death and almost eating one another with despair God hath herein saith Plato well provided for seeing the soul was to be Plato in Timaeo Pater misericors illis mortalia vincula faciebat shut up in the body as in a prison he hath at least made it chains mortal What makes you so much desire life I find saith the worldling it is a pleasure to behold the light the star elements and seasons There will be much more delight to see them one day under your feet than there is now to behold them over your head Are there now so many years you have been upon the earth and have you not yet sufficiently looked upon the elements There were certain people among the Pagans who by laws forbade a man of fifty years to make use of the Physitian saying It discovered too much love of life and yet with Christians you may find at the age of four-score who will not endure a word of the other world as if they had not yet one days leisure to look into it But I must still Ambr. l. 2. de Abel Cain Non advertitis senectutem hanc aerumnarum esse veteranam processionibusque aetatis miseriarum crescere stipendia Scyllâ—o quodam usu circumsonari nos quotidianis naufragiis perform the actions of life Have you not done them enough See you not that to live long is to be long in the entertainment of travel and misery which extend their power over our heads according as the web of our life lengtheneth Do you not consider we are in this life as fish in the sea perpetually in fear of nets or hooks Will you not say we live here in the midst of misery and envie as between Scylla and Charybdis and that to decline once perishing we daily make ship wrack Notwithstanding we are pleased with life as if man were not so much a mortal creature as an immortal misery Do you not know life was given by God to Cain Revolution troublesom the most wicked man on earth for a punishment of his crime and will it rest with you as a title of reward There is great cause to desire life Were there no other miseries which are but too frequent this anxiety and turmoil of relapsing actions would tyre us What is life but clothing and unclothing rising and down-lying drinking eating sleeping gaming scoffing negotiating buying selling masonry carpentery quarreling cozening rowling in a labyrinth of actions which perpetually turn and return filling and emptying the tub of the Danaïdes and to be continually tied to a body as to the tending of an infant a fool or a sick man That is not it which withdraweth me say you But I must see the world and live with the living Had you been all your life Baseness of the world time shut up in a prison and not seen the world but through a little grate you had seen enough of it What behold you in the streets but men houses horses mules coaches and people who tumble up and down like fishes in the sea who have many times no other trade but to devour one another and besides some pedling trifles hanged out on stals When I have seen all this but for half an hour
quality of a good death is the ready and constant adieu given to the world as did the Blessed Virgin who was so disengaged from it towards death that she touched not earth at all but with the soles of her feet Philo saith God gave Moses leave to live very long perpetually in glorious actions in contemplations in lights so that his body was worn wasted and almost wholly vapoured out into the substance of his spirit By a much stronger reason may one say the like of the Mother of God For it is certain her life was nothing else but a divorce from the world But as Physitians observe that the breath of storks is purified and made sweet in the proportion as they increase in age in such sort that becoming old they yield forth most odoriferous exhalations So the life of this holy Mother which was ever hanging about the heart of her Son ever in the contemplation of the great mysteries of our salvation perpetually in the furnace of love wholly transformed it self into her well-beloved as one wax melted into another as a drop of water poured into a great vessel of wine as incense wasted into flames O what sweetness of breath what odour of virtues in her old age Her body seemed to be exhaled and to vapour out Harph. c. 49. libri de mystic Theol. all in soul the soul which is the knot of life and which possesseth in us the most inferiour part of spirituality dissolved wholly into spirit which is in the middle and the spirit melted entirely into the understanding which hath the highest rank in the soul and which bears the image of the most holy Trinitie Her memory in a silent repose was freed from all rememberances of the world her will resided in languishing fervours and her understanding was wholly engulfed in great abysses of lights there was not one small threed of imagination which tied her to earth O what an adieu to the world It is very well declared in the Canticles by these Cantic 1. 6. Quae est ista quae ascendit per desertum sicut virgula fumi ex aromatibus myrrhae thuris universâ— pulveris pigmentarii The three ties of the world Genes 12. Egredere de terra tua de cognationetua de domo patris tui words Who is it that ascendeth through the desert like a thin vapour composed of odours myrrb incense and all the most curious perfumes Which saith in a word the holy Virgin was wholly spiritualized wholly vapour all perfume all spirit and had as it were nothing of body massiness or earth O how many unreasonably fail in this second condition When death comes to sound his trumpet in our ears and saith to us Let us go thou must dislodge from thy lands inheritances never to return again from thy kinred from the house thy father gave thee to wit thy bodie how harsh that is to ill mortified spirits and which hold of the world by roots as deep as hell and as big as arms Go out of thy land O how hard is this first step to go out of the land to forsake the land not at all to pretend to the land to the gold to the silver to those jewels that inheritance to all that glorious glitter of fortune See the first torment of worldly spirits Such there have been who Desperate desire of worldly goods Joannes Nider seeing themselves in the last approaches of inevitable death have swallowed their gold like pills other to eternize themselves on earth have caused formidable sepulchers to be built wherein they put all their wealths as the Aegyptian King Cheopes who prostituted even his own daughter to raise unto himself a Pyramid for burial so enormous that it seemed the earth was too weak to bear it and Heaven too low to be freed from its importunity Besides he caused to be engraven upon it that the manufactures alone of this sepulcher had cost six millions of gold in coleworts and turneps Others caused to be buried with them dogs horses slaves apparrel dishes to serve them in the other world Yea it is not long ago since there was found in Anno 1544. Belforest Goodly monument of the Emperess Marie Rome a coffin of marble eight foot long and in it a robe embroidered with Gold-smiths work which yielded six and thirty pounds of gold besides fourty rings a cluster of emeralds a little mouse made of another precious stone and amongst all these precious magnificencies two leg-bones of a dead corps known by the inscription of the tomb to be the bones of the Emperess Marie daughter of Stilicon and wife of the Emperour Honorius who died before consummation of marriage About twelve hundred years were passed after she was buried with all these goodly toys which no doubt gave much ease to her soul My God how are we tied to earth Tell me not the like is not done now adays for it is worse since they were buried after death with their riches and you O mortals alive as you are build your sepulchers thereon We see men who having already one foot in the grave if you speak to them of the affairs of their consciences all the spirit yet remaining is perhaps for two or three hours besieged by an infinite number of thoughts of worldly wealth Death crieth out aloud in their ears saying Go from thy land and you pull it to you as with iron hooks After that cometh kinred allies table-frends friends for game buffons amourists and all the delights of former companies Some weep others make shew of tears the rest under a veil of sorrow make bones-fires in their hearts they seem all to appear about the bed and to sing this sad song of S. Augustine Aug. Confes 6. 11. Dimittis ne nos a momento illo non erimus tecum ultra in aeternum Et a momento isto non licebit hoc illud ultra in aeternum Alas do you leave us and shall we hereafter meet no more together Farewel pleasing amities Adieu feasts adieu sports adieu loves This nor that will any longer be permitted from this moment for ever Behold another very slipperie and dangerous step notwithstanding you must leave it Death hasteneth and says Go from thy kinred In the last the body and flesh is presented which seems to say Ah my soul whither goest thou My dear hostess whither goest thou Thou hast hitherto so tenderly pampered me so pompously clothed me so wantonly cherished me I was thy Idol thy Paradise thy little Goddess and where will you put me into a grave with serpents and worms what shall I do there and what will become of me Behold a hard task principally for such of both sexes as have dearly loved their bodies like the Dutchess of Venice Damian opusc in instit ad Blanch. c. 11. The prodigality of a Venetian Ladie and her punishnent of whom Cardinal Petrus Damianus speaketh who was plunged into sensuality
with so much profusion that she could not endure to lodge but in chambers full of delicious perfumes of the East she would not wash her self but in the dew of Heaven which must be preserved for her with much skill Her garments were so pompous that nothing remainned but to seek for new stuffs in Heaven for she had exhausted the treasures of earth Her viands so dainty that all the mouthes of Kings tasted none so exquisite nor would she touch her meat but with golden forks and precious stones God to punish this cursed superfluity cast her on a bed and assailed her with a maladie so hydeous so stinking and frightfull that all her nearest kin were enforced to abandon her none staying about her but a poor old woman already throughly accustomed to stench and death yet could not this proud creature part with her infamous body but with sorrow She was of those souls that Plato calleth Phylosemates which tie themselves to flesh as much as they can and after death would gladly still walk round about their flesh to find a passage into it again Know you what is to be done to die well Cut off in good time the three chains which straightly bind foolish and sensual souls For the first passage that The way how to be well provided for death concerneth earthly goods seasonably dispose of your temporal Entangle not your hands for so short a time as you are to live in great affairs perilous and uncertain which will perplex you all your life and throw you down to death Do not like evil travellers who stay to reckon and contend with their hostess when it is already fair day-light and that the guid wrangles and sweareth at them Digest your little business that you may leave no trouble in your family after death Make a Will clear and perspicuous which draweth not suits after it Preserve your self carefully from imitating that wicked man who caused all his gold and silver to be melted into one mass to set his heirs together by the ears who killed one another sprinkling the apple of discord and the object of their avarice with their bloud Say to your self I brought nothing into the world nor will carry any thing away no not the desire of it Behold one part of my goods which must be restored to such and such these are true debts that must necessarily be discharged Behold another for pious legacies Another for alms to persons needy and indigent another for my servants male and female and my poor friends who have faithfully served me They have wasted their bodies and lives to contribute all they might to my will there is no reason I should forget them Nay I desire mine enemies have some part in my will As for my children and heirs the main shall go to them they will be rich enough if they be virtuous enough Behold how the temporal should be disposed And for so much as concerneth kinred give the benediction of God to your children and all your family leave worthy examples of contempt of the world of humility of patience of charity procure a full reconciliation with your enemies entertain your friends with sage discourses which may shew you gladly accept Gods visitations that you die full of resolutions to prepare them a place and that you expect from their charity prayers and satisfactions for your negligence and remisness If needs some small tribute must be paid to nature in two or three drops of tears it is tolerable But take away these whyning countenances these petty furies these mercenary weepers who weep not knowing why nor for what they mourn As for that which toucheth the state of your body it would be a goodly thing for you to be wail it after you have had so many troubles in it Go out of it like a Tennant from a ruinous house go from it as from a prison of earth and morter Go out of it as on the sea from a rotten leaky ship to leap on the shore and care not much what will become of it after death so it be on holy land Souls well mortified speak not of flesh considering the state of sin but with horrour Yea we find in the bequests of one of the sons of S. Lewis Count of Alencon these words I will Modesty of a son of S. Lewis the Tomb that shall cover my stinking flesh exceed not the charge of fiftie livres and that which encloseth my evil heart pass not thirty livres Behold how the son of one of the greatest Kings in the world speaketh of his body and would you idolatrize yours Lastly for the third condition of a good death it The third quality of a good death must have union with God whereof our Lady giveth us a perfect example For it being well verified by Theologie that there are three unions supernatural and as it were wholly ineffable the first whereof is the sacred knot of the most holy Trinitie which tieth three persons in one same Essence the second is the tie of the Word with humane nature which subsisteth by the hypostasis of the same Word and the third the intimate conjunction of a Son-God with a Mother-Virgin I affirm the Virgin being a pure creature cannot equal either the union of the Trinity or the hypostatical union yet notwithstanding hath the highest place of all created unions as she who was united to God when she lived in the world in the most sublime and sacred manner the spirits of the most exalted Seraphins might imagine which was most divinely expressed by S. Bernard She entered into a deep abyss of divine Profundissimam divinae sapientiae penetravit abyssum quantum sine personali unione creatur◠conditio patitur luci illi inaccesibili videatur immersa D. Bernard serm in signum magnum Mater mea quà m appellatis foelicem inde foelix quia verbum Dei custodit non quia in illa Verbum caro factum est c. Aug. tract 10 in Joan. wisdom so that she was united to light inaccessible so much as a creature might be permitted not arriving to the personal union of God But saying this I not onely speak of the union she had in quality of the Mother of God being one same flesh and one same substance with her Son but of the union of contemplation devotion and submission to the will of God which alone was the center of her felicity as witnesseth S. Augustine My Mother whom you call happie hath all her happiness not so much because the Word was made man in her as for that she kept the word of God who made her and who afterward allied himself to humane nature in her womb as he would say Our Lady was more happy to have conceived God in her heart and continually kept spiritual union with him than to have once brought him forth according to flesh We cannot arrive at this sublime union of the Mother of God but howsoever at least in the last
anima pueri ejus in viscera ejus Eccles 26. 23. Exaltavit vocem ejus de terra in prophetia Tob. 4. 11. of heaven Whom shall I believe touching the verities of God but God himself And verily behold the advise God giveth us to resolve us in doubtful cases which is to follow some great and powerfull authority that may draw our spirits with a strong hand out of so many labyrinths Without it saith S. Augustine there would neither be world rest light wisdom nor religion And if a decisive authority must be chosen where shall we find one more certain than that of a Man-God whose words were prophesies life sanctity actions miracles who by ways secret and incomprehensible advanced the Cross on Capitols and gave a new face to the whole world Now without speaking at this time of the Pentateuc where the Word with his own mouth drew reasons for the immortalitie of the soul against the Sadduces I might alledge the book of Kings where the soul of a little infant returneth into its body at the words of Elias I could produce the true soul of Samuel which returneth from Limbo and speaks to King Saul as the Wiseman rendereth this apparition undoubted which I will shew I might mention the book of Tobias which distinguisheth two places for souls in the other world one of darknes and the other of lights But let us hear Ecclesiastes since Infidels will make an arrow of it against us where after the propositions of the wicked rehearsed in this book to be refuted which must be well observed the Wiseman Eccles 12. 7. decideth and concludes That the body returneth into the earth from whence it came and the spirit to God who gave it Let us hear Wisdom where it is written That the soul of the Just are in the hands of God and Sap. 3. 1. shall not be touched with the torment of death Let us hear the Prophet Daniel who saith Daniel 12. 3. The true Sages shall shine as the brightness of the firmament and that such as instruct many to justice shall be as stars for ever Lastly let us hear our Saviour who speaketh to us clearly and intelligibly in the bloud of all Martyrs Fear not those who kill the bodie and cannot kill the Mat. 10. 28. soul Here will we hold this doctrine of the immortality from his own mouth more than from any other reason he caused us to make it an Article of faith he establisheth upon it all our beatitude why should we then argue and trie new conclusions after the decision of Gods Word 5. I knew well said the wicked man this second Court would condemn me but I am not yet satisfied After nature and faith I appeal to reason I Proofs drawn out of reason will enter into the bottom of my self to know some news of my self What a madness is it to appeal from the decrees of God to reason And yet was this wretch condemned likewise by this tribunal For asking his soul whither wilt thou go What will become of thee after the death of thy body Wilt thou not accompany it in death as thou didst during life I die replieth the soul It is as impossible the light of the Sun become night and fire ice as the soul of man which is the source of life and understanding should be subject to death For from whence should this death and corruption S. Thom. l. 2. contra Gentes c. 79. proceed If thou hast never so little reason thou well seest what the great S. Thomas and all the Sages of the world said A thing cannot die and be corrupted but by one of three ways either by action of its contrary so heat cold moisture and drought corrupt our bodies by their mutual counter-buffs and continual combates or by the want of subject which serves as a basis or foundation to it so the eye dieth when its organ is corrupted or by defect of the assistance of the cause which hath influence into it so the light faileth in the air when the Sun retireth In which of these three kinds wouldest thou corrupt Substantia intellectualis patitur tantum intelligibiliter qui motus potius est perfectivus quà m corruptivus S. Thom. l. 2. contra Gentes c. 55. me Should it be by the action of the contrary I am not subject to bodily impressions but to those onely of the mind which are rather to perfect than corrupt me I am not composed of elements I am not hot cold moist nor drie I admit no contrariety But when I (a) (a) (a) Anima parvo continetur corpore continetque res maximâ—s Aenesius platonicus comprehend in my understanding white black water fire life and death I accord all contraries Death saith (b) (b) (b) Lucr. l. 1. Mors coetum dissipat ollis Lucretius is onely made for the things which have a collection of parts and I am most simple Wilt thou rin me by defect of the body I am of a nature different from body It was sometime without me and I shall be a long time without it for I depend not on it but by accident and chance I take somewhat of it as an hostess in this life but I govern it as a mistress for eternity I make use of the organs of senses but I correct senses and when they tell me the Sun is but a foot broad I prove to them by lively reasons it is much greater than the globe of the earth If I borrow fantasies from imagination I make truths of them and in matter of understanding willing and judging which is my proper profession I have properly nothing to do with bodies as the Philosopher Arist l. 2. de anima l. 2. text 21. Aristotle hath well observed saying I could not be before body but I might remain after the death of body and be separated from it as things eternal from corruptible because I have an action dis-entangled from body which is contemplation All that which is idle perisheth in nature but I have no death because not idle I make it my profession to understand to will and to love which I now exercise in a body but which doth not absolutely depend on body I make use of my senses as of my windows when they shall be no more and that the panes of my prison shall be broken I shall not for all that loose sight but shall see the more easily Behold you not how even at this present I never am more knowing than when I sink into the bottom of my self and separate my self from commerce of sense For I am a Mistress said S. Augustine who see better by my own eyes than by those of my servant Wouldest thou destroy me by the want of an influent cause Needs must God fail if I should be so defective on that part since God having created a thing never reduceth the same to nothing Material creatures are corrupted by changing themselves into
