yet divers instances may be produced to prove That Avarice doth change into Ambition in mens declining age Martius Crassus p See Plutarch in his life had by a sordid kinde of Avarice attained to the greatest riches of any that we read of and yet out of Envy that he bore to the warlike atchievements of Pompeius and Caesar such an insatiable Ambition or desire of honor possessed him in his declining age That at threescore and three yeers of age he gave away half his estate to the common people of Rome to obtain a general Commission to be Commander in chief of the Roman Legions that were appointed to make war in the furthest parts of Armenia against the Parthians Which insatiable and unseasonable Ambition of his was ingeniously reproved by an old Armenian Knight of whom he did desire to be informed of the condition and distance of the way he was to undergo and power he was to oppose in this Parthian journy saying unto him That it was too great for him to undertake the same in his declining age and that the morning Sun of his age had been fitter for such an enterprise then the setting of it And had Crassus been ruled by this wholesom Counsel he had not by his insatiable desire of honor faln from the highest degree of worldly prosperity to the lowest degree of humane disgrace and misery as he did for by this rash enterprise he was the cause of his own death and of his eldest sons and of the lives of a great part of the bravest Nobility of Rome and of the rout and utter overthrow of his whole Army This is to prove That men in their declining age are fitter for Counsel then for Action and that is the reason that the Roman Senate the Counsel of Areopage and the Senate of Venice have been and are composed of men much advanced in their declining age because their Passions are commonly more moderate their Experience greater their Judgment more solid and their Counsels safer then of those who are in the youth or virility of their age for as Job saith With the ancient should be wisdom and in length of yeers understanding q Job 12.12 Contrarily there have been others in whom the desire of honor hath raigned in their youth and virility as their Noble Martial atchievements do witness who have changed this Ambitious Passion into the Sordid Passion of Avarice in their declining age As may appear by the lives of Vespasiaanus r See Dion and the English and the French Histories of Henry the seventh King of England and of Henry the fourth King of France Howsoever the desire of Wine of Money and the malicious Passion of Envy is more natural and doth commonly increase with age as much as rash Temerity and carnal Delights do diminish by age whereby I conclude That the declining age of men is not free from Vanity For what greater Vanity can there be then to Envy at another mans prosperity or to desire Wine when our head-piece is so weakened by age that it cannot overcome the vapors of it or to desire Money when we have less need of it sith we daily expect to be carried to our Graves Sixthly and Lastly The decrepit age of men begins at seventy and ends when Death strikes them with her Dart which is according to the course of life between fourscore or fourscore and ten For none attains to the days of Methuselah Å¿ Gen. 6.26 or of the Patriarks Abraham Isaac and Jacob for God hath shortened the days of men because of their transgressions as it appears Gen. 7.3 My Spirit saith the Lord shall not alwayes strive with man for he also is flesh yet his dayes shall be an hundred and twenty years and the oldest man that hath been known in this age of the world was a Shropshire Husbandman that was brought up to London as a wonder in the days of King James who was said to be one hundred and thirtie three years of age and this long life of his according to the opinion of the learned Physitians did proceed from the simplicity of his meate and drink for as soon as he came to be fed with the dainties of the Court he came to be diseased and suddenly departed this life Plinius and other Naturalists have much troubled themselves to finde out the naturall reasons why mens lives are so short the best reason they give for it is their immoderate diet and the variety of dainties and change of superfluous meats cooked with art inticing men to gluttony and drunkenness for daily experience doth shew that those who live soberly and live upon simple food avoiding slowth and idleness do live commonly longer then such as feed on dainties and use a sedentary life but the chief cause of it is that men do daily increase in sin and it is just with God for the punishment of their sins to shorten their lives sith as the Apostle Paul saith t Rom. 6.23 That the wages of sin is death howsoever the decrepit age of men except it be indowed with free grace and sanctified by the blessed Spirit of God it is the vanity of vanities and the misery of all miseries for the numerous infirmities incident to it and especially if penury doth accompany the same for old age with penury is the greatest affliction that can befal to generous spirits and the greatest tentation of Satan to intice men to despair for if rich men who have all manner of comforts cannot with patience support the infirmities of a decrepit age but murmure as some have done in my hearing that they were weary of their lives of what distemper must the poor aged people be who have no worldly comforts at all but are ready to starve for cold and to famish for want of food therefore tender and compassionated Christians should exercise their charity upon these objects of unparalleld misery as the most acceptable sacrifice they can offer to God and yet all the hearts of most men are so hardened by a just Judgment of God upon this Nation for its transgressions that they can look upon these dying objects of compassion whoperish daily in the streets without pity or reluctation Now for a conclusion and confirmation of the vanity and misery incident to the life of men I will make a short relation of the Maladies incident to every one of the ages of their lives first in their very conception they may be extinguished by ill sents and vapours and by divers accidents of bruises or falls secondly in their infancy by the squincy convulsions measles or the smal pox thirdly in their adolescency by the sword the pleuresie and burning feavers fourthly in their virility by sanguin apoplexies bloudy-flixes and consumptions fifthly in their declining age by the stone and the gout by dropsies paralepsies and flegmtick apoplexies and in the decrepit age by gouts aches cough the retentions of urine the strangullion poverty cold and
will appear by these three insuing effects of Despair fourthly In the time of the civil wars See Plutarch in Syllaes life between Sylla and Marius Sylla besieged Preneste a small but a very strong City of Italy because it had sided with Marius and after a long siege he took the same and commanded that all the Inhabitants should be put to the Sword and the City set on fire onely he charged that his Host and his Family should be preserved because in former time he had shewed him much love and good hospitality so at the first entrance of the Town an Officer with a band of souldiers were sent to this Hosts house to preserve it from plunder but he hearing of Syllaes cruel decree against the City was so transported with Despair that he slew himself saying He would not be obliged for his life to the destroyer of his native Countrey See Plutarch in Cesars life fifthly in the civil war between the Cesarean and the Pompeian faction a Centurion or Captain of Cesar and some thirty common souldiers were taken in a fight and brought before Cornelius Scipio that was then Governor of Africa for the Pompeian party who condemned them all to death the Centurion excepted who seeing the cruelty of Scipio drew out his sword and slew himself in his presence saying He would not be obliged for his life to so cruel an enemy of Cesar sixthly In the war that fell out between the Romans and the Iews in the days of the Emperor Vespasianus See Josephus in the war of the Iews Titus his son laid siege and incompassed Iopata a strong City of the Iews with trenches and a powerful Army and after a long siege and great resistance thirty of the chiefest Magistrates of Iopata seeing no probability that the City could hold out any longer hid themselves in a private Vault into which they conveied victuals for three days before which time the City was taken by a Storm and the greatest part of the people put to the sword and such strickt watch set to the gates that none could escape so that these thirty in the Vault must either yield themselves to the Romans or famish whereupon transported with Despair they resolved rather to kill themselves then to die a lingering death or to yield themselves to the mercy of the Romans a desperate mad and barbarous resolution for the fury of the souldiers being over they had undoubtedly obtained mercy and so they cast lots who should be killed first till there were but two left alive and that was Iosephus and another who abhorring this Self-murdering perswaded his fellow to yield themselves to the Romans to which he consented and having discovered themselves they were brought before Titus who having heard of the merit of Iosephus shewed him mercy and at his intreaty saved the life of his fellow Fourthly The good effects of the passion of Despair may be these first It annihilates and turneth to smoak all the vain and extravagant hopes of men that are fixed upon impossibilities Four good effects of Despair secondly It doth quench the burning flames of love and clips the wings of presumptuous Lovers who fly too high with their desires that would otherwise rack and torment their mindes and make them daily sigh and groan because they could not obtain the enjoyment of that object that is too rare and excellent for their degree but Despair coming on makes them desist from the prosecution of things in which there is no probability they can be obtained thirdly it mitigates the ambitious hopes of Princes who would conceive nothing impossible to them because of their might and power if this faithful counsellor of Despair did not respresent unto them the difficulties there may be to attain to the fruition of their Hope The Emperor Charls the fifth See du Bailys Commentaries in the life of Francis the first King of France being ready to pass out of Italy into France with a very potent Army led by approved Commanders and composed of old and experienced souldiers caused this Army to be ranged in Battel array and when it was Marshalized in the best order it could be according to the Art and Rules of War he sent for a French Noble man that was his Prisoner to ride along with him to view this Army and after they had ridden through the same and viewed all the Squadrons of it The Emperor did ask the Noble man what he conceived of this Army He answered that it was a gallant one and well disciplined I hope said the Emperor to ride with this Army thorow the heart of France without impediment of any moment and come to the very walls of Paris safe Sir said the French Noble man mitigate your Hopes with Despair for I can assure you if you had three such Armies you will not come to Paris before you are well beaten and so it fell out for he went no furthen then Marsellies and there lost thirty thousand of his men and was inforced to raise his siege and to return with shame and dishonor into Italy fourthly As Despair makes men fly and takes away their courage so when it isextream and that there is no