bringing himselfe to destruction Page 111 § 10. How indirect self-murder of commission is wrought by desperate hazard in six cases Page 112 The first case is concerning Braves and desperate undertakers Page 112 The second case is concerning purchase and reskue Page 112 The third case is concerning some souldiers Page 113 The fourth case is concerning Mariners Page 113 The fifth case is concerning Duells Page 114 The sixth case is concerning desperate attempts upon daring and wagering Page 116 § 11. Of indirect self-murder committed by covenant and society with persons destinate to destruction in three cases Page 118 1. Of Leagues Page 119 2. Of Warre ibid. 3. Of presuming into infectious places or company Page 120 § 12. Of indirect self-murder of commission by doing that which naturally procures that which kills the doer of it Page 121 § 13. Of indirect self-murder of commission by wilfully doing capitall crimes against humane Lawes and Authority Page 120 § 14. Of indirect self-murder of commission by wilfull transgression of Gods Laws after two severall waies Page 120 § 15. Of three exempt cases wherein men may expose their lives to death without danger of indirect self-murder Page 125 The first case is concerning venturing life upon lawfull calling ibid. § 16. A question or case of conscience resolved about Souldiers in danger of their lives fleeing without order Page 127 § 17. Of the second exempt case about adventuring of life without danger of indirect self-murder which is in urgent unavoidable necessity in three points Page 128 The first whereof is about both uncertaine death for certaine and necessary good ibid. And also certaine death for Superiours and for some friends Page 129 § 18. Of the second point which is concerning certaine death for certaine more publick good Page 131 § 19. Of six questions resolved that belong to this second point Page 133 The first where of is about a man-slayer what he is to do for whose sake his friends are pursued to death ibid. § 20. Of the second question which is about a man under deadly displeasure of Superiours what he is to do for to pacifie their mortall wrath reflecting for his sake upon his friends Page 133 § 21. The third question which is touching the voluntary appearing of Fellons or the like at liberty upon baile to submit to Iustice for freeing of their bailes with danger of their owne lives Page 135 § 22. The fourth question which is about what an unquestioned or unsuspected guilty party is to do for saving of a guiltlesse person that is brought to the doome and danger of death upon triall by error or misprision for the capitall fact of the former Page 136 § 23. The fifth question which is about a mans voluntary revealing to the Magistrate his owne secret capitall crimes touching his life in case of importable distresse of conscience for the same crimes by him done Page 137 § 24. The sixth question or case which is about burning or sinking a ship in a sea-sight and how farre such a fight is to be mainteyned against the Enemies without danger of self-murder Page 138 § 25. Of the third point of the second exempt case which is about venturing of life without danger of indirect self-murder for saving of soules Page 141 In two cases 1. About infectious persons ibid. 2. About publishing of the Gospell upon danger of death to the doer Page 142 § 26. Of the third generall exempt case wherein men may expose their lives to death without danger of indirect self-murder which is about religion and our owne salvation in foure points or cases Page 143 § 27. Of the first point or case which is about defence of Religion in peace and warre Page 144 § 28. Of the second point of the third case about adventuring and laying down our lives for religion without danger of self-murder which is about the publick confession or profession of the truth with danger of life Page 145 § 29. Of the third point belonging to the third exempt case which is about not-omitting doing necessary duties commanded by God in perill of life upon humane command or threats to the contrary and of the severall sorts of those duties and how farre they bind us And of the obedience and disobedience of Ministers to suspension deprivation and the like censures Page 146 § 30. Of the fourth point of the third exempt case which is about not-commission of any evill of sinne upon any command or inforcement of man threatning death to the disobedient Page 149 § 31. Of the kinds of sins of commission to be avoided to death in things determinatly evill of themselves both by the law of nature and also by the positive Law of God Page 150 § 32. Of indifferent things and how the use of them may be sinfull and in that respect then to be forborne Page 152 § 33. Of the diverse properties of an indirect self-murderer Page 154 § 34. Observations from indirect self-murder in three uses Page 155 Chap. 12. Of direct bodily self-murder § 1. What direct self-murder is both in the generall nature of it in foure things and also in the specificall nature of it remote and neere Page 159 § 2. Of the imaginary good conceited to be in self-murder Page 163 § 3. Concerning the wills object and its faultinesse Page 167 § 4. Of diverse observations from direct self-murder Page 169 § 5. Of certaine exempt cases of some that kill themselves and are not direct self-murderers Page 172 Chap. 13. Of direct self-murderers § 1. That practise and habit gives denomination and why Page 175 § 2. How it is apparent by Scripture that many men have murdered themselves with diverse observations from the same about self-murder and horrible crimes falling out in the Church Page 176 § 3. How self-murderers are apparent by Histories both prophane and Ecclesiasticall amongst heathens and Christians and the reasons of the same Page 178 § 4. That self-murderers are knowne by continued experience and of two uses of the same and how the motions of self-murder cleave to men and prevaile over them Page 181 Chap. 14. Of the meanes and method of self-murderers murdering themselves directly § 1. Of the meanes of self-murder how none is lawfull of two uses shewing how hard it is to do good and easie to do evill Page 183 § 2. The self-murderers application of the meanes of self-killing in premeditation and determination of the end and choise of the meanes to effect it with observation of three things therein and of two observations for instruction and use Page 185 § 3. Of the self-murderers method in executing murder upon themselves with observation of three things therein upon two reasons and how hardly resolved self-murder is withstood Page 187 Chap. 15. The self-murderers motives whereupon they directly kill themselves § 1. That men by abused reason do sin worst and that there is no true reason why any should kill themselves Page 189 § 2. Of motives to
self-murder there can bee none warrantably sufficient and how arguments are deemed weak or strong Page 191 § 3. Concerning the motive to self-murder from perverted Iudgement by humane lawes and customes how both prevaile against nature How the judgement of the learned and wise hath the force of Law How lawes and customes against Scripture and reason are erroneous and not to be obeyed A caveat against vaine praise of self-murderers Page 192 § 4. Of the motive to self-murder from perverted judgment by mis-understood Scripture the three causes thereof and of foure meanes or rules of right understanding the Scriptures Page 195 § 5. Of the motive to self-murder from perverted judgment by mis-construed decree and destiny and the grounds of the same the errer of grounding ill practises upon that foundation with diverse observations about that course Page 202 § 6. Of the motive to self-murder from perverted judgment by the conceited good of self-murder and how apparent good beguiles the understanding And now the will workes upon the understanding to deceive it and how self-murder blinds the mind Page 207 § 7. Of the motive to self-murder from afflictions their severall sorts whereof three are upon the body Page 211 § 8. Of the motive to self-murder from afflictions upon a mans outward estate Page 214 § 9. Of the motive to self-murder from crosses in points of honour Page 215 § 10. Of the motive to self-murder from disasters upon friends in two eases Page 216 § 11. Of the motive to self-murder from trouble of conscience the kinds and manner of the same Page 217 § 12. Of the motive to self murder from disconcentment of mind and passion of love the kinds and causes of discontentment Page 219 § 13. Of the motive to self-murder from disgrace and shame 221. the causes effects and kinds thereof Page 222 § 14. Of the motive to self-murder from feare the causes and effects of it Page 224 § 15. Of the true causes of self-murder in afflictions which are three Page 225 § 16. That Affliction is no warrantable motive for any to kill themselves shewed by foure reasons Page 228 § 17. Of certaine uses about afflicted persons Page 230 § 18. Of the motive to self-murder from anger and revenge the kindes thereof against ones selfe and others good and bad their causes and powerfull effects Page 232 § 19. Of the motive to self-murder from care of prevention of sin to come in our selves or others and how unwarrantable it is for any to kill themselves for that end Page 237 § 20. Of the motive to self-murder from ambition and excessive desire after glory praise or a better life to come after death and how unwarrantable it is for any therefore to kill themselves Page 241 § 21. Of the motive to self-murder from the motions and temptations of the devill how he suggests the same and to whom specially how knowne to be from Satan and upon what reasons to be rejected Page 246 § 22. Of the motive to self-killing from phrensie the kinds the subjects and grounds of it Page 250 § 23. Of the motive to self-murder from the examples of such as have murdered or killed themselves and of the insufficiency of that motive for any to do the like upon such presidents Page 252 Chap. 16. Of Self-murderers introduction and entrance into the practise of self-murder § 1. Of the persons most subject to self-murder who are of foure sorts Page 254 § 2. Of the entrance into self-murder by foure particular degrees where are handled two questions 1. concerning desire of death 2. about the goodnesse of being against them that wish that they had never beene borne or never had being Page 256 § 3. Of foure signes of ensuing self-murder neere approching Page 259 Chap. 17. Arguments against self-murder proving the same to be utterly unlawfull and damnable § 1. That self-murder is contrary to Religion and how where two questions are resolved 1. Whether the Supreame Magistrate may for any capitall crime done by him either kill himselfe or be put to death pon his owne command or otherwise by his people 2. How farre a man condemned to die may be active about taking away his owne life Page 262 § 2. How self-murder is against God himselfe in foure respects Page 267 § 3. How self-murder is against nature Page 269 § 4. How self-murder is injurious to mankinde Page 270 § 5. How self-murder wrongs mans selfe in doing it Page 271 § 6. How self-murder is a sinne most harmfull and to whom Page 272 § 7. How right reason condemnes self-murder by nineteene severall arguments Page 273 Wherein also is shewed the reasons why the goods of self-murderers become confiscate and Deodands Page 278 § 8. Of certaine uses about the grievousnesse of self-murder and how men should beware of it Page 286 Chap. 18. Of the finall estate of direct selfmurderers whether they be all everlastingly damned with the devils in hell or not § 1. Of the extent of self-murder to the soules hurt and how regardlesse self-murderers be of their soules Page 288 § 2. That all that kill themselves are not properly direct self-murderers nor are in their state of damnation and who be exempted and upon what grounds Page 290 § 3. That all proper and direct self-murderers are reprobates without the state of grace and are in the state of eternall damnation and the reasons thereof Page 291 § 4. That by the Testimony of the Scriptures both in doctrine and also in all examples of self-murderers recorded therein all proper and direct self-murderers are everlastingly damned Page 293 § 5. That self-murder is a transcendent sin beyond both law and mercy and subjects the doers of it to damnation ibid. § 6. That self-murderers want all true saving repentance and likewise salvation Page 296 § 7. How the Church testifies by her judgement and usage of direct self-murderers that they are all damned in hell Page 297 § 8. Of certaine uses Page 299 § 9. Of certaine objections made in favour of the salvation of self-murderers answered and first touching that which is taken from the nature of self-murder compared with other the most damnable sins committed against the Law and Gospell Page 300 § 10. The second objection answered which is made from the example of self-killers such as Sampson Pelagia and others who are saved Page 303 § 11. The third objection answered which is taken from the antecedent prayer and repentance of self-murderers for the intended fact of self-murder to come that for the same the doer of it may not be damned Page 306 Chap. 19. Antidotes for prevention of self-murder § 1. What a man is to do of and by himself to prevent self-murder in eight severall particulars Page 311 § 2. How to others wee should make confession of our temptations motives and progresse to self-murder that we may prevent the same and of the manisold caveats and observations about confession Page 317 § 3. Of the meanes to
acting in it selfe can bee destroyed by man whereby it ever lives to be capable of eternall misery or glory For such a death it cannot die without being reduced into nothing and quite extinguished in regard of the spirituall simplicity thereof void of composition and the nature of it is an act but this death is onely of that superadded supernaturall beatificall life of grace and glory whereof a man may misse and come short and be guilty of the losse thereof although he were never personally possessed of it as those that are said 1 Tim. 1.19 to have put away faith and a good conscience §. 3. Of soul-murder by deprivation of life Tvvo degrees of it 1. Of soul-murder there are two degrees the first is deprivation of spirituall life which is poena damni or punishment of losse 2. the second is subjection to misery in positive manner which is called the second death and is poena sensus or punishment of sensible feeling because man was indowed at first as it were habitually with a spirituall life in gracious indowments and communion with God and now by mans owne fault that habit of spirituall life being destroyed it may be truly said that hee himselfe hath killed it in regard that he was radically and implicitely in Adam when he first destroyed and lost the same §. 4. Of mans deficiency to be saved Meanes of mans deprivation of 〈…〉 all life his deficiency The principall meanes of mans deprivation of this spirituall life is his neglect of meanes when himselfe is the immediate cause and procurer thereof by his owne deficiency and that two waies 1. In Adaw First as he is originally confidered in Adam who was the roote of mankind and whose first sinne and effects thereof are equally reckoned to bee all mens in common who then were in him and so thus radically in Adam all men have deprived themselves of spirituall life by their owne act of neglect of eating of the tree of life and of others permitted for their use and by their eating of the forbidden tree of knowledge of good and evill 2. By himselfe personally considered Secondly as he is personally considered by himselfe a man may deprive himselfe of spirituall life and so in that respect be a self-murderer of his soule which is done by his voluntary omission of duties upon which life is promised every man is dead in trespasses and sins a Ephes 2. and thereby subject to death but the Lord hath abundantly provided us of meanes to advance us to life which if we do wilfully neglect or contemne to use there being no other safety of necessiry wee must perish and bee guilty of our owne destruction as were the Iewes by rejecting of the Gospell Act. 28.25 Foure-fold omission Of this degree of self-soule-murder or deprivdtion of life a man may bee guilty by a foure-fold omission of things that ought to be done by him for his salvation 1. Neglect of the outward meanes First when a man willfully neglects the conscionable and diligent use of the outward ordinances of Gods word worship and Sacraments the blessed meanes of life appointed by God without which no man of discretion in the visible Church can be saved the Apostle Rom. 10.13 limits salvation to calling upon the name of the Lord which cannot be without hearing of the word of God This neglect of spirituall meanes is either by not going where they may be had and sincerely used or if hee may have them his neglect may be in not frequenting and carefully using them in conscionable manner nor submitting himselfe to bee wrought upon that he may be moulded in the forme and frame of the word a Rom. 6.17 But doth come to the meanes either with a prejudicate opinion against the truth or with a resolution to continue still in his unregenerated estate and in his sinfull courses as those that with their mouth shewed much love but their hearts went after their covetousnesse Ezek. 33.31 and as those that Ieremie speakes of Ier. 18.12 who said Wee will walke after our owne devices and wee will every one doe the imagination of his evill heart such persons are as guilty of their owne damnation as a man is of self-murder of his body that out of stubbornnesse or sullennesse will not eate but in the midst of plenty starve himselfe to death §. 5. Of mans neglect of the power of the meanes 2. The contempt of the power of the meanes The second omission procuting deprivation of spirituall life and so consequently effecting self-soule-murder in that degree is a mans contempt and regardlesnesse of the spirituall efficacy and power of the meanes for inward change of his spirituall and morall state and condition and for power of enabling him to all holy practise of life and conversation whereby he may be borne againe and be made a new creature a Iob. 3.3 which is a thing most necessary and availeable for salvation Gal. 6.15 Such men are either utterly carelesse and regardlesse of grace and spirituall life from their undervaluing of the worth of it or from their esteeming of the same to be needlesse Or else they harden their hearts as did Pharaoh and set themselves against the power of the Word that it may neither enter into their hearts nor make any divine change in their states or lives as if they had made a league with hell and death What be those Contemners Such are ever learning but never attaine to saving knowledge they are ever sowing but never reape they are ever in the hand of the workeman but are never framed anew they are fairely featured by some outward profession but are without life and sound grace the reason hereof is because such an one rests upon and pleases himselfe in his owne sufficiency using the meanes without consideration of the end why God gave the meanes and why we are couse them and without looking and seeking to God for a blessing upon the meanes that they may be effectuall to his salvation §. 6. Of mans defect in obedience 3. Want of obediencs The third omission whereby a man excludes himselfe from this spiritnall life and so consequently subjects himselfe to spirituall death is wilfull want of obedience to Gods word and that in a double respect 1 Evangelicall First in regard of the Gospell when he doth not savingly beleeve in Christ as the Gospell requires but remaines in privative unbeliefe whereby a man is destitute or deprived of Christ our life and Saviour For we are frequently said to live by faith b Habak 2.4 Heb. 10.38 Rom. 1.17 and therefore without it we are dead and so such as do not savingly beleeve and repent which are the acts of Evangelicall obedience doe deprive themselves of salvation through their owne default which is evident because they are willingly impenitent unbeleevers resisting the motions of the word and Spirit not sorrowing for nor striving against
damned in hell can be for that sensible misery that they shall suffer both in respect of the differing degrees and also of the natures of the things but punishment of damage and privation of life and happinesse proceeds from want and omission of good whereof wee are to beware §. 10. Of indeavour after spirituall life and of the lets thereof 2. The second use is to stirre us up to indeavour after life spirituall both to get and keepe it by the conscionable use of the meanes thereof For as God gives not this life without our using of appointed meanes so these meanes are within the reach of our power and none do perish but such as are wanting to themselves therein For no man perishes or is saved by an absolute decree of God without respect to his owne courses in the accomplishment thereof as Act. 13.48 it is said that as many as were ordained to life beleeved By a mans constant carefulnesse in the use of the meanes and walking in the waies of salvation it is apparent that he is appointed to life as the Apostle tells us 1 Thes 1.4 Knowing your election for our Gospell came unto you in power c. this life is worth the labouring for if we doe our parts for a thing of that price we may have assurance and comfort of it against the servile feare of the contrary death Letts The lets and hinderances of this endeavour and the causes of this omission whereby men deprive themselves of this spirituall life are specially three 1. Perverted judgment First a perverted judgement and stupid understanding undervaluing the worth of that life as not so excellent and necessary as it is it being not subject to our present naturall senses nor regarded by the world 2. Mis-placed affections Secondly the preferment of the world in the profits and pleasures thereof before it in place or degree after which ungodly men doe more eagerly hunt and therein have more content because they have the same in present possession and it agrees best with their estate and disposition insomuch that it may be said of such men that it is better to be their bodies than their soules as the Emperour said of Herod Macrobius that it was better being his hog than his Son because he killed his Son but spared and fatted his hogs 3. Presumption Thirdly groundlesse presumption that either he hath that life already or that he hath time enough to get it long afterwards or that it may be easily had without meanes or at least without so much adoe makes a man to omit endeavouring after it in due time in use of the meanes and so he misses that life §. 11. Of spirituall self-murder by subjection to death through commission of evill The second degree of self-soul-murder The second degree of self-soul-murder is subjection to spirituall destruction in damnation and everlasting misery whereof man himselfe is the efficient meritorious cause by his owne activity in committing and wilfully doing those sinnes for which death and destruction is threatned a Ezek. 18.4 and is assuredly inflicted upon the impenitent perseverers therein For as by a mans omission of his duty he deprives himselfe of life so by his commission of sinnes hee subjects himselfe to the contrary death the former being as terminus à quo the terme from which men move the latter as terminus ad quem the terme to which they move both which are inseparably united in the same person in whom thereby this spirituall self-murder is consummate to the highest perfection or degree of it whereby it properly may be called self-soule-murder §. 12. Of the meanes of destruction by breaking the Law By sins of commission The deadly meanes whereby men kill their owne soules and subject the same to eternall positive destruction are the sins that they wilfully commit and continue in in such kinds and degrees and manner as cannot consist in them with grace and salvation and are of two sorts 1. Against the Law of negative commands First such as be against the prime law of Nature by transgressing the negative Commandements of God whereby the transgressours doe subject themselves to that punishment which is called poena sensus or punishment of smart or damnation in hell For by sinne entred death Rom 5.12 Rev. 21.8 Prov. 19 16. The properties of soul-murdring sinnes The properties of the course and sinnes of Commission whereby a man becomes guilty of self-murder of his soule are foure 1. They are grosse Although the nature of all sinnes be mortall deserves death and disposes a man for it yet those that be of the grossest kinds and in the highest degrees of exorbitancy such as Hosea speakes of cap. 4.2 are specially said to be mortall for their extreame contrariety that they have to God and his justice their inconsistency with grace and for their apting and disposing of those to destruction that live in them so that by committing such sinnes men doe cast their owne soules into the gulfe of perdition 2. Wilfull Secondly when they that commit those sinnes or any of them doe willingly doe the same and live in them against the light and checks of their owne consciences as our Saviour charges the Pharisees Iohn 9.41 then are they self-condemned and do wittingly destroy their owne soules without excuse of ignorance or of want of power to have avoyded the same seeing as there is in some naturall notions of the Law in the minde such as the Gentiles have Rom. 2.14 So likewise all men have some remainder of power to forbeare sinnes in their grossest kinds and degrees if they were not wanting to themselves and therefore as all men specially the wicked within the Church shall be judged by the Law so they shall have nothing to plead to excuse why they should not be damned for their grosse transgressing of it 3. Obstinate Thirdly when men commit those sinnes with eagernesse and delight from and upon advised judgment and wilfull resolution with contentment in the acting of them and defending or excusing them when they are done as did Saul 1 Sam. 13.12 and do fall to opposing censuring and condemning the contrary course of vertue and godlinesse in the persons that doe practise the same whom therefore they hate and persecute a 1 Thes 2.15 such persons are in a course of destroying their owne soules by setting themselves with a high hand against God provoking him to his face to fall upon them for revenge 4. Presevered in Fourthly by this course of sinning a man murders his own soule when he goeth on and incorrigibly perseveres therein passing from evill to worse hardning his owne heart against all reproofes and amendment storming against and abusing all the meanes of his recovery to his deeper plunging in wickednesse and destruction for although hee would willingly misse hell and bee rid of the guilt of his sinne that troubles his conscience
marvell that one man endeavours the ruine and destruction of another when we see how desperately and eagerly they doe the same against themselves For who can expect better respect and usage from any man than he gives to himselfe or is in him to performe Some difference there is in the affection and intention of betternesse to himselfe but his reall performances are to himselfe worst Thus having declared what indirect self-murder is and how it is diversly procured and committed now I will shew certaine exempt cases which although in the materiality of the facts they differ not from indirect self-murder yet in the formality of their acting are much discrepant §. 15. Of certaine exempt Cases Exempt cases Three cases there are wherein men are warrantably to expose their bodies to the apparent danger of death without perill of self-murder or just blame of guiltinesse of their owne deaths 1. By calling First when a man hath a lawfull calling generall or particular which without danger of losse of his life in discharging thereof he cannot execute then is he to adventure his life that he may doe his duty which otherwise cannot be performed committing himselfe to Gods protection and disposall As Peter did in comming downe out of the Ship to walke upon the Sea when Christ commanded him a Mat. 14.29 and as Sampson in execution of his office of Iudge against his enemies pulled downe the house whereby hee with them did perish b Judges 16. Pacchtarius ad Januarium In fine obitus sui sub Martyrii passione David a Mauden in praeceptum 6. discurs decim and is commended among the faithfull Heb. 11.32 whom Bacchiarius an ancient Author calls a Martyr of which David a Mauden gives the reason quia illae quae ad Martyrium requiruntur conditiones in ipso reperiuntur the things requisite for Martyrdome were found in him being a person reconciled to God and dying for Gods glory and in defence of the truth and by a warrantable calling of divine instinct and supernaturall ability And we see that when God did call Moses to come up into the mount there to die he obeyed and went willingly and wittingly unto his owne death Deut. 34. By this rule souldiers and servants taking wages or otherwise bound to fight for their lives or at the command of their superiours are bound as Mauden sayes ex justitia by the law of justice to expose their lives to death in discharge of their duty to obey and protect their superiours Reasons of incouragement The reasons of incouragement to undertake such mortall adventures are specially two First our knowledge and assurance that God whom herein wee are to respect and obey originally or secondarily commanding us will either protect us in our wayes and undertakings or will so dispose of us as shall be best for us with comfort and honour in and after our death Knowledge in which respect both Plato pro Socrate and also Aristotle affirme that honest a mors turpi vitae est praeferenda An honourable death is to be preferred before a shamefull life 2. Benefit of death Secondly the feare of the losse of our lives should bee no remora or hinderance to our dutifull performances because our deaths in this manner may be the medium or meanes to the end that is better than our lives Wee see that if a thing destinated to a certaine end doe at any time crosse or hinder the attaining of that end in that respect it is to be deemed evill and to be rejected as our Saviour commands that if our eye cause us to offend then pull it out and in like case to cut off our hand or foote Mat. 5.30 which is done by mortification and grace making them as uselesse to any scandalous courses as if they were cut off in semblable manner as men throw away their armour to save their lives by slight in a hot pursuit of their enemies and as men at Sea throw their goods into the water to save themselves §. 16. A particular question about souldiers flying resolved Abâ—ut souldiers a case of conscience Question A question may be here moved whether it be in conscience lawfull for any souldier out of feare of death upon his owne apprehensions to flee and runne away to save his life before a signall command or example bee given him by his Commander so to doe Answer Souldiers are to stand I answer for the fact it is true nothing is more frequently done in warre than so to runne away in disorderly manner because feare bereaves men of their use and command of reason and also self-love makes every man more carefull of his owne particular than of the publike things that are neerest doe most affect extremities of dangers convert all a mans thoughts to thinke how then to preserve himselfe But for the morall lawfulnesse of that course it appeares not to me yea rather I conceive that although present death stood ready before them to swallow them up they are not to turne their backs to leave their stations and runne away without due crder signall or example of their Commanders Because such desertion of their Commanders and fellowes in distresse is a betraying of them into their enemies hands Againe the greatest destruction and ruine of an Army comes by disorderly flight wherein every man is objected to the enemies execution Whereas by resolution and couragious resisting to death many victories are gotten with the preservation of the body of an Army Finally if the publike doe miscary our particular cannot bee safe but those that escape may in regard of their after-miseries wish that they had fallen in the army by the sword of their enemies We are bound to attribute so much to the wisdome and valour of our Commanders that they will not cast away the lives of their men but upon apparent possibilities of victory or preservation by opposition although we see it not Helps so to do 1. Faith The helps to enable us to this high courage of performing of duty are two First Faith both for the goodnesse of our estate in Christ to Godward wherby we may be assured of everlasting life and glory when we die and also for the lawfulnesse of our calling and imployment in that service wherein death attaches us that we may as comfortably there end our dayes as if we dyed upon our beds being perswaded of our future happy condition and that our death in that manner is more usefull to men and more acceptable to God than our lives 2. Resolution Secondly undaunted resolution to be obedient in doing our duties considering that obedience is better than sacrifice although in doing thereof wee doe perish For for to enjoy vertue and union with God which confists in obedience to Gods will is better than life without them §. 17. The second exempt case about venturing of life which is upon urgent necessity The second Case Necessity in three
Coate let him have thy Cloake also and whosoever shall compell thee to goe a mile goe with him twaine a Mat. 5.38 39 40.41 For no man is so farre bound to contend for justice in his owne particular but that he may upon good reasons forbeare or dispense with his owne right whereby he incurres onely an evill of damage and not of sin 3. Of yeelding to suffer Thirdly this yeelding is not a making of the innocent sufferer to be guilty nor of the nocent wrong doer to be just or more obstinately to persist in his unjust courses no more than the not applying of medicines to the disease called No li me tangere doth foment it when the medling with it would inrage it and make it worse This course of yeelding to suffer wrongs makes way and place for passive obedience and for God the great and righteous Iudge of the world to do justice even upon the highest and to worke his owne glorious works with redresse of all such evills as neither by right nor might can bee by man reformed in which course of suffering wrong wee have the Martyrs for examples to follow §. 21. Touching the voluntary appearance of Felons at liberty upon baile to free their baile Third question Touching the voluntary appearing of Fellons to receive justice A third question reducible to this point is whether a man that for some capitall crime is under bond of his owne promise or upon some penall summe of money or upon bond of a friend for him of body for body for his personall appearing at the Assizes ought thereupon to appeare when he certainely foresees that there he shall be cast and die as put the case it be for battery or wounding of a man mortally who dies thereupon after such bond given Answer When they ought I answer if the bond for his appearance bee his owne promise hee ought in conscience to appeare because Gods Word and Law bindes us to keepe our promises if the same be not to doe sin although the same may bee damageable to us a Psal 15. but if so bee that his bond for appearance be a penall summe of money onely by sureties then all that a man hath he will give for his life so that in this case I see not that he is bound in conscience to appeare where he foresees his owne death when the Magistrate hath accepted a penall summe for fiduciary caution in stead of his personall imprisonment or other assurance for his appearance and so may shift himselfe for his safety to some place as a City of refuge to keep himselfe from the hands of the avenger of blood When againe they ought But if hee bee at liberty upon his friends bond of body for body for appearance then ought hee in conscience to appeare although hee certainely foresee that there hee shall die that he may free his friend by his meanès and for his sake so ingaged both in respect of the Law of friendship and in regard of the cause that is not his friends but his owne that by his meanes and for him an innocent man do not perish which were his grievous sinne §. 22. What a guilty person ought to do to free the innocent Fourth question Concerning an innocent mans suffering by misprision or error in stead of the nocent and what the guilty ought in that case to doe A fourth question that belongeth to this point may be this if a burglary or a murder be committed and an innocent man be attached arraigned found guilty and upon presumptions be condemned for it to die the true fellon not being knowne as it fell out where a certaine young man a Suiter to a Maid was taken cast and condemned to death and suffered for the murder and death of that maide with whom he was late in company after the rest of the family were in bed and she the next morning found murdered which fact was done by a Villaine that was hid about the house and not by the young man-suiter as the Fellon afterward confessed Whether is not the true actor of such a fact bound in conscience to discover himselfe and confesse that hee may save the life of an innocent that for his sinne he may not die Answer The nocent ought to discover himselfe I answer that hee is bound in conscience so to doe for otherwise he is guilty both by his fact and silence of the death of such an innocent man so suffering whom he might and ought to rescue now it is certaine that no man is to doe or omit that which by the doing or omission thereof either multiplies or aggravates his sin to his owne worse and eternall condemnation And how againe he is bound not to suffer other men to sinne either by rashnesse or malice in the witnesses or jurie when it is in his power to prevent it by true information as in this case he may yet I thinke he is to do it with as great circumspection for safety of his owne life as he can being sure that he leave not the truth undiscovered nor suffer the innocent to perish through his feare or neglect §. 23. About a mans voluntary revealing to the Magistrate his own secret capitall crimes Fift question A fift question hitherto belonging to bee resolved is if a man have committed a capitall crime as murder Polygamy or the like which was done so long agoe or so farre off or so secretly that none knowes or will accuse him thereof About secret capitall crimes and is so troubled in conscience about it that upon his private confession to Divines thereof and their counsell and consolations ministred to him he hath no rest nor comfort but in revenge upon himselfe is strongly tempted to destroy himselfe by his owne hands and cannot prevaile against his resolutions of doing it whether then is he to accuse himselfe of the crime and to put himselfe into the hands of Iustice to suffer for it Answer When and how the delinquent is to reveale his crimes that are capitall In this case I think such an one ought so to do both for the easing of his conscience that no otherwise can have rest that thereupon others may be affraid to venture upon sinne with presumption of secrecy when they shall see the force of conscience compelling men to blaze their owne crimes and shame And also for preventing of self-murder by submission to the sword of Iustice and to the mercy of the Magistrate who perhaps will hardly in such a case condemne a man upon his owne inditement and witnesse where there is no other that doth the same and when the act seemes to be unreasonable that any man should seeke his death where none accuseth and if he were in this case condemned it is most like that the supreme Magistrate would save such a one by pardon or replevin for the usefulnesse of his life in time to come for the sword
the truth and Church is bound to doe the duties of his calling notwithstanding any such former restraint or danger of disobedience to it because the power of the Church is but ministeriall under and according to God rather declarative than Soveraigne therefore what she doth tyes not men here on earth to obey it to the destruction but to the edification of the Church or at least to prevent a greater mischiefe And also because the true Church may doe no such acts of deprivation or suspension whereby to intend or effect the destruction of the Church and therefore in that case transgressing of such restraints is no disobedience to the Church but rather an obeying the intent of the same as in times of persecution we have plentifull examples specially of the Church of the Iewes against the Christians A Caveat Yet herein is to be observed that such performance of duties in that case after restraint bee done in mecke patient manner without tumults or forcible opposition of authority submitting with passive obedience where they cannot lawfully performe active This extends not to warrant any schisme or heresie that esteem themselves only to be the true Church as did the Donatists and others to oppose out of feare of their owne ruine the proceedings and restraints of the more Orthodoxe and generall body of a sound Church whose authority doth preponderate and oversway her apostating members so long as by the doctrine publikely taught in her men may be saved and built up §. 30. Against commission of evill upon any humane command or threats Fourth member about commission of evill upon humane command The fourth member of the case wherein a man ought to expose his life to death in causes concerning religion is when a man is desired commanded or threatned to doe any sinne forbidden by Gods word that then hee doe it not although he therefore doe die as Iosephs practise manifests in resisting his whorish mistris a Gen. 39.12 and the three children that would not upon the Kings command worship the golden Image to save their lives Daniel 3.18 Because it is better for us to die than deliberately and wilfully to sinne against God as the woman with her seaven sonnes did choose 2 Mach. 7. according to S. Augustines judgement who sayes that if it be propounded to a man Vt aut mali aliquid faciat aut mali aliquid patiatur eligat non facere mala quam non pati mala b Epist 204. that either he should doe some evill or suffer some calamity then let him choose rather not to doe evill than not to suffer evill Observe How we are to abhorre sin For we are ever to doe that which may most neerely unite us to God our chiefe good and to shunne what may divide us from him which nothing can doe but our sinnes specially those that consist in the transgression of the negative Commandements and are most opposite to God and incompatible with him and therefore those lawes doe binde ad semper to the alwayes observing of them and cannot be dispensed withall seeing God is unchangeable The evill of sinne should be more terrible to us than death it selfe not onely for that it is the cause of death and imbitters it but also because it deprives us of a greater good of our spirituall life that farre exceeds the naturall The beatificall object that sinne deprives us of is the infinite blessed God from whom to be separated is worse than death it self and in that respect rather than we should sinne we should choose to suffer death which is a glorious kinde of Martyrdome and a meanes of advancement to happinesse for the power and practise of the truth laying downe our lives which is a more undoubted signe of grace and salvation than is the suffering of many for holding the truth in opinion and profession Wee should choose rather not to bee than not to bee happy for the originall and end of our being is better than our being it selfe in regard that our happinesse is not of and in our selves but in and from another who is both our beginning and end §. 31. Of the kindes of sinnes of commission to be avoyded Evils of sin to be avoided These sinfull evills that wee ought thus carefully to avoid and forbeare to death are of two sorts 1. Against the law of nature First those that be directly and absolutely forbidden by the Law of nature as fundamentally unlawfull at all times and in all cases for the contrariety that they have against the nature of God and against the inbred principles of reason and conscience of which no question can be made but that wee are alwaies utterly to shun them notwithstanding any humane command or inforcement that may be to the contrary because no human power can dissolve the obligation of those ingrafted Commandements of God and nature Innata Lex Rom. 2.15 that we may be discharged in conscience from keeping of them which would overthrow both divinity and humanity neither can any free us from the punishment of the transgression of them both because equity and Law requires that the soule that sins shall die and also for that there is no power matchable with Gods and natures to protect or free us by force from their vengeance 2. Against the positive Law of God Secondly the sins that wee are to shun and not wittingly and willingly to do upon any threats or worldly danger or for any profit are those that are forbidden by the positive Law and revealed will of God the violating whereof doth wrong the soveraignty and honor of God who is the absolute and onely independant King of all the world and his will the supreame unerring rule of our obedience throughout our lives our transgression whereof is a breach of that loyalty and due subjection which wee owe to that our highest Lord. To whese positive Law conformity is more properly obedience to God than conformity to the Law of nature is by it selfe considered Because the ground of our conformity to the Law of nature is naturall inclination and Reason equally binding Heathens aswell as Christians But the ground of our conformity to the positive Law of God is principally the soveraigne Authority and Will of God himselfe which kinde of obedience is that which is properly of the Church and her members to God and proceeds from faith love feare c. Evangelicall or Thelogicall graces From which obedience to God no wight can absolve or excuse us that we may lawfully and safely subject our selves to feare to please or to obey any other in opposition or contraty to him and his will Reasons 1. Because there is none above God whose will may be preferred or equalled to his to whom all is subordinate in nature state and imployment 2. Neither is any man Lord over the Conscience either to bind or discharge it contrary to the Law or will of God that we
only good meanes that we may looke for a blessing from God upon them Actions are not good onely from intention Againe we must not measure and judge an action to be good only by the good end and intention of the doers thereof in their act of doing the same for Saul offered sacrifice a 1 Sam. 13.12 and Paul persecuted the Church b Acts 22.4 both of them with a good intention and yet for all that their actions were evill Because to make an action good there are many other things necessary than the good intention of the doers of it it is sufficient to make an action morally evill if it be defective in any thing requisite for to make it good but to be good it must be every way perfect §. 20. Concerning ambition The fifth generall motive Ambition The fifth generall motive of self-murderers to kill themselves is Ambition either to keep or get a greater good by killing themselves than they can have or enjoy by living any longer as they thinke which profitable exchange makes them thinke it both lawfull and expedient to kill themselves This good is of two kindes whereof man is ambitious to death and for which some kill themselves Kinds of good aimed at by ambition 1. Glory and praise First it is worldly glory and praise which they think to purchase to themselves Ethnicitanquam insignem fortitudinē celebrârūt by the very acting and doing of self-murder touching which the heathen hath commended such for their fortitude specially when they did it to preserve their personall liberties from falling under subjection to their enemies as did Cato to whom I may apply that of Brutus that it was the love of his countrey and excessive ambition of praise that made him to kill himselfe Amor patriae laudumque immensa cupido And when they did the same lest they should either suffer or doe any thing as they thought more disgracefull Vaine-glory and popular praise is so powerfull a motive that for the same it is said that Empedocles killed himselfe 2. A better life after death The second good for ambition whereof some kill themselves that they may hasten to attaine the same Ad assequendam gloriam aeternam is another and better life after death as did Cleombrotus who upon reading in Plato of another more happy life after this which cannot bee attained but by death did precipitate himselfe into the mouth of death and so killed himselfe as Cicero in the first booke of his Tusculan questions makes report In such esteeme was that life even with naturall men that they did willingly run into death that they might enjoy that whereof they had but a small glimpse and little assurance Which may condemne many Christians who have greater knowledge and better evidences for the same and doe so lightly regard it that for it they will not forsake their pleasures and lusts nor will doe duties of easier performance according to Gods appointment to have it Men would willingly be saved and go to heaven but by their owne wayes and courses and not by Gods although their owne bee more tedious and chargeable than his so farre is man wedded to his self-will and so ready to doe what himselfe devises Note Men are more deceived in the meanes than in the ends Men are not so much deceived in the ends that they project to themselves which commonly are good but especially the last as they are self-beguiled in the meanes and wayes that they use of their self-devising and pleasing to attaine their ends whereupon it comes to passe that so many are frustrated of their desires and expectatation For good ends which be morally and beatifically such are never got but by good meanes of Gods owne appointment whereabouts man is to deny his own will and only to follow Gods who never disappoints us thereby of good successe according to our hearts desire in the attainement of our last end Insufficiency of the former motive touching the first branch The insufficiency of the former motive of praise and fortitude justly to cause a man to kill himselfe is apparent by that which Augustine sayes of Cato that it was not fortitude but a softnesse that made him kill himselfe because he was not able to beare adversity a Non fortitudo sed mollities non potuit serre res adversas and did it out of impatiency at Caesars empire but being impatiently self-willed would not submit to Gods providence he sayes his fact was great but not good b Magnum potius sactum quam bene Fortiterille facit qui miser esse potest Sene. Epist 59. Imbecillis est ignavus qui propter dolorem moritur Arist 3. Nicomach cap. 7. Molles sunt qui amoris gratia vel paupertatis sibi mortem consciseunt non posse pati non est vera fortitudo sed magis quaedam mollities animi non valentis mala poenalia sustinere Tho. 2.2 q. 64. art 5. and further affirmes that it is pufillanimity not to be able to suffer which is a thing whereunto the weakest as women are most apt both for want of strength to endure to suffer and also for want of wisdome to make choise of that which indeed is best for them for as the Philosopher saith no man kills himselfe nisi depravata ratione c Arist Eth. lib. 3. cap. 8. but by depravation of his reason and so is as it were a mad man that is worse than a beast Praise is got by well-doing The true way and meanes for a man to gaine true honour and praise is well-doing according to the will and commandements of God as the Apostle sayes Glory honour and peace to every man that worketh good a Rom. 2.10 which extends it selfe to all eternity in the presence and with the commendation of God his holy angels and of all Gods people whereas of evill doing there comes nothing but shame and confusion eternall for even to bee commended by vaine and wicked persons for doing good casts some suspition or aspersion upon the commended much more is it disgracefull to be praised by such for evill doing which is the matter of mans shame and therefore upon that motive not to be done About the second branch the insufficiency of the motive from a better life kill ones selfe For the second branch of the aforesaid motive viz. about a better life the insufficiency thereof to make a man undertake to kill himselfe thereby the sooner to come to eternity is evident by foure particulars 1. Self-murder is not the way to heaven First self-murder being a most grievous sin it cannot be the way to heaven and life but to hell and death The Saints of God that did most long for this eternall life of happinesse and to whom their naturall lives were not deare for them to spend them to attaine it did not therfore kill themselves to have it which
nature of self-murder Objections There remaines now certaine objections to be answered which may be made in favour of proper self-murderers for their salvation which are especially three The first of them may be pretended to be taken from the nature of self-murder alledging that the same is not so hainous a sinne but that the doers thereof may bee saved 1. From the nature of self-murder First because if we consider sinnes as they are committed against the Gospell onely the sinne against the holy Ghost is called a sinne unto death a 1 Joh. 5.16 which never shall be pardoned b Mat. 12.31 Self-murder is not that sinne and therefore may seeme to bee pardonable and the doers thereof saved 2. Againe if wee do consider the sinnes committed directly agaist the Law there is none of them desperately unpardonable because they all and every of them may upon repentance be cured by the Gospell which is of equall extent to the Law to be able to repleave and save all that the Law condemnes And of the sinnes committed against the Law some as spitefull blasphemy against the Majesty of God and the like may in the true nature of them seeme to be more hainous than self-murder both in regard of their more direct and malignant opposition against God and also for their greater distance in nature from pardon Answ 1. The sin against the holy Ghost To this objection that caries with it a countenance of probability I answer first touching the argument taken from the sin against the holy Ghost it is to be considered that that sin is unpardonable and they damned that do it onely in respect of that desperate opposition whereby the committers of it do spitefully oppose and reject Christ and his Gospell the very only meanes whereby they can be saved so that there remaines no further or other way or help for salvation and also because that sinne is ever infallibly accompanied with finall impenitency which alwaies makes a man uncapable of grace and salvation which none can have but true penitents How self-murder is equivalēt to the sinne against the holy Ghost Self-murder hath that in it which is in the sin against the holy Ghost in respect whereof it damnes and is unpardonable which is both finall impenitency in regard that a self-murderer by that sinne in the perfection of the anomie of it doth so indispose himselfe and shuts up and ends his life by and in such a horrible transgression that hee cannot possibly repent nor consequently bee saved And also equivalent and answerable to that spitefull rejection of Christ his grace and Gospell in the sin against the holy Ghost by the living there is in self-murder the cutting off of one selfe by his owne hands in this death from grace and salvation to be gotten only in and by life So that in these respects self-murder is as certainly damnable and the doers thereof reprobated as is the sin against the holy Ghost and the committers thereof For although of the sin against the holy Ghost it be precisely said that it shall never be forgiven and that the committers thereof are certainely damned yet it is neither said nor is true that none but sinners against the holy Ghost have their sinnes not forgiven to them and are damned seeing the contrary is abundantly certaine and the wicked quality and impenitent disposition of some persons so depraved and vitiated by their sins makes the same to be in them unpardonable which brings them to the same finall state with sinners against the holy Ghost it matters little for a mans comfort that is to be put to death whether he be hanged for felonie or for burglarie seeing for either of them his death is the same 2. Self-murder a transcendent great sin Secondly I answer touching the comparison made betweene self-murder and other sinnes committed against the Law that self-murder is a greater sin than any that can be directly and properly committed against and within any precept of the Law for which the committers of the same may have grounded hope of forgivenesse because self-murder is a transcendent sinne as hath beene shewed in the third reason transcedents are ever larger and greater than subordinates and it is a sinne condemnable by more and stronger reasons and arguments than any other sinne committed against and within the compasse of the Law as the same is more grievously injurious to more objects and transgresses more Lawes naturall divine and humane and therefore it must needs be the greater sinne Also the estimate of the greatnesse and unpardonablenesse of sinnes as they are in offenders is not wholly to be made by consideration of their abstract nature but specially the same is to bee made by the quality and disposition of the committers of them whose personall and actionall circumstances in doing of thē much aggravats or extenuats the same For pardon or not pardon of sins depends more upon the penitencie or impenitency of the offenders than upon the nature of their sins absolutly and abstractly considered the fact of self murder is such a sinne as no man penitently disposed can commit and it cuts him that doth it off finally from all repentance and consequently from salvation Self-murder most dangerous for a mans soule Of all sinnes against the Law self-murder is most dangerous and pernicious for a mans soule to bring it to damnation both because it excludes all care and meanes of a mans salvation which if a self-murderer did regard he would not venture in the last period of his life upon a course so contrary to it and also it puts the self-murderer into such an estate and disposition of sinfulnesse and aversenesse from God and his will in pursuing of his owne wicked lust that he is not nor can be capable of grace nor is in the way of salvation whereunto self-murder is most contrary by his last act of horrible sin in the closure of his life And therefore it is apparent that for any thing in this objection alledged there is nothing from the nature of the sin of self-murder properly so called that can give any comfort of salvation to self-murderers or can warrant us to hold probably and in the judgement of charity that they are not all generally considered utterly damned §. 10. Touching Examples of self-killers 2. Object Is from examples The second objection that may be made in favour of the salvation of self-murderers is taken from examples of Sampson Pelagia and many others that in the Primitive Church killed themselves and are acknowledged to be saved Therefore it may seeme probable that some self-murderers may be saved Answers 1. That Sampson is no self-murderer To this objection I answer first touching Sampson that he was no self-murderer directly nor in that point of so dying indirectly the reasons whereof are evident Reasons 1. First because his intention will and endeavours were not directly or primarily but only
Page 311 Prevention of sinne occasioning self-murder Page 237 Prevention of error Page 199 Pride cause of self-murder Page 215. 226 Prodigality cause of self-murder Page 111 Professors How in professors gross sins are most offensive Page 178 Promises Gods promises cherish spirituall life Page 41 Properties of self-murdring sins Page 68 Prosperity of the wicked ground of self-deceit Page 156 Proud ambitious persons in danger of self-murder Page 255 Providence Gods providence how wronged by self-murder Page 268 Punishment of damage is worse than of smart Page 65 Purchase Of desperate purchase Page 112 Pusillanimity the cause of self murder in affliction Page 227 Q Questions Sixe questions resolved Page 133 135 136 137 138. R Reason Man by meanes of his reason suffers 164. Man wanting the use of reason no self-murderer Page 172 Reason abused to self-murder Page 189 Reason condemnes self-murder Page 273 Regardlesness Of regardlesness Page 260 Regenerated The regenerated preserved from self-murder Page 291 Religion For religion to adventure life 143. The defence of religion 144 Self-murder is contrary to religion 262. Religion requires the observation of the Law of nature Page 269 Repent To repent Page 157 Repentance True repentance self-murderers have not 296. 306. The use of it against self-murder Page 312 Reskue Of desperate reskue Page 112 Restraint Of forcible restraint of self-murderers Page 325 Resolution a help to obedience Page 128 What resolution is hardly altered Page 188 Resolutions of self-killing injected by Satan Page 246 Revealing Of revealing a mans own capitall faults Page 137 Revenge good and bad Page 232 Rules for understanding the Scripture Page 199 S Salvation In state of salvation none can be properly a self-murderer Page 292 Sampson proved no self-murderer Page 303 Sanctification How sanctification is wrought in us by the holy Spirit 32. 35. the degrees of it ibid. Satan To give any way to Satan is dangerous 188. Of his powerfull motions in the mind Page 247 Saved No man is saved for fulfilling the will of Gods decree Page 205 Saving For saving of soules to adventure life Page 141 Scripture mis-understood perverts judgement 195. the causes of mis-understanding of it Page 196. Abused Scripture harmefull Page 198 How rightly to understand it Page 199 It is apparent by the Scripture that men murder themselves Page 176 Sea-fight Of a sea-fight Page 138 Secrecie The reason of affectation of secrecy about self-murder Page 211 Secret When a man is to reveale his secret capitall crimes to the Magistrate Page 137 Seeming-good is cause of disobedience Page 70 Selfe Mans selfe is subject to self-murder 159. How self should behave himselfe to self Page 171 Self-blinded How man is self-blinded Page 155 Self-conceit a ground of self-deceit Page 156 Not to be self-conceited Page 210 Self-content in indirect self-murder Page 155 Self-deceived and causes of self-deceit Page 156 Self-deniall is cure of pride Page 227 Self-killing To self-killing who are most subject Page 236 Self-killing is no lawfull meanes to prevent sin Page 240 Self-killers What self-killers be not self-murderers Page 172. 290 Self-murder described what it is 2 How known by life 2. it is horrible comprehends in it murder 47. the degrees of it why slighted Page 83 Of bodily self-murder the kinds 84 defined and differenced Page 85 How self-murder is horrible and great 162. It falls our in the Church and is most blameable in Christians Page 176. 180. The meanes and way of self-murder 183. Motives of it 189 how it is heresie 233. it is proved unlawfull Page 262 How self-murder extends to the soule to hurt it 288. it is a transcendent sin and how 295. 302. It is equivalent to the sin against the holy Ghost Page 301 Self-murders antidotes 311. and how best prevented Page 323 Self-murderers many 124 how known by Scripture history and experience 178. 181. their follie 186. their secrecy 187. they are deceived 229 their goods confiscate 278. how they sin most grievously 286. they are Atheists 278. they regard not their soules 288. they are all damned 291. they want faith and true repentance 296. they are debarred from Christian buriall and why 287. their antecedent prayer and repentance is vaine and they cannot be at peace with God Page 306 Service Our service must be done before we receive our reward Page 245 Shame Of shame causing self-murder the kinds of shame Page 221 Shortnesse of life a motive to spend it well Page 19 Similies By similies self-murder condemned Page 279 Sins of commission against negative coÌ„mandements subjects to death 67 Of sins against the Gospell 70. 77. sin costs deare 77. men sin against themselves 158. how to prevent sin men murder themselves 237. sinne blinds 208. men sinning think they sin not 203. the worst sins are committed against Gods goodnesse 268 Some sins beyond Law and mercy Page 294 Sinning is a course of self-murder Page 77 Sinking or burning a ship in fight Page 138 Society with persons destinate to destruction Page 118 Solitarinesse of self-murderers Page 259 Soule The soules double act in man 7 its works in the body Page 81 The soules relation to its owne body Page 270 Soule-murder how it is self-murder 57 the degrees of it Page 58 Soule-murdering sins Page 68 Souldiers About souldiers Page 112. 127 Speeches Manner of speeches of self-murderers Page 260 Spend How to spend our lives well Page 18 Spirit Of the Spirits operation quickning us 29. how it manifests its power in the meanes 32. the evidences of its work 34. the degrees of its working 35. its worke in us about obedience 36. how it is a meanes in us to know the Scripture Page 200 Spirituall life what it is 21. the acts of it ibid. degrees of it 22. who may have it and how it is lost 24 the nature and excellency of it 26. the continuance and effects of it ibid. how to obtain it 8. 66. the signes of it 37 how preserved 39. and to be preferred 39. ibid. how it is destroyed Page 45 Spirituall-self-murder defined and differenced 58. how done by omission 59. by commission â—7 by sinning against the Gospell 70. by sinning against the Law 68. spirituall self-murder most damnable Page 78 Strictness in religious observances Page 234 Superiours For â—uperiors men should choose to die 29 Of their displeasure to be appeased and how Page 133 T Teachers False Teachers cause of mis-understanding the Scriptures Page 196 Temper of people Satan observes to tempt them Page 248 Our own tempers we should know Page 255 Temptations People under spirituall temptations are in danger of self-murder Page 254 Temptations of self-murder to be withstood Page 313 Thoughts Mans thoughts heavenly a signe of spirituall life Page 38 Our thoughts to bee rightly ordered Page 315 Torments inflicted occasion of self-murder Page 212 Transgression How transgression of Gods Law kills Page 122 Trouble of conscience and grounds thereof Page 218 Truth to be confessed 145. it is blamelesse 177. we should know and obey it
LIFES PRESERVATIVE AGAINST SELF-KILLING OR AN VSEFVL TREATISE Concerning Life and Self-murder SHEWING The Kindes and Meanes of them both The Excellency and preservation of the former The Evill and prevention of the latter CONTAINING The Resolution of manifold Cases and Questions concerning that Subject with plentifull variety of necessary and usefull Observations and practicall Directions needfull for all Christians Is it lawfull to save life or to kill Mark 3.4 Non est nostrûm mortem arriperc sed oblatam patienter ferre Hieron in Jonam By JOHN SYM Minister of Leigh in Essex LONDON Printed by M. Flesher for R. Dawlman and L. Fawne at the Brazen Serpent in Pauls-Churchyard 1637. TO THE RIGHT HONORABLE AND MOST NOBLE LORD ROBERT EARLE OF WARWICK Lord RICH Baron of LEEZE c. My very good LORD and most noble PATRON Increase of Grace Honor and Happinesse Right Honourable THat Eminencie that is in a most excellent Maecenas to supply the defects and meannesse of an obscure Author and that Relation and obligation that a poore Clerk may have to a most noble worthie and respective Patron hath made me presume to make choise of your noble Lordship for a Guardian of this my poore tractate which is of a compounded Denomination consisting of contrary ingredients of life and death of saving and killing by such reflecting acts of the doers upon themselves as make the Agents and patients thereof to be the same individualls The discourse is of a mixt and various nature and the theame of self-killing is the subject both of Divinity and of humanity of Religion and of Law the full handling whereof may be serviceable to the Kings Majestie for preservation of the lives of his people against the blowes and mortall wounds of a self-killing hand and may be usefull for the publick good of the Church and of the Common wealth both for the safety of the soules and bodies of their members and also in point of Honour that the government of so gracious a King and the glory of so famous a Nation may not be ignominiously stayned by self-murdring practises In which respects it was most requisite that I should dedicate the treatise of that nature to such a noble Guardian as hath a most speciall care to uphold and advance both Religion and Iustice the honour of the King and kingdome and the welfare both of Church and Commonwealth in all the members of the same as your Honourable Lordship alwaies hath in the places of your imployment and residence which in cognizance of us in the Ministery is specially apparent by your noble and pious care of providing able painefull and godly Ministers to the Churches under your speciall Patronage bestowing your Church-livings both freely and to the fittest and best deserving that you can finde for those places and countenancing and furthering the Clergie what you can in all godly and legall courses whereby multitudes of soules being saved and the Church of England under our Soveraigne the King advanced and supported in the Honour of her Ministery all have cause to praise God and to pray to God for your Lordship and for your noble Family the honourable instruments of so much divine and publick good whereof many blessed soules in heaven saved by that meanes are witnesses before God to your eternall praise honour and comfort with your renowned progenitors of that practise And I confesse it is the dutie specially of us of the Ministery to write your most Illustrious name and highest Commendations with the poynt of a Dyamond in letters of Gold upon the most durable pillars of perpetuity and ever to celebrate your due praise both for honour of your noble deservings and also for vertuous and pious example and incouragement to all posterity and noble Peeres in that poynt specially of upholding and advancing true Religion and piety both in and by that carefull and conscionable course of bestowing your Church-livings and regarding of your Ministers and also by your constant profession of the truth and according to the same professedly worshipping the true God thereby publickly obliging your selfe to such holines of heart and conversation in walking with God according to the rules of true Religion as may give your Lordship sound and grounded hope of eternall life and may verifie in you the realitie of that most Christian and heroick motto Garde ta foy In a word Divine Providence and Heavens favour hath made your Lordship Rich not onely by nature and name but also in honor and manifold blessings upon you and in much good done by your meanes whereby you stand bound to be accordingly thankfull to God and to be ever mindfull that your Eminency objects your Lordship to the worlds prying observation and to mens rigid censure which requires your more carefull circumspection in your whole conversation that you may be as farre distant from all ignoble vices and sinfull courses which staines and abases Honour and greatnesse and as Illustrious in all vertues and commendable actions as your noble condition is elevated above the common ranck of men which conciliates and procures Honour and comfort of a higher nature and of more lasting continuance than that which can be had from or by Titles and humane dignities or from sycophantizing humoring and flattering that so you may attaine to eternall glory and happines after this short life ended Most noble Lord I commed this treatise to you not onely that you may put credit and respect upon it for publick favour and entertainment and to give encouragement to the Author but also with all observancie to subject it to your judicious censure and my selfe to the service of your Honour and noble Family for the furtherance of the good and salvation of you and yours by the dayly prayers and faithfull labours of him that ever remaines From your Lo ps Leigh in Essex Your Lordships devoted faithfull and obsequious servant in Christ Iohn Sym. THE PREFACE TO THE READERS OF THIS TREATISE AND To my Auditors in my Ministery specially my ever much respected loving Friends and respective Parishioners the Inhabitants of Leigh in Essex Grace and Peace be multiplyed THis Treatise I can neither commend to you from the pleasantnesse of the nature of the subject of it which is about Self-murder that is a wickednesse not to be named among Christians in regard of likeing or practice thereof nor yet can I magnifie it to you for any thing that is simply mine in it although there is much more mine in it than might have beene if there had been full and compleat Tractates made by other men of that subject whence I might have borrowed more and have had more help than now I could to have made this a more perfect and better polished peece I doubt not but it shall be found in the advised and candide perusall thereof to carry in all the passages thereof the impresse and stamp of truth for which it may be worthy of your acceptation both for information of judgment
after that wofull experience had given too great evidence of mens impudency in committing this inhumane and unnaturall sinne most severe lawes were made against the same In like case hath more woefull experience given more abundant evidence of the more then most in humane and unnaturall sinne of Self murder And I suppose that scarce an age since the beginning of the world hath afforded more examples of this desperate inhumanity than this our present age and that in all sorts of people Clergie Laity Learned unlearned Noble meane Rich poore Free bond Male Female young and old It is therefore high time that the danger of this desperate devilish and damnable practice be plainly and fully set out which to my best remembrance hath not before this beene performed by a full and just Treatise Chrysost Hom. 84. in Ioh. 19. Augustin epist 61. alisque in locis Hier. comment in Ion. cap. 1. Cic. de Fin. bon mal l. 5. Somn. Scipion. Proxima deinde tenent moesti loca qui sibi lethum Insontes peperere manu c. Virg. Aen. 6. It hath in sundry Sermons preached and published and in other printed Treatises beene spoken against and the hainousnesse and danger thereof somewhat to the quick yea and life too beene declared and that both by the Ancient Fathers and also by late Divines Yea Heathen men by the light of nature have damned it to the pit of bell where they have placed Self murderers making them againe and againe to wish themselves alive on earth though there poverty griefe shame and all other evills should befall them Surely most seasonably is this Treatise here published by an Author well fitted and enabled thereto For he is an expert Casuist by learning and experience so fully accomplished as he hath for many yeares beene accounted an Oracle where be lives and by all sorts resort is made to him to be resolved in intricate doubts In handling this Treatise like a skilfull Artist and wise builder Luke 6.48 be hath digged deep to lay his foundation sure he hath begun with life and artificially distinguished the severall sorts thereof and shewed the excellency of every sort that the hainousnesse of taking away so precious a thing might thereby be the more aggravated Many pertinent cases are here and there yea every where in this Treatise judiciously discussed and resolved So good is the wine here to be had Vino vendibili non opus est hederâ as there needs no bush to draw thee to it Let mee but perswade thee to taste it I shall need to set no greater commendation upon it I make no question but that wheresoever it findeth entertainment it will prove a most soveraigne preservative against this horrible temptation to Self-murder The Lord give such a blessing to it as it may be a meanes of keeping men from laying violent hands upon any especially upon themselves and of directing and inciting them so to preserve their temporall and spirituall life as they may bee reserved unto eternall life 18. Apr. 1637. VVILLIAM GOUGE IN DOCTISSIMVM ET ELABORATVM HVNC TRACTATVM Technas Diaboli homines ad horrendum scelus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 provocantis mirâ arte pietate denudantem MOrtalibus vitae semèl scintillulam Natura cunctis indidit Tuendam ab omnibus virili prosua ad Imaginem quae condita est DEI cruore et sacro CHRISTI parta huic Larvatus invidet Serpens Hanc suffocare cordis pendulus cujus Curae anxiae cor vellicant Contendit alter nescius probi qui se Nequitiâ totum faedat Illam aestimat parvi scelestâ dexterâ Extinguit illam tertius Sic à DEO creata vitae scintilla et CHRISTI redempta sanguine Quae charior lapillis est purior Morte interit repentinâ Quis non beatum praedicabit Symeum CHRISTI facit solertem quem Gregis tuendi cura quipandit viam Quâ possit haec scintillula Vitae foveri pendulum cordis cui Iter dolores obstruunt Vocis per anfractus doloris dirigit Ad sempiterna gaudia Acumine insigni qui pandit subdolas Technas diaboli quibus Vitae struit dolum qui cunctos instruit Vitam caducam degere Vt illius peracto cursugaudijs Vitae fruantur aeternae Gregem ô beatum qui Tuo doctissimo Labore ductus abstrusa Coelstium scitorum ediscit dogmata CHRISTUS diu Tesospitet Gregem ut Tibi commissum possis quod facis Fovere scriptis vitâ T.Y. Haec amoris ergò apposuit qui gravissimum hujus Tractatus Authorem verè suscipit sincerè colit A deare Friend to the Author FRom Albion whence now we all be one with healthfull salves thou doest assay to cure Self-murders griefe that many long agone doth kill and fill dark Hell with soules impure Which sage Hippocrates and Galen sure could not prevent nor heale with all their skill But thou by thy receipts that will indure most skilfully canst soundly cure this ill Goe to therefore deare Sym God give successe Like to thy skill thy will this to redresse S.H. A TABLE OF THE Chapters and severall Sections with their Contents CHAPTER 1. The generall description of Self-murder § 1. Concerning life and death that they are things of greatest importance Page 1. § 2. Self-murder described what it is and of the three parts of the description Page 2 § 3. How self-murder is knowne by life which it destroyes why evill ever cleaves to good and that all worldly things are subject to contrary passions Page 2 3. Chap. 2. Of the kindes of the life of man naturall and spirituall and what the care of men should be of both Page 4 Chap. 3. Of naturall life in generall § 1. Of diverse sorts of life of vegetation sense and reason Page 4 5 § 2. That man onely is subject to self-murder and of the greatnesse of that sin Page 6 § 3. How naturall life is knowne in and by the man in whom it is both by sense and understanding Page 6 § 4. Of the soules double act in man for his person and his workes Page 7 Chap. 4. Of mans naturall life more specially § 1. Wherein the naturall life of man consists which is fraile Page 8 § 2. Of the sweetnesse of naturall life Page 9 § 3. How the losse of naturall life is horrible and painfull and why Page 9 § 4. How life is deare and precious with three reasons thereof Page 10 § 5. Of naturall lifes preservation the meanes thereof and of cheerefulnesse Page 12 § 6. How to use Physick with foure cautions about the same Page 14 § 7. Of three deadly things to be resisted Page 16 § 8. How to spend our lives well with three motives so to do and how men mispend their lives foure wayes Page 18 Chap. 5. Of mans spirituall life § 1. What spirituall life is Page 21 § 2. Of the acts of spirituall life which are two Page 21 § 3. Of the
degrees of spirituall life which are two and subordinate Page 22 § 4. Who may have spirituall life which is denyed to none and by whose fault doth any misse of it or lose it How the Gospell was published to Adam and to all his posterity who for unbeliefe of the same are justly punishable Page 24 § 5. Of the excellency of spirituall life in three respects Page 26 § 6. How to obtaine spirituall life by meanes which wee are to use to get it and grow in it Page 28 § 7. How the Gospell works life not physically or ethically but supernaturally by the power of God working according to his owne will upon mans heart that is the subject of conversion Page 30 § 8. Why God uses meanes to convert us reasons three Page 31 § 9. How the power of the Holy Spirit is manifested and seene upon us in the meanes by foure degrees of operation And of three evidences of the Spirits application of Christ to us Page 32 § 10. How the Spirit works holinesse in us in two degrees with their uses and of three grounds of actuall obedience Page 35 § 11. Of the foure signes of spirituall life Page 37 § 12. How spirituall life may be preserved by use of six meanes Page 39 § 13. How mans care of his spirituall life should be great preferring it above his naturall life Page 42 Chap. 6. Of lifes destruction and of murder in generall § 1. How mans life maybe lost both passively and actively Page 43 § 2. How naturall life may be lost by meanes both internall and externall casuall and voluntary justly and unjustly Page 44 § 3. Of the meanes of the destruction of spirituall life by the justice of God and by the meanes of men and of mans subjection to death Page 45 § 4. Of murder in self-killing how the same is horrible and of foure things observable in it Page 47 § 5. How murder is vile in three respects Page 49 § 6. Of the originall of murder how it selfe is an act of impotency which we are to abhorre and how none can murder another without murdering themselves Page 51 Chap. 7. Of murder as it is of ones selfe § 1. Of the specificall nature of self-murder Page 53 § 2. Of the evill and greatnesse of the sin of self-murder Page 54 § 3. Of lawfull self-killing of our old-man of the kind of that killing and how it is done Page 54 § 4. Of diverse observations from the generall consideration of self-murder for informing of our judgement and directing of our practise Page 56 Chap. 8. Of spirituall self-murder in speciall § 1. That all perishing-soules are self-murdered and how soule-murder is self-murder Page 57 § 2. Spirituall self-murder defined what it is Page 58 § 3. Of soule-murder in two degrees by deprivation of life Page 58 § 4. Of mans deficiency to be saved in Adam and in our selves by a fourefold omission of doing our duties in use of meanes Page 59 § 5. Of mans neglect and contempt of the power of the meanes that he uses Page 60 § 6. Of mans defect in obedience both Evangelicall and Legall Page 61 § 7. Of the reasons of our defect of obedience which are foure Page 62 § 8. How and why grace dies by mans neglect Page 63 § 9. How the harme of omission of dutie is deprivation of life spirituall and of negative righteousnesse and how the punishment of damage is greater than that of smart Page 64 § 10. Of the endeavour after spirituall life wherein it consists and of the lets thereof Page 66 § 11. Of the second degree of spirituall self-murder which is in subjection to death by sinnes of commission Page 67 § 12. Of the meanes of mans destruction by breaking the Law of negative commands and of foure properties of soul-murdring sins Page 67 68. § 13. Of two causes of mens adventuring upon sinfull courses against the law Page 69 § 14. Of spirituall self-murder by sinning against the Gospell and how the obedience of the Gospell differs from the obedience of the Law in foure points Page 70 § 15. Of infidelity against the Gospell and of the causes and cure thereof Page 72 § 16. Of impenitency Page 72 § 17. Of the sin against the holy Ghost and things observable about it Page 73 § 18. Of finall Apostacy and of the difference of sinnes Page 75 § 19. Of the malignity of the sinnes against the Gospell above those that are committed against the Law for three reasons Page 76 § 20. The uses and improvement of the doctrine of spirituall self-murder Page 77 Chap. 9. Of bodily self-murder in speciall § 1. How bodily self-murder is defined and differenced from spirituall self-murder Page 80 § 2. Of mans body in a threefold consideration with its works and of the soules three sorts of morall works in the body and how the body suffers by and for the soule Page 81 § 3. Of the degrees of bodily self-murder and the pronenesse of man to it upon two causes which are removed by answers to both Page 83 Chap. 10. Of the kindes of bodily self-murder direct and indirect § 1. Direct and indirect self-murder are defined Page 84 § 2. Of the difference betweene direct and indirect self-murder in three things Page 85 § 3. How indirect self-murder is greater in two respects than direct Page 87 § 4. How direct self-murder is absolutely the greater in three respects Page 88 § 5. Of the degrees of sin and how to escape the greatest and its end Page 89 Chap. 11. Of indirect self-murder of the body § 1. The reasons why indirect self-murder is first treated of Page 90 § 2. How indirect self-murder is wrought two wayes by omission and commission Page 91 § 3. How indirect self-murder by omission is physically effected foure waies ibid. § 4. How indirect self-murder by omission is morally wrought two waies and that neglect of meanes of preservation is tempting of God and how Page 94 § 5. A question resolved about standers mute or those that refuse to answer legally and to submit to lawfull triall when they are arraigned at the barre for some capitall crime the reasons pro and contra with the conclusion that such mutes are indirect self-murderers Page 96 § 6. The resolution of the question concerning malefactors arraigned for capitall crimes wherof they know themselves guilty whether they ought in conscience to answer affirmatively or negatively to the question made to them at the Barre whether they be Guilty or Not Guilty the reasons on both sides with the conclusion for the negative that they may avoid indirect self-murmurder Page 100 § 7. Of indirect self-murder of commission by distemperature and needlesse mutilation of body or members whereupon death ensues Page 109 § 8. Of indirect self-murder of commission by unwarrantable practising of Physick or Chirurgery upon ones selfe thereby killed Page 111 § 9. Of indirect self-murder of commission by a mans unthriftinesse and prodigality
be used by the tempted privatly and publickly with others against the temptations to self-murder with the grounds of hope of comfortable successe to prevaile against them Page 322 § 4. Of the course that others without or against the wil of the tempted are to use to save him against the temptations and danger of self-murder Page 324 And lastly the conclusion shewing the great benefit of recovery from the temptations and danger of self-murder by the use of the former course Page 326 LIFES PRESERVATIVE AGAINST SELF-KILLING CHAP. 1. The generall description of Self-murder §. 1. Concerning life and death Life and death things of great importance and much to be regarded are not rightly cared for LIfe and Death are two things of the greatest importance in this world both in respect of what they are and whereto they tend that is their Essence and the great consequences that depend upon them and yet there is nothing wherof many men are more regardlesse than of their lives how wretchedly they spend and end them and of their Deaths how desperately they incurre and contract them casting themselves into the danger of it by the hands of others or of themselves although the sinnes in which they die can never afterwards be recovered or eternall destruction be avoided And therefore considering the dangerous and damnable practise of divers persons desperately destroying their owne lives and murdering themselves with so great prejudice to the Honour of God and his truth imbraced amongst us and with so much hurt to themselves and others I have adventured to treat more largely of the point of self-murder than yet I have seene the same done by others Touching which I will first describe in generall what it is §. 2. Self-murder described What it is Self-murder is the voluntary destroying of a mans owne life by himselfe or his owne meanes and procurement 1. In which description we are for the better understanding of it to consider First the object of self-murder and that is the life of man 2. Secondly the act it selfe which is the voluntary taking away of life or unjustly destroying of it which makes it to be murder 3. Thirdly the efficient cause or meanes of the destruction of mans life and that in this case is a mans owne selfe by his owne procurement which specifies the act and makes it to be properly self-murder §. 3. Self-murder is knowne by life Life In explicating these in order I will begin at life as first in nature and more auspicable which is the object of self-murder For self-murder being death and death being onely a privation it cannot be knowne what it is but by the knowledge of life which is its contrarie for no privation can be defined in regard of its want of entitie in it selfe but by its opposite habit as no man that knows not in some measure what light is can know what darknesse is Evill cleaves to good And self-murder being in it selfe evill it cannot be but in and about that thing which of it selfe is good 1. For evill cleaves and adheres to good for two reasons first that it may subsist which extra subjectum bonum without the subject of good cannot be for evill is like to the disease called the woolfe which maintains it self by eating feeding upon the body wherein it is For as non datur summum malum nec datur merum malum per se existens There is nothing absolutely evill neither is there a meere evill subsisting by it selfe but in that which is good 2. Secondly evill adheres to that which is good that it may convert and turne the good subject wherein it is into the quality of it selfe so making it nought and destroying it as loaven that sowreth the whole lump wherein it is the nature of all evill is ever active and destructive of that good that entertaines it or that it is exercised about it being as the worm that destroyes the tree wherein it breeds and harbours Observe All things are subject in this world to contraric passions From whence we may observe that as all created substances are mutable so are they capable of and subject unto contrary passions and qualities in this world and by how much the more excellent any good thing in this world is so much the worse is the contrary evill that attends upon and corrupts it and therefore the better that any created thing is on earth the more danger it is in and needs the greater care and indeavour to be had about it to preserve it against its opposite evill so life being of the nature and number of the best things it is in danger of the worst evils and therefore is with the greater care and circumspection to be watched over for its preservation CHAP. 2. Of the kindes of the life of man THat we may know what life is because there be divers kinds of it which it is that in self murder is destroyed by death we are to consider there are two kinds of the life of man Kinds of life naturall and spirituall the first is naturall the second is spirituall according as he consists of two natures and is an inhabitant of two worlds being made of heaven and earth to inhabit both there is no creature in the world that consists of such various different composition as man nor is indowed with such multiplicity of vitall operations or such variety of properties and qualities fitted for diversity of actions of so many kindes and thereupon is subject to so many and opposite motions and temptations Observ Mans care must be of two lives From the divers kindes of mans life we may observe that mans care must not bee as the brute beasts to live according to the instinct of nature but that he may live by a supernaturall principle and divine direction a spirituall life even here in this naturall life as he expects to arrive and attaine to a more excellent and heavenly end of advancement than other earthly creatures do or shall and there is a taske of more and greater porformances required to be done by him than from any other creature on earth CHAP. 3. Of naturall life in generall §. 1. of divers sorts of life Kindes of naturall life FOr our better understanding of naturall life wee are generally to consider that according to the distinction of earthly living creatures there be three kindes of naturall lives 1. Of vegetation First that which is called the life of vegetation which is the life of trees plants corne and the like whereby they grow and encrease both in their severall kindes and in their individuals 2. Life of sense Secondly the life of sense whereby irrationall and sensitive creatures do besides their life of vegetation common with plants live inlived with sense and motion Now these two kindes of lives considered specifically in the aforesaid severall kindes of creatures fall not under the
consideration of nor are subject to self-murder because the law against murder is not given to them who are not properly capable of the same by meanes of their want of reason neither are they subject to this fact and sin of self-murder which by instinct of nature they abhorre and doe alwaies naturally indeavour their owne preservation 3. Rationall life The third kinde of naturall life is that which is called rationall or of reasonable creatures which is proper to men whereby they live besides the life of vegetation and sense common with other earthly living creatures according to reason or in a rationall manner both for the essentiall forme of their natures whereby they are called rationall creatures and also for their thoughts and actions which for their originall principle whence they flow and for the rule whereby they are ordered are reasonable morall and more divine in all their motions than are other earthly creatures if the same be not perverted by some other exorbitant principles or accidents In and under this rationall life of man both the other lives are comprehended as things inferior and subordinate are contained in their superiour and summary head Note Mans perfection The perfections of all other earthly creatures are in man together with or comprehended in that which is proper to himselfe whereby he transcends them all §. 2. Man only is subject to self-murder Notwithstanding that man indowed with understanding hath the greatest helps against self-murder and hath the greatest reason of all worldly creatures to preserve his life it being so excellent above theirs yet he onely of them all is subject to this fault and mischiefe of self-murder The greatnesse of the sin of self-murder And as all the aforesaid three kinds of lives are comprehended for faculty and vertue in mans reasonable life flowing from his reasonable soule as we see in the ceasing of them all in man at once upon the departure of his soule from the body Note so the killing destroying of mans life is absolutely farre greater than the destroying of the lives of all other earthly creatures because both the lives of them all for kinds and also mans own proper life that farre excells them all in the destruction of mans life are destroyed and also all other creatures were made for man for the comfort of whose life all their lives do serve §. 3. How naturall life is knowne by man in whom it is Touching the knowledge of the naturall life of man a reasonable living creature apprehends the same both by sense and understanding This life is knowne 1. by sense by sense a reasonable creature not onely descernes that it lives but also feeles this life by the effects of it to be a quickning power of inlivening the body inwardly and disposing and inabling it to action outwardly 2. By understanding By understanding a man knowes that this life is an act of the spirit or soule in the body of man or a quickning vertue of it in a continued fluxe by the personall union of the soule and body together §. 4. The soules double act of life in man The soules act of life in man This act of the soule in its union with the body is twofold 1. Making the subiect to live First that which respects the bodie it self or rather mans person in that worke or lively energie which we may in some respect call opus ad intra or a reflexe worke of man upon himselfe upon the personall union of the soule and bodie whereby he becomes a living soule Gen. 2.7 for extension in all his parts and for intensiox in fulnesse of lively power for his subsisting and growth to his appointed period and for use of all his organs and faculties for their proper function being thereby also able to discerne take notice and judge of himselfe his state and actions For not the soule only nor the body onely is to be properly said to live after their union together but the person consisting both of soule and body doth live this life which is not the life of either of the natures or parts of man by themselves considered Man lives or dies personally considered but the life of the person of man consisting of both natures personally united And therefore when one kills a man we say not properly that he hath onely killed an earthly body but we say properly that he hath killed such a person as consists of a soule and a body and therefore it is said in Scripture that there were so many soules slaine a Joshua 10.28 not that the immortall spirit is in it selfe subject to such a death or can be slaine but in regard of its Acting and working in its personall union with the bodie whereby both of them live personally together that life which is the life of the person which is destroyed and ceases upon death which is further apparent by this Reason because the murder of a man is so hainous a crime in regard of the destruction of the Image of God in man which is not onely in the body or onely in the soule but is in the whole person of man so long as the same lives 2 Making the subject to worke The second lively act of the soule in this union with the body personally considered is that whereby it makes the body organically fitly disposed and active to those duties which we call opera ad extra works about objects not it selfe which works are the common outward workes of the person consisting of those two natures and not of either of them apart Observe Upon life depends the subsisting and working of the person Whereupon wee may observe that upon this life depends both the subsisting of the person of man in its being and also all its actions naturall civill and morall so that he that kills a man destroyes his person and abolishes all his personall actions and activity whereby he might be serviceable and usefull to God to himselfe to the Church or Commonwealth And yet we see no thing more passionately and rashly enterprised than killing of men than the which nothing should be more deliberately and upon weightier causes done it being no lesser matter than to dissolve heaven and earth by destruction of a person consisting of an heavenly spirit and of an earthly body to destroy the noblest naturall life and to deprive God and the world of the most glorious and profitable workes Such a thing is this naturall life of man generally considered CHAP. 4. Of mans naturall life more specially §. 1. Wherein the naturall life of man consists Mans naturall life is fraile Phil. 1.22 expounded MAns naturall life consists as in part wee have heard in the Act of the soule united personally with the body by meanes of the animall naturall and vitall spirits which the Apostle calls living in the flesh Philip. 1.22 which is to live neither to the flesh to
fulfill the lusts thereof nor yet is it to live according to the flesh directing our waies by our owne carnall wisdome and will but thereby is intimated living in a fraile and sinfull body subject to manifold troubles and infirmities in which regard it is a fading and temporary life as Saint Iames tels us Iam. 4.14 comparing it to a vapour that vanisheth away With the which life all men that come into this world are indowed as Saint Iohn affirmes Ioh. 1.9 and this naturall life is onely for this sublunary world and not for the world to come for our lives do differ according to our estates and places wherein we are to live §. 2. The sweetnesse of naturall life In what respect naturall life is sweet Even this naturall life is sweet in regard of the union of the soule and body together and in respect of the preservation of our persons by it and for the workes that we may doe in it for Gods glory and our owne salvation 1. So that the lesse certainty that a man hath of a better life the more deare this should be unto him that therein he may enjoy the present and may provide for a better 2. and also the more zeale and desire that a man hath to doe good in glorifying of God and in benefiting of others and the more care he hath of advancement of his owne eternall happinesse the more is hee to respect his life wherein the same is to be done §. 3. The losse of naturall life is horrible and painefull How death is naturally horrible God hath so ordained that the departure of the soule from the body should ordinarily be horrible to mans apprehension and with paine and griese not onely in respect of parting two such sweet Companions which separated are imperfect the one without the other but also in respect of the utter destruction of their common naturall personall life and the cutting off of all these comfortable actions and affections that depend upon and do tend to the perfection of the same Which is to the end that man may naturally endeavour the preservation of his life against all dangers and may abhorre self-murder that deprives him of so much good §. 4. How life is deare and precious Life deare There is nothing in the world more deare to a man than his life in which regard it was that Satan said to the Lord touching Iob all that a man hath will he give for his life Iob. 2.4 and for the excellency and use of it Salomon calls it the precious life Prov. 6.26 and therefore he should not part from it or cast it away for a trifle or in a humour specially seeing he can never redeeme or recover it againe from death a Psal 49.7 Reasons 1 It preserves the person in being For three reasons especially is the life of man precious First because by it the person of man is preserved in its esse or being by personall union of soule and body which otherwise would be dissolved and undone Now betweene being and not being there is so vast a distance and opposition that a creature doth naturally desire rather to live miseraebly than not to live as is apparent by that naturall instinct whereby the creature to save its life or vitall parts objects and offers its lesse principall members to undergoe the danger choosing rather to live mutilate and wretched than for prevention thereof to die For the losse of life is not onely irrevocable and unmatchable in worth compared with that worldly thing for which it is exchanged but also it includes all other worldly losses in it and therefore it is farre the greatest losse that man can suffer 2 It makes capable of comfort Secondly it is by life that the creature is capable of any comfort or of the use and benefit of the blessings of good things that God gives us to rejoyce in in this world for to a dead man all this world and pleasure of it is gone and to him that wants sense the use and delight of all sensible things is lost in which respect Solomon saith to him that is joyned to all the living there is hope for a living Dog is better than a dead Lyon Eccles 9.4 so it is under God by the blessing of life that other good things are blessings to us and that the miseries and calamities that betide us here are lesse evills than death for that partiall and initiall evills are ever lesse than those that are compleate and full those that afflict than those that extinguish 3. For the use of it Thirdly life is precious for the use and improvement of it 1 To Gods glory First to Gods glory in spending of it in manner according to his holy word with respect to God for the end that we aime at in which regard godly Hezekiah said that not the dead but the living praise God a Esay 38.18 19. 2 To others Secondly the preciousnesse of mans life is seene in the use of it for the good that thereby is done to others both in civill and divine good offices in Church and Common-wealth as the Apostle Paul confesseth of himselfe that he did live for the spirituall benefit of the Philippians Phil. 1.24 25. As for the dead they are unprofitable to the living as appeares by Esay 63.16 saying that Abraham is ignorant of us and the Psalmist tels us that we should not put our trust in Princes nor in the sonne of man in whom there is no help and then gives the reason of it His breath goeth forth he returneth to his earth in that very day his thoughts perish b Psal 46.304 3 To a mans selfe Thirdly the excellencie and necessity of life is seene in the use and benefit of it to a mans selfe in fitting him for heaven by working up of his salvation here in this life and in advancing himselfe in glory both by adorning his person with divine and saving graces of Gods spirit and also by holy actuall obedience and dutifull performances to God in tract of living For if a man doe not at all live this naturall life he cannot be capable of eternall life and although he do live this naturall life yet if he do not endeavour to extend and employ it to the attainment of salvation but that it be cut off before salvation be wrought he cannot but of necessity perish for ever For as the tree falls so it shall lye there is no amendment of our estate and errors after death as appeares by the parable of the rich man Luke 16.25 26. if God doe give a man life and time he puts a price into his hand and gives him a great blessing for his advancement to a better life And therefore in all the aforesaid respects it is apparent that life is the most precious thing that God bestowes upon man whereby all other blessings to us are expressed as appeares by Abrahams
speech to the Lord saying Oh that Ishmael might live before thee a Gen. 17.18 Vse To preserve life The chiefe use of the former doctrine is to provoke and move us to use all lawfull meanes to preserve and prolong our lives for hee that wills the end should also will the meanes whereby he may attaine to that end §. 5. Of the meanes of lifes preservation The meanes 1. Prayer Those meanes are first prayer to God for to sustaine and preserve our lives especially in apparent dangers as David did Psal 102.24 saying Oh my God take me not away in the midst of my dayes For as our lives depend upon him that is the fountaine of life b Ioh. 1.4 so our eyes must be to him for a continuall influxe of continuing the same in regard of outward dangers and inward mortality dayly putting our lives in jeopardy which of our selves we are not able to resist 2. Foode cheerefulnesse c. The second meanes of the preservation of mans life is the moderate and cheerefull use of necessary foode and raiment with other convenient comforts and delights needfull to cherish and preserve our lives according to Solomons direction that there is nothing better for a man than that he should eate and drinke and that he should make his soule enjoy good in his labour Eccles 2.24 according to Iacobs desire Gen. 28.20 intreating God that he might have bread to eate and cloathes to put on not to hoard and lay up but for his use For a man to have plenty and yet to be in want is a miserable condition for so he defrauds and wrongs himselfe he is injurious to the creatures in not imploying them to the use for which God made and gave them and is ingratefull to God in not rightly using his blessings so as he may thereby doe God the greatest honor and service Of cheerefulnesse Cheerefulnesse is an excellent meanes of life for as Solomon saies by sorrow of heart the spirit is broken and all the dayes of the afflicted are evill but a merry heart maketh a cheerefull countenance and he that is of a merry heart hath a continuall feast a Prov. 15.13 15. and therefore Eccles 8.15 he commendeth mirth because a man hath no better thing under the sun than to eate and to drinke and to be merry for that shall abide with him of his labour the daies of his life which God giveth him under the sunne and for this purpose God gives us some things that are onely for delight and of other things he often bestowes such plenty upon us as shewes it to be his pleasure that we should use them not onely for necessity but also for cheering of us that we may both taste thereby how good he is to us and also that we may the more joyfully serve him with gladnesse of heart in health and in plenty of all things Grounds of cheerefulnesse 1 A good conscience grace and hope The grounds of this Cheerefulnesse are two First inward peace of conscience in the apprehension of Gods favour and love to us in Christ Iesus in the comfortable evidence of the pardon of our sins in the undeceivable enjoying of the saving graces of Gods spirit in the truth of our conformity and obedience to God and in assured hope of everlasting life and happinesse all which will make us to rejoyce yea even in tribulation Rom. 5.3 with joy unspeakeable and glorious 2. Outward blessings The second ground of our cheerefulnesse is the outward favours and benefits that God in mercy bestowes upon us whereof wee are to take the present use and sweetnesse not depriving our selves thereof nor deading our spirits with feares of uncertaine or remote future evils according to the direction of our Saviour Mat. 6.34 Take no thought for the morrow forbidding anxious tormenting care for feare of ensuing crosses and according to the practise of Hezekiah to whom the Lord had denounced fearefull judgements upon his posterity who said Good is the word of the Lord for there shall be peace and truth in my dayes Isai 39.8 3. Physick Thirdly to preserve our lives it is requisite that we use the seasonable fit and moderate help of Physick to prevent or remove diseases which are not onely the enemies of life but are also an inchoate or begun death as Hezekiah did take a lump of figgs and laid it on his boile for his recovery 2 King 20.7 according to Gods direction by Esay the Prophet in this respect did Saint Paul direct Timothie to drinke no longer water but to use a little wine for his stomacks sake and his often infirmities 1 Tim. 5.23 that so a man may not be a deficient cause of the preservation of his owne life when God gives meanes to save or prolong it §. 6. How to use Physick Cautions about Physick 1. That wee trust not to it In taking of Physick wee are alwaies to observe these subsequent cautions First that wee dote not upon nor trust or ascribe too much to physicall meanes but that we carefully looke and pray to God for a blessing by the warrantable use of them For it is God that both directs the Physitians judgement and conscionable practise about a patient and also puts vertue into and gives healthfull operation to the medicines 2. Use it moderately Secondly that we use Physick moderately not out of wantonnesse but for necessity nor as our daily diet bringing our selves under a necessity of ever using it and so by repairing of the house of our body wee may waste and overthrow it neither are we then to use Physick when there is no needfull cause nor yet in such desperate cases where there is no hope of life but apparent signes of approching death lest under an intent of prolonging life wee doe shorten it or of curing wee doe kill where there is not strength of nature to help physick to work its due effect 3. Use it not rashly Thirdly our care about Physick must be that wee doe not unadvisedly and rashly use it either by practising upon our selves or others beyond our skill or calling or else by taking Physick from others that be either presumptuous-ignorant Empericks or prophane and desperate dispensers and undertakers neither conscionable in their owne lives nor tender of the lives of others but are more desirous of their patients monies than of their healths and therefore our endeavour should be to take physick both seasonably for time and also by the counsell and direction of such as be both skilfull persons in that facultie and also conscionable for religion and piety that God may blesse their labours the better who will be tender and carefull of mens lives working by safe courses and in manner fit for their patients good and herein what ever the effect be men may have comfort when they shall have insisted in a warrantable way 4. Not to be perplexed about the event
Fourthly wee are to take heed that we be not anxiously perplexed and troubled when upon the using or forbearing of Physick upon warrantable grounds the effect answers not our desire or expectation But suppose the patient dies or labours under any griefe unrecovered without hope of cure it is folly to vexe our selves because we have not used this body or that body this medicine or that medicine thinking or saying if we had done this or that our selves or some other patient belonging to us had beene recovered just as Mary said to Christ Lord if thou hadst beene here my Brother had not died a Ioh. 11.32 When a thing contrarie to our desire is done wherein we are not faultie when wee worke according to our present knowledge and meanes we should rest content with the will of God how adverse or crosse soever it seemes to us considering that as God appoints the end and thing that doe come to passe so doth he likewise direct and order the meanes to accomplish the same For God oftentimes over-rules our purpose mens skill and the nature and effects of Physick to the bringing to passe of his owne purposes contrary to our expectation which must bee attributed to God the soveraigne Lord and is not to bee imputed to unblameable men and meanes that are but the instruments under God and subject to his controle and disposition and therefore touching the events thereupon following wee must bee content to be crossed of our wils sometime that God at all times may have his §. 7. Of deadly things to be resisted 4. Opposition of deadly things Fourthly and lastly to preserve his life every man is bound to decline and oppose all things that tend to the unlawfull taking of it away for that which other creatures do by Antipathie and instinct of nature for shunning that which is contrary or pernicious to them man is by the meanes of his reason and will to do the like for his preservation who by his intellectuall parts can better foresee and discerne what is hurtfull and dangerous to him or his life 1 Invasion The things that especially he is to decline and beware of are First Forcible invasion whereby his life is assaulted or indangered and his death attempted by others For besides the perill that a mans life is in by that inbred poyson of diseases and mortality in himselfe it is lyable to death by meanes from without himselfe whereof a man is to be carefull both to foresee the same and to prevent it or to extricate and free himselfe out of it as we see how Paul understanding of a conspiracy of above 40. men lying in waite to take away his life used his best indeavours to decline and prevent the same by discovery thereof to the chiefe Captaine Act. 23.17 and so our Saviour himselfe gave commandement to his Disciples that when their enemies did persecute them in one citie they should flee to another Mat 10.23 according to his own practise who to avoid and escape the bloody hands of Herod was carried into Egypt 1 Mat. 2. which course is abundantly warranted by manifold arguments and examples in Scripture and upon just reason is so good that necessity of saving a mans life against unjust and violent invasion warrants him both in the Courts of Heaven and Earth in his owne lawfull defence to kill rather than to suffer himselfe to be unjustly killed because that love which is the fulfilling of the Law b Rom. 13.10 begins at a mans selfe it being the rule that we should love our neighbours as our selves How can it bee expected that he will preserve other mens lives that is carelesse of his owne Qui sibi nequam cui bonus 2. Dangerous undertakings Secondly for preservation of mans life he must not onely not submit himselfe passively to private deadly cruelties of others but also he must not actively expose himselfe to hazard the losse of his life upon self-will'd dangerous undertakings without a lawfull calling and sufficiency of strength to undertake or go safely through the enterprise as our Saviour intimates Luk. 14.31 in the parable of the King going to warre that would not undertake above his power 3. Motions of self-murder Thirdly the thing that a man is to decline for preservation of his life is that he do abhorre and reject all unnaturall motions or resolutions of self-murder That the heart of man may neither be suffered to breed nor to entertaine the thoughts of his owne destruction like a viper conceiving and somenting such an issue as in the birth thereof destroyes the parent that gave it being The thoughts of evill that a man doth at first but dally withall and fearelesly beholds in his mind presuming of his power over them at length possesse him and master him and therefore above all things wee are to keep our heart for out of it proceeds all evill Prov. 4.23 Mat. 15.19 if the seed and spawne of sin in the motions of it in the heart be extinguished and destroyed then there is no feare of the breaking of it out in act for as Saint Iames saith Lust first conceives before it brings forth sin a Jam. 1.15 §. 8. Of spending our lives well To spend our lives well Another generall use of the former doctrine of the pretiousnesse of mans life is that wee be the more carefull to husband and spend it well to the glory of God our owne good and comfort and for the good of others among whom we live considering that our life is too good to be spent away in idlenesse to bee wasted prodigally or to bee mis-imployed in the service of sinne and Sathan and is irrevocable when it is past that it cannot be had backe againe that it might be better spent and former errors be undone and therefore we doe ever need with the Psalmist to intreat that God would so teach us to number our dayes that wee may apply our hearts unto wisdome b Psal 90.12 being ever mindfull of the Apostles admonition redeeme the time because the dayes are evill Eph. 5.16 Motives The motives that may move us to spend our time and life well are specially these three following First 1. Badnesse of the times the wickednesse of the world which should make us more watchfull to catch at all opportunities to do good that our life that will waste away with the rust of doing nothing may bee comfortably spent in well doing Happy shall that servant be whom his Lord when he comes shall find doing so Mat. 24.46 2. Shortnesse of our lives Secondly the shortnesse and uncertainty of our lives which passes as a shadow or a vapour that appeares no more puts us in mind not to deferre but while it is called to day requires us with sobriety and watchfulnesse to be couragious and incessant in well doing Post est occasio calva the morrow is not ours and if we be cut off
before it comes our worke being undone how then will it grieve us that we were so slothfull 3. The benefit of well-spending them Thirdly the weightinesse of that which depends upon well-spending of our lives here as the comfort of our soules and everlasting salvation hereafter calls upon us to consider that no estate or stock need be so frugally spent as the short life and few dayes of man than which nothing is more wastefully worthlesly vainely nor worse mis-spent specially three wayes to which we may adde a fourth How men mis-pend their lives 1. By doing evill First in doing of naughtinesse and evill which wee ought not to doe it being forbidden by God whereby many men take great paines in vile courses of prophanenesse filthinesse drunkennesse fighting against the truth and the like mis-spending their meanes and lives to oppose God and to get and goe to hell by rightly imploying whereof they might with farre lesse trouble and adoe happily do much good and attaine to heaven and everlasting glory 2. By doing things impertinent Secondly by doing that which is little or nothing to the purpose for a mans true happinesse and comfort as impertinent studies pursuite of curiosity and vanity hunting immoderately and prosecuting eagerly after the profits and pleasures of this world that before God will availe a man nothing for his salvation and eternall or spirituall comfort when the things whereupon the same depends have beene neglected for as the Apostle sayes bodily exercise profiteth little but godlinesse is profitable to all things a 1 Tim. 4.8 3. By idlenesse Thirdly men do often mis-spend their lives by wasting it in sluggish idlenesse when they minde and indeavour nothing so much as how they may sleepe at ease or passe away their time in sloath or sottishnesse so driving their dayes and lives to an end in doing nothing although none have more to do than they while others complaine of want of time in their imployments about their commendable affaires these object that they have more time than they know what to doe with Such are iners inutile pondus an unprofitable burthen and the excrements of the Church and Commonwealth dead while they live and as hoggs more profitable by their deaths than by their lives like ciphers they keepe a place but are of no value or worth they go out of the world before they regard why they came into the world when they are present they are unprofitable and when they are gone they are not missed for any good they ever did Causes of idlenesse The causes of which idle course of life are affectation of their owne bodily and worldly ease contenting the flesh with doing of nothing and care onely to avoid trouble which attends upon active and industrious godly imployment but wee finde the sentence of condemnation passed no lesse against those that omitted to doe their duties b Mat. 25.43 than against them who committed that evill which was forbidden Wilfull defects and omissions of doing good bring damnation He that wanted his wedding garment was thrust out of doores and cast into utter darkenesse Mat. 22.13 Why was Meroz cursed because they came not out to the helpe of the Lord against the mighty Iudg. 5.23 An idle and slothfull spending of a manlife is every where in Scripture condemned and by nature the Bees expell the Droanes 4. By over-charging ones selfe in doing good There is another way of mis-spending a mans life proceeding from good affection in a pious manner by his over-tasking or overcharging himselfe in religious performances or good duties above his strength as in fasting and prayer in studies and labours in the Word Neque immoderata imperamus jejunia Hieron ad Demetriadem and the like whereby a mans life is soone spent like a sudden blaze consumed in a present flame which by more frugall ordering of it according to his ability might last much longer to the greater benefit both of Church and Commonwealth and thus I have done with the discourse of mans naturall life CHAP. 5. Of mans spirituall life §. 1. What spirituall life is Spirituall life what WEe are now to consider of mans spirituall life which is not properly the life of his spirit whereby the spirits of all men doe live but it is the life of a man whereby he personally considered lives a spirituall and supernaturall life Which consists in the gratious union of man with God in Christ who is our life a Ioh 14.6 whom God sent into the world that we might live through him 1 Ioh. 4.9 by whom we are delivered from death by his spirit because of the spiritualnesse of this our life it is said to be hid with God in Christ Col. 3.3 §. 2. The acts of spirituall life Acts of it 1. Of this spirituall life there are two acts First that whereby we that were dead in trespasses and sinnes are quickned Ephes 2.1 being translated into a state of spirituall and eternall life and indowed with a new lively principle of grace inabling us to spirituall motion 2. The second act of this life is that whereby we walke and worke according to the direction of Gods word and the good motions of the good spirit so being made conformable to God and walking with God as new creatures in the estate of regeneration §. 3. The degrees of spirituall life Degrees of it Of this life there are two degrees 1. First that which is by faith in the state of grace in this world as our Saviour tells us that hee that beleeveth on him hath eternall life Ioh. 6.47 by this life we are to live according to God in the spirit 1 Pet. 4.6 and also if wee live in the spirit wee are also to walke in the spirit a Gal 5.25 Faith and good workes as the cause and effects are alwaies together Iam. 2.20 The second degree of our spirituall life is that which is by vision or sight in glorie whereof Saint Iohn tells us that we shall be like to Christ for we shall see him as he is 1 Ioh. 3.2 and touching those things wherein it consists Saint Paul saies that eye hath not seene nor eare heard neither have entred into the heart of man the things which God hath prepared for them that love him b 1 Cor. 2.9 And he himselfe having beene rapt up into the third heaven confesseth that there he heard unspeakable words c 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which was not lawfull for him to utter d 2 Cor. 12.4 in regard of impossibility there being want of words to expresse such supernaturall matter and his conceiving being lesse than could comprehend what was represented to him This spirituall life in the estate of grace in this world is apprehended first in the understanding Heb. 11.1 but in the state of glory in heaven it is visibly injoyed by way of a spirituall sensiblenesse Note In the former
state life is put into us but in this latter state wee shall be put into life filled with it within us and fully compassed about with it without us as vessels cast into the sea are filled with water within and without so being comprehended by it as well as it is comprehended by us according to our modell and capacity This life is one Although these degrees of spirituall life bee severall yet the life it selfe is but one whereupon these subsist This life is begunne here in the state of grace by faith in Christ and is consummate and fully accomplished by vision or sensible fruition in the state of glory in heaven according to our hope Gods promises to us although at death faith doth cease yet the spirituall life thereby wrought in us is not extinguished for or by the introduction of the life of glory but the manner onely is altered and degree of spirituall living intended to perfection The degrees subordinate A mans severall and graduall kinds of lives do stand in subordination one to another thus to the life of glory in heaven with the Lord none can attaine but those that first live by faith in Christ in the state of grace in manner conformable to Gods word and will neither can any attaine to the life of grace but those that first live the naturall life which is the materiall or passive foundation of the other twaine for this naturall life gives beeing to a man the other two doe adde perfection and happinesse to him so that if the first be a blessing much more are the other lives blessings and highly to be esteemed These three degrees or kinds of life are like to the three roomes of the Temple where all entrance into the most Holy place was made by the Holy place and into this by the outward Court so none could come into the third but by the second and none could come into the second but by the first whereby it appeares that naturall life brings man under a possibility and capacitie of the life of grace and glory and the life of grace brings us that certainely have it into faire assurance of attaining the life of glory for that they are specifically the same but gradually different as the twilight and perfect light at noone §. 4. Who may have spirituall life and by whose fault doe any misse of it Denyed to none Although all men that doe live the naturall life attaine not to the spirituall yet spirituall life is denyed expresly to no man if they will carefully use the meanes and truly indeavour to have it for whosoever miscarries and misseth of this spiritual life he himselfe is guilty and cause thereof Lost by our owne fault for God hath given sufficient meanes of salvation and made a generall offer thereof to all men as Ioshua did call Heaven and earth to record that day that he had set before the people life and death and so did put them to their choise Ioshua 24.14 if with Mary wee choose the better part wee are happy it were better for us that wee had never lived at all than that wee should not live this spirituall life without which we are dead while we live a 1 Tim. 5.6 None can be excused by pretense of want of particular insinuation of the Gospell that is the power of God to salvation to every individuall man or because it is not naturally ingrafted in every mans heart as is the morall Law in the generall principles and matter unformed thereof though not as it is perfectly formed in every particular precept For the Gospell is not contrary to the Law but the Law both morall and ceremoniall is our Schoolemaster to drive and direct us to Christ for salvation b Gal. 3.21.24 and that for the same we should neither rest upon our selves nor upon the Law The Gospell to al published 1. To Adam Againe when God himselfe at the beginning first after the fall preached and delivered the gospell to Adam and Eve c Gen. 3.15 he did publish and give the same to every particular man and woman then in them that ever should be borne into the world to whom their parents were bound successively to preach and deliver the Gospell by a continued tradition Note If any of their children should have died before they were capable of salvation by that mean then as it is most probable they were to be saved as dying infants of beleeving parents now are 2. To his posterity Furthermore ever since the first promulgation of the gospell to Adam it hath pleased God to repeat and more and more fully to explicate the same by his servants with invitation of all men to entertaine the same from age to age in such places and companies where all men might take notice thereof if they were not wanting to themselves in adjoyning themselves to and keeping union with the Church where they might be within the hearing of the Gospell which is sufficient to leave men inexcusable in their ignorance of it Although God by his providence and prerogative Royall directs dispenses and applyes the Gospell in the ministrie of it to some people and not to others according to the good pleasure of his will after the first promulgation as wee see how the publication of Lawes and proclamations of Princes which are as little written in their subjects hearts as the gospell is in mankind Comparison being published in manner and in places as Princes please whereby and whence their subjects are to take notice of them ignorance of the same excuses not but that the disobedient and transgressors of them may justly be punished notwithstanding that they never knew them seeing every man is at his owne perill to looke after and take notice of those Lawes or ordinances whereby he is to live whether they proceed from inbred naturall notions or outwardly from the will of his Superiours §. 5. Of the excellency of spirituall life Spirituall lifes excellencie Mans spirituall life far excells his naturall life in three respects especially 1. For nature First in regard of the things where in it consists the naturall life consists but in the union of soule and body which are but naturall things and holds by a tie of naturall spirits in the blood upheld by earthly naturall meanes such as man is made and compounded of Spirituall life which is now supernaturall consists in a spirituall union with God by his eternall Sonne and Spirit and is upheld by supernaturall meanes and divine influence whereby we live the life of God and also by God and to God a Rom. 14.8 and so as the life of naturall or reasosonable men 2 Cor. 5.15.1 Pet. 4.2 farre excells the lives of brutes so doth this spirituall life of Gods regenerated people farre surpasse the lives of meere naturall and unregenerated men and therefore it is that men are farre more beholding to the
meanes and instruments of their spirituall life than to the meanes of their naturall for naturall life without spirituall makes a man but subject to misery whereas the spirituall life upon the naturall makes a man everlastingly happy which should quicken in us a desire and endeavour to be borne againe according to our Saviours speech Ioh. 3.3 2 For continuance Secondly the spirituall life farre transcends the naturall in respect of its continuance the naturall life depending upon mutable and mortall ties and bonds and subject to many externall harmfull accidents is fraile and at last is swallowed up of mortality it being appointed for all men once to die Heb. 9.27 and few and evill are our dayes in this world wherein wee have no abiding city the spirituall life is eternall without subjection to death because it is in it selfe supernaturall and advanced above the reach and power of all things that can destroy life and is preserved and upheld by such a fountaine of indeficient and omnipotent life and undecaying lively vigour and meanes of divine living that never suffers the man that hath and keeps communion with the same to be subject to death but makes him passe from death to life Iohn 5.24 the faith whereof doth free a man from the feare of losing that happy estate while he continues to love it whereas others in a loseable and mutable estate of life are by feare of being deprived thereof and being without hope of a better hindered in injoying the full comfort of the present good that here is afforded 3. For effects Thirdly spirituall life surpasses the naturall in its effects the naturall life enables a man to the doing onely of naturall actions specially concerning mans naturall good agreeable unto and flowing from naturall principles in man being in the meane time dead to any divine or supernaturall good neither actively doing that of goodnesse which is truely morall or divine nor passively receiving and enjoying that thereof which is beatificall or which makes man blessed and so he may for all that life the powers and actions thereof be miserable and perish for flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdome of God 1 Cor. 15.50 The spirituall life by so neere conjunction of a man with the fountaine of life Essentiall the well-spring of infinite goodnesse not onely by that touch and union doth it make him so live but also it causeth him to be most happy both by making him able Actively to live the life of God a Gal. 2.19 and to live to the will of God 1 Pet. 4.2 and also by endowing him with passive capacity and with reall possession of all such beatificall perfections as are necessary for his advancement to and in a glorious estate farre above all other earthly creatures in this world and in the world to come whereby he becomes so happy that nothing can make him miserable but even in tribulation he hath cause of rejoycing Rom. 5.3 and when he dyes yet still he lives in more excellent manner as Paul said touching his afflictions as dying and behold we live 2 Cor. 6.9 In regard of the aforesaid excellency of this spirituall life above the naturall it was that our Saviour did command his Disciples not to feare them that kill the body but are not able to kill the soule but rather to feare him which is able to destroy both soule and body in hell Mat. 10.28 §. 6. How to obtaine spirituall life Vse 1. To get spirituall life From the former doctrine touching the excellency of this spirituall life of man diverse very necessary uses are observable First it may provoke and stirre us up to get this life above all things in this world whereof we are borne destitute yea dead in sin to which life by our manifold actuall transgressions wee doe indispose and unfit our selves but yet the Lord of his mercy hath appointed us a way whereby we may get this spirituall life so that by our conscionable use of the meanes appointed by God By meanes wee may attaine thereunto in regard of his promise and faithfulnesse that those that seeke shall finde Amos 5.6 And why to be used These meanes are wee to use in regard both of Gods commandement who thereby tries our obedience and faith and also in respect of the dispensation of God who gives his graces onely by and in his owne way which otherwise cannot be had Also the worth and necessity of this spirituall life is such as deserves our best endeavours to get it our esteeme whereof is seene by our labours for it in Gods appointed way without which God will not give it because hee will have us active about our owne salvation that the same may cost us the price of our labours to come by it that thereby we may the more comfortably know that we have it when we know how we came by it that wee may be the more carefull to keepe what wee have so laboriously purchased and may assuredly looke for the reward of our labours which God that cannot lie hath promised to those that seeke life by his appointed meanes To use no meanes to get this spirituall life is to contemne both it and God and to indeavour to get it by using other meanes than God hath appointed for that end is to tempt God or to prescribe him his waies of dispensing his grace and to preferre our owne wits and wills above Gods whereby such men lose both their labour and expectation Which they be 1. The word of God The meanes in particular to get this spirituall life are First the word of God specially the Gospell which is as the materiall and seminall cause of it 1 Pet. 1.23 2. Application Secondly the meanes vegetating and applying the Gospell to quicken us which is fourefold 1. By the ministry First the ministrie of the word by reading and preaching of it to the enlightning of the understanding and to the moving of the affections and hearts of the hearers to embrace it for Faith comes by hearing Rom 10.17 2. Christian conference Secondly the Company and conferences of those Christians that in this kind of life are by their motion and example lively and vigorous able by their warmth and livelinesse to heat and quicken those whom they touch as Elisha by his application of himselfe to the dead child made it warme and alive 2 King 4.34 and as leaven leavens the lump and every thing affects to procreate its like 3. Prayer The third meanes of the Gospells application to quicken us is servent and effectuall prayer to God from whom is all the vertue and efficacy of it that he would make it effectuall to us for although Paul do plant and Apollo water it is God that gives the increase 1 Cor. 3.6 4. Sacraments the spirits operation in them Fourthly the Sacraments and in them the powerfull operation of the spirit of Christ is that which quickens us when
life from the fountaine of life whereby we live as men say actu primo so by the imployment and exercise of this life in obedience to God we live actu secundo preserving and nourishing this life For we see that by rest and idlenesse things are not onely often frustrate of the end of their being but doe also languish and die which by action according to their naturall faculties and proper use are preserved For all things that are in the way to their end as spirituall life is here are maintained and perfected by their motion to that end where at last they are to rest there not being an ultra or more-over for them to aspire after 3. Zeale Thirdly this spirituall life is somented and cherished by stirring up and blowing the coale of godly zeale for goodnesse and against evill whereby a man may quicken the things that are ready to die this zeale is as the lively spirits that quicken this life to make it active whereby it growes and is vigorous The vveakenes of zeale The things that weaken this zeale are three First wearisomenesse and satiety contracted by the length of time in assiduity about good things and divine exercises 2. Secondly by diseouragements from all examples and from opposition of goodnesse 3. Thirdly for the prevailing of vice in our selves or generally in others caried with a high hand and from the languishing of grace in our selves and from the generall discountenancing of it by others Meanes to quicken zeale 1. The meanes to quicken this zeale are First the serious consideration both of the excellency and also of the usefulnesse of goodnesse whereby wee may bee inslamed with the love and desire of it 2. Secondly the odiousnesse and dangerousnesse of iniquity and sinfull prevailing courses in others may by antipathie and antiparistasis kindle our zeale the more against it as David confesses of himselfe that rivers of waters did runne downe his eyes because men kept not Gods Law Psal 119.136 4. Gods promises Fourthly this spirituall life is maintained by observing and collecting the promises of the word of God and marking how God fulfills the same to his people and so by meditating and relying upon them wee shall find incouragement and a lively influence come from the same to uphold this spirituall life in us in all estates when all other things do faile As the Prophet saith unlesse thy Law had beene my delight I should then have perished in mine affliction a Psal 119.42 5. Preseverance Fiftly spirituall life is upheld in us by having our eyes fixt upon God in constant perseverance in all well doing as did Iehosaphat b 2 Chro 20.12 from whom there proceeds to us a gracious influence of divine life as light from the sunne to the moone when she is within the aspect of it 6. Hope of happincsse The sixt meanes of preservation of this spirituall life is hope set upon our future happinesse as did our Saviour Christ who for the hope that was set before him indured the crosse Heb. 12.2 by this anchor of hope a man rides safe in all stormes as held up by the chinne that hee can never bee drowned when this anchor is cast upward within the vaile whither Christ our forerunner is gone c Heb 6.19 drawing us after him §. 13. Of mans care of spirituall life Vse 2. Mans great charge The second use of the excellency of mans spirituall life is to instructus that man hath the greatest adventure and charge to save or lose of any creature in the world for as he hath both a soule and a body so hath he both a naturall and a spirituall life to save or lose and upon the miscarying of the spirituall depends the misery of the naturall Therefore it is that man is subject to most dangers of all earthly creatures and needs to be most vigilant and carefull of himselfe for by how much the more excellent he may be if he be saved so much the more miserable shall he be if he perish And therefore as of a ship lade with rich goods more care is to be had than of a ship lade with coales or chalke Comparison so more care is to be had of a man than of any other worldly creature in regard of the greatnesse of the aforesaid adventurer which may be fitly represented by the answer of a certaine Philosopher to a wretched fellow when they were both at sea in danger to be drowned together whereof the Philosopher was much more fearefull than the other who upbraided him for the same and demanded the reason thereof to whom the Philosopher replyed that the losse was farre the greater for him to miscarry than for many such fellowes as the other was who were nought worth Vse 3. The third use observable from hence is that if it come into competition whether wee should yeeld to lose our naturall life or our spirituall when both cannot be enjoyed to ether then wee are to preferre the preservation of our spirituall life before our naturall and for saving of this to do nothing to hurt or prejudice that remembring that our Saviour saith be that loveth his life shall lose it Terent S. naturall before naturall life and he that hateth his life in this world shall keepe it unto life eternall Iohn 12.25 for obtaining whereof many of Gods people little respected their naturall life as they who Heb. 11.35 did not accept deliverance from death that they might obtaine a better resurrection Paul said that his life was not deare to him but that he was ready to die for the name of Iesus Christ Act. 21.13 which was the ease of all the Martyrs such was their esteeme of and affection to spirituall life We that live saith Paul are delivered to death for Iesus sake that his life may bee manifest in us Which coademnes those that Esau-like set light by this spirituall life preterring the world their lusts their pleasures or naturall life before it because they neither know the worth nor comfort of it nor have part or hope of it which whosoever hath will choose rather a thousand times to die this temporall death than to lose his spirituall life CHAP. 6. Of lifes destruction and of murder in generall §. 1. How mans life may be lost HAving spoken of mans life which is the object of Self murder now it followes in the next place that we consider the act it selfe of taking away this life specially in unjust manner Life may be lost Of both the aforesaid kinds of life naturall and spirituall a man may bee deprived and that after two severall wayes 1. Passively First passively as he therein is immediately but a sufferer although mediatly or by originall merit he may be said to be efficient in procurement of his owne destruction but as he is meerely passive he cannot be deemed to be guilty thereof 2. Actively
Secondly actively as he is an agent in and about his owne death working to effect the same either meritoriously or efficiently and so he is a self-murderer and guilty of his owne death §. 2. Of the meanes of losing life naturall Meanes of losse of life are 1. Internall Mans life is loseable by two sorts of meanes First internall arising from and within a mans selfe that kills him as the worme that breeds of and in the tree and destroyes it so in mans bodie doe distempers and diseases breed of and from it selfe whereby hee is in deaths hands and by degrees dies daily also in the soule of man sinne doth breed that kills his spirituall life and so he hath in himselfe the principles and meanes of the destruction both of his soule and body of his life both naturall and spirituall 2. Externall The second meanes is externall inflicted from without a man tending to that taking away of his life and the same is either casuall or voluntary 1. Casuall Casuall or accidentall is when besides the intension of the agent and proper nature and end of the action it falls out and comes to passe that thereby the life of man is hurt or taken away as when in felling of wood the axe flees off the helve and unawares to him that uses it kills a man a Deut. 19.5 herein the life of man is taken away not without concurrence of the providence of God who is pleased by suffering such an accident to lay a crosse upon the agent to whom it is a kinde of calamity or punishment to be a meanes against his will of the death of any man Also to this casuall destruction of mans life belongs the perishing of the soules of those that unjustly take offence at other mens estates and lives b 1 Cor. 1.23 for that which they lawfully and necessarily doe or suffer in their callings and Christian condition whereby such persons flee off from the truth and fall into or persist in evill and damnable course to their eternall perdition without any fault of theirs by whose occasion they of their own wretchednesse stumble and miscarry and so goe guilty of their owne spirituall death by abusing of that which is good to their hurt and damnation so falling and ruinating themselves by other mens rising and standing 2. Voluntary Or else the externall meanes of taking away a mans life doe of themselves in their proper nature and direct use and in the intension of the agent tend to the effecting thereof which about our life that is naturall is done either justly upon lawfull causes in just manner Justly by those those that are sufficiently authorized to doe the same or else it is done unjustly when the same is without just cause Unjustly not by the hands of persons lawfully authorized to doe it or is not performed in a just and warrantable manner §. 3. Of the meanes of the destruction of spirituall life 2. Of the soule Also touching our spirituall life the same is externally or by meanes without a mans selfe destroyed eyther by the justice of God 1. By God when he most righteously in his act of vindicative and distributive justice punishes man with eternall destruction for his sinnes Mat. 10.28 in which case man in respect of his owne merits and deservings is guilty of his owne perishing and not God 2. By men two waies Or else our spirituall life may miscarry by meanes of men 1. who First by their corrupt doctrine and evill examples doe draw others with them to perdition as did the Scribes and Pharisees that did compasse sea and land to make one Proselyte whom when they had wonne they made him twosold more the child of hell than themselves Mat. 23.15 or by depriving them of the meanes of their salvation they are subjected to destruction 2. Secondly when men by compulsory meanes of unjust lawes and severe threatnings and punishments are driven and forced from the waies of righteousnesse into sinnefull courses as by Ieroboam Manasses c. soules are destroied with a twofold guilt both of them that force others and also of them that yeeld themselves to evill upon such constraint Life is taken avvay 1 By others 2. By a mans selfe Againe the externall meanes of depriving a man of his life is inflicted either by others sometime lawfully sometimes unlawfull or else by a mans owne hands and procurement which is ever in all cases unlawfull for him to doe mediately or immediately directly or indirectly But it is to be noted that no man loseth his spirituall life but by his owne meanes and merits procuring the same for the spirituall life of man is subject to no mans power who can kill onely the body and doe no more Mat. 10.28 And God that is esseatially and absolutely just subjects not man to suffer that which actively he hath not first some way procured by his owne doings and deservings Observ How subject man is to death From hence it is observable that the lives of no creatures are longer and with more adoe hatchedup and maintained than the lives of men and yet the lives of no creatures are subject to so many dangers inward and outward of destruction and sooner overthrowne than mans we being like brittle glasses that containe precious balsame and as choise flowers hardly cherished up and soone blasted which shewes both our weakenesse and want of self-sufficiency to uphold our selves and also how we are possessed and compassed about with things adverse and dangerous to our lives both of soule and body of all creatures man onely being a stranger and pilgrim on earth hath therefore the least kinde entertainment in this world and the most uncertaine possession of it and is alwaies neerest to be thrust out of it walking here but as a shadow Vse 1 Therefore wee should be more carefull to cleave the more closely to our God who is the preserver of men that by him we may be upheld and protected against all dangers 2. And againe we should be the more watchfull against carnall security that wee doe not presume upon our uncertaine lives nor suffer our selves to be intangled with this world and the things of it but that we be ever heavenly minded and ready for our departure hence labouring to get and keepe that spirituall and eternall life §. 4. Of murder in self-killing Killing of a mans selfe is murder 1. In a mans taking away of his owne life two things are to be considered First that it is murder in regard of the nature of the act of it 2. Secondly that it is murder of ones selfe in respect of the object thereof and so self-murder is a compounded sinne of more degrees than one and that in such a kind as is the most hainous and most to be abhorred in humane society in regard that this destroyes the substantiall being of that which ought to bee of
all worldly things most deare to us whereas other sinnes spoile the wel-being of our selves or others which so long as life lasteth is recoverable Self-murder is horrible And therefore whatsoever is to be thought of the vile quality and of the damnable deserts of murder in generall is to be conceived to be due and much worse to self-murder in speciall For murder is but the genericall or generall matter and not the speciall and formall nature of Self-murder and therefore if it be horrible to murder another man it is much more odious to kill ones selfe For by naturall reason the more that any Genus or generall matter is restrained and actuated by its superadded formes and specificall differences the more it is intended active and powerfull according to the motion of nature ab imperfectioribus ad perfectiora proceeding toward that perfection wherein it intends to termine and end Now the perfection of a vice if I may so speake consists in the highest exorbitancie of it beyond which none can passe and in murder it is certaine that none can goe beyond self-murder as afterward will fully appeare 4. Things are observable in murder In taking away specially a mans naturall life unjustly and murderously foure things are to be considered 1. That death is undeserved First that the effect done or death of a man in depriving him of his life is without due desert on his part at their hands that put him to death 2. Done without lavvfull authority Secondly that the act it selfe whereby that effect is accomplished is unlawfull on his part that doth it in regard of his want of authority and just calling to do that act and if the sufferer have deserved death and the executioner have a lawfull calling to kill him yet if his manner of doing of it bee contrary to the prescript and rules of his calling and to the minde and disposition requisite for such an agent in that act then the same is murder 3. Done wittingly Thirdly it is considerable in murder that the agent therein both knowes not onely that the nature of his action that he doth tendeth to death but also that morally it is an unlawfull act or thing to be done and also doth voluntarily and wittingly intend the doing of that action without regard of the effect or insuing of death thereupon 4. Death intended Fourthly touching murder it is remarkeable that the agent doe not onely voluntarily and wittingly a lethiferous or mortall act but that he doe also intend and desire to effect the death of a man thereby whom justly he cannot kill otherwise if a man should ignorantly or unwillingly in doing of his lawfull calling be a meanes accidentally to take away the life of a man he is not therefore guilty of murder For for such God provided Cities of refuge for their preservation against the avenger of blood Deut. 19.3 4 5. Iosbua 20.3 by the first of these wee see that an innocent suffers death by the second wee see that the Agent or executioner is such an one as ought not to kill him although he were nocent by the third and fourth it appeare that the act is formaliter murderous in regard of the knowledge and intention of the doer thereof Self-murder is most vile murder in transcendent manner So in Self-murder as it is murder an Innocent never deserving of himselfe that himselfe should kill himselfe is slaine the Actor whereof hath no authority nor calling over himselfe so to doe seeing no man can be both superiour and also inferiour to himselfe and for a man to doe an act upon himselfe which he knowes to be both mortall and unlawfull and yet will doe it with purpose and intent to bereave himselfe of his own life it cannot be denyed to be murder in the highest degree and he a murderer that doth it §. 5. How murder is vile The vilenesse of murder in its effects The vilenesse of murder is not onely seene by its contrariety to Gods Law and the heavie censures and punishments thereof and its incompatibility with humane society but also by the effects thereof upon the sufferer 1. It destroves naturall life For first the act of murder utterly so destroyes the naturall life of man upon the departure of his soule from the body that the same is never againe recovered For naturall life depends not onely upon the presence of the soule informing the body but even upon our state of being in this world insomuch that after the resurrection although soule and body shall be againe united yet as then our bodies shall be spirituall bodies a 1 Cor. 15 44. so shall our lives be So then a murderer takes that life away which he can never give nor restore and destroyes that which he can never build up 2. It destroyes mans persen Secondly the act of murder destroyes the person of man which depends upon mans life For neither is the soule alone nor the body alone the person of man but the whole man consisting of soule and body with their properties hypostatically united So that when the soule is in heaven he cannot say but Synechdochically that the person is in heaven Nor when the body is in the grave can we properly say that the person is in the grave For then either a man must be two persons one in heaven and another in the grave which is absurd or else one created person should be in diverse places at once which is impossible Observe vvhere the person is after death If you say where then is the person after death I answer it is not in actuall being but potentiall in its constitutive principles of soule and body that are to be joyned together at the day of judgment And therefore it is that the soules separate from the bodies thinke not nor worke in that manner as they did organically in the body whereupon the Psalmist saies of Princes that when they die their thoughts perish b Psal 146.4 and therefore neither remember they in that estate things past nor are capable of present under those species and notions as they did here in the body So then he that murders a man destroies a person although his distinct natures doe remaine Thirdly a murderer is injurious to God not onely in breaking his Law but also in destroying his Image which is not properly in the body or in the soule apart but in the whole person of man consisting of both soule and body with their properties personally united man was created in Gods Image now the soule alone or body alone is not the man but both united as is said so it is apparent that wrong is done to heaven and earth by a murderer §. 6. Of the originall of murder Murder whenee 1. From our selves We are to consider whence it comes that man doth monstrously First fall upon his owne kinde to destroy it and then upon himselfe Of murder in
comfort that upon our perseverance we shall have happinesse and life eternall So that we need not pleade uncertainty and ignorance of whether we are going to heaven or hell or whether in the state or course we live in we shall be saved or damned seeing that the Scripture makes it manifest what shall be the reward and event of every man according to the state and course he lives and dyes in that we need neither put off the knowledge nor the blame or cause of whether we shall be saved or damned upon our praedestination when wee doe determine the same in the accomplishment thereof by our owne courses CHAP. 9. Of bodily self-murder in speciall §. 1. How bodily self-murder is defined and differenced NOw we are to prosecute the second branch of self-murder which is called bodily self-murder and is thus defined Bodily self-murder is the killing of a mans owne body in destroying of his naturall life by himself his owne voluntary meanes or procurement This kind of self-murder is differenced from spirituall self-murder by two things First by the object that is killed in this the soule and spirituall life is destroyed in that the body or mans naturall life is undone Secondly they differ in the meanes and manner of killing of them the soule or spirituall life is slaine by spirituall and morall meanes the body by naturall or bodily self-willed waies §. 2. Of Mans body and its works Touching the body of man in this case we are to consider three things 1. Considerations First that it is an essentiall part and not onely an integrall part constituting the person of man without which he cannot be a man personally considered and therefore by killing of his body he destroyes his person that it ceases from being or subsisting in this world 2. Secondly the body of man is the organ or instrument whereby the soule works organically and therefore hee that kills his owne body destroyes all those works that the soule was to worke in it and which it cannot doe without it The soules morall workes in the body 1. The morall organicall works of mans soule in the body are of three sorts First such as immediatly intend and concerne the advancement of the glory of God in this life where the living and not the dead do praise him 2. Secondly such works as are serviceable for the morall and spirituall good of the person himselfe which is to bee attained and procured by life before we can come to enjoy it by death 3. Thirdly such works as promore the good of the Church and Common-wealth of both which every Christian is a member and can onely by his life and not after death benefit the same so that by killing himselfe a man wrongs God himselfe the Church and Common-wealth in bereaving them of that service and good which they all might have by his life 3. Consideration The third thing here considerable in mans body is that it with the soule makes the person and so in that respect is the subject or seate of Gods Image and therefore a man in killing of his owne body not only dishonours but also in a sort doth what in him lieth to kill God himselfe as he is similitudinarily in him and incurres the horrible crime of Laesae majestatis divinae or treason against the sacred Majesty of God Observ The body suffers by and for the soule So then the body which is the soules instrument or servant and is no way culpable or nocent but by partnership with and inserviceablenesse to the soule is ill rewarded and indignely suffers by its owne master abusing it to sinne and subjecting it to misery and punishment who is not content to weare it out but after his owne lust breakes and spoyles it whereof hee cannot turne one haire to be white or black hee spares his soule in its sinnes which he should mortifie and in a sinfull course kills his body which he should spare Naturall life is both a blessing of it selfe and also is a meanes of blessing God and others in this world and whereby wee may attaine to everlasting blessednesse hereafter Life is unsure of all which a man deprives himselfe by thus killing of himselfe which cannot be done but against the light and reluctancie of nature in all men whereby the actors declare themselves to bee unnaturall and barbarou monsters Naturall life that is a tenant at will in man is most uncertaine and soone thrust out at doores when it is not secure from him that owes it Man is unworthy of this life that is no more thankfull for it neither more values it nor makes better use of it but after his wastefull expence of it in sinfull courses desperately destroyes it God in his Word never appointed nor commended any meanes for a man to kill himselfe by because where God appoints not the end he appoints not the meanes to attaine it yet man wants not meanes to doe it by perverting his power and skill to that end and abusing other things contrary to the use for which God made them when he purposes to doe such an act so abusing both himselfe and all other things to his owne ruine The body is passive The body is but a passive subject in respect of the soule to whose power and will it is obnoxious and therefore it is the more subject to suffer and it is the more inexcusable sinne to misuse it seeing it neither deserves to be ill intreated at his hand that owes it nor yet hath it power to resist or defend it selfe against the invasions of him to whom it is committed to preserve it In this bodily self-murder not onely doth the soule turne enemy to the body but it moreover makes an unnaturall mutinie against and amongst the members raising by faction a partie for it selfe so causing the hand to stab the body and the parts to be instruments to undoe the whole and thus by intestine opposition a man subverts and pulls downe upon his owne head the tabernacle of his owne body as Samson did the house wherein he was whereby he crushes and undoeth himselfe ordinarily in body and soule §. 3. Of the degrees of self-murder and pronenesse of men to it The degrees of self-murder This self-murder of the body is either inchoate and begun only in purposes and courses tending to the effecting thereof in time if it be not seasonably prevented or else it is consummate in the full accomplishment thereof No man falls into the highest extremities of evill but by degrees the least whereof makes way for and drawes on the greatest Causes of pronenesse to self bodily murder The causes why men often are prone to the self-murdering of their bodies are two 1. First the meannesse of it in comparison of the soule for nature and durance it being but earthly and fraile whereby it must naturally die 2. Secondly in regard that by it the soule is
subjected to manifold sufferings here in this life and is hindered from that ease and advancement that freed out of the body it might have Answer to 1. But touching the first it should make us the more tender over it chary to use it and to consider that by self-murderously destroying our bodies wee do contaminate and defile our soules whereby wee make them far more vile than any carion can be seeing sinne is the onely excrement and morall defilement for which God detests and abhorres men as loathsome Ansvver to 2. For answer to the second it is to be observed that by self-murder of the body a man is so farre from bettering of himselfe that thereby he deprives himselfe of happinesse and subjects himselfe to that wofull misety which otherwise living he might escape and therefore our bodies and naturall lives are to be respected and cherished not onely for their worth but also for their use for which God hath given them to us So that we are not to force a divorce of those things that God hath coupled so neere together nor to thrust away or reject that which God requires us not then and that way to lay downe CHAP. 10. Of the kindes of bodily self-murder §. 1. Direct and indirect self-murder defined 1. Direct self-murder THe kindes of bodily self-murder are two Direct and Indirect Self-murder is not such a generall as in the Schooles is called Genus univocum so predicated of them both as equally communicating it self to both those species or specialls under it but is genus analogum ab uno or commune genus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for that the same doth properly and primarily belong to direct self-murder Direct bodily self-murder is the killing of a mans bodie or naturall life by himself or his owne meanes advisedly wittingly and willingly intending and effecting his owne death 2. Indirect self-murder Indirect self-murder of the body is when a man advisedly wittingly and willingly intends and doth that which he knowes may be of it self the meanes of the destruction of his naturall life Although he doth not purposely intend to kill himself thereby Or it is the killing of a mans owne body by unlawfull either morall or naturall meanes of his owne using without intending of his death thereby §. 2. Of the differences between direct and indirect self-murder 1. They differ in their ends The proper differences between direct and indirect self-murderers consists specially in three things First in the ends directly and immediately intended by the self-murderers of both kindes in their severall acts the end that is immediately intended in direct self-murder is death it self of their bodies that kill themselves although not for it self but in respect of some benefit conceited to be had thereby which is their ultimate end whereunto death is in the murderers intention subordinate as for a man to kill himself that he may be out of trouble The end that in indirect self-murder is immediately aimed at is the attainment of some good really or apparent in or by the meanes that an indirect self-murderer doth use without any respect or expectation of death thereupon ensuing as in surfeiting by drunkennesse or gluttony 2. In their meanes Secondly they differ in the meanes that are used by them for accomplishing those ends in direct self-murder the meanes abused to that effect and end are not proper of themselves nor by Gods appointment but are perverted by him that kills himself thereby as knives or the like for God never appointed meanes for any man lawfully to use for effecting that which he would never have men to doe a direct self-murderer uses not the meanes for any pleasure he hath in them but for the consequent effects that he intends by them In indirect self-murder the meanes and course used are such as doe properly kill in the end if that they bee persisted in as drunkennesse and the like although they have in them a shew of present good which gives the users of them a kinde of delight and contentment in them whereof they shall be disappointed when in the end they shall in stead thereof finde death which they least expected and most abhorred and would resist the same if it were inferred or offered to them by others 3. In the good aimed at Thirdly direct and indirect self-murder doe differ in the good that is aimed at by them and in the time wherein they looke to enjoy it A direct self-murderer doth fancy his good intended by him in his act of self-murder not to be in the meanes that he uses to kill himself but in or by death in his freedome from evill or enjoying of good the time of his reaping of which benefit he conceives to be after that he is dead and gone An indirect self-murderer conceits the good that hee aymes at by his course to bee and rest in the very meanes themselves that he uses therein expecting the present enjoyment thereof before and not after his death the cogitations and inflicting whereof hee abhorres although he doe prosecute with eager delight the courses that doe hasten and bring his death §. 3. How indirect self-murder is greater in some respects than direct Which of them is the greater sinne It is demanded whether direct or indirect self-murder be the greater sinne Answer In some respects Indirect self-murder I answer if we consider the freenesse of the will with lesse inforcement and with more delight prosecuting those deadly courses of indirect self-murder there can be in that respect lesse said to excuse it than for direct self-murder 1. For freenesse of willing An indirect self-murderer is at last in respect of the mortall meanes he uses and persists in untill the effect be accomplished as sure of death which he abhorres as a direct self-murderer is of the same that he desires and indeavours for and longs after 2. Obstinatenesse Againe an indirect self-murderer is more hardly diverted from his unlawfull dangerous course than at first a direct self-murderer Because this man may be sooner convinced of the vilenesse of his purposed fact in excuse whereof he hath so little to say and also the danger of it is more apparent and ghastfull to the mind that advisedly in cold blood considers of it The other is taken up with looking upon the present contentment in the meanes that he uses not considering death and danger thereupon attending and insuing but self-deceives himselfe with excuses and colourable pretenses and so doth wink as it were that he may not see the blow of death that he is giving himselfe with his owne hands Of direct self murder the cause or occasion is ordinarily from discontentment and sorrow but of Indirect self murder the cause commonly is pleasure and delight Delores serre sacilius est quam â—â—voluptatibus absunere Arist 3 Eth. c. 12. of these two motives pleasure is the strongest and their motion
way of omission if out of sullennesse griefe or nigardize or by undiscreet punishment of his body he shall stubbornly and foolishly refuse to eate or drinke in that measure or kinde that is requisite for his preservation by abstinency and sparing either starving himselfe to death or breeding in himselfe and contracting that which kills him somewhat like hereunto was the practise of Ahab 1 King 21.4 who because Naboth would not let him have his vineyard heavie and displeased layd him downe upon his bed and turned away his face and would eat no bread 1 Tim. 5.23 the contrary whereof Paul commanded Timothy A Caveat Yet to avoid this danger men may not Gormandize or excessively pamper themselves indulgendo Genio but may and ought at set times to fast both for civill and divine ends with respect to the good both of soule and body 2. Contempt of Physick Secondly in this kinde of omission a man may indirectly murder himselfe by wilfull contempt of the lawfull use of Physick or Chirurgery either to cure or prevent apparent mortall diseases or griefes or when he will not be ordered by the wholesome direction of the skilfull in their calling or doth not depend upon God for a blessing upon the meanes who by his over-ruling providence directs the course and blesses the meanes A Caveat Yet men must herein be carefull that they slavishly enthrall not themselves to the meanes nor anxiously perplexe themselves if they cannot have them or that the successe answers not their expectation because the Lord disposes things so as he also may effect his worke and will often by crossing ours Neglect of prevention of dangers Thirdly a man may incurre indirect self-murder by regardlesnesse of preserving himself against mortall dangers from without himself as in not seeking to God for reconciliation by humiliation and repentance in some imminent judgements that threaten from God our destruction that we may bee preserved either from them or in them Or as when wee are in danger of invasion by enemies for a man then regardlesly to shut his eyes from foreseeing the same that it may suddenly surprise him or that he should not prepare himself and do his utmost endeavours in his owne defence to save his life if by resisting it may be done or otherwise to provide for himselfe by flight or other prudent diversion or preventing of the evill that he may not carelesly suffer his life to be lost So then the cowardise of men in extremities by Sea or land that will not doe their utmost endeavours for their owne preservation as likewise the griplenesse of those that to spare their goods indanger the losse of their lives for want of military furniture and meanes to make opposition are much to be blamed for this course of indirect self-murder A caveat But yet touching this point men should be wary that they neither be so carefull to preserve their lives that they should spare to venture them where they ought and may comfortably spend and lay them downe nor yet have their eyes and confidence so upon earthly meanes of humane strength and provision that they should forget or neglect to seeke to God and to depend upon him for safety and victorious successe 4. Not avoiding dangerous persons places Fourthly of indirect self-murder a man may be guilty by not avoiding and fleeing from persons and places destinated to destruction which are under a curse or in a course of mortall judgements when we are not necessarily tyed by duty or calling to commerce and bee with them as is apparent by Lots forsaking of Sodome and by the command of Moses to the Israelites Gen. 19. Numb 17.26 to depart from the tents of Corah Dathan and Abiram and by that divine commandement charging all the godly to come out of Babylon that they might not be partakers of her sins and that they might not receive of her plagues Rev. 18.4 And therefore such as out of unwarrantable presumption or carnall security avoid not persons and places infected with the pestilence or subjected to perdition when their presence is unnecessary not to be justified and pernicious to themselves they must be cast upon the inditement of indirect self-murder if by the aforesaid meanes they doe miscary §. 4. Of indirect self-murder by omission morally wrought 2. Morally By way of deficiency or omission of indirect self-murder a man may be guilty by a morall meritorious default two wayes 1. By neglect of good life First by his wilfull neglect or contempt to live and walke in the wayes of godlinesse and obedience to gods affirmative commandements whereunto the promises of life and protection are annexed a Gal. 3.12 and which we may certainly expect so long as we keepe our selves within compasse of morall obedience to the Law and Gospell and within the limits and precincts of our speciall callings so that if therein or therefore we should lose our lives we shall be free of the imputation of self-murder any way in that respect 2. Neglect of prayer c. Secondly in meritorious morall manner a man may miscary and be indirectly guilty of his own death by wilfull omission and neglect of commending himselfe in constant and ordinary prayer to God for divine preservation and safety of his life against all evills and dangers which may hurt him and over which and over him God hath a soveraigne power and command Unbeliefe And also by his unbeliefe and not trusting in God in all estates for preservation under whose wings he may securely rest a man may be justly deserted and given over to perish and sinke as Peter when he doubted was in danger of drowning b Mat. 14.30 31 Whence it proceeds This neglect of thus depending upon God ariseth either from self-confidence in mans owne power and meanes whereupon he rests as secure or else from Atheisticall conceits of the providence of God as if he were regardlesse of humane affaires and that all things did fall out by chance and fortune because they doe see all things in this world fall out alike to all men which being more exactly considered manifests rather the free and soveraigne powerfull providence of God over-ruling all things A caveat Yet this divine preservation by faith and prayer to God excludes not but includes the conscionable use of lawfull meanes and walking in appointed courses without which we can expect safety no more than Paul and his company could if they did let the mariners forsake the Ship a Acts 27.31 if a man by the aforesaid neglect of prayer and dependance upon God doe not perish it is Gods speciall worke reserving him either for repentance and amendment of his life or for some worse end and heavier judgement Observe Neglect of meanes is tempting of God From this degree of indirect self-murder by omission of meanes wee may observe that when God gives meanes of life if
we use them not to that end we tempt God to follow our owne wills while we will not follow his and if we use the meanes with trusting in them then we make gods of the meanes and therefore in that respect it is just with God to disappoint us of our expectation and to condemne us of indirect self-murder upon our miscarying in not using the meanes For all meanes as they are meanes have relation to the end why and whereunto they are appointed and so in their use to that end consists their perfection without which they were uselesse and needlesse and therefore by the omission of the use of the meanes of life which men would enjoy they either tempt God to doe things otherwise than he hath ordained or else they doe shew themselves regardlesse of God preferring their owne wills above his expecting to have their owne purposes without him whereby many men deceive themselves §. 5. A question resolved about standers mute at tryall About mutes refusing to undergoe the ordinary legall triall for their lives To this branch of indirect self-murder by omission belongs the case about mutes who are persons standing legally indited and arraigned for some capitall crimes that doe wilfully and obstinately decline and refuse either to confesse themselves guilty of the same or to submit themselves to be tryed by God and the Country notwithstanding that they certainly know that for their stubborne mutenesse they shall in fearefull manner bee pressed to death in which respect they are indirect self-murderers although that they are thereunto moved especially by foure seeming reasons Their reasons 1. First because that by that way they would save their estates if they have any from being confiscate to the King that their heires may enjoy the same 2. Secondly that so they may escape the death that is most ignominious in their eyes and infamous in the world to their memories friends and posterities whereunto they foresee they should be subject if so be they should undergoe an ordinary tryall 3. Thirdly that it may not be said that they suffered and dyed for so odious and shamefull crimes and facts as they are accused of and indited for 4. Fourthly that they may not be cast condemned or suffer by the meanes wills and hands of such prosecutors witnesses Iury or Indges as they take to be their capitall enemies they choose to die by that course of their owne election wherein their adversaries can least as they thinke have their will of them They should die and why But whatever be their reasons of standing mute in that case it is most just that therefore they should bee put to death in most terrible and ignominious manner for two reasons 1. First because of the intollerable wrong that thereby they doe to authority and justice tending to the overthrow of the same by refusing to subject their lives to the triall and judgement thereof and by their deaths as it may be truly interpreted depriving their highest Soveraignes on earth both of the commendation of Iust and also of opportunity of shewing mercy and giving pardon to delinquents and so not submitting to the judicature they actually declare themselves to be rebellious outlawes for which they are justly to die 2. Secondly be cause such persons by declining so just a way of trial by God and their Peeres doe in iust construction declare themselves to bee guilty of the facts and crimes whereof they are indited and for which they ought to die but seeke to crosse the law in the proper kindes of punishment due for the same And that they are guilty of their owne deaths by a grosse course of indirect self-murder is evident by foure reasons Mutes are self-murderers Reasons 1. First because such an one wilfully and obstinately reiects that lawfull and ordinary course of triall whereby it is possible that he might escape with his life either by not being found guilty or else by replevin or pardon from the execution and chooses that illegall course of standing mute whereby and for which hee certainly knowes he shall die and as certaine it is that so dying he is an indirect self-murderer in regard that he casts away his life wilfully by that course which was in his owne power most lawfully to have avoyded 2. Secondly by choise of that course of standing mute when he is called to a lawfull tryall he dies not only for that contumacy against authority and law but also thereby he unnaturally witnesses and gives verdict against himselfe to be guilty of the originall fact or crime for which he is indited and ought to die if it can bee proved and found against him which thing hee by his mutenesse doing in that respect hee justly perishes by his owne meanes and is indirectly a self murderer for no innocent would decline so just and lawfull a tryall by God and his Peeres when he knowes that by so refusing hee shall surely die 3. Thirdly it is apparent that such a body is indirectly a self-murderer because of the morall nature of their course of standing mute which is most wicked and unlawfull both by Gods law and mans For by the law of God and nature every man is bound to plead and doe the best he can by all lawfull meanes to prolong or preserve his life but standers mute in case of triall upon their lives doe not so but utterly neglect the use of lawfull meanes to prolong or save their lives and therefore are of this kinde of self-murderers By mans law for a person arraigned to stand mute is most unlawfull because it crosses the execution of Justice and is justly punished by a most terrible kinde of death by pressing Man hath not an allowed choise given him by law either to submit to triall or to be mute as he shall please for if the choise were lawfull why then should hee bee punished for doing that which hee may lawfully choose which could not be done by the magistrate without great injustice 4. Fourthly that such mutes are indirect self-murderers is evident by the voluntary disposition of their wills in the free choise of that mortall course and by the proper nature of their death and by the meritorious cause and reason of it all proceeding from themselves in active manner Whereas touching their deaths and course of inflicting thereof they should passively and obediently submit to God and lawfull authority to live or die as they please where no lawfull choise is given in mortall courses there no man can choose that which is unlawfull without being an indirect self-murderer as it is in this case Answer to their motives The motives whereupon any persons doe stand mute refusing to be tryed in an ordinary lawfull manner are altogether insufficient to justifie their practise For answer to the first it is certaine that we should do nothing that is unlawfull to save our worldly estates for our heires but this course is
measure and manner falling into extreames either of defect or of excesse or of unseasonablenesse which is done two wayes 1. As meate drinke c. First in things both respecting the body and in the acts about them as in eating to gluttony and drinking to drunkennesse using labour and recreations to surfeiting and also in things respecting the minde as in the overstraining and surcharging of the thoughts fancy and understanding 2. Distemperature of the minde in the immoderate distemperature of the affections and passions of the minde suffocating or wasting the spirits by excesse of choller griefe fretfulnesse and the like which being let loose and extended beyond the bankes of their due moderation doe often prove mortall and meanes of indirect self-murder when they are willingly and indulgently entertained and given way to It is a hard thing for a man to use meanes and not to abuse them which causes many a mans table to become a snare to him and a trap a Psal 69.22 and shortens his time upon earth 2. Self-mutilation Secondly indirectly a man may be guilty of self-murder by needlesse mutilating of himselfe and cutting off any of his members as Origen did to the hurt and danger of his life which by the preservation of such a member might have beene in more safety for lifes perfection is in the perfection of the whole body Notwithstanding for the safety of the whole a man may lawfully and necessarily cut off a member which cannot be preserved without manifest danger of thereby losing his life but neither to punish a sin past nor to prevent a sin to come may a man destroy or cut off any of his members whereby he may be lesse able to doe the offices and duties for which God hath given him the same seeing that both for chastisement and prevention of sin God hath appointed other morall meanes which wee are to use and therein to depend upon God for the successe for not in mans forced disability to act sin but in the renovation of the heart consists true sanctification Note that of pulling out the right eye and of cutting off the right hand Mat. 5.29 30. is meant of morall mortification whereby those members are made uselesse and as if they were not to any unlawfull use §. 8. Of Indirect self-murder of commission by unwarrantable practise of Physick c. 3. Unwarrantable practise of Physick Thirdly a man may be guilty of indirect self-murder by practising of Physick or Chirurgery unskilfully immoderately or dangerously upon himselfe either above his strength or knowledge killing himselfe by his unwarrantable endeavours to cure himselfe or else by leaving those that they know to be skilfull carefull and have lawfull calling to practise to put themselves into their hands whom they neither know to have skill nor calling to undertake such cures or are such as be desperate attempters with small regard of mens lives in their practise if a man know the same and doth wilfully choose and commit himselfe specially in difficult cases into the hands of such he can look for no good successe and must be self-guilty of the mortall effects thereupon following but of this see more in the abuses of taking of Physick Chap. 4. § 6. §. 9. Of indirect self-murder by unthriftinesse c. 4. Vnthriftinesse Fourthly this indirect self-murder is committed by wilfull unthriftinesse and prodigality whereby a man provides not but mispends the meanes of his livelihood and so subjects himselfe and his to the perill of famine Deut. 2.19 Prov. 27.27 contrary to the light of nature and Scripture A Caveat Yet we are herein to be wary that for prevention of want of livelihood we fall not into covetousnesse and carking cares or that we follow the world with neglect of better things or that we should spare more than is fitting and shut up the bowells of compassion with the overthrow of liberality and workes of charity and piety §. 10. Of indirect self-murder of commission wrought by desperate hazard in 6. Cases 5. Desperate hazzard Fifthly indirect self-murder is committed by those that cast themselves into desperate hazard of losse of their lives by undiscreetly and rashly venturing into deadly dangers without lawfull calling and above their strength to escape where there is no necessity for greater good of others or gods glory requiring the same which falls out specially in sixe cases The first Case of Braves and Gallants Case 1. Concerning Braves First when any doe out of a bravery and gallantry of spirit goe needlesly with a charge of money or of mens persons or errands either in the night through a place haunted and beset with murderous robbers or at any time through knowne ambushments and strong troupes of enemies above the passengers strength to resist or escape whereby if they fall they are guilty of this indirect self-murder Concerning purchase and rescue Case 2. Secondly when any doe out of over-great affection to worldly goods make desperate attempts with the apparent perill of their lives either to get goods either by violent taking them from others as theeves and spoilers doe or by labour in their callings abovē that which with their health they are able to endure or else by their desperate adventuring to save or recover their goods out of fire or water or from and out of the hands of their enemies with the casting away of their owne lives above all meanes and strength that in this case they have to save them in such undertakings beyond all warrantable calling Exception within neither of these two cases are we to restraine or bound the divine-heroicke enterprises of such as by supernaturall instinct or power doe undertake transcendent enterprises above the allowance of ordinary rules as David to kil Goliah a 1 Sam. 17.32 and Ionathan and his Armour-bearer to invade a whole Garrison of the Philistims b 1 Sam. 14.6 Such men must have both a calling by divine inward instinct motion and qualification and also a strong well grounded faith in assurance of Gods assistance as the Scripture tells us how such through faith subdued Kingdomes escaped the edge of the sword out of weakenesse were made strong waxed valiant in fight turned to flight the armies of the Aliens Heb 11.33 34. Concerning some souldiers Case 3. Thirdly when self-conceited wilfull foole-hardy men will fight against their enemies upon desperate disadvantages and imminent perill of death when they are neither forced to it by unavoidable necessity nor are warranted by command of such superiours as either have absolute power over them of life and death or can assure them or give them the victory c Numb 14.40 Vsque ad finem as God often did to the Israelites fighting by his command or approbation upon strange disadvantages yea when they cannot probably come off with the safety of their lives then that is a course of indirect self-murder Concerning Mariners
Case 4. The fourth Case is of those that trade by Sea who often runne into mortall and desperate adventures out of eagernesse to make their voyages either putting to Sea in such weather and seasons as is like to endanger all or putting for the Port upon desperate hazards of miscarying by stormes sands or rocks or running presumptuously into the danger of Pyrates or other mortall ingagement by Sea either through wilfull negligence or through self confidence of skill or power more than they have so tempting God Observe The true occasion of which miscariages of men by Sea is often given by Merchants upon the Land who praise and respect men for fortunate and valiant according to the successe careat successibus opto Quisquisab eventu facta probanda putat and the event of their courses without respect to the due rules of the managing the same which makes many a man come short home by adventuring to please their Merchants contrary to the rules of art and wisdome Note In this case I would advise men rather to looke to do what they may warrantably justifie and may therein have peace in their consciences although the successe answer not their desire than to endeavour contrary to wisdome and art to please their owners and Merchants by such courses of desperate and unwarrantable adventures as if they or their charge miscary therein will over-cloud them with just blame ignominie and will bereave them of that comfort in their consciences which should cheere and uphold them under their crosses a course of accidentall good successe and a course of direct ill successe are not so to be compared together that for the former a man should venture upon the latter with the guilt of self-murder to be imputed to him if therein he doe perish Concerning Duells Case 5. The fifth Case of desperate adventure is of those that undertake Duells or doe give or accept challenges of single combats upon their owne private motion for private revenge or for supposed maintenance of impeached honour who if they perish in the attempt or by meanes of the conslict are guilty of more than indirect self-murder because that course so unwarrantably and needlefly undertaken is commonly where the wronged may have better redresse with lesse adventure of life Duellers what they b. and those Duellers or single combattants doe by such challenges shew themselves to be lawlesse contemners of authority whose allowance they have not as they ought for such a triall by battle to make the same just but by usurpation they make themselves Kings in contempt and prejudice of lawfull authority in erecting a tribunall for Iustice of their owne making in their own case where themselves alone are Parties Iurie Witnesse Iudge and Sheriffe whereas it is the prerogative of Kings to make warre and peace and independently to execute justice under God It also argueth in them both great folly and impotency of minde so lightly to adventure or give away their lives a price so far exceeding the worth of the purchase that they contend for and which they may have decided farre better without any such desperate danger and also it proclaimes their pusillanimity and weaknesse in that they cannot beare crosses and injuries And finally it makes their cause apparently unjust when they passe by or neglect a peaceable triall by equall justice and reason and doe put it to be decided by bodily strength and chance of warre in a course more beseeming beasts than men It seemes that such men doe account themselves and their lives little worth and that they are weary of living who so rashly expose the same by thrasonicall provocations and darings to be taken away and destroyed in such a manner wherein having abandoned the command of reason they become beasts and becomming slaves to their vilest passions of fury madnesse cruelty and the like whereby they are overcome who would in that course overcome others Duellers degenerate into incarnate devills And while they thus contend to gain or maintaine reputation of Honour and Valour by this most dishonourable and base brutish course of impetuous self-revenge by Duells they justly lose that for which they contend and otherwise might have had Concerning desperate attempts upon daring and wagering Case 6. The sixt case of desperate hazzard and adventure whereby men may indirectly be self-murderers 1. About daring is in the point of provocation by others for proofe of their courage and valour challenging them to dare to attempt the effecting of some deadly enterprise beyond all warrantable calling or lawfull meanes safely and lawfully to accomplish the same as for a man needlesly to conflict with a Lyon to run over rocks to provoke or assault Adversaries too potent for him to resist or offend with safety of his life or upon such daring to doe some capitall act or mischiefe whereby he is most like to perish and not thereby without just imputation to himselfe of guiltinesse of his owne death in regard of the unlawfulnesse of that his course wherein hee cannot warrantably looke for any blessing or protection from God neither doe such unjustifiable daring-practises argue any true fortitude and valour but onely bewraie temerarious audaciousnesse which is in excesse contrary to fortitude because true valour is seene in couragiously undertaking and accomplishing dangerous performances upon advised reason by lawfull courses to just and necessary ends but rash audaciousnesse in daring to doe unwarrantable attempts is manifest by the unreasonablenesse and unnecessarinesse thereof undertaken upon unadvised passion and foole-hardy presumption with arrogancy in the manner of accomplishing and folly in the end of it A truly valorous man manifests his fortitude by his unconquerablenesse upon any provocation of darring to doe any thing that is not fit and warrantable for him to undertake upon good grounds and reason that if he bee crossed or perish in atchieving it hee may have honour and peace and no way be guilty of his owne death So that although daring audaciousnesse exceeds true fortitude in unwarrantably adventuring beyond it yet it comes short of valorous fortitude in the grounds and manner of enterprising and of consequent effects and honour of it A valorous man is his owne master in disposing of himselfe and his actions about dangerous enterprises according to his owne minde sound reason and advised resolution Whereas an audacious man is but as a servant to others by whose will and daring provocations he orders himself and his actions as they list at their pleasure and for their service that he must needs doe whatsoever desperate attempts they will dare him to doe even to the perill of the losse of his life without any lawfull reason and calling 2. Wagering To this case also belongs desperate undertakings with danger of life upon wagers as for a man either upon a naked contract for a certaine summe or upon assumpsit of ten for one or the like to be paid to him when he
shall have performed some desperate hazardous enterprise agreed upon for him in that consideration onely to undertake and attempt the same with the danger of the losse of his life as to walke under the water to crosse the Ocean in a Wherry in a few dayes to goe backward or blindfold a long journey in a dangerous way or some such unreasonable needlesse dangerous mad and idle vaine-glorious prancks with adventure and losse of life whereby such are indirectly self-murderers and those that lay such wagers with them are accessary to their death thereby hireing and provoking them to a mortall course of self-destruction For such a course is no warrantable way and calling of Gods appointment thereby to adventure or get goods and therefore no blessing can be therein nor thereby expected it is a needlesse tempting of God to commit themselves to such a mortall course which they may well avoyd and can looke for no protection in it nor comfort of the action wherein they perish being guilty of their owne death therein Such desperate enterprises upon wagering whereby a man may lose his life proceede either from covetousnesse to be rich or from necessity to live but by unlawfull meanes never destinated of God to that end neither of them can comfortably be expected nor endeavoured it seemes that such men either value their lives to be little worth or apprehend their present condition to be most miserable that they preferre the uncertaine attaining of a little lucre and worldly goods before them and had rather die than live as they are and therefore goe to seeke up death where they can find him to make an end of their dayes by this desperate and last shift that they doe use when otherwise they cannot live That man is neere driven that cannot subsist but by courses of selfe-ruine and he is very destitute of good parts and of vertuous actions that despaires of better fame and repute in the world than he can procure by such needlesse vaine undertakings and accomplishments which are but the pastime of fooles and the ludibrie and scorne of the wise and uncomfortable vanity and sinne of the performers §. 11. Of indirect self-murder committed by covenant and society with persons destinate to destruction 6 Branch of indirect self-murder by commission The sixt branch of indirect self-murder by commission is by wilfull contracting and keeping society with those that are under a curse and apparent danger of destruction whereby all such are most probably like to share with them that have neere communion with them which falls out specially in three cases Case 1. Of leagues First when a man unwarrantably enters a league or bond of neere amity and society with persons Princes or States worthy of and as it were marked out to destruction as Iehoram did contract and keepe with Ahaziah a 2 King 9.27 whereby hee involved and inwrapped himselfe into the same ruine with him Which barres not conclusions for commerce of trade and also for intercourse of correspondency with them at such a distance and degree whereby hurt from them may be avoyded and use made of them for warrantable advantage as the Scripture requires that wee should have peace with all men if it be possible b Heb. 12.14 Case 2. Concerning warre The second case of indirect self-murdring society is when a man takes up armes or puts himselfe into military service or joynes with others in warre offensive or defensive either to hinder or oppresse equity and truth or in opposition of Gods Church to prejudice or oppresse the Gospell and true religion by this latter fighting against and provoking God and by the former irritating mankind justly to destroy such as goe about to overthrow Gods Kingdome and humane justice on earth without which the world cannot subsist in which course of Combination or society whosoever perishes is guilty of indirect self-murder by death of his owne unwarrantable procurement Although warre bee lawfull yet it is a violent course of justice the decision whereof is hereby cast upon the omnipotent Lord God for him to determine the same as he pleases by victory or vanquishment And therefore none should dare voluntarily to engage himselfe in that course upon his life where hee knowes that just and powerfull Iudge to bee party for the truth against him lest he perish by this indirect self-murder whereas to bee safe therefrom wee should ever bee party on Gods side Crosse event of warre That the event falls out contrary so that the Abetters in a good cause do often fall and the propugners of an evill do prosper it comes to passe by Gods speciall wise providence for three causes Reasons 1. First to chastise some sinnes or to exercise some vertues in the vanquished 2. Secondly to make men more loath to fall to warre and blood-shed upon presumption of their strength and cause but rather with some losse to make peaceable composition 3. Thirdly that God may shew and exercise his absolute soveraignty over the world disposing humane things as he pleases in the demolishing and translating of Empyres and dominion by the ruines of one making way for the building of another that it may be apparent that by him Kings Raigne and that as many Principalities and Empires are raised and stand upon the foundation of invasion latrocinies rapines and blood so shall they answer for the same and bee shaken to peeces by a divine hand of Iustice as wee may see expressed by the dashing of the Image to peeces by that small stone out of the divine hand of God Daniel 2.33 Case 3. Presuming into infectious places and company The third case of indirect self-murdering society is when men do wilfully presume without necessity or warrantable calling into deadly infectious places and companies wherein or by which meanes if they miscarry or perish they are guilty of their owne death in a higher degree of indirect self-murder as also are those that doe without a warrantable calling put themselves into such places or imployments as doe procure or hasten their deaths §. 12. Of indirect self-murder by doing that which naturally procures that which kills the doer 7. Branch Seventhly if a man doe willingly and wittingly any such unlawfull act as proves the cause or occasion of that which by Gods providence in just judgement kills him or takes away his life he indirectly murders himselfe as a drunken man that falls into a ditch or a pit and is drowned breakes his neck off his horse dies by surfeits or the like he is in this degree guilty of his owne death for the cause of the cause is the cause of the effect Causa causae est causa causati such a mans precedent unlawfull course or disposition is so farre from excusing the consequent effect that in a sort it doubles his sin a man that kills another when he is drunk is not excused but hanged when he is sober §. 13.
points 1. Vncertaine death for certaine good The second Case wherein we may wittingly and willingly without danger of self-murder adventure the losse of our lives is a present urgent and unavoidable necessity for a certaine greater more eligible good which falls out in three points First not only when with an uncertaine danger of our owne lives wee seeke to redeeme the certaine destruction of our neighbours as to cast our selves into the water being skilfull to swimme to save him from assured drowning who hath no other meanes of safety or to cast our selves into desperate dangers for rescue of our wives children or friends from out of the fire or out of the hands of our enemies as did Abraham for Lot a Gen. 14.14 and David for his wives b 1 Sam. 30. or to minister to the necessities of our sick houshold that they perish not in neglect wee ought to venture our lives with them in their infectious diseases But further also to save another from certainly perishing sometimes men may object themselves to certaine death Certaine death for Superiours as if the person be a publicke Magistrate or Prince or evidently of more use and worth in Church or Common-wealth than our selves we may exchange our selves to passe for him as the Scripture intimates with commendation that peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die Rom. 6.7 and the peoples esteeme of David was that he was worth ten thousand of them and therefore would not let him adventure himselfe where if halfe of them should die the enemies would not care for them 2 Sam. 18.3 this respect and preferment of eminency and vertue is not only from love of themselves but also from love of that publike body to which those persons by their lives may be beneficiall For a friend Also a man may for preservation of his deare friend put himselfe upon assured death as our Saviour implies by way of commending the same when he sayes Greater love hath no man than this Ambros lib. 3. officiarum c. 12. de duobus Pythagoraeis Virgil. me me adsum qui seei in me converene serrwn that a man lay downe his life for his friends Therefore this degree of love hee may have and was practised by divers as betweene Nisus and Euryalus Damon and Pythias Pylades and Orestes Object The thing that may seeme to withstand the lawfulnesse of this practice is that generall rule of loving our neighbours as our selves and not otherwise Answ But this is easily answered first by the right understanding of the rule as our selves which notes not the degree or measure of our love 1. It is required that our love be sincere for then must we love all men alike if the rule of the measure be one for quae conveniunt in uno tertio conveniunt inter se they that agree in any one third thing doe agree within themselves but that we are to love all men alike is absurd and against the practice of our Saviour Christ who loved Iohn above the rest of the Apostles then as our selves notes the sincerity of our love for as the Apostle tells us No man ever yet hated his owne flesh Ephes 5.29 So then here is commanded first that we should love our neighbours secondly that for the quality of this love it should be in truth and as we would that others should love us which doth not exclude such a superlative degree of love as may expresse it selfe by a mans dying for his friend as if it were an unlawfull excesse 2. To dye for a friend may bee self-love and lawfull Secondly this doubt may be resolved by the true interpretation of such a mans act because in that degree of love so expressed for his friend he loves himselfe both by the consummation and earthly perfection of the vertue of friendship in him which in some sort beatifies the subject wherein it is and also thereby he gaines to himselfe the honour to be counted more worthy of a friend than a friend was of him Amicus est after ego lovers are said to live rather in those that they doe love than in themselves so that without such friends their lives would be but a languishing dying With mee in this point accords Cardinall Folet upon a Idem ibid. Iohn 15.13 and David à Mauden in his tenth discourse upon the sixt Commandement is peremptory and sayes that * Id non facit ex amore vitae alterius sed ex amore virtutis amicitiae ad ahorum exemplum quod dum sacit se plus quaÌ„ amicum diligit Certum est licitum esse vitam suam certo periculo exponere pro servanda amicivita temporali ex motivo honestatis amicitiae quandoquidem honestas virtutis majus bonum sit quà m vita propria corporalis It is certaine that it is lawfull for a man to expose his life to certaine danger for to preserve the temporall life of his friend upon the motive of honesty and friendship seeing the honesty of vertue is a greater good than his owne corporall life From hence he sayes Licitum esse aiunt Doctores amico peste laboranti inservire cum aequi certo per culo mertis in communi naufragio takulam soâ—io cedere unde si duo amici simul naufragium secissent usque residua eset tal ula cu jus subsidio alteruter ex illis tantum po Yet salvari posset quidem alter eâ non uti ut sibi cam amicus assumeret cujus saluti consultum crpit in kee tamen eventu cavendum est ne quis per positivam aliquam actionem directè neci suae ecoperetur hoc enimilliciâ—â—n est Disetus 10. in praecept 6. numer 3.5 Ema Sa in vocabulo vita that the Doctors affirme that it is lawfull to doe service to a friend that is sick of the pestilence with equally certaine danger of death and in a common shipwrack to yeeld a board to a fellow companion as if two friends have suffered shipwrack together and that there were a board remaining to them by the help whereof only one of them could be saved the one of them may forbeare to make use of the same that his friend whose safety he desires may take it to himselfe Notwithstanding in this case heed must be taken that no man doe directly by any positive action cooperate to his owne death for that is unlawfull Emanuel Sa in his Aphorismes affirmes as much §. 18. Of the second point which is concerning certaine death for certaine more publike good The second point The second point concerning present urgent necessity wherein a man may adventure the losse of his life for a greater good without any danger of self-murder is when by the losse of one or of a few lives many more are preserved Certaine death for greater pub like good for bonum commune est praeferendum proprio
the publike good is to be preferred before our owne private which argueth the greater charity for extension of it abroad and as we are not made every one for himselfe onely but for the good one of another So should wee endeavour the same by life and death as the Apostle commands that we should not looke every man on his owne things but every man also on the things of others Phil. 2.4 In the publike good the good of every particular is comprehended and therefore the members severally considered are to expose themselves to suffer for the good and preservation of the Whole Thomas of Aquine sayes well that Charitas communia propriis anteponit a Tho 2.2 quaest 26. arlic 4. ad 3. Charity preferres the publike before the private In this also David a Mauden is cleare when he sayes in his aforenamed discourse Laudabiliter facit qui pro bono publico se periculo exponit Sicut enim in naturalibus pars una corporis rectè periculo exponitur pro servando toto corpore ita in politicis particulare Reipub. membrum pro servanda tota Republica That man doth commendably that exposes himselfe to danger for the publike good as even in naturall things one part of the body is rightly exposed to save the whole body so also in things politique a particular member of the common wealth is to be exposed for to save the whole And therefore the Prophet David upon this ground accompanied with a speciall instinct and motion of the Spirit for the generall good of his nation undertooke with the perill of his life a dangerous combate against the Gyant Goliah b 1 Sam. 17. Caiaphas did tell a truth when he said that it was better that one man should die for the people than that the whole Nation should perish c John 11.50 Eleazar is commended Qui se in mortem dedit ut populum suum liberaret Who gave himselfe that he might deliver his people sayes Mauden Examples of this practice are frequent among the Heathen and by them celebrated with greate praise As Codrus the Athenian King if I be not mistaken who thrust himselfe into death among his enemies that hee might procure victory to his people according to the Oracle Also of Curtius the Romane it is said that Se pro Republica praecipitavit in hiatum terrae for preservation of the common-wealth hee did throw himselfe into a gulfe of the earth But of this kinde many might be alleadged Vpon this ground it is that the keeping of a Passe the defending of a Town or Fort or the making of a Stand to check the pursuing enemy may be committed to a few against an unresistable multitude of enemies which charge and service those few are not to decline nor disert and quitt although they doe foresee that in that service they must all die upon the place when it is apparent that by the losse of the lives of those few after that brave manner the lives of many others are preserved with a more generall publike good of that body and State whereof they are members So Sampson-like doing more good by their thus dying than they ever did or could by otherwise living §. 19. Of certaine questions resolved Questions 1. About a man-flayer for whose sake his friends are pursued to death To this point belongs the decision of divers questions As first if a man have killed another and escaped for revenge whereof the kindred and friends of the slaine in their pursuit of the manslayer for justice doe fall upon his kindred and friends that favour or entertaine him whereby may follow the effusion of much innocent blood where there is not sufficient power and authority to order and protect men against such outrages then is such a manslayer bound in conscience to put himselfe betweene his friends and such harme and to offer himselfe a sacrifice to appease wrath and to prevent a more generall bloodshed mortality and deadly feud Whereby for his sake many of his dearest friends might perish It is better that one should die for preserving of many than that many should die for preserving one of no more worth and use than any one of the other which is apparent by Ioabs demand in his pursuit of Sheba at Abel of Bethmaachah requiring him to bee delivered up to him upon promise that he would depart from the City which was done accordingly a 2 Sam. 20.21 §. 20. About a man under deadly displeasure of Superiours Question 2. Secondly if a man be fallen so farre under the displeasure of his Prince or State although unjustly and undeservedly that they pursue him with that eagernesse to death that for his sake and life a storme of destruction is like to light upon and consume his dearest and nearest friends then ought he for their safety to put himselfe into the hands of implacable authority to bee thereby heaved as Ionas a Jonah 2.15 into the high grown sea of Superiours displeasure that the same may cease from the raging thereof Which practise and care seemes to have beene used by our Saviour Christ when he said if you seeke me let these go their way b Iohn 18.8 to make a party if hee were able to resist were to make an innocent man guilty of rebellion and the meanes of more generall ruine An objection If it be replied that self-love is against this course and that the preservation of justice is to be preferred above many mens lives and that such yeelding doth condemne the sufferer as guilty and encourages the persecutors in their injustice Answer 1. About love I answer that the love of the whole or more generall body or principaller parts thereof is to be preferred before the love of any particular or inferiour member of the body as is cleared by what is spoken already 2. About Justice To the second I reply that of justice in generall it is true that it is to be preferred before the bodies and lives of many men 1. In generall because neither trade humane society nor the world can consist without it and therefore it is that for maintenance therof Kingdome is justly armed against Kingdome to reduce and keepe those to justice that otherwise transgressing the same would confound all in tyrannie or anarchy 2. In particular But the case is not so in particular execution of justice about every individuall person when by seeking or preserving of Iustice in particulars wee open a way for greater injustice using a medicine worse than the disease But our Saviour Christ fully cleares this point in the fift of Mathew when he saies Yee have heard that it hath beene said an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth but I say unto you that yee resist not evill but whosoever shall smite thee on the right Cheeke turne to him the other also And if any man sue thee at the Law and take away thy
of Iustice cuts men off not onely for punishment of mischiefe done but also specially for prevention of evill to come The barre removed The barre that may hinder such a man from taking this course may bee the feare of immortall shame and disgrace that he thinks he should never be able to indure if hee should live and the Magistrate not put him to death after this publick accusation of himselfe But to that it is easily answered that the comfort and ease of the conscience would bee such upon that course and the opinion and respect of the godly and wise concerning him that all that feared shame and disgrace would vanish in the ayre and he be the better approved §. 24. A sixt question about burning or sinking of a Ship in sea fight A Sea case For conclusion of this point I will propound a sea case to wit whether it be lawfull for a Captaine or Master of a Ship being overcharched with enemies in a Sea fight rather to fire or sink his Ship with himselfe and his company to perish in her than to yeild and bee at the mercy of his enemies Touching a Sea fight Answer Touching Ships Royall When to susteine untill the ship be burnt or sunk without danger of self-murder I answer if the Ship do belong to the King and is in service for the State and committed to her Commanders with charge rather to burne or sink her than to yeeld then are they to follow their Commission in obedience to their Superiours alwaies being carefull that they neither directly burne nor sink the ship with themselves in her but as the same may be done by the invading enemies or accidentally by themselves in their owne defence as by blowing up the Ship with intention to destroy their enemies although they do see that they cannot doe the same without the death of themselves thereby as Sampson did When a man himselfe may burne or sink his owne ship without danger of self-murder A proviso Furthermore such a Commander may himselfe burne or sink such a Ship so committed to him when he is no longer able to keepe her out of his enemies hands for that he is to deprive the enemies of all the strength hee can provided that he and the remnant of his Company do forsake her and shift for their lives otherwise as they best can that they may not bee guilty of selfe-murder But if a Captaine or Master have Command of such a Ship without such peremptory charge then is he no further bound in conscience touching yeelding keeping sinking or burning of her in such a desperate case than such a Captaine or Master that Commands at or by his owne discretion according to the Lawes and Customes of the Sea the determination whereof is touched in the next Touching a Merchant man whē to sustaine untill she be burnt or sunk without danger of self-murder But if so be that the Ship be a merchant-man and is commanded by her Captaine or Master at his owne discretion according to the Lawes and Customes of the Sea if so be that he be so oppressed in fight with his enemies that he is not able to make longer resistance or to escape and shall certainely foreknow that if he his Ship and Company do fall into the hands of their enemies their adversaries will thereby be so encouraged and strengthned that the Nation or State to which such a ship did belong shall suffer much more harme and damage by the imployment of her her Company and goods against the same than if so be that such a Ship should have perished in the Sea with all her company and goods or if so be that such a Commander do foresee that his yeelding will bring him and his men to a captivity or death more tedious than what by resistance they can suffer then ought such a Commander to choose the best of the two evils of damage and rather die in resisting induring the Ship to be sunk or fired by his enemies or to doe it himselfe A proviso alwaies being carefull in such a case for preservation of their lives as long as they can by quitting her and shifting as they can in the Sea at the mercy of their enemies and of the waters when Gods providence unevitably casts them into their hands In such a desperate pinch to blow up the Ship whereby they foresee that themselves also must perish is no more unlawfull than Sampsons pulling downe the house upon his enemies and himselfe so long as their intention is not to kill themselves but their enemies in their owne just defence which in this case they cannot doe without killing themselves accidentally But if there bee not so great danger and losse like to ensue by their enemies taking such a Ship as by perishing in resisting then is such a Commander to yeeld that he may not bee guilty of indirect self-murder as hath beene said about fighting beyond our warrant or upon desperate disadvantages and that he may save himselfe and his Company for further service of God his Countrey and friends When to yeeld §. 25. Of adventuring about saving of soules The third point saving of soules The third point concerning the second case about present urgent necessity wherein a man may adventure the losse of his life for a greater good without any danger of self-murder is when the necessity and opportunity of saving mens soules requires the adventuring of the losse of a mans naturall life to doe it which may fall out in two Cases Case 1. Of adventuring to infectious persons First if a man be sick of some pestilent infectious mortall disease and labours not only under the feare and pangs of death But also lyes oppressed with the horror of a troubled conscience like to be swallowed up in utter despaire languishing and longing for meanes and comfort of salvation then may the Minister within whose charge such a one is or in his default some other either Minister or private Christian upon outward calling from the party or by Gods providence inviting him finding withall an inward motion and inclination of the spirit to take the opportunity to save a soule then I say may one of these adventure into such infectious places and to such infected persons out of love and zeale to save a soul in danger of perishing so they indanger no other lives than their owne by so adventuring 1. Grounds of adventuring The grounds of which adventure are first confidence of Gods protection in that warrantable pious imployment so farre as God sees good 2. Secondly comfort that if in that service a man doe die he had a lawfull calling and his adventure was for saving that which is better than many lives for which the deare Son of God did die upon the crosse A Caveat Yet men are herein to be observant that they tempt not God by their rash presumption or self-confidence needlesly or beyond
their due bounds thrusting themselves into such dangers but that they doe use as great caution and as good preservatives as they can with carnest prayer to God to give him successe and safety that if they doe die by meanes of such dangerous enterprises their conscience may not justly accuse them that they were wilfully negligent of their own lives and so thereby accessary to their owne deaths Case 2. Of adventuring among heathens to preach the Gospell Secondly in such times and places where the publike preaching of the truth necessary to salvation is wholly wanting or powerfully suppressed and grosse ignorance or damnable error and heresies prevailes as among the heathens and grosse Idolaters then and there is any Christian man that hath a warrantable calling and opportunity to teach others the truth and to warne them of errors although they cannot doe the same without danger of persecution and death this course we finde warranted not onely by the practise of the Apostles who ceased not to preach Christ both publikely and from house to house although they were otherwise charged and therefore threatned and persecuted to death a Acts 20.20 But even others more private Christians did so as Aquila and Priscilla and those that were scattered from Ierusalem b Acts 5.28 29. Acts 18.16 Acts 8.4 whose labours God greatly blessed to the advancement of the Church Of such examples Ecclesiasticall histories are full in times of the primitive persecutions as Theodoret reports hist lib. 1. cap. 23. of two yong men called Aedesius and Frumentius who while they were lay men did teach among the Indians a Quoniam in vero Dei cultu educatierant mercatores qui eò commeabant cohortati sunt ut in unum congregati divina ministeria obirent And of Christian Merchants Socrates affirmes that they did instruct some of the Indians in the principles of religion b Christiani illi quosdam ex Indis fidei principiis instituentes also Theodoret makes mention hist l. 1. c. 24. of a certaine captive Christian woman who did convert the nation of the Iberians to the Faith c Mulier quaedam capta in bello Iberes ad veritatem traduxit with whose report consents Sozomen lib. 2. cap. 6. speaking of the conversion of the Iberians he sayes that the fame was that that Nation did leave their ancient religion upon the perswasion of a captive woman d Fama est hanc Iberiam suasu mulicris Christianae captivae patriam avitam religionem deseruise And Socrates speaking of the King and Queene of Iberia converted by the woman hee sayes that both the King and Queene did preach Christ He to the men and Shee to the women c Vtrique Christū praedicant Rex viris Regina mulieribus Deut. 6.7 Colos 3.16 Extraordinary things and accidents are not bounded and regulated by ordinary rules and so much doth God himselfe require us to doe in many places that the soules of our brethren may not perish for lack of his saving truth which all are bound to maintaine §. 26. Of adventuring for salvation and religion The third generall case About religion The third generall case wherein men may expose their lives to death without any danger of indirect self-murder is in the cause of religion for maintenance of the truth for advancing of Gods glory and for the conversion and confirmation of others both in profession and practise although the same should cost us our lives as we see was done by Daniel and his three companions a Daniel 6.10 and 3.17 Whereunto wee are bound by that love that we owe both to God and our Neighbour According to which David à Mauden sayes well David à Maupraecept 6. discurs 10. that Ex charitate tenetur quis fidem profiteri cum periculo vitae quando honor Dei id exigit aut externa confessio necessaria est ad aliquorum conversionem ad fidem vel in eadem vacillantium confirmationem seu quando credit minus firmos in fide eam facilè vel bonorum temporalium amore vel vitae conservandae causae negaturos that is A man is bound by charity to professe his faith with danger of his life when the glory of God requires the same or when our outward confession is necessary for the conversion of some to the faith or to confirme those that waver in it or when a man beleeves that the weake in faith will easily out of love of temporall goods or to preserve their lives deny the faith This adventuring of our lives for religion consists of foure points or members §. 27. Of the first case or point which is about defence of religion Members of it 1. First in the defence of the truth and religion both by speaking and writing for it when the same is reproached impugned Defence of the truth and slandered with endeavouring to overthrow it although that such a course of patrociny were capitall to the undertakers for which we have a luculent warrant and example in the practise of Hester in the like case b Hest 4.14 16. and in the practise of Iustin Martyr against the Heathen upon no lesse danger yet herein it were to be wished that men would rather content themselves to prove and commend what they hold to bee the truth and fit for godly edifying than for to multiply unprofitable controversies and to alienate affections by bitter disgracefull imputations and railing confutations of the errors of others And also we are to defend the truth and religion by objecting our selves with perill of our lives to resist by force armes the unjust invasion of hostility endeavouring to roote out the professors of the same only for the truths sake when the enemies doe endeavour quite to extirpate the truth of God Note Although that force and armes in hostile invasion is not to bee used to propagate and spread the truth and to reforme errours and abuses in religion which is to be done by teaching and perswasions to draw and not to force the conscience about divine things Moderation of warre for religion Yet in just defence a man may oppose himselfe with force and armes against forraigne or usurping unjust invaders that violently would thrust him out of his possession of the truth because the course taken against him is most tyrannically unjust in usurping to domineere over mens consciences which are subject onely to God and if for spreading of religion and rooting out of errors it were lawfull to make hostile invasion then might the whole world be in a flaming fire of warre every nation and people one against another according as they differ in opinions and customes about religion seeing that every one thinkes his owne religion best and condemnes and dislikes all others And againe of all the goods a man hath true religion is the chiefe and doth most neerely concerne him to keepe it above his life and it is the choisest
and most necessary thing that he can provide preserve and commend to his posterity So that if there be any thing of worth in this world for which he ought to contend to death a Jud. 3. it must be the true religion that through his neglect or fearefulnesse he suffer it not violently by force of forraigne armes to be opprest and himselfe and his to be tyrannically thrust out of his just possession of it without which to be were better not to bee when therefore he shall bee forcibly inthralled and subjected to that which he is perswaded is erroneous and hereticall and the bane of his soule §. 28. About the publike confession or profession of the truth The second member about confession of the truth 1. The second member of the case wherein a man ought to expose his life to death in cause of religion is in point of confession of the Gospell and true religion with danger of our lives for the same which is to bee done both when wee are called to declare our faith and opinion about the truth so that then we are neither to dissemble nor deny it but are commanded to make profession of it 1 Pet. 3.15 as was practised by Iohn the Baptist Iohn 1.20 and so by all the blessed Martyrs 2. And also when we doe see that our concealement of our profession may prejudice the truth dishonour God strengthen and confirme the adversaries or may discourage and offend the weake Christians whereby they may droope or fall then no feare of death should cause a man to forbeare to declare himselfe in point of religion lest that of our Saviour Christ be verified upon him He that loveth his life sholl lose it a John 12.25 Whereas contrariwise He that hateth his life in this world or as it is in Matthew Ioseth it for Christs sake b Mat. 10.39 shall keep it unto life eternall By failing in this point many a man standers himselfe causing the people of God to thinke worse of him than he is indeed and deprives himselfe of much honour and comfort that he might have by exposing himselfe to all hazzards for Gods cause to whom that in the fifth of the Iudges concerning Ruben may be applyed that for the divisions of Reuben there were great thoughts of heart why abodest thou among the sheepfolds to heare the bleatings of the flocks c Judges 5.15 16.23.18 And againe that concerning Meroz Curse ye Meroz saith the Angel of the Lord curse yee bitterly the inhabitants thereof because they came not to the help of the Lord against the mighty Whereas contrariwise in the same cause it is said with commendation Zebulon and Napthalie were a people that jeoparded their lives unto death §. 29. Touching not omission of necessary duties commanded of God in any perill of life for the same The third member is about omission of duty The third member of the ease wherein a man ought to expose his life to death in cause of religion is when he is charged and bidden by any humane command or authority upon threatning paine of death to forbeare doing of that which God commands him to doe whether the same be personall duties of generall obedience to Gods lawes that are proper to all men or officiall respecting some conditions of men in their speciall places and relations as officers and the like if they have the same in charge immediately from God without dispensation 1. Personall then a man is not upon any humane prohibition to omit doing of such duties which he is bound by immediate authority from God to performe a Dan. 6.10 as honouring of our parents and all the other affirmatives of Gods morall Commandements which no man can release or dispense withall to discharge a man before God for his omission of them 2. Officiall Also for officiall duties which are so proper to mens particular places and relations wherein they are that without performance of those duties these relations and places would be marred a man is not to omit them upon any threatning and danger so long as he stands in such relation or place 1. Of divine institution because both the places and duties belonging to them are of divine and not humane ordination and dependance as the places and duties of parents children husbands wives masters servants magistrates subjects c. who are not upon any humane command or danger to omit their duties to those to whom they owe them upon divine bond which is so plaine that it is professed of the Pope that he cannot nor will not absolve subjects from their allegiance and obedience due to their Princes b Bellar. in dialogismo adversus Borclaium c. 31. but only from obedience to such as by heresie contumacy or the like are fallen from their places of Kingly authority which they had being unworthy of it and of the duties and respects due to the same 2. Of humane institution But it is to be observed that for those places and their duties which are wholly of humane ordination as offices of State or Common-wealth they are to bee executed or suspended by the superiour authority although our endeavours are not to concurre in it mainly and clearely to crosse the morall rules of equity and religion Also for callings that are fundamentally of divine ordination the manner of execution whereof depends upon the rules of Gods direction in his Word as is the Ministry of the Gospell so long as the persons that exercise that function have their calling thereunto by men who are the Church of God by the same power they may be discharged and put out of place or while they are in it be suspended from liberty of exercising their publike office and ministry for the same power that makes may unmake and the affirmative Commandements of God doe not binde ad semper to the doing of them alwayes Of obedience to suspension and deprivation specially when the intermission only or restraint of exercise of those duties is intended by the deprivers or suspenders so long as there is sufficient provision by others to perform the same without so great dānge to the Church as might arise to the same by the Ministers doing of the duties of his calling contrary to the said authority then such a deprivation or suspension Exception against suspension and deprivation of ministers by the Church of Rome although it were unjust is to be obeyed and for a man in that case to suffer for his disobedience to the same he can have no comfort nor just incouragement except such restraint were so generall that there were not men enough in places to discharge the duties of that function without which a true Church cannot subsist so as therein and by the doctrine thereof men may be saved then in that case of extreame necessity such a deprived or suspended Minister by the rule of charity which warrants lay-men to help to uphold
a Eccles 8.11 which takes away from them all remorse for their evill courses and all care of reformation to be better §. 34. Observations from indirect self-murder Vses The uses of the former doctrine about indirect self-murder are specially three 1. Men self-deceived First it serves for our instruction that we may see that many men are deceived in their self-pleasing courses whereby they promise to themselves much comfort and good but indeed reape death and destruction by their own meanes and procurements according to the Proverb There is a way which seemeth right unto a man but the end thereof are the waies of death b Prov. 14 12. as is apparent by the course of our first parents Adam and Eve destroying themselves and us in them by following their own wits and wills without obedience to their Maker Causes of self-deceit The true causes of this deceit and errour of man in this point are foure 1. Vnbeliefe First unbeliefe of Gods threatnings while men trust to lying vanities upon groundlesse presumptions and erroneous carnall principles and misinformations and misconstructions willing to bee perswaded and to beleeve that which stands best with their liking and sinfull condition so corrupting their understanding to give a false verdict against the truth of God to their owne destruction 2. Self-conceit Secondly men are self-beguiled by self-conceit of the goodnesse of their unsound estates and by being taken up with contentment in the present seeming good of their self-pleasing sinfull courses for that they did never throughly see and apprehend the miserable badnesse of their owne wretched estates nor did truly see and taste the excellency and sweetnesse of a better 3. Prosperity of the wicked Thirdly men are here self-deceived by resting upon the present visible dealing of God with many as bad or worse than themselves whom they see still to prosper in their ill courses Because judgement is not speedily executed therefore their hearts are set to doe evill being perswaded that it shall bee as well with them as others of their owne ranke that they see flourish and doe well enough as they thinke 4. Shifting the blame Fourthly men deceive themselves by shifting off the blame of their ill course from themselves to other concurring or accessary causes of their evill wayes as Adam did to Eve as if they were freed by the temptations or partnership of others with them in evill But the condemnation of accessaries doth condemne and not cleare the principals Predestination is blamelesse But they that to cleare or encourage themselves in their naughty courses shift off the blame thereof to Gods Predestination are impudently impious by both making God the author of sin and also by traducing his justice for unjustly punishing them that by their owne verdict are blamelesse But God Predestinates no man to an end without respect of meanes whose use is within the compasse of a mans power and wherein he himselfe is a voluntary agent so that predestination offers no force to any mans will and therefore a man living in a sinfull course of his owne choosing and liking cannot blame God or his Predestination seeing that God both gives him sufficient meanes and invitation to come out of that sinfull state Observe Men self-binded So men that runne into evill courses are by their own meanes darkened in their judgements and doe wilfully put out their owne eyes of their understandings that they may fearelesly goe on to their own ruine in their owne wayes of destruction Who is so blinde as he that will not see Deceived Many mens estates are found by themselves in the end to be farre worse and more desperate than they expected and this also many come not to see untill it is too late and past all hope of amendment or recovery which by carefulnesse and good heed taking in time might have been prevented Vse 2. Consideration of our courses The second use is for admonition that wee doe well consider our courses what they be and whither they tend that we may not dare to venture upon that which may make us accessary to our owne destruction It is dishonourable and uncomfortable for a man to suffer by his owne deservings or procurement And therefore we are to observe how the Apostle Peter advises us That none of us doe suffer as an evill doer 1 Pet 4 15. Repent and reforme If we be entred upon an unwarrantable course then are we to breake off and to make hast to returne by true repentance and to walk in the way that leades to life And therefore I conclude with the Prophet Cast away from you all your transgressions whereby ye have transgressed and make you a new heart and a new spirit for why will ye die ô house of Israel For I have no pleasure in the death of him that dyeth saith the Lord God wherefore turne your selves and live yee Ezek. 18.31 32. That we may doe so we must beware of self-conceitednesse and obstinacy in our owne self-will'd wayes and be carefull to listen to good counsell and advertisement and to consider the latter end and not the present contentment and faining flattery of evill courses Vse 3. Men sin against themselves The third use is an intimation to shew unto those that doe desperately or carelesly venture upon courses tending to their owne self-destruction that they are not only guilty of sinnes against God and their Neighbours immediately but even also against themselves in self-murder a crime of the vilest nature for which they shall be arraigned before God and suffer their owne wrongs being revenged upon themselves and their own unjust and unnaturall suffering at their owne hands being punished upon themselves by the hand of God Observe 1. Ill courses are most harmfull to the doers of them Where it is observable that man being both the wrong-doer and wrong-sufferer in the same act by himselfe doth justly suffer by the hand of God for wronging his creature and for breaking his Law in mans self-respect and usage of himselfe The consideration of which terrible end of such courses redounding to the destruction of the doers should affright men from them Observe 2. Where it is also remarkable that a man cannot wrong God or others but by ruinating himselfe therewithall and so all ill courses doe prove a punishment to the doers of them and therefore if there were any true love in such persons to themselves they would abandon all such courses as tend to the ruine and perdition of the entertainers or proceeders in the same CHAP. 12. Of direct bodily self-murder §. 1. What it is Now it followes that we treate of direct self-murder and first shew what it is Direct bodily self-murder is an advised witting and willing intention and effectuall endeavour of a man by his owne hands or meanes to take away or destroy his owne life whereby he doth indeed kill himselfe In which
effect the killing of a mans selfe by his owne hands or meanes whereby it is perfected and consummated with self-perdition in a wicked conspiracy of self-destruction by soul and body against themselves Observe Abuse of power and of obedience Wherein is to be observed and condemned both the wretched abuse of the authority and power of mans understanding and will directing and commanding the inferiour faculties and body to doe that which tends directly to destruction both of their parts and-whole and also we may see herein a patterne of unwarrantable obedience in the bodies yeelding to doe that which is unlawfull and ruinates it selfe the superiority of the understanding derstanding and will frees not the body from blame for then why should it suffer with the soule for that act But the sin is the greater by how much the further it extends to involve partizans or accessaries and makes many guilty of the same crime who are to be condemned not only for the fact done by them but also for violating the rights and duties of their places in unlawfully commanding and obeying in that which is evill contrary to an higher rule §. 2. Of the imaginary good conceited to bee in self-murder Object Excl cannot be an end It may be objected that for a man advisedly wittingly and willingly to propound to himselfe and to ayme at that for his end that is his destruction is against nature because the end is or ought ever to be the perfection of the thing that desires it and endeavours to have it and good only is desirable and to be sought after which may content us in the enjoying thereof and therefore the conclusion may seeme to be good that no man can advisedly wittingly and willingly purpose and endeavour to kill himselfe Answ Death is not the ultimate cad Whereunto may be answered although death bee the immediate end intended and sought in direct self-murder yet it is not the ultimate or last end neither is it sought for at any time for it selfe but accidentally and for another thing which is good for obtaining whereof a self-murderer would use that as a meanes Comparison As Physick is immediately desired and taken not for it selfe but for health thereby which is the patients ultimate end in taking of medicines therefore one sayes Mors ut malum non estoptabilis nec optatur per se sed gratiâ alteriê° Death as it is an evill thing is not desirable neither is it of it selfe desired but in respect of some other thing and so is desired per consequutionem non per se by consequution and not of it selfe for death is never desired by a naturall appetite as opposite to that appetite or desire that followes reason either right or depraved because nature is materiatum quid some materiated thing belonging to the person in respect both of matter and forme soule and body so long as they are united and therefore ever desired the good and preservation of the person in that union The imaginary good of self-murder The good ultimately intended and conceited to bee obtained by self-murder is twofold 1. Freedome from evill First freedome from greater evill felt or feared reall or but imaginary which in a self-murderers opinion is no other way avoidable and they despaire to be able to beare it measuring themselves by themselves so as if they cannot shake off the yoke then will they violently dissolve themselves Causes 1. Conceited badnesse of estate The true causes hereof are first the self-murderers conceit that his present or feared condition is worse than any other that can betide him or that he can shift into by death 2. Want of meanes Secondly his want of having or foreseeing meanes of prevention or deliverance from the evils that he despaires to be able to beare causes him to fall upon this wicked damnable course of ridding himselfe from them 3. Impatience Thirdly disobedient impatiency that will not let a man in all things submit to bee ordered by God and an evill heart of unbeliefe that hinders him from trusting and depending upon God for supportation and deliverance Note 1. By meanes of his reason man suffers Man by meanes of his understanding and reason is subject to many more miseries and troubles than any bruite beasts because he fancies many imaginary calamities to himselfe from possibilities in reason that doe as much sometimes affect and trouble the minde as if they were reall although they never be insticted And present troubles men doe aggravate in their esteeme and opinion for measure and extent beyond that which they are in truth and sense so making them needlesly the more importable 2. By meanes of memory And troubles future and past man by his imagination makes present by helpe of his memory and feare overcharging himself with the burden of more than ever God did lay upon him at once Spirituall afflictions And finally in his minde he is capable by meanes of reason of manifold spirituall afflictions farre exceeding those that are upon the body and where of no irrationall creature is capable Imagination And yet of all these troubles the greatest part is imaginary of mans owne needlesse and voluntary contracting by meanes of his abused reason and doe worke most reall and desperate effects even to self murder Although that self-murder be no fit or appropriated meanes to preserve or deliver a man from misery or troubles yet a self-murderer doth use it deeming according to the Philosophers that a lesser evill compared with a worse obtaines the place of good and is to be desired for good a Arist ad Nicom lib. 5. c. 6. Picol grad pol. Minus malum comparatu cum detertore obtinet lotie boni pro bono optabile est which is onely to be understood of the evill of punishment and not of the evill of sin for for to avoid all punishment we are to doe no sin which to doe were a greater punishment and would draw punishment more abundantly upon the doers of the same in evils of sinne there is no choise or lawfull election where all is forbidden 2. Advancement to good The second imaginary good conceited to be had by self-murder is the advancement of a mans selfe thereby to more good or to a better estate than he hath at present either to an estate really better as to absolute good in heavenly happinesse or to fancied or comparative good in comparison of greater evill in the self-murderers apprehension that he may be in an estate lesse miserable as he thinks than that is which he feeles or feares which in that respect he esteemes to be better than the present In these regards self-murderers are willing to exchange their lives by death but of evill properly there comes no good For men gather not grapes of thornes neither will any expect it that is not spiritually mad Oh miserable state of life that is more tedious to a
man than death A blessing may become a judgment Thus the greatest earthly blessing may become in mans sense and opinion a grievous judgement For God can make a man a terror to himself and to all his friends so that in that respect he may brooke the name of Magor Missabib as did Pashur Ier. 20.3 4. when a man leaves God or is left of him who is the blessed object and fountaine of all true contentment and solid comfort Observe The misery of the damned in hell Whereby wee may see in part the miserable state of the damned in hell whose living there is a second death farre exceeding the first in misery there is a death of dissolution and a death of torment the former brings the subject to an end the latter brings the subject of it to all miseries they that are in this latter shall wish for the former and shall not finde it whereby we may in some sort see two things 1. For measure First the measure of hells misery upon a man in it being even as if a man in his perfect strength and senses were struggling and in the very pinch and agonie of the last and fiercest act of death labouring under the unspeakeable horror and unsupportable and untolerable paine of it and in kinde and degree much more as a man in that death of hell shall bee made more capable and spiritually sensible of misery than he is here and whereas here a man can die but by one mortall paine there shall the damned be under all paines and mortall miseries in their extremities to the utmost measure and degree that those damned wretches are capable of with exact spirituall sense and feeling of the same besides their woe for want of that infinite happinesse in heaven whereof they are deprived 2. The durance of v. Secondly wee may see here the everlastingnesse and endlesse continuance of that death in hell which shall be as long as the damned shall have being which shall be ever that they may be capable of suffering to the utmost of their capacity so that their being gives neither ease nor comfort but they shall ever be in the same extremity of death for evermore without any relaxation or abatement which fills them with utter desperation and unexpressible woe Note For they have all that can make any creature miserable viz. in hell they have both life and death by their living there they are capable of and doe suffer the punishment of sensible misery and by that death they have punishment of damage in deprivation of all comfortable good and so whatsoever wee can be in the absence of good and in presence of evill they have the same §. 3. Concerning the wills object and faultinesse Object of the will is good That we may surther understand how a man can will his owne death wee are to observe that the will never chooses to doe a thing sub ratione mali as it is evill but wills a thing that is either in itselfe good or apparently such in our apprehension or else it chooses a thing that in itselfe is evill but is comparatively good in respect of another evill which in our judgement or sense is greater or worser and so no man chooses death for it selfe but in respect of some conceited good imagined to be had by it and not otherwise or to have a lesser evill for a greater by that exchange as Saul who that hee might escape the mocking of the heathen killed himself a 1 Sam. 31.4 so that no man is absolutely willing in the act of self-murder but conditionally because he uses it not for itself but as a meanes for a further end and good The kinds of good Will hath ever good for the object of it but of this good there is a double triplicity First bonum animi corporis fortune Good of the minde of the body and of wealth and preferment Secondly there is Bonum utile jucundum honestum Good profitable pleasant and honest Of these goods the will doth not ever respect bonum honestum or morale vertuous or morall good but often makes choise of profit or pleasure as the greater good before the other and still bonum or good is the object of the will Note From hence it is evident that the error of the will is not all nor ever from the mis-information of the judgement but that the will is in it selfe very fanlty in three respects Wils faultines 1. It obeyes not the sound understanding First in that it doth not ever listen unto nor obey the true and good directions of the understanding but rejects them or inclines against them according to that old saying Video meliora proboque Deteriora sequor I see and approve better things but follow the worser the bounds of the understanding and will are not of equall extent 2. It submns to the affections Secondly the fault of the will is that it submits it selfe to receive information and direction from the affections passions and senses following the same without reasons precedent triall and approbation whereby it inverts the course of nature rebells against its Soveraigne and subjects its selfe to her servants and labours so to enthrall the understanding to the same 3. Corrupted by innated pravity Thridly will is corrupted by innated pravity whereby it is more inclinable to erroneous directions than to true readier to move to vice than to vertue and by meanes of that pravity either inbred in it selfe or acquired by impressions from inferiour faculties and senses it labours to deceive and corrupt the minde and understanding that the same may determine and give direction according to wills owne disposition whereby it comes to passe that the will ever followes the last determination of the practicall understanding and yet is not therefore blamelesse For sinne is vitium suppositi the vice of the person and therefore is in all the parts and faculties of the same especially in the will which is the primus motor the first mover in all practicall actions which are sinfull but as they are voluntary The motions of mans will are very diverse and often contrary Will variable For although will in man is answerable to instinct in irrationall creatures and to naturall inclinations in insensibles yet it moves much more variously both as man is compounded of many more various things whereof every one conferres to his motion naturall and morall according to its nature and also as man and his will is passively affected and wrought upon by motives within and without and as his reason directs and perswades variously according to occasions whereupon it followes Note that man is the most uncertaine and unstable creature in the world most restlesse and tossed as the Sea with tempests and stormes in his will distracting him in his resolutions and performances una eurusque notusque ruunt creberque procellis Affricus as the East the
whereof he knowes not or when a man doth kill himselfe out of a rash precipitancy and sudden unpremeditate pang and fit of forcible passion or temptation tempestuously raised by others making violent impressions upon him suppressing reason and captivating the will to doe that which otherwise hee abhorres and for which in the Court of heaven he is not properly a direct self-murderer because such a fact before God is but a kinde of chance-medly when it proceeds not out of advised judgement and will but that the doer thereof is therein quoad principium motus for the originall of his motion in that act more passive than active Comparison as a Ship that may be overset in a storme and as persons possessed by uncleane spirits that by their meanes did cast themselves into the fire and water a Marke 9.22 wherein if they had perished they had not beene self-murderers when they were not in their owne power nor was it an act of their owne free judgement and will Case 3. Killing by mischance The third case is when a man kills himselfe by mischance or misadventure in his doing of an act of lawfull imployment without any intent to take away his owne life As a man in his attempt to save another out of the fire or water is by his act drowned or burnt to death himselfe or if a man be killed by the breaking of a peece of his owne shooting off at another marke or the like This is an act of God in his speciall providence taking away the life of a man Exod. 21.13 and is not an act of self-murder because the actors end and intention is not to kill himselfe but to doe a lawfull duty neither doth that act of his in regard of that mortall effect of it proceed from his judgement and will but to him is meerely casuall and contrary to his expectation and desire and so in that respect he is meerely passive and so formaliter and in truth not a self-murderer Case 4. Self-killing in discharge of ones calling The fourth exempt case is when a man in discharge of his calling doth wittingly and willingly such an act whereby hee knowes hee must die as did Samson of whom Augustine sayes that Spiritus latenter hoc jusserat the spirit did secretly command it in this case such an one is not a direct self-murderer because hee intends not primarily his owne death but the discharge of his necessary duty otherwise not feasable And this death is not from an act of his owne meere judgement and will but from Gods in obedience whereunto he layes downe his life Case 5. About phrenticks The fift exempt case is of phrentick persons of whom when it shall happen any to kill himselfe in his fit of phrensie he cannot justly be said to be a direct self-murderer nor yet an indirect self-murderer where his phrensie is not contracted by his own fault because of his defect of the use of his understanding in his act of self-killing whereof then he knowes not the morall nature neither properly can he be said to be a voluntary agent therein because then he hath not a will determined by any act of the practicall understanding but doth it only by a bruit passion or unreasonable internall impulsion equivalent to inforcement from negation or their faultlesse defect of power of sufficient opposition which is evident by that which they are habitually to the contrary manifested when they have any Lucide intervalls or when they were or are in their sound mindes alwayes abhorring such a fact Of this see more Cap. 15. § 22. and Cap. 18. § 2. CHAP. 13. Of direct self-murderers §. 1. Practise and habit gives denomination One act of self-murder gives denomination to those that do it and why A Self-murderer hath denomination from his fact of self-murder whereby it staines him with an ill and odious name although a man properly is not to be named from one single act but from an habituall disposition and continued practise yet here one act gives the name because it proceeds from that which is in a man by way of habit and is an act that in regard of the extinguishment of its subject can be done but once by one body but if they should live againe in the same state yet upon the same motives and disposition would againe and againe doe the same as we see by the practise of those that after restraint or disappointment of effecting their purpose therein doe not cease still to attempt the same untill it be done and therefore such a fact is equivalent to a constant practise if any body be impatient and ashamed of the imputation of the name of any notorious vice then should he be most carefull to avoide the thing in respect whereof the same is due unto him Observe He that hath the principall must have the appurtenances the name of any crime must goe with the thing to which it belongs the odious repute of the name shewes the vilenesse of the vice which is farre more to be abhorred than the nickname of or from it Comparison But men are commonly like witlesse children more affraid of shadowes than substance as children are gastered with mentioning of Goblins and bugheares so many men are startled with the disgracefull names of vice imputed unto them who are not at all affraid of the vices which they entertaine and for which the names of the same are due to them who doe deserve to brooke the name of the master whom they serve and of the trade which they practise Why should any man serve such a master or exercise such a trade whereof he is ashamed and would not brooke their names That some men doe murder themselves is apparent §. 2. How it is by Scripture apparent that many men doe murder themselves That many do murder and destroy themselves by their acting of that horrible unnaturall fact and sin upon their owne bodies is apparent three wayes 1. By the Scriptures First by the Scriptures of the old and new Testament in the old Testament we reade of Saul and of his armour-bearer that they killed themselves 1 Sam. 31. Of Abimelech that did the same by his owne command Iudges 9.54 Also of Ahitophel that he hanged himselfe 2 Sam. 17.23 Of Zimri that hee burnt himselfe to death 1 King 16.18 In the new Testament we reade of Iudas that though he were one of Christs disciples hanged himselfe Mat. 27.5 Which intimates That the Scripture witnesseth so much it intimates to us three things 1. The certainty of such facts First it evidences to us the certainty of such facts because the Scripture is infallibly true aswell in matter of history as of doctrine It records them not for imitation but for condemnation which is plaine if wee consider how ungratious the persons were that did it the manner of the Scriptures propounding and relating of the same with dislike of it and
their owne accord leape into the fire with divine and unutterable cheerefulnesse and Ambrose Ambros lib. 3. de virginibus and others doe note divers professors to have done the like as Pelagia Apollonia and many others Observe Which shewes to us that as all mankinde are sprung from the same roote and are infected with the same disease so are we all lyable to commit the same sins if the Lord doe not renew and keepe us All are sick of the same disease So that wee need not so much to think it strange a member of the visible Church kills himselfe as to admire the gratious goodnesse of God in keeping of us that very many doe not the same in regard both of our owne wicked naturall disposition and outward temptations whereby what betydes men may betyde all men in the same case Observe To depend upon God Here we are to observe that those examples of self-murder recorded within the Church are not registred for imitation but for caution that all Christians may be stirred up the more carefully to cleave to God and thank him for their preservation even from this horrible act of self-murder whereinto many professing Christianity have fallen §. 4. Self-murderers knowne by experience The third way of discovery of self-murderers Experience Thirdly that many do murder themselves it is cleare by wofull experience in all places and ages notwithstanding that they may be terrified frō the same both by the fearefull examples of manifold wreckes of that kinde and also by the doctrine of the truth condemning that vile practise besides manifold other restraints and ignominious censures of that odious course against all which such breakings out doe shew the continued rage and power of Satan against Mankinde and manifest mans madnesse and perversenesse still in all places furiously running upon this most horrible and dismall sinne Hurt of self-murder Whereby men doe most ignominiously shut up the period of their lives with the losse of their good names and with the destruction of their soules for ever depriving their posterity of their estates and uncomfortably overshadowing them with the shamefull disgrace and ill example of their execrable fact of self-murder Vses The uses of this point are specially two 1. To be observant of occurrences First it serves to teach us to be observant of the daily occurrences that fall out from time to time that thereby wee may grow by sense in experimentall knowledge both of facts done and also of the nature and causes of the same whereby we may be wise not only for to direct our owne course aright but also may be able prudently to advise others and to give a right estimate of things that fall out and make a holy use of them So that the longer we live and the world stands we should bee the wiser and better in regard of the helps that we have to know Gods will both by his Word and workes that we may not be carelesly secure of the most haynous crimes Note but without grace and Gods protection neither doctrine nor example is sufficient to withstand mens impetuous wilfull running upon destruction The lamentable spectacles of manifold executions for murders and robberies we may thinke might affright all men from committing the like crimes which we see it doth not Comparison So as the multitude of Shipwracks terrifies not men from going to Sea neither doe examples of frequent miscariages by self-murder prevaile with gracelesse men to hinder them from the like facts Self-murderers not deterred from the fact who doe thereby rather harden themselves to attempt and perpetrate the same Vse 2. Beware of self-muder The second use of this point is to admonish us to abhorre and beware of this odious sin of self-murder which runnes through all times and sorts of people although we may seeme to be out of danger of it in regard of the present distance and opposition betweene us and it yet are we not to be over-secure For the sins which at first we seeme to loath afterwards by degrees through negligence or venturing upon the causes and occasions thereof men doe embrace and commit as we see by the example of Hazael 2 Kings 8.13 Motions of self-murder most hardly shaken off And of all sinnes even the motions and setled purposes of self-murder are most hardly shaken off because all unnaturall and hideous sins breaking impetuously through the strongest hedges and pales of opposition and outragiously overflowing the bankes of all resistance both of nature and grace have nothing left of sufficient force to withstand them but that they rage in that high and transcendent degree without shame or restraint as they list Note the most grosse and unnaturall sinnes are ever done by desperately wicked men with the least remorse of conscience and with the greatest shamelessenesse and obstinacy of will and indivertiblenesse of indeavours The use of examples Touching the use of the examples of self-murderers Augustine sayes well Non quaerimus utrum factum sed utrum faciendum Sana ratio exemplis anteponenda est We enquire not whether self-murder hath beene done but whether it ought to have been done Sound reason is to be preferred before examples CHAP. 14. Of the usuall means and furtherances of self-murdering §. 1. Of the meanes of self-murdering 1. Meanes ABout the fact of Self-murder we are to consider the meanes thereunto used and the application and method thereof by self-murderers None lawfull for that use Meanes there are none proper of lawfull ordination for to doe evill because that the same ought not at all to be done but man either abuses good or devises ill meanes of his owne invention to doe naughtinesse and mischiefe withall Meanes abused The meanes abused by self-murderers to kill themselves are of two sorts 1. Good First such as be destinated and appropriated by God for the good and preservation of mans life as water fire swords are and the like which a self-murderer perverts to drowne burne stab himselfe to death c. 2. Evill The second kinde of meanes of self-murder be those that be evill and sinfull in themselves fitter to destroy than to save such as eating and drinking of poyson throwing ones selfe over rocks as did the Circumcellians or out of windowes or from off high places and turrets with intent to kill themselves as the devill would have had our Saviour Christ to have done a Mat. 4.6 going unwarrantably into the mouth of destruction with purpose to be slaine commanding others to doe it as Abimelech did Iudg. 9.54 hanging ones selfe as Iudas and Ahitophel did fretting or starving ones selfe purposely to death as Pomponius Atticus did or in mortall sicknesse or wounds rejecting the helps of cure by Physick or other meanes and disordering ones selfe purposely that they may thereby die and the like so that for this vile act men are inabled by all the
furniture and power of hell and what their owne wit can invent or abuse for that end Observ It is hard to do good easie to doe evill From hence wee may observe First that whereas when wee are to do good wee are hardly drawne to it and do excuse our backwardnesse by pretence of disability and want of meanes and by alledging of impediments and letts as Moses did a Exod. 4.10 13. the sluggard pretends that a Lion is in the way b Prov. 26.13 But when wee are about to do evill we make no such objections but finde abundance of helps with opportunities and great frowardnesse and readinesse to doe the same Causes 1. Mans disposition The causes hereof are specially two First internall in mans owne will and disposition far more prone to evill than to good where will and inclination are to a thing they will find meanes Causes 2. The devill and evils easinesse Secondly there is an externall cause hereof to witt the devill who doth powerfully instigate and help to do mischiefe according to mens tempers and the outward occasion and the work of doing evill is farre more easie than of doing good because of the entitie that is in goodnesse and the non entity that is in evill goodnesse is an effect of power and evill is more properly an effect of impotency to pull downe is more easie than to build up to erre than to go aright Observe 2. Self-murderers are guilty of abuse of Gods Creatures Secondly we may here observe that he that is a self-murderer is guilty not onely of the vile act of self-murder but also of the abuse of Gods good creatures and of his owne abilities in perverting the same to that unnaturall end contrary to Gods ordination whereby they are in this respect subject to vanity c Rom. 8.20 so that a self-murderer erects a counterwork of creation and use of things against God while he gives being to self-murder against both nature and religion so setting up his owne works of evill against Gods that are good and disposing of Gods good works to his owne vile ends contrary to Gods will and ordination Note whereby it is apparent that such wicked persons are factiously-rebellious against God and disturbers of the peace and tranquillity of all the frame of nature and grace contrary to the Lawes and ordinances of God Sinne is in the world as pestilentiall humors in the body which disorder and indanger all where they are §. 2. Of the application of the meanes of self-killing 2. Application For application of the aforesaid meanes to the wicked act of self-murder there are three things considerable In it 3. things considerable 1. Predestination and determination of the end First the self-murderers premeditation and determination of the end which is his owne death to be effected by himselfe so setting limits to his owne daies as if he were his owne absolute Master and that he were so unhappy that his life were worse than death which death all other creatures do abhorre and that he were so desperate and forlorne for want of present mercy or future hope and that he were so forsaken of all that he can finde none to rid him out of his life and misery but that he must kill himselfe so hastening himselfe by a most wofull exchange into a farre greater misery by so doing than ever it was possible for him to suffer in this world by living although that therein he should live for ever under the most exquisite torments that here he can be capable of 2. Election of meanes The second thing considerable in the application of the meanes to the acting of self-murder is the election and choise of the particular meanes to effect the same all self-murderers do not choose to die by the same meanes For then the way of so dying would be unvariably one and the same in them all Wherein a self-murderer observes three things In election of meanes to kill himselfe a self-murderer observes specially three things 1. Such as best agree with his temper First he is carefull to make choise of such meanes as do best fit and agree with his naturall temper and sexe and are least formidable and terrible to his fancie or sense in the execution such as are familiar to him by daily use or such as in his judgement or sense are least horrible or painfull as Cleopatra that chose to kill her selfe by Aspes making her die sleeping 2. Such as be readiest Secondly a self-murderer makes choise of such meanes to kill himselfe that are readiest at hand and easiest for him to have according to his sexe calling occasions or imployment 3. Most certaine to effect death Thirdly he chooses to use those meanes which in his opinion are most certaine to effect that end most easily speedily and unperceivedly from the knowledge of others that he may not be crost of his designe and aime nor be long in paine Observe 1. It is easie to do evill Here we may observe that there is variety and choise of meanes to doe any one evill or sinne which shewes with what facility and ease we may sinne and perish and with what difficulty and hardnesse wee may doe good and bee saved which cannot bee done by such multiplicity of meanes and waies a right line can bee drawne but one way and the truth is simple and not manifold 2. The folly and madnesse of self-murderers Secondly here appeares the folly and madnesse of those that are so circumspect and carefull about choise of the meanes whereby they would die and are so regardlesse of the morall maner how they die and of their consequent condition that will follow upon such a death Observe every grosse and notorious sin is ever committed with a spice of madnesse accompanying the same because it is done against the dictat of sound reason and of true religion and therefore such men are so frequently in the Proverbs called fooles in respect not onely of the thing they doe but also in regard both of the reasons of their proceedings and also of the fruit and end of their courses touching whom it may be said that they have sowne the wind and they shall reap the whirle winde as sayes the Prophet a Hosea 8.7 §. 3. Of the method of self-murderers The method and maner of execution of self-murder The method and manner that a self-murderer observes in execution of self-murder consists in three branches 1. He observes opportunities First he watches and hunts after all opportunities and affects retired solitarinesse that he may without hinderance kill himselfe 2. Secrecy Secondly hee affects secrecie and expedition to accomplish that vile act upon performing whereof all his indeavours and power being bent and being deserted and left of God and his good Angels and the devill instigating and helping him and all meanes fitly concurring for that execution the
opinions and practises of men are to be examined by reason and Gods word Try all things follow that which is good 1 Thess 5.21 because whatsoever is humane may be as it is humane erroneous proceeding from men subject to be deceived and erre Caveat against vaine praise To conclude this point I would intreate all men specially Scholars and men of sublimated brave spirits to beware of the encomiasticall discourses of heathen authors either encouraging to self-murder or commending self-murderers that neither the poyson of that opinion nor the example of that vile practise in eminent and famous persons may insensibly corrupt and seduce us to dare to enterprise the like upon our selves Observe for by the praise of self-murderers and by amorous discourses the heathen writers have done much hurt in the Christian Church besides the example and dregges of their Idolatry from which the Christian world is not yet well purged but among us where there is no law nor approved custome doctrine nor practise of self-murdering we are not in like danger as heathens to erre in our judgements upon this ground seeing wee have sufficient meanes of knowledge and restraint to the contrary §. 4. Of misunderstood Scripture perverting the Iudgement and the remedy thereof The second ground of errors in judgements is misunderstood Scripture The second ground of a deceived judgement in this point is misunderstanding of the Scriptures As our Saviour told the Sadduces That they did erre not knowing the Scriptures a Mat. 22.29 Whereof wee have Origen for an example who gelt himselfe upon his misconceiving the speech of our Saviour saying There be Eunuches which have made themselves Eunuchs for the kingdom of heavēs sake Mat. 19.12 Martinius b Christiana pietas lib. 2 de remicidio Professor at Breme in Germany tells of those that he cals Patriciani who held that the substance of mans flesh was made not by God but by the devill that they held it lawful to kil thēselves to be rid of their bodies from which they supposed that all sin did come Baldwin c Cas lib. 3. c. 4. Cas 13. circa melanchelicos the Casuist speakes of a certaine Hermit that threw himselfe into a well to drowne himselfe out of the abundance of his devotion that he had to mortifie himselfe upon the mistake of the meaning of Col. 3.5 in like manner did Baals priests in the heat of their devotion cut themselves 1 Kings 18. Gloriae sibi putibant si seipsos ex petris praecipitarent in ignem conjicerent vel alia ratione nee◠traderent The Circumcellions among the Donatistss did count it an honour to them if they did throw down themselves off rocks cast themselves into the fire or by any other meanes kill themselves Augustine speaking of them in his booke of heresies written to Quo-vult-Deus sayes that in a mad cruelty they did not spare themselves for they used to kill themselves by divers kindes of deathes chiefly by water fire and throwing themselves downe headlong from high places a Non sibi insana feritate parcēdo nam per mortes varias maximè praecipitiorum aquarum ignium seipsos necare consueverūt their grounds of so doing were abused Scripture Such as that the flesh is to be mortified and he that hates his life shall finde it Augustine sayes that there were specially two vile and usuall deaths of them who doe kill themselves the halter and steep headlong places Self-murder both Iudas and the Donatists have learned from the same master Indas to doe it by the halter the Donatists by steep headlong places b Duae sunt maximè viles atque usitatae mortes eorum qui seipsos interimunt laqueus praecipitium spontaneas mortes ab uno magistro utrique didicerunt Judas laqueum Donatistae praeipitium Causes of misunderstanding Scripture The causes or meanes of mis-understanding the Scripture are specially three 1. Fals teachers and undiscreete First false teachers who under pretence of their learning and authority seduce and beguile the simple by specious pretexts obtruding error for truth or intermingling falsehood with verity or obscuring or corrupting the truth from the simplicity thereof And also undiscreet teachers are a meanes to men of mis-understanding the Scriptures by their neglect or transgressing the true genuine scope and meaning of their texts in their preaching diffused into the latitude of common places multiplyed according to the number of the words Metamorphosed preaching And likewise those teachers that expresse the truth in termes and phrases proper to heretickes or schismaticks teaching things wherein we differ from them in sense and meaning doe not only make themselves to be suspected of error but also they open a way for entertainment of errors from others And also they that do disguise the ancient truth into new fangled habit of method and expressions whereby it may seeme to be some other more transcendent thing than it is and do with curiosity dangerously mince and marre the truth contrary to that which is warrantably revealed whereby the way to peace is rather lost than found they unsetle men from their former faith about the truth and incline them to embrace erroneous innovations about opinions whereby their judgments are mis-informed or made doubtfull what to hold or stick to being shaken by this course which is sutable to the practise of some ore-curious Schoolmen who did degenerate from the plaine simplicity of the Fathers The Schoolmen in handling and publishing of the truth which those Sophisters corrupted and perverted by such foraine Philosophicall termes and perplexed distinctions and method as both obscured and did weare out of use and respect the plaine ancient truth and also laid grounds and gave occasions for and raised manifold errors which filled the Church with contention schismes and heresies which overthrew peace sincerity and the power of godlinesse 2. Shallow capacities Secondly wee are often deceived by the weakenesse of our owne intellectuals and shallow capacities as were the Capernaits about eating of Christs body a Iohn 6.52 when we limit and interpret the Scriptures according to our reason and sense and not by themselves as wee ought with the helpe of the meanes in the Church that God hath given us 3. Headstrong affections Thirdly our misunderstanding of the Scripture proceeds from the strength of our headstrong affections self-willed resolutions and from our ambition after vaine glory whereby wee wring and wrest the sense and meaning of the Scriptures to make them favour and speake what we fancie and hold So not taking the sense contained in the Scripture but imposing our sense upon the Scripture as best pleases us to maintaine our owne opinions or to purchase the vaine glory of extraordinary learning among shallow braind or prejudicate persons whom nothing pleases but that which is strange or new or suits and agrees with their humours and ends
Note The higher that this ground of error of judgement is the more obstinate are the resolutions that are built upon the same Because such conclusions are to the deceived matters of conscience founded as they think upon divine authority farre above the countermand of any humane reason or argument and testimony of truth diffenting from their tenets and opinions Observe Abused Scripture harmefull From hence we may observe that although God hath graciously given us his holy Scriptures to be the powerfull meanes of life a Rom. 1.16 yet many men do abuse and make the same the meanes of their owne destruction as Peter speakes of the unlearned and unstable who did wrest the Episties of Paul as they did also the other Scriptures unto their owne destruction b 2 Pet. 3.16 and so the Commandement that was ordained to life is found to bee unto death to them Rom. 7.10 as the Gospell that is the savour of life to life to those that are saved is the savour of death to death to those that perish c 2 Cor. 2.16 Nothing doth so much hurt when it is abused as that which may do most good when it is rightly used There is no heresie or practise or opinion so vile in the Christian world that pretends not and abuses not Scripture or something in it or from it in defence or excuse of the same and upon that ground chiefly prevailes upon mens consciences and holds them captivated in their errors and ill courses and so men do turne the sweetest Manna into the bitterest gall of Aspes to their owne perdition Compatison As a man by managing a sword by its handle may defend himselfe thereby so by taking and using it by the point or edges mischiefes himselfe by the same Therefore wee need take heed how wee use the sword of the Word Prevention of this error by not following the letter against the true meaning of the Scripture For prevention of error of judgement from this ground of abused Scripture wee are to be carefull that we be not moved with the letter of the Scripture without its proper sense agreeable to the truth contrary to which the abused letter of the Scripture is no warrant for us to beleeve or do any thing as wee see by our Saviour Christs replie to Satan who a Mat 4.6 in tempting of him alledged Scriptures after his manner to perswade him to doe evill Observe Our faith and practise should be founded upon sound knowledge otherwise all our building will fall that is reared up upon a rotten foundation and wee shall commit two faults at once one in error of our judgment another in our unwarrantable practise according to the same Rules or meanes of knowledge of the Scripture Therefore that we may not wrest the Scripture from its true sense to our meaning that wee shall please to give it or that wee should take it in a carnall or grosse sense contrary to its owne interpretation we are to observe foure rules or helps that wee may rightly understand the Scripture 1. Humility First it is needfull that we be indowed with humility of spirit that denying our owne selves and carnall reason wee may submit to take such sence and meaning of the Scripture as it of it selfe affords with the assistance of the helps of the Church and not to impose upon it any sense of our owne making or to wrythe or wrest it to favour our conceits or purposes but that laying aside all ambition of over-ruling the Scripture to force it to patronize and countenance any new fangled humorous opinions or old errors of ours for our vaine ostentation or sinfull profit we are humbly to conforme all our opinions and courses to the Scriptures and not to bring the Scriptures into subjection to our opinions and practise God will guide the meeke in judgement and the meeke will he teach his wayes saies David Psal 25.9 2. Holinesse The second meanes whereby we may be able rightly to understand the Scriptures is holinesse of heart and conversation as our Saviour tells us that if any man will do his will he shall know of his doctrine whether it be of God Iohn 7.17 For as the Philosopher saies Every evill body is an ignorant Omnis malus est ignorans Arist Ethic. l. 3. and persons prepossessed with error and vice labour to interpret all Scripture in favour of the same Whereas godly people indowed with a new divine nature as Peter tels us a 2 Pet. 1.4 are thereby inclined so to expound the Scripture as best agrees with the truth and grace of God in them who are divinely illightned whereby they are able to try things that differ b 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Phil. 1.10 When others are blinde and cannot see a farre off 2 Pet. 1.9 3. Prayer The third meanes to help us rightly to understand the Scriptures is Prayer to God that he would both reveale and manifest to us his truth and also would give us grace rightly to conceive it in our minds and hearts as the Prophet David praies Teach me good judgment and knowledge Psal 119.66 that so we may be taught of God c 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 Thes 4.9 For the matter of the Scripture is in many points so supernaturall and high and wee so dull and grosse in conceiving such truths that as flesh and blood cannot reveale them to us neither can the naturall man receive the things of the Spirit of God d 1 Cor. 2 14. without divine help procured by prayer 4. The Spirit of God The fourth meanes of rightly understanding the Scripture is the Spirit of God in and by our use of hearing and reading and conferring illightning our mindes and perswading our consciences of the truth according to the promise of our Saviour touching the holy Spirit whom he said he would send and that when this Spirit of truth is come he would guide us into all truth which he manifests to us by a twofold light Twofold light of the Spirit 1. In the Word First that which accompanies the Word and truth it selfe whereby it makes it selfe conspicuous to all that have eyes to see it Comparison even as the Sun manifests it selfe by its owne light and splendour to the world 2. In our mindes The second kind of light whereby the Spirit manifests the truth of the Scripture to us is that light that hee endowes our minds withall whereby we are enabled and made capable to see and apprehend the former light of truth in the Word Compatison as a blind man that can see nothing before that he hath both an inward faculty of sight restored to him and also an externall light to make the object visible So then none can truly nor fully understand the truth of the Scriptures but by the same Spirit that gave them For as the Apostle saith The things of God knoweth no
comes by that fact and also ignorance of the illnesse of that action Apprehension of the presence of God and of absence of evill perswades the minde of the lawfulnesse of the thing and makes the conscience bold to undertake the performance of it Good conceived Cap. 12 §. 2. Of the goodnesse that a self-murderer conceives to be in killing of himselfe I have spoken already in the explication of the definition of self-murder How apparent good affects the understanding Touching which I will onely now observe how bonum or good that properly is the object of the will or of the soule in its elections and actions can affect the understanding when it is but apparent good and contrary to truth 1. By the wills working upon it from the senses To cleare this it is to be marked first that the will receiving impressions from the senses doth often by ascending worke upon the understanding and drawes it as formerly we have heard 2. Goodnesse and truth are equally the object of the understanding Secondly whereas bonum and verum good and truth in a metaphy sicall notion are the same and convertible confineable to no one Category as neither are any of the properties or attributes of the Godbead they are likewise equally the object of the understanding as of the will which in the soule doe not differ essentially but are only the divers powers offices and workes of the same soule about its-severall objects which doe give the occasion of the distinction of those things which in themselves are one and so where ever bonum good is presented to the minde there also it offers it selfe to the same as verum true Whereby the understanding is deceived when the object thereof is not that which it is supposed by it to be which makes a man no lesse bold to doe it than if it were indeed true Of self-murder the illnesse unknowne incourages a man to commit it The ignorance of the illnesse of this sinne of self-murder incourages men to commit it when they doe not judge of it by the morall rules whereby it is forbidden and censured The thing that hides the vilenesse of sin from sinners is even the sin it selfe As the Apostle Peter speakes of such That they are blinde and cannot see afarre off a 2 Pet. 1.9 What blindes men 1. Sinne. Men are first blinded that they may the more boldly sin as Samson was that he might be led about to grinde 2. Consequent of sinne There is a subsequent blindnesse that followes upon sinning whereby the oftner that sin is committed the lesse evill it seemes to be to the doers thereof in respect both of the sinfulnesse and punishment thereof in which regard the Prophet sayes that Ephraim was like a silly dove Hosea 7.11 And Augustine affirmes that darknesse followes those that transgresse the Law a Obumbratio sequitar cos qui legem transgrediuntur The former ignorance proceeds from love and affection to sinne the latter from the habit and custome of sinning The ignorance of the illnesse of the sinne of self-murder proceeds from it selfe which in the motions and resolutions of it blindes the understanding two wayes Self-murder blindes the minde 1. Privatively First privatively by drawing away of the minde from advised and serious consideration of the truth about that sin whereby the vilenesse of it might be seene and by declining the thoughts from all arguments reasons and censures whereby a man may be kept from doing of it So that when he comes to the act he sees nothing or but little to hinder him from doing of it 2. Positively Secondly this sinne blindes the understanding positively both by setting the minde aworke as it presents it selfe to it to wrest the Scripture and to finde out reasons that may make the fact eligible as Eve did about eating of the forbidden fruit Gen. 3.6 And also it makes the will by the command that it hath got over it to labour upon the understanding to coyne arguments to justifie the evill fact of self murder against future reproach and punishment which vile and odious crime it is now in consultation to doe Thus doth it labour upon the understanding as Balak did upon Balaam that by change of his stations he might finde a place to curse Gods people b Numb 23. Observ It is the property of the greatest and most wilfull sinners to labour to seeme to be least guilty and pretend the most excuses to justifie themselves as did Saul c 1 Sam 15.20 21. Simeon and Levi d Gen 34 31. and the harlot in the Proverbs e Prov. 30 20. If hypocrite-like they cannot hide their sinnes then they labour to defend them making if it were possible vice to be vertue and vertue to be vice Note Men self blinded Thus doe men blinde themselves by wilfulnesse in ill courses and also God in just judgement doth the same by giving those over that will not entertaine the truth with the love of it to be deluded with error and folly and to beleeve it as the Apostle shewes 2 Thess 2.11 and as God commanded the Prophet to preach to the people that they should heare but not understand a Esay 6.9 Whereupon such men are wise in their owne eyes and doe thinke their owne wayes best If the judgement be subdued to the sinne then men doe runne unresistably to the fact But all such reasons are nothing but error that are used to prove an error which at last upon these delusions the minde conceits to bee a truth Note the truth is in some sort hidden to those that perish Observe Wee are here to observe two things for our instruction in this point 1. Ignorance makes way for destruction First that ignorance and error opens the way to destruction when men are loth to know the true nature of their sinnes the judgements due to them and to take notice of the meanes whereby they both may be prevented 2. Our care to obey the truth Secondly our care should be to know and obey the truth by the help of the Word and directions of approved teachers that we may not be self-deceived through the neglect of meanes of knowledge which makes our sins the greater Not to be self-conceited And therefore we are to observe that we be not self-conceited of our owne wit and opinions that we should trust to the same specially in our passions And wee are also to be carefull that we affect not odde straines nor adventure to do great things upon new and weakly grounded opinions which is as if a man at Sea upon life and death should dare to ride out a storme by a weak halsser or small roape the which if it breake will lay him dead on shore Comparison Therefore in matters of such importance upon life and death men should open themselves to and advise with those
our consciences in well-doing and be our selves taken up about heavenly things and holy imployments then is it not in the hand of any creature to make us miserable or weary of our lives the comfort whereof depends not upon any earthly wight our repudiating desertion and wrong by those here on earth that should least faile us should make us cleave the more close to God and to live here as possessing none of these things 1 Cor. 7.29 30 31. that for our want of them or suffering by them we may care the lesse considering what little assurance we have of them at any time which at all times are accompanied with dislikes §. 16. Of afflictions unwarrantablenesse to kill ones selfe Insufficiency of this motive of crosses for a man to kill himselfe 1. Afflictions are not simply evill The insufficiency of this ground of affliction to warrant any man to murder himselfe is apparent by foure things First by the consideration of the nature of the things that men by self-murder would rid themselves from which are afflictions and therefore in that respect not properly evill much lesse so bad as self-murder which is the course men take to free themselves from the former It is certainely madnesse for any body wittingly and willingly to cast themselves into a greater evill that they may free themselves from a lesser For a man to get out of trouble by making a stollen escape Non enim poena vitatur furtiva discessiene sed crescit he encreases his deserved punishment wee must not breake prison but wait Gods leisure 2. Death is worse than afflictioÌ„s Secondly if a man consider what hee parts from namely his life to bee freed from troubles he may see the folly of such a course of self-murder upon this motive For the goods of nature and of the world Donum vilae majus est ijs ommbus Filli. are farre inferiour to a mans selfe and to the worth of his life because in them consists not a mans chiefe happinesse and therefore for the same should not a man kill himself The Philosopher sayes that Poverty is not horrible or to bee feared neither death neither any thing at all besides sinne a Arist asserit nec paupertatem esse horribilem aut pertinvescendam nec mortem nec omn no quicquam praeter culpam Therefore why should a man kill himselfe for that whereof he should not be afraid and why should hee make so bad an exchange in giving away his life for ease from that which cannot by its presence make miserable and for to precipitate himselfe into endlesse misery 3. A self-murderer is deceived Thirdly if a self-murderer did consider how he is deceived in his expectation of being eased or delivered from troubles by killing himselfe VltimuÌ„ malorum hujus vitae maxime terriâ—ile est mors et iccireo inferre sibi morteÌ„ ad alias hujus vitae misertas evadendas est majus malum assumere ad minoris mass vitaâ—ienem Tho. 2.2 q. 64. Art 5. when thereby he casts himselfe into infinite greater miseries hee might see what little force this motive hath in it to worke and justifie this effect Seeing life is more proper and effectuall than such a death to procure happinesse Although that self-murder be a quick way of dispatch and of putting out all feeling of bodily paine it is not therefore better when the exchange is for the worse ease and expedition in doing self-murder is no argument of commendation seeing evill of sin is most easily performed as the Apostle shewes Rom. 7.21 Heb. 12.1 Because it is not an act of power but of impotency Peter Martyr wonders at the Stoicks that place happy life in vertue and doe hold that adversity is not evill that they should to free themselves from troubles kill themselves and sayes What kind of happinesse is that which death doth perfit if life be happie then should wee labour to abide therein what happinesse is that which may be overcome by those things that are not evill a Quaenam est foelicitas quae morte est perficienda Si vita est beata in ea est manendum quae est faelicitas quaevinci potest ab ijs quae non sunt mala For persecution our Saviour bids us flee from it or patiently to endure it and no where allowes that we should kill ourselves to prevent or escape it our blessed Saviour although he were to lay downe his life yet would not kill himselfe for accomplishment of that worke that necessarily was to be done Ludovicus Vives cites out of Plutarch and he out of Menander That it is not the part of a good and valiant man to say I will not suffer this but to say I will not doe this b Non est boni et fortis viri dicere hee non patiar sed hoc nonfaciaÌ„ 4. He resists Gods will Fourthly he that kills himselfe for to free himselfe thereby out of troubles and afflictions resists the will of God by shaking off that burden which God hath laid upon him to beare during his good pleasure to which all are subject And thereunto the Son of God submitted himselfe when he said to Peter The cup that my Father hath given me shall I not drinke it c Iohn 18.11 And therefore we are bound in this case to fulfill the will of God by passive obedience when we cannot doe the contrary without offending God neither did the Saints of God use self-murder to free themselves out of troubles whereof we have neither precept nor commendable example §. 17. Of certaine uses about afflicted persons Observe The uses or observations observable from this motive generally considered are two Afflicted persons are doubly burdened First we are here to observe that persons in trouble and adversity are under a double burden both of their afflictions which they suffer and also of strong temptations wherby thereupon Satan assaults them both which the persons in distresse doe commonly aggravate so making their estates more tedious and unsupportable than otherwise they would be Note in which condition men should beware of hard uncharitable conclusions against themselves Beware of censuring either in censuring themselves to be reprobates forsaken of God or the like or in determining rashly of or against themselves what they will doe with themselves or to themselves in that case otherwise than they have warrant from God Beware of concealement Againe in that estate they should take heed of over-close concealement of their troubles from those that may advise and help them to beare their burdens concealed griefe is most dangerous to sink a man but vent gives ease and procures help Finally of persons in adversity others are to be observant how they doe and to be helpfull to them by their countenance counsell and aide of assistance from themselves and by their intercession from others that so that may be easily borne that
which is bad and it is either a wilfull debiliating of ones selfe to good or killing of ones selfe for his sin by excessve griefe against which wee have already spoken in some sort or else this revenge is in laying violent hands upon ones selfe purposely to mutilate or kill himselfe out of indignation for his sinne Causes The causes hereof are specially two 1. Desperation First desperation in regard of the horriblenesse and grievousnesse of the sinnes whereof a man is guilty and by which hee is confounded in his conscience and for that withall hee conceives and perswades himselfe that God will never be mercifull to him to pardon him 2. Ease of conscience Secondly affectation indeavour to ease ones troubled and restlesse conscience for some unnaturall cruelties and crying crimes by satisfaction of Iustice according to his demerits makes himself to destroy himself but of this case we have spoken before The saul inesse of this revenge This revenge upon ones selfe in this manner upon this cause is many wayes faulty 1. First because of the opinion of expiation of sinne thereby which nothing can doe away or can quiet the conscience but onely the blood of our blessed Saviour Christ 2. Secondly because sinne cannot be done away by sin and such as is worse than the former no more than fire can be quenched by addition of more fire to it the punishment of sinne belongs to God and his Vicegerents whose lawes are violated 3. Thirdly no man is a competent judge over himselfe in this case either to cleare or to condemne himselfe Non est quis idâ—neus judex inse in propria causa Nemo halet in se authoritate est non sit seipso superior Filli. Because it is impossible that he should bee both Superiour and inferiour to himselfe or that he should not be partially inclined in his affection to himself either in love or hatred 4. Fourthly not by killing our selves which deprives us of the necessary time of repentance but by repentance and faith in Christ our past sinnes are to be done away how grievous soever they be Sibi adimit necessariuÌ„ poenisteÌ„tiae sepus Tho. 2.2 q. 64. Art 5. by living according to the will of God and not by dying by our owne hands our sinnes are reformed and God glorified God sayes that he wills not the death of a sinner Ezek. 18. why then should we will it 5. For peace of con cience what is to be done in this case Fiftly for peace of conscience in that case God hath appointed other meanes as 1. First humiliation and repentance before God 2. Secondly confession to godly Ministers for advice and comfort 3. Thirdly if the former will not do then are we to put our selves to open shame for private faults by publick penance in the Church or to put our selves into the hands of the Magistrates to suffer for our crimes by the civill sword Second kind of revenge Against others The second kinde of revenge is intended against others by ones killing of himselfe when he is implacably offended by others from whom he can neither have satisfaction nor reformation of his grievances and when his death by his owne hands may redound to the hurt or disgrace as he thinks of those that have wronged him Who in this respect are most subject to self-murder Which practise of self-murder upon this motive is most incident to persons of the weakest sexe and worst disposition and condition such as be women and servants and men sympathizing with them in qualities as a Wife that because shee cannot have her will of or with her Husband kils her selfe to the intent to disgrace him with the reproach of being the occasion of that fact to grieve and vexe him and to deprive him of all benefit and comfort that he might have by her life and to hurt him by all the evill that can betide him by her death The unreasonablenesse of the practise Which is a mad course for one to pull out both their owne eyes to the end that another may lose one of his Such persons doe die in implacable malice and are certainely damned by their owne act and manner of concluding their life A good revenge There is a good and lawfull revenge to bee exercised upon those that wroug us which is in killing that evill in them whereby they offend God and us by instructing and reforming them by holy admonitions and example and also in killing their enmity with preservation of their persons by our love and good dealing towards them making them our friends both in affection and behaviour whereby our enemies are destroyed and our selves benefited Touching killing a mans selfe in revenge for his sins S. Augustine sayes that We affirme that no man ought for his sinnes past to kill himselfe Hoc asserimus neminem propter sua peccata praeterita propter que magis â—ac vita opus est ut possit poeniteudo sanari cum fructuosam agere possumus poeniteâ—â—â—â— apud Deum Jude sacium meritò detestamur cum se liqueo suspendit seeleratae illiâ—s traditionis auxisse potiùs quam expiâsse commissùm quoniam Dei miscricerdiam desperando exiâ—â—abiliter penitus nullum sibi salubris poenitentiae locum reliquit suae mertis reus sinivil â—ane vitam quia licet propter suum scelus alio seclere suo eccisus est for which hee hath rather need of his life that by repentance they may be healed And condemnes the same when we may by living performe profitable repentance before God And further sayes that we doe justly abhorre the fact of Iudas seeing when hee hanged himselfe he did rather increase than expiate the fact of his flagitious treason because damnably despairing of the mercy of God he left no place of saving repentance to himselfe he ended this life being guilty of his own death for although he was flaine for his owne vile fact yet it was by another vile fact of his owne And so it is apparent that for sinne past or for revenge no man can murder himselfe warrantably §. 19. Concerning prevention of sin to come The fourth generall motive to self-murder Prevention of sinne The fourth generall motive of men to self-murder is prevention of sin to come which a man conceives will inevitably be effected to Gods dishonour and his owne disgrace if he doe still live and may by his death be prevented and therefore doth he hasten and inflict the same with his owne hands Those sins for which hee would kill himselfe to prevent them are of two sorts 1. The sins of others First they are the sinnes of others for which a man would kill himselfe either that he may not see them to his griefe or that he may not be the object or subject of other mens committing of them As those women that to avoide ravishment and of being deflowred
discerne and feele the wofulnesse of their estates being under the desperate sense and importable horrour of their sinnes and judgements due for the same then are they in danger to conclude their wretched dayes by self-murder Observ To know our tempers and watch our selves Therefore people should well consider their owne tempers and states with the severall dangers that attend upon the same and are to be wise to fortifie themselves where they are weakest and so wisely to demeane and behave themselves that they neither entertaine nor give way to any thing in themselves that may bring them to destruction but by faith and good workes to walke with God whereby they may be sure to live for ever §. 2. Of the entrance into self-murder 2. Entrances into self-murder The second thing considerable in the acting of self-murder is the first entrances degrees or approaches into it which are specially foure 1. Crying capitall crimes Parricide proceeds First grievous capitall crying sinnes of blood as murder knowne or secret parricide which is killing of parents children wives or husbands 1. From love of them that are killed which flowes either from exuberancy of carnall affection to them whom they kill whereby they take occasion to kill them by prevention to free them from miseries or to have them with them out of this world being by their owne hands about to rid themselves out of this life 2. From hatred of them Or else it proceeds from unnaturall or monstrous hatred to them for wrong sustained by them for keeping some good from them 3. From love of some other things or for the supposed evill they may bring upon them as whores that kill their infants to avoide shame and punishment children that kill their aged parents to come to their estates mothers in law that kill their children in law to derive estates to their owne widdowes that kill their children to ease themselves of charge and to preferre themselves by mariage These persons as they kill their owne soules by such vile sins so are they justly given over of God in recompense of their owne wayes to destroy their own bodies by their owne self-murdering hands 2. Desperation The second degree of entrance or approach into self-murder is desperation of pardon of sins or of freedome from calamities which rather than some will endure they will kill themselves seeing no other way of easing themselves and their minds whereof some resemblance may bee seene in Iobs Wifes counsell to her Husband Job 2.9 expounded advising him in his extremitie to curse God and die that is that he would take a course to be rid out of his miseries either by blasphemy provoking God to kill him or by dispatching himselfe with his owne hands after that he had blessed God in making peace with him for the safety of his soule 3 Entertainment of self-murderous motions Thirdly a further degree of entrance into self-murder is the advised entertainment of temptations and motions for a man to kill himselfe voluntarily suffering the same to seise upon him with some liking thereof searching and pleading reasons and examples to beguile himselfe whereby he may thinke it lawfull or lesse-evill in that case to kill himselfe and begins to plot the manner how he may best accomplish it with a fluttering wavering resolution to doe it 4. Impatient desire of death The fourth degree of entrance into self-murder is the impatient wishing and desiring of death and a lothing and wearisomnesse of life which so farre prevailes upon some that their whole study and endeavours are how to get out of their lives and to dispatch themselves by their owne hands rather than to live here A question concerning desire of death It is here a pertinent question whether it be at all lawfull to desire that we were dead Answer For resolution whereof it is to bee considered that there are two sorts of desires of death the one is holy the other is sinfull 1 A holy desire of death How it is holy A holy desire of death is that which desires not to be unclothed but to be clothed upon 2 Cor. 5.2 4. the things that make this desire to be holy are two 1 By subordination to Gods will First when it is conditionall and moderate with respect and subordination to the good will of God being content to live if God will have it so and while wee are in this life such holy desires of our dissolution from hence doe not hinder but further all such performances as tend to the glorifying of God and to the edification of our selves and others 2 In the motives thereof Secondly the holinesse of the desire of death consists in the motives thereof the which are two 1 The first is to bee with Christ that we may enjoy God in him to our full happinesse Philip. 1.23 The second is that we may be wholly freed from sinning against God and may be beatifically perfit in having the fulnesse of that whereof we now have the first fruits as the Apostle professes touching himselfe that he did forget those things that are behinde and did reach forth to those that are before and did presse toward the marke for the price of the high calling of God in Christ Iesus a Phil. 3.13 14. yet for to be translated no man is purposely to doe any thing to hasten his death nor to omit any thing due for preservation of his life or to bee more negligent in doing the things which are pertinent for him to doe in this life Vnlawfull desires of death A sinfull desire of death consists in three things First in absolutely desiring it according to our owne wills how and when to die with using meanes as wee list to effect it neglecting the preservation of life and well imployment of the same in doing all those duties for which God doth give it to us 2 Secondly when our desire of dying is from lothing of life and envying the benefit of it to ones selfe for Gods glory and the good of others which wee postpone and subject to our owne self-wills 3. Thirdly when our eager desire of the same is more for freedome from some temporary evills b 1 Kings 19.4 Job 3.3 Jer. 20.14 Rev 6.16 than for to enjoy spirituall and eternall good which ought not to be because God is as much if not more glorified and our selves and others truly benefited by our passive obedience as by our active Note for by the former God hath his will more than by the latter Our chiefe care should be for the happy estate of our soules and of both soule and body for evermore Non pro vitandis naturae vel fortunae malis sed pro vitando malo animi ossequendo potiore bono And therefore as one saith Wee may not desire death to shunne and escape the evills of nature or fortune but to avoide the
unlawfull by the rules of religion is because it is against nature it selfe and against that naturall affection and propensnesse whereby it endeavours to preserve and cherish it selfe and to withstand and repell all that is destructive of it and inimicall to it Religion requites the observation of the law of nature that religion requires the observation of the law of nature is manifest because religion and natures law are not repugnant but differ in extent and degrees of perfection the law of nature being more universall and lesse divinely perfit The Scripture it selfe commends the keeping and condemnes the transgressing of the law of nature In which respect the Apostle blames the Gentiles that knowing God by nature they did not glorifie him as God a Rom. 1.21 And againe he commends them for doing by nature the things contained in the Law b Rom. 2.14 15. and which naturally was written in their hearts Hee blames the Incestuous Corinthian for doing a sin so hainous as is not so much as named amongst the Gentiles c 1 Cor. 5.1 And further he condemnes mens wearing of long haire contrary to the law of nature when he sayes Doth not even nature it selfe teach you that if a man have long haire it is a shame unto him d 1 Cor. 11.14 Thomas Aquinas sayes e Quod aliquis scipsum occidat est contra inelinationem naturalem contra charitatem that for any man to kill himselfe is against naturall inclination and charity The devill knew that man naturally will give all he hath for his life Iob 2.4 the soule and body of a man doe naturally affect to be united together because of the unity of the person that consists of them both personally joyned together by whose dissolution it is destroyed The soule and body are neither of them perfit without the other and therefore affect to be united together And the soule and body are so made one for another that they are not nor can be perfit the one without the other neither with naturall nor beatificall perfection for beside a partiall perfection there is that full perfection that is of the whole and in the whole The soule doth not willingly leave the body but with respect of advancement of the person whereof it is the soule by entring upon possession of that partiall perfection whereof it is capable and the whole for measure and degree is due to the person constituted of soule and body and for which union and adeption of perfit glory of the person there shall be a resurrection of the body at the last day 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and therefore is the body in the meane time called Nephesh a Psal 16.10 by the Hebrewes And God is said by our Saviour himselfe speaking of the dead to be the God of the living b Mat. 22.32 whose bodies although they were dead yet themselves are said to be alive in regard of their living soules who cannot be personally considered but in their union together that by death cannot be dissolved in Gods consideration of us and in respect of the naturall inclination of each mans proper soule and body the one to the other for their full perfection and in regard of the resurrection when they shall be united everlastingly to live together betweene which time and the day of our death there is no sensible distance of time to us nor length of time with God §. 4. How self-murder is injurious to mankinde 4. Self-murder wrongs mankinde The fourth particular that makes it evident that self-murder is condemned by religion is because it is injurious to mankinde and to the common-wealth whereof the self-murderer is a member who by that fact of killing himselfe hurts humane society by such hainous disorders and pernicious examples for others to follow to their destruction and by the unrecoverable damage and losse of its members and of the good that the same might have by their lives For as Thomas sayes Every man is a part of a Commonalty and he that kills himselfe doth an injury to that Commonalty a Quilibet homo est pars comunitaetis qui scipsum intersicit injuriam sacit Communitati Examples The commendable examples and practise of the godly hath ever beene opposite to self-murder as well as their opinion and have had a care to preserve their lives not only for their own good but also for the good of others who had an interest in them as is manifest by the Apostle Paul Phil. 1.24 25. and 2.17 Who seeing his life to be needfull for the Philippians was willing to abide and continue with them For the furtherance and joy of their faith and did joy and rejoyce to be offered upon the sacrifice and service of the same It is hurtfull to the common-wealth If self-murder were not unlawfull even in respect of the wrong thereby done to the common-wealth why should David have commanded to take away the life of the yong man the Amalekite that did help Saul to kill himselfe whom David asked How he was not affraid to stretch forth his hand to destroy the Lords annointed and so caused to put him to death not simply for unjustly killing an innocent man but specially in consideration of killing of the King the head of the land which by his death was wronged and was a dangerous president to passe unpunished § 5. How self-murder wrongs mans selfe doing it 5. It wrongs a mans selfe and how The fifth particular demonstrating how unlawfull self-murder is by religion is the sin and wrong which the self-murderer doth thereby to himselfe in three speciall respects 1. It overthrowes faith and love in a man First in regard of the principall saving graces of God in man which are faith and love self-murder is against faith and trust in God and overthrowes the same by desperation that neither in adversity can a person that is resolved to kill himselfe have any true comfort nor any hope of life eternall by a course that he knowes is the way to damnation Touching love we have heard before how it cannot consist with self-murder they being contrary For as one sayes Quisque debet plus amare seipsum quam proximum Filliue Every one ought to love himselfe more than his neighbour For the neerenesse of our selves to our selves and for the perfection that should be in the rule or measure whereby we are to love others 2 It marres our duty Secondly in regard of our duty which is not to dispose of or doe that which is not in our power nor within our authority such as to kill ones selfe is For when a man kills himselfe he either kills an innocent and so in that respect grievously sinnes or else hee kills a malefactor and then he sinnes that doth it without lawfull authority to warrant his action which no man hath to kill himselfe but expresse command to the contrary 3.
datur regressus but when a man hath killed himselfe he cannot make himselfe alive againe that hee may amend the errors of his course and therefore expedient it is for him to keepe his life as long as hee can when hee hath it 11. It crosses a mans last arme Eleventhly no man is to doe that which may crosse his last aeyme and end which is his salvation but for a man to kill himselfe crosses him in this end and deprives him of attaining the same because thereby he termines and finishes his life with and in an act of most damnable sin and also deprives himselfe of all meanes of reformation and salvation in time to come 12. Self-murder is condemned by similies Twelfthly self murder is condemned by Macrobius and Picolomineus under similies as a servant may not kill himselfe because he is not sui juris his owne 1. So we being Gods servants not only as they say by creation and subordination in place and duty but also by covenant and redemption we may not kill our selves 2. No man may dispose as hee list of other mens goods although he bee usis fructuarius of them for a time having the propertie of them for his profitable use with reservation and preservation of the substance of them we are such and therefore have not such soveraigne and absolute right and authority over our selves that we may kill our selves seeing we are bound as Gods tenants to the upholding and reparations of our selves as much as we can 3. A man committed to prison by lawfull and just authority although unjustly may not make an escape by breaking of ward to prevent punishment because thereby he condemnes and makes himselfe a transgressor and worthy of punishment neither are we to rid our selves out of this life of troubles into which God hath put us untill he shall againe himselfe call us out and free us as Paul and Silas would not come out of prison untill the Magistrates brought them out that had put them in a Act. 16.37 39 4. Plato sayes that as wee may not kill another mans servant in regard that thereby we wrong his Master and as Souldiers may not forsake their stations and places without order from their Commander b Injussa imperatoris deserere stationem so may no man kill himselfe seeing thereby he wrongs God that is his Master and forsakes the place and condition that God his Commander hath set him in there to serve him as a Souldier in this world during his good pleasure a 1 Tim. 1.18 August de C.D. lib. 1. c. 20. Augustine sayes that as he is a false witnesse as well and rather more that wittingly deposes salsely against himselfe so he that kills himselfe is a murderer as much and more then if he killed another man 5. Parricide as to kill Wife Husband or children is odious but self-murder is worse because it is neerest a mans selfe and most against the rule 13. It is the grossest murder Thirteenthly wee are specially bound to shun the most grossa and worst facts and sinnes for that if we do them wee are most inexcusable and culpable and justly damned beeause they are most against conscience they being most within the light of mans understanding whereby the conscience being convinced it inexcusably condemnes the doers of them which also are most within the power of man to resist and against which he hath most helps and therefore the doing of them imports more wilfulnesse than frailty or want of power in those that do the same But self-murder is a sinne of this kind because it is the grossast and most odious sort of murder that can be and therefore most to be shunned 14. It makes a bad exchange Fourteenthly we are advisedly to make no exchange that may be for the worse but a man by killing himselfe makes an exchange for the worse because hee gives his life in exchange for death or at the best for freedome from worldly troubles discontentment which is a price farre above the worth of the purchase and God never allowed of this kinde of truckage nor appointed self-murder to be the means of any good but thereby men cast themselves into greater misery and destruction than otherwise they should ever have beene subject to 15. It puts man into a bad estate to die in Fifteenthly every man should strive to be in such an estate of favour with God and to bee found of him so doing when he dies as may be allowable before God and most comfortable to a mans selfe Blessed is that servant whom his Lord when hee commeth shall finde so doing a Math. 24.46 But a self-murderer in his act of killing of himself can neither have any comfort that hee is in the estate of Gods favour nor that his act is allowable before him whose law thereby hee transgresses with a high hand concluding his last gaspe with an act of horrible sinne having his soule in the passing thereof out of his body filled with disordered passions and perturbations of discontent griefe hatred feare diverted upon unlawfull objects and acts and filled with horror and environed with devils and so by self-murder the soule is most diverted from God and infected when the same should be most neerely converted to God and bee best fitted and perfited for him at death that by the hands of the blessed Angels it may be caryed into heaven and eternall happinesse 16. Man hath not authority to kil himselfe Sixteenthly a man is to do no more than hee hath lawfull right and power to do lest he make himselfe a transgressor but mans power over himselfe is not supreame but as a usu-fructuarie he hath dominium utile profitable dominion of himselfe being bound by God his highest Lord not to commit waste upon himselfe Comparison As mans dominion over the earth is not supreame for the Lord is King the earth may be glad of it but onely to take the profit of it and not to destroy it the creatures he may kill for to enjoy a better use of them But the best use that a man can have of himselfe is by his life and not by his death and therefore he is to avoid self-murder because it deprives a man of that use of himselfe for which God hath given a man to himselfe Comparison As the wife hath not power of her owne body to dispose thereof as she list in regard of that interest and proprietie that her husband hath over her so cannot man do with himselfe what he pleases in regard that we are the members of Christ his body and spouse a Ephes 5.23 24 and therefore are subject to him The object of mans will Man is Lord of his naturall and morall actions because they are the subjects of his will and therefore he is culpable and punishable if they be not well ordered and so to the doing only of that
constant practise thereof seeing such do alwaies live impenitent wretches in their sins without godly remorse and new life 2. Actuall repentance Secondly for such persons actually and indeed to repent soundly and to life at or in their act of this transcendent self-murder they cannot in regard that either they want time to doe it if it were possible for them to repent or they want rather a heart savingly to repent which requires both a divine principle within them whereby they may be able to do it and also some blessed meanes of Gods ordination to exuscitate and stirre up that power into act the former a self-murderer hath not for the latter God never ordained vile self-murder to be a meanes of a self-murderers repentance neither attends such mens leisure to give them repentance when they list who would not repent at his call By the transcendency of their sin these self-murderers over-set themselves beyond the pitch of recovery And if any such should happen to have time betweene his vile act and his expiration his sorrow for such an extraordinary and odious fact cannot be true saving repentance because repentance in such extremities and also late where there is no time to trie and give proofe of the soundnesse of it is forced and rarely true and also repentance for one grosse fact or for a few is not sound nor sufficient for salvation where a man stands guilty and impenitent for abundance of other finnes and corruptions whereof he ought to repent as well as of the other And when and where was it ever knowne certainly that any such transcendent self-murderer did savingly repent although he had time betweene the blow and his departure And therefore as no proper and transcendent self-murderer doth or can truly repent so can he not be saved but is damned by and upon accomplishment of that enormious and odious fact §. 7. The Churches Iudgement of self-murderers 5. Reason That all self-murderers are damned By the Iudgment of the Church The fifth and last argument that makes it apparent that no proper self-murderer is saved is the ancient and constantly continued Iudgement of the Church touching the finall estate of such persons which is expressed by her order and practise in excluding them from the priviledges of Christian buriall as hath beene formerly said a Chap. 17. §. 7. Argument 9. that she will neither permit nor allow that their bodies shall be brought to the grave with Christian solemnity as with ringing of Bells or singing of Psalmes or the like nor that they shall be interred or buried in consecrate ground or Christian buriall Pecreti secunda pars causa 23. quaest 5. c. 12. Vlacuit in common with the bodies of those all whose soules the Church hopes in charity are saved in Heaven neither at their buriall where ever it be else will the Church suffer any prayers or reading of Scriptures to be used Quise laqueo pertmunt aut ense recant wanifestum si seclus borum sit nobiscum non tumulentur Rarmundus as may intimate to others any comfort or hope of their salvation Their wills she makes void as of persons that having cast away their soules have nothing left nor power to dispose of any thing she deemes it unreasonable for such to have their wills stand who do in so high a degree withstand and counterveen the will of God Barring them from Christian buriall Neither at any time after their buriall will the Church allow or permit that any commemoration shall be made of the names of any such in the suffrages or solemnities of her divine service as anciently the manner was to deale with those of whose salvation shee did not despaire That by this omission it might be manifest how shee abhorred self-murderers and their vile practise and that their names might bee extinct and rot whose soules shee conceived were damned she would not have them remembred or registred by her to their honor that were so dead or to the comfort of the living either in regard of the fact or in respect of the finall estate of the persons whose names she conceives are razed out of the booke of life For if so bee that the Church did in charity conceive that the soules of any proper self-murderers had communion after death in place state and blessednesse with the soules of those that are saved why then should shee or could shee justly exciude the bodies of those self-murderers from communion in Christian buriall with the bodies of the godly and heires of salvation And if the Church had any hope of the salvation of self-murderers why should she deny the use of those meanes of solemnities of reading of Scripture of saying godly prayers and of making honourable commemorations of their names in publick divine assemblies and service whereby the Church her self might be comforted and also the disconsolate friends of such parties might be cheered touching the goodnesse of the finall estate of such self murderers Why should the Church deny any of her common priviledges to any that she conceives to inherit the priviledge of enjoying the kingdome of Heaven it cannot be done only for terror to the living that they may not dare to do the like because the Church the pillar and ground of truth a 1 Tim. 3.15 will not do so much wrong and injustice to the dead to effect any good for doing whereof she hath other and those warrantable meanes sufficient yea even the Roman Church leaves no place of hope for self-murderers so much as in purgatory but abandons them all to hell without redemption by all which the Church makes it manifest that it is her Judgement that none such are saved but are all damned whose very externall goods are judged by the Church and Common-wealth to be execrable and in that respect are made a deodand And therefore upon all the foresaid reasons and arguments I conclude that no proper self-murderer in manner aforesaid can be saved but are all damned §. 8. Of certaine uses Observe From what hath beene said touching the finall estate of proper self-murderers we may observe for our use 1. first that none but reprobates and damned persons do breake out into this transcendent direct and proper self-murder so that it is proper only for reprobates and damned persons to do it in the perfit height and greatest enormity of it and is not incident to any good body that shall be saved to do it in that manner 2. Secondly the consideration of the finall damnable estate of those self-murderers in respect of that fact may make self-murder odious and formidable to all people lest by their venturing and approaching neere to the brinks of that desperate gulph they should fall in to the everlasting destruction both of soule and body which shewes the desperate madnesse of those that wilfully ruinate themselves for ever in this manner by self-murder §. 9. Certaine objections answered and first touching the
over-ruling providence hindering the execution and turning his will 2. Be observant of the tempted Secondly men should bee observant of such persons 1. To spie out the causes both to fish and spie out the outmost hidden lurking undiscovered causes thereof that the same may be removed that hinders the cure 2. To watch him that he do it not and also to watch him against all oppertunities and meanes whereby hee may accomplish his act of self-murder 3. Humane forcible restraint Thirdly they are to use outward forcible restraint to such an one as to a mad man shutting him up and keeping meanes of self-destruction from him as much as may be The putting by of the violent attempts and passions of self-murder which comes by fits ague-like not only restraines the act for the time beeing but may also counter-check and abate the rage of it that by degrees it may be prevailed against and asswaged Comparison as agues many times are cured accidentally by very impertinent modicines putting by the fits Observe None are self-murdered but by their owne fault From that which hath beene said touching the Antidotes for self-murder we may observe that it is a mans owne fault if he perish by self-murder in neglect of using the meanes against it Comparison For as there are medicines for all diseases so are there meanes of preservation against all sinnes too how great soever they be to prevent them and these meanes are within the reach of a mans power to use Note The benefits of recovery frō the temptatiōs of self-murder If a man once deeply plunged into these temptations of self-murder do christianly overcome the same and be soundly recovered he hath thereby a good pledge never to be so tried againe and hath a pawne and evidence of victory against other sinnes if he doe his best against them Vse of it And also for this deliverance such a one is bound to be ever exceeding thankefull to God Vpon the cure dangers Upon preservation and freedome out of these temptations of self-murder a man is to take heed of two great dangers 1. Security c. First security self-confidence and presumption whereby those corruptions and sinnes may closely grow upon him that may bring him into as dangerous a condition for his salvation as we see how Hezechia after his recovery out of his mortall sicknesse fell into other sins as he manifested by his oftentation to the messengers of Babylon in boastingly-shewing them his treasure and strength all which cost him deare a 2 King 20.13 2. Vnprofitable life to goodnesse The second danger to be avoided after such a recovery is unprofitable living when such a man spends not the life that God hath given him in speciall manner to Gods glory to the good of others and to his owne salvation which is the maine end why God gives us our lives and for the attainement thereof if we spend them not it were better for us not to live Observe The various states and great dangers that God carieth man through are very remarkable and Gods worke therein is gracious and wonderfull for which we should ever praise his glorious and blessed name with constant dependance upon and dutifull obsequiousnesse to him in all our life and wayes which God grant we may do Amen FINIS AN ALPHABETICALL Table of the materiall Contents of this Treatise directing to the Page where the same is contained or begun A ABsurdity Page 204 Abuse of power Page 162 Abuse of lawfull things procures indirect self-murder Page 109 Abused Scripture most harmefull Page 198 Act How one act of self-murder gives denomination to the doers Page 175 Actions are good not onely from intention Page 241 Adam In Adam all are self-murderers Page 124 Advancement Hope of advancement abused to evill Page 245 Adventuring Of mans adventuring upon sinfull courses the causes Page 69 Of adventuring for saving of soules and for Religion Page 141. 143. Adversity Persons in adversity how to be observed and helped Page 231 Advise To advise the tempted Page 323 Advisedly a self-murderer kils himselfe Page 160 Afflictions spirituall Page 164 Afflictions not simply evill Page 228 Of afflictions occasioning self-murder Page 211. c. In afflictions how men should order themselves Page 231 Afflicted persons doubly burdened ibid. Affections Head-strong affections and ambition are causes of mis-understanding the Scripture Page 197 Ambition cause of self-murder Page 216 241 Amorous discourses how hurtfull Page 195 Anger the cause of self-murder Page 232 Anger against a mans selfe for his sins Page 234 Antidotes for self-murder Page 311 Antiquity of self-murder Page 177 Apostacy Of finall apostacy Page 75 Apparent How it is apparent that men murder themselves Page 176. 178. 181 Apparent good affects the understanding Page 208 Appearing of fellons voluntarily at Assizes Page 135 Application of the meanes of self-killing Page 185 Application of the Word against temptations Page 315 Arguments against self-murder Page 262 274 How arguments are deemed weak or strong Page 191 Ashamed to do good Page 222 Authority man hath not to kill himselfe Page 281 B Badnesse Conceited badnesse of estate cause of self-murder Page 164 Baile for Fellons how by them to be freed Page 135 Being Goodnesse of being Page 259 Behaviour Godly behaviour signe of spirituall life Page 39 Gastly behaviour a signe of subsequent self-murder Page 260 Beleeve To beleeve errors men are strong Page 206 Benefit the benefit of well spending our lives Page 19 Benefit of death encourages against dangers Page 126 The benefits of recovery from temptations of self-murder Page 325 Beware of self murder Page 182 Blame Men blame God to excuse themselves Page 207 Blessing A blessing may become a judgement Page 166 Blindes What blindes men Page 209 Body of mans body and its works 81 with its threefold consideration ib. How the body suffers by and for the soule Page 82 The bodies imployment in murdring it self Page 162 Braves Of Braves Page 112 Publishing Of publishing the Gospell amongst Heathens Page 142 Burning Of burning of a Ship in fight by her own Master or company Page 138 C Calamities The diverse sorts of calamities Page 211 Calling Killing ones self in discharge of calling is not self-murder Page 174 Capacity Shallow capacity is cause of mis-understanding the Scripture Page 197 Capitall-crimes against human laws procuring death Page 121 Capitall-crimes how a man is to reveale against himselfe Page 137 How capitall-crimes make way for self-murder Page 256 Care Mans care of his naturall and spirituall life Page 4 Mans care ought to be most for his spirituall life Page 42 Our care to be preserved from soule-destruction Page 79 Mans care to live well Page 206 Our care to know and obey the truth Page 210 Carefull of what men should be most carefull Page 289 Carnall reason dislikes of strict obedience Page 62 Cases of leagnes and society of warre of infectious places or
how Page 262 The Law of nature is to be observed Page 269 Lawes of men condemne self-murder Page 277 Lawes given to men are bounded Page 294 Lawfull self-killing Page 54 Vpon lawfull calling how to adventure life Page 125 Leagues Of Leagues Page 119 Letter The Letter of the Scripture is not to be followed contrary to the true meaning Page 199 Lets of endeavour after spirituall life Page 66 Life is a thing of great importance Page 1 Of the kinds of the life of man Page 4 How mans life may be lost 43. and how taken away Page 45 Life unsure 82. It is the object of self-murder Page 159 Life eternall is here begun Page 245 Life temporary is a blessing Page 275 Light of the Spirit twofold Page 200 Live Mans care to live well Page 206 To live by faith Page 313 Love Of love and to love our neighbours as our selves expounded Page 129 Love is destroyed by self-murder Page 272 Lusts Curbing of our lusts is a good revenge upon our selves for our sins Page 234 M Mad men killing themselves Page 250 Madnesse of self-murderers Page 186 Magistrate A Soveraigne Magistrate for no crime may slay himselfe nor be slaine by his subjects Page 264 Man only is subject to self-murder Page 6 Man how subject to death Page 45 Man in greatest danger Page 56 Mans care to live well Page 206 Man onely is capable of shame Page 222 Mans-self wronged by self-murder Page 271. 273 Mankinde To mankinde self-murder injurious Page 270 Manner The manner of executing self-murder Page 187 Man-slayer What a man-slayer is to do to save his friends pursued to death for his fact Page 133 Mariners Concerning mariners Page 113 Meanes to be used for spirituall life Page 28 Of meanes of conversion why appointed of God Page 31 Meanes of preservation of spirituall life Page 39 Meanes weakening and quickning zeale Page 41 Meanes of losse of life Page 44 The meanes of the destruction of spirituall life Page 45 The meanes of self-murder Page 183. 185 Meanes for knowledge of the Scripture Page 199 Meanes of sin cut off Page 234 Meanes to prevent self-murder Page 311 Meanes against Satans motions to self-murder Page 250 Melancholick persons killing themselves Page 250 Melancholick people in danger of self-murder and why Page 254 Memory How by meanes of his memory man suffers Page 165 Men self-blinded Page 209 Merchant Of merchant men Page 139 Minde how the mindes distemperarature procures indirect self-murder Page 110 The minds calamities Page 217 Ministery of the word and its use Page 29 Mischance Of killing ones selfe by mischance Page 173 Mis-spend How men mis-spend their lives Page 19 Moderation of war for Religion Page 144 Mortifying humiliation a good revenge upon ones selfe Page 234 Motions of self-murder to be abhorred 18. They are most hardly shaken off Page 182 Motions of the devill causing self-murder 246. How knowne to bee from him Page 248 Of motions of self-murder entertained 257. Horrible motions to be withstood Page 314 Motives to self-murder c. 15. throughout Page 191 Murder In murder things observable 48. murders vilenesse 49. what it destroyes ibid. Whence murder comes 51. What kind of act it is how man is restrained from it 52. How murder is not to be desired to be done upon us Page 274 Murderers of others murder themselves by the same act Page 53 Mutes Of standers mute at Triall refusing to answer legally Page 96 Mutilation of body procuring self-murder Page 110 N Natures opposition to true obedience Page 63 Nature is against self-murder Page 269 283 Naturall How naturall life is known 6. wherein mans naturall life consists 8. The sweetnesse of it the losse of it painfull and horrible 9 How it is deare and pretious the degrees of it 10. How it is well spent and ill spent 19. How it is taken away Page 44 Necessity Vrgent necessity may make men adventurous of their lives Page 128 Necessaries The want of necessaries for the body Page 213 Neglect of outward meanes of life Page 60 Neglect of the power of the meanes of spirituall life Page 60. Neglect of meanes is tempting of God Page 95 Of neglect of duties Page 260 Negative righteousnesse Page 65 Nocent or criminall persons how and when to discover themselves Page 137 O Obedience Of actuall obedience the grounds 36. the kinds Evangelicall and Legall Page 61 Want of obedience and reasons of it Page 62 How the obedience of the Gospell differs from the obedience of the Law Page 71 Of obedience and disobedience to unjust suspension and deprivation Page 148 Of unlawfull obedience Page 162 Obey Disobedients to God forward to obey the devill Page 206 Our care to obey the truth Page 210 Observe What self-murderers observe Page 187 Observant To bee observant of occurrences Page 181 Observations from indirect self-murder Page 155 Obstinate Self-murderers are obstinate Page 187 Old-man Our old-man of sin we should kill and how done Page 54 Omission A fourefold omission of dutie 60. Of sins of omission Page 62 Omission deprives man of life eternall Page 64 By omission how indirect self-murder is committed Page 91 Of the not omission of necessary duties upon perill of life Page 146 Opportunity self-murderers observe Page 187 Oracles occasioning self-murder Page 202 Over-charging ones selfe in doing good Page 21 Outward blessings are a ground of cheerefulnesse Page 14 P Parricide and whence it proceeds Page 256 Passions To contrary passions all earthly things are subject Page 3. Immoderate passions kill Page 123 Of passions disappointed Page 219 Patient suffering for Gods truth Page 38 Pelagia That Pelagia and such others that killed themselves were not self-murderers Page 205 Perishing That all perishing soules are self-murdered Page 57 Perseverance upholds spiritual life Page 41 Person Where the person of a man is after his death Page 50 Our persons destroyed by self-murder Page 272 Perversenesse of man Page 170 Perverted judgement hinders spirituall life 66. and occasions self-murder Page 192 Philolaus his opinion against self-murder Page 277 Phrensie the cause sometime of self-killing Page 250 Spirituall phrensie whence it arises Page 251 Phrenticks in their fits killing themselves Page 174 Physick and how it is to be used Page 14 92. 111 Platoes opinion against self-murder Page 279 Pleasure and profit hinder obedience Page 63 Practise Of unwarrantable practise of Physick and Chirurgery Page 111 Practise gives denomination Page 175 Praise Of vaine praise of self-murderers 194. and of praise more largely Page 242 Prayer a preservative of life 12. the neglect of it how hurtfull Page 94 Prayer is a help to know the Scripture 200. Of a self-murderers antecedent prayer before the fact Page 206 Of prayer to prevent self murder Page 315. 323 324 Preaching Of Common-place and metamorphozed preaching Page 196 Predestination blameless of mans destruction Page 156 Preferment How preferment hinders spirituall life Page 66 Premeditation of self-murder Page 185 Presumption Of presumption Page 67. 310 Prevent To prevent self-murder
old man There is a lawfull and commanded killing of our selves For understanding whereof it is to be observed that every one of us hath in him a self-old-man of sinfulnesse lively and powerfull in manifold lusts and wicked actions of which the Apostle tells us Rom. 7.5 That when we were in the flesh the motions of sinnes which were by the Law did worke in our members to bring forth fruit unto death when the Commandement came sinne revived the living whereof doth kill us In this case even for our owne preservation it is necessary and lawfull for us to kill our self-old-man with the lusts thereof as the Apostle commands us to mortifie our memhers that the body of sinne might be destroyed we should put off the old man Ephes 4.22 Col. 3.9 so that we should become dead to trespasses and sinnes wherein formerly we were dead The kinds of it This killing of our selves is metaphoricall and morall by which death we are made alive For if we doe not thus die wee cannot live as the sowne corne must first die before it can live and grow Comparison Hovv done 1. In Christ This our self-old-man is slaine by three severall acts or blowes First the same after a sort was crucified in Christ Rom. 6.6 That the body of sinne might be destroyed although not the individuall persons but the common nature of mankind aslumed by Christ did suffer death in him 2. By change of our estate in Justification Secondly our self-old-man is killed by change of our state upon our grafting into Christ by faith so that we are in that respect said to be dead to the Law by the body of Christ Rom. 7.4.6 and that we are dead to the Law that we might live unto God Gal. 2.19 this is done at one entire act or blow in the act of our justification so by this death freeing us from him that hath the power of death even the devill 3. By the Spirit Thirdly our self-old-man and the lusts thereof are killed as touching the dominion and corruption of them by the Spirit of God in the act of sanctification touching which the Apostle tells us Rom. 8.13 That if we through the Spirit doe mortifie the deeds of the body which is the worke of our whole life we shall live How we are actors in it This killing of our self-old-man should be done by our selves being the executioners of it by assistance of divine power from God in three severall acts 1. First by our act of savingly beleeving in Christ whereby our state is changed from death to life 2. Secondly by our constant indeavours to be conformed to Gods Image and will by daily renovation 3. Thirdly by our continuall warfare against our corruptions and temptations touching which the Apostle saies that the flesh lusteth against the spirit and the spirit against the flesh Gal. 5.17 they are so contrary the one to the other that there is no living for either of them but by the death of its opposite neither is there any peace untill one of them be dead Observe The use of our Christian armour Wee should therefore ever use our Christian armour and imploy our utmost indeavours to destroy our self-old-man against which if we doe turne the edge of our spirituall sword to slaughter it with the lusts thereof we shall be diverted not onely from unjustly killing of others but much more from killing our selves in any other respect but when we as Saul doe spare the life of this Agag or self-old-man it causes us by a just hand of God to fall upon our selves to take away that life of our owne which we should both spare and cherish §. 4. Diverse observations from the generall consideration of self-murder Observ 1. Man is in greatest danger From the consideration of self-murder we may observe First that man stands in more danger of destruction than any other creature for no creature is subject to attempts against the life of it by it selfe but onely man who is invironed also with mortall dangers from without but specially of his owne procurement by opening the way for others to invade and hurt him by breaches and armes of his owne making 2. God vvants not executioners of his justice Secondly wee here see that God wants not meanes of execution of his judgements upon man seeing he can leave a man to fall upon himselfe and be his owne executioner Vse Feare God The use hereof is to make us afraid to offend God or to provoke him to be our enemie or to live unreconciled with him destitute of the assurance of his peace and favour Distrust our selves Neither are we over-confidently to trust our selves with our selves of whom wee have so little assurance for security and safety from self-mischiefe and therefore we are carefully to cleave to God for preservation praying him not to give us up to our selves who are mercilesly cruell to our selves when wee fall into our owne hands for the neerer that any are linked and knit together in condition or affection the more desperately opposite they are when they fall into division because of the want of a fit medium or mediatour of reconciliation betweene a mans selfe and himselfe what meane is there either to keepe himselfe from himselfe or to reconcile himselfe to himselfe when himselfe is fallen out into murdercus resolutions against himselfe CHAP. 8. Of spirituall self-murder in speciall §. 1. All perishing soules are self-murdered Soule-murder OF self-murder thus generally defined there are two kinds or specialls to wit spirituall and bodily Although some may be said to be murderers of other mens soules by their scandalous practises or by their corrupt doctrine or by depriving them of the meanes of their salvation and the like yet no soule can perish without the intervening and concurring of the assistance and meanes of him that owes that soule whereby it comes to paffe that all soules that miscarry are in some sort Is also self-murder self-murdered For although it is against nature to desire to bee absolutely miserable and that he should in his last existing in his last principles bee undone or wretched albeit he may affect the dissolution of his personall subsisting upon intention and hope by his change to bee bettered in his future estate subsisting in his remaining principles yet he may wittingly and willingly doe that which may be the destruction of his soule although he doth not intend that effect and so commit not direct but indirect self-soule-murder §. 2. Spirituall self-murder defined What spirituall self-murder is Now that wee may know what it is Spirituall self-murder is the killing of a mans soule or spirituall life by himselfe or his owne meanes That which distinguishes this from bodily self-murder is the subject killed which is the soule or spiritual life not that the soule essextially considered or its naturall life of being and