a harder matter for him to preserve souls he created than to derive them from nothing He will because he engageth his Eternal word to give us this assurance yea he will because it is manifested to us by the light of nature One cannot believe a God unless he believe him just and it is impossible to think him just without the belief of an immortal soul as S. Clement reasoneth after Clemens 3. Recogn his Master the great S. Peter For what a stupdity is it to imagine this father of spirits who accommodated the most silly creatures with all the conveniencies of nature hath neglected man so far as to afford him a most lively knowledge and a most ardent thirst of immortality which principally appeareth in the most holy and worthy souls to hold a heart in torment never affording it any means to be satisfied since in all nature he never grants any inclination to any creature whatsoever but that he provideth for its accomplishment But which is more into what mind of a Tartarian can this imagination fall that a sovereign Cause most intelligent very good and Omnipotent should be pleased to burn virtue here with a slow fire to tear it among thorns to tie it on wheels afterward to equal the soul of the most virtuous man of the earth with that of murderers Sardanapaluses and Cyclopes Never should these base thoughts take possession of the heart of man if he had not villified his reason with great sins and drowned his soul in the confusion of bodie Put these prophane spirits a little upon the proof of their opinion and let them consider the reasons of Plinie of Lucretius of Panecus and Soranus they are not men who speak but hogs that grunt They tell you the soul is not seen at its passage out of the body as if the corporal eye were made to see a soul spiritual Doth one see the air the winds odours and the sphere of fire which our soul incomparably surpasseth in subtilitie They ask what doth this soul separated Plin. l. 7. c. 55. Vbi cogitatiâ— illi Quomodo visus auditus aut qued sine his bonum Quae deinde sedes Quae malum ista dementia iterari vitam worte where is its sight its hearing pleasure tast touching and what good can it have without the help of sense Spirits dulled with matter which never gave themselves leisure to find out the curious operations of the soul in the understanding and love whereupon it lives of its own wealth They curiously enquire where so many souls may abide as if hell were not big enough to contain all the Atheists Lastly they adde it is to tyrannize over a soul to make it survive after death Who sees not it is the fear they have of God's judgement causeth them to speak in this manner And are not they well worthy of all unhappiness since they so readily become the enemies of an eternal happiness Let us cut off the stream of so many other reasons and say at this present This should teach us to treat with the dead by way of much respect and most tender charity as with the living It should teach us to use our soul as an eternal substance What would it avail us to gain all the world and The care to be had of the soul loose that which God deigned to redeem by his death Let us forsake all these inferiour and frivolous thoughts which nail us to the earth and so basely fasten us to the inordinate care for our bodies Let us manure our soul let us trim it up as a plot fit to receive impressions of the divinity Let us prepare it for the great day of God which must make the separation of a part so divine from these mortal members Let all that die which may yield to death Let the contexture of humours and elements dissolve as weak works of nature But let us regard this victorious spirit which hath escaped the chains of time and laws of death Let us contemn the remainders of an age already so much tainted by corruption Let us enter into this universality of times and into the possession of Diet iste quem tanquam extremum reformidas aeterni natalis est Sen. ep 102. of eternity This day which we apprehend as the last of our life is the first of our felicities It is the birth of another eternal day which must draw aside the curtain and discover to us the secrets of nature It is the day that must produce us to these great and divine lights which we behold with the eye of faith in this vale of tears and miseries It is the day which must put us between the arms of the father after the course of a profuse life turmoyled with such storms and so many disturbances Let us daily dispose us to this passage as to the entrance into our happiness Let us not betray its honour Let us not wither up its glory Let us not deface the character which God hath given it We are at this present in the world as in the belly of nature little infants destitute of air and light which look towards and contemplate the blessed souls What a pleasure is it to go out of a dungeon so dark a prison so streight from such ordures and miseries to enter into those spacious Temples of eternal splendours where our being never shall have end our knowledge admit ignorance nor love suffer change The sixteenth EXAMPLE upon the sixteenth MAXIM Of the return of Souls GOd who boundeth Heaven and limiteth earth ordaineth also its place to each creature suitable to the nature and qualities thereof The body after death is committed to the earth from whence it came and the soul goes to the place appointed it according to its merit or demerit And as it is not lawful for the dead body to forsake the tomb to converse with the living so the soul is not permitted to go out of the lists Gods justice ordained for it to entermeddle in worldly affairs Notwithstanding as the divine power often causeth the resurrection of the dead for the confirmation of our faith so it appointeth sometimes the return of souls for proof of their immortality I would not any wise in this point favour all the shallow imaginations which entitle sottish apprehensions of the mind with the name of visions but it is undoubted there is no Country in the world nor time throughout Ages which hath not afforded some great example of apparition of spirits by known witnesses and the judgements of most eminent Mitte quoque advivus aliquâ—â— ex mortuit Scriptura lestatur De cura pro mortuis c. 15. c. c. 10. Luc 14. personages S. Augustine holds it is a doctrine grounded on Scripture experience and reason which cannot be gain-said without some note of impudence although he much deny that all the dreams we have of the dead are ever their souls which return again Such was the belief of
whereof the poor have too much been frustrated to establish thy vanities and fatten thee in pleasures Where is thy liberality Where are thy alms toward miserable creatures who die in affliction in the streets Observe justice and take example by my disasters Husband it is thy wife so beloved that speaks to thee saying Ah my dearest friends where is the faith plighted in the face of the Church Where are the faithful loves which should have no limit but eternity Death no sooner absented me from thy eyes but forgetfulness drew me out of thy heart I complain not thou livest happy and fortunate in thy new affections for I am in a condition wherein I can neither envy nor malice any but I complain that not onely after my death the children which are pledges of our love were distastful to thee but thou hast wholly lost the memory of one who was so precious to thee and whom thou as a Christian oughrest to love beyond a tomb Open yet once unto her the bowels of thy charity and comfort by thy alms and good works a soul which must expect that help from thee or some other The seventeenth EXAMPLE upon the seventeenth MAXIM Apparition of Souls in Purgatorie HIstories tell us the apparation of souls in Purgatory are so frequent that he who would keep an account may as soon number the stars in the sky or leaves on the trees But as it is not fit to be too credulous in all may be said thereupon so a man must be very impudent to deny all is spoken of it and to oppose as well the authority of so many great personages as the memory of all Ages He who believes nothing above nature will not believe a God of nature How many extraordinary things are there the experience whereof teacheth us the effects and of which God hideth the reasons from us The Philosopher Democritus disputing with Solinus Polyhistor the Sages of his time concerning the secret power of nature held commonly in his hand the stone called cathocita which insensibly sticketh to such as touch it and they being unable to give a reason of it he inferred there were many secrets which are rather to humble our spirits than to satisfie our curiosity Who Jul. Scal. A Porta Caâ—eraâ— can tell why the theamede which is a kind of adamant draweth iron on one side and repelleth it on the other Why do the forked branches of the nut-tree turn towards mines of gold and silver Why do bees often die in the hives after the death of the Master of the family unless they be else-where transported Why doth a dead body cast forth bloud in the presence of the murderer Why do certain fountains in the current of their waters and in their colour carry presages of seasons as that of Blomuza which waxeth red when the countrey is menaced with war Why have so many noble families Diâ—â—arus Petrus Albinus certain signs which never fail to happen when some one of the family is to die The commerce of the living with spirits of the dead is a matter very extraordinarie but not impossible to the Father of spirits who holdeth total nature between his hands Peter of Clugny surnamed the Venerable and esteemed in his time as the oracle of France was a man who proceeded in these affairs with much consideration not countenancing any thing either frivolous or light Behold the cause wherefore I willingly make use of his authority He telleth that in a village of Spain named the Star there was a man of quality called Peter of Engelbert much esteemed in the world for his excellent parts and abundant riches Notwithstanding the spirit of God having made him understand the vanity of all humane things being now far stepped into years he went into a Monastery of the Order of Clugny there the more piously to pass the remnant of his dayes as it is said the best incense cometh from old trees He often spake amongst the holy Fryers of a vision which he saw when he as yet was in the world and which he acknowledged to be no small motive to work his conversion This bruit came to the ears of Venerable Peter who was his General and who for the affairs of his Order was then gone into Spain Behold the cause why he never admitting any discourses to be entertained if they were not well verified took the pains to go into a little Monastery of Nazare where Engelbert was to question him upon it in the presence of the Bishops of Oleron and Osma conjuring him in the virtue of holy obedience to tell him punctually the truth touching the vision he had seen whilest he led a secular life This man being very grave and very circumspect in all he said spake the words which the Authour of the historie hath couched in his proper terms In the time that Alphonsus the younger heir of the great Alphonsus warred in Castile against certain factious dis-united from his obedience he made an Edict that every family in his Kingdom should be bound to furnish him with a souldier which was the cause that for obedience to the Kings commands I sent into his army one of my houshold-servants named Sancius The wars being ended and the troups discharged he returned to my house where having some time so journed he was seized by a sickness which in few dayes took him away into the other world We performed the obsequies usually observed towards the dead and four moneths were already past we hearing nought at all of the state of his soul when behold upon a winters night being in my bed throughly awake I perceived a man who stirring up the ashes of my hearth opened the burning coals which made him the more easily to be seen Although I found my self much terrified with the sight of this ghost God gave me courage to ask him who he was and for what purpose he came thither to lay my hearth abroad But he in a very low voice answered Master fear nothing I am your poor servant Sancius I go into Castile in the company of many souldiers to expiate my sins in the same place where I committed them I stoutly replied If the commandment of God call you thither to what purpose come you hither Sir saith he take it not amiss for it is not without the Divine permission I am in a state not desperate and wherein I may be helped by you if you bear any good will towards me Hereupon I required what his necessity was and what succour he expected from me You know Master said he that a little before my death you sent me into a place where ordinarily men are not sanctified Liberty ill example youth and temerity all conspire against the soul of a poor souldier who hath no government I committed many out-rages during the late war robbing and pillaging even to the goods of the Church for which I am at this present grievously tormented But good Master if you loved me
find the like to whom wouldst thou have me go but to thy self who doest not yet cease to call me The Gospel upon the third Sunday in Lent S. Luke 11. Jesus cast out the Devil which was dumb ANd he was casting out a devil and that was dumb And when he had cast out the devil the dumb spake and the multitudes marvelled And certain of them said in Belzebub the Prince of Devils he casteth out Devils And others tempting asked him a sign from Heaven But he seeing their cogitations said to them Every Kingdom divided against it self shall be made desolate and house upon house shall fall And if Satan also be divided against himself how shall his Kingdom stand because you say that in Belzebub I do cast out Devils And if I in Belzebub cast out Devils your children in whom do they cast out Therefore they shall be your judges But if I in the finger of God do cast out Devils surely the Kingdom of God is come upon you When the strong armed keepeth his court those things are in peace that he possesseth but if a stronger than he come upon him and overcome him he will take away his whole armour wherein he trusted and will distribute his spoils He that is not with me is against me and he that gathereth not with me scattereth When the unclean spirit shall depart out of a man he wandreth through places without water seeking rest and not finding he saith I will return into my house whence I departed And when he is come he findeth it swept with a besom and trimmed Then he goeth and taketh seven other spirits worse than himself and entering in they dwell there And the last of that man be made worse than the first And it came to pass when he said these things a certain woman lifting up her voice out of the multitude said to him Blessed is the womb that bare thee and the paps that thou didst suck But he said Yea rather blessed are they that hear the word of God and keep it Moralities 1. THe Almond-tree is the first which begins to flourish and it is often first nipt with frost The tongue is the first thing which moves in a mans body and is soonest caught with the snares of Satan That man deserves to be speechless all his life who never speaks a word better than silence 2. Jesus the eternal word of God came upon earth to reform the words of man his life was a lightening and his word a thunder which was powerfull in effect but always measured within his bounds He did fight against ill tongues in his life and conquered them all in his death The gall and vinegar which he took to expiate the sins of this unhappy tongue do shew how great the evil was since it did need so sharp a remedy He hath cured by suffering his dolours what it deserved by our committing sins Other vices are determined by one act the tongue goes to all it is a servant to all malitious actions and is generally confederate with the heart in all crimes 3. We have just so much Religion as we have government of our tongues A little thing serves to tame wild beasts and a small stern will serve to govern a ship Why then cannot a man rule so small a part of his body It is not sufficient to avoid lying perjuries quarrels injuries slanders and blasphemies such as the Scribes and Pharisees did vomit out in this Gospel against the purity of the Son of God We must also repress idle talk and other frivolous and unprofitable discourses There are some persons who have their hearts so loose that they cannot keep them within their brests but they will quickly swim upon their lips without thinking what they say and so make a shift to wound their souls 4. Imitate a holy Father called Sisus who prayed God thirty years together every day to deliver him from his tongue as from a capital enemy You shall never be very chaste of your body except you do very well bridle your tongue For loosness of the flesh proceeds sometimes from liberty of the tongue Remember your self that your heart should go like a clock with all the just and equal motions of his springs and that your tongue is the finger which shews how all the hours of the day pass When the heart goes of one side and the tongue of another it is a sure desolation of your spirits Kingdom If Jesus set it once at peace and quiet you must be very carefull to keep it so and be very fearfull of relapses For the multiplying of long continued sins brings at last hell it self upon a mans shoulders Aspirations O Word incarnate to whom all just tongues speak and after whom all hearts do thirst and languish chase from us all prating devils and also those which are dumb the first provoke and loose the tongue to speak wickedly and the other bind it when it should confess the truth O peace-making Solomon appease the divisions of my heart and unite all my powers to the love of thy service Destroy in me all the marks of Satans Empire and plant there thy Trophees and Standards that my spirit be never like those devils which seek for rest but shall never find it Make me preserve inviolable the house of my conscience which thou hast cleansed by repentance and clothed with thy graces that I may have perseverance to the end without relapses and so obtain happiness without more need of repentance The Gospel upon Munday the third week in Lent S. Luke 4. Jesus is required to do Miracles in his own Countrey ANd he said to them Certes you will say to me this similitude Physitian cure thy self as great things as we have heard done in Capharnaum do also here in thy Countrey And he said Amen I say to you that no Prophet is accepted in his own Country In truth I say to you there were many widows in the dayes of Elias in Israel when the heaven was shut three years and six moneths when there was a great famine made in the whole earth and to none of them was Elias sent but into Sarepta of Sidon to a widow woman And there were many Lepars in Israel under Elizeus the Prophet and none of them made clean but Naaman the Syrian And all in the Synagogue were filled with anger hearing these things And they rose and cast him out of the Citie and they brought him to the edge of the hill whereupon their Citie was built that they might throw him down headlong But he passing through the midst of them went his way Moralities 1. THe malignity of mans nature undervalueth all that which it hath in hand little esteems many necessary things because they are common The Sun is not counted rare because it shines every day and the elements are held contemptible since they are common to the poor as well as the rich Jesus was despised in his own Countrey because he
extream love Jesus the most supream and redoubted Judge who will come in his great Majesty to judge the world fire and lightening streaming from his face and all things trembling under his feet was pleased at this time to be judged as a criminal person Every thing is most admirable in this judgement The Accusers speak nothing of those things which they had resolved in their counsels but all spake against their consciences As soon as they are heard they are condemned justice forsaketh them and they are wholly possest with rage Pilate before he gave judgement upon Jesus pronounced it against himself for after he had so many times declared him innocēt he could not give judgement without protesting himself to be unjust The silence of Jesus is more admired by this infidel than the eloquence of all the world and Truth without speaking one word triumpheth over falshood A Pagan Lady the wife of Pilate is more knowing than all the Laws more religious than the Priests more zealous than the Apostles more couragious than the men of Arms when she sleepeth Jesus is in her sleep when she talketh Jesus is upon her tongue if she write Jesus is under her pen her letter defended him at the Judgement-Hall when all the world condemned him she calleth him holy when they used him like a thief She maketh her husband wash his hands before he touched that bloud the high price of which she proclaimed She was a Roman Lady by Nation called Claudia Procula and it was very fit she should defend this Jesus who was to plant the Seat of his Church in Rome All this while Jesus doth good amongst so many evils He had caused a place to be bought newly for the burial of Pilgrims at the price of his bloud he reconciles Herod and Pilate by the loss of his life He sets Barrabas at liberty by the loss of his honour he speaks not one word to him that had killed S. John the Baptist who was the voice And the other to revenge himself without thinking what he did shewed him as a King He appears before Pilate as the king of dolours that he might become for us the King of glories But what a horrour is it to consider that in this judgement he was used like a slave like a sorcerer like an accursed sacrifice Slavery made him subject to be whipped the crown of thorns was given onely to Enchanters and that made him appear as a Sorcerer And so many curses pronounced against him made him as the dismissive Goat mentioned in Leviticus which was a miserable beast upon which they cast all their execrations before they sent it to die in the desart He that bindeth the showers in clouds to make them water the earth is bound and drawn like a criminal person He that holds the vast seas in his fist and ballanceth Heaven with his fingers is strucken by servile hands He that enamels the bosom of the earth with a rare and pleasing diversity of flowers is most ignominiously crowned with a crown of thorns O hydeous prodigies which took away from us the light of the Sun and covered the Moon with a sorrowfull darkness Behold what a garland of flowers he hath taken upon his head to expiate the sins of both Sexes It was made of briars and thorns which the earth of our flesh had sowed for us and which the virtue of his Cross took away All the pricks of death were thrust upon this prodigious patience which planted her throne upon the head of our Lord. Consider how the Son of God would be used for our sins while we live in delicacies and one little offensive word goeth to our hearts to which though he that spake it gave the swiftness of wings yet we keep it so shut up in our hearts that it getteth leaden heels which make it continue there fixed Aspirations ALas what do I see here A crown of thorns grafted upon a man of thorns A man of dolours who burns between two fires the one of love the other of tribulation both which do inflame and devour him equally and yet never can consume him O thou the most pure of all beauties where have my sins placed thee Thou art no more a man but a bloudy skin taken from the teeth of Tigers and Leopards Alas what a spectacle is this to despoil this silk * * * Ego sum vermis non home Psalm 21. worm which at this day attires our Churches and Altars How could they make those men who looked upon thy chaste body strike and disfigure it O white Alabaster how hast thou been so changed into scarlet Every stroke hath made a wound and every wound a fountain of bloud And yet so many fountains of thy so precious bloud cannot draw from me one tear But O sacred Nightingale of the Cross who hath put thee within these thorns to make so great harmonies onely by thy silence O holy thorns I do not ask you where are your Roses I know well they are the bloud of Jesus and I am not ignorant that all roses would be thorns if they had any feeling of that which you have Jesus carried them upon his head but I will bear them at my heart and thou O Jesus shalt be the object of my present dolours that thou mayest after be the Fountain of my everlasting joys Moralities for Good Friday upon the death of JESUS CHRIST MOunt Calvarie is a marvellous scaffold where the chiefest Monarch of all the world loseth his life to restore our salvation which was lost and where he makes the Sun to be eclipsed over his head and stones to be cloven under his feet to teach us by insensible creatures the feeling which we should have of his sufferings This is the school where Jesus teacheth that great Lesson which is the way to do well And we cannot better learn it than by his examples since he was pleased to make himself passible and mortal to overcome our passions and to be the Authour of our immortality The qualities of a good death may be reduced to three points of which the first is to have a right conformity to the will of God for the manner the hour and circumstances of our death The second is to forsake as well the affections as the presence of all creatures of this base world The third is to unite our selves to God by the practise of great virtues which will serve as steps to glory Now these three conditions are to be seen in the death of the Prince of Glory upon Mount Calvarie which we will take as the purest Idea's whereby to regulate our passage out of this world 1. COnsider in the first place that every man living hath a natural inclination to life because it hath some kind of divinity in it We love it when it smileth upon us as if it were our Paradise and if it be troublesom yet we strive to retain it though it be accompanied with very great miseries
