Apostles The Pretended quite contrary faigning they honour Saints as one would Socrates or Phocion perpetually mock thereat break down their images call them by the name of idols and false gods The Catholick Church holdeth man hath free wil Genes 4. Deut. 30. Eccl. 15. supported in this article upon so many passages of Scripture The Pretended dispoil man of all liberty which is to destroy the worth of his conditions and to deprive him of the best part of his essence The Catholick Church holdeth the bloud of our Saviour is a treasure infinite and very able to purge away all manner of evil and to merit all good but that it is applyed to us by works of satisfaction and merit and purgative pains in those who stand in need of it as a medicine which profiteth the sick man by the co-operation he bringeth The Pretended teacheth good works are not necessary to salvation but onely faith justifies which is to open a gate to the corruption of good manners and to all kind of liberty The Catholick Church believes a Purgatory for souls which going out of the bodie are not yet purified grounded therein on 19. or 20. passages of Scripture all understood by the ancient Fathers according to our belief The Pretended having disturbed the ashes of the dead deprive them of the assistance and prayers of the living contrary to divine and humane laws and the manifest practice of all antiquity The Catholick Church makes a Sacrament of marriage according to S. Paul and the interpretation of most eminent Fathers of the Church The Pretended make their marriages like those of Barbarians The Catholick Church holdeth the reality of the body of CHRIST in the Sacrament of the Altar and believe that under the Sacramental species which are sensible and corruptible our Saviour subsisteth with a glorious body which is called by S. Paul a spiritual body because it is dignified with qualities and conditions of spirit though it loose not the essence of a body She adoreth therein with all humility that which she cannot comprehend sufficiently after express passages of Scripture the decision of fourty Councels the testimony of five hundred Authours ancient grave and sincere Adding from the authority of the most illustrious Councel of Nice that it is the unbloudy Sacrifice presented for the expiation of the sins of the world The Pretended will place in stead of it chimaeraes imaginary figments cessation of Sacrifices and abominable desolation The Catholick Church publisheth confession and remission of sins by the ministery of Priests as the Son of God did institute it in S. John The Pretended shaking off so wholsom a yoak hath made himself a John 10. way to liberty and dissolution The Catholick Church acknowledgeth a visible Head on earth established by the express word of Jesus Christ in S. Matthew averred by all the holy Fathers Matth. 15. confessed by the continuation of a lawful succession in the revolution of so many Ages The Pretended seek to bring into the house of God an anarchy of the children of Belial The Catholick Church is the bright star of truths The Pretended is a furious Comet which throws disorder and poyson into all the parts of the world To say truly should an Angel have spoken to it yea could it create a golden Age never might this design be accomplished by ways so furious and turbulent But having cost France so much gold and bloud what hath it done but that which is mentioned by the excellent pen of Cardinal Berule in the Preface of the greatness of Jesus A Church without Apostles Apostles without mission Pastours without sheep sheep without Shepheards Faithful without Churches Christians without Baptism Prophets without miracles Temples without Altars Altars without Sacrifices a Religion without ceremonies a Law without obedience a Faith without works and a Charity without effects Behold excellent pieces and well worthy of a reformed Church In the name of God weigh at leisure these considerations Humamum fuit errare diabolicum per animositatem in errore manere August de verbis Apost serm which would deserve a whole volume and since you are convinced by reason kick no longer against the prick go no more about to forge difficulties nor say how shall I put this in execution What means have I to do it What will such and such say What will our whole side say in general Must I confess I have erred and a thousand other thoughts which are true illusions You shall no sooner set your foot in the Roman Catholick Church with so many men of note lately converted but all these fantasies will vanish you shall live in peace of conscience and shall receive before God glory immortal O that we might quickly see that great day wherein France may no longer speak but with one tongue wherein the names of Lutherans and Calvinists may be banished out of the memories of men wherein all French-men reunited under one faith one law one Head one Church may eternally bless the name of Jesus What joy what comfort what embracements of both sides what consolation for so much afflicted kindred which waste themselves with grief and sorrow for these poor straglers what satisfaction for the sacred person of the King what honour for France what peace for the Church what edification for all the world what triumphs for Heaven what blessings of God will fall upon their heads who shall give example of this reunion and shall consent to the peace safety and honour of this Monarchy The third OBSTACLE To live by Opinion THe tree of the knowledge of good and evil Over much wit troubleth us doth also yield fruits which cost us very dear we labour here with too much application of wit which goeth up and down searching and prying into all the objects of the world often forsaking the better for the worse S. Thomas most judiciously S. Them 1. 2. quaest 8. observeth that there is much difference between the natural appetite the sensual and the intellectual The natural aimeth always at things which are really Intellectual appetite faulty good for her and proportionable the sensual is scattered the intellectual much more to desire evil plaistered over with the semblance of good The plant desireth moysture with which it is nourished and will never take a stone for the dew Man having too much wit and sense not contenting himself with things that really are good and truly consonant to his nature forgetteth others in his idea which are good in apparance and evil in substance Notwithstanding apparence taketh upon her when Apparence she hath seduced the sense and conquered the imagination to dive even into the Cabinet of the Prince which is the understanding and putting false spectacles upon his eyes to make him believe that black is white glass is diamond and darkness light It is necessary that the will should dance to this tune and pursue the good which is represented unto her by the
in the hearts of men by a presumption of their salvation Christian discipline oppressed by liberty chastity trodden underfoot by unbridled luxury the standard of rebellion advanced against the sacred persons of Kings a million of French exposed to slaughter four thousand Church-vesteries Monsieur de Sainctes in his Book of saâ—cage pillaged five hundered Churches demolished France so many times given over as a prey to strangers corruptions so strange desolations so dreadful acts so barbarous that they make the hair stand an end on the heads of all good men which have never so little understanding A stile of fire were needful or a pen of a damant steeped in bloud to express them Ah poore France France the paradise of earth eye of the world pearl of all beauties How many times by the means of this heresie hast thou seen thy bosom heretofore crowned with ears of corn and guilded with harvests all bristled with battallions How many times hast thou seen the land covered with blades and the sea with ships How many times hast thou felt the arms of thy children to encounter in thy proper entrails How many times hast thou seen flames of brothers hostility flie through thy fat and fruitful fields When hast thou not sweat in all the parts of thy bodie When have not rivers of bloud been drawn from thy veins but such bloud as was able to cement together huge bulwarks for the defence of our Countrey or to serve for seed for flower-deluces to make them grow and be advanced in the plains of Palestine and they have been sacrificed to furies Innocency seemed to afford infants shelter from the tempest yet the sword of heresie found a passage into their tender bodies Age rendred old men venerable yet would no pardon be granted to their gray haits moistined with the massacre of their children Virgins were guarded in their mothers arms as a Temple of God yet have they been dishonoured So many personages of eminent quality have served as an aim for their impiety their pains have been sport for them and their deaths a spectacle What hair would not stand an end with horrour and what eye not weep forth bloud when we speak of these disasters which your selves detest Nor can you sufficiently wonder at the crueltie of those who have taken the liberty of such barbarous outrages and so bloudy tragadies I pass over this discourse as over coles covered with ashes and would willingly be silent were it not that as it was fit to expose massacred bodies to view thereby to cure the madness of the Milesian maids so must I discover some bloudy effects in the pretended Religion to raise a horrour against it in good souls Why also have you in this time renewed so many wounds which were not well closed and for want of a little obedience so lawfully due to the most just Prince of the world do you make a civil war to exhaust France of gold and bloud after such expence and so many bloud-lettings If these acts seem so base and inhumane to you why abhor you not the sect which produced them If God curse him who is the cause of scandals were it not fit if you have some beliefe stranged from common sense rather a thousand times to stiffle it in the bottom of your conscience than to divulge it with these disturbances divisions and spoil of a Countrey which you should love as men and honour as true Children Were there some stain in the house of our Mother which never was must you therefore call her whore drag her along by the hair and carry fire to burn her house in stead of providing water to quench the flames Is it not better to become patient to sweeten the acerbities of times spare wounds on ulcered bodies or at least to be satisfied with silence in a matter where you can pretend no right of correction What was that so exorbitant which the Church commanded for which you separated your selves and took arms to defend the wranglings of our Apostataes made afterward your Apostles What Maximes have we so rough and unreasonable that they must be taken away with the sword there to plant reformation Consider a little the notable corrections and admirable policies which Arch-hereticks have invented to introduce them into the Church I will here with all sincerity recite the Maximes of the Catholick and the Pretended Maximes of the chief Sectaries of which some have afterward affrighted you and you have disavowed them as you daily do by others God making you plainly see in the inconstancy and great diversitie of your Doctrine the little confidence you should put therein The Catholick Church teacheth that God would have all the world saved as the Apostle hath expressed in the Epistle to Timothie that he desireth good 1 Tim. 2. 4. of which he is the source and that he communicates himself to all his children The Pretended say that God absolutely desires evil yea doth it willingly predestinating men without any regard some to life others to eternal damnation as if a father who had daughters should cut the throat of one most innocent and marry the other wealthily having no reason for it but his will which is most execrable impiety pronounced by the authour of this sect in the book of his Institutions and chapter 21. where he saith Men are not all created to the like condition but that life eternal is pre-ordained for some and eternal damnation for others The Catholick Church speaks of our Saviour with most profound and religious reverence The Calvin in Evang Mat. 27. Institut 2. cap. 16. Authour of the Pretended makes him inferiour to his Father calling him the second King after God and attributing ignorance to him despair on the Cross and the pains of the damned which are things most horrible The Catholick Church holdeth Jesus Christ is the onely and sole Mediatour of redemption and that there is no other name either in heaven or earth in which and by which we can be saved and for that cause she honours it all she can extending and multiplying the fruits of honour and praise not onely in his own person but in his dear friends also which are the blessed Virgin and the Saints whom we pray unto as the fruits of his Cross and take them for Mediatours of intercession grounded therein on the word of God which commandeth the friends of Job to take him for intercessour Job 42. though he were in this transitory life and not at all doubting if the soul of the evil rich man prayed unto Abraham out of hell but we on earth Luc. 16. may be permitted to call to our aid souls so faithful so much honoured by God and whose praises he reckons his own greatness We likewise reverence holy images since it is an ancient custom in the Church the marks whereof we yet behold in Tertullian who might have conversed Tertul de pudicitia c. 7. with the Disciples of the
understanding these propositions went to find out the noble Bayard in his lodging and made a long discourse to him of the evil disposition of Pope Julius and the enterprises he had both on his life and of the Frenchmen of purpose to enkindle him for revenge Then he pursued his opportunitie and made overture to him of the treason of this wicked Gerlo Bayard beheld him and said How Sir I could never have imagined that a Prince so generous as you would consent to such a mischief and had you done it I swear by my soul before night I would have given the Pope notice of it How answered the Duke he would have done as much either to you or me It is no matter replieth Bayard this treacherie displeaseth me The Duke shrugged up his shoulders and spitting on the ground Mounsieur Bayard saith he I would I had killed all mine enemies in this sort but since you dislike it the matter shall rest and you and I both may have cause to repent it We shall not if it please God replyeth the good souldier but I pray you put this gallant into my hands that would do this goodly piece of service and if I do not cause him to be hanged in an hour let me supply his place The other excused it saying he had given him assurance of his person Behold you not a brave spirit See you not a man of a Royal conscience and of an honestie in all things like to it self Where are these pettie spirits of the abyss more black than specters and infernal furies who have neither loyaltie for their Prince nor Common-wealth but as it may concern their own interests who swallow treasons as big as cammels to gain a flie They would make truth it self to lie were not their issues ever tragical abominable and hideous The ninth SECTION Short and notable Instructions MY souldier follow the precepes which the great S. Augustine gave to Captain Boniface August ep 80. Observe faith and virtue in Arms which never will be prosperous on earth if they be not fortified with blessings from Heaven Beg of God with David to deliver you from your necessities which are your passions he doth nothing to overcome visible enemies that have power over bodies who surmounteth not the invisible bandied against the health of our souls Make use of the world as a thing borrowed do good with its goods and become not bad They are goods since they come from God who extendeth his power over all things both celestial and temporal They are goods since God gives them to good men but they are not also great goods since he affords them to the wicked He takes them away from the virtuous to trie their virtue and from the perverse to chastise their crimes It is true strength health victorie honour wealth are indifferently the portion of all men but conquest over passions virtues salvation of soul immortalitie of bodie glorie honour beatitude are the proper inheritance of Saints Love these goods desire them seek them with all your endeavour do alms-deeds to get them fast as much as your forces will permit all here below passeth away but good works Think when you go to the wars that the strength of your bodie is a gift of God that it is not fit to arm against your sovereign Masters proper benefits Keep promise even with your enemies make peace with all the world voluntarily and war for necessity to acquire the good of peace Be peacefull even in Arms for such men are called the children of God If it be necessarie to kill an enemie in fight let mercy be always exercised in the latter end of the combat principally when there is no further fear of rebellion Adorn your manners with conjugal chastitie sobrietie and modestie It is a ridiculous thing to conquer men and be vanquished by vices to escape the sword and be overthrown by wine If you want means seek it not on earth by wicked practices but secure rather in Heaven that little you have by the exercise of good works Flee these rocks of Nobilitie which we have hitherto spoken against and above all bridle presumption choller the tongue and sensuallitie They are slaves who cannot keep in the mean between servitude and Empire where either chains must be had to master them or a Throne erected to honour them Pesumption if you afford it enterance will make you of a man a baloon filled with wind a scare-crow of honour a temerarious thing void of courage an undertaker without successe a phantastick without shame which in the end shall become burdensome to it self and odious to all the world Choller and folly are two sisters which have in all things the same qualities or if there be any difference it is that the one with more furie maketh havock in an instant and the other produceth her effects with more leisure and cheerfulness whilest you are subject to this passion no man can confide in you in matter of judgement no more than to weather-cocks in the point of stabilitie you will have all other vices in-seed and perpetually live in the sorrow of time past disturbance of the present and uncertaintie of the future As for the tongue it is that which containeth all the good or evil of man It is the needle of the great dial of the soul that must shew all the hours It is the truche-man of our thoughts the image of our actions the interpreter of our wills and the principal key of conversation He that will now adays live in the world saith the famous S. Nazianzen must have a veil over his Nazianz. in Iamb eys a key on his ear a compass on his lips A veil over his eyes not to see or in seeing to dissemble many things a key on his ears to shut them up against so many follies and ordures which proceed from bad mouthes and a compass on the lips to measure and square out all his words with discretion So many secrets unnecessarily discovered so many infamous slanders so many inconsiderate tales so many frivolous promises so many impudent lyes such perjuries and execrable blasphemies so many disasters which oft happen for a sleight speech daily teach us that words have no handles to hold them by and better it is to trip with the foot than the tongue Sensualitie if you powerfully resist it not from the first reflections which reason may present will make you a thing of nothing The three spirits wine love and game will fetter you with a prodigious slavery You will become a living sepulchre a tomb of surphets and slaughters a gulf of calumnies a meer hobgoblin without repose which shall continually handle cards and dice to bereave you of your purse and understanding so to make a spoil of your goods a frencie of your reason and a perpetual feaver of your life Your condition ought not to make you pretend power over men if you seasonably enterprise it not over your own passions
with a constancy which amazed this bloudy soul that so tortured her In the end she again took her garments going out of the water as from an Amphitheater of her glorious battel The twelfth SECTION The retreat of Hermingildus and his Conversion HErmingildus who knew nothing of what had passed beholding her somewhat pase and weakened with such harsh usage asked her if she felt any pain of body or affliction of mind to discolour her so much more than ordinary but the wise Princess replied It was nothing and that there was not any thing so important as to be worthy of his knowledge He who well perceived that she by her discretion dissembled some great affront enquired very curiously of those who might inform him and somewhat too soon discovered the cruel disgrace which his mother-in-law Goizintha had put upon his wife This transfixed him with a dolour so sensible and so enkindled him with fire and choller in his heart that if the fear of God and the sweetness of his wife had not served for a counterpoize to his passion he had torn this wicked Queen in pieces But the good Indegondis prostrating her self at his feet besought him by all that which was most noble in him not to precipitaâ—e the matter into such extremities and prevailed so well with her natural eloquence that he was contented to remove presently from the Court and retire to Sevil which his father had given him for his lively-hood Then was the time when those chast loves which had been crossed by the disturbances of Goizintha all obstacles being overcome enlarged themselves as a river which having broken his banks poureth it self with a victorious current in the wideness of his channel Hermingildus could not sufficiently satisfie himself to behold so many virtues in so great a beauty the modesty which she had witnessed in this last disgrace gave him apprehensions of her piety above all may be said Those who seek nothing in marriage but sensual pleasure which is more thin than smoke and much lighter than the wind cannot imagine how much these fair amities which are the daughters of virtues nourish holy delights These are celestial fires which are ever in the bosom of God as in their sphere It is he who begetteth them and breedeth them they being not constrained to descend upon earth to beg a caytiff nourishment from perishable creatures which promise so many wonders and produce nought but wind These two great souls beheld one another with the eyes of the dove and were mutually enflamed with affections so honest and innocent that Angels would not be ashamed to entertain the like fires since they are those of charity which is the eternal furnace of all souls the most purified Indegondis perceiving she had already great power in the affection of her husband and that there was no longer any step-mother to dissolve her designs sollicited him seriously for his Conversion and said Sir I must confess unto you the honour I have received from your alliance seemeth not accomplished whilest I behold between us a wall of division which separateth us in belief and Sacraments Since our amities are come to that point as to enjoy all in common and that they unite things most different why should we divide God who is most simple of nature Why should we make two Religions and two Altars since we now live in such manner that we have but one table one heart and one bed Verily Sir if I saw the least ray of truth in the Sect you profess and some hope of salvation I would submit thereunto the more to oblige me to your person which I love above all the things in the world But it is most undoubted that you are ill rectified that you pursue a fantasie in stead of a verity and that dying in this state you loose a soul so noble which I would purchase with expence of my bloud I boast not to be learned as you Arians who have so many goodly allegations of Scripture that you make the ignorant believe God is all that which to your selves you imagine Sir I for my part think the chief wisdom in matter of religion is not to be so wise as you are and to have a little more submission of spirit for faith is the inheritance of the humble and never doth the day of God shine in a soul which hath too much light of man You well see this heresie of the Arians is a revolted Band which hath forsaken the high way to wander cross the fields you are not ignorant that this Arius was a wicked Priest who raised an heresie for despight that he was not made Bishop and was rejected and solemnly condemned in a Councel of three hundred and eighteen Bishops These men were wise enough for you and me I fix my self upon their resolutions I follow the generality of the Church I adhere to the body of the tree and you tie your selves to a rotten branch I have no argument more strong than the succession of lawfull Pastours than the conformity of the Universal Church than the succession of all Ages than the wisdom sanctity and piety which I see resplendent on our side Besides I come from a Countrey where we have seen all the Arian Kings our neighbours round about to have had most unhappy ends when in the mean time my great grand-father King Clodovaeus for having sincerely embraced Catholick Religion received so many blessings from Heaven that he seemed to have good hap and victories under his pay I am not the daughter of a Prophet nor do I vaunt to have the spirit of prophesie but I dare well foretel the Kingdom of Spain shall not be of long continuance unless it vomit out this pestilence of Arianism which lies about the heart of it I would to God with expence of my life I might establish my Religion then should I account my self the most contented Queen of the world Hermingildus knew not what to answer to the strength of truth and love two the most powerfull things in the world onely he said it was a business which well deserved to be pondered and that these changes in persons of his quality are subject to much censure if they have not great reason for caution The good Princess to give him full leisure to advise thereupon handled the matter so by her industrie that he conferred with S. Leander who was a strong pillar of the Catholick faith in Spain The sage Prelate so well mannaged the spirit of this Prince that with assistance of God and the good offices of Indegondis who moved Heaven and earth for this conversion he drew him from errour This brave courage so soon as he saw the ray of truth needs would acknowledge and freely confess it taking the Chrism of Catholicks with pomp and solemnity even to the giving a largess of golden coyns which he purposely caused to be stamped a little too suddenly making his own image to be engraven thereon with a
there so ill intreated that he more hastily returned than came thither laden with confusion and in short time heard the discomfiture of his Armies and victory of the Jews whereupon he entered into so desperate sury that he resolved to retire hastily again to Jerusalem and to make of the whole Citie but one tomb But the hand of God had already designed his for Joseph Ben Gerion it happened being in his coach his horses frighted extraordinarily upon the meeting and roar of an Elephant gave him so boysterous a stroke that thrown on the ground he received a mortal wound the fire and venom whereof crept so far into his hurts that he seemed to burn alive like the damned feeling inexplicable dolours throughout all his body which became a nest of vermin and having his soul turmoyled with Specters and Furies that gave him no repose At which time the miserable Atheist coming to himself after a drunkenness of so many years spake these words JUSTUM EST SUBDITUM ESSE DEO ET MORTALEM NON PARIA DEO SENTIRE professing there was a Great God to whom we must submit and never with him contest when being in the bed of death he acknowledged impiety had been the original of al his evils and that should God restore him to his health he would fill Jerusalem with gifts and wonders even to the becoming a Jew and ever proclaim the glory of the Creatour But the gates of mercy were already shut up against this disloyal man who had no true repentance his hour was come which made him die all wasted with putrefaction insupportable to his Army who could not endure the stench troublesom to himself and execrable to the memory of all mankind The Prophets and holy Fathers mention him as a damned soul and the figure of Antichrist to teach the wicked out of the deportment of this man that there is not any one withdraws from God but flies from his mercy and falls into the hands of his justice which pursueth Libertines beyond the gates of hell III. MAXIM Of the Excellencie of the DIVINITIE THE PROPHANE COURT THE HOLY COURT That Great men are Gods on earth whose favours we should adore That all greatness is wretched before the Majesty of God who alone is to be adored THere is not any thing hath more perplexed Divers opinions of the Divinity the minds of men since the beginning of the world than the diverse opinions of the Deitie since the wisest when they had spent all their abilities upon this question found nothing more certain than uncertainty One would wonder why the knowledge of the true God being so important for man hath been so many Ages obscured and covered in a great abyss of darkness even from those who thought themselves the most clear-sighted in the knowledge of total Nature But who sees not it is an evident punishment for sin and a most just effect of Gods vengeance who hath permitted truth to be hidden from man because man would conceal himself from truth even in the shadow of death and nothing They vanished in their thoughts said Evanuerunt in cogitationibus suis obscuratum est insipiens cor eâ—rum Rom. 1. God in this life handleth the wicked as the damned the Apostle and their senseless hearts were obscured But that which herein is very considerable is that God hath ever handled wicked men like the damned for the unhappy souls condemned to hell have an idaea of the beatitude they have lost which serves for an executioner And infidels after shipwrack of faith and truth which they abandoned fail not still to retain an opinion of the excellency of the Divinity not knowing what it is nor why they should stick to it It was that wherein Plinie esteemed men more miserable than beasts For creatures not made for the knowledge and fruition of a God are troubled at nothing nor make any question thereupon contenting themselves peaceably to enjoy innocent favours of Nature but the curiosity man hath had through all Ages to be informed of the state of the Sovereign cause is a strong conviction of his infidelity He findeth himself obliged to seek into the knowledge of God which as saith Tertullian is the first vesture of the soul but this knowledge flieth him so long as he renounceth faith innocency and reason the prime pieces of the intellectual life From thence grew the great diversity of gods heaped Diversity of Gods Plin. l. 2. c. 7. one upon another by the Gentiles For poor humane nature overwhelmed partly by the greatness of this sovereign Essence partly also clouded by its own ignorance misery and sin being unable to understand a God most Onely and Simple with one sole touch of the soul hath made an impertinent dissection of it dividing it into as many parts as there are errours on the Altars of Gentiles whilest every one sought to adore that which most flattered his imagination or sensuality They who were more spiritual have deified virtues as Chastity Concord Intelligence Hope Honour Clemency and Faith Other more absurd have tied themselves to the worship of creatures as the Aegyptians Some who questionless were sottish have framed gods in humane shape some old others young and many perpetually infants They have made them male and female black white winged and deformed They made some to rise out of a wind others from the sea and divers from rocks They who were more fearfull and superstitious adored the feaver and tempests not for esteem of their worth but through horrour of their malignity They ware their gods shut up in rings and many times submitted to monsters denying themselves repose and repast to satisfie their superstition It is the misery which S. Augustine deplored in his Citie of God after Plinie the Historian and other Authours who handled this subject But such as amidst this great obscurity of Sects God of flatterers thought themselves more gentile and refined in conversation taking other ways and leaving old superstitions began to canonize Emperours Princes and the Great-ones of the earth saying There were no Divinities more visible and propitious than these seeing they daily became the distributours of glory and worldly fortunes The Athenians who vaunted to Remarkeable punishment of flattery Senec. Suasor 1. have the most subtile wits of the earth quickly suffered themselves to fall into such like flatteries whereof we have a very notable passage in Seneca who telleth us that Mark Anthonie being a Prince extreamly dissolute was instantly called god Bacchus by his flatterers and soon came to such shameless impudence as to suffer this title to be engraven upon his statues Behold the cause why entering into the Citie of Athens all the men of quality marching before him and desirous to be acceptable with him both through humour and affection of favour they failed not to introduce him with the title of Bacchus nay willing to over-value him above other people they added the hearty offer of
must there perhaps long time remain to burn and wear off so many ordures as our soul contracted in worldly affections if we make account to decline the eternity of torments I am amazed when I reflect on the remisness of Catholicks as well in the provision for their own safety as the comfort of their bretherens souls And when I have well weighed the course and progress of this great neglect I find it hath two sources The first is called infidelity the second stupidity which I resolve to convince in two passages of this discourse It is true that after this direfull heresie blown by the breath of the infernal serpent hath for this last Age opposed the verities of our faith besides the lost souls it daily takes away in the torrent of corruption it hath destilled into the minds of Catholicks faintness and infidelities which now adays turmoyl irresolute wits upon many articles and namely that which is now our present object Purgatorie will some Libertine say amidst the fumes of wine and good cheer is not so hot as folk talk Who ever came back to tell us news of it God is mercifull think you he takes delight to burn his children and to cut off the price of his Sons passion who satisfied for our sins Young souls hear this and suck in poison by the ear which choaks their belief and killeth the exercise of good works What shall I say against these infidelities and floating opinions of feeble Catholicks It is not my purpose to cast my self upon a subtile controversie which doth nothing but hale truth hither and thither I will loose no time to touch at many passages I onely to the matter express two reasons drawn from two lights that of nature and the other of faith which are able to evict confession of truth from a man who hath never so little shame or brain 2. It is a strange thing to see the great consent of all Purgatorie proved by the light of nature Ages which agree in a pretention of purgations of the soul so strong powerfull that those lights of nature speak as understandingly as if they were written with the rays of the Sun All the Gentiles who lived out of the law knew not how to gainsay this doctrine For they were sensible of the noble extraction of their soul and knew it was defiled by the body and by sensual works Behold the cause why they tied themselves to The opinion of the Ancients concerning the purgation of souls feeble elements to purifie it one while washing themselves in the streams of fountains another while passing through flames and sometimes seeking other ways to cleanse themselves from pollutions of the flesh But it was a pitifull thing they found prophanation even in sacrifice They were not content to purge themselves in this life but extend it to the souls of the dead constantly believing they stood in need of remedies to free themselves from bodily stains Theophilus Patriark of Antioch in the book he directed to one named Antiochus saith the Gentiles took out of the Scripture all they wrote of punishments in the other life And S. Augustine observeth that having this August 21. de civitate Dei c. 13. idea that all stains of the soul proceeded from the earth they employed the other three elements to purge them as he proveth by texts of the Ancients Synesius Synesius epist ad Joan. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 likewise thought there remained certain visible spots in the soul which made it appear they were the crimes wherewith it was contaminated in the body which notwithstanding agrees not very well with the truth we hold of the spirituality of the same soul And I find he spake in this text more like a Platonist than a Christian The Hebrews the Aegyptians Grecians and Romanes all contended for prayers for the dead and the truth of purgatorie The Hebrews three times in the Morus de Missa An excellent observation upon the belief of Purgatorie among the Hebrews Apoc. 21. 16. Civitas in quadro posita est year celebrated the feast of the dead and their Priest mounting up into a chair made expresly and ceremoniously four-square to represent the Citie of the blessed according to S. John rehearsed aloud and audibly the names of the dead to recommend them to the prayers of such as were present prayers so familiar amongst them that they wrote them upon tombs instead of Epitaphs in these terms SIT ANIMA EIUS COLLIGATA IN FASCICULO VIVENTIUM let his soul be bound up in the posey of the living As one would say all the souls of Saints were as an odoriferous posey whereof every elect constituted a flower What is this but to make stones speak against impietie What shall I say of the Aegyptians that were so Notable purgation of Aegyptians 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 impressed with the opinion that souls must be purged in the other life in so much as they had been drenched in voluptuous pleasures of the flesh that in the funerals of the dead having opened the bodie they took the heart out of the breast and put it into a little casket then on the bank of Nilus where ordinarily Plutarch in convivio septem Sapientum tombs were erected a herald holding the casket and shewing it to the eyes of heaven protested before all there present the deceased now in question had lived piously and according to the laws of his Ancestours that if he had offended through bodily pleasures they wished his soul might be as well cleansed as they went about to purge the stomack the instrument of the lusts of the living thereupon they threw it into Nilus Behold these poor Pagans how they were moved with a touch from God which cannot lye who says unto them the dead must be purged but as for the rest they know not how Shall I speak of the Grecians And know we not that Plato the prime man of their Nation in his Phedon spake so perspicuously for purgatory that he seemed to have been bred in the Christian schools I will conclude with the Romans And can we be ignorant how in the beginning of the Church under the Emperour Domitian when as yet some Apostles lived Quintilian a most renowned Oratour making Qintil Declam 10. an oration in the City of Rome in a certain pleading concerning a sepulcher which had been enchanted by magick protested in terms most express the truth of purgatory saying The soul being purged of fire went to take place in heaven as we shewed also in the sixteenth maxim If you also require authorities of Pagans who have seen what Christians practised adde to all this that Julius a very ancient Authour speaking Julius Florileg l. 3. of the death of a Lady named Podon observed in plain terms that her husband who was one of the most ancient Christians made offerings for her which he called Tertul. in exhort ad castitat Jam repete apud
of Angels who say that he is alive And certain men of ours went to the Monument and they found it so as the women said but him they found not And he said to them O foolish and slow of heart to believe in all thing which the Prophets have spoken Ought not Christ to have suffered these things and so enter into his glory And beginning from Moses and all the Prophets he did interpret to them in all the Scriptures the things that were concerning him And they drew nigh to the Town whither they went and he made semblance to go further And they forced him saying Tarry with us because it is toward night and the day now far spent and he went in with them And it came to pass while he sate at the table with them he took bread and blessed and brake and did reach to them And their eyes were opened and they knew him and he vanished out of their sight And they said to the other Was not our heart burning in us whiles he spake in the way and opened unto us the Scriptures And rising up the same hour they went back into Jerusalem and they found the eleven gathered together and those that were with them saying That our Lord is risen indeed and hath appeared to Simon And they told the things that were done in the way and how they knew him in the breaking of bread Moralities 1. IT is a strange thing that God is always with us and we are so little with him We have our being our moving our life from him he carries us in his arms he keeps us as a nurse doth her dear child and yet all this while we scarce know what he is and use him so often as a stranger He is in our being and yet we keep him far from our heart as a dead man who is quite forgotten And Enoch walked with him and for that he was taken from the conversation of men and reserved for Paradise To speak truth our soul should always be languishing after her Jesus and count it a kind of Adultery to be separated from him so much as by thought Let us learn a little to talk with him we commonly have that in our tongue which we keep in our heart Let us sweeten the sadness of our pilgrimage by the contemplation of his beauties Let us look upon him as God and man the God of gods the Man of men our great Saviour and Prophet powerfull both in word and work for if his word be thunder his life is a lightening He hath been here doing good to all the world and suffering hurt from all the world doing good without reward and enduring evil without impatience We all pass here as Torrents into valleys the onely question is of our passing well whether we look on worldly goods as on waters which pass under a bridge and as upon the furniture of an Inn which is none of ours If we be embarked in the Vessel of life let us not amuse our selves to gather Cockles upon the shore but so that we may always have our eyes fixt upon Paradise 2. Two things do hinder those Pilgrims from knowing Jesus as they should The one is their eyes are dazeled and the other is the little account they make of the Cross which drives them into the mistrust of the Resurrection And this is it which crosseth us all our life and so oft diverts us from the point of our happiness Our eyes are dazeled with false lights of the world they are darkened with so many mists and vapours of our own appetites and passions that we cannot see the goods of heaven in the brightest of their day Worldly chains have a certain effective vigour and pleasure which is onely painted but they have a most certain sorrow and a most uncertain contentment They have a painful labour and a timorous rest A possession full of misery and void of all beatitude If we had our eyes well opened to penetrate and see what it is we should then say of all the most ravishing objects of the world How senseless was I when I courted you O deceitfull world thou didst appear great to me when I saw thee not as thou art But so soon as I did see thee rightly I did then cease to see thee for thou wast no more to me but just nothing We run in full career after all that pleaseth our sense and the Cross which is so much preached to us is much more upon our Altars than in our hearts We will not know that the throne of Mount Calvarie is the path-way to Heaven and as this truth wanders from our hearts Jesus departs from our eyes Let us at least pray Jesus to stay with us for it is late in our hearts and the night is far advanced by our want of true light We shal not know Jesus by discourse but by feeding him in the persons of his poor since he gives the continual nourishment of his body Aspirations O Onely Pilgrim of the world and first dweller in the heart of thy heavenly Father what a pilgrimage hast thou made descending from Heaven to earth and yet without forsaking Heaven Thou hast markt thy steps by thy conquests made visible thy way by thine own light thou hast watered it with thy precious bloud and paved it with thy wounds O what a goodly thing it is to walk with thee when thou openest thy sacred mouth as the opening of a temple to discover the beauties and mysteries of it O that is most pleasing to understand that mouth which distils so much honey through lips of Roses But wherefore My good Lord art thou pleased to hide thy self from a soul which languishes after thee Take away the vail from mine eyes and suffer thy self to be seen in the vesture of thy heavenly beauties If I must bear the Cross and pass by the throne of Mount Calvarie to come to Heaven I most humbly submit to thy divine pleasure that I may possess all that thou art The Gospel upon Tuesday in Easter week S. Luke the 24. ANd whiles they spake these things Jesus stood in the midst of them and he saith to them Peace be to you It is I fear not But they being troubled and frighted imagined they saw a Spirit And he saith to them Why are you troubled and cogitations arise in your hearts See my hands and feet that it is I my self handle and see for a spirit hath not flesh and bones as you see me to have And when he had said this he shewed them his hands and feet But they yet not believing and marvelling for joy he said Have you here any thing to be eaten But they offered him a piece of fish broiled and a honey-comb And when he had eaten before them taking the remains he gave to them And he said to them These are the words which I spake to you when I was yet with you that all things must needs be fulfilled which are written
