you could love and if you could benefit all mankinde for I conceive that is the sum of all friendships I confess this is not to be expected of us in this world but as all our graces here are but imperfect that is at the best they are but tendencies to glory so our friendships are imperfect too and but beginnings of a celestial friendship by which we shall love every one as much as they can be loved But then so we must here in our proportion and indeed that is it that can make the difference we must be friends to all That is apt to do good loving them really and doing to them all the benefits which we can and which they are capable of The friendship is equal to all the world and of it selfe hath no difference but is differenc'd only by accidents and by the capacity or incapacity of them that receive it Nature and the Religion are the bands of friendships excellency and usefulness are its great indearments society and neighbourhood that is the possibilities and the circumstances of converse are the determinations and actualities of it Now when men either are unnatural or irreligious they will not be friends when they are neither excellent nor useful they are not worthy to be friends when they are strangers or unknown they cannot be friends actually and practically but yet as any man hath any thing of the good contrary to those evils so he can have and must have his share of friendship For thus the Sun is the eye of the World and he is indifferent to the Negro or the cold Russian to them that dwell under the line and them that stand neer the Tropicks the scalded Indian or the poor boy that shakes at the foot of the Riphean hills but the fluxures of the heaven and the earth the conveniency of aboad and the approaches to the North or South respectively change the emanations of his beams not that they do not pass alwayes from him but that they are not equally received below but by periods and changes by little inlets and reflections they receive what they can and some have only a dark day and a long night from him snowes and white cattel a miserable life and a perpetual harvest of Catarrhes and consumptions apoplexies and dead-palsies but some have splendid fires and aromatick spices rich wines and well digested fruits great wit and great courage because they dwell in his eye and look in his face and are the Courtiers of the Sun and wait upon him in his Chambers of the East just so is it in friendships some are worthy and some are necessary some dwell hard by and are fitted for converse Nature joyns some to us and Religion combines us with others society and accidents parity of fortune and equal dispositions do actuate our friendships which of themselves and in their prime disposition are prepared for all mankind according as any one can receive them We see this best exemplified by two instances and expressions of friendships and charity viz. Almes and Prayers Every one that needs relief is equally the object of our charity but though to all mankind in equal needs we ought to be alike in charity yet we signifie this severally and by limits and distinct measures the poor man that is near me he whom I meet he whom I love he whom I fancy he who did me benefit he who relates to my family he rather then another because my expressions being finite and narrow and cannot extend to all in equal significations must be appropriate to those whose circumstances best fit me and yet even to all I give my almes to all the world that needs them I pray for all mankind I am grieved at every sad story I hear I am troubled when I hear of a pretty bride murdered in her bride-chamber by an ambitious and enrag'd Rival I shed a tear when I am told that a brave King was misunderstood then slandered then imprisoned and then put to death by evil men and I can never read the story of the Parisian Massacre or the Sicilian vespers but my blood curdles and I am disorder'd by two or three affections A good man is a friend to all the world and he is not truly charitable that does not wish well and do good to all mankind in what he can but though we must pray for all men yet we say speciall Letanies for brave Kings and holy Prelates and the wise Guides of souls for our Brethren and Relations our Wives and Children The effect of this consideration is that the Universal friendship of which I speak must be limited because we are so In those things where we stand next to immensity and infinity as in good wishes and prayers and a readiness to benefit all mankind in these our friendships must not be limited but in other things which pass under our hand or eye our voices and our material exchanges our hands can reach no further but to our arms end and our voices can but sound till the next air be quiet and therefore they can have entercourse but within the sphere of their own activity our needs and our conversations are served by a few and they cannot reach to all where they can they must but where it is impossible it cannot be necessary It must therefore follow that our friendships to mankinde may admit variety as does our conversation and as by nature we are made sociable to all so we are friendly but as all cannot actually be of our society so neither can all be admitted to a speciall actuall friendship Of some entercourses all men are capable but not of all Men can pray for one another and abstain from doing injuries to all the world and be desirous to do all mankinde good and love all men Now this friendship we must pay to all because we can but if we can do no more to all we must shew our readinesse to do more good to all by actually doing more good to all them to whom we can To some we can and therefore there are nearer friendships to some then to others according as there are natural or civil nearnesses relations and societies and as I cannot expresse my friendships to all in equal measures and significations that is as I cannot do benefits to all alike so neither am I tied to love all alike for although there is much reason to love every man yet there are more reasons to love some then others and if I must love because there is reason I should then I must love more where there is more reason and where ther 's a special affection and a great readiness to do good and to delight in certain persons towards each other there is that special charity and indearment which Philosophy calls friendships but our Religion calls love or charity Now if the inquiry be concerning this special friendship 1. how it can be appropriate that is who to be chosen to it 2 how far it
principal But when by caution and prudence and severe conduct a friend hath done all that he or she can to secure fame and honourable reports after this their noises are to be despised they must not fright us from our friendships nor from her fairest entercourses I may lawfully pluck the clusters from my own vine though he that walks by calls me thief But by the way Madam you may see how much I differ from the morosity of those Cynics who would not admit your sex into the communities of a noble friendship I believe some Wives have been the best friends in the world and few stories can out-do the nobleness and piety of that Lady that suck'd the poisonous purulent matter from the wound of our brave Prince in the holy Land when an Assasine had pierc'd him with a venom'd arrow and if it be told that women cannot retain counsell and therefore can be no brave friends I can best confute them by the story of Porcia who being fearful of the weakness of her sex stabb'd her self into the thigh to try how she could bear pain and finding her selfe constant enough to that sufferance gently chid her Brutus for not daring to trust her since now she perceived that no torment could wrest that secret from her which she hoped might be intrusted to her If there were not more things to be said for your satisfaction I could have made it disputable whether have been more illustrious in their friendships men or women I cannot say that Women are capable of all those excellencies by which men can oblige the world and therefore a femal friend in some cases is not so good a counsellor as a wise man and cannot so well defend my honour nor dispose of reliefs and assistances if she be under the power of another but a woman can love as passionately and converse as pleasantly and retain a secret as faithfully and be useful in her proper ministeries and she can die for her friend as well as the bravest Roman Knight and we find that some persons have engag'd themselves as farre as death upon a less interest then all this amounts to such were the {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} as the Greeks call them the Devoti of a Prince or General the assassins amongst the Saracens the {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} amongst the old Galatians they did as much as a friend could do and if the greatest services of a friend can be paid for by an ignoble price we cannot grudge to vertuous and brave women that they be partners in a noble friendship since their conversation and returns can adde so many moments to the felicity of our lives and therefore though a Knife cannot enter as farre as a Sword yet a Knife may be more useful to some purposes and in every thing except it be against an enemy A man is the best friend in trouble but a woman may be equal to him in the dayes of joy a woman can as well increase our comforts but cannot so well lessen our sorrows and therefore we do not carry women with us when we go to fight but in peacefull Cities and times vertuous women are the beauties of society and the prettinesses of friendship And when we consider that few persons in the world have all those excellencies by which friendship can be usefull and illustrious we may as well allow women as men to be friends since they can have all that which can be necessary and essentiall to friendships and these cannot have all by which friendships can be accidentally improved in all some abatements will be made and we shall do too much honour to women if we reject them from friendships because they are not perfect for if to friendships we admit imperfect men because no man is perfect he that rejects women does finde fault with them because they are not more perfect then men which either does secretly affirm that they ought and can be perfect or else it openly accuses men of injustice and partiality I hope you will pardon me that I am a little gone from my undertaking I went aside to wait upon the women and to do countenance to their tender vertues I am now return'd and if I were to do the office of a guide to uninstructed friends would adde the particulars following Madam you need not read them now but when any friends come to be taught by your precept and example how to converse in the noblest Conjugations you may put these into better words and tell them 1. That the first law of friendship is they must neither ask of their friend what is Undecent nor grant it if themselves be askt For it is no good office to make my friend more vitious or more a fool I will restrain his folly but not nurse it I will not make my groom the officer of my lust and vanity There are Villains who sell their souls for bread that offer sin and vanity at a price I should be unwilling my friend should know I am vitious but if he could be brought to minister to it he is not worthy to be my friend and if I could offer it to him I do not deserve to claspe hands with a vertuous person 2. Let no man choose him for his friend whom it shall be possible for him ever after to hate for though the society may justly be interrupted yet love is an immortal thing and I will never despise him whom I could once think worthy of my love A friend that proves not good is rather to be suffered then any enmities be entertained and there are some outer offices of friendship and little drudgeries in which the less worthy are to be imployed and it is better that he be below stairs then quite thrown out of doors 3. There are two things which a friend can never pardon a treacherous blow and the revealing of a secret because these are against the Nature of friendship they are the adulteries of it and dissolve the Union and in the matters of friendship which is the marriage of souls these are the proper causes of divorce and therefore I shall adde this only that secrecy is the chastity of friendship and the publication of it is a prostitution and direct debauchery but a secret treacherous wound is a perfect and unpardonable Apostacy I remember a pretty apologue that Bromiard tells A Fowler in a sharp frosty morning having taken many little birds for which he had long watched began to take up his nets and nipping the birds on the head laid them down A young thrush espying the tears trickling down his cheeks by the reason of the extreme cold said to her Mother that certainly the man was very merciful and compassionate that wept so bitterly over the calamity of the poor Birds But her Mother told her more wisely that she might better judge of the mans disposition by his hand then by his eye and if the hands do strike
A Discourse of the Nature Offices and Measures of Friendship With Rules of conducting it Written in answer to a Letter from the most ingenious and vertuous M. K. P. By J. T. D.D. {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Dion orat 1. de regno LONDON Printed for R. Royston at the Angel in Ivie-lane 1657. To which are added Two Letters written to persons newly changed in their Religion The first to a Gentlewoman seduced to the Roman Church The other to a person returning t the Church of England By J. T. D.D. Volo Solidum Perenne A Discourse of the Nature and Offices of Friendship In a Letter to the most ingenious and excellent M. K. P. Madam THe wise Bensirach advised that we should not consult with a woman concerning her of whom she is jealous neither with a coward in matters of warr nor with a merchant concerning exchange and some other instances he gives of interested persons to whom he would not have us hearken in any matter of Counsel For where ever the interest is secular or vitious there the bias is not on the side of truth or reason because these are seldome serv'd by profit and low regards But to consult with a friend in the matters of friendship is like consulting with a spiritual person in Religion they who understand the secrets of Religion or the interior beauties of friendship are the fittest to give answers in all inquiries concerning the respective subjects because reason and experience are on the side of interest and that which in friendship is most pleasing and most useful is also most reasonable and most true and a friends fairest interest is the best measure of the conducting friendships and therefore you who are so eminent in friendships could also have given the best answer to your own inquiries and you could have trusted your own reason because it is not only greatly instructed by the direct notices of things but also by great experience in the matter of which you now inquire But because I will not use any thing that shall look like an excuse I will rather give you such an account which you can easily reprove then by declining your commands seem more safe in my prudence then open and communicative in my friendship to you You first inquire how far a Dear and a perfect friendship is authoriz'd by the principles of Christianity To this I answer that the word Friendship in the sense we commonly mean by it is not so much as named in the New-Testament and our Religion takes no notice of it You think it strange but read on before you spend so much as the beginning of a passion or a wonder upon it There is mention of friendship of the world and it is said to be enmity with God but the word is no where else named or to any other purpose in all the New-Testament It speakes of friends often but by friends are meant our acquaintance or our Kindred the relatives of our family or our fortune or our sect something of society or something of kindness there is in it a tenderness of appellation and Civility a relation made by gifts or by duty by services and subjection and I think I have reason to be confident that the word friend speaking of humane entercourse is no otherwayes used in the Gospels or Epistles or Acts of the Apostles and the reason of it is the word friend is of a large signification and means all relations and societies and whatsoever is not enemy but by friendships I suppose you mean the greatest love and the greatest usefulness and the most open communication and the noblest sufferings and the most exemplar faithfulness and the severest truth and the heartiest counsel and the greatest Union of mindes of which brave men and women are capable But then I must tell you that Christianity hath new Christened it and calls this Charity The Christian knows no enemy he hath that is though persons may be injurious to him and unworthy in themselves yet he knows none whom he is not first bound to forgive which is indeed to make them on his part to be no enemies that is to make that the word enemy shall not be perfectly contrary to friend it shall not be a relative term and signifie something on each hand a relative and a correlative and then he knows none whom he is not bound to love and pray for to treat kindly and justly liberally and obligingly Christian Charity is friendship to all the world and when friendships were the noblest things in the world charity was little like the sunne drawn in at a chinke or his beames drawn into the Centre of a burning-glass but Christian charity is friendship expanded like the face of the sunne when it mounts above the Eastern hills and I was strangely pleas'd when I saw something of this in Cicero for I have been so push'd at by herds and flocks of people that follow any body that whistles to them or drives them to pasture that I am grown afraid of any truth that seems chargeable with singularity but therefore I say glad I was when I saw Laelius in Cicero discourse thus Amicitia ex infinitate generis humani quam conciliavit ipsa natura contracta res est adducta in angustum ut omnis charitas aut inter duos aut inter paucos jungeretur Nature hath made friendships and societies relations and endearments and by something or other we relate to all the world there is enough in every man that is willing to make him become our friend but when men contract friendships they inclose the Commons and what Nature intended should be every mans we make proper to two or three Friendship is like rivers and the strand of seas and the ayre common to all the world but Tyrants and evil customes warrs and want of love have made them proper and peculiar But when Christianity came to renew our nature and to restore our lawes and to increase her priviledges and to make her aptness to become religion then it was declared that our friendships were to be as universal as our conversation that is actual to all with whom we converse and potentially extended unto those with whom we did not For he who was to treat his enemies with forgiveness and prayers and love and beneficence was indeed to have no enemies and to have all friends So that to your question how far a Dear and perfect friendship is authoris'd by the principles of Christianity The answer is ready and easy It is warranted to extend to all mankind and the more we love the better we are and the greater our friendships are the dearer we are to God let them be as Dear and let them be as perfect and let them be as many as you can there is no danger in it only where the restraint begins there begins our imperfection it is not ill that you entertain brave friendships and worthy societies it were well if
may extend that is with what expressions signified 3 how conducted The answers will depend upon such considerations which will be neiâ—her useless nor unpleasant 1. There may be a special friendship contracted for any special excellency whatsoever because friendships are nothing but love and society mixt together that is a conversing with them whom we love now for whatsoever we can love any one for that we can be his friend and since every excellency is a degree of amability every such worthiness is a just and proper motive of friendship or loving conversation But yet in these things there is an order and proportion Therefore 2. A Good man is the best friend and therefore soonest to be chosen longer to be retain'd and indeed never to be parted with unless he cease to be that for which he was chosen {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Where vertue dwells there friendships make But evil neighbourhoods forsake But although vertue alone is the worthiest cause of amability and can weigh down any one consideration and therefore to a man that is vertuous every man ought to be a friend yet I doe not mean the severe and philosophical excellencies of some morose persons who are indeed wise unto themselves and exemplar to others by vertue here I do not mean justice and temperance charity and devotion for these I am to love the man but friendship is something more then that Friendship is the nearest love and the nearest society of which the persons are capable Now justice is a good entercourse for Merchants as all men are that buy and sell and temperance makes a Man good company and helps to make a wise man but a perfect friendship requires something else these must be in him that is chosen to be my friend but for these I do not make him my privado that is my special and peculiar friend but if he be a good man then he is properly fitted to be my correlative in the noblest combination And for this we have the best warrant in the world For a just man scarcely will a man die the Syriac interpreter reads it {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} for an unjust man scarcely will a man die that is a wicked man is at no hand fit to receive the expression of the greatest friendship but all the Greek copies that ever I saw or read of read it as we doe for a righteous man or a just man that is justice and righteousness is not the nearest indearment of friendship but for a good man some will even dare to die that is for a man that is sweetly disposed ready to doe acts of goodnesse and to oblige others to do things useful and profitable for a loving man a beneficent bountiful man one who delights in doing good to his friend such a man may have the highest friendship he may have a friend that will die for him And this is the meaning of Laelius Vertue may be despised so may Learning and Nobility at una est amicitia in rebus humanis de cujus utilitate omnes consentiunt only friendship is that thing which because all know to be useful and profitable no man can despise that is {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} or {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} goodnesse or beneficence makes friendships For if he be a good man he will love where he is beloved and that 's the first tie of friendship {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} That was the commendation of the bravest friendship in Theocritus They lov'd each other with a love That did in all things equal prove {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} The world was under Saturns reign Wen he that lov'd was lov'd again For it is impossible this neerness of friendship can be where there is not mutual love but this is secured if I choose a good man for he that is apt enough to begin alone will never be behinde in the relation and correspondency and therefore I like the Gentiles Letany well {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Let God give friends to me for my reward Who shall my love with equal love regard Happy are they who when they give their heart Find such as in exchange their own impart But there is more in it then this felicity amounts to For {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} the good man is a profitable useful person and that 's the band of an effective friendship For I do not think that friendships are Metaphysical nothings created for contemplation or that men or women should stare upon each others faces and make dialogues of news and prettinesses and look babies in one anothers eyes Friendship is the allay of our sorrows the ease of our passions the discharge of our oppressions the sanctuary to our calamities the counsellor of our doubts the clarity of our minds the emission of our thoughts the exercise and improvement of what we meditate And although I love my friend because he is worthy yet he is not worthy if he can do no good I do not speak of accidental hinderances and misfortunes by which the bravest man may become unable to help his Childe but of the natural and artificial capacities of the man He only is fit to be chosen for a friend who can do those offices for which friendship is excellent For mistake not no man can be loved for himselfe our perfections in this world cannot reach so high it is well if we would love God at that rate and I very much fear that if God did us no good we might admire his Beauties but we should have but a small proportion of love towards him and therefore it is that God to endear the obedience that is the love of his servants signifies what benefits he gives us what great good things he does for us I am the Lord God that brought thee out of the Land of Egypt and does Job serve God for nought And he that comes to God must believe that he is and that he is a rewarder all his other greatnesses are objects of fear and wonder it is his goodness that makes him lovely and so it is in friendships He only is fit to be chosen for a friend who can give me counsel or defend my cause or guide me right or relieve my need or can and will when I need it do me good only this I adde into the heaps of doing good I will reckon loving me for it is a pleasure to be beloved but when his love signifies nothing but Kissing my Cheek or talking kindly and can goe no further it is a prostitution of the bravery of friendship to spend it upon impertinent people who are it may be loads to their families but can never ease my loads but my friend is a worthy person when he can become to
is wise and good and secret and just ingenuous and honest and in those things which have a latitude use your own liberty but in such things which consist in an indivisible point make no abatements That is you must not choose him to be your friend that is not honest and secret just and true to a tittle but if he be wise at all and useful in any degree and as good as you can have him you need not be ashamed to own your friendships though sometimes you may be ashamed of some imperfections of your friend 4. But if you yet enquire further whether fancy may be an ingredient in your choice I answer that fancy may minister to this as to all other actions in which there is a liberty and variety and we shall finde that there may be peculiarities and little partialities a friendship improperly so called entring upon accounts of an innocent passion and a pleas'd fancy even our Blessed Saviour himself loved S. Iohn and Lazarus by a special love which was signified by special treatments and of the young man that spake well and wisely to Christ it is affirmed Iesus loved him that is he fancied the man and his soul had a certain cognation and similitude of temper and inclination For in all things where there is a latitude every faculty will endeavour to be pleased and sometimes the meanest persons in a house have a festival even sympathies and natural inclinations to some persons and a conformity of humors and proportionable loves and the beauty of the face and a witty answer may first strike the flint and kindle a spark which if it falls upon tender and compliant natures may grow into a flame but this will never be maintained at the rate of friendship unless it be fed by pure materials by worthinesses which are the food of friendship Where these are not men and women may be pleased with one anothers company and lie under the same roof and make themselves companions of equal prosperities and humour their friend but if you call this friendship you give a sacred name to humour or fancy for there is a Platonic friendship as well as a Platonic love but they being but the Images of more noble bodies are but like tinsell dressings which will shew bravely by candle-light and do excellently in a mask but are not fit for conversation and the material entercourses of our life These are the prettinesses of prosperity and good natur'd wit but when we speak of friendship which is the best thing in the world for it is love and beneficence it is charity that is fitted for society we cannot suppose a brave pile should be built up with nothing and they that build Castles in the aire and look upon friendship as upon a fine Romance a thing that pleases the fancy but is good for nothing else will doe well when they are asleep or when they are come to Elysium and for ought I know in the mean time may be as much in love with Mandana in the Grand Cyrus as with the Countess of Exeter and by dreaming of perfect and abstracted friendships make them so immaterial that they perish in the handling and become good for nothing But I know not whither I was going I did only mean to say that because friendship is that by which the world is most blessed and receives most good it ought to be chosen amongst the worthiest persons that is amongst those that can do greatest benefit to each other and though in equal worthiness I may choose by my eye or ear that is into the consideration of the essential I may take in also the accidental and extrinsick worthinesses yet I ought to give every one their just value when the internal beauties are equal these shall help to weigh down the scale and I will love a worthy friend that can delight me as well as profit me rather then him who cannot delight me at all and profit me no more but yet I will not weigh the gayest flowers or the wings of butterflies against wheat but when I am to choose wheat I may take that which looks the brightest I had rather see Time and Roses Marjoram and July flowers that are fair and sweet and medicinal then the prettiest Tulips that are good for nothing And my Sheep and Kine are better servants then race-Horses and Grayhounds And I shall rather furnish my study with Plutarch and Cicero with Livy and Polybius then with Cassandra and Ibrahim Bassa and if I do give an hour to these for divertisement or pleasure yet I will dwell with them that can instruct me and make me wise and eloquent severe and useful to my selfe and others I end this with the saying of Laelius in Cicero Amicitia non debet consequi utilitatem sed amicitiam utilitas When I choose my friend I will not stay till I have received a kindness but I will choose such a one that can doe me many if I need them But I mean such kindnesses which make me wiser and which make me better that is I will when I choose my friend choose him that is the bravest the worthiest and the most excellent person and then your first Question is soon answered to love such a person and to contract such friendships is just so authorized by the principles of Christianity as it is warranted to love wisdome and vertue goodness and beneficence and all the impresses of God upon the spirits of brave men 2. The next inquiry is how far it may extend That is by what expressions it may be signified I finde that David and Ionathan loved at a strange rate they were both good men though it happened that Ionathan was on the obliging side but here the expressions were Ionathan watched for Davids good told him of his danger and helped him to escape took part with Davids innocence against his Fathers malice and injustice and beyond all this did it to his own prejudice and they two stood like two feet supporting one body though Ionathan knew that David would prove like the foot of a Wrastler and would supplant him not by any unworthy or unfriendly action but it was from God and he gave him his hand to set him upon his own throne We finde his paralels in the Gentile stories young Athenodorus having divided the estate with his Brother Xenon divided it again when Xenon had spent his own share and Lucullus would not take the Consulship till his younger brother had first enjoyed it for a year but Pollux divided with Castor his immortality and you know who offer'd himselfe to death being pledg for his friend and his friend by performing his word rescued him a bravely and when we finde in Scripture that for a good man some will even dare to die and that Aquila and Priscilla laid their necks down for S. Paul and the Galatians would have given him their very eyes that is every thing that was most dear to them and some
others were neer unto death for his sake and that it is a precept of Christian charity to lay down our lives for our Brethren that is those who were combined in a cause of Religion who were united with the same hopes and imparted to each other ready assistances and grew dear by common sufferings we need enquire no further for the expressions of friendships Greater love then this hath no man then that he lay down his life for his friends and this we are oblig'd to do in some Cases for all Christians and therefore we may do it for those who are to us in this present and imperfect state of things that which all the good men and women in the world shall be in Heaven that is in the state of perfect friendships This is the biggest but then it includes and can suppose all the rest and if this may be done for all and in some cases must for any one of the multitude we need not scruple whether we may do it for those who are better then a multitude But as for the thing it selfe it is not easily and lightly to be done and a man must not die for humor nor expend so great a Jewel for a trifle {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} said Philo we will hardly die when it is for nothing when no good no worthy end is served and become a Sacrifice to redeem a foot-boy But we may not give our life to redeem another unless 1. The party for whom we die be a worthy and a useful person better for the publick or better for Religion and more useful to others then my selfe Thus Ribischius the German died bravely when he became a Sacrifice for his Master Maurice Duke of Saxony Covering his Masters body with his own that he might escape the furie of the Turkish Souldiers Succurram perituro sed ut ipse non peream nisi si futurus ero magni hominis aut magnae rei merces said Seneca I will help a dying person if I can but I will not die my selfe for him unless by my death I save a brave man or become the price of a great thing that is I will die for a Prince for the republick or to save an Army as David expos'd himself to combat with the Philistin for the redemption of the Host of Israel And in this sense that is true Praestat ut pereat unus quam Unitas better that one perish then a multitude 2. A man dies bravely when he gives his temporal life to save the soul of any single person in the Christian world It is a worthy exchange and the glorification of that love by which Christ gave his life for every soul Thus he that reproves an erring Prince wisely and necessarily he that affirms a fundamental truth or stands up for the glory of the Divine attributes though he die for it becoms a worthy sacrifice 3. These are duty but it may be heroick and full of Christian bravery to give my life to rescue a noble and a brave friend though I my selfe be as worthy a man as he because the preference of him is an act of humility in me and of friendship towards him Humility and Charity making a pious difference where art and nature have made all equall Some have fancied other measures of treating our friends One sort of men say that we are to expect that our friends should value us as we value our selves which if it were to be admitted will require that we make no friendships with a proud man and so farre indeed were well but then this proportion does exclude also humble men who are most to be valued and the rather because they undervalue themselves Others say that a friend is to value his friend as much as his friend values him but neither is this well or safe wise or sufficient for it makes friendship a mere bargain and is something like the Country weddings in some places where I have been where the bridegroom and the bride must meet in the half way and if they fail a step they retire and break the match It is not good to make a reckoning in friendship that 's merchandise or it may be gratitude but not noble friendship in which each part strives to out-do the other in significations of an excellent love And amongst true friends there is no fear of losing any thing But that which amongst the old Philosophers comes nearest to the right is that we love our friends as we love our selves If they had meant it as our Blessed Saviour did of that general friendship by which we are to love all mankind it had been perfect and well or if they had meant it of the inward affection or of outward justice but because they meant it of the most excellent friendships and of the outward significations of it it cannot be sufficient for a friend may and must sometimes do more for his friend then he would doe for himself Some men will perish before they will beg or petition for themselves to some certain persons but they account it noble to doe it for their friend and they will want rather then their friend shall want and they will be more earnest in praise or dispraise respectively for their friend then for themselves And indeed I account that one of the greatest demonstrations of real friendship is that a friend can really endeavour to have his friend advanced in honour in reputation in the opinion of wit or learning before himselfe Aurum opes rura frequens donabit amicus Qui velit ingenio cedere rarus erit Sed tibi tantus inest veteris respectus amici Carior ut mea sit quam tua fama tibi Lands gold and trifles many give or lend But he that stoops in fame is a rare friend In friendships orbe thou art the brightest starre Before thy fame mine thou preferrest far But then be pleas'd to think that therefore I so highly value this signification of friendship because I so highly value humility Humility and Charity are the two greatest graces in the world and these are the greatest ingredients which constitute friendship and expresse it But there needs no other measures of friendship but that it may be as great as you can express it beyond death it cannot goe to death it may when the cause is reasonable and just charitable and religious and yet if there be any thing greater then to suffer death and pain and shame to some are more insufferable a true and noble friendship shrinks not at the greatest trials And yet there is a limit even to friendship It must be as great as our friend fairely needs in all things where we are not tied up by a former duty to God to our selves or some pre-obliging relative When Pollux heard some body whisper a reproach against his Brother Castor he kill'd the slanderer with his fist That was a zeal which his friendship could not warrant Nulla
it hath the soul of friendship So that if it be asked which are most to be valued Brothers or friends the answer is very easie Brotherhood is or may be one of the kinds of friendship and from thence onely hath its value and therefore if it be compared with a greater friendship must give place But then it is not to be asked which is to be preferred a Brother or a Friend but which is the better friend Memnon or my Brother For if my Brother sayes I ought to love him best then he ought to love me best * if he does then there is a great friendship and he possibly is to be preferred if he can be that friend which he pretends to be that is if he be equally worthy but if he sayes I must love him only because he is my Brother whether he loves me or no he is ridiculous and it will be a strange relation which hath no correspondent but suppose it and adde this also that I am equally his Brother as he is mine and then he also must love me whether I love him or no and if he does not he sayes I must love him though he be my Enemy and so I must but I must not love my Enemy though he be my Brother more then I love my Friend and at last if he does love me for being his Brother I confess that this love deserves love again but then I consider that he loves me upon an incompetent reason for he that loves me only because I am his Brother loves me for that which is no worthiness and I must love him as much as that comes to and for as little reason unlesse this be added that he loves me first but whether choice and union of souls and worthiness of manners and greatness of understanding and usefulness of conversation and the benefits of Counsel and all those endearments which make our lives pleasant and our persons Dear are not better and greater reasons of love and Dearness then to be born of the same flesh I think amongst wise persons needs no great enquiry For fraternity is but a Cognation of bodies but friendship is an Union of souls which are confederated by more noble ligatures My Brother if he be no more shall have my hand to help him but unless he be my friend too he cannot challenge my heart and if his being my friend be the greater nearnesse then friend is more then Brother and I suppose no man doubts but that David lov'd Ionathan far more then he lov'd his Brother Eliab One inquiry more there may be in this affair and that is whether a friend may be more then Husband or Wife To which I answer that it can never be reasonable or just prudent or lawful but the reason is because Marriage is the Queen of friendships in which there is a communication of all that can be communicated by friendship and it being made sacred by vows and love by bodies and souls by interest and custome by religion and by laws by common counsels and common fortunes it is the principal in the kind of friendship and the measure of all the rest And there is no abatement to this consideration but that there may be some allay in this as in other lesser friendships by the incapacity of the persons if I have not chosen my friend wisely or fortunately he cannot be the correlative in the best Union but then the friend lives as the soul does after death it is in the state of separation in which the soul strangely loves the body and longs to be reunited but the body is an useless trunk and can do no ministeries to the soul which therefore prayes to have the body reformed and restored and made a brave and a fit companion So must these best friends when one is useless or unapt to the braveries of the princely friendship they must love ever and pray ever and long till the other be perfected and made fit in this case there wants only the body but the soul is still a relative and must be so for ever A Husband and a Wife are the best friends but they cannot alwayes signifie all that to each other which their friendships would as the Sun shines not upon a Valley which sends up a thick vapour to cover his face and though his beams are eternal yet the emission is intercepted by the intervening cloud But however all friendships are but parts of this a man must leave Father and Mother and cleave to his Wife that is the dearest thing in Nature is not comparable to the dearest thing of friendship and I think this is argument sufficient to prove friendship to be the greatest band in the world Adde to this that other friendships are parts of this they are marriages too less indeed then the other because they cannot must not be all that endearment which the other is yet that being the principal is the measure of the rest and are all to be honoured by like dignities and measured by the same rules and conducted by their portion of the same Laws But as friendships are Marriages of the soul and of fortunes and interests and counsels so they are brotherhoods too and I often think of the excellencies of friendships in the words of David who certainly was the best friend in the world Ecce quam bonum quam jucundum fratres habitare in unum It is good and it is pleasant that Brethren should live like friends that is they who are any wayes relative and who are any wayes sociall and confederate should also dwell in Unity and loving society for that is the meaning of the word Brother in Scripture It was my Brother Ionathan said David such Brothers contracting such friendships are the beauties of society and the pleasure of life and the festivity of minds and whatsoever can be spoken of love which is Gods eldest daughter can be said of vertuous friendships and though Carneades made an eloquent oration at Rome against justice yet never saw a Panegyrick of malice or ever read that any man was witty against friendship Indeed it is probable that some men finding themselves by the peculiarities of friendship excluded from the participation of those beauties of society which enamel and adorn the wise and the vertuous might suppose themselves to have reason to speak the evill words of envie and detraction I wonder not for all those unhappy souls which shall find heaven gates shut against them will think they have reason to murmur and blaspheme The similitude is apt enough for that is the region of friendship and love is the light of that glorious Countrey but so bright that it needs no Sun Here we have fine and bright rayes of that celestiall flame and though to all mankinde the light of it is in some measure to be extended like the treasures of light dwelling in the South yet a little do illustrate and beautifie the North yet some live under the
line and the beams of friendship in that position are imminent and perpendicular I know but one thing more in which the Communications of friendship can be restrained and that is in Friends and Enemies Amicus amici amicus meus non est My friends friend is not alwayes my friend nor his enemy mine for if my friend quarrell with a third person with whom he hath had no friendships upon the account of interest if that third person be my friend the nobleness of our friendships despises such a quarrel and what may be reasonable in him would be ignoble in me sometimes it may be otherwise and friends may marry one anothers loves and hatreds but it is by chance if it can be just and therefore because it is not alwayes right it cannot be ever necessary In all things else let friendships be as high and expressive till they become an Union or that friends like the Molionidae be so the same that the flames of their dead bodies make but one Pyramis no charity can be reproved and such friendships which are more then shadows are nothing else but the rayes of that glorious grace drawn into one centre and made more active by the Union and the proper significations are well represented in the old Hieroglyphick by which the antients depicted friendship In the beauties and strength of a young man bare-headed rudely clothed to signifie its activity and lastingness readiness of action and aptnesses to doe service Upon the fringes of his garment was written Mors vita as signifying that in life and death the friendship was the same on the forehead was written Summer and Winter that is prosperous and adverse accidents and states of life the left arm and shoulder was bare and naed down to the heart to which the finger pointed and there was written longè propè by all which we know that friendship does good farre and neer in Summer and in Winter in life and death and knowes no difference of state or accident but by the variety of her services and therefore ask no more to what we can be obliged by friendship for it is every thing that can be honest and prudent useful and necessary For this is all the allay of this Universality we may do any thing or suffer any thing that is wise or necessary or greatly beneficial to my friend and that in any thing in which I am perfect master of my person and fortunes But I would not in bravery visit my friend when he is sick of the plague unless I can do him good equall at least to my danger but I will procure him Physicians and prayers all the assistances that he can receive and that he can desire if they be in my power and when he is dead I will not run into his grave and be stifled with his earth but I will mourn for him and perform his will and take care of his relatives and doe for him as if he were alive and I think that is the meaning of that hard saying of a Greek Poet {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} To me though distant let thy friendship fly Though men be mortal friendships must not die Of all things else ther 's great satiety Of such immortal abstracted pure friendships indeed there is no great plenty and to see brothers hate each other is not so rare as to see them love at this rate The dead and the absent have but few friends say the Spaniards but they who are the same to their friend {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} when he is in another Countrey or in another World these are they who are fit to preserve the sacred fire for eternal sacrifices and to perpetuate the memory of those exemplar friendships of the best men which have filled the world with history and wonder for in no other sense but this can it be true that friendships are pure loves regarding to do good more then to receive it He that is a friend after death hopes not for a recompense from his friend and makes no bargain either for fame or love but is rewarded with the conscience and satisfaction of doing bravely but then this is demonstration that they choose Friends best who take persons so worthy that can and will do so This is the profit and usefulnesse of friendship and he that contracts such a noble Union must take care that his friend be such who can and will but hopes that himselfe shall be first used and put to act it I will not have such a friendship that is good for nothing but I hope that I shall be on the giving and assisting part and yet if both the friends be so noble and hope and strive to doe the benefit I cannot well say which ought to yield and whether that friendship were braver that could be content to be unprosperous so his friend might have the glory of assisting him or that which desires to give assistances in the greatest measures of friendship but he that chooses a worthy friend that himself in the dayes of sorrow and need might receive the advantage hath no excuse no pardon unless himself be as certain to do assistances when evil fortune shall require them The summe of this answer to this enquiry I give you in a pair of Greek verses {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Friends are to friends as lesser Gods while they Honour and service to each other pay But when a dark cloud comes grudge not to lend Thy head thy heart thy fortune to thy friend 3. The last inquiry is how friendships are to be conducted That is what are the duties in presence and in absence whether the friend may not desire to enjoy his friend as well as his friendship The answer to which in a great measure depends upon what I have said already and if friendship be a charity in society and is not for contemplation and noise but for materiall comforts and noble treatments and usages there is no peradventure but that if I buy land I may eat the fruits and if I take a house I may dwell in it and if I love a worthy person I may please my selfe in his society and in this there is no exception unless the friendship be between persons of a different sex for then not only the interest of their religion and the care of their honour but the worthiness of their friendship requires that their entercourse be prudent and free from suspicion and reproach and if a friend is obliged to bear a calamity so he secure the honour of his friend it will concern him to conduct his entercourse in the lines of a vertuous prudence so that he shall rather lose much of his own comfort then she any thing of her honour and in this case the noises of people are so to be regarded that next to innocence they are the
treacherously he can never be admitted to friendship who speaks fairly and weeps pittifully Friendship is the greatest honesty and ingenuity in the world 4. Never accuse thy friend nor believe him that does if thou dost thou hast broken the skin but he that is angry with every little fault breaks the bones of friendship and when we consider that in society and the accidents of every day in which no man is constantly pleased or displeased with the same things we shall finde reason to impute the change unto our selves and the emanations of the Sun are still glorious when our eyes are sore and we have no reason to be angry with an eternal light because we have a changeable and a mortal faculty But however do not think thou didst contract alliance with an Angel when thou didst take thy friend into thy bosome he may be weak as well as thou art and thou mayest need pardon as well as he and {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Theog that man loves flattery more then friendship who would not only have his friend but all the contingencies of his friend to humour him 5. Give thy friend counsel wisely and charitably but leave him to his liberty whether he will follow thee or no and be not angry if thy counsel be rejected for advice is no Empire and he is not my friend that will be my Judge whether I will or no Neoptolemus had never been honoured with the victory and spoiles of Troy if he had attended to the tears and counsel of Lycomedes who being afraid to venture the young man fain would have had him sleep at home safe in his little Island He that gives advice to his friend and exacts obedience to it does not the kindnesse and ingenuity of a friend but the office and pertness of a Schoolmaster 6. Never be a Judge between thy friends in any matter where both set their hearts upon the victory If stâ—angers or enemies be litigants what ever side thou favourest thou gettest a friend but when friends are the parties thou losest one 7. Never comport thy self so as that thy friend can be afraid of thee for then the state of the relation alters when a new and troublesome passion supervenes ODERUNT quos METUUNT Perfect love casteth out fear and no man is friend to a Tyrant but that friendship is Tyranny where the love is changed into fear equality into empire society into obedience for then all my kindness to him also will be no better then flattery 8. When you admonish your friend let it be without bitternesse when you chide him let it be without reproach when you praise him let it be with worthy purposes and for just caâ—ses and in friendly measures too much of that is flattery too little is envy if you doe it justly you teach him true measures but when others praise him rejoyce though they praise not thee and remember that if thou esteemest his praise to be thy disparagement thou art envious but neither just nor kind 9. When all things else are equal preferre an old friend before a new If thou meanest to spend thy friend and make a gain of him till he be weary thou wilt esteem him as a beast of burden the worse for his age But if thou esteemest him by noble measures he will be better to thee by thy being used to him by tryall and experience by reciprocation of indearments and an habitual worthiness An old friend is like old wine which when a man hath drunk he doth not desire new because he saith the old is better But every old friend was new once and if he be worthy keep the new one till he become old 10. After all this treat thy friend nobly love to be with him do to him all the worthinesses of love and fair endearment according to thy capacity and his Bear with his infirmities till they approach towards being criminal but never dissemble with him never despise him never leave him * Give him gifts and upbraid him not †and refuse not his kindnesses and be sure never to despise the smallness or the impropriety of them Confirmatur amor beneficio accepto A gift saith Solomon fastneth friendships for as an eye that dwells long upon a starre must be refreshed with lesser beauties and strengthened with greens and looking-glasses lest the sight become amazed with too great a splendor so must the love of friends sometimes be refreshed with material and low Caresses lest by striving to be too divine it becomes less humane It must be allowed its share of both It is humane in giving pardon and fair construction and opennesse and ingenuity and keeping secrets it hath something that is Divine because it is beneficent but much because it is Eternall FINIS Postscript MADAM IF you shall think it fit that these papers pass further then your own eye and Closet I desire they may be consign'd into the hands of my worthy friend Dr. Wedderburne For I do not only expose all my sickness to his cure but I submit my weaknesses to his censure being as confident to finde of him charity for what is pardonable as remedy for what is curable but indeed Madam I look upon that worthy man as an Idea of Friendship and if I had no other notices of Friendship or conversation to instruct me then his it were sufficient For whatsoever I can say of Friendship I can say of his and as all that know him reckon him amongst the best Physicians so I knew him worthy to be reckoned amongst the best friends Two Letters to Persons changed in their Religion A Copy of the First Letter written to a Gentlewoman newly seduced to the Church of Rome M. B. I Was desirous of an opportunity in London to have discoursed with you concerning something of nearest concernment to you but the multitude of my little affairs hindred me and have brought upon you this trouble to reade a long Letter which yet I hope you will be more willing to do because it comes from one who hath a great respect to your person and a very great charity to your soul I must confesse I was on your behalf troubled when I heard you were fallen from the Communion of the Church of England and entred into a voluntary unnecessary schism and departure from the Laws of the King and the Communion of those with whom you have alwaies lived in charity going against those Laws in the defence and profession of which your Husband died going from the Religion in which you were baptized in which for so many years you lived piously and hoped for Heaven and all this without any sufficient reason without necessity or just scandall ministred to you and to aggravate all this you did it in a time when the Church of England was persecuted when she was marked with
voice but saw and perceived nothing of the sence and what you understood of it was like the man in the Gospel that was half blinde he saw men walking like Trees and so you possibly might perceive the meaning of it in generall You knew when they came to the Epistle when to the Gospel when the Introit when the Pax when any of the other more generall periods were but you could have nothing of the Spirit of prayer that is nothing of the devotion and the holy affections to the particular excellencies which could or ought there to have been represented but now you are taught how you may be really devout it is made facil and easie and there can want nothing but your consent and observation 2. Whereas now you are taken off from all humane confidences from relying wholly and almost ultimately upon the Priests power and external act from reckoning prayers by numbers from forms and out-sides you are not to think that the Priests power is less that the Sacraments are not effective that your prayers may not be repeated frequently but you are to remember that all outward things and Ceremonies all Sacraments and Institutions work their effect in the vertue of Christ by some morall Instrument The Priests in the Church of England can absolve you as much as the Romane Priests could fairly pretend but then we teach that you must first be a penitent and a returning person and our absolution does but manifest the work of God and comfort and instruct your Conscience direct and manage it You shall be absolved here but not unless you live a holy life So that in this you will finde no change but to the advantage of a strict life we will not flatter you and cozen your dear soul by pretended ministeries but we so order our discourses and directions that all our ministrations may be really effective and when you receive the holy Sacrament of the Eucharist or the Lords Supper it does more good here then they do there because if they consecrate ritely yet they do not communicate you fully and if they offer the whole representative Sacrifice yet they do not give you the whole Sacrament only we enjoyn that you come with so much holiness that the grace of God in your heart may be the principal and the Sacrament in our hands may be the ministring and assisting part we do not promise great effects to easie trifling dispositions because we would not deceive but really procure to you great effects and therefore you are now to come to our offices with the same expectations as before of pardon of grace of sanctification but you must do something more of the work your self that we may not do lesse in effect then you have in your expectation We will not to advance the reputation of our power deceive you into a less blessing 3. Be careful that you do not flatter your self that in our Communion you may have more ease and liberty of life for though I know your pious soule desires passionately to please God and to live religiously yet I ought to be careful to prevent a temptation lest it at any time should discompose your severity Therefore as to confession to a Priest which how it is usually practised amongst the Romane party your self can very well account and you have complain'd sadly that it is made an ordinary act easie and transient sometime matter of temptation often times impertinent but suppose it free from such scandal to which some mens folly did betray it yet the same severity you 'l finde among us for though we will not tell a lye to help a sinner and say that is necessary which is only appointed to make men do themselves good yet we advise and commend it and do all the work of souls to all those people that will be saved by all means to devout persons that make Religion the business of their lives and they that do not so in the Churches of the Roman Communion as they finde but little advantage by peridiocal confessions so they feel but little awfulness and severity by the injunction you must confess to God all your secret actions you must advise with a holy man in all the affairs of your soul you will be but an ill friend to your self if you conceal from him the state of your spiritual affairs We desire not to hear the circumstance of every sinne but when matter of justice is concerned or the nature of the sinne is changed that is when it ought to be made a Question and you will finde that though the Church of England gives you much liberty from the bondage of innumerable Ceremonies and humane devices yet in the matter of holiness you will be tied to very great service but such a service as is perfect freedom that is the service of God and the love of the holy Jesus and a very strict religious life for we do not promise heaven but upon the same terms it is promised us that is Repentance towards God and Faith in our Lord Iesus and as in faith we make no more to be necessary then what is made so in holy Scripture so in the matter of Repentance we give you no easie devices and suffer no lessening definitions of it but oblige you to that strictness which is the condition of being saved and so expressed to be by the infallible Word of God but such as in the Church of Rome they do not so much stand upon Madam I am weary of my Journey and although I did purpose to have spoken many things more yet I desire that my not doing it may be laid upon the account of my weariness all that I shall adde to the main businese is this 4. Reade the Scriptures diligently and with an humble spirit and in it observe what is plain and beleeve and live accordingly Trouble not your self with what is difficult for in that your duty is not described 5. Pray frequently and effectually I had rather your prayers should be often then long It was well said of Petrarch Magno verborum freno uti decet cum superiore colloquentem When you speak to your superiour you ought to have a bridle upon your tongue much more when you speak to God I speak of what is decent in respect of our selves and our infinite distances from God but if love makes you speak speak on so shall your prayer be full of charity and devotion Nullus est amore superior ille te coget ad veniam qui me ad multiloquium Love makes God to be our friend and our approaches more united and acceptable and therefore you may say to God the same love which made me speak will also move thee to hear and pardon Love and devotion may enlarge your Letanies but nothing else can unless Authority does interpoâ—e 6. Be curious not to communicate but with the true Sonnes of the Church of England lest if you follow them that were amongst us but are gone out from us because they were not of us you be offended and tempted to impute their follies to the Church of England 7. Trouble your self with no controversies willingly but how you may best please God by a strict and severe conversation 8. If any Protestant live loosely remember that he dishonours an excellent Religion and that it may be no more laid upon the charge of our Church then the ill lives of most Christians may upon the whole Religion 9. Let no man or woman affright you with declamations and scaring words of Heretick and Damnation and Changeable for these words may be spoken against them that return to light as well as to those that go to darkness and that which men of all sides can say it can be of effect to no side upon its own strength or pretension The End Martial l. 8. ep. 18. Prov. 27. 10. * Vt praestem Pyladen aliquis mihi praestet Oresten Hoc non fit verbis Maree ut ameris ama Mart. l. 6. ep. 11. * Extra fortunam est quicquid donatur amicis Quas dederis solas semper habebis opes Mart. l. 5. ep. 43. Et tamen hoc vitium sed non leve sit licet unum Quod colit ingratas pauper amicitias Quis largitur opes veteri fidoque sodali ep. 19. †Non bellè quaedam faciunt duo sufficit unus Huic operi si vis ut loquar ipse tace Crede mihi quamvis ingentia Posthume dones Authoris pereunt garrulitate sui ep. 53. De potest Eccles. cons. 12.