And if we must needs forsake this miserable body we then desire to leave it by some gentle and easie death This maketh us plainly see the generosity of our Saviour who being Master of life and death and having it in his power to chuse that manner of death which would be least hydeous being of it self full enough of horrour yet nevertheless to conform himself to the will of his heavenly Father and to confound our delicacies he would needs leave his life by the most dolorous and ignominious which was to be found among all the deaths of the whole world The Cross among the Gentiles was a punishment for slaves and the most desperate persons of the whole world The Cross amongst the Hebrews was accursed It was the ordinary curse which the most uncapable and most malicious mouthes did pronounce against their greatest enemies The death of a crucified man was the most continual languishing and tearing of a soul from the body with most excessive violence and agony And yet the Eternal Wisdom chose this kind of punishment and drank all the sorrows of a cup so bitter He should have died upon some Trophey and breathed out his last amongst flowers and left his soul in a moment and if he must needs have felt death to have had the least sense of it that might be But he would trie the rigour of all greatest sufferings he would fall to the very bottom of dishonour and having ever spared from himself all the pleasures of this life to make his death compleat he would spare none of those infinite dolours The devout Simon of Cassia asketh our Saviour going toward Mount Calvarie saying O Lord whither go you with the extream weight of this dry and barren piece of wood Whither do you carry it and why Where do you mean to set it Upon mount Calvary That place is most wild stony how will you plant it Who shall water it Jesus answers I bear upon my shoulders a piece of wood which must conquer him who must make a far greater conquest by the same piece of wood I carry it to mount Calvarie to plant it by my death and water it with my bloud This wood which I bear must bear me to bear the salvation of all the world and to draw all after me And then O faithfull soul wilt not thou suffer some confusion at thine own delicacies to be so fearfull of death by an ordinary disease in a doun-bed amongst such necessary services such favourable helps consolations and kindnesses of friends so sensible of thy condition We bemoan and complain our selves of heat cold distaste of disquiet of grief Let us allow some of this to Nature yet must it be confest that we lament our selves very much because we have never known how we should lament a Jesus Christ crucified Let us die as it shall please the Divine Providence If death come when we are old it is a haven If in youth it is a direct benefit antedated If by sickness it is the nature of our bodies If by external violence it is yet always the decree of Heaven It is no matter how many deaths there are we are sure there can be but one for us 2. Consider further the second condition of a good death which consists in the forsaking of all creatures and you shall find it most punctually observed by our Saviour at the time of his death Ferrara a great Divine who hath written a book of the hidden Word toucheth twelve things abandoned by our Saviour 1. His apparrel leaving himself naked 2. The marks of his dignitie 3. The Colledge of his Apostles 4. The sweetness of all comfort 5. His own proper will 6. The authority of virtues 7. The power of Angels 8. The perfect joys of his soul 9. The proper clarity of his body 10. The honors due to him 11. His own skin 12. All his bloud Now do but consider his abandoning the principal of those things how bitter it was First the abandoning of nearest and most faithfull friends is able to afflict any heart Behold him forsaken by all his so well-beloved Disciples of whom he had made choice amongst all mortal men to be the depositaries of his doctrine of his life of his bloud If Judas be at the mystery of his Passion it is to betray him If S. Peter be there assisting it is to deny him If his sorrowfull mother stand at the foot of the Cross it is to increase the grief of her Son and after he had been so ill handled by his cruel executioners to crucifie him again by the hands of Love The couragious Mother to triumph over her self by a magnanimous constancy was present at the execution of her dear Son She fixed her eyes upon all his wounds to engrave them deep in her heart She opened her soul wide to receive that sharp piercing sword with which she was threatened by that venerable old Simeon at her Purification And Jesus who saw her so afflicted for his sake felt himself doubly crucified upon the wood of the Cross and the heart of his dear Mother We know it by experience that when we love one tenderly his afflictions and disgraces will trouble us more than our own because he living in us by an affectionate life we live in him by a life of reason and election Jesus lived and reposed in the heart of his blessed Mother as upon a Throne of love and as within a Paradise of his most holy delights This heart was before as a bed covered with flowers But this same heart on the day of his Passion became like a scaffold hanged with mourning whereupon our Saviour entered to be tormented and crucified upon the cross of love which was the Cross of his Mother This admirable Merchant who descended from Heaven to accomplish the business of all Ages who took upon him our miseries to give us felicities was plunged within a sea of bloud and in this so precious shipwrack there remained one onely inestimable pearl which was his divine Mother and yet he abandons her and gives her into the hand of his Disciple After he had forsaken those nearest to him see what he does with his body Jesus did so abandon it a little before his death that not being content onely to deliver it as a prey to sorrow but he suffered it to be exposed naked to the view of the world And amongst his sharpest dolours after he had been refused the drink which they gave to malefactours to strengthen them in their torments he took for himself vinegar and gall O what a spectacle was it to see a body torn in pieces which rested it self upon its own wounds which was dying every moment but could not die because that life distilled by drops What Martyr did ever endure in a body so sensible and delicate having an imagination so lively and in such piercing dolours mixt with so few comforts And what Martyr did suffer for all the sins of the
whole world as he did proportioning his torments according to the fruits which were to proceed from his Cross Perhaps O faithfull soul thou lookest for a mans body in thy Jesus but thou findest nothing but the appearance of one crusted over with gore bloud Thou seekest for limbs and findest nothing but wounds Thou lookest for a Jesus which appeared glorious upon Mount Tabor as upon a Throne of Majestie with all the Ensigns of his Glory and thou findest onely a skin all bloudy fastened to a Cross between two thieves And if the consideration of this cannot bring drops of bloud from thy heart it must be more insensible than a diamond 3. To conclude observe the third quality of a good death which will declare it self by the exercise of great and heroick virtues Consider that incomparable mildness which hath astonished all Ages hath encouraged all virtues hath condemned all revenges hath instructed all Schools and crowned all good actions He was raised upon the Cross when his dolours were most sharp and piercing when his wounds did open on all sides when his precious bloud shed upon the earth and moistened it in great abundance when he saw his poor clothes torn in pieces and yet bloudy in the hands of those who crucified him He considered the extream malice of that cruel people how those which could not wound him with iron pierced him with the points of their accursed tongues He could quickly have made fire come down from Heaven upon those rebellious heads And yet forgetting all his pains to remember his mercies he opened his mouth and the first word he spake was in favour of his enemies to negotiate their reconciliation before his soul departed The learned Cardinal Hugues admiring this excessive charity of our Saviour toward his enemies applies excellent well that which is spoken of the Sun in Ecclesiasticus He brings news to all the world at his rising and at noon day he burns the earth and heats those furnaces of Nature which make it produce all her feats So Jesus the Sun of the intelligible world did manifest himself at his Nativity as in the morning But the Cross was his bed at noon from whence came those burning streams of Love which enflame the hearts of all blessed persons who are like furnaces of that eternal fire which burns in holy Sion On the other part admire that great magnanimity which held him so long upon the Cross as upon a throne of honour and power when he bestowed Paradise upon a man that was his companion in suffering I cannot tell whether in this action we should more admire the good fortune of the good thief or the greatness of Jesus The happiness of the good thief who is drawn for a cut-throat to prison from prison to the Judgement-hall from thence to the Cross and thence goes to Paradise without needing any other gate but the heart of Jesus On the other side what can be more admirable than to see a man crucified to do that act which must be performed by the living God when the world shall end To save some to make others reprobate and to judge from the heighth of his Cross as if he sate upon the chiefest throne of all Monarchs But we must needs affirm that the virtue of patience in this holds a chief place and teaches very admirable lessons He endures the torments of body and the pains of spirit in all the faculties of his soul in all the parts of his virgin flesh and by the cruelty and multiplicity of his wounds they all become one onely wound from the sole of his foot to the top of his head His delicate body suffers most innocently and all by most ingrate and hypocritical persons who would colour their vengeance with an apparance of holiness He suffers without any comfort at all and which is more without bemoaning himself he suffers whatsoever they would or could lay upon him to the very last gasp of his life Heaven wears mourning upon the Cross all the Citizens of Heaven weep over his torments the earth quakes stones rend themselves Sepulchers open the dead arise Onely Jesus dies unmoveable upon this throne of patience To conclude who would not be astonished at the tranquility of his spirit and amongst those great convulsions of the world which moved round about the Cross amongst such bloudy dolours insolent cries and insupportable blasphemies how he remained upon the Cross as in a Sanctuary at the foot of an Altar bleeding weeping and praying to mingle his prayers with his bloud and tears I do now understand why the Wiseman said He planted Isles within the Abyss since that in so great a Gulf of afflictions he shewed such a serenity of spirit thereby making a Paradise for his Father amongst so great pains by the sweet perfume of his virtues After he had prayed for his enemies given a promise of Paradise to the good thief and recommended his Mother to his Disciple he shut up his eyes from all humane things entertaining himself onely with prayers and sighs to his Heavenly Father O that at the time of our deaths we could imitate the death of Jesus and then we should be sure to find the streams of life Aspirations O Spectacles of horrour but Abyss of goodness and mercy I feel my heart divided by horrour pitie hate love execration and adoration But my admiration being ravished carries me beyond my self Is this then that bloudy sacrifice which hath been expected from all Ages This hidden mystery this profound knowledge of the Cross this dolorous Jesus which makes the honourable amends between Heaven and earth to the eternal Father for expiation of the sins of humane kind Alas poor Lord thou hadst but one life and I see a thousand instruments of death which have taken it away Was there need of opening so many bloudy doors to let out thine innocent soul Could it not part from thy body without making on all sides so many wounds which after they have served for the objects of mens cruelty serve now for those of thy mercy O my Jesus I know not to whom I speak for I do no more know thee in the state thou now art or if I do it is onely by thy miseries because they are so excessive that there was need of a God to suffer what thou hast endured I look upon thy disfigured countenance to find some part of thy resemblance and yet can find none but that of thy love Alas O beautifull head which dost carry all the glory of the highest Heaven divide with me this dolorous Crown of Thorns they were my sins which sowed them and it is thy pleasure that thine innocency should mow them Give me O Sacred mouth give me that Gall which I see upon thy lips suffer me to sprinkle all my pleasures with it since after a long continuance it did shut up and conclude all thy dolours Give me O Sacred hands and adored feet the Nails which have pierced
in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms of me Then he opened their understanding that they might understand the Scriptures And he said to them That so it is written and so it behoved Christ to suffer and to rise again from the dead the third day and penance to be preached in his Name and remission of sins unto all Nations Moralities 1. WE think sometimes that Jesus is far from us when he is in the midst of our heart he watches over us and stretches out his divine hands for our protection Let us live always as if we were actually in his presence before his eyes and in his bosom An ancient Tradition doth observe that after our Lords Ascension the Apostles did never eat together but they left the first napkin for their good Master conceiving that according to his promise he was always with them Let us accustom our selves to this exercise of Gods presence It is a happy necessity to make us do well to believe and apprehend that our Judge is always present If respect make him formidable love will teach us that he is the Father of all sweetness There can be no greater comfort in this world than to be present in heart and body with that which we love beast 2. Jesus is taken by his Apostles for a Spirit because after the Resurrection he pierced the walls and appeared suddenly as Spirits do S. Paul also saith in the second to the Corinthians that now we do no more know Christ according to the flesh that is to say by the passions of a mortal body as S. Epiphanius doth expound it We must make little use of our bodies to converse with our Jesus who hath taken upon him the rare qualities of a Spirit We must raise our selves above our senses when we go to the Father of light and the Creatour of sense He teaches us the life of Spirits and the commerce of Angels and makes assayes of our immortality by a body now immortal Why are we so tied to our sense and glued to the earth Must we suffer our selves to enter into a kingdom of death when we are told of the resurrection of him who is the Authour of all lives 3. Admire the condescending and bounties of our Lord to his dear Disciples He that was entered into the kingdom of spirits and immortal conversation suffers his feet and hands to be touched to prove in him the reality of a true body He eats in presence of his Apostles though he was not in more estate to digest meat than the Sun is to digest vapours He did no more nourish himself with our corruptible meats than the Stars do by the vapours of the earth And yet he took them to confirm our belief and to make us familiar with him It is the act of great and generous spirits to abase themselves and condescend to their inferiours So David being anointed King and inspired as a Prophet doth not shew his person terrible in the height of his great glory but still retained the mildness of a shepheard So Jesus the true Son of David by his condescending to us hath consecrated a certain degree whereby we may ascend to Heaven Are not we ashamed that we have so little humility or respect to our inferiours but are always so full of our selves since our Lord sitting in his Throne of glory and majesty doth yet abase himself to the actions of our mortal life Let it be seen by our hands whether we be resuscitated by doing good works and giving liberal alms Let it appear by our feet that they follow the paths of the most holy persons Let it be seen by our nourishment which should be most of honey that is of that celestial sweetness which is extracted from prayer And if we seem to refuse fish let us at least remain in the element of piety as fish is in water Aspirations THy love is most tender and thy cares most generous O mild Saviour Amongst all the torrents of thy Passion thou hast not tasted the waters of forgetfulness Thou returnest to thy children as a Nightingale to her little nest Thou dost comfort them with thy visits and makest them familiar with thy glorious life Thou eatest of a honey-comb by just right having first tasted the bitter gall of that unmercifull Cross It is thus that our sorrows should be turned into sweets Thou must always be most welcome to me in my troubles for I know well that thou onely canst pacifie and give them remedy I will govern my self toward thee as to the fire too much near familiarity will burn us and the want of it will let us freeze I will eat honey with thee in the blessed Sacrament I know that many there do chew but few receive thee worthily Make me O Lord I beseech thee capable of those which here on earth shall be the true Antepasts to our future glory The Gospel upon Low-Sunday S. John the 20. THerefore when it was late that day the first of the Sabbaths and the doors were shut where the Disciples were gathered together for fear of the Jews Jesus came and stood in the midst and saith to them Peace be to you And when he had said this he shewed them his hands and side The Disciples therefore were glad when they saw our Lord. He said therefore to them again Peace be to you As my Father hath sent me I also do send you When he had said this he breathed upon them and he said to them Receive ye the Holy Ghost Whose sins you shall forgive they are forgiven them and whose you shall retain they are retained But Thomas one of the twelve who is called Didymus was not with them when Jesus came the other Disciples therefore said to him We have seen our Lord. But he said to them Unless I see in his hands the print of the nails and put my finger into the place of the nails and put my hand into his side I will not believe And after eight days again his Disciples were within and Thomas with them Jesus cometh the doors being shut and stood in the midst and said Peace be to you Then he saith to Thomas Put in thy finger hither and see my hands and bring hither thy hand and put it into my side and be not incredulous but faithfull Thomas answered and said to him My Lord and my God Jesus saith to him Because thou hast seen me Thomas thou hast believed Blessed are they that have not seen and have believed Moralities 1. JEsus the Father of all blessed harmonies after so many combats makes a general peace in all nature He pacifieth Limbo taking the holy Fathers out of darkness to enjoy an eternal light and sending the damned to the bottom of hell He pacifieth the earth making it from thenceforth to breathe the air of his mercies He pacifieth his Apostles by delivering them from that profound sadness which they conceived by the imaginary loss of their dear Master
He pacifieth Heaven by sweetening the sharpness of his Heavenly Father quenching by his wounds the fire which was kindled of his just anger Every thing smileth upon this great Peace-maker Nature leaveth her mourning and putteth on robes of chearfulness to congratulate with him his great and admirable conquests It is in him that the Heavenly Father by a singular delight hath poured out the fullness of all Graces to make us an eternal dwelling and to reconcile all in him and by him pacifying by his bloud from the Cross all that is upon earth and in Heaven This is our Joshua of whom the Scripture speaketh that he clears all differences and appeaseth all battels No stroke of any hammer or other iron was heard at the building of Solomon's Temple and behold the Church which is the Temple of the living God doth edifie souls with a marvellous tranquilitie 2. The Sun is not so well set forth by his beams as our Saviour is magnificently adorned with his wounds Those are the characters which he hath engraved upon his flesh alter a hundred ingenious fashions The Ladies count their pearls and diamonds but our Saviour keeps his wounds in the highest attire of his Magnificences It is from thence that the beauty of his body taketh a new state of glory and our faith in the resurrection is confirmed that the good fill themselves with hope miscreants with terrour and Martyrs find wherewith to enflame their courage These divine wounds open themselves as so many mouthes to plead our cause before the Celestial Father Our Saviour Jesus never spake better for us than by the voice of his precious Bloud Great inquiry hath been made for those mountains of myrrh and frankincense which Solomon promiseth in the Canticles but now we have found them in the wounds of Jesus It is from thence that there cometh forth a million of sanctified exhalations of sweetness of peace and propitiation as from an eternal Sanctuary A man may say they are like the Carbuncle which melteth the wax upon which it is imprinted for they melt our hearts by a most profitable impression At this sight the Eternal Father calms his countenance and the sword of his Justice returneth into the sheath Shall not we be worthy of all miseries if we do not arm these wounds against us which are so effectual in our behalf And if this bloud of our Abel after it hath reconciled his cruel executioners should find just matter to condemn us for our ingratitudes John the Second King of Portugal had made a sacred vow never to refuse any thing which should be asked of him in the virtue of our Saviour's wounds which made him give all his silver vessel to a poor gentleman that had found out the word And why should not we give our selves to God who both buyeth and requireth us by the wounds of Jesus 3. Jesus inspireth the sacred breath of his mouth upon the Apostles as upon the first fruits of Christianity to repair the first breath and respiration of lives which the Authour of our race did so miserably lose If we can obtain a part of this we shall be like the wheels of Ezechiels mysterious chariot which are filled with the spirit of life That great Divine called Matthias Vienna said That light was the substance of colours and the spirit of Jesus is the same of all our virtues If we live of his flesh there is great reason we should be animated by his Spirit Happy a thousand times are they who are possessed with the the Spirit of Jesus which is to their spirit as the apple of the eye S. Thomas was deprived of this amorous communication by reason of his incredulitie He would see with his eyes and feel with his hands that which should rather be comprehended by faith which is an eye blessedly blind which knoweth all within its own blindness and is also a hand which remaining on earth goeth to find God in Heaven Aspirations GReat Peace-maker of the world who by the effusion of thy precious bloud hast pacified the wars of fourty ages which went before thy death This word of peace hath cost thee many battels many sweats and labours to cement this agreement of Heaven and earth of sence and reason of God and man Behold thou art at this present like the Dove of Noah's Ark thou hast escaped a great deluge of passions and many torrents of dolours thrown head-long one upon another Thou bringest us the green Olive branch to be the mark of thy eternal alliances What Shall my soul be so audacious and disordered as to talk to thee of war when thou speakest to her of peace To offer thee a weapon when thou offerest her the Articles of her reconciliation signed with thy precious bloud Oh what earth could open wide enough her bosom to swallow me if I should live like a little Abiram with a hand armed against Heaven which pours out for me nothing but flowers and roses Reign O my sweet Saviour within all the conquered powers of my soul and within my heart as a conquest which thou hast gotten by so many titles I will swear upon thy wounds which after they have been the monuments of thy fidelity shall be the adored Altars of my vows and sacrifices I will promise thereupon an inviolable fidelity to thy service I will live no more but for thee since thou hast killed my death in thy life and makest my life flourish within thy triumphant Resurrection FINIS AN ALPHABETICAL TABLE Setting down the most observable Matters contained in the first three TOMES of the HOLY COURT A Aâ—dâ—rites Fol 38 Abdâ—lâ—â—in 7 Abraham the Hermit 86 Abstinence defined 468 The Aâ—â—rons of men must be directed to one assured Butt 67 Apprehension of Affronts 47 Retreat into the Conscience in Affronts is a good remedy against them 58 Aglae a noble Dame 379 She is a worldly Widow ibid. She is in love ibid. Her admirable Conversion 380 Her devotion in enquiry after Martyrs ibid. Her speech to Boniface her Steward ibid. Agrippa Grand-child of Herod 3â—2 His flatterie ibid. Alexander son of Mariamne imprisoned 130 Alms the works of God 9 Ambition an itch 56 It is a forreign vice ibid. It is the life of a slave 57 The Ambitious are miserable ibid. Extream disaster of an Ambitions man ib. Ambitious men travel for Rachel and find 〈◊〉 58 Ambition was the God of Antiochus 347 Sr. Ambrose 175 His Calling ib. His Election 176 His rare endowments 179 His government ib. He cherisheth the Religious 181 He took away superstitions and excesses ib. His puritie of invention ib. His Oration against Symmachus 184 He refuteth Symmachus his strongest arguments ib. His answer concerning the dearth 186 His greatness in the Conversion of Sr. Augustine 188 He speaketh unto the two souls of his Pupils 211 His brave speech to Theodorick 214 The majestie of Sr. Ambrose 205 His prudence and charitie 209 He is persecuted by Justice 206 Resolution of Sr.
corruptible matter of Earth but after he became a Christian he lived upon the most pure influences of heaven S. Gregory Nazianzen saith he more breathed S. Basile then the aire it self and that all his absences were to him so many deaths S. Chrysostome in banishment was perpetually in spirit with those he most esteemed S. Jerome better loved to entertain his spirituall amities in little Bethelem then to be a Courtier in Rome where he might be chosen Pope And if we reflect on those who have lived in the light of nature Plato was nothing but love Aristotle had never spoken so excellently of friendship had he not been a good friend Seneca spent himself in this virtue being suspected by Nero for the affection he bare to Piso Alexander was so good that he carried between his arms a poor souldier frozen with cold up to his throne to warm him and to give him somewhat to eat from his royall hands Trajan brake his proper Diadem to bind up the wound of one of his servants Titus wept over the ruines of rebellious Jerusalem A man may as soon tell the starres in the heavens as make an enumeration of the brave spirits which have been sacrificed to amity Wherefore great hearts are the most loving If we seek out the causes we shall find it ordinarily proceedeth from a good temperature which hath fire and vigour and that comes from good humours and a perfect harmony of spirit little Courages are cold straightned and wholly tied to proper interests and the preservation of their own person They lock themselves up in their proprieties as certain fishes in their shell and still fear least elements should fail them But magnanimous hearts who more conform themselves to the perfections of God have sources of Bounty which seem not to be made but to stream and overflow such as come near them This likewise many times proceedeth from education for those who fall upon a breeding base wretched and extremely penurious having hands very hard to be ungrasped have likewise a heart shut up against amities still fearing lest acquaintance may oblige them to be more liberall then they would contrariwise such as have the good hap to be nobly bred hold it an honour to oblige and to purchase friends every where Add also that there is ever some gentilenesse of spirit among these loving souls who desiring to produce themselves in a sociable life and who understanding it is not given them to enlighten sands and serpents will have spectatours and subjects of its magnificence Which happens otherwise to low and sordid spirits for they voluntarily banish themselves from the conversation of men that they may not have so many eyes for witnesses of their faults So that we must conclude against the Philosophers of Indifferency that Grace Beauty strength and power of nature are on their side who naturally have love and affection §. 2. Of Love in generall LOve when it is well ordered is the soul of the universe Love the soul of the universe which penetrateth which animateth which tieth and maintaineth all things and so many millions of creatures as aspire and respire this love would be but a burden to Nature were they not quickned by the innocent flame which gives them lustre as to the burning Bush not doing them any hurt Fornacem custodiens in operibus ardoris Eccl. 43. at all I may say that of honest love which the wise man did of the Sunne That it is the superintendent of the great fornaces of the world which make all the most Love the superintendent of the great Fornace of the world Faber ferrarius sedens juxta in eodem considerans opus ferri vapor iguis uret carnes ejus in calore fornacis concertatur c. Eccl. 29 38. Pieces of work in Nature Have you ever beheld the Forge-master described by the same wise-man You see a man in his shirt all covered over with sweat greace and smoke who sporteth among the sparks of fire and seemeth to be grown familiar with the flames He burns gold and silver in the fornace then he battereth it on the Anvil with huge blows of the hammer he fashioneth it he polisheth it he beautifies it and of a rude and indigested substance makes a fair piece of plate to shine on the Cup-boards of the most noble houses So doth love in the world it taketh hearts which are as yet but of earth and morter it enkindleth them with a divine flame It beats them under the hammer of tribulations and sufferings to try them It filleth them by the assiduity of prayer It polisheth them by the exercise of virtues lastly it makes vessels of them worthy to be placed above the Empyreall heaven Thus did it with S. Paul and made him so perfect Act. 9. that the First verity saith of him that he is his vessel of election to carry his name among nations and the Kings of the Earth and that he will shew him how much he must suffer for his sake The whole nature of Pigri mortui oetestandi eritis si nihil ametis Amare sed quid ameris videte August in Psal 31. Hoc amet nec ametur ab ullo Juvenal Seven excellent things the world tendeth to true love every thing loves some of necessity other by inclination and other out of reason He who will love nothing saith S. Augustine is the most miserable and wretched man on earth nor is it without cause that in imprecations pronounced over the wicked it is said Let him not love nor be beloved by any The ancient Sages have observed in the light of Nature that there are seven excellent things to be esteemed as gifts from heaven which are clearnesse of senses vivacity of understanding grace to expresse ones thoughts ability to govern well Courage in great and difficult undertakings fruitfulnesse in the productions of the mind and the strength of love and forasmuch as concerneth the last Orpheus and Hesiodus have thought it so necessary that they make it the first thing that came out of the Chaos before the Creation of the world The Platonists revolving upon this conceit have built us three worlds which are the Angelicall nature Vide Marsilium Ficinum in convivium Platonis An exâ—ellent conceit of the Platonists the soul and the Frame of the universe All three as they say have their Chaos The Angel before the ray of God had his in the privation of lights Man in the darknesse of Ignorance and Sinne The materiall world in the confusion of all its parts But these three Chaoses were dissipated by love which was the cause that God gave to Angelicall spirits the knowledge of the most sublime verities to Man Reason and to the world Order All we see is a perpetuall circle of God to the world and of the world to God This circle beginning in God by inestimable perfections full of charms and attractives is properly called Beauty and
the love with which he will be loved and who hath loved us even in disfavour to transport us to favour Whereby it appeareth that this fair love is nought else but a celestiall quality infused into the soul by which we love God above all and all for God Now I imagine with my self that he is born in our hearts in such a manner as pearls grow in their shells The mother of pearl is first pierced by a celestiall influence as with an arrow fiery and sharp which sollicits and importuneth it to dispose it self to this excellent production Which is the cause that it spreads openeth and dilates it self to receive the dew distilled into it from the air and having moistned it it digesteth concocteth and transfigureth it into this little miracle of nature which is with so much curiosity sought after Behold what passeth in a soul when it bringeth forth this precious love it is prevented by a speciall grace from the Divine Goodnesse which at first gives it a distaste of all things in the world and fixeth a generous spur in the heart to excite awaken and enflame it to the quest of so great a good Then it extendeth dilates and opens all its gates to the Holy Ghost who descendeth into it as the dew of Hermon by qualities and Donec Christus formetur in vobis Gal 4. 10. effects admirable which through free-will it embraceth and ties and habituateth it self therein conceiving and forming Jesus Christ as saith S. Paul Then is the time when this divine love is conceived which is no sooner born but it causeth a rejoycing in the heart of man like unto that which happened in the house of Abraham at Isaacs nativity It is a celestiall laughter The Empire and eminencies of Divine love an extraordinary jubilation an expansion of all the faculties and functions of the spirit and will This little Monarch is no sooner born but it begins to command and sits on the heart as in its Throne All powers do it Instructi in charitate in omnes divitias plenitudinis intellectûs Col. 2. 2. Ailredus tom 13. Bibliorum in speculo charitatis Excellent conceit of charity homage all passions render it service All the virtues applaud at its coronation and confesse they hold of it and are all in it He who is once well instructed in charity aboundeth with all riches and hath the full plenitude of the spirit according to the Apostles and is a Tree grafted with siens of all perfection and which fail not to bring forth their fruits Sciences and virtues are that to us which oars to vessels what the viaticum to travellers what light to blear-eyes what arms to souldiers but charity alone is the repose of the wearied the Countrey of Pilgrims the light of the blind the Crown of the victorious Faith and the knowledge of God carry us to our countrey Hope maintaineth us the other virtues defend us but where charity is perfect as it is in glory one no longer believes any thing because it seeth all one hopes for nought because he possesseth all Temperance combateth against Concupiscence Prudence against errour Fortitude against adversity Justice against inequality But in perfect charity there is a perfect chastity which standeth not in need of the arms of temperance having no blemish of impurity A perfect knowledge which expecteth not any help from ordinary Prudence since it hath no errours a perfect Beatitude which needeth not Fortitude to conquer adversities since to it nothing is uneasie a Sovereign peace which imploreth not the aid of Justice against inequality since all therein is equall For in a word what is charity but a temperate love without lust A prudent love without errour a strong love without impatience a just love without inequality Faith is the first day of our Creation which driveth away darknesse Hope is the second which makes a firmament for us and which divideth waters from waters things transitory from eternall Temperance is the third which arraungeth the waters and storms of passions in their proper element and causeth the land of our heart to appear which sendeth up vapours to God that are its sighs Prudence is the fourth which lighteth up in us the sun of understanding and the lights of knowledge Fortitude is the fifth which sustains us in the Ocean of adversities not suffering us to corrupt as fishes in salt-waters and as birds above the Tempest Justice the sixth for it gives us to command over our passions as Adam who on the same day he was created obtained it over all living creatures But charity is the seventh day The Symbole of Glory which contracteth all delights in the circle of its Septenary And how can it but abbridge all Theology since it abbridgeth God himself S. Zeno ser de fide spe charit Tu Deum in hominem demutatum voluisti tu Deum abbreviatum paulisper à majestatis suae immensitate peregrinari fecisti tu virginali carcere nove nâ—mensibus religasti tu mortem Deum mori docendo evacusti and that we have cause to speak to him in such terms as Saint Zeno did O love what hast thou done Thou hast changed God into Man Thou hast contracted him drawing him out of the lustre of his Majesty to make him a pilgrime on earth Thou hast shut him in the prison of a virginall womb the space of nine moneths Thou hast annihilated the empire of death when thou taughtest God to dy Love thus acknowledged by all the virtues mounteth as on a chariot of Glory maketh it self conspicuous with heroick and noble qualities It is pious since it employeth all its thoughts on God It is generous and magnanimous since it is ever disposed to great designs It is liberall as that which spareth nothing It is strong not yielding to any of all those obstacles which present themselves to divert the course of its intentions Qualities of divine love by which we may know whether it inhabit a soul It is just equally distributing rewards to merit It is temperate admitting no excesses but of love It is prudent having eyes alwayes upon its deportments It is witty to find out a thousand inventions It is violent without eagernesse active without participation sage without coldnesse good without remissnesse and calm without idlenesse But I must tell you though its perfections be without number you shall chiefly know it by three qualities Three principall marks of love which will make it appear unto you plyant obliging and patient I say plyant for there is nothing but fires desires sweetnesse affections joyes admirations extasies Plyantness pleasures transportments for its well-beloved This is the State which the great Origen figureth unto us Orig. Hom. de Magdal of S. Mary Magdalen when he saith that by the strength of love she was dead to all the objects of the world She had her thoughts so employed upon her Jesus that she was almost insensible she had
nothing but God and It God who was in it with eternall contentments It which was in God with reciprocall and wholly ineffable affections This heart of Jesus resembled the Halcions nest which cannot hold one silly fly more then the bird it self So he knew not how to lodge one creature in himself to the prejudice of the Creatour but could tell how to lodge them altogether to uâ—ite them to their Head O it was properly his businesse to give us this lesson which he afterward dictated by one of his Oracles He loveth thee not August â—olil Minà s tâ— amat qui tâ—cum aliquid amat quod propter te non amat Apoc. 8. enough whosoever loveth any thing with thee which he loveth not for thee From solitude he entred into the silence which Synesius calleth Beatifick Silence and which S. John placeth in heaven in the peacefull condition of the Blessed It was properly the calm and repose which the holy soul of Jesus took with his heavenly Father in his divine Orisons which he many times continued the space of whole nights watching and weeping for us and dwelling as it were in the fire of love It is that silence which the Canticle calleth the Cantic 3. Bed of Solomon encompassed with threescore valiant ones but of that great Host of Angels From silence he passed to the suspension whereof Job speaketh Job 7. 15. Elegit suspendium anima 〈◊〉 where his soul felt it self totally pulled up by the root from earth but not as yet placed in heaven because he was corporally in this transitory life We verily find three admirable suspensions in Nature That of water in the clouds of Heaven above the clouds and of earth under the clouds and two ineffable suspensions in the Humanity of Jesus The first is that of his blessed soul which was alwaies hanging at the heart of God and the second of his body on the Crosse to purifie by his death all the regions of the world both above and beneath above by the exhalation of his spirit beneath by the effusion of his bloud After suspension he mounted to insatiability which Daâ—iâ—â— Cardi. â—â— Hymno dâ— Paradiso Avidi semper plâ—ni quod habent de â—â—â—â—rant caused him that drinking those eternall sources by long draughts in the delighrs of Contemplation which streams upon him from heaven he slaked his thirst in his own bosome not quite quenching it therein retaining the condition of those who see God of whom it is said That they are still replenished yet still greedy incessantly desiring what they possesse From insatiability he came to the degree of Indefatigability which caused him perpetually to spend himself in most glorious labours for the redemption of the world measuring and running over the earth as the sun doth Heaven and fowing virtues and benefits every where to reap nought but Ingratitude From thence he proceeded to that Inseparability which tied him for the love of his heavenly Father not onely to the punishment of the Crosse but to so many scorns and miseries as he embraced for us and he made so much account of this mortall flesh which he took of us that he associated it unto himself with an eternall band and hath transmitted it into the bosome of Immortality placing his wounds which were the characters of his love and of our inhumanity even in the sanctuary of the most blessed Trinity From this Inseparability he suffered himself to slide into languours extasies and transanimations which make up a Deified love such as was that of Jesus Languour dried him up with the zeal he had for our salvation exhausting all the strength of his body and to speak with Philo he seemed as if he would have transformed his flesh into the nature of Mark 3. 21. his spirit causing it to melt and dissolve under the ardours of ineffable affection as we see a Myrrhe-Tree which distilleth the first fruits of its liquour under the lustre of the sun-beams Extasie which bare this great soul with a vigorous violence to the heart of God made a truce in all the actions of sensitive nature and as it happeneth that the Ocean extraordinarily swelling up upon one shore forsaketh the other So the spirit of our Saviour already divinized amassing together the whole multitude of his forces to serve his love and satisfie the passion he had towards his celestiall Father overflowed in the heart of the Divinity with so immeasurable a profusion that all his inferiour Nature seemed to be forsaken and despoiled of the presence and government of his soul In the end he entred into that transanimation which Orig. 2. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Anima ilia quasi scrâ—um in igne semper in verbo semper in sapientia semper in Deo in convertibilitatem ex verbi Dei unitate indesinenter ignita possidebat so powerfully united him to God that onely retaining the property of two natures Divine and Humane he made an incomparable commixtion of heart of love of affections and conformities which made Origen say This soul like unto Iron which is on burning Coles was alwayes in the word alwayes in wisdome ever in God and took an immutable constancy from the ardour wherewith it is enkindled in the union of God If you find this love too sublime for you behold it as it were tempered and reflected in so many saints as were S. Paul S. Augustine S. Bernard and so many other §. 13. A notable Example of worldly love changed into divine Charity I Will give you a very familiar one in a man of the world a man of the Court and one who is at this present a treasure hidden from many who was hated by the envious persecuted by the proud condemned by the Ignorant and yet a great servant of God It is the learned and pious Raymundus Lullus as it Vitae Patrum Occid l. â— Ex Carolo Bovillo appeareth by his life faithfully written in the Tome of the lives of the Western Fathers This man flourished above three hundred years ago and was born in the Island of Majorica of a notable extraction which gave him passage into worldly honours and caused him to be bread in the Court of his King by whom he afterward was made one of his prime Officers Never was there a man more inclining to love for he loved transportedly and spent all his youth in this vanity having no employment more acceptable then to write amourous verses to expresse his passion In the end he fell into the snare of a violent affection that long turmoiled him which was the love of an honourable Lady endowed with an invincible chastity Here ordinarily love which delights to pursue what it cannot arrive unto finds most admiration for the eyes and food for its flame He was so on fire in this quest that he thought he should lose his wits suffering himself to fall into unbeseeming and extraordinary actions so farre as being one day on horse-back
facil and sweet The one took the golden branch with violence the other gathered it gently as if the Providence of God had put it into his hands Now Raymond not satisfied with seminaries of students embraced the conquest of the Holy Land and stirred up many cities of Italy in this matter exhorting them to make contributions wherein he was so perswasive that the city of Pisa alone which is none of the greatest furnished him with devotists who made of one sole free gift twenty five thousand crowns which he would by no means handle leaving it to the dispose of the Pope who would not give ear to the erection of new Colledges so much were the affairs of the Papacy embroiled He more easily obtained one thing which was one of his three wishes to wit the suppression of the books of Averroes an enemy to Christianity which many with too much curiosity read in the Schools of Philosophy God many times grants good dispositions to his servants whereof he will not they have the accomplishment making them appear more eminent in sufferings then actions This great man was of the number of those for he made himself most remarkable in the love of suffering wandring over the world in extreme poverty great incommodities of heat cold nakednesse hunger scorns contempts dolours banishments dangers both by sea and land shipwracks treasons chains prisons and a thousand images of death One day travelling alone through a huge forrest he met two lions which caused some little fear of death in him as he witnesseth in his writings desirous to live that he might yet on earth serve his well-beloved but in this great surprisall be had a thought that love would put it self into the midst of this passage and make him endure death with the more contentment herewith he comforted himself and the lions drew near and licked his face bathed in tears of Devotion and kissed his feet and hands doing him no harm Men were more sharp and discourteous to him who ceased not to drag him before Tribunals to charge him with calumnies for his extraordinary wayes to give sentence against him but in all he appealed to his well-beloved who never forsook him Seeing himself destitute of all succour for the conversion of Sarazens he passed alone into the kingdome of Thunes where he freely disputed with the chief of the Mahometans concerning the greatnesse and excellency of our Faith against the impostures of Mahomet which was the cause that he was immediately cast into prison and condemned by the King himself to have his head cut off to which he disposed himself with an incomparable fervour of love At which time one of the prime men of State in the countrey who had conceived well of him out of the admiration of his wit perswaded the King to be satisfied with banishing him out of his kingdome and that by this way he should do all he was obliged unto for the preservation of his own law and should get the reputation of a mild Prince among Christians abstaining from the bloud of such a man which he did but he was thrust out of Thunes with so many blows and ignominies that he therein gained a noble participation in the Crosse of Jesus Christ The fervour which incessantly boiled in his veins suffered him not to be long at rest He went into the kingdome of Bugia as Jonas into Nineveh crying out aloud through the streets that there was in the world but one Religion and that was ours and that the law of Mahomet was a meer imposture and a fantasie He was instantly laid hands on as a mad-man and lead to the high Priest named Alguassin who asked him whether he knew not the Laws of the countrey which forbad him upon pain of death to speak against Mahometisme To which he answered he could not be ignorant of it but that a man who knew the truth of Christian Religion as he did could do no other but seal it with his blood This Alguassin proud of science perceiving him to be a man of a good wit entred farther into discourse with him where he found himself shamefully gravelled which made him forsake the Syllogismes of the School to have recourse to the arguments of tyrants which are arms and violence for he caused him to be presently taken as an Emissary Goat there being not any Mahometan hand so little which delighted not to hale and leade him with blows untill they brought him into the most hideous prison which was rather a retreat then a gaol where he endured a thousand miseries with an unshaken constancy The Genowayes his good friends who traffick in these parts moved with his affliction got with good round summes of money a more reasonable prison for him where he began again to dispute with the most learned of the sect and made himself to be so much admired by those his adversaries that they endeavoured to gain him to their Religion promising him wife family honours and riches as much as he could wish but he mocked at all their machinations and seeing them fervent to dispute he persisted therein with great strength of reason and courage They said words were lost in the air but they must take the pen in hand and write on both sides with which he was infinitely pleased and spent nights and dayes in prison to compose a great volumn for defence of our Religion But the King of Bugea coming into his capitall city dissipated all these counsels much fearing the touch of his Law which was gold of a base allay and caused him the second time to come out of prison From thence he sought to get something in Greece passing over into Cyprus where he disputed against the Nestorians and Jacobites who rendred him poison for the honey of his discourses whereof he was like to die had he not been preserved by divine Providence and the assistance of a good Angel The blessed man had already passed forty years in a thousand toils and crosses and spared not to suffer by reason of the flames of love which burnt his heart but he knew not whether he suffered or no so much he took to heart the cup which God had mingled for him Verily our Lord appearing one day unto him and asking him if he well knew what love was of which he so many years had made profession he very excellently answered If I do not well know what Love is I at least well understand what Patience is meaning that it was to suffer since nothing troubled him for the satisfaction he had in Gods causes And another time being asked whether he had Patience he said All pleased him and that he had no cause of impatience which onely belongs to them who keep the possession of their own will Lastly being about fourscore years of age he considered within himself what he said afterwards that love was a sea full tempests and storms where a port was not to be hoped for but with the losse of himself and
of his own accord and wholly melts himself as Incense in the fire in such sort that S. Gregory very well saith That he is the Amber of the Prophet Ezekiel enrobed with the heat of flames But better saith Origen who calleth him the Perfume which is annihilated Origen in Cant. unguentum exinanitum for us comparing the will of the Son of God to a viol filled with an aromatick liquor which one hath turned up-side down to empty it to the last drop so the desires and affections of Jesus are poured forth in the bosome of his heavenly Father But most espeally Hab. 3. Qui ascendis super equos tuos quadrigae tuae salvatio on the day of his Passion for then was the time when the Prophecy of Habakuk was accomplished It is thon who mountest upon the light-horses and who bearest salvation in thy mysterious chariot I now leave those who interpret this passage of the chariot of God triumphing in those ugly darknesses of Egypt I leave those who referre it to the second coming I follow the Interpretation which S. Ambrose Ambros in Luc. Patibulum triumphale 〈…〉 presenteth unto me who calleth the Crosse a gibbet of Triumph and others who term it the true chariot of the glory of the God of hostes I consequently say that the light-horses of our Saviour are his winged and flaming desires which bare him more gloriously then Elias unto the throne of Honour where he hath made a full consummation of himself by the separation of his bloud and soul in that great Sacrifice which put Heaven to mourning the Sunne into eclipse the Earth into quakings and men the most stupid into affrightment O with what obedience with what resignation did that dying Swan then appear when all the starres as Dydimus relateth about three of the clock afternoon were seen in the heavens to enlighten his death O with what union of his will to Gods will he spake these words O my God O my Father behold me on the Pile to be sacrificed to thy Divine Majesty My God I have desired it from the first moment of my conception Deus mens volvi le gem tuam in medio cordis mei I have had the law of Obedience engraven in my heart with a chizzel of fire and an eternall character and at this time O my celestiall Father I wish it I would it and will protest it whilst my soul shall be on my lip to have but one onely desire in the world which is to annihilate my self in accomplishing thy will § 6. The condemnation of the evil Desires of the world and the means how to divert them ANd yet thou O disloyall soul wilt in thy heart entertain a masse of Desires thou wilt Against evil desires rather live among feavers and burning coals then tie thy self to the will of God! Rebel thou hast In omni colle sublimi in omni ligno frondo so tu prosternebaris meretrix Jer. 2. 21. prostituted thy self on high and below upon the mountains and under trees under cedars and on the hysop so many great and little Desires have possessed thy heart Thou miserable man to have affection in store for a deceiving creature who hath put the sword of division into thy marriage to cut asunder a knot tied before the face of Angels and men Thou unfortunate maid unlucky victime to fill all the sails of thy Desires for a man more light then the wind and more faithlesse then ice whose words are but promises promises but perjuries perjuries but forsakings and forsakings but diastres and to have neither heart nor thought for God a Father so benigne a Saviour so affectionate a Lover so loyall Thou to burn alive with black and shamefull flames of ravenous avarice and to have no feeling for him who hath the beauty of fields the enamel of meadows the extent of seas the riches of metals and all the magazines of the Universe in his bosome Thou to run at randome after transitory honour which glisters like a worm in a piece of rotten wood and which pricketh like a thorn and not to hold sympathy with him who crowneth the heads of his Elect with eternall garlands Thou to live daily in fits of fire and ice for a slight toy for a gorget for a chopino for a little dog a parichito for all that which I neither can nor dare to expresse O what a shame is it that all creatures serve for snares and prisons to hearts moistned with the bloud of Jesus and they not to be softned by this venerable shower able to break rocks asunder and dissolve anvils You will ask me what you should do to be delivered from this tyranny First accustome your self to cut away all superfluities whether of apparel Desideria tua parvo redime hoc enim tantum curare debes ut desinant Sence diet vain company or other delights which fight against the law of God Reduce your appetites to a small cost and take more care how to end them then to cherish them Resolve with your self to lop off all your superfluities and to be contented with little holding it for a thing most assured that by how much the lesse you shall depend on your greedy desires which are most forward mistresses to whom you have prostituted your Christian liberty so much shall you be the more near to God Secondly if you feel in your heart some seeds of desires to sprout and disquiet you seasonably prevent them one while diverting them by some laudable employment another while by pulling them up with main strength in their first tendernesse and never to Non obtinebis ut desinat si incipere permiseris Sen. ep 116. let them get strength to your prejudice It is much more easie to defend ones self in the beginning from a passion then to moderate the violence of the exorbitancy when it is lodged in your heart Thirdly follow Aristotle's counsel and look Voluptates abeuntes specta fessas poenitentiâ plenas quò minus cupidè repetantur on all the objects of pleasure not such as they are when they at first soothe Sensuality but such as they be when they turn their backs to forsake us Lastly exercise your self continually in the desire of joyes eternall Behold all those things which environ you all those honours those riches those pomps as deceitfull and momentary things Behold them as a flitting company Each day undo a knot of your slavery Put your self into the liberty of Gods Children Place your self in such a nakednesse of spirit that you may say One and no more Blind soul how canst thou live one sole moment with so many desires which are as so many daughters to marry what a care must be had well to bestow them what a fear to bestow them ill what a grief that they are ill bestowed Stupid soul canst thou rest with so many bloud-suckers fastned to the marrow of thy bones
after so exquisite torments so that in the one and twentieth Psalme which it is thought our Narr abo nomen tuum fratribus meis in medio Ecclesiae laudabo te Apud te laus mea in Ecclesia magna vota meareddam in conspectu timentium cum Psal 21 Saviour wholly recited when he hanged on the Crosse having reckoned up the dolours which invironed him on all sides he raised himself up as the Palme against the weight of his afflictions and said I will declare thy Name to my brethren in the midst of the whole assembly of the faithfull Yea my God all my praise shall be in thee and for thee I will pronounce thy marvels in thine own house and I will offer thee my vows and sacrifices before all those who make profession to honour thee 6. Encouragements to good Hopes ANd will we then in so great light of Examples in so eminent protection of divine Helps resign our selves over to sadnesse and despair among so many accidents of this transitory life Despair onely belongs to hearts gnawn with dull melancholy and to souls extremely in love with themselves and the commodities of the world or to maligne spirits who have lost all the sparks of good conscience or lastly to the damned Why should we deprive our selves of an inestimable treasure of good hopes which the eternall Father hath kept for us in his omnipotency of which the word Incarnate hath assured us on the Crosse with his bloud and the rest of his life Is it not a goodly thing to see people who bear the character of Christianity to lay down the bucklet and to throw away arms at the first approach of some affliction whatsoever to grumble and murmure against God and men to cruciate themselves like Prometheus on the rocks of Caucasus to torment themselves with a thousand imaginary evils Wo to you Apostate and fugitive children Vae filii desertores dicit Dominus ut faceretis consilium non ex me ordiremini telam non per Spiritum meum Isa 30. 1. Chrysost ad Theodorum who have made resolutions without me and who have weaved a web which was not warped by my spirit It is no extraordinary matter said S. Chrysostome to fall in wrestling but to be willing to lie still stretched out at length on the earth It is no dishonour to receive wounds in fight but to neglect them and to let the gangrene through lazinesse to creep in is a folly inexcusable We entred into this life as into a list to wrestle as into a field of battel to fight why are we amazed if God use us as he did his most valourous champions Let us look upon life on all sides and we shalll find it preserved by good Hopes and is totally ruined by Despair Behold men build after ruines and fires see others after they are come all naked from amidst waves rocks frothy rages of the sea gather together in the haven broken planks of their unfortunate vessels to commit their life to an element whose infidelity they know by experience and taste prosperous successe onely by very slight hopes Yet flie they like Eagles into dangers among all the images of death after they therein have been so ill treated When Alexander was ready to enter into the Indies one said unto him Whither wilt thou go Beyond the world where dying Nature is but a dull lump where darknesse robs men of heavens light and the water hath no acquaintance Aliena quid aequo ra remis sacras violamus aquas Divúmque quietas turbamus sedes Eamus inter has sedes Hercules coelum meruit Senec. suasorta 1. with the earth What shall you see but frozen seas prodigious monsters maligne stars and all the powers of life conspiring your death To what purpose is it to hasten to sail over new and unheard of seas Inconsiderately to interrupt the peacefull seat of the Gods But replyed he Let us courageously go on let us discover those forlorn Countreys Thus did great Hercules deserve to win heaven Hope caused Rome to set Armies on foot after the battel of Cannae and France to triumph over the English by the hands of a silly shepherdnesse wherefore will we despair of our salvation sith the mercy of God was never extinguished nor can he cease to be what he is what a thought of a devil is it to deliver ones self over to despair in the sight of a Jesus who beareth our reconciliation on his sacred members and pleadeth our cause before his eternall Fathet with as many mouths as our sins in him have opened wounds Know we not We have a Bishop who cannot but compassionate Non habemus Pontificem qui non possit compati infirmitatibus nostris tentatum per omnia Heb. 4. our infirmities seeing he himself hath pleased to passe through all those trials and to make experience thereof to his own cost and charges It is not the despair of our salvation which tempteth us but that of temporall goods this suit and that money is lost here is the thing which afflicteth this desolate soul and makes it hate its proper life O soul ignorant of the good and evil of thy life It is thy love and not thy despair alone which tormenteth thee Thou then hast fixed thy Beatitude on this gold this silver on thy profit by this suit and thou lookest on it as on a little Divinity Dost thou forget the words Perdix sovit quae non peperit secit divitias non in judicio in dimidio dierum suorum derelinquet eas Jer. 17. 11. of the Prophet Silly partridge thou broodest borrowed eggs thou hast hatched birds which were not thine let them flie sith thou canst not hold them That which thou esteemest a great losse shall be the beginning of thy happinesse thou shalt ever be rich enough if thou learnest to be satisfied with God But this person whom I more dearly loved then my self is dead and all my purposes are ruined by his death wherefore dost thou resolve with thy self to say now he is dead Began he not to die from the day of his birth Must he be looked on as a thing immortall since both thou and he have already received the Sentence of your deaths from your mothers wombs If thou onely grievest for his absence thou wilt quickly be content for thou daily goest on towards him as fast as the Sun which enlightneth us there is not a day which set thee not forward millions of leagues towards thy Tomb. I am content that they bewail the dead who Ruricius S. Hieron Fleant mortuos suos qui spem resurrectionis habere non possunt fleant mortuos suos quos in perpetuum aestimant interiisse in brevi visuri sumus quos dolemus absentes can have no hope of Resurrection they who believe they are dead never to live again Let them bemoan the losse of their friends as long as they will as
thorns their repose but torment life but anxiety and death very often a tomb of water And yet holy Boldnesse reserveth to it self courages which it leadeth forth as it seems beyond the sun time and seasons to conquer souls to God Must we not say this passion is infinitely generous and that it mounted to a heighth of virtue almost prodigious All are not created to come to the most eminent degree of its excellencies Nature must therein have a part and verily in my opinion the divine Providence prepareth bodies greatly adapted to those daring souls which in them he resolveth to enclose Their temperature is hot their heart little in bulk but a true fornace of heat the members well composed the speech strong and the arm sturdy Education and Custome create another nature which hath alwayes been observed to be extremely necessary in the children which are to be trained up to valour Those people of India must in some sort be imitated who set them on the backs of certain great birds to carry them in the air whereat these little Cavalliers are at first astonished but in the end they so fashion themselves thereto that they despise all other perill The Romans daily made them to see lions and elephants in the Amphitheatre and the bloud of sword-players shed almost as ordinarily as wine others leade them out to the sea among monsters and tempests others practised them to combats where they quickly learn'd the art of giving and receiving wounds and to beat men down David Theseus and Brasidas began the profession of Warre very young The son of King Tarquin at the age of fourteen years slew an enemy with his own hand Scipio saved his father in the confusion of a battel being then but seventeen years old Probus was without a beard when he was made Tribune in the Army Alboinus very young in duel vanquished the son of Thorismond King of the Gepides which was the cause that his father Cranz l. 3. Daniae who before bred him amongst his servants did set him at his own table Some think that study and learning are very much Study lesseneth not courage opposite to Military Boldnesse and it is very little to be doubted if it be excessively pursued in the vigour of years which are proper for the exercise of arms but that it will endanger mens Courages to become timorous But it is of infinite use for Princes and young Gentlemen who are to be disposed to actions the most elate For by a laudable temperature it sweetneth all that which a warlike humour might have contracted of roughnesse and incivility it awakeneth wisdome it enlightneth counsel it renders Boldnesse intelligent and magnanimous it polisheth the tongue it gives authority in charges grace in conversation invention in the cabinet honour among the wise and glory with posterity After nature and education to become bold he Nec tristibus impar nec pro successu timid usspatiúmque morandi vincendique modum mutatis noscit habenis Claudianus must be sensible of Honour which enkindleth the most timorous he must vigorously exercise himself in the toils of Military discipline and the practice of brave pieces of service he must not be either vaunting scoffing captious or offensive but prudent reserved active and laborious he must very little fasten his affections upon things of the earth compose himself to the contempt of death make account one is not born but to die for his Prince and Countrey and to esteem no life in the world more precious then Glory § 4. That true Boldnesse is inspired by God and that we must wholly depend on him to become bold BUt besides this to raise ones self to something Why Boldnesse is not in God more excellent we must look upon the divine Virtues which ought to be the perpetuall sources of ours But if you now ask me wherein we may be aided by our first model to acquire Boldnesse I do not affirm we may properly say that Boldnesse is in God because this Passion is essentially conjoyned to a regard it hath towards a thing very difficult and encompassed with dangers Now we know that nothing can be difficult or dangerous before God by reason of his Sovereign Power and most accomplished Felicity God to speak Aristot â— Rhetor. Audaciore eos esse quo rectè se habent ad divina perspicuously can neither be timorous nor bold but it is he who makes all those who are truly bold within the limits and lists of virtue Certainly Aristotle saw much when he said That the most bold were such as were most in Gods favour I will make good this proposition in the first part of this discourse and shew a most manifest reason which teacheth us that every able man considering what he is cannot be hardy of himself by reason of the incapacity and weaknesse of humane nature and therefore we must say that if he have some Boldnesse it necessarily comes to him from above The Platonists said there are seven things able much Seven things able to humble a man to humble a man the First whereof is that his spirit is caitive thorny and light Secondly that his body is brutish and extremely exposed to all the injuries and impressions of exteriour violences Thirdly that being Apulei de Daemonio Socratis Homo levi anxiâ mente bruâ—o obnoxio corpore sui similis erroribus dissimilis moribus casso labore fortunâ caducâ tardâ sapientiâ citâ morte so inconstant in his manners he commonly is very constant in his errours Fourthly that his endeavours are infinitely vain and that many times being ready to enter into his tomb when he comes to behold and consider his whole life already past he finds it to be full of spiders webs which he with much labour and industry hath spun but to no purpose Fifthly that his fortune is of glasse and many times catcheth a crack when it is most resplendent Sixthly that if he find wisdome amidst so many errours it is but too late and when he scarcely hath time left to use it The seventh that wisdome coming so slowly death fails not to make haste and to surprise a man when his heart is embroiled with divers designs and with certain knowledges of having done ill with uncertainty of doing better Besides Reason doth not the Scripture in many places teach the weaknesse of man and the necessity he hath of Divine succour for his subsistence Behold you Isa 41. 24. Psal 143. 4. Isa 45. Jac. 1. Pro. 18. are but a nothing and all your works are as if they were not Man is the very image of vanity and a sherd of an earthen pot Hay that withers at the first rising of the hot sunne The name of God is a strong and most assured tower the just shall there have their refuge and there shall be exalted Hence we see how all those who have appeared in the world with some eminency have ever
and that which is exacted to husband it for their benefit to employ the customes with the greatest fidelity as the bloud of men redeemed by the blood of Jesus Christ This is to take order for the Education of Youth to honour the Church and persons of desert to Authorize good Magistrates to have a particular care of acknowledging the good services of men at Arms which do sacrifice themselves in a thousand occasions for the Common-weal It is to have great compassion on the poor especially Widows and Orphans to hear willingly the Petitions of those that are afflicted and oppressed to take thought for all watch for all to do that in his Realm that the soul infused doth in the Body It is too much power to say that which Nero said by Royalty a mervellous profession the tongue of Seneca Among so many mortals I am the onely one chosen in heaven to performe the office of God upon earth I am the Arbitratour both of life and death I am the distributer of fortunes the favours that come from above are not bestowed but by my mouth I cause the rejoycings of cities and countreys nothing flourisheth but by my favour If I speak but a word I make a million of swords to come forth of the scabberd and if I command I cause them to be put up again It is I that give and take away liberty which make and unmake Kings which remove nations which lay waste rebellious towns which hold the happinesse or unhappinesse of men in mine hands What other thing is this that he vaunts and so proudly boasts himself of but onely to confesse himself responsible to God for so great an account whereof this miserable Emperour acquitted himself so ill that having lived like a beast he dyed like a mad-man There is no man worthy to reign but he that can tremble at the very shadow of Royalty Great Princes are not made by the suffrages of men Great Princes the workmanship of God alone but by the finger of God they are born in Heaven by the Divine Decrees before they appear upon earth by humane birth To speak the truth there are wonderfull qualities required to make a well-accomplished King and this is a thing more hard to Very rare find then the Phenix nest When the children of Israel had this conceit that Moses was lost they repair to his brother Aaron and intreat him to make them a God to sit in the place of their Conductour as if they meant to say after Moses no lesse will serve them then a Deity Neverthelesse God hath never suffered that there should be a perfect Monarch in the World in whom nothing hath been wanting for there would have been a hazard lest he should have been taken for a God and thereby have caused a perpetuall Idolatry The Heathens have made Gods of some Emperours vicious enough what would they not have made of perfect ones seeing that men naturally do bear a certain reverence towards virtue Look a little narrowly into the life of the greatest Monarchs of the World as of David Cyrus Alexander Julius Cesar Augustus Constantine Charlemagne and you shall find that all those beauties which have so dazled the eyes of the World have had their spots and the most part of the rest have inherited a Renown but little commendable that is To be none of the worst amongst many bad ones Whatsoever excellency the most famous of them had proceeded from the especiall gift of God and whatsoever meannesse was in them proceeded from themselves who alwayes mingled somewhat of Man with the work of the great Work-master Neverthelesse good Instructions are very usefull for Princes to rouse up and make active the endowments they have from above yet it is not in those Panegyricks so well composed that they learn their duty for there they may sooner learn to forget it when being puft up by those flatteries they think themselves to be in deed that which they are there but in flourish It is not my intent here to discourse at large how Princes ought to govern themselves but to contract in a few words that which is necessary for their direction and I am perswaded that the Scripture Saint Lewis in his Testament and Lewis the eleventh in that Treatise which he composed himself for the instruction of the King his sonne have said hereto sufficient and that the rules of reigning well cannot be drawn better from any then those that have been of the same profession The perfection of a Prince may be comprehended within these five Qualities Piety Wisdome Justice Goodnesse and Valour Piety fits him for God Wisdome for himself Justice for the Law Valour for Arms and Goodnesse for the whole World Piety or to speak more properly with Saint Thomas Religion is a virtue that appropriates Man to God and makes him to render that honour that is due to him as first Originall and chief Lord of the whole frame of Nature Synesius in that excellent Treatise that he made for the Emperour Arcadius concerning goverment sayes That this is the foundation on the which all firmnesse subsists This is that spirit of life which Kings do breathe from heaven which fills their understanding with enlightning their heart with Divine love and confidence their Palace with holinesse and their Kingdome with a Blessing It belongs to a King above all to be Pious and Devout towards God even by the Title of Royalty it self Who should honour that highest Majesty more then his Vicegerent here on Earth Who should represent his virtues more then his image here below Who should render greatest thanks for his favours more then he that receives them in the mostabundance besides the obligement that binds the Prince unto this virtue he finds the chiefest interest there Prosperity for the most part is found on their side which honour the Deity saith Titus Livius in his History And Aristotle who proceeds by way of Policy onely counsels a Monarch to be exceedingly religious for that thereby he will be more beloved and reverenced by his subjects which expect lesse evil and more good from a Prince which is joyned to God by Religion This also procures him an assurance in his affairs and makes his prosperity the sweeter and adversities the lesse afflicting God who is the Master and Teacher of Princes doth so strictly recommend this virtue to those Kings that were made more especially by his own election that he commands them to receive from the Priests a copy of the Law of God or else to transcribe it with their own hand to carry it alwayes with them and to reade it all the dayes of their life to learn thereby to fear the highest King and to keep his instructions Now the Piety of a Prince ought not to be ordinary but it ought to excell in three things chiefly in an inward sence of the Deity in his worship and zealous affection An Antient said That he which believes the Gods
temptations and those that have yielded once thereto have done a thousand other worthy actions to blot out the memory of one ill If Clemency hath no place in such occasions it will have nothing to do about a Prince and if it find no employment with him it is to be feared that the vengeance of God will find work there to busie it self The wisest of Kings is of opinion that this virtue is the foundation of thrones whence it follows that that Prince which is unprovided thereof puts his own person in danger and his estate into shaking It is to deceive ones self to think that a Prince may be secure there where there is nothing secure against the violence of the Prince Despair of Mercy hath often caused horrible cruelties to ensue and it is needfull alwayes to take heed of the force of a last necessity There are some things which ought to be pardoned by the contempt of punishing them others by the profit and others by the glory and it is alwayes to be remembred that we have a Judge over our heads which suffers us to live by his onely goodnesse being able every moment to punish us by his Justice At last to conclude this little Treatise Valour procures an high reputation to a Monarch making him terrible to his Enemies and amiable to his Subjects Greatnesse maintains it self by the same means which gave it its beginning and it renews new vigour by those qualities which have been the Authours of its originall Our fist Kings attained to this dignity by their valour and by that stoutnesse which they had to expose their courageous persons to very many hazards for the safety of the publick this made them admired and lifted them up at last upon the Target to be shewed throughout the whole Army and chosen by generall consent to command over others by the title of their deserts The same of Valour doth so easily run through and with such approbation the minds of people and valiant men that it sufficing not it to make Kings upon earth it hath made amongst the Heathens Gods in Heaven They have deified an Hercules and a Theseus for having cut off the head of Hydra's and overcome Minotaures and not contenting themselves to have consecrated their persons they have put wild beasts and monsters amongst the Constellations for having served as objects of their victories chusing rather to eternize beasts amongst the Stars then to diminish any thing of the eternall glory of those valiant men Alexander being crowned King by his father Philip before he took possession of the Kingdome that fell to him by the decease of his Predecessour assembled together all the great ones of his Kingdome and said to them that he would counsel them to chuse such a one as should be most obedient to God which should have the best thoughts for the Publick Good which should be most compassionate towards the Poor which should best defend the right of the weak ones against the strong but above all that should be the most Valiant and should adventure himself most boldly for the safety of his Countrey And when they had all confirmed to him that which his birth had given him he took an Oath that he would keep all he had propounded as he did testifying in all his actions his Goodnesse and Valour above all the Kings that had gone before him A Monarch shall give some proof of himself by diligently studying the art of Warre in often frequenting the exercises thereof in being able to judge of places and Armies of Captains of Souldiers of Defences of On-sets of Policies and Stratagems of Fortifications of Arms of Provision of Munition and giving exact order for every thing that belongs to Military affairs He must often shew himself in the Army by exhorting encouraging consulting resolving giving orders and causing them to be executed by shewing readinesse of courage in dangers and an invincible heart in the midst of bad successe But he ought not at any time to mix himself therein without great necessity seeing that the hand of one man can do very little and the losse of a King brings a dammage unrecoverable The young King Ladislaus thrust himself into danger at the Battel of Varna against Bajazet the Turk when he had there lost himself and that they had taken away his head and put it upon the end of a spear as a sad spectacle to the Christians This caused their whole Army to be routed which before was half victorious and gave the victory to the Infidell Warre is a long and difficult profession and one of the most dangerous which never ought to be undertaken but upon necessity I cannot neither ought I here to teach it by words reserving that to the skill of the more understanding and to the experience of perfect ones I am onely obliged to advertise that great heed is to be taken lest any one take rashnesse or salvage rage instead of true valiantnesse Those are no Bravado's nor terrible looks that give the most valiant blows in Armies It pleaseth not God that a Virtue that doth such wonders upon earth and places the Hero's in the heaven should be accomplished by such feeble means This is no effect of boasting nor of ignorance nor of fury this is a branch of generousnesse which teacheth the contempt of dangers and of death it self for the glory of God for the defence of ones Countrey for the subduing of the impious Infidels and wicked ones for the exaltation of the true Faith of Religion and the glory of ones Nation Oh the excellency of this divine Virtue which protects so many people with the shadow of its branches and laurels which causes a calm to be found in a tempest safety in the midst of dangers comfort in disastres an upholding in the midst of weaknesse Happy are the wounds of the valiant whence flows more honour then bloud Happy their immortall Souls which flie hence into heaven carried upon the purple of so generous bloud and which flying hence leave to posterity an eternall memory of their prowesse Time hath no sythe for them Death is unprovided with darts Calumny loseth its teeth there and Glory spreads throughout the Ensigns of their Immortality THE MONARCHS DAVID SOLOMON DAVID REX SALOMON REX DAvid is a great mixture of divers adventures of Good of Evils of Joyes of Griefs of Contempts of Glories of Vices of Virtues of Actions of Passions of un-thought-of Successes of strange Accidents and Marvels It is not my purpose to set forth his Life here which is exactly contained in the holy Scripture but to make some reflexions on the principall things therein that concern the Court We will consider him in a two-fold estate of a Servant and of a Master and will observe with what wisdome he preserved himself in the one and with what Majesty he behaved himself in the other The whole beginning of his History is a continuall combate against an horrid monster which is the
resolve to dye Yet for all this Elijah orders her to make him a little Loaf baked under the Ashes and to think afterward upon her self and sonne and assure her self that neither her Meal nor Oyl should diminish any thing till such time as the Famine should be past It was a strong proof of the faith of this Sidonian that commanded her to take away the Bread from her self and her sonne to give it to a stranger and quitting that which she had in her hands to rest upon uncertainties Yet she obeyed in that great necessity yielding more to a man that she knew not for the esteem that she had of his virtue and the opinion which she had that he was the servant of the great God then to her own Life So true it is That the Considerations of Religion and of Religious persons touch even the souls of Pagans and of Infidels So was she worthily requited having a little inexhaustible treasure in her house which was sufficient for her Prophet for her self and for her child and this was a particular mercy of the Sovereign power to her that called her to his knowledge by this miracle and would not that Elijah should eat alone the bread which he multiplyed by the words of his mouth but that he should give part of it to the poor as our Saviour did afterward God ordaining that good miracles should be never vain but profitable to the soul and body of men created after the image of God While he stayed in this house the sonne of the Dame of it dyed of a burning Feaver whereof this poor afflicted woman laid the fault upon Elijah saying that he had renewed the memory of her sinnes before God and Elijah complained of God for that he had afflicted his Hostesse But that great Master did all for his own glory for Elijah having three times contracted himself upon the dead body of the child breathed into him the spirit of life and restored him to his mother Three years being now passed in the great anguishes of hunger God commanded Elijah to present himself again to Ahab and was resolved to sent some Rain When the extremity of the evil was very great and no inventions could be found to appease the scourge Ahab a carnall man instead of having recourse to Prayers and Supplications to ease his subjects thought on nothing but preserving his Horses and his Mules He had at his service and at his Court in quality of a superintendent of his House and of his Levies a great and good man named Abdias who moderated the furies of that wicked Court saved the Prophets of God when they were persecuted and greatly comforted the People Ahab resolved to go one way and send him the other to seeek some herbage to feed his Cattle As Abdias was going along his way he met with Elijah the Prophet whom the King had caused to be searched after in his own territories and through all the neighbouring Kingdoms without being ever able to learn any news of him And therefore he was very much amazed at that accost and asked him if he were Elijah whereto he answered that he was the very same and that he should go and give Ahab information of his comming The other making him a low Reverence with his face to the Earth replyed wherein have I ever offended you that you should deliver me into the hands of Ahab with an intention to cause me to be put to death For it is true that there is no Kingdome nor Nation whither my Master hath not sent to inquire news of you without ever getting any light of you and now if I should go tell the King of your arrivall and the spirit of God should carry you away as it doth ordinarily to transport you into some other part I should be found a Lyar and the King would take away my Life What good would it do you to be the cause of my death seeing that I have feared God even from mine infancy and have alwayes honoured his servants so farre as to preserve an hundred Prophets from the horrours of the Persecution and nourish them secretly at mine own charge in Caves wherein they were hidden Do not deprive your self now of a servant that is most gained unto you The Prophet assured him and sware to him that he would appear before Ahab By which I find that this Abdias was very prudent in that he would not rashly carry a news to his Master that should be without effect because that great ones are easily incensed when men are so light as to promise them what they ask and answer not their expectation besides that if they are frustrated of their desire they think themselves to be slighted and are angry even at the times and elements that do not apply themselves to their humours When therefore he was assured by the inviolable oath of a Prophet he went to the King and told him that he had met with Elijah who was ready to present himself to his Majesty This Prince that burned with a passion to see him stayed not till he could come to see him fearing lest he should steal away again but went to meet him in person and having found him asked him with disdain whether he was not the man that embroiled all his Kingdome The Prophet as bold as a Lyon answered him that he had never embroiled any thing but that the trouble came from his Fathers house and from him for that they had forsaken God and followed Baal and that if he would know by experience the errour wherein he was that he should make an Assembly on Mount Carmel of all the People of Israel and summon thither the four hundred and fifty false Prophets that are every day fed at Queen Jezabels Table and that there should be decided the businesse of Religion It was an high attempt on which Elijah had never so much as dreamed had he not had an expresse Revelation from God for one ought not lightly to commit the verity of the faith before the Court and the common people to uncertain disputes and doubtfull accidents from whence the Pagans and Hereticks may by chance draw some advantage But the Prophet being well assured on his side King Ahab exposed himself on His to cause a great revolt among his subjects and a manifest divorce with his wife Yet God would have it so to disabuse him and to bring him back to the true Religion As soon as he had then accepted the condition and commanded the assembly there were gathered together an infinite number of people there being nothing that so much tempts curiosity as the affairs of Religion It was then that one might see the assurance and vigour of a true servant of God for he observing that the King and people who had not yet choaked all the seeds of Truth floated in divers opinions spake solemnly to them That it was no longer time to halt sometimes on one side and sometimes on the other and
with a prodigious army against which there was no humane resistance He sent a certain man named Rabshakeh in an Embassage to King Hezekiah who vomited out blasphemies and proposed to him conditions shamefull to his reputation and impossible to all his powers All the people were in an affright expecting nothing but fire and sword The King covered with sackcloth implores the heavenly assistance and sends the chief Counsellours of his State to the Prophet Isaiah to turn away this scourge by his prayers The holy man in that confusion of affairs wherein one could not see one onely spark of light encourages him animates him and promises him unexpected effects of the mercy of God The Prophecy was not vain for in one onely night the Angel of God killed an hundred fourscore and five thousand men in the Army of the Assyrians by a stroke from heaven and a devouring fire which reduced them to dust in their guilded arms This proud King was constrained to make an ignominious retreat and being returned to Niniveh the capitall city of his Empire he was slain by his own children This is a manifest example of the amiable protection of God over the Holy Court who defended his dear Hezekiah by the intercession of the Prophet as the apple of his eyes He expressed yet another singular favour to him in a great sicknesse caused by a malignant ulcer of which according to the course of nature he should have died and therefore Isaiah went to see him and without flattering him brought him word of his last day exhorting him to put the affairs of his State in order This good King had a tender affection to life and being astonished at that news prayed God fervently with a great profusion of tears that he would have regard to the sincerity of his heart and to the good services that he had done him in his Temple and not to tear away his life by a violent death in the middle of its course The heart of the everlasting Father melted at the tears of that Prince and he advertised Isaiah who was not yet gone out of the Palace to retread his steps and carry him the news of his recovery He told him from God that he should rise again from that sicknesse and within three dayes should go up to the Temple ro render his Thanks-giving Further he promised him that his dayes should be augmented fifteen years and that he should see himself totally delivered from the fury of the Assyrians to serve the living God in a perfect tranquility The King was ravished at this happy news and desired some sign of the Divine will to make him believe an happinesse so unhoped for Isaiah for this purpose did a miracle which since Joshua had not been seen nor heard which was to make the Sun turn back so that the shadow of the Diall which was in the palace appeared ten degrees retired to the admiration and ravishment of all the world And to shew that the Prophet was not ignorant of Physick he caused a Cataplasme composed of a lump of figs to be applyed to the wound of the sick man whereby he was healed and in three dayes rendred to the Temple This miracle was not unknown to the Babylonians who perceived the immense length of the day in which it was done and their Prince having heard the news of it sent Embassadours to King Hezekiah to congratulate his health and to offer him great presents whereat this Monarch that was of an easie nature suffered himself to be a little too much transported with joy and out of a little kind of vanity made a shew of his treasures and of his great riches to those strangers which served much to kindle their covetousnesse And therefore the Prophet who was never sparing of his remonstrances to the King rebuked him for that action and fore-told him that he made Infidels see the great wealth that God had given him through a vain glory which would cost him dear and that having been spectatours of his treasures they had a mind to be the masters of them and that at length they should compasse their design but that it should not be in his time This Prince received the correction with patience and took courage hearing that the hail should not fall upon his head passing over his to his childrens Manasses his son succeeded him a Prince truly abominable who wiped out all the marks of the piety of his father and placed Idols even in the very Temple of the living God All that Idolatry had shown in sacriledges cruelty in murders impudence in all sort of wickednesses was renewed by the perfidiousnesse of this man abandoned of God Poor Isaiah that had governed the father with so much authority had no credit with the son this tygre was incensed at the harmonious consorts of the divine Wisdomes that spake by his mouth and could no more endure the truth then serpents the odour of the vine Yet he desisted not to reprehend him and to advertise him of the punishments that God prepared for his crimes whereat this barbarous man was so much moved and kindled with fury that he commanded that this holy old man that had passed the hundreth year should be sawn alive by an horrible and extraordinary punishment O Manasses cruell Manasses the most infamous of tyrants and the most bloudy of hang-men this was the onely crime that the furies themselves even the most enraged should never have permitted to thy salvagenesse This venerable Master of so many Kings this King of Prophets this prime Intelligence of the State this Seraphim this instrument of the God of Hosts to be used so barbarously at the Court by his own bloud after so many good counsels so many glorious labours so many Oracles pronounced so many Divine actions so worthily accomplished All the Militia of heaven wept over this companion of the Angels and the earth caused fountains to leap up to bedew her lips in the midst of her ardent pains His Wisdome hath rendred him admirable to the Learned his Life inimitable to the most Perfect his Zeal adorable to the most Courageous his Age venerable to Nature and his Death deplorable to all Ages JEREMIAH BEhold the most afflicted of Holy Courtiers a Prophet weeping a Man of sorrows an heart alwayes bleeding and eyes that are never dry He haunted not great men but to see great evils and was not found at Court but to sing its Funerals and to set it up a tomb Yet was he a very great and most holy person that had been sanctified in his mothers womb that began to prophecy at the age of fifteen years a spirit separated from the vanities and the pretensions of the world that was intire to God that lived by the purest flames of his holy love and quenched his thirst with his tears He drank the mud of bad times and found himself in a piteous Government in which there was little to gain and much to suffer After that the
Commission with their own Names On which she demanded by what Law they would proceed against her the Canon Law or the civil Law and because she knew very well that they were no great Lawyers she conceived it would be requisite that some should be sent for from the Universities in Europe They replied That she should be tried by the civil Law of England in which they were sufficiently experienced But she who well observed that they would intangle her with a new Law on purpose against her made answer you are gallant Gentlemen and can make what Laws you please but I am not bound to submit unto them since you your selves in another case refuse to be subjected to the Salick Law of France Your Law hath no more of Example than your proceeding hath of Justice On this Hatton Vice-Chamberlain to the Queen of England advanced himself and said unto her you are accused for conspiring the ruin of our Mistress who is an anointed Queen Your degree is not exempted to answer for such a Crime neither by the Law of Nations nor of nature If you are innocent you are unjust to your Reputation to indeavour to evade the judgement The Queen will be very glad that you can justifie your self for she hath assured me that she never in the world received more discontent than to find you charged with this accusation Forbear this vain consideration of Royalty which at this present serves for nothing Cause the suspitions to cease and wipe away the stain which otherwise will cleave for ever to your reputation She replied I refuse not to answer before the States of the Realm being lawfully called because I have been acknowledged to be a presumed Heir of the Kingdom Then will I speak not as a subject but in another nature without submitting my self to the new Ordinance of your Commission which is known to be nothing else but a Malicious net made to inwrap my innocence The Treasurer on this did interrupt her and said we will then proceed to the contempt to which she made answer Examine your own consciences and provide for your Honours and so God render to you and your children as you shall do in the judgement The next morning she called one of the Commissioners and demanded if her Protestation were committed to writing And if it were she would justify her self without any prejudice to the Royal dignity Whereupon the Commissioners did presently assemble themselves in the Chamber of presence where they prepared a Scaffold on the upper end whereof was the seat Royal under a Cloath of State to represent the Majesty of Queen Elizabeth and on the one side of it a Chair of Crimson Velvet prepared for her The courageous Queen did enter with a modest and an assured countenance amongst the stern Lords thirsting after her bloud and took her place Bromley the Chancellour turning towards her did speak in these words The most Illustrius Queen of England being assured not without an extream Anguish of spirit that you have conspired the destruction of her of the Realm of England and of Religion to quit herself of her duty and not to be found wanting to God herself and her people hath without any malice of heart established those Commissioners to hear the things of which you are accused how you will resolve them and shew your innocency This Man who had spoken ill enough had the discretion to speak but little And immediately as he had given the signal the perverse Officers who were more than fourty in number did throw themselves upon her like so many mastives on a prey propounding a thousand captious questions to surprize her but the generous AMAZA did shake them off with an incredible vivacity In the end all things were reduced to the letter of Babington in which he gave her notice of the conspiracy and to the answer which she made to it exhorting him to pursue his design but most of all to the depositions of her own Secretaries who gave assurances that she did dictate the said letter as also other letters to forreign Princes to invade England with arms They did press her on these falsities which seemed to carrie some probability with them but she did answer invincibly to them as most clearly may appear by those terms which I have drawn from her several answers and tied them together to give more light to her Apology wherein the clearnes of her understanding and her judgement is most remarkable IF the Queen my Sister hath given you a Commission The invincible Apology of the Queen to see Justice done it is reasonable that you should begin it rather by the easing of my sufferings than by the oppressing of my innocence I came into England to implore succour against the Rebellion of my Subjects My bloud alliance Sex Neighbourhood and the Title which I bear of a Queen did promise me all satisfaction and here I have met with my greatest affliction This is the twentieth year that I have been detained Prisoner without cause without reason without mercy and which is more without hope I am no Subject of your Mistresses but a free and an absolute Queen and ought not to make answer but to God alone the Sovereign Judge of my Actions or bring any prejudice to the Character of Royal Majesty either in my Son the King of Scotland or his Successours nor other Sovereign Princes of the earth This is the Protestation which I have made and which I repeat again in your presence before I make any answer to the Crimes which are imposed on me The blackest of all the Calumnies do charge me for having conspired the Death of my most dear Cousin and after many circumventions all the proofs are reduced to the Letter of Babington the Deposition of my Secretaries and my sollicitations made to forreign Princes to invade England with Arms. I will answer effectually to all these Articles and make the justice of my Cause most clearly appear to those who shall without passion look upon it And in the first place I swear and protest that I never saw this Babington who is made the principal in this Charge I never received any letter from him neither had he any letter from me I have always abhorred these violent and black counsels which tended to the ruin of Queen Elizabeth and I am ready to produce letters from those who having had some evil enterprize have excused themselves that they have discovered nothing to me because they were assured that my spirit was opposite to such Designs I could not know what Babington or his accomplices have done being a Prisoner he might write what he pleased but I am certain that I never saw nor heard of any letter to me And if there be found any Answer written by me to those things which never so much as came into my imagination it is an abominable forgery We live not in an Age nor a Realm that is to learn the trade to deceive I am
smiling she added some few words that she blamed Paulet and Deurey who guarded the Prisoner for not delivering her from that pain It is true that in the morning she sent one named Killigrew to Davison to forbid to put that command in Execution whether it were that her Remorse of Conscience had put her into some frights her sleeps being ordinarily disturbed with horrible Dreams which did represent unto her the images of her Crimes or whether it were an artifice to procure her the reputation of being mercifull in killing with so much treachery The Secretary came to her in the field and declared to her that the Order for the Queen of Scotland's death was now finished and sealed on which she put on the countenance of displeasure and told him that by the Counsel of wise men one might find out other expedients by which it is believed that she intended poison Nevertheless she now was commanded that the Execution should be delayed And as Davison presented himself to her three dayes afterward demanding of her if her Majesty had changed her advice she answered No and was angry with Paulet for not enterprising boldly enough the last of the Crimes And said moreover That she would find others who would do it for the love they did bear unto her On which the other did remonstrate that she must think well of him for otherwise she would ruin Men of great Merit with their posterity She still persisted and on the very same day of the Execution she did chide the Secretary for being so slow in advancing her Commands who as soon as he had discovered the affair the evil Counsellours did pursue the expedition with incredible heat for they sent Beal a Capital Enemy of the Catholicks with letters directed to certain Lords in which power was given them to proceed unto the Massacre who immediately repairing to the Castle of Fotheringhey where the Queen was prisoner they caused her to rise from her bed where the Indisposition of her body had laid her and having read unto her their Commission they did advertise her that she must die on the morning following 16. She received this without changing of her countenance and said That she did not think that the Queen her Sister Her death and miraculous constancy would have brought it to that extremity But since such was her pleasure death was most agreeable to her and that a Soul was not worthy of celestial and eternal joys whose body could not endure the stroke of the Hang-man For the rest she appealed to Heaven and Earth who were the witnesses of her Innocence adding that the onely Consolation which she received in a spectacle so ignominious was that she died for the Religion of her Fathers she beseeched God to increase her constancy to the measure of her afflictions and to welcome the death she was to suffer for the expiation of her sins After she spake these words she besought the Commissioners to permit her to conser with her Confessor which by a barbarous cruelty was refused a cruelty which is not exercised on the worst of all offendours and in the place for a Director of her conscience they gave her for her comforters the Bishop and the Dean of Peterborough whom with horrour she rejected saying That God should be her Comforter The Earl of Kent who was one of the Commissioners and most hot in the persecution of her told her Your life will he the death and your death will be the life of our Religion Declaring in that sufficiently the cause of her death whereupon she gave thanks to God that she was judged by her Enemies themselves to be judged an instrument capable to restore the ancient Religion in England In this particular she desired that the Protestants had rather blamed her effects than her designs After the Lords were retired she began to provide for her last day as if she had deliberated on some voyage and this she did with so much devotion prudence and courage that a Religious man who hath had all his Meditations on death for thirty years together could not have performed it with greater Justice And in the first place she commanded that supper should be dispatched to advise of her affairs and according to her custom supping very soberly she entertained her self on a good discourse with a marvellous tranquillity of mind And amongst other things turning her self to Burgon her Physitian she demanded of him if he did not observe how great was the power of the Truth seeing the sentence of her death did import that she was condemned for having conspired against Elizabeth and the Earl of Kent did signifie that she died for the apprehension which they had that she should be the death of the false Religion which would be rather her glory than a punishment At the end of supper she drank to all her Servants with a grave and modest chearfulness on which they all kneeled down and mingled so many tears with their wine that it was lamentable to behold As soon as their sobs had given liberty to their words they asked her pardon for not performing those services which her Majesty did merit and she although she was the best Mistress that ever was under heaven desired all the world to pardon her defects She comforted them with an invincible courage and commanded them to wipe away their tears and to rejoyce because she should now depart from an abyss of misery and assured them that she never would forget them neither before God nor men After supper she wrote three letters one to the King of France one to the Duke of Guise and the third unto her Confessor Behold the letter in its own terms which she wrote unto King Henry the Third SIR GOD as with all humility I am bound to believe A Letter unto Henry the Third having permitted that for the expiation of my sins I should cast my self into the Arms of this Queen my Cousin having endured for above twenty years the afflictions of imprisonment I am in the end by her and her Estates condemned unto death I have demanded that they should restore the papers which they have taken from me the better to perfect my last Will and Testament and that according to my desire my body should be transported into your Kingdom where I have had the Honour to be a Queen your Sister and ancient Allie but as my sufferings are without comfort so my requests are without answer This day after dinner they signified unto me the sentence to be executed on the next day about seven of the clock in the morning as the most guilty offendor in the world I cannot give you the discourse at large of what is passed It shall please your Majesty to believe my Physitian and my servants whom I conceive to be worthy of credence I am wholly disposed unto death which in this Innocence I shall receive with as much misprision as I have attended it with patience The
the day of its own brightness to consider how Providence guarding her dear Pool as the apple of her eye did reserve him for a time which made him the true Peace-maker of that nation For this effect it came to pass that Henry the Eighth The Estate of England having reigned eighteen years in schism leading a life profuse in luxury ravenous in avarice impious in Sacriledge cruel in massacres covered over with ordures bloud and Infamy did fall sick of a languishing disease which gave him the leisure to have some thoughts on the other world It is true that the affrighting images of his Crimes The death of Henry the Eighth and the shades of the dead which seemed to besiege his bed and perpetually to trouble his repose did bring many pangs and remorses to him Insomuch that having called some Bishops to his assistance he testified a desire to reconcile himself unto the Church and sought after the means thereof But they who before were terrified with the fury of his actions which were more than barbarous fearing that he spoke not that but onely to sound them and that he would not seal to their Counsels which they should suggest unto him peradventure with the effusion of their bloud did gently advise him without shewing him the indeavours and the effects of true repentance and without declaring to him the satisfactions which he ought to God and to his Neighbours for the enormities of so many Crimes He was content to erect the Church of the Cardeleirs and commanded that Mass should there be publickly celebrated which was performed to the great joy of the Catholicks which yet remained in that horrible Havock To this Church he annexed an Hospital and some other appurtenances and left for all a thousand Crowns of yearly Revenue As he perceived that his life began to abandon him he demanded the Communion which he received making a show as if he would rise himself but the Bishop told him that his weakness did excuse him from that Ceremony he made answer That if he should prostrate himself on the Earth to receive so Divine a Majesty he should not humble himself according to his duty He by his Will ordained that his Son Edward who was born of Jane Seimer should succeed him and in the case of death that Marie the Daughter of Queen Katharine should be the inheritress of the Crown and if that she should fail that his Daughter Elizabeth although a Bastard should fill her place and possess the Kingdom On the approches of death he called for wine and those who were next unto his bed did conceive that he oftentimes did repeat the word Monks and that he said as in despair I have lost all This is that which most truly can be affirmed of him for it is a very bad sign to behold a man to die in the honour of his Royal dignity and by a peaceable death who had torn in pieces JESUS CHRIST who had divided the Church into schisms who of the six Queens that he espoused had killed four of them who had massacred two Cardinals three Archbishops eighteen Bishops twelve great Earls Priests and Religious Men without number and of his people without end who had robbed all the Churches of his Kingdom destroyed the Divine worship oppressed a million of innocents and in one word who had assasinated mercy it self Howsoever he wanted not flatterers who presumed to say and write that his wisdom had given a good order to his affairs and that he happily departed this world not considering what S. dustine doth affirm That all the penitencies of those who have lived in great disorders and who onely do convert themselves at the end of their life being pressed to it by the extreamity of their disease ought to be extreamly suspected because they do not forsake their sins but their sins do forsake them It was observed indeed that at his death this King did testifie a repentance of his savage and inordinate life but we cannot observe the great and exemplary satisfactions which were due to the expiation of so many abominable sins King Antiochus made submissions of another nature and ordered notable restitutions to recompense the dammages which he had caused to the people of the Jews nevertheless he was rejected of God by reason of his bloudy life and the Gates of the Temple of mercy were shut against him for all eternity The foundation of a small Hospital which Henry caused at his death was not sufficient to recompense the injuries of so many Churches which he had pillaged nor of so much goods of his Subjects as he had forced from them seeing we know by the words of the wise man That to make a benefit Eccles 34. of the substance of the poor is to sacrifice a Son before the eyes of his Father He had by his Testament ordained many tutors to The Reign of Edward His Uncle Seimer spoileth all his Son who were able to have made as many Tyrants but Seimer Uncle by the mothers side to the deceased King gaining the favour of the principal of the Lords of the realm whom he had corrupted with mony and great presents did cause himself to be proclaimed Protector and Regent He took a great possession on little Edward the Son of Henry heir to the Crown whom he brought up in schism and Heresie against the intentions of his Father This furious man immediately began his Regency with so much insolence that he almost made the reign of Henry the Eight to be forgotten he fomented the poison which he had conceived under him he did use the Catholicks most unworthily and did cut off the head of his own Brother by a jealousy of women But as he had made himself insupportable so it came to pass that the affairs of war which he had enterprized against the French did fall out unfortunately for him Dudley one of the chiefest of the Lords drawing a party to him did accuse him of Treason and caused his head to be cut off on the same Scaffold where before he had taken off the head of his own Brother This death was followed with great fears and horrible commotions for the Regency which presently after was extinguished by the death of the young King Edward This poor Prince was rather plucked with pincers The Qualities and death of King Edward from his mothers womb than born and he could not come into the world without giving death to her who conceived him He was said to have none of the comeliest bodies He spake seven languages at fifteen years of age and in his discourse did testifie a rare knowledge of all those sciences which were most worthy of a King It seemeth that death did advance it self to ravish his spirit from his body which did awake too early and was too foreward for his age for he died in his sixteen year having not had the time throughly to understand himself and to see by what course
lawfull greatest Princes to interrupt your Highnesses I will appear for the Cause of God the Angel of Peace the Minister of Concord and Union the Interpreter of Truth the Mean and Solicitour of Salvation I am not that terrible and dreadfull messenger who injected terrours and scourges into David astonished with Divine Prodigies I am not listed in that number which utterly overwhelmed the City of Pentapolis almost drowned before in the inundation of their impieties I rain nor sulphur I do not brandish flames I dart no thunderbolts but with a mild temperate and gentle amenity I exhibit those olive-branches which the direfull contagion of Warres hath not yet blasted I come from the conversation of those who at the Nativity of our Jesus sang Anthems of Peace to Good-willing men Despise not the Augur of Glad-tydings contemne not the Hyperaspist of Truth who speaketh unto you before God in Christ It is the concernment of the whole Christian world most pious Princes which I addresse unto you it is your interest which I urge and inculcate both by wishes and writings it is the Profession of God which I require and indeed of great importance as having diverse times summoned yea enforced the Priests from the Altars the Virgins from the Monasteries and the Anachoretes from the Woods that of the mute it might make Oratours and Agitatours of the retired God the Arbitratour and Accomplisher of all things who calleth those things which are not as if they were he formeth and prepareth the mouths of infants giveth wisdome to the impudent to yield to him is victory to contest with him is succeslesse opposition Appetite infuseth Eloquence and necessity not seldome makes a souldier To be silent amidst the articulated movings of the oppressed is unlawfull and to sit still amidst the wounds of Military men as unconcerned is highly and justly reproveable That hand that is not officious to the suffering world deserves an amputation I shall not disoblige the supplicated engagement of your patience excelient Princes with unimporting reasons I shall not abuse your senses with unappertaining figments but by a pleasant prospect I shall shew you that Glory which you aim at thorow fields flowing with bloud thorow the flames of collucent Cities and thorow many doubtfull circulations and diverticles Condescend therefore to give me an allowance of discourse concerning the nature of Warre and Peace and of the Right of Christian Princes in each of them For upon this foundation I conceive I can build firm and satisfactory Arguments whereby to secure your Dignity and to settle the Peoples safety It was a speech well becoming the wisdome of the Ancients that this world in whose circumference all things are contained is as it were a great volumn of the Deity wherein life and death are as the beginning and the end but the middle Pages are perpetually turned over backwards and forwards That which Life and Death bring to passe in the nature of things the same doth Peace and Warre in the Nation of all Kingdomes and Empires And indeed Life is a certain portion of the Divine Eternity which being first diffused in the Divine Nature and afterwards streaming into the sea and penetrating into the earth and our world doth contemperate by an espousall and connexion of bodies and souls wonderfull and almost Divine Agreements But when there is a solution of this undervalued continuity when this harmony is disturbed and broken it suddenly vanisheth by the irresistible necessity of death greedily depopulating all things under his dominion In like manner Peace the greatest and most excellent gift of the Divine indulgence reconciles and apportions apportions a kind of temperature in the wills of men from whence floweth the most active vigour of all functions in the Body Politick as the alacrity of minds the rewarded sedulity of Provinces the faithfull plenty of the Countrey the security of travelling the opulency of Kingdomes and the accumulation of all temporall blessings But when Concord is dissipated and the alarms of Warre besiege mens ears presently there insueth a convulsion and direfull decay of all the members and Audacity finding it self disingaged from the mulcts and penalties of the Laws runneth headlong into all variety of mischief the most Sacred things are violenced and the most Profane are licenced the nocent and the innocent are involved in the expectation of a sad and promiscuous catastrophe and bonefires are made of cities not to be quenched but with the bloud of miserable Christians He that will tax his own leisure but with the cheap expence of considering our mortality will so much scruple these effects to be the actions of men that he may be easily seduced to believe that Hell hath lost some prisoners or that some troops of Furies have broken the chains of darknesse and in a humane shape deluded men with such enormous villanies My highest obedience most excellent Princes is due to truth and that obligation prompts me to proclaim this judgement That Contentions and Warre have not had any ingresse into the Church of God but by clandestine and undermining Policies Discipline resisting and Conscience standing agast at the monstrous object And indeed Paul exclaimeth against contentions Brother saith he goeth to law with brother and that under Infidels Now therefore there is altogether an infirmity in you in that you go to law one with another Why rather suffer you not wrong Why rather sustain you not fraud But ye your selves do wrong and exercise fraud and that to your brethren What do we hear an Edict published by an Apostle invested with thunder and lightning I beseech the revisitation of your thoughts what would he imagine were he lent again unto the world by providence that then wanted patience to see a controversie about a field perhaps or a house and should now behold among those that claim the title of the Faithful Ensigne against Ensigne Nation against Nation and not a House not a city not a Province but the whole Christian world precipitated into slaughters rapes and priviledged plunders would he countenance such an inhumane spectacle with a Declaration of allowance or would he perswade men to the violations of the Law of Nature and dictate encourgement to ruine and rapine But Tertullian also is very strict in this point and peradventure too rigid whilst he saith that our Lord by that injunction to Peter to sheath his sword disarmed all Christian Souldiers This in my judgement deserves a censure of extream severity if he conclude all warfare to be criminall this were to destroy the innocent in a detestation of the guilty should we perpetrate corrupt actions upon the order of the cruel and the petulancy of luxuriant villains What would Christianity then be but a prey to the insatiable and a laughing-stock to the insolent if it were not lawfull to revenge unfaithfull injuries with a just retaliation If it were not lawfull to defend Churches from Sacriledge Widows and Orphans from oppressions and disinteressed persons
from ruine 'T is a rash determination that bloweth off the victorious laurels of so many Christian Kings with such a blind and precipitate whirlwind of words Justly therefore are the Manichees obnoxious to a spirituall Outlawry from the Church whilst I know not whether they more impudently assert innocence or more blameably disarm it All Ages concurre in the justification of Warre against Infidels but the intermingled contentions of the Faithfull have been alwayes reprehended and never impartially tolerated Be pleased to take a review of an old instrument There were many and bitter discords among the Jews many tumults many warres but ever against those that had abandoned the true Religion and collapsed into foul Idolatry and the worship of the Gentiles The Israelites indeed upon the division of the Tribes fought against the Benjamites with a fierce warre and an infinite destruction but this was rather the fury of grief rushing into arms for the revenge of a woman violated with prodigious lust then any destinated opposition or just controversie for the enlargement of their territories The magnanimity of David could scarce be induced to a just resistance of his sonne Absolon forcing his way unto his Fathers Throne thorow the bloud and carkasses of many Citizens till Joab had obstinately dissipated that languidnesse of his gentle mind so detestable an undertaking was it for those who were brethren by the bonds of Nature and Religion to forfeit all civill respects to the rage of warre If you please to consult the first times of the Christian Emperours you shall find Constantine opposing his forces against Julian but not till he became the desertour of Christ and the Standard-bearer of impiety You shall also find Theodosius the Great levying his utmost strength against Maximus Eugenius and Arbogastus but his quarrel was with most perfidious Tyrants who under the veil of Religion laboured to hide flagitious and damnable excesses You shall scarce meet with any Prince in the more innocent times who took up arms to be embrewed in Christian bloud but upon the most deliberate and important causes And indeed Baronius doth excellently observe that the Crosse was first opposed to the Crosse in arms in the Warre which Constantius raised against Magnentius A horrible wickednesse saith he and not to be attempted but by a Christian Tyrant a dissembler of Religion and an Hereticall Emperour I am not ignorant that Augustine hath handled this subject and question against Faustus and that he hath established the equity of Christian arms upon the foundation of the Gospel because John in so exemplary a rigour of life perswaded not the souldiers enquiring after the means of their salvation to cast away their weapons but to be contented with their pay and to strike no man Because also the Apostle not without cause saith That Princes bear not the sword in vain But if it be lawfull to yield our assent to the approbation of his judgement we shall find that all those darts were ejaculated against the mad phrensies of the Manichees who would have Christians to abstain from the sword and to bear the most cruel injuries of treacherous Infidels unrepelled unrevenged He would not therefore either cherish the severity or irritate the power of Christian Princes in an unlawfull Warre against their brethren for in the same place he exclaimeth a defire of doing violence a cruel preparation of mind to revenge an implacable mind a barbarous lust to rebel a secret speculation of Lordly dominion and other such as these are the causes which are justly culpable in the Warres Now who are they according to the opinion of S. Austin that consociate themselves and their adherents in an unjust Warre First they that are hurried into Arms by a blind violence of spirit not so much for love of Justice as a greedinesse of revenge Who being provoked by some injury inhumanely and unmeasurably rave and rage abhorring all attonement and refusing by the authority of an incensed reason to chide out their Passions those petulant and contentious inmates In the second place they who endeavour a Rebellion against their lawfull Sovereigne and casting off the yoke of their Allegiance precipitate themselves into all licencious enormities Finally they who out of a sole desire of Ruling involve and mingle the Kingdomes of their neighbours in commotions and intestine discords and that they may extend their Empire open a passage to their ambitious expectations by all designes either violent or fraudulent Consider now best Princes what a proclivity there is in such to boil with indignation and displeasure to burn with paroxisms of envy and exacerbations of revenge yea and to be tickled with an apprehension of purchasing or amplifying a Kingdome How obvious it is the reins being let loose to transcend the just limits how easie a matter to counterfeit Justice to pretend necessity and now to trample upon those Laws which before were so much outwardly reverenced you will undoubtedly find it true that it is more easie to take up then to moderate and temper Arms. But that I may not detain you long Aquinas requireth three things to the justification or legitimation of a Warre the Authority of the Prince a just Cause and a right Intention whereunto other Divines have added warrantable Reasons to obtain the end it is absolutely unlawfull therefore for private men to appear in Arms for the prosecution of their own right though in judgement This God hath delegated unto Princes that that might happen seldome which must needs be violent To the Lords of the earth we may say with Seneca I am he that God hath chosen out of so many men that I might be his Vicegerent upon earth I am the supreme Arbiter of life and death unto the Nations It is in the hand of my power to dispose the lot of their conditions to all my people These millions of swords that guard my peace shall at the lest intimation of my pleasure be all unsheathed What Cities shall perish and which shall flourish is my jurisdiction To be able to put all these things in execution is indeed a great matter but to forbear the pursuance of them unlesse necessity require it is farre more divine It is a lawfull wish that he to whom all things are lawfull would confine his will to the practice onely of lawfull things The right of the Sword is not extended when it devolveth into the Protection of one but is rather restrained One hand is stretched forth that all may be bound affairs are managed by the wisdome of a paucity lest the temerity of the whole multitude should precipitate them into a promiscuous destruction The parsimony even of the meanest bloud is to be praised No man is more unjustly invested with a superiority over others then he that is prodigall of their lives though in a just emergence Those thunderbolts must be slowly shot which the wounded persons can reverence Let Kings therefore beware lest they glorifie themselves by that faculty
their jubilations but see how they destroy one another see how they butcher one another see how they prosecute and persecute one another with endlesse hatred Either they are without Christ or Christ is without Peace It is a hard saying yet hath it more of truth then wonder The Cause of God suffereth diminution in these discords the Church mourneth for many and horrid things either the Religion we professe accuseth our errours or we the Professours accuse our Religion By us Infidels insult over the Elect the Profane over the godly the Jews over Christ and Barbarians over the Church If our honour be cheap in our own valuation why do we betray the Honour of God why do we batter his inheritance Moreover to what short consideration is it not evident that Christian dissentions have been alwayes the occasion of Heathenish rejoycings Whilst our own Armies are conflicting one with the other the Turks have taken Rhodes from us and usurped Constantinople May we not think it a miraculous indulgence of our mercifull God to divert so potent and cruel an enemy from our destruction by engaging him in the Persian Warre But this is much to be feared lest if such whirlwinds of wrath continue among us he should flie upon the torn and scattered remainder of our Kingdomes with fury and violence It is also to be feared lest the Providence being so often provoked by our renewed injuries should cast us out as a prey to the roaring and the ravenous lion The greatest Empires have been often lost in ruine for the same causes and the same offences and the wicked Kings have been subjected to a forreign domination their posterity hath been cut off and all their glories have vanished into a reproachfull scoffe What constant glories have they possessed what dry deaths hath the check of Providence allowed them by whose means it hath come to passe that the Kingdome of Christ hath devolved into the hands and power of the Sarazens Adde to these things O you Princes the unregarded grievances of your Subjects and the laborious servitude of your people Necessity compels you to devour your own members that you get into your grasp the members of another Such a numerous people as the omnipotent God hath delegated to your care and piety that they should be kneaded and compounded into one substantiall felicity by Peace and concord by holy laws and religious adoration of the Deity are either exposed as unfortunate and succourlesse oblations to the fury of their enemies or groan under the pressures of taxations and are tilted in their fortunes by the unappeased and insatiable avarice of exactours Those who have escaped the Sword Famine depopulates by lingring deaths or else they live oppressed under some tyrannous calamity They are sequestred from light and conversation they have neither countrey nor habitation neither rest nor food Fecundity the most desired blessing of their former hopes is now both hated and feared because they cannot leave an inheritance of good things to their children they would not propagate them to become heirs of misery That life which they have been carefull to preserve amidst so many dangers they now detest as unprofitable to you uncomfortable to themselves To be plundred of all things at once is their deliberate wish lest every day they should be plundred But in the mean time they are infested with a diversity of evils the amission of all things and the capitation of each particular thing an Excise upon every thing an undoubted property in nothing They fall under the cruel command of necessity where they are neither permitted to live with the honest nor to die with the quiet they are made gazing-stocks to others and are formidable to themselves whilst their estates perish to themselves their affections are lessened to you which formerly adorned and confirmed your Crowns with a loyall valour Consider Greatest Princes that next to the Honour and Worship of God the most supreme Law that binds you is the safety of the People It was once the speech of a valiant Emperour Non mihi sed exercitui sitis You are not so much born for your selves as for your subjects Their cares if you be wise must be your crosses their oppressions your burdens their miseries your infelicities and their discouragements your complaints What doth it advantage disconsolate men to be defended from the expectations of a greedy enemy by being rifled and impoverished by those of his own Nation He is a miserable Pastour from whom the tutelary Gods of the flock require more things then wolves can devour But this is the soul of misfortune the estate being exhausted the mind is dejected and the virtues are disheartned the Laws are silent among Swords the Blasphemer and the Hypocrite have the uncontrolled liberty of speaking Sword-men licenciously swagger Robbers and Plunderers are the onely Ranters Murderers are the merry-men and all variety of lust is predominant the beauty of Churches is disgraced and sullied with Sacrilegious hands Altars are overthrown Justice is vilipended and Injustice blusheth in scarlet robes Religion fainteth Piety languisheth Charity is counted scandalous and not onely all things are perverted but perverse things are neglected as if it were expedient that things should be so necessity that fruitfull mother of impieties so commanding And if you will reflect upon your own affairs I beseech you Princes among so many funeralls of Warre what can be pleasant to you You must stirre the earth adde disquiet to the sea and by many dangers you must arrive at greater danger Death that is obvious to every person must be sought for by hard labours no erroneous or reproveable course indeed if a happy Peace were unfeignedly pursued Many things are unfaithfull at home infested abroad great Armies are hard to raise costly to maintain easie to be destroyed the fate of Battels is common and the chance of Warre uncertain Prosperity doth not satisfie adversity striketh with a steep wounding dart and pierceth the very heart Many times victories themselves are the seeds of new contentions the brooding of new sorrows It is not lawfull for them that are up to keep their station nor for those that were overcome to lie still Discords increase with a prodigious fertility being once begun and many times the conquered draw the Conquerours and an inconcocted excesse of fortune obstructeth all their glories all things are intermixt with fear that depend upon expectation Many times fallacious events delude well-grounded hopes and horrid Catastrophe's befall the desperate The ingresses of Warre are troublesome the progresses doubtfull the egresses commonly deplorable Many is exhausted to make good the baffles of force by underming fraud lost Commanders are lamented to whom nothing was wanting but immortality Cyprus disappoints the Laurel and Funerals are distinguished by Palms The Conquerours stand over the ruines of the oppressed being themselves wasted by the expence of bloud and strength and nearer to their Tombs then Triumphs You would believe that a Kingdome
Divine Love ib Qualities of Divine Love by which we may know whether it inhabiteth a soul 26 Pliantnesse Liberality and Patience three principall marks of Love ibid. Twelve effects of Love ibid. Three orders of true Lovers in the world ib. Nine degrees of Seraphical Love for the conterplative ib. That it is good to be honestly Loved 38 We most ardently Love the things we most lose 58 The scandalous of the Emperour Lotharius and Valdrada 109 The Love of David and Jonathan 140 Excellent loyaltie of a Ladie 8 Lysias his speech before the raising of the siege of Hierusalem 203 Lysias is taken and slain by the souldiers ibid. M THe gallant resolution of Maccabeus who with a handfull of men gave battell to a great army wherein being over powered he lost not his honour but his life 204 Some Men are in the world as dislocated bones in the body 52 Man terrible above all terribles 72 Man as he is the most miserable of all creatures so he is the most Mercifull 98 Man hath no greater evil then himself ibid. An observation of Bernardine concerning Marriage 35 Mattathias the father of Judas Machabeus opposeth the tyranny of Antiochus 197 He refuseth to offer incense to Idols ibid. His courage for Religion 198 His glorious death ibid. Utility of Melancholy 55 A notable example of Meroven to divert youth from Marriage 106 The first Mervell in the life of S. Lewis is the joyning of the wisdome of State with the Gospell 177 The second is of the union of Humility and Greatnesse 179 The third is his devotion and courage ibid. Incomparable Mildnesse of Lewis the sonne of Charlemaign 120 Mildnesse of the first men 99 The beauty and utility of Mildnesse 100 Sin and Folly the chief evils of the Mind 58 Remedies for Minds full of scruple 56 Moderation of the Kings of France 117 Great Moderation in S. King Robert 119 Mordecai his excellent personage 187 His entertainment in the Court of Ahashuerus ib. He discovereth the treason which was plotted against Ahashuerus ib. Moses flooted in the river of Nile in a cradle of bull-rushes 227 His education 228 He killeth an Egyptian 229 He withdraweth into the countrey of Midian ib He talketh with God ibid. He dyeth having first seen the land of promise from mount Nebo 234 Gods judgement on wicked Murray 300 N NAaman the Assyrian commanded by Elisha to wash seven times in the river Jordan 257 His leprosie stayes upon Gehezi 258 Naboth unjustly condemned and slain 251 Nathan and Bathsheba's advice 151 Nature necessarily brings with it its sympathies and antipathies 46 Nebuchadonozar his dream 242 He worshippeth Daniel 241 He erecteth a statue of gold of sixty cubits high 243 He commandeth all his nobles to do homage to it ib. He commandeth the three children that disobeyed his command therein to be cast into the fornace 244 His second dream and the interpretation by Daniel ibid. His misfortune is bewailed by the whole Court 245 He is again found out and reinvested in his throne ib. The birth and education of Nero. 271 The perfidiousnesse of his mother ibid. His cruelty towards Britanicus 272 The love of his mother did degenerate to misprision ibid. His present to his mother ibid. His horrible attempt upon his mother ibid. The amazement of Nero. 273 Nero continueth his cruelties ibid. He falls in love with Poppea and doth estrange himself from his wife Octavia 274 Nero grows worse and worse 284 The conspiracy against him is detected ibid. The image of Nice-ones 49 Treason against the Duke of Norfolk and his ruine 299 The horrible Catastrophe of the Duke of Norfolk 300 O FLight from Occasions is the most assured bulwark for chastity 18 Octavia calumniated by Poppea 274 Ozias Prince of the people in the presence of Joachim appeaseth the people of Bethulia 182 P THe over-fond love of Parents to their children is chastised in them 272 The exercise of Patience what it is 37 Necessitie forceth Patience 58 S. Paul tender in holy affections 8 He came to Rome 279 He is falsly accused ibid. His conversation with Peter ib. He preacheth the Gospel ib. He is threatned and persecuted 280 He is condemned to the whip but diverted that punishment ib. He is committed to the hands of Felix ibid. He appears before the Tribunal of Felix ibid. Drusilla comes to hear him ib. S. Paul appeals to Rome 281 The young Agrippa king of Judea with his sister Bernice assist at the judgement of S. Paul ib. Festus is touched with his words ibid. He is imbarqued for Rome ibid. He arrives there and treateth with the Jews ibid. S. Paul is undoubtedly known by Seneca ibid. His Oration to the Senate of Rome 282 The effect of his Oration ibid. The paralel betwixt S. Paul and Seneca 283 The grace of Jesus and the Crosse are the two principles of S. Paul ibid. His perfection and high knowledge 284 He leaveth Rome ibid. The politick counsell of Pharaoh 227 He dreameth 222 He fails in his purposes 228 Marks of reprobation in Pharaoh 230 The plagues of Egypt ibid. An excellent conceit of Plato concerning terrestriall love 222 An excellent conceit of Platonists  The secrets of the Divine Policy of God 238 The birth and education of Cardinall Pool 313 His love of solitude ibid. His travels and return to England ibid. The combat in his spirit 314 He took part with God ibid. He is made Cardinall ib. He is considered on to be made Pope 315 He retireth again into solitude ibid. He travels to the reducement of England to the antient faith 317 His speech to the States 318 Princes the workmanship of God 132 What the wisdome of a Prince should be 133 Princes should not give too much authority to their subjects 144 Whether learning be fitting for Princes 153 That learning is fitting for Princes defended ibid. The favour of Princes is very uncertain 219 Procopius his extravagant fables of Justinian and Theodora disproved 168 The secrets of Providence 164 The great Providence of God in Josephs entring and negotiating in Egypt 218 R REason remedieth all humane actions 57 The love of Reputation is a strong spur 81 The wicked Revenge of an Abbot and of John Proclytas against the French 119 Rigour misbecometh persons Ecclesiasticall 99 The causes of differences of Rigour ibid. Elogy of the city of Rome 79 The estate of Rome and court of Nero when Paul came to it 271 The Practise of Romulus 131 The end o◠Royaltie 131 Royalty a glorious servitude 132 Royalty a mervellous profession ibid. S THe Essence and Image of Sadnesse 54 Four kinds of Sadnesse 55 The remedies against Sadnesse 57 The three Sadnesses of our Blessed Saviour 60 Samuel from his infancy was conversant in the Tabernacle 235 His zeal and other rare qualities 236 His speech to the people ibid. His wisdome in concluding a peace with the Philistims ibid. He dieth 240 The widow of Sarepta's oyl and meal fails not during the
their Colours and that it was enough if they did but shew themselves to conquer The Rebels tormented with the affrightments of their conscience and which had not such entertainment as they were promised first were put into disorder after to flight and then to a rout It seemed that on the one part there were men that came to kill and on the other sheep that came to be slain As soon as they were mingled the one amongst the other the sword on the one side made great Massacres on the other the falls and tumblings headlong carried them away in such manner that there remained twenty thousand upon the place Absolon taken with a great astonishment is left by all the world and betaking himself to flight gets The death of Absolon up upon a Mule It hapned that passing through a Forrest his head was catched and wreathed within the branches of a Tree insomuch that his carryer having left him he remained hanging between heaven and earth where he made a very fitting amends both to the justice of God and the goodnesse of his Father Joab had notice thereof who neverthelesse although David had forbidden it stroke him through with three Darts and when as yet he seemed to have life ten young souldiers of the Troups of Joab ran to make an end of him he feared so much that if he should return into favour and authority lest he should take vengeance upon him because he would not follow his party The body was interred in a pit under a great heap of stones for to convince the vanity of him which had caused a stately monument to be built for himself which he called Absolons hand Behold an horrible end of an evil sonne and a rebellious subject which is sufficient to make posterity afraid throughout the revolution of all ages While all this was doing David inclosed in a little Town expected the event of the battell and when as the Posts brought him the news of the Victory he shewed not so much rejoycing as fear asking every moment in what estate his sonne Absolon was which caused that divers durst not bring him the news of his death seeing the trouble of his mind At last Cushi uttered the word and said That they should desire Absolon's end to all the Kings enemies He understood well what he would say and was pierced with so violent a grief that he could not be comforted losing all courage and crying every moment Absolon my sonne my sonne Absolon Oh that this favour had been done for me that I might have dyed for thee Every one cast down his eyes for pitty and the whole victory was turned into sorrow the Palms and Laurels were changed into Cypresse Joab alwayes bold and insolent towards his Master Joabs insolency instead of receiving reproches for his fault casts them upon David and thinks that the means to justifie himself was to speak the more stoutly He enters into the Chamber of his King and reproves him sharply saying to him That he would put to confusion all his good servants that had that day saved his life his house and all his estate That he was of a strange nature and seemed to have been made for nothing but to hate those that loved him and to love those that hated him That it was very clear that he bore no good affection to his Captains and good Souldiers and if they all had perished to save the life of one rebellious sonne he would have been very well satisfied Further he swore to him by the living God that if he did not rise and go forth to see and entertein those that returned from the battell that there should not remain one man onely with him before the morning which would prove a greater displeasure to him then ever he received in all his life He pressed him so vehemently that the King without daring to answer him one word rose up and did all that he would have him This great grief diminished by little and little and the rejoycings of those that came on every side to carry him back to Jerusalem in Triumph gave him no leasure to think upon his losse He endeavoured to draw to him again all those that had separated themselves pardoning all the world with an unspeakable meeknesse being ready even to give Joabs place to Davids mildenesse very great Amasa that was chief Captain for Absolon But Joab quickly hindred this and kild with his own hand him that they had purposed for his successour After that he began to pursue one Sheba a Captain of the Rebels who was retyred into Abela with some remainder of the mutinous and as he was about to besiege it and destroy the City for to take him a woman of discretion and great in credit amongst her people which had made composition with Joab caused him to be slain and threw his head over the walls to put an end to this whole bloodie warre After this re-establishment of his Estate David The last acts of Davids life reigned about eleven years in full peace in continuall exercises of Piety of Devotion of Justice and caused a generall Assembly of the States of his Realme where he made his sonne Solomon which he had chosen to be confirmed and encouraged him to build that great Temple which should be the marvell of the World whereof he shewed him the plat-form the beautifying and the orders in the Idea Two things do a little astonish those which do seek an exact sanctity in this Prince the first that he dyed having unto the last hour a maid of rare beauty by him and the other that he recommended to his son Solomon punishments and deaths by his Testament But there are that answer to those that may be offended with these actions That God hath permitted this to make us the better to relish and admire the perfections of his Evangelicall law whereof the Word Incarnate was made the Law-giver and bringet above all the excellencies of the presents and virtues of the Mosaicall law And that one ought not to expect from David the chastity of a Saint Lewis nor of a Casimire but that one ought to measure things according to the manner of the time according to the law and custome Neverthelesse I should rather say that the plurality of women was not an offence seeing that it was approved of God so that it caused not a weakning of the vigour of the spirits and mortifying their divine functions by too much commerce with the flesh David sinned not in causing the Shunamite to lye besides him seeing that she was in the place of a spouse and approched unto him not for the pleasure which his great age had totally extinguished but for the entertainment of his Royall person Lastly there are other actions that do set forth his virtue besides this which is more worthy of excuse then blame And forasmuch as he ordained by his testament the death of Joab and of Shimei this doth something
trouble those spirits which have an inclination to mildnesse they say that Joab was his kinsman his faithfull servant the best of his Captains the chief Commander that had followed him from his youth accompanied him through infinite dangers and upheld the Crown a thousand times shaking upon his head He never medled in the factions that were raised against the King he was alwayes the first that dissipated them by the vigour of his spirit resolution counsell of his Arms and of his Sword If he slew Abner it was in revenge of his Brother which the other had slain If he stabbed Amasa it was the chief Captain of the Rebell Absolon whom they would have put in his place for to lay then great faults of the State upon him If he spoke freely to David it was alwayes for his good and for his glory in the mean time at his Death he recommended him to be punished after that in effect he had pardoned him all his life But to all this I say that the last actions of so great a King are more worthy of honour then censure The punishment of Joab proceeded not from a Passion but from a Justice inspired by God which would satisfie the voyce of blood the which cryed still against the murders committed by this Captain Further also there was a secret of State as saith Theodoret which is that this Joab shewed himself against the re-election of Solomon and was ready to trouble the peace of the Realm And as concerning Shimei to whom he had sworn that he would not cause him to dye he kept his promise to him faithfully abstaining from doing him any evil while he lived although he was in absolute power for to hurt him but as his oath was personall he would not extend it upon his sonne and tye his hands contenting himself to recommend unto him that he should do justice according as his wisedome and discretion should direct him It is very fitting that we should think highly of this Prophet and that we should rather search out the reason of many of his actions from the secret inspiration of God then from the weaknesse of humane judgement He lived near upon three-score and twelve years reigned fourty and dyed a thousand and thirty two years before the birth of our Saviour leaving infinite treasures for the building of the Temple and eternall monuments of his devotion and understanding It was a speciall favour to him that the Saviour would be born of his bloud and that his birth was revealed to him so many dayes before it was known to the world He hath often set it down upon the title of his Psalmes and was in an extasie in this contemplation by the fore-taste of that his happinesse Men are accustomed to take their nobility and their names from their Ancestours that go before them But David drew it from a Son which is the Father of Glory and Authour of Eternity The industrious hands of men have taken pains in vain to carve him out a Tomb Death hath no power over him seeing that he is the Primogenitour of life All things are great in his person but the heighth of all his greatnesse is that he hath given us a Jesus SOLOMON SOlomon was he that ordered the holinesse of the Temple and yet he can hardly find place in the Holy Court The love which gave Solomons entry into the Realm full of troubles him the Crown by the means of his mother Bathsheba hath taken from him his innocency The Gentiles might have made him one of their Gods if Women had not made him lesse then a man His entrance into the Throne of his father was bloudy his Reign peaceable his Life variable and his End uncertain One may observe great weaknesses at the Court at his coming to the Crown confused designs desperate hopes a Prophet upright at the Court a woman full of invention an old Courtier overthrown and little brotherhood where there is dispute of Royalty David was upon the fading of his Age and his Throne looked at by his Children which expected the dissolution of their father He had taken the authority upon him to decide this question by his commands not willing to be ruled therein by nature nor to preferre him whom she had first brought into the world but him which should be appointed by God and best fitted thereto by his favours Bathsheba a subtil woman Bathsheba fitly insinuares her self and procures the Crown for her son Solomon that had carried him away by violence of a great affection kept her self in her possession and had more power over the mind of the King then all his other associates Amidst the kindnesses of an affectionate husband which is not willing to deny any thing to her whom he loves she drew this promise from David that he would take her sonne Solomon to be successour in his Estates This was a little miracle of Nature in his Infancy Solomons infancy pleasing and it seemed that all the Graces had strove together to make a work so curiously polisht His mother loved him with infinite tendernesse and his father could not look upon him without amazednesse He was married at the age of nineteen years and David before he departed from the world saw himself multiplied by his son in a second which was Roboam Aristotle hath observed well that children which are married so young do seldome bring forth great men and this observation was verified in Roboam who caused as many confusions in his life as he had made rejoycings at his birth This strengthened Solomon at the beginning in his own and his mothers pretences But Adonijah his brother which immediately followed Absolon was before him in the right of Eldership and promised himself to have a good part of the Empire The example of that unfortunate brother which had Adonijah competitor of the Crown and his faction expired his life in the despair of his fortune was not strong enough for to stay him which treading as it were in the same steps went on infallibly unto his last mischance David endured too long for him and it seems to him that the greatest kindnesses that a rich father could do for his sonne when he is come to die is to suffer himself to die He had sufficiently well knitted his party together binding himself closely to the chief Priest Abiathar and to Joab It seemed to him that having on his side the Altars and Arms he was invincible But in that burning desire that he had to reign he The fault of Adonijah in his Counsel of State committed very great faults which put an end to his life by an event very tragicall He did not sufficiently consider the power of his father who governed himself by the orders of them in the disposition of their Royalty and saw not that to undertake to succeed him without his good will was to desire to climb to the top of the house vvithout going up by the stairs His