de concent l. 38. I were created to live free from all worldly contrarieties I who commit so many fins on the other part will to day do an act of virtue in honour of my Master and in despite of passion Let us go to heaven by love since we cannot go thither by sufferings This is the true gate by which we enter into the sanctuary eternally to enjoy the sight of the inaccessible beauties of the holy and regall Trinity Hear you not the God of peace who saith to us If thou O unhappy soul wilt still persist in Hatred I pronounce unto thee the six punishments of Cain Banishment from the sight of God fear stupidity of mind the life of a beast the malediction of the earth and as Procopius addeth persecuting Angels armed with swords of fire who shall pursue thee like spectres and spirits in all places and shall make themselves visible and dreadfull to thee at the last day of thy life Behold here deservedly thy inheritance since being mortall thou makest thy enemies immortall and dost still persecute the afflicted widow and her children who are become orphans after the death of a husband and a father whom thou hatest The strongest enmities oft-times are appeased at the sight of a dead body and a tomb which we find exemplified in Josephus for Alexander was extremely hated by the Jews as having reigned over them with a rod of Iron But when death had closed up his eyes and that the Queen his wife most sorrowfully presented Joseph l. 3. c. 23. A notable example to appease hatred her self accompanied by two young children and exposed the body of her husband saying aloud Sirs I am not ignorant that my husband hath most unworthily used you but see to what death hath brought him if you be not satisfied tear his body in pieces and satisfie your own revenge but pardon a deplorable widow and her little innocent orphans who implore your mercy The most salvage spirits were so softned by this act that all their hatred turned into pity yet you Barbarian still persist to hate a man after his death to persecute him in a part of himself to tear him in pieces in his living members O good God if you renounce not this revenge you will be used like Cain as an enemy of mankind and a hang-man of Nature O flame O love O God! As thou art dispersed throughout us by love so banish all these cursed Hatreds of Hell and make us love all in thy goodnesse to possesse all in thy fruition § 6 Of the profit may be drawn from Hatred and the course we must hold to be freed from the Danger of being Hated THere now remains to consider here what profit may be derived from hatred and with what Oeconomy Utility of hatred it may be husbanded to render it in some sort profitable and in case it be hurtfull to prevent its assaults and sweeten its acerbities If the industry of men found out the way to make preservitives out of the most dangerous poysons why should it be impossible for us to make some notable utilities to arise out of a passion which seems not to be created but for the dammage and ruine of all things yet it is certain that Nature which never is idle in its productions hath given it us for a great good For it may serve love well rectified in its pretentions it furnisheth it with centinels and light-horse to hinder that which opposeth its inclination and to ruine all contrarieties banded against its contentments How often would Nature throw it self out of stupidity into uncertain dangers and most certain mischiefs were it not that naturall a version did awaken it did avert it from its misery and insensibly shew it the place of repose Is it not a wholesome Hatred to hate Pride Ryot Ambition and all ill Habits Is it not a reasonable Hatred discreetly to fly from maladies crosses incommodities which hurt the body and nothing advantage the mind This passion which in the beginning seemed so hideous teacheth us all this When it is well managed it conspireth against others by an according Discord to the lovely Harmony of totall Nature One may say there is happinesse and advantage to hate many things but what profit can one find in passive Hatred which makes a man many times to be hated and ill wished without cause or any demerit To that I answer with Saint Ambrose that it is That it is good to be honestly loved good to avoid such a kind of Hatred that it is fit to make ones self to be beloved with all honour by good men and to gain as much as possible the good opinion of all the world thereby to render glory to God as Rivers carry their tribute to the Ocean A publick Bonum est testimonium habere de multorum dilectione hinc nascitur fides ut committere se tuo affectul non vereatut alienus quem charum advertit pluribus Ambr. l. 2. offic c. 7. Means to gain the good will of the publick person who is in the employments and commerce of the great world may have all the treasures of the Indies and all the dignities of old Rome but if he have not the love and good-will of men I account him most indigent and poor Thence it is that confidence taketh beginning without which there is no fortune maketh any notable progression nor affair which can have such successe as might be expected It is infinitely profitable for great men that they may divert the Hatred of the people to have innocency of life greatnesse without contempt of inferiours revenues without injustice riches without avarice pleasures without ryot liberty without tyranny and splendour without rapine All the rich who live in the society of men as Pikes called the tyrants of rivers in the company of other fishes to ruine devour and fatten themselves with the bloud of the commons are ordinarily most odious but as there is a certain fish which Elians History calleth the Adonis of the Sea because Adonis an admirable fish Aelian l. 9. c. 16. de animal it liveth so innocently that it toucheth no living thing strictly preserving peace with all the off-spring of the sea which is the cause it is beloved and courted as the true darling of waters so we find in the world men of honour and estate who came to eminent fortunes by pure and innocent wayes wherein they demeaned themselves with much maturity sweetnesse and affability which put them into the possession of the good opinion of all the world But those who are hated ought diligently and carefully to consider from whence this hatred proceedeth and by what wayes it is fomented that fit remedies may thereunto be applyed There is a hatred which cometh from equals another How hatred is to be diverted from inferiours a third from great ones and sometimes from powerfull and subtile women which is little to be feared That which proceedeth