of heauen and showres from the cloudes to make it fruitfull It is granted the Sunne shines the dewes fall The Garden hereupon brings forth herbes the desart thornes If these blessings of heauen were the proper cause of the weeds why hath not then the good ground such cursed effects The euerlasting lampe of heauen sends forth his sauing rayes and the sacred deawes of the Gospell fall on the pure and vncleane heart There it is requited with a fertile obedience here with an impious ingratitude Let not the mercy of God be blamed for this mans miserie Perditio ex se God hath done enough to saue him S. Augustine directly to this purpose Simul pluit Dominus super segetes super spinas Sed segeti pluit ad horreum spinis ad ignem tamen vna est plâ—uia GOD at once raines vpon the herbes and the thornes Vpon the herbs or good seed to shoot it vp for his barne for himselfe vpon the thornes to fit them for the fire yet is it one and the same raine This shall couer the faces of Libertines with â—uerlasting confusion who are euermore rubbing their owne filthinesse on Gods puritie and charging him as the authour of their sinnes If the Diuels in hell should speake what could they say more wee haue falne from our happinesse and God caused it Reprobate thoughts Men haue spilt bloud defiled forbidden beds strucke at Princes with treasons ruin'd countries with depopulations filled the earth with rapes and shot at heauen with blasphemies and lay their damnation on their Maker deriuing from his purpose excuses of their wickednesse The ineuitable decree of Gods counsell is charged the thought of that hath made them carelesse so with good food they poison themselues Willing fooles racke not your beleefe with impossibilities Behold God is so farre from authorizing your sinnes and falls that he raines on yoâ— the holy deawes of his word to mollifie your hearts Iustifying himselfe by this proffered meanes of your saluation that he would not the death of a sinner O but his hidden will is to damne vs. Mad men that forsake that signed will written in tables published with trumpets commanded with blessings cursings promises menaces to which euery soule stands bound and fall to prying into those vnsearchable mysteries couered with a curtaine of holy secrecy not to be drawne aside till the day comes wherein we shall know as we are knowne Cease aspiring man to roote thy wickdnesse in heauen and to draw in God as an accessary to thy profanenesse God would haue thee saued but thou wilt beare thorns and briars though thou endangerest thy selfe to cursing Is this the requitall for his mercy Are all his kindnesses to thee thus taken That when he hath done so much to bring thee to heauen thou wilt taxe him for casting thee to hel when he hath so laboured to make thee good thou wilt lay to his charge thy owne voluntary badnesse No iustifie God and magnifie his mercie Accuse thine owne corrupt heart that turnes so good and alimentall food into offensiue crudities Say Heauen is good but thy ground is naught Fatnesse and iuyce hath been bestowed on thee but thou hast yeelded pestilent and noysome fruits Lay not the fault on heauen but on the natiue corruption of thy owne heart that hath decocted the goodnesse of God into venome 3. This obseruation shall make way and giue place to another That the ground is very vnthankfull which answeres the kindnes of heauen in rayning on it with bryars and thornes Wretched man that receiues so blessed deawes from the fountaine of mercie and returnes an vngratefull wickednesse Vnthankefull it is as failing in both these essentiall parts of Gratitude acknowledging and requiting a benefite and so guilty both of falshood and iniustice Say the wicked did confesse Gods mercies yet where 's their obedience True thankfulnesse is called Gratiarum actio non dictio Whiles for holy deawes they render vnholy weedes this disobedience is the greatest Ingratitude The silence of our tongues the not opening our lippes to let our mouth shew forth his prayse is a grieuous vnthankfulnesse He is of an euill disposition that conceales or dissembles a benefite This is one branch of Ingratitude but our speech hitherto keepes but lowe water let vs rise vp to view the mountenous billows of that ingratitude here taxed a reall actual sensuall senselesse vnthankfulnesse if it bee not a degree beyond it and vnthankfulnesse too poore a word to expresse it Meere ingratitude returnes nothing for good but this sinne returnes euill for good Silence in acknowledging is too short we must thinke of a contumacious and contumelious retribution God after his mercifull raine lookes for some herbs of Grace when he walks down into his Garden to see whether the Vine flourished and the Pomegranates budded And behold weedes stinking weedes stinging weedes thornes and bryars Here is Ingratitude in ful proportion wiith all the dimensions of his vgly stigmaiticke forme This is that wickednes which brings the ground here to reiection malediction combustion Obserue further that 4. Wicked men proue commonly so much the worse as they might haue been better and diuert the means of their conuersion to their confusion The more raine of the Gospell they receiue the more abundantly they thrust forth the thornes of iniquities The rootes of these bryars are surely earthed in their hearts and do boyle out at the warme deaws of the Word It fares with them as with a man of a surfeted stomach the more good meate he eates the more hee increaseth his corruption The former crudities vndigested vnegested hauing the greater force turne the good nutriment into themselues There is such an antipathie betwixt the good word of God and the heart of a reprobate that the more it wrastles to bring him to heauen the more he wrastles against it that hee might be damned Tully mentions a Countrey wherein a great drought and heat maketh abundance of mire and dirt but store of raine causeth dust It is here experimentally true the plentifull raine of Gods blessed word is answered with the dusty and sandy barrennesse of mens euill liues So the Sunne shