unregarded weather-beaten tattered Noble in nothing but in the Moss of time and the Moulds of Bullets discharged against but repelled by them Though I say this may be the mis-fortune of deserving men Sir H. Wottons letter to the Duke of Buckingham who yet are like those â—ell-fishes which sometimes they say oversleeping themselvs in an ebbing water feel nothing about them but a dry shore when they awake Yet in Heaven whither O Nobles and Gentlemen I hope by the mercy of God many of you will come there will be as no preterition of you nor no separation from your glory so will your glory keep your vertues in constant actuation Omnes virtutes erunt ibi in effectu potenitalitate tarditate ac difficultate operandi omnino sublatis erunt itaque in continuâ— actualitatis suae Gulielâ—us Parisiensis c. 1 de trib Sanctorum And when you have considered this compensation promised and certain your mortal varieties of state ought not so much to fear you to encounter with as your immortal stability and unalterableness encourage you to overcome them And is not God a good Master and the thoughts of him a notable cordial to provoke you to despise 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 De corpore Christi Stus Athanasius Orat. de Salutari adventâ— Salvatoris advers Apollinar p. 648. Tom. 1. and carry you thorow whatever this life which Athanasius calls a sequestration from glory can inamour you with by its power or discourage you in by its policy which is nothing at all to a good man whose treasure is magazin'd where nothing malicious or injurious can come yea in spight of which God will speak peace by the voyce of conscience whose meâ—â—age is as solacing as that to Leo the ninth was Ego cogito pacis cogitationâ—s non afflictionis Platina in Leone 9. I think the thoughts of peace and not of affliction For God makes this World to Holy men what the Father calls affliction 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Stus Basil. Selenciae Orat 6. p. 37. The Schole of Vertue the Safe of Nature in which are deposited the Laws Rights of it the admired shadows the victorious Tree of the Cross. SECT XLIV Shews That by thinking of God and the account Nobles and Gentlemen are to make to him better preparation is made for Death THirdly Quantumlibt enim vivat diutius somnium sibi esse videtur quod vixit cum moritur non ergo longaevitatem homo hic habet ubi quandoques moriâ—urus est Anselmus lib. de similitud c. 58 by this ye Nobles and Gentlemen shall the better prepare for the suddenness and inevitability of death which being the wages of sin and the doom of God upon culpable nature is to be expected till and welcommed when it comes for alas what is life which death is the intruder upon and the determiner of but a wind that soon passes a vapour presently dissipated a tale ending while telling a Flower in a moment faded a Flash of Lightning as instantly departed as darted a bubble that with the least touch is prick'd and flatted and when life so tender and mercenary to every trifle is trod upon by death and trampled upon by its insultings then all the Pageantries of mens visible greatnesses gives way to their recess into silence and forgetfulness the meditation of this Epictetus commends to men 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Euchyrid c. 23. as that which renders life not much to be desired or death much to be feared for in that life is rather lent and deposited by God with us then given to us as Retrarchs notion of it is wisdom calls upon men to reckon themselves ever accountable Homo quippe vitae commodatus est non donatus sapiens in hac vitaa sic dies studeâ— agere transitorias ut in futura dieâ— aeternitatis inveniat Petrarch lib. 1. de vera sapientia and to be willing to return it every moment which is confirmed by holy Moses whose desire for Israels useful and practical good was That they were wise to consider their latter end and I suppose upon this ground is that of the Wiseman Better go into the house of mourning then into the house of laughter because the mourning house is disciplinary of mortality and referential to that fatal period which sin and sorrow the two unhappy Twins of life have set to them Indeed sin is so natural to life and so true â—n alliance of sorrow that it is not ordiâ—arily possible to separate their conjunctiâ—n or to disanul their cognation Hence â—t is that because we are all in the shadow of death life being but glittering death Iob 10. 11. Iob 30. 23. and death as it were but ecclipsed life all â—hat man who is born can look for here 〈◊〉 to die that is to ravle off the bottom of his daies and to become what he was when he was not man that is dust and to â—he expectation of this nature and expeâ—ience do every day manifoldly summon â—nd lesson him For in that we see all â—ges all conditions all sexes render themselves prisoners to death how Noble is it to die daily and to cherish life but as a present good not worth delighting in or progging for further then as the season to sow what in eternity we would â—eap Death being thus stated and certain God has mercifully seconded Nature with his premonitions to man how to encounter and overcome the force and fear of it and that by not only meditating upon Gods decree For all men once to dye but also by pawsing upon those written parts of Gods pleasure introducing to the maine conclusion Thus we are told of Sorrows of death compassing us Psal. 18. 4. and of being in the valley of death Psal. 23. 4. of being harassed with the terrours of death Psal. 55. 4. Of being brought neer the gates of death Psal. 107. 18. before we sleep the sleep of death and are not these notable Monitors to vigilance and excitations to watch against deaths approach to us as a thief in the night of our security in the Moment of our unpreparation in the midst of our dreams of dainties dalliance and sensuall sinfulness and ought not the possibility of this dismal approximation of death in this moment before the next put us upon prayer to God to fit us for himself 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Arrianus Epictâ—t lib. 2. c. 5. p. 179. by giving us new hearts and forgiving us our old sins that we may be living for him dye in him and after death reign for ever with him Ought not the discovery of the truth that man who is born must dye Perswade us to live and doe and think and dye as those who have Magnaminity and are inspired with thoughts above fearing death or charging God with indurable love or determining goodness For in that he suffers revolutious to be he does not impair his power or kindness but improves
them as by them he makes way for the worlds Circumâ—erence and the succession of the Elementary Vigour in its Specifique appearance and respective usefulnesse Hearken to this O ye who pish at the day of death and live as if ye were born ever to live and never to dye and be judged and Condemned for an evill life and an impenitent death Consider this â—ee Nobles and Gentlemen The mortality of whose ancestors has made way for your being and bravery and since ye being born of corruptible seed must be corruptible in your bodies do not live as if you never meant to dye or come for an evil life to judgement Can you hold out the seige of deaths terrours and repell the force of his assaults can you peep into the Counsells of the Almighty and seize his judgments for your prisoners are your eyes all light your feet all wing your fingers all force your weapons all steele your armour all proof can you make time stand at your big words or diseases keep off for your grim looks Have ye the art to fix the fluency of life wrapping up its motion in a punct of consistence beyond which it shall not stirr are yee Masters of those millions of accidents that your sins have 〈◊〉 against made mischievous to and masterfull over ye Can ye corrupt the last Judge Can ye dwell with everlasting burnings Can ye turn your sins red as scarlet to become white as Wool Are ye stronger then he that made the world and all in it Or wiser then he that rules the world and all the concerns of it Or durabler then he that is from everlasting to everlasting If thus ye be furnished then reproach his Champion Marshall your Forces produce your Artillery beat up the Drums and sound the Trumpets of your defiance and reverse the sentence of death by Force and enact your priviledge from the fate and certainty of death But if ye have less force to encounter lesse prudence to regulate lesse certainty to overbear and vanquish death 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Thucyd lib. 2. p. 158. then death has to subdue you and your Fancyed greatnesse Then kisse the Son of God while you are in the day and on the way of life to death and so compose your selves in life against your change That your death may not become your torment nor your dissolution your despair O Consider God holds the glass of time in his hand and as he has appointed to â—very thing its season so is it to act and not otherwayes and though in the course of nature Youth has a larger Circuit and greatnesse a probabler trench â—bout it then age or meanness has which â— as it were naked exposed to every hazâ—rd yet so can God errand accidents â—nd so leaven the advantages that most â—rprise and detain you That they shall â— miserable Comforters to you What deâ—ght do Titles and Honours give to â—e torture of the cout Or what ease â—o Treasures or Mannors present to the â—exation and anguish of the stone What â—eliefe does the fame of strong beautiful â—eloved Minister to the torment of a â—roken limb or what comforts come to a â—angreen'd body from Fomentations of â—â—sts and Baths of pleasure Doe the â—â—lls of Couscience own suppling from â—ires of Musick or the Hells of despair â—â—ap cooling from merry company doth â—ot God often reach Pharoah's power â—nd pride with Armies of Insects and â—ortify the First born of Countryes to â—proach the folly of Mortall insolence â—ould Herods Oratory that spake him a â—od free him from dying like a man or â—â—ther like a beast Or Selymus the Firsts â—mbition who vowed conquest of Europe â— of Asia Turkish History p. 561. not meet with a Canker that â—ulled him back to buriall He that can â—ise up death and envigour faintnesse â— Cebelits to be his Executioner upon the p. 209. victorious Amurath and can disselse the subtilty of Duns Scotus by an Apoplexy which shall conclude his Learning with his life he that is the Lord of life and death and does whatsoever he pleases in order to life and death he only is the Fountaine of content and the hope and happinesse of the Soul and to him and to his joyes we are carryed by death and