hope left for the preservation of their lives it inflames their courage See the English History and du Halian in his French History and makes them fight like Lyons The Black Prince having entred France with an Army of some ten thousand men and taken divers strong holds in Poytou Iohn then King of France came against him with an Army of thirty thousand men the Prince seeing himself over-matched by the means of the Popes Nuncio desired to come to a Treaty and offered to the French King to restore unto him all the strong holds he had taken and to make good the damages he had received so he might peaceably retreat with his Army into Aquitain that did then belong to the Kingdom of England but King Iohn a rash and inconsiderate Prince required greater things which stood not with the Princes honor to grant and so was inforced out of Despair to fight whether he would or no and being an excellent souldier seated his Camp in a high ground full of thorns and bushes which he lined with his Archers and caused in the night time a deep ditch to be cast up about his Camp to break the fury of the French horse the French in the morning in stead to send their foot to make a passage through this ditch sent their horse who falling atop of one another in the ditch were slain by the Archers and the battel of the French disordered whereupon the Prince came upon them with his whole Army and obtained a famous victory and took King Iohn and his youngest son Philip le Hardy that was afterwards Duke of Burgundy prisoners and a great number of the French Nobility which confirms that extream Despair makes men fight like Lyons and that wise Princes are rather to
extraordinarily violent in all its operations It is also of an insatiable and sordid nature by the means of the passion of desire that hath an insatiable proprietie and is most base because this desire hath no other object then the excrements of the Earth Avarice is of a violent insatiable and feminine nature for Gold is nothing but a yellow and Silver nothing but a white clay calcinated and refined by the beams of the Sun by a long continuance of time It is likewise of a timerous quality by the means of the passion of fear that is of a feminine nature so by the mixture of these ill-qualified ingredients Avarice is one of the most base passions incident to men Fourthly These kinde of men are most commonly addicted to it 1. Low and base minded men 2. Old men are more addicted to it then the young 3. Those who have in their youth been riotous and prodigal are much inclined to it when they become ancient 4. Such as have been in great want in their youth become avaritious when they are old out of fear to fall into the like straits For the first all generous spirits disdain to be avaritious for their thoughts soar higher then the excrements of the Earth whereas the low-minded are like the Swine who never rise nor lift up their eyes to Heaven but are still fixed and routing with their snout in the muck-hils of the Earth See Plutarch and Dion in their Lives I mean by using all vile and base means to enrich themselves as Crassus and Vespasian did Secondly the antient are more addicted to Avarice then young men and this proceeds of fear and from the experience they have of the mutability of all worldly things besides they consider their weakness disabilities of body to labor as they did in their youth therefore hoard up what they can against the day of need hope being then utterly extinguisht in their breast by the cold blast of timerous fears which doth possess decrepit aged men yet this consideration that they have one of their feet upon the brink of their Grave should induce them to make use of the blessings of God sith they have but short time to live and less need of them then younger men Thirdly such as have lavished their means by profuse prodigalities fall when they are recalled from these courses from one extream to another and from great Prodigals become great Usurers avaritious Misers Fourthly Princes who in their youth were of a generous spirit yet having been brought by mutation of state into great wants and necessities become when they are antient out of fear to fall again into the same straits extreamly avaritious and prone to hoard up Treasures as it appears by the Lives of Peter de Medecis Duke of Florence See Guicciardine and the English and French Histories in their Lives and by Henry the Seventh King of England and Henry the Fourth King of France Fifthly The causes moving men to affect Avarice may be these 1. A base distruct of the providence of God suggested in their hearts by Satan through want of Faith to believe these precepts of our blessed Saviour * Math. 6 25 26 27 28 29 30. Take no thought for your life what ye shall eat or what ye shall drink nor yet for your body what ye shall put on Is not the life more then meat and the body more then rayment Behold the fowls of the air for they sow not neither do they reap nor gather into barns yet your heavenly Father feedeth them Are ye not better then they Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit to his stature And why take you thought for raiment consider the Lilies of the Field how they grow they toil not neither do they Spin. And yet I say unto you that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these Wherefore if God so clothe the grass of the field which to day is and to morrow is cast into the oven shall he not much more clothe you O ye of little Faith 2. This diffidence doth beget in them a faint-hearted fear to fall into poverty if they scrape and heap not by hook and crook some heaps of Gold or Silver for although poverty of it self be innocent yet in these depraved days it is held criminal and the greatest vice and misery upon earth Prov. 14.20 For the poor saith Solomon is hated even of his neighbour Notwithstanding saith he in another place Prov. 19 1. Better is the poor that walketh in his integrity then the rich that is perverse in his ways 3. Because none are regarded in this age but the rich yet rich men without wisdom and piety should be no more regarded then fools for as snow in Summer Allusion upon Prov. 26.1 and as rain in Harvest comes unseasonably even so honour is as unseemly to rich men that want understanding It was an ingenuous comparison of a modern Author who said that a wise vertuous and religious poor man was like a good horse with a leather Saddle on his back and a vitious profane and foolish rich man like a Jade that had an embroydred Saddle on his back Men respecting in these days more the rich and gay apparel of men then their worth and vertue 4. Because they may enjoy by riches all carnal volupties from which the poorer sort are debarred by their poverty 5. Because they erroneously conceive that riches make them have many friends but they are commonly Sycophants and Table-friends for all such whose friendship is grounded upon riches and not upon the vertue and merites of the party are time-servers and of a base and mercenary spirit and as fickle in their love and friendship as the wind and at the least blast of disgrace or adversity forsake them These two instances shall prove the point Haman the great Favourite of King Ahashuerus had many friends who bowed their knees daily before him when he had the favour of the King but as soon as his wrath was kindled against him they acquainted the King he had erected a Gibet of fifty Cubits high to hang up Mordecai the preserver of the Kings life Esth 7.9 10. and were the first upon the Kings command who cast a Cloke upon his face offered to hang up Haman upon the same Gibet See Sejanus Life 2. Sejanus the beloved Favourite of the Emperour Tiberius had many friends as long as he was graced by the Emperour for he was more courted by the Senators and men of War then Tiberius himself but they all forsook him when he fell into disgrace and were more eager and active then any to draw his body through the kennels of the Streets of Rome Whereby it appears that the rich mens friends are like a broken bow or a bruised reed 6. Because they falsly believe that riches will rescue them out of many dangers but they are deceived for the smaller
shame and many men in these days come to penury by often changing of Calling or by undertaking such Callings as they never were bred to or by exercising four or five Callings at one and the same time which is a great vanity for that is the cause that Artificers never attain to the perfection of their Art or handy-craft but remain ignorant hudlers in them all It is therefore convenient that men should be constant to one Calling and to take delight in it For godliness with content saith St. Paul c 1 Tim. 6.6 is great gain and without men take delight in their profession they will always be changing till they bring themselves to extream misery Secondly violent and superfluous Pleasures are desructive two ways the first impair mens health and shorten their dayes and the other doth waste and consume their estates how many have lost their lives by the excessive pleasures of Venery in the very act many more by excessive riots of drunkenness and gluttony and others by the violent exercises of Tennis Foot-ball play Leaping Vaulting and running of races some others by swiming The violent and superfluous pleasures and others by drinking in Summer wines cooled in snow and of late years how many have shortned their lives by the excessive use of Tobacco a bewitching herb in the taking of which the poorer sort consume the small means they have and the richer impair their health and fill their brains as full of foot as is the funnel of a chimney by which they deprive themselves of sleep consume their radical humor engender Palsies and apoplexies and go down to the grave before their time whereas if it be used moderately it purgeth the Phlegm prevents the Dropsie and refresheth the spirits It is then apparent that as these violent pleasures impair the body so they wast mens estates for rioting gluttony and drunkenness Tennis and Foot-ball-play running of races and drinking of wine cooled in snow are consumers of the means and estates of men Thirdly the moderate and lawful pleasures are not prohibited in the word of God so they be used with moderation for Christians may boldly take pleasure in a moderate way of all the creatures under the Sun so it be with thanksgiving and after a sanctified manner in all sobriety and temperance 1. They may take delight in the admirable works of God d Psal 136.8 in the contemplation of the light of the Sun in the constant course it observes in the regulating of the seasons of the year and in the increase and declination of its heigth whereby the days are lengthened or shortned In the various mutations of the Moon by whose influence the Tides increase or fall 2. They may delight to see the aspect of the Spring e Psal 8.3 when after a cold Winter the vegetative creatures begin to sprout and when Flora doth revest her self in her glorious apparel clothing the earth with variety of odiferous flowers inameled of divers colours which excel in beauty in the esteem of our blessed Saviour f Math. 6.28 the very glory of King Salomon and in Summer they may delight in the blessing of God upon the labour of the Husbandman and in Harvest upon the incredible increase of the seed and in Winter g Psal 72. â—6 in the consideration of the propriety that God hath given to the vegetative creatures to draw their sap which is their life into their root that it may be kept in the bowels of the earth from the danger of the frost and snow and how by his admirable providence he doth feed the beasts of the field and the fowls of the air in that barren season The moderate and lawful pleasures as well as in havest 3. They may delight in the glorious objects of the green and beautiful medows and in the sweet rivers running along their banks in the numerous herds of cattel feeding in the Valleys and Mountains 4. They may rejoyce in the commerce and trade of rich merchandise that are brought from forraign parts whereby the commonwealth doth flourish and the poor are set at work and all in generall provided of all necessary things for this life 5. They may take delight to see the Artificers Shop-keepers and all others of the poorer sort to prosper and to have vent and utterance for their wares whereby they are enabled to maintain themselves wives children and servants in a decent condition and free from want or penury 6. They may delight and bless the Lord for their health peace and prosperous estate and that they live and move and have a beeing with all necessary things for this life as meat drink and raiment but above all they may laud and praise the Lord for his mercy and the free liberty they have to hear his Word and Gospel preached with zeal and sincerity 7. They may solace themselves in honest recreations as in walking abroad to take the aire in the company of their friends their discourses being h Col. 4 6. seasoned with salt and rather tending to edification then depravation 8. They may sometimes go a hunting hawking fishing shooting bowling but these recreations are to be short and onely for to refresh their spirits after tedious studies and weekly employments and to strengthen their bodies by these laudable exercises and not to make them as some do their daily work for otherwise these honest and laudable recreations would become vitious and destructive to body and soul for nothing ought to be more precious to Christians then Time Fourthly Vicious and unlawful pleasures are the snares of Satan and the harbengers of death and yet they are most in fashion in these days See Plutarch and the English and French History and few or none that are addicted to them will give them any bound or limits It is recorded that Cesar Edward the fourth King of England and Henry the fourth King of France were over-much addicted to Venery and yet those that have written their Lives give them this commendation that they bounded this Passion within certain limits for their Venerian delights did never say they make them neglect any affairs of State or actions of war because saith a modern Author of Cesar Senault in the use of Passions that the Passion of Ambition was more predominate in him then the Passion of Love although the Passion of Love in the opinion of Aristotle and of Senault himself is held to be the most violent Passion of all the other Passions but if men are to be moderated as I have said before in the natural and necessary pleasures there is great reason they should be more temperate in their vitious pleasures sith they are sinful and odious to God and to all vertuous and temperate men and St. Paul i 1 Thes 4.3 would have men to be moderate in their cating and drinking for their healths sake and for conscience sake for the abuse of the creature is prohibited by the
inlarge my self upon these particulars 1. On the Definition of this Passion 2. On the Causes of it 3. On the Nature and Proprieties of it 4. On the evil and good Effects of it 5. On the Spiritual Use of it First This Passion hath several names some call it Confidence and have good reason for it because it is its unseperable companion others call it Audacity but this terme doth blemish the true Nature of it The definition of the passion of Undantedness for audacious and presumptuous men are held to be under one and the same predicament other call it boldness but this word is often taken for Impudency but the French call it Hardiesse which doth express most properly the nature of it which is Undantedness in the English Tongue And here is the definition of it according to the judgment of the best Moralists Boujou fol. 7 23. Vndantedness saith one is an affection and assurance to eschew an evil and to overcome all the difficulties of it Vndantedness The Bishop of Marseilles in pag. 401. saith another is a Passion of the soul which strengtheneth the same and makes it confident it can overcome the most difficult evils that can befall it in this life and doth also incourage it to prosecute the good that is most difficult to obtain And to this last definition I assent as concerning the same the best of the two for it doth truely express the nature of this passion which is the third passion incident to the Irascible Appetite 2. The Causes of it are many but they may be reduced to these six the two first are Natural the two middlemost accidental and the two last supernatural The first natural cause of undantedness is a hot and moist temper of the body The first Natural cause may be a moist and hot temper of the body for the Naturalists have observed that all such as are of that constitution of body have ordinarily an undanted spirit The Natural reason of it is that this hot and moist temper doth suppress the Melancholick humor and its evil proprieties and effects whereby the blood that is hot and airy an ful ofvital spirits and the bilia that is dry and fiery and the flegm that is cold and moist being thus mixt become of a dilative nature and by the motion of the heart spread themselves into all the utmost parts of the body and inableth the minde to undertake and the body to execute all maner of generous designs be they never so difflcult or perillous The second natural cause of Undantedness may be the largeness of the heart of men for it hath been observed by the Physitians when they have opened the bodies of valiant and undanted spirits that their hearts were larger then the hearts of ordinary men See Plutarch in the life of Themistocles and King Xerxes King of Persia having caused the body of Leonidas King of Sparta to be opened partly out of admiration of his valour and in part out of curiosity The second natural cause of undantedness is the largeness of the harts of men to see whether the heart of such an undanted spirit was larger then the hearts of common men he found the same to be as big again and hairy all over a natural propriety incident to such as are of a hot and moist constitution of body to abound in hair The Natural reason why men with larger hearts then others should be addicted to Valour and Undantedness is this that the larger the heart is the morevital spirits it can contain which are the essential causes of Valour and Undantedness and therefore it may very well be that the largeness of the heart is a natural cause of Undantedness That tall and burly men are commonly less valorous then short and middle stastured men Divers men are of opinion that tall and burly bodied men are more addicted to Valour and Undantedness then short and middle-statur'd men but they are mistaken for tall men have smaller hearts then others and are also commonly more faint-hearted then other men and the Naturalists give this reason for it If their hearts say say were proportionable to their body they might have reason to be of that opinion but it is commonly smaller because Nature extended its vertue to the utmost parts deprives the inward parts of it Besides all the vitall spirits reside in the bloud and in the heart and by its motion they are dispersed through all the parts of the body Now the farther distant these parts are from the heart the longer time are the vital spirits a going to quicken and vivifie them and by consequence tall and burlybodied men are fuller of Flesh then of Spirits and less couragious then others It is true that they have a presuming undantedness because of their strength but what is done by strength proceeds from Strength and not from Valour which doth reside in the heart and in the minde and not in the arms and in the sinews And the most valorous and undanted spirits of this Age and of other Ages were for the most part short or at the most of a middle stature Leonidas See Plutarch in Peleopidas life and Peleopidas were but short men and Sir Francis Veere and Sir Francis Drake and the Marshal de Biron and the Marshal Gastion were all short men I conclude then that Valour and undantedness doth reside in the heart and minde and not in the strength of the body and that some of all statures may be valiant and undanted The first accidentall cause may be the innocency of men and the justice of their Cause for as Salomon saith Prov. 28.1 The wicked flee when no man pursueth but the righteous are bold as a a Lyon and it is daily seen that three true men will overcome half a dozen of theeves And when men fight for the preservation of the Liberties of their native Countrey and the lives of their wives and children and all the means they have they fight commonly like Lyons The second accidentall cause of Undantedness may be The relations support or alliances that men have with potent and powerful Princes or States for the confidence they have to be backt and supported by them doth make them undertake with undanted courage difficult and perillous enterprises The two accinentall causes of the undantedness of men for Instance The Hollanders a small Commonwealth being at the first supported by Elizabeth Queen of England and afterwards by Henry the fourth King of France have for many years together undantedly waged war with the great King of Spain and likewise the Kingdom of Sweden a petty Kingdom in comparison of the Empire of Germany being supported by Lewis the 13th King of France hath with an undanted courage waged war many years with the House of Austria See the Histories of Germany England and France Thirdly The first supernatural cause of the undantedness of men may be their zeal to Religion for
eyes look right before thee intimating that to look aside upon a beautiful woman is a sign of a lascivious eye but to look on her straight is a token of an innocent eye And it is most certain that of all the five senses the Eye doth more then any other encrease the Kingdom of darkness because they are the windows whereby all unclean thoughts enter into the soul from which do proceed all the actual and intellectual Fornications and Adulteries and that is the reason why our blessed Saviour doth charge us to pluck out our right eye if it doth offend Math. 5 29. meaning we should mortifie the lust of our eye rather then be cast into Hell for as S. John saith 1 Joh 2.16 17 18. The lust of the eyes is not of the Father but of the world and the world passeth away and the lust thereof but he that doth the will of God abideth for ever Thirdly All suspected places where men may be allured to lust are to be eschewed 1. The Schools of love as the Italians call them 2. Publick meetings 3. Enterludes 4. Court-Revels For in all these men do finde alluring Objects to commit sin and when opportunity time and place meet together men or women must have a great measure of Grace to refrain them from sin As for the 1. Solomon discribes elegantly in these words the alluring charms of the Mistresses of the Schools of love Prov. 7.10 13 14 15 16 17 18. 27. Behold there met him a woman in the habit of a Harlot and subtile of heart so she caught him and kissed him and with an impudent face said unto him I have peace-offerings with me this day have I payd my vows Therefore came I forth to meet thee diligently to seek thy face and I have found thee I have deckt my bed with coverings of Tapestry with carved work with fine linnen of Egypt I have perfumed my bed with Myrrhe Aloes and Cinamon Come let us take our fill of love until the morning let us solace our selves in loves c. But the conclusion of it is Her house is the way to Hell going down to the chambers of death For the 2. Dinah by rambling abroad to see the publike Sports was Ravished by Shechem the Prince of the Land For the 3. Enterludes Playes and Comoedies are the very Seminaries of all uncleanness and the Aretin postures that are there seen with the lascivious Dances and Discourses do inflame and intice men and women to Lust For the 4. Court-Revels and Masks have been the overthrow or loss of many womens chastity See the History of England and France Edward the Third and Edward the Fourth Kings of England and Henry the Third and Henry the Fourth Kings of France were all of them allured to lust by the beautiful Objects they saw in their Court-Masks Fourthly All evil Company is to be eschewed for in them lyeth an insensible venom the Effects of which do not appear suddenly but in continuance of time it will shew it self visibly in the life and conversation of men and women for young men that fall into evil company will at the first be ashamed of it but after they have frequented them they wil delight in it then they will palliate and excuse them and lastly they will patronize and maintain them And become as vitious profane and debaucht as the worst of them and therefore as he that toucheth Pitch shall be defiled with it Eccles 13.1 even so such as haunt evil company will at last be infected with their vices Besides it is a dishonour to converse with evil company for if men were as righteous as Lot Who was saith Peter 1 Pet. 2.7 8. vexed from day to day with the unlawful and ahhorred sins of the Sodomites yet will he be reputed as vitious as they by this common Proverb That birds of a feather do ever flock together Now I come to the four Vertues or Graces which are to be obtained to mortifie and subdue this sinful passion of Volupty First men are to endeavor by fervent prayers to obtain from God the Grace of Continency which is distinguished by corporeal and intellectual the first is common to natural men as well as to the children of God but the second is onely peculiar to the true Elect because it is an immediate gift of the sanctifying Spirit of Grace to such as are regenerated by a justifying Faith for by Faith men are justified and afterwards sanctified for all things which are done without Faith cannot Rom. 14.23 saith S. Paul be acceptable unto God contrarily they are an abomination unto him The Heathens have excelled in the corporeal continency most of the Christians of these days as it may appear by the carriage of Alexander the Great towards the two Daughters of King Darius See Plutarch and Livy in their lives and of Publius Scipio towards a Spanish Lady that was his Captive but none of them could ever attain to the intellectual continency because they were out of the Covenant of Grace and by consequence incapable of a justifying Faith And among those who were under the Convenant of Grace the number was small that were truly continent or had the gift of the corporeal and intellectual continency except it were Isaac Joseph and S. Paul for all the other Patriarks were addicted to Polygamy The corporeal continency may proceed from natural causes as from a defect of Nature as the Eunuchs or it may be obtained by the precepts of Morality and a good education But the intellectual cannot be acquired because it is a supernatural Grace of the sanctifying Spirit except it be by frequent and fervent prayers to God who is the only giver of it And certainly by the want of this Grace of intellectual continency many of the most precious Christians of these days commit Adultery in the cohabitation with their own Wives of which they seldom repent Which doth induce me to enlarge my self upon this point Christ our blessed Saviour who was the best Interpreter of the Law that ever was upon Earth doth tell us plainly Math. 5.18 That whosoever looketh upon a woman to lust after her hath committed Adultery with her already in his heart Now this lust proceeds from the eyes 1 Joh. 2.17 and the lust of the eyes saith S. John is not of the Father but of the world and the eyes convey the same into the heart and from the heart saith our Saviour proceed evil thoughts Math. 15.19 murthers adulteries fornications c. So many looking upon a woman with lascivious eyes make such an impression in their imagination of her beauty or comeliness which is suggested to their phansie by their senses and the temptations of Satan to excel the beauty or comeliness of their Wives that in the very cohabitation with them their mind is wholly bent upon this forraign object and not upon the same they embrace and this is a plain
Christendom But God who derides at the ambition of Princes which do not tend to the execution of his secret will brought all his ambitious designs to nothing for his invincible Navie was beaten and scattered by the English valour and the greatest part of it swallowed up by the roaring Seas And the Catholike League in France was utterly subdued by the activity wisdom and valour of Henry the Fourth their lawfull king See the Netherland History Yet notwithstanding that the Hollanders have deprived him of seven of the Netherland Provinces and the Portuguies from his usurped kingdom of Portugal he hoped still ambitiously to make himself the absolute Monarch of Christendom by the divisions he hath lately fomented in Holland England France Scotland and Ireland by the means of the Machiavellian Principles spread abroad by the Jesuitical Locusts that he hath scattered among these Nations like so many swarms of Bees But I hope God will turn his Counsels into foolishness 2 Sam. 17.14 as he did that of Achitophel and make his unlimited Ambition the cause of his utter annihilation The Second Propriety of Ambition is That it hateth Parity and all Competitors and Equals Numerous Instances might be produced for proof of it but half a dozen shall serve 1. Romulus and Remus brethren having been chosen kings or Governors of the Fugitives that were the first Erectors of the Roman Commonwealth did not raign two years together Livie in his first Decade Lib. 1. but Romulus out of ambition to raign alone slew his brother Remus under colour that he had in derision leaped over the mud wals of the City of Rome 2. Lucius Tarquinius impatient of the long life raign of Servius Tullius his Father-in-Law possessed with an ambitious desire to raign in his stead by the wicked instigations of his wife Tullia Lib. 1. p. 76. threw him down the Senate-Chamber stairs and caused him to be murthered in the streets of Rome and this accursed and abhorred Tullia coming from the Senate in a Chariot with four horses where she had caused her Husband to be proclaimed King caused her Coachman to drive the Chariot over her Fathers body as he lay a dying and goared in his blood in the street And no marvel it was that she who to prosecute her ambitious design had already caused her Husband to murther her own sister and his own brother that was her first Husband would omit to act this unparalleld cruelty towards her Father-in-Law by whose untimely and violent death she came to have the fruition of her accursed ambition See Plutarch in their lives 3. Crassus Pompeius and Caesar having divided the power of the Roman Common-wealth between them Crassus being gone with a great Army into Asia to subdue the Parthians and Caesar with another Army into France and Pompeius with another Army left at Rome to preserve Italy all three of them being excessively ambitious and specially the two last could not be contented with their condition but under-hand aspired to be absolute Monarchs which Caesar after the death of Crassus easily obtained 4. After the death of Caesar Lepidus Marcus Antonius and Augustus Caesar did divide the power of the Roman Empire between them but before seven years came about Augustus Caesar the most ambitious of them became the absolute Monarch of the World by these means first Antonius and Augustus joyned together to deprive Lepidus of his part then Antonius and Augustus came to a second division but ambition being more predominant in Augustus then in Antonius who was addicted to volupty he soon deprived him of his part and became the only Monarch upon earth 5. See Herodian in his Life The Emperour Severus at his death left his two sons Bassianus and Geta equal Heirs of the Roman Empire but Bassianus transported with an unnatural ambition slew his brother Geta before a year came about in his Mothers arms to raign alone 6. Lewis the Twelfth King of France and Ferdinando King of Arragon by a mutual consent did divide the Kingom of Naples between them See the French History in the Life of Lewis the Twelfth But the Spaniard being more ambitious then the French under colour of a Toll paid for Cattel which did really appertain to the French but fained to be the Spaniards Ferdinando's pride and ambition disdaining to have a Competitor or Equal in that Kingdom deprived the French of all he held in the same The third Propriety of ambition is That it is never free from jealousie I mean that which is called the jealousie of State And for proof of it these following instances shall suffice 1. The Emperour Tiberius out of an ill-grounded jealousie that Germanicus his own Nephew who was extreamly beloved of the Senators Souldiers and common People for his vertue valour and noble parts should aspire to the Empire before his death See Tacitus in his Life caused Lucius Piso Governour of Syria to poyson him at a Banquet and then forsook the said Piso being accused and convinced of the Fact and suffered him to be sentenced and executed although he had a warrant under his own hand commanding him to rid him out of the way the which Warrant he durst not produce out of fear the Tyrant would deprive his children of his incredible Riches and yearly Revenews 2. Nero out of the same ambitious jealousie caused young Germanicus the true Heir of the Empire to be poysoned as he sate at his own Table 3. Domitianus out of the like jealousie See Tacitus and Dion in these Empeiors lives caused divers Roman Senators to be slain and was resolved to do the like to the Captain of his Guard and to the best beloved of his Concubines if they had not prevented him by taking away his life to preserve their own 4. Lewis the Eleventh King of France out of an ill-grounded but violent ambitious jealousie that his Brother Charls Duke of Normandy did aspire to the Crown See the History of France and of England caused him to be poysoned secretly by one of his own servants 5. Edward the Fourth King of England by the false impressions that his younger Brother Richard Duke of York had malitiously infused in his heart of this ambitious jealousie caused the Duke of Clarence his brother to be arraigned and drowned in a Butt of Malmsey 6. Richard the Third out of this State jealousie caused the Duke of Buckingham to be beheaded because he conceived him to be as willing then to disthrone him and to set his Crown upon the Earl of Richmonds Head as he had been ready in former times to make him that was an Usurper King of England 7. This ambitious jealousie is so cruel that it makes men trangress the Law of Nature and to put their own sons to death as Herod did Antipater his son See Josephus whereupon Augustus Caesar said ingeniously that it was better to be Herods Swine then his Son See the