hereupon because death is beneficiall to good men it is desired entertained resigned to Mors timenda non est quia vita adimitur sed quoniam acerba mors nihil aliud est quam vitae sceleratae Carnisex dictâ—m Bruxilli morientis ad Senatuâ—â— Guevara Horolog Princip lib. 1. c. 6. by them with all chearfulnesse The very Heathen said Death was not tâ— be feared because it determined life buâ— because a bitter death was nothing else buâ— the Executioner of a wicked life And Christians inasmuch as Christ has by tasting death sweetned it to and victor'd iâ— for them ought to meet it at Gods time and upon his account with joy and spiriâ—tual Triumph as it is Vehiculary of theâ— to Christ as it is the conclusion of theiâ— sorrowes and the buriall of their sins as it is the expedient that only can unit their hopes and feares their faith witâ— their fruition whereupon St. Bernarâ— writing to his friend uses this Meditatioâ— I would have thee if not escape yet not at aâ— to fear death sor a holy man though he caâ—not sometimes avoid death yet ever ought â— â— beware fear of it Volo te mortem etsi non effugere certe vel non timere justus quippe mortem si non cavet tamen non pavet bona mors si peccato moriarts justitiae vivas Bona mors justi propter requiem melior propter novitatem optima propter securitatem mala mors peccatorâ—m in mundi amissione pejor in carnis separatione pessima in vermis ignis duplicis contritione Stus Bernardus Ep. 104. ad Gualteruns de Calvo monâ—e for if it be a good death â—hich a good man dyes to sin and lives to â—ighteousnesse it is an ill fear that makes a â—an avoid so Good an expression of Gods â—race and mercy the death of a holy man is Good for therest he hath from his labours â—etter for the change he hath of his life his â—bour his Company his reward best for 〈◊〉 security he hath against lapse or â—â—verter of evill to him whereas the â—eath of the wicked man is bad in the â—ss of the world his Paradise worse in the â—peration of his Flesh worst in the worm of â—â—nscience and fire of Hell which after it he â—ust everlastingly be punished in Thus St. â—ernard And is death thus advantageous to â—ood men then is the thought of death the â—ost necessary and healthfull theme the â—ul at its senses can take Comfort from â—ust death come because it is appointed â—y God the wages of sin Must the seâ—ond death follow where in the sting and â—orrour of it the first is not passed Must â—e day of death be
v. 11. Cardinal I saw cause to fear God and I were not at a truce but when I was made Pope then I almost despaired ever to see God with comfort So Pope Clement the Eighth was wont to bemoan himself Let not God have cause to say to your upbraid The poor receive the Gospel when Ye Rulers believe not on my Son but reject the Counsel of God against your selves Fishermen have left their nets and forsaken all to follow me when those that have great Possessions think it a hard saying so to command and resolve not to be guilty of the folly to obey it Silly women ministred to my Son in his disertion when the great Counsellors and Doctors were afraid to own him boldly or to come to him openly Poverty does Sinite ergo sinite Sapienti hujus seculi de spiritu sapientiae hujus mundi tumentes alâ—a sapere terraÌ„ lingentes sapienter descendere in infernum vâ—s autem dum foditur peccatori fovea sicut cepistis stulti facti propter Deum per stultum Dei quod sapientius est omnibus hominibus duce Christo humilem apprehendite disciplinam ascondendi in coelum Sauctus Bernatdus Epist. ad Fralres do monte Dei. often cast a charitable mite into my Treasury when Plenty and Abundance are close-fisted Do not O do not stand upon your terms with God and dispute your Priviledge till his patience wave you and you with all your Greatness and Wisdom descend into Hell amongst all that forget God and themselves But do ye as wise and holy Souls stoop to Gods terms and accept his conditions not thinking it below you to be vile in your own that you may be lovely in his eyes who gave you yours to see him and will make them happy in seeing him after you have served him Let nâ—â— God complain his gifts of gold are in your â—â—hinets become dross and his â—â—naments on your outward Splendour become Instruments to your inward and outward Rebellion against him Remember Queen Eliz. 2 Speech to the Parliament â—9 regni that renowned Monarch who said When first I tool the Scepter my Title made â—e not forget the Giver and think him best worthy your temporal Greatness in all the emanations of it who hath prepared for you â—â—ansions with himself and be MuliuÌ„ quidem meruiâ— de nobis qui immeritis dedit seipsum nobis Sanct Bern. Tract de diligendo Deo willing to invest his Glory with your Robes of State It ho hath provided for you the Robes of his Sons righteousness and in the glory of that will set you on his Right hand Be not offended I beseech Non numero Hispanos nec robore Gallos nec calliditate Paenos nec artâ—bus Graecos sed pietate ac religione atque hac una sapicntia quod deorum immortaliuÌ„ numine omnia regi gubernarique perspeximus omnes gentes nationesque superavimus Cic. Orat. de Aruspicium responsis you at this my Address as if I wished you to your loss or presented with what is beneath you to accept 'T is no Pedantry I provoke you to but the noblest Act of Divine Generosity and Magnanimity you can express Think O think nothing beneath you that is a service to Him who is farr above Principalities and Powers compared to whom your Honour is but Baseness your Riches but Poverty your Wisdom but Folly your Power but Weakness your Duration but Momentaryness Recall to mind that Great Monarch and Grave Christian Who esteemed it the greatest Title and chiefest Glory to be the Defender of the Church both in its true Faith and its Eicon Bafilic e 14. just Fruitions equally abhorring Sacrilege and Apostacy Is Gods Harvest great Be ye in what you can the Lords Harvesters present honest learned and pious Clerks to your Livings and countenance them in Hearken to this that God may hearken to you their Ministerial Labour deserve by sharing with them in the work of mens conversion to share with them in the reward of Gods Promise Be the Lords Helpers who has helped you to be Lords and Gentlemen the Angels your Equalls are serviceable hereto O draw not back the shoulder Is Gods cause in danger Take courage and let the Stars be your President who fought in their order to help the Lord against the Mighty O be ye not unactive in this Heroicism Is the life of Christ in Humility Meekness Purity Patience Obedience and Constancy traduâ—ed and blasphemed by the Sins and Conâ—idictions of enormous men Be ye as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was Noah Gold glittering in the midst of his Ages mud bright virtue in a grave of night â—â—d death partake not with them in their Sanct. Basil. Selencia Orat. 5. Basphemy and enmity but live to their consutation rule to their suppression exâ—end your selves to their conviction appear openly to their confront and let them Liquet â—ergo absque scientia dignitatem esse inutilem scientiam absque virtute damnabilem Sanct. Bern. Tract de diligendo Deo â—ot alone till you have brought them off the evil of their wayes and brought them 〈◊〉 to submit to the yoke to lye down at the feet to come at the call and run at the command of God in his word and upon the motions of his Spirit in the Dictates of â—well-informed and regular conscience When you are to resist sins bear your arms in your eyes that the pride of not underâ—aluing your selves may make you abstenious but when God commands you to duty carry with Noble Bradeas your Armes in your shoos trample upon any diâ—ersion any high thought that exalts it self against the courage and gratitude you owe to him Shall one brave Roman venâ—ute to ride armed into the deep Pit where he and his horse and armes inevitably are swallowed up And shall another I mean Horatius Cocles and his two Companions encounter the whole Army of the Hetrurians and keep the pass over the Bridge that led to Rome till the Bridg behind them was cut off and that done leapt into Tyber venturing his life in the water which he had so strenuously hazzarded on the Land Shall these and such other Chieftains of Fame dare to bid more for the Breaths and Pens of Men to be well-spoken and well-written of as Heroiques and Virtuoso's of Nobility And dare you express the cowardize not to offer your selves to God to be the footstools of his Throne the door-keepers of his House the dancers before his Ark the Champions of his Battells O think not Egregiâ—s viros dico quâ—s è grâ—ge hominum vulgarium aliqua abstraxit excellentia Dei justitia sanctitas insigais quod heu nostra aetate perrarum est vel rei militaris experientia ac liberorum copia rerumque notitia singulares sâ—cit Petrarchâ— lib. de Reip. administratione your Right-eyes your Right-hands your Parts your Fortunes your Relations or your Honours too
having set an end to all their desires and seen a period of all their labours by the enfranchisement of their departure become from Earths villaines and lifes vassals Gods freemen yea Kings and Priests to God The just consideration whereof if the dictates of pure nature and the assurances of Gods word had any power with men would lenify the thoughts of deaths trouble in the worlds adiew and the body and Souls dissociation because the incontinuity of them does but resolve them into their respective Principle the Body retiring to the dust from whence it came and the Soul to God that gave it Nor is any man happy in life further then he has provided for a good death or in death if he have not the testimony of a good yet of a penitent life my meaning is if before he dye the errors of his life be not expiated for in the palliations of his guilt and Gods ignoscency of them and in the acceptation of his sorrow and person with Gods agnition of him for a dyer in him That is in the beliefe and assurance of his forgivenesse and filiation which once had the soul cannot but trample upon despondency and bid defiance to despair since Christ justifies it is too late for any to condemn if life makes us debtors to nature the whole Creation being but as one lump of power and mercy masshed together in the common fatt and fate of vicissitude and the providence and wisdom of God brewing us together till we work out the Lees of sin and nature and become defecate or as neer it as the pleasure of our maker design'd us to arrive at and by our respective proportions to auxiliat the productions and gradations of succession towards perfection then to dye when we have lived our time and out-lived our innocence by as many degrees as we have at all lived is but the payment of our debt to nature and the surrender of our forfeiture to God and we are to account that a Good death which not so much takes away as betters life because it does rather advance the Soul then depresse the body Bona mors quae vitam non aufert sed transfert in melius bona qua non corpus cadit sed anima sublevatur rerum enim cupiditatibus vi vendo non teneri humanae virtutis est corporum verò similitudinibus speculando non involvi angelicae puritatis est utrumque tamen divini muneris est utrumque excedere teipsum transcendere est Stus Bernardus Serm. 52. in Cant. Cant. for to be in Soul an Angell while in state a man is to be an arriver at what ever God requires and man can attain to in this under-age of Glory And O Nobles and Gentry If death be thus Emolumental if it be the Ladder to heaven if it be the disarray of those uneasy harnassings that sin and life put upon you such as Iob oft calls shaking of the bones Iob. 4. 14. piercing the bones Ch. 30. ver 17. and David calls vexing the bones Psalm 6. 6. If it brings no rest to the bones Psal. 38. 3. breaks the bones Psal. 51. 8. if it streightens the compass and disedges the Divine soul and its faculties in their raptures and sallies and fill the heart with grief the eye with tears and the countenance with wanness and disspiriting then to be by death enlarged and to have a separation of a troublesome match Vivebas antea O beata anima sed in specioso carcere nunc immensus aether palatium est vidâ—bas sed non nisi per fragiles atque angustas corporeae Massae â—enestras nunc liberè sine transenna sine velamine audiebas sed per sinâ—osos aurium meaus mortalium eos ingâ—atos sape sermones nunc dulcissimam caelorum Harmoniam aeternarum intelligentiarum concentus precipis Ludovicus Fabritius in Orat Inaugurali super moâ—â—em Domini de Saletione and an assignation of body and soul to their proper Spheres is to be released from both the labour and the guilt of sin and to be in the road and upon the march to the Hercules pillar beyond which there is nothing but hope of being more belief of becomming more then you unclarifiedly are and is not this a great motive to be ready to dye and to be advanced by dying well 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Stus Basilius Mag. p. 229. for as the Sea and the wind and the stars and the compasse and the industry of Seamen and the titeness of the ship well rigg'd well steered are all furtherances to the one attainment of the Port Habitatio ista nec deserviret hominibus ut patria cum in ea nullus nasceretur nec deserviret ut exilium cum in ea nullus exulare mereretur Gulielm Parisiens parte 1. de universo part 3. c. 48. nor do men ordinarily come thither safely and seasonably but by the subserviency of these to the purpose and project of the mind where the designs upon the port are united so neither does any man attaine the Vision of God the Clarification of his nature the Comprehension of happinesse but by the passe of death Which lets us out of toyle and combate into pleasure and quietnesse And that not as pleasure and quietnesse is notioned here which is Planetary and moving as well as tired with vexation and confusion but as it is in Gods presence fullnesse of joy and pleasure for evermore Thus shall a good death befriend the providers for it who only have Confidence in and comfort from it For though God did translate a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Stus Basil Mag Orat. p 65. ol 1. Enoch without sight of death as an example by himselfe of a Celestial man who in a sort lived above sin and was taken away without death yet the grave is the usuall Supersedeas to life and death the Port of Mans march off and therefore since nature piety and the interest of both tends to death to set your souls O ye Nobles and Gentry in Order to receive deaths charge is to discharge your selves of being surprised and to receive your charger and enemy with Courage and by victorying his terrours to be victors of the joyes consequent to it which St. Paul intended in that Epinichion which he athletarily chanted out 1 Tim. 4. 7. I have fought the good fight I have finisht my course I have kept the faith Henceforth is laid up for me a Crown of righteousnesse SECT XLV Evidences that to meditate of God and the great concerns of the Soul is the way to come unto and come off from Iudgment Honourably MY last and not least Argument to beseech ye O Nobles and Gentry to think of God and of the great concerns of your soules is that thereby ye may come off honourably in the day of judgment 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Stus Basil. Mag. Epist. ad virgin laps p. 755. operum 2 Thes. 2. 8.
for their merit of the Nation For while others vapour on their Sejan horse of idle and vicious unfortunateness See my discourses of Arms and Armory printed An. 1660. these command the Trojan Horse out of which march continually the Hellio's of Learning the Hectors of courage the Critiques in Law the Magistrates in Towns the Nobles and Gentry in Parliament and Country The Nation is now peopledmore then heretofore and necessity giving aym to ingenuity there are now more courses of imployment and entertainment taken and approved then quondamly and as all sumptuary Lawes are vanished by the mixtures of gentry with the plebs in Corporations so ought all grudge between the Country and the City Gentry to be castated for that is the best Mine of Treasure in the Nation which advances men from low beginnings to eminent growths and leaves their posterity rich and respectfull after them And what would have become of the younger Brothers of England after the cessation of the Civill Wars by the Union of York and Lancaster in H. 7. of happy memory and ofter the dissolution of Religious houses by H. 8. In both which they were bestowed and from them supported If Sciences Trades and Callings of Civill request had not taken them up is easie to say either reason of State must have turned them to a forraign Warre or they must have lived at home upon the prey either of their elder brothers or of the Countrey SECT IX Discourseth of good Company and the great Addition and Benefit it is to free vertuous and liberall growth of Men and Families FIfthly To the former add good Company un-vicious and ingenious For since Man is a sociable creature whose time is best whiled away and his cross fates digested by the help of conversation and the pleasancy of company Company that abounds with those conjunct vertues which fertilize and adorn life and make men usefull to and honoured by the age they live in is most to be desired obliged and adhered to Cum plaâ—idissimo facillimo minime anxio morosoque vivendum est Sumuntura conversantibus mores ut quaedam in contactos amorem vini traxit ita animus mala sua proximit tradit Senec. lib. 3. de irâ—c 8. which the great Moralist observes to my hand With the most sweet tractable and least sowre companion men wisely court to live because their own manners are formed from their associates and such either in good or evil are men usually as their mates are So he Indeed life without society is but a motive death and a sensitive insenseness like a watch which has all the hours of the day inscribed on its Circumferential Table and has a finger to direct to every hour of Circulation but no spring within to carry about its finger according to the directed order So at a loss is man without company and those proper and adapt to him that the quickness of his parts being abated by absence of the edge of their presence example and of that little ambition of rivalry which is amongst them while he studies he loyters while he gathers he loses whiles he endeavours to be something he proves indeed nothing but lumpish stupid inexpert ignorant of men the best Expositors and sweetners of Books and the second noble expence of time Which has caused the judicious in all ages and Nations to fix their mayn content and conversational felicity on Company which is called between Man and Woman marriage between Men and Men friendship for this is so strict and severe a compago and in-laying of soules that it is not only hard to discern any character of inunion or to peep into the secrecy of their piecing but impossible to conclude them any thing else but a coanimation of divers numerical soules into one and the same single and undivided souliness The consideration of which choice and connexion of Companions by the bond of friendship made Senca conclude Detrahit amicitiae majestatem suam qui illam parat ad bonos casus Ep. 9. that when it is calculated only for and limited to prosperity it hath lost its Majesty and therefore is it the obâ—ectament of life because it is a fellowship of soules in community of Fortunes what ever they are Which Seneca describes fully Friends saith he be of coincident hearts making the common secrets of each other the Iewels of their retirement punctuality who prove themselves precisely such as transcend the suspition of imparity Nihil aeque oblectaverit animum quam dulcis â—idelit amicitia quantum bonum est ubi preparata sunt pectora in quae tuto secretum omne descendat quorum conscientiam minus quam tuam timeas horum fermo solicitu dine leâ—iat conâ—silium expediat hilaritas tristitiam dissipet conspectus ipse delectâ—t lib. de Tranq c. 7. whose speech is a relief to solitude and are in Counsels Oracles in presence pleasures in absence grounds of confidence that they shall meet the same in kindness and cordiality that they were at parting This is Friendship which provoked a Synesius lib. de regno p. 11. Mea inquit in Antonium majora merita sunt illius in me beneficia notiora itaque discrimine vestro me subâ—raham ero preda victoris Paterculus lib. 2. p. 60. edit Lipsii Synesius to term this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This Friend as a mans own soul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Kingly present and to cry out 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Who a pleasanter partaker of prosperity and a patienter consort in adversity who more upright in praise and more affectionate in reproof then a friend who like Asinius Pollio raised by Mark Antony and commanded by Caesar his enemy to attend him in the Actian War replied thus to him Sir My deserts of Antony are greater and his bounty more resented by and obliging upon me then to permit my so doing Behold I submit to your pleasure and withdraw my self from all appearance that you may not fear me who render my self a spoyl to your victory Thus he in testimony to the efficacy of friendship which because it is most confirmed by daily converse frequent compotation sameness of humour and end therefore is company so to be chosen by men that would reap the royal fruit and harvest of it as that the procerity of vertue the virgin verdure of sincere Ingenuity in the native marks of worthy and wel attended Generosity may appear herein For Company is the Glass in which the beauty or deformity of every mans mind is transparent 't is the crucible in which the loyalty or adulterations of their addictions are tried 'T is the Physick that either purges out peccant humours and abates the menace of them or else leaves dregs of offence to the body by its ill composition and the ineffectuality of its ingredients by reson of which as if men resolve to be evil they must not take good Company to them so
Princes favours for if to them not onely Honours Riches Reputation but even in a sort much of the administrative divinity of Kings is indulged as Theodoric the Gothish King wrote to a Vice-king under him What fidelity ought they express to their benefactor in not neglecting their service disobliging their people misusing their trusts as did Wolsey who fraudulently got a warrant from H. 8. to execute the E. of Kildare though the Lieutenant of the Towers honesty in not executing it made it void by the Kings Countermand a Speed p. 775. p. 849. And Gardiner from Qu. Mary to execute the Lady Elizabeth the after happy Queen of this Land What conscience and reverence to themselves not to do any thing rashly and improvidently by which they may lose their ground and be outed the occasion of so general good For Princes favours being of delicate and casual composure are not to be put to the stress of gross and dull mettalled ones but to be humbly and modestly improved which the wise King Solomon adviseth to He that loveth pureness of heart Prov. 22. 11. Fuit enim illi nobile ingenium furebundi regis Impatiens Senec. Nat. Quest. lib. 6. c. 22. for the grace of his lips the King shall be his friend The failer of which in Calisthenes the Favourite of Alexander lost him both his interest in the King and in his own life That being true of Favourites over-confidence and peremptoriness which a friend of the Earl of Essex Sir Henry Wotton work p. Favourite to Queen Elizabeth told him O Sir These courses are are like hot waters which help at a pang but if they be too often used will spoil the stomach as it was wofully made good in him whose impatience to have any companion in favour with him or any grists of greatness go by the Mill of his only influence declined both his lustre and his life Yea above all what caution are they that have these intrusts to express in avoyding envy Sect. 2. Eicon Bâ—silic upon the E. Sraâ—â—ord Who moving in so high a Sphere and with so vigorous lustre raise many envious exhalations which condensed by popular odium are capable to cast a cloud upon the brightest merit and integrity as the divine Kings words are and to chuse such choice servants and friends whose intâ—grity conscience prudence and industry they being responsible for Holinshed p. 324 p. 511. may not be defeated in and then they will be secure if not from the calumâ—y yet from the desert of envy which had the Spensers in E. 2. time p. 555. the Earl of March temps H. 4. Earl of Arundel and Lord Percy temps R. 2. guarded themselves against they could not have fallen as they did For much suspected by me does no hurt when nothing proved can be is true All which in such measures and proportions as God shall permit their prudences to method to themselves being protected and blessed by him makes Favourites not crazy but hayle and happy in their Princes favour then which there is no speedier way to Rise Riches Nobility Prelacy Splendour and Endowments of all kinds possible to be imagined for though Riches Industry and Frugality give many rounds to the ascents of men yet the Master Caper and the Noblest Capreol to advance is the Kings Favour which as it is too full a blessing for any but a Magnanimous and Royall minded person to disgest and well manage so to such as already have or hereafter may have it I beseech God it may be continued and enlarged for it is an opportunity to serve God the King the people and the havers to all beneficially Noble purposes it being under the King the spring that moves all without which nothing runnes currant but has cheques too many to pass by as is evident in the vivid representation of it in Haman who is said to have his seat set by Abashuerus above all the Princes that were with him Ver. 2. Esther 3. and to command that all the Kings servants should bow before him and his word so prevail'd with the King that he gave him his Royal Signet and said The Silver is given to thee the people also to do with them as it seemeth good to thee Ver. 10 11. and what Haman issues forth is dispatched to the Kings Lieutenants to be accordingly executed Ver. 12 13. In that I say these are the bounties of Princes to their Favourits from whom they seem to withhold nothing but the Throne it self there is great cause to conclude That no way to advance Men and Families is more expedite and energical then Service to and Favour from Princes For if the displeasure of a King be as the messenger of death Prov. 16. 14. and the fear of a King is as the roaring of a Lyon who so provoketh him to anger sinneth against his own soul Pro. 20. 2. If not only in case of Felony or Treason but upon displeasures penalties are not only inflicted upon persons but upon Lands Cambden in Doaset Britan. p. 214. and that indelibly as Mr. Cambden tells us the Lands of Hinde and others in New Forrest were charged and yet pay white hart Silver for killing a white Hart of H. 3. in that Forrest If these terrours and mulcts are in the disfavour of a King whose frown and word has killed the heart of subjects of courage who durst have out-lived any other hardship what joy and freedom is in the Kings favour No less sure then dew upon the grass Prov. 19 12. Ch. 20. v. 8. v. 26. Eccles. 8. 4. no less then scattèring all evil and bringing the wheel over the wicked no less then power and that visible in the testimonies of his favour and the effects of it the prosperity of which is such as the Princes in soul and government are whose the favour is and the design of the soul is who is a suitor for and obtainer of it For as to be in favour with Terrible Princes whose reigns are butcheries and whose instruments must be rigorous and cruel as was Peirce Exton to H. 4. who to be as that Kings words were The faithfull friend which will deliver me of him whose life will be my death and whose death will be the preservation of my life Holinshed in H. 4. p. 517. undertook and effected the execrable and damnable Parricide of good King Rich. 2. is to be a divel in Flesh and a miscreant more unhappy then almost Hell can make one So to be in favour with a vertuous and serene Prince whose soul is so serious and sincere that he dare appeal to God as his Compurgator and beseech God to try and search him if there be any malicious and premeditated iniquity in him and in his government by his privity To be a Favourite to a Prince whose faith in and relyance upon God comforts him Eicon Basil. Sect. 15. That no black veils of calumny shall
flourishes of their Oratory which did hallucinate and becalm men into a credulity of transport and veneration Though God I say did at the first Exoriency of the Gospel thus credit his Implantation of Faith and Holiness which was to subvert all antique settlements and to disgorge all wonted imbibings yet the usual and declared way of God to produce brave persons is from Neat and Noble education of their Childhoods Nor is it often seen that men do prove conspicuous and praise-worthy where their Youths have been lax and loose And therefore Plato prescribes breeding 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Lib. 4. de Repub of Learning and Manliness in Youth to be the only way to make them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Grave and well-poysed souls in age For so penetrative is the tincture of youth that it leavens all the subsequent life with its impression if bad and gives it a pleasancy if good which was not only the opinion of the Garamant Sage to Alexanden who told him his active Manhood was a spire from that root of Ambition which his youth had nourished and his age discovered Viro enim turbis ac contentionibus enutrito ipsa pro quiete inquietudo est Guevara lib. 1. c. 35. Ut liberos daret ingeniosos acutos Crebrum infantiae ploratum adversae mero fortunae esse praesagium Guevara l. 1. c. 11. but even is the experience of all mankind who therefrom take the hints of anticipating evill by prudent means inductive of good And as they presented the God Cautius sacrifices that their children might be ingenuous and acute and to their Vagitanus that they might be cheery and not full of tears they concluding children given much to weep destined to misfortune So did they indespensably train those that they would have brave Souldiers brave Senators to Learning as that which must chiefly nourish them in furnish them for and carry them to the reward of great vertues For Learning as it is an improvement of the Candle of God in a man being a kind of natural Divinity which lets a man into all those varieties of apprehension utterance sagacity policy conduct counsel which bespeaks acceptance procures assurance extrieates difficulties prevents surprises discovers secrets improves Sciences so is it that which without diligence to follow and resolution to obtain will not be arrived to in any conspicuity And therefore Oye Nobles and Gentry let my counsel Note this be acceptable to you Study books convers with wise men get understanding in the Laws of God and of the Nation be humble Christians valiant Englishmen Libros plus quam Saphyros smaragdos câ—aros hobuiâ— quibus Chrisolitorum magnam copiam inesse dicebat Platin. de Pio 2do Pontific Roman learned Artists sincere and true-hearted creatures and you shall have more honour in life and comfort in death from these endeavours and acquisitions then from those mistaken recreations and false delights that are entred upon with trouble carried on with sin and ended in sorrow and infamy For most true in this Case is that of St. Bernard of the Cells of Religious men A Cella euim saepe in caelum ascenditur vix autem unquam à cella in infernum descenditur nisi sicut dicit Psalmista descendunt in infernum viven tes ne descendant morientes Stus Bernard lib. de vita sâ—litaria Ad Fratres de morte dei From the Cell men often ascend up into Heaven seldom do men descend into Hell unless they tast of Hell in their lives afflictions who in their deaths are promised and prepared for endless joyes Which is a notable argument for you not to count Learning pedantry and studying of Books an effemination of courage since Books are as the Noblest representation of Antique valour in the enumeration of their examples dijudication of their motives so in the excitations of the spirit to that time and method of action and expression Nâ—m fuit Socrates Patritius non eques Romanus quem tamen Philosophia non accepit sed nohilem reddidit Senec. ad Lucilium which is most opportune and seasonable Especally since this vertuous Learning was that which made Socrates Servius Tullus Tullus Hostilius and others Noble for blood they had none nor came they from Patritian Ancestors or Triumphers adopting them mean obscure were their parentage yet so glorious and esteemed by their wisdom and vertue did they grow that they were held the wonders of their age and the patterns of excellent Endowments to all successions of men For it is not Robes of Purple nor Mantles of Ermin nor Georges of Quis est autem reâ—um humâ—narum adco imperitus qui hos censeat nobiles appellandos quorum vita quo turpior fuit eo citius suorum Nobilitatem extinxit Platina lâ—b de vera Nobilitate Diamonds nor Spurrs of Gold and Swords keen and well Girt nor gilt Coaches many Lacquies great Mannors gainfull Offices Noble Relations that Make men in the account of rational and real Heraldry Noble and Gentlemen but the knowledge of God and themselves the pions and generous disposition they have to be good and by being such patterns to make others good also To serve mankind by such improvements as Gods mercy and their time parts and accomodation enables them to do that declares them Noble and Generous Holinshed p. 709. Which that brave Prince E. 4. of England well knowing councelled the Lords whom he left his children with thus I commend and deliver into your government both this Noble Realm and my Natural children and your Kinsmen My Children by your diligent oversight and politique provision to be taught informed and instructed not only in the Sciences Liberal Vertues Morral and good Literature but also to be practised in Tricks of Martial activity and diligent Exercise of prudent Policy If you set them to Learning your Governours shall be men of knowledge If you teach them Activity you shall have valiant Captains If they practise Policy you shall have politique and prudent Rulers Thus he And the great Attempts and Conquests of Alexander 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Plutarchus in Parallellis p. 337. Plutarch refers not so much to his Numerous and Valiant Army or to Perdicca Meleager Seleucus and the other brave Commanders that under him mannaged his Army as to Alexanders Wisdom and Learning of Mind and Councel which understanding Things Men and Times made his Motions and Actions conform to them prosperous and taking For when Alexander was dead then the Army mouldred away and did nothing splendid for it was only notable when it had him its head who had Philosophy for his Rule and Valour for his Recreation whose associate Vertue with his Arms made him successful Which brings to my mind that passage of Erasmus That those onely are Noble who adarn their minds with Vertue and fill their heads with Learning and while others give Lyons Eagles Bulls Leopards in their shields as
age might be regarded as the best season that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Plato lib. 12. de Legibus p. 988. Edit Ficini Towards 40. years of age and not then for common persons but for such only as are publique such as Spies Ambassadours Heralds and such as may there lie on purpose at their return to breed up others to the knowledge of what is good and useful in Travaile For when the Judgment is ballasted in point of Religion and they are setled well in the belief of our Reformed Truths which are but the declarations of Catholique credens there will be less danger of their seduction which has long time been the project of the Romish Factors whose practice it is to captivate novices and them to place beyond the Seas in such Convents and Trains as are apt for them of which they make such a Trade that the late Learned Holy and Eloquent Bishop of Norwich Incomparable Bp. Hall Father to to the now Reverend Bp. of Chester See his Quo vaâ—lis p. 641. whom I must to all the world own to be the first provoker of me to compose and write my Virgin penn being the Pedisequa of his devout Meditations He I say has observed it long agoe That one of those Factors for Transfretation of our English youth hath been observed to carry over six several charges in one year and then children naturally taken with toyes and outsides which are pleasing Hogoe's in the Romish Ollio's are apt to be captivated by them beyond the solid Reason Scripture authority or the pious lives and deaths of the professors of Popish Religion So true is that of a learned and witty Doctor Dr. Fuller Holy State lib. 2. c. 4. now with God They that goe over Maids for their Religion will be ravished at the sight of the first Popish Church they enter into but if first thou saith he be well-grounded their fooleries shall rivet thy Faith the faster and Travail shall give thee Confirmation in that Baptism thou didst receive at home So he Yea I am confirmed in the belief that the Statute 1 Iacob 4. 3 Iacob 5 3 Car. 2. all which were inhibitive of sending children beyond the Seas to be Popishly bred are cleanlily avoyded and fairly eluded by this pretence of Travail for breeding Nor shall there need to be any more favour done to Popery then what the fashion and common inclination of persons of quality have to their childrens Travaile gives it Which I wish the wise and great men would look upon as the In-let to the first neglect then diseteem and lastly subversion of our Church and Religion To Travaile also when ever entred upon I wish settlement in Morrals For if the Reines be laid on the neck of Youth which is unbroken and not brought to handiness by good manage how apt is youth to miscarry in its choyce way conclusion I love when men make resolutions to build their Travailes with Gods help as the sons of Seth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Antiquitatum Iudice lib. 1. c. 3. by Iosephus are said to leave their love to Learning and succession on pillars of brick and stone that withstand fire and water the impetuosity of lust and the submersion of Multitudes which like waters are hurried this way and that way as the impulses and breaths of greatness drive them what men of Fortune and Fashion on travaile do that they 'l do also be it never so dissolute and desperate My suffrage accompanies them who bring their practice to the rule of pure nature and improved piety who fear the defamation and abhor the turpitude of irregularity though it be back'd by Greatness foreseeing the fatal setting of those seeming Sun-shines in a night and cloud of dis-lustre Let the Nobles of the Isle of Somabarr in East-India glory in the brand of a red hot Iron on their faces Sir Iohn Mandevils Tâ—avails in testimony of their Honour and other our Gallants of Christendom bring the testimony of their Veneral Valour in the loss of a Nose or in some other visible deformity let them pride in the sin and shame of their travailes they shall be the true Nobles and Gentlemen in my Calendar who keep themselves unspotted from the world who are free from the just Tax of prophane prodigal proud absurd effeminate light sordid from which vices whoever preserves himself in travaile must needs be favoured by God in the restraint of his grace be applauded for faithful to himself in a latitude of careful and diligent circumspection for he that will not experiment the vices of sense must almost not touch not tast not handle it is very difficult to forbear to be bad where one is not afraid to be any thing beneath good nor will he ever be the faithful steward of Gods restraining grace as Mr. Ascham was Preface to his Schoolmaster who delights to stay in Italy above nine daies wherein as his words are in one City Venice he saw more liberty to sin then in London he ever heard of in nine years Therefore Wisdom avoyds Travaile to early the very goodness of which is either Impiety or Superstition Holy Bish. Hall Quo vadis p. 641. Nor will any man be convinced of the danger of a long Elopement but he that has found the bitter sawce of those adulterate mixtures and vicious captivations that associate careless travaile If Seignior Scipioni was a wise man whom Sir Henry Wotton none of the lowest rate men consulted as an Oracle how he should best and safest travaile to Rome answered Your thought close I pensieri stretti il viso sciolto and your countenance loose will goe safely over the whole world If this be as undoubtedly it is good counsel Sir Henry Wotton Elements Architect p. 396. then youths that look at random and talk what comes uppermost which wise men refrain are not expectable to travaile but in danger For experience and years make the fairest Sculptures by being purgations of superfluities and since England has ever been accounted Gods Kingdom I wish from my heart the Nobles and Gentry of England would Consider this in this sense seek this Kingdom of God and the righteousness thereof by breeding their sons more in the knowledge and love of it and not seek other foreine things to be added to them without which I dare say a true Englishman is more Englishly compleat SECT XXXIX That the Great men of England would study most and affect best the Laws Customs and Vsages of England FOurthly I humbly offer to the Great men of England that they would study most and affect best the Laws Customs and Usages of their own Countrey which I under favour take to be a great piece of wisdom in them For since it is natural for ever man to love his own and the innate Interest of propriety calls for the great shares of kindness and benevolence England being the natural and native ayre of
may with Gods blessing further be as to marry their equals so will it be their Honour also to be vertuous Examples to and valewers of their own Wives their own Children and their own Paternal or other acquired abodes and to live with and in them which they will most contentedly do when they love whom they chuse in marriage and devote conscienciously their most generous spirits and kindnesses to them and to them onely the fruit whereof besides peace of conscience salve of Honour increase of Fortune and popular Renown will be contented and kind Wives who like Alceste the loyal Wife of King Admetus will die to redeem his life and like the renowned Queen Philip wife to Edw. 3. Holingshed p 404. whos 's three petitions of the King declare her a Noble Lady Beauteous and observant Children in whose faces and on whose bodies the Sculptures of conjugal Chastity are fairly and symmetriously wrought by the Master-hand of Nature and to whose minds God the Naturater of Nature has assigned suitable Vertues of Holy softness pure Modesty unprovoked Patience humble Meekness commendable Thrift couragious Grandeur domestique Ingenuity resolved Fidelity indefatigable Goodness These having an Indian wealth and a felicity of Paradise associating and attending them will be good seconds to the narrow Fortunes of younger Children Nullum majorem haereditatem possunt filiis parentis tradere quam rerum bene gestarum gloriam integritatis ante actae vitae Iodocus Chicthoneus tract de Nohilitate c. 5. 7. as well as great Contributers to the preferment of elder Children For no Greatness will stick to marry into a Stock that is worthy in Parents Great Grave and Good and in Children worthy them to bring into and breed and bestow in the world For if a Gentleman that has courage to serve in Arms with a Prince be a brother in Arms to him a Gentlewoman that has Vertue to deserve and Prudence to guide it may is well be a Sister nay a Wife in Arms to a Prince to whom she may perform as good service to perpetuate his posterity by the fruit of her body and the fervour of her prayers answered by Gods grace in and blessing upon them as by all other means that reason of State and worldly Interest can imagine set a foot or bring to pass to make him happy This I the rather press because one of the great mistakes and mischiefs of our Age 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Epictetus Euchirid c. 62. is dis-esteem of wives and that upon conceit that any thing if woman serves for a wife if she have but money be she never so otherwise incompleat they think all is well when if men of Honour and Fortune would well weigh the vanity and fallacy of this conception they would abhor the â—ucacity resolve against the prevalence of it for if any thing be valuable in this world it is a Wife and if any thing be in a Wife contributive to a perennity and principality of glory 't is in a worthy and wise wife not such an one as that of â—arnard Newmarch the famous Norman who when her only sonne by Newmarch called Mabell reproved a young Gentleman that was too familiar with his mother took it from her sonne so heynously that to be revenged of him she took a publique solemn Oath that Mabell was not the sonne of Newmarch her husband Cambden Brittania p. 620. but got by another in Adultry This Oath she took before H. 3. which act of hers she grievously paid for for within few years after she was cast into prison and famished there But in such a Wife as does not only adorn life with all friendly and contenting Domestique comforts but conveyes to Posterity the fruits of Piety Chastity Kindness Constancy Frugality and that not only by imparting so much of her soul and body to them as is Emanant from Motherhood wherein her participations are concludable to be more from her long fostering them in her then they can be thought from the father from whom they pass in a Whirl-wind but also from those actions of vertue which she will breed them up to know and exercise And if men of great value and place would not debase themselves by vices and deeds of clancularity in the Gins and Traps of which they are by vulgar persons snap'd and ecclipsed they would find their Honours more valuable their Posterities more proveable their Lives more Exemplary their Death 's more Christian for poor Spirits advanced do know neither Moderation nor Gratitude Quid jactitas genus tuum quem teipsum facis vaga incerta est hominum generatio quandoque putatur filius Principis qui filius est culinarii Histrionis Petrus Blesens Ep. 3. ad Nobilem nor do they think any thing below them whose souls are so lowly minded to be vicious nor are Great Personages by any thing more diminished then when they forget unlikeness the Curse and Disparageâ—ent the Cross of Marriages SECT XLI Suggests the Convenience and Commendation of Great mens living within bounds of their Fortune and by such frugal living not contracting Debts SIxthly That which I shall further humbly beg of them is That they would live on and within bounds of their Fortunes For to spend beyond what is ones own is to borrow of others and to pay them either in the ruine of the Creditor or the misery of their Debtor in his Imprisonment or what 's worse then it an ill Conscience which abuses the Law into Patronage of Injustice For what greater abuse can be offered to the Law which is the Rule of Right then to make Prisons her Punishment to become Sanctuaries to dissolute and injurious men whose Vices have run their Fortunes into Arrears and whose resolves are to pay them off onely by the colour of Imprisonment which is a privilegiated freedom And what readier way is there to become infamous for dishonesty then to borrow and pay not promise and perform not be security for money and therby insecure the money they subscribe to pay and all this when they have reason to tell them they ought and fortune to enable them to answer their undertakings Indeed it is one of the things to be deplored that many men of Place and Fortune who in their places are examples to common People and Ministers of Justice Government over them should be so remiss to their own reputations as to lesson them in their practice the evasion and prostitution of the Equity and Majesty of the Law of which they themselves are Conservators yet so it is that moral virtue and conversational Justice and Sobriety is less Debtor usually to Greatness then to Communities What a shame is it that the Houses of Greatmen should be receits of Vice and lodges of Luxury nests of Idleness and pests of Prophaneness which ought to be the shame and bane of such Courses Sed hac domo ut cum familia dominum comprehendam
proper a companion of and obliger to Loyalty and subjection to Government that it is impossible to find it separate from it or to expect truth of fidelity upon Noble grounds any where but in such well tempered and well instructed souls And therefore to rebuke those Hot-spurs who think S'blood S'wounds Rammee Damme words not for a Heathens mouth Those that think to Drink Drab Raunt Prophane the only and best Cryterions of loyalty and trustableness Vbi enim regnat ebrietas ratio exulat intellectus obtunditur consilia devianâ— consilia subvertuntur Petrus â—les Ep. 7. do I profess my prealledged sense That the King is best and most effectually served by Pious Quorum exitio intelligi possit eorum imperiis Rempublicam amplisicatam qui Religionibus paruisâ—ent Cicero lib. 2. de Nat. deorum Moderate Sober Learned Well-directed Gentlemen whose resolution is to observe the Laws themselves and thereby to invite others so to do Note this or to shame and punish them that obstinately oppose themselves to it Quod me corripi putes affectio est ideoque mihi acceptiora sunt vestra verbera quam eorum ubera qui me lactant Idem Ep. 6. For as he is not a good man that desires to live without Law so he is not a good Subject that having a good and just Law dares wilfully and propensedly violate it Nor does he deserve any better Title then singular and proud Adeo non erit Christianus qui eam negabit quam confitentur Christiani his argumeâ—tis negabit quibus utitur non Christianus Tertullianus lib de Resurrect Carnis c. 3. who vehemently reasons against National constitutions though they conclude his private liberty and judgment for there must be in the Nation some Civill ultimate Judge which surely is in England the great Judgment of the Nation the King in his Parliament by them particular Subjects must be bounded in their judgment of Civil duty to the Laws of their Establishment And I pray God I may live no longer then to see the Law in power and credit against all opposition of private and seduced spirits SECT XLIII Commends the Meditation of God Death and Iudgment to Great men in their Conversations Actions and Counsels EIghthly and lastly I do humbly commend to the Nobles and Gentry of England That in all their Lives Counsels and Actions they would think of God Death and Judgment Of God the Soveraign being whom to know is life eternal whom to love is to be holy whom to live with Iohn 17. 3. Ch. 14. v. 15. is to be happy Of Death the common and inevitable state of mankind into which the greatest pride and gallantest pomp must be resolved and with which be veyled and vanquished Of Judgment the Just Assise wherein distribution shall be of rewards unutterable of Torments intolerable These three well and throughly debated and then applied as incitations to Vertuous and Godly demeanours and dehortating terrours to the contrary will be notable both Defensatives and Cordials Concerning God though the thoughts of him are precious yet there are some that have a specifique tendency to the whole latitude of godly life and godly action being not only Therapeutique and Medicinal to heal the flaws and gashes that the violence of depravation has made in the soul but Energical and Incentive to exercise of spiritual faculties to spiritual purposes And these I suppose may be reduced to five heads in which the whole of a Christians meditation of God in order to sins anticipation in its prevalence over man is most effectually visible The purity of Gods nature the power of his Hand the preception of his Eye the obligation of his Mercy the severity of his Sentence These well considered and applied by that serious digestive faculty that sincere piety discharges its thoughts into and from whence it draws forth its Spiritual Artillery upon occasion of Spiritual conflict Satans temptation make the first degree of my commendation of this Head to Great mens meditation 1. The purity of Gods Nature is the â—ourse and Womb of all purity for the created Purity being but a Ray of that Purity increate as to the quantum it is short to the quale it is incomparable to it God is pure Fontally as Purity is his Essence and as Purity is in the verity though inutterability of its being Thus pure he centrally himself only is who is light and no darkness Now in as much as to this Divine purity there is no possibility of attainment 1 Iohn 1â— 5. In Deo est magnitudo virtutis perfectionis non autem magnitudo molis Sâ—us Thomas part 1. q. 42 art 11. because it is incommunicable assumption of Manhood into the Godhead being onely in the Hypostatique union of Christ and without possibility of after condescension or assimilation that which of Purity â—s attainable by man being but a following of his president and an obedience to his precepts is yet as close an access to God and as full a price for glory as Mortality can attain to or offer for it And therfore since God is perfect unalterable purity as his command is to be pure so his acceptation is according to the truth of purity in men things For so far and no farther does the purity of God admit mortality as it is defecated by purity of intention and sincerity God that made the heart loves purity in the Cabinet of his Residence and Treatment and therefore â—eb 11. 6. as he that will come to God must believe his being that he is so he that will converse with God must be pure as he is For God heareth not sinners Iohn 9. 31. nor doth purity correspond with defilement and thereupon thou art 1 Pet. 1. 15 16. O man by Gods purity called upon to be pure as he is if thou wilt be happy as he is Matth. 5. 8. because blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God And as thy heart so thy deeds must be pure nay if the heart be upright the Emanations from the heart transports and temptations only excepted will not be halting or down-right lame Christianity is a votal regularity a holy Order of reclucism Note this a temporal exinanition 't is an abstraction of the soul from the body of sin and an oblation of all that is worthy to him who is worthy all because Wise Pure Merciful Powerful above all And thereupon the consideration of Gods Nature has an avulsive operation it makes the Christian sit loose from and be indifferent to this world 1 Iohn 2. 15 16. which is so hostile to and quarrelsome with Purity It considers it self under the vow of God to be as he is as far as imitation of him can have being in it The true Puritan now the serious and practical Puritan commands his thoughts to be holy Psalm 139. 17 23. his words to be edifying his works to
looks thought fellow only to the dogs of his flock shall be â—iducially quiet and hopefully couragious to encounter death and shall have a seat at Gods right hand when this great and wise disdainer shall be extruded Heaven and intruded into the place of Devils Hearken to this In compendiam mittimus mala si presentia facimus esse judicia Casâ—iod Var. lib 6. c. 2 1 O ye Nobles and Great men that too often think of death never â—ill it comes and are too often unprepared for it when it comes who ought to be the Lights of your Countreys the Tutors of your Neighbours in all morral literature the terrors of your ages Exorbitancies be not blind Guides to your seeing Countreymen be not dead Flies in the oytment of Grandeur cause not the way of Honour and the worth of Blood to be depreciated by your oblivion of and contraition to God but let this eye of Gods condescension in these distinguishing external mercies expressed to you above others provoke your eyes to be lifted up to him in holy gratitude in humble love in fixed faith in exemplary charity That you may expiate for the failings of some Great men by the vertues of you Great men that are Great and Good And that this Ye may do consider the mercy of God ought to melt and the patience of God to shame you into this holy Justice to it and your selves This the Apostle presses upon his Romans Rom. 12. 1. I beseech you therefore saith he by the mercies of God that ye present your bodies a living Sacrifice holy and acceptable to God which is your reasonable service Where the Apostle enforces his argument on them from not only his Apostolique condescension in beseeching them whom he might command but from Gods goodness to them not barely in the mercy of his Ministery which though he knew salvifique to them De quatuor â—iliabus magnae miseâ—icordiae dictum est quae sunt immistio amaritudinâ—s substractio opportunitatis vâ—rtus resist eâ—di saniâ—as affectationis Serm de Tripl misericord quatuor miserationibus Ostendit uno exemplo ei ritualia perfâ—ci per res solidiores quae unibris istis ex adverso respondeant Iudaei offerunt corpus mortuâ—m vos corpus vinum id ect una cum corpore actiones ejus nâ—m agere est vivere Grat. in locum Hostia vivens est corpus pro domino afflictum Aâ—selmus in locum yet he magnifies not amongst them but by the mercies of God which are exemplified by Godly sorrow wrought for sin by defeat of opportunity in which to commit it by gift of grace to resist it by confirming them in a constancy of good resolution I say the Apostle does not only press them by these which St. Bernard calls the daughters of Gods great mercies but moves them to become Gods in their bodies fully no member no faculty exempted freely for that 's offering our selves without any compulsion or mercenary respect and this by holiness tending to acceptation with him From the consideration that thus to do is to be reasonable ereatures and thus to offer is to offer to God reasonable service For if God made the bodies and has honoured the bodies of men above other creatures with the inhabitation of reason in them is it not reasonable that their bodies should be devoted to God who is the giver of the life lustre of their bodies by the inspiration of their divine souls to quicken their bodies And this Gods Spirit provokes Ye to in the conviction of your reason and the convulsions of your conscience That God has made you among Creatures Men â—mon Men Christians among Christians Free-men among Free-men Noble and Gentle-men are cogent exertions of mercy in retributions to which your lives are too short your parts to low your fortunes too narrow to give mercy a suitable return and when you do the utmost you can and above as it were your selves if yet you are short of that you ought how unlike your selves and your just acknowledgements to your God are of ye among Noble Gentlemen who by Oathes and Blasphemies Adulteries Oppressions of poor Neighbours and Creditors indiligence in your Charges and heedlesness of Gods service endavour to provoke God to determin your pace which is yet as a river and your righteousness as a wave of the Sea Isai. 6. 18. For when sins of Great men are enormous Exemplary Truculent and the sufferers by them have no Earthly remedy God takes them to task and sets them home in the fatal return of them which leaves them wretched pittiless remediless For who shall gather when he scatters who shall bind up when he breaks in pieces who shall powre in Balm when he causes the wound to rage and the playster to be invalid Remember O remember He that has waited that he might be gracious Isai. 30. 18. been discouraged any longer to wait that he might be gracious has a Fan in his hand to purge Ier. 15. 7. a Fining-pot to try Mal. 3. 2. a Hammer to break in pieces Iur. 23. 29. and an Ax to hew down Ier. 51. 20. impenitent sinners and such all will appear that are rather vitiously Great then vertuously Good and then what ever silence your power and mens civility favours here your vanities with the Truth the whole Truth of them then will out and then shall ye appear to be the sinners whom the long-sufferance of God has not led into nor kept in continual repentance nor work'd into amendment of life O therefore forget not Saint Bernards Meditations Consider whence you came Vnde veneris erubesce ubi sis ingemisse quo vadas contremisce Serm. de primordiis mediis noviffimus nostris and be abashed where and what you are and be sorrowful and perplexed whether you are passing post and be amazed and tremble And O Nobles and Gentlemen having thus meditated of God and approved your selves Candidates to his favour you will be the better disposed to die comfortably and appear in judgement couragiously to die in the comfort of God lived unto Primo dominandi spes in arduo ubi sis ingressus adsunt studia ministri Tacit Annal. 4. is to prepossess God lived with 'T is to have a chaire of connexion between the upper and lower Worlds 'T is to be Magnetique as I may say of God into a Mans soul and to breath out Hyperhumane Hallelujahs 'T is to contend and vye with Angels in comfort of condition rapture of Intuition and delight of permanency 'T is to be what God is fixable on a Created stump and improvable into an increated attainment This is the true Nobility and Generosity that God designed our nature little lower then the Angels For in that he hath made us Kings and Priests to himself by effectual vocation testified in an holy life and death what has be done less then superiorated us to Angels
hidden from all men â—at they may alwayes be solicitous about â— preparing for it expecting of it joyâ—ll at it does it come as a thief in the â—ght in the cloud and umbrage of a â—ontemned accident with a potent and not to be refused errand in the moment of thy Jollity in the heigth of thy youth in the glory of thy preferment when all eyes are upon thee all tongues applaud thee and all knees bow to thee and perhaps all backs bear burthens for thee in defiance of thy power in Confront of thy Learning in ruine of thy designs without pitty of thy relations without fear of thy fury without diversion of thy policy Will not thy bags buy off its execution nor thine eloquence soften its stroak nor thy bravery transport it to kindnesse nor thy charms bind its hands but with its rapacious claw it must seise and by its mall burst asunder the fabrique of soul and body Must these things be without baile or Mainprize or saving of the Contenement Then O then what manner of men ought yee O Nobles and Gentlemen to be in all Holy Conversations How ought ye to be tuned Heaven-ward 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Nazianz in Encomio Athanasii p 22 and as it is said of Athanasius to have your lives words and works unisonous full of harmony and concent not jarring and combatting one with another How ought your vessels to be pure your lights to shine your Lamps to be trim'd your loynes to be Girded How ought ye to anticipate deaths terrour by dying dayly in terrour to your lusts How ought ye to take Heaven by force as it were while you live for whom if penitent the possession is purchased when you dye what is the graves visage to one that is dead unto sin and alive unto God Quid caput strophiolo aut Dracontario damnas diademati destinatum nam Reges deo patri suo fecit Iesus Christus Quid tibi cum flore morituro habes Florem ex virga Iesse super quem tota divini spiritus gratia requievit Tertulliâ—nus lib. de Corona Militis cap. 15. What is the dissolution of Soul and body to him at any time whose resolution is to make Christ his at all times and to live no longer nor other then to please God alwaies and to be pleased with Gods pleasure concerning him How can the expiration of a Mortall life be troublesome to him who lives as one born to exercised in assured of a most glorious and durable life consequent to it And this no man being possible to attain but by Meditating and living in a dayly exercise of Christian severity and fiducial Mortification How important is it to presse upon the Memories and Consciences of Great-men not to be infected with Pride not to be buryed in secular affairs Parvi defectique animâ— est de subditis non profectum quaerere subditoruâ— sed quaestum proprium Stus Bernard de consider lib. 3. not to be glewed to and glutted with varietyes of pleasures Happy that Prince that can say I received my Life and Crown from God and as I managed them for him so I am willing to resign them to him happy that Peer and Gentleman who can appear before God in the Coat armour of humility and dare to appeal to God for his Justification That he has walked before him with an upright heart and desired to do the thing that was right in his sight Isai. 38. 3 Happy that Prelate who has deserved Athanasius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In vita Athanasii Fortes fuere in bello non molles in sericis c. Si â—tlius es Apostolorum prophetarum tu fac similiter vendicae tibi nobilâ— genus similibus moribus quod non aliunde nobilâ— quam morum ingenuitate fidei Fortitudine fuit Stus Bernard lib. 2. consider his character to be a living and immovable Pillar of Virtue whose life has bin a continual sermon of Moderation self denyal charity diligence who has followed the Apostles Martyrs and Confessors in their prayers and private agonies in their care and tendernesse to teach and keep together the flock of God commited to them and whose Consciences on their death beds can solace them that they have preach'd and lived and ruled not for their own fame and pomp but for their Masters honour and their fellow labourers encouragement and their flocks edification to life eternall this will be the sweetest and takingst cordial to the departing soul to consider that their labour in the Vineyard shall have the penny of eternity and their denying themselves for Christ shall be recompenced with Christs imparting his glory to them and their taking up Christs Crosse in self contempt self abasement shall return them a partaking in Christs crown and glory with him Happy he and he only that can so live and so dye that living and dying he may be Gods Which the Meditation of death is a great furtherance to because it both keeps from folly of action and keeps in eye eternity of joy or misery for in that lifes determination gives entry to death and that to particular Judgement it is a high part of Christian Prudence to ruminate on death in the summer and brightest day of life and by a quotidian view of it to lessen the terrour and usher in the treatment of it by such diseases and other loosenings of life from its basis as God uses to make the access of death understood by us and this whoever does will not only possesse his Soul in patience and prevent the exorbitances of his passions whose evolations are not easily leured home or whose tumours are not presently asswaged but also settle in the mind ready to leave the world the sedatenesse of a prelibating Saint whose earnest of heaven appears in a sensible senselessenesse of what is tumorous troublesome avulsive and incongruous with his departing sublimity God that has called his heart to heaven in the Divinity of its Love having left the faculties of the soul yet resident in the body to expressions of themselves suitable to their origen Office and other circumstances by which they subsist and serve the conjunction of soul and body Peregrinus nimirum potest facile occasione viatici plus quam oporteat detineri quaerendo praegravari portando mortuns si desit ipsa sepultura non sentit sic vituperantes ut laudantes sic adulantes audit ut detrahentes imo vero nec audit quod mortuus est Stuâ— Bern Serm. 7. in Quadrages by reason of which they being dead to sin and alive to God in their option of dissolution as well as in their ligament of faith and in their assurance of acceptance rather are detained by then living in or to the world For the world being nothing to them but their prison Death which brings their Habeas Corpus must needs be their joy and Gods Writ of Ease their gratulation for Men
2 Pet 3. 10. For this indeed is the true end of a vertuous life and of regular and exemplary actions to appear happy accepted and approved of God in that great day when the secrets of all hearts shall be disclosed the Cabinets of all Junctos â—riffled the Legerdemains of all Politicos tryed the seeming piety of the worlds Sanctimonists weighed and the frothy Learning of the worlds flatterers repudiated when God shall come with truth and terrour of judgement with legions a of Angels Armies of Saints and summon the Juries of mens consciences to their impartiall verdict when the elements shall melt and the earth be burnt up the randezvouz of all Creatures great and small be and the b Mat. 25. 32 33. Angels referr them to their respective Stations when the persecuted Son of God whose life was the scorn and whose death and wounds are the curse of the lewd world when the Saints that have undergone the reproach of Christ shall attend the Lord Jesus to judgement and to give approbation and acclamation to his sentence Then Then to stand in judgement Luke 21. 28. Matth. 19. 28. Matth. 10 37. To lift up the head with joy as those that have followed Christ in the regeneration and have not bin ashamed of him before men but have loved Christ more then Father or Mother or House or Land or Honour or Preferments Nil magis proficit ad vitam honestam quam ut credamus eum judicem futurum quem occulta non fallunt indecora offendunt honesta delectant Stus Ambros. officiorum lib. 1. c. 26. will be the priviledge and peculiarity of Gods Jewels To whose illustrations nothing is more contributive then this day of Judgement because it sets every being upon its own bottom and gives every action its due testimony and every actor his deserved essay Therefore Goodmen look upon Christs second Advent Judiciall not Ministerial as their Jubile the restitution of Gods Kingdom of content quiet and victory to his Israel In which none can be bold and added to but Gods hidden ones Who have exercised themselves to keep a good conscience void of offence both towards God and towards men and who have mourned in secret Acts 24. 16. Ezech. 9. 14 for their own and othermens sins these are the contenders for Revel 2. 17. v. 28. and obtainers of Revel 3. 12. the New name and the white stone Revel 3. 4 5. and the Morning starr these are to be pillars in the house of God These are to be cloathed in white as Citizens of the supernall Ierusalem Matth 22 Isaâ— 26. 1. for these not Tophet is prepared of old but salvation for walls and bucklers Iohn 14. 1. These are they to entertain whom the Marriage feast is made Iohn 12 32. and on whom the wedding Garment is put and for whom Mansions are prepared and to glorifie whom Christ sits at his Fathers right hand to draw them up to heaven after him and to place them in Heaven on the right hand with him Quod enim ibi honoratur glorificatur non sua utiliâ—as sed hominum slcut cum sol videtur non ipsius utilitas est sed vivenâ—ium sic dei glorificatio honoratio tota perfectio animarum nostrarum in ultimitate suae completionis Gulielm Pariscensis partis 1. de universo parte 2. p. 709. This is the honour that God does his Saints the glory of whose translation and association adds not to God who in perfection is unaddable to undiminishable from but the lustre that thence is reflected is purely remunerative to them who have bin in the holy warr with him against sin Satan and the world And O Nobles and Gentry is any thing so Magnificent and Royal as to compartizate with Christ to preside above Angels to be released from a troublesome life into a plenary vision and fruition of good Or can any change parallel this that changes a light and Lovelesse world For a weighty and eternall Glory 2 Cor. 4. 17. And this the day of Judgement will devolve upon every particular Worthy whose vessel according to its receptivity shall be brim-full of glory and stowed up with unutterable Comforts and whose â—idelity shall have the Test and Seal of Truth and Power for its Security and Commendation which will be denyed to those caytiffs whose power has trampled upon the necks and whose cruelty has rowled their Garments in the blood of Christs Martyrs and Confessors and whose mouths have blasphemed Christs holynesse and whose weapons have suppressed his Gospell Yea even to the Iudases and Demases of Christs own Family those irreverend Clerks who have withheld the truth in unrighteousnesse Rom. 1. 18. and have rejected the counsell of God in the Motions of his spirit and the convictions of their own Consciences When such Viragoes and Illuminates shall cry to the Mountaines Rev. 6. 15 16. a Wisdom 5. 3 4 5. fall upon us Verus honor qui nulli negabitur digno nulli defertur indigno ad quem nec ullus ambiet indignus ubi nullus permittetur esse nisi dignus vera ubi nihil adversi nec à seipso nec ab alio quisquam patietur ubi praemium virtutis erit deus iâ—se qui virtutem dedit ubi ipse erit vita salus copia gloria honor pax omnia bona Stus Augustin lib. ult de Civitat Dei and shall beshrew themselves for very anguish as those in a Wisdom do We fools counted his life madnesse and his end to be without honour How is he numbred among the Children of God and his lot is amongst the Saints When these I say are reserved for the Distruction of the great day Iude ver 6. Then shall the righteous lift up their hearts with joy and chearfulness then shall their faces be cleansed from blubbers and their eyes be wiped from tears Then shall their ears be filled with transporting Ecchoes and their living sincerity be compensated with unutterable comforts the Judge our Lord Jesus shall own them his Members and embrace them in his arms and possesse them in his joyes and confirm them in all the perquisites of his purchase and in all â—he merits of his life and death and say â—nto them Matth. 25. Come ye blessed of my Father â—â—herit the Kingdome prepared for you from â—he beginning of the world This shall be â—he Portion of those contemned and desâ—ised ones whom the world vilipends aâ—uses disgraces casts out And therefore Nulla splendidior gemma in omni praecipue ornatu summi pontificis Quo enim celsior cateris eo humilitate aâ—paret illustrior seipso Stus Bernardus lib. 2. de considerat ad Eugen. O ye Nobles and Gentry Consider your selves and the advantages God has above others indulged you and do not neglect your eternall splendour â—hink nothing small that God expects as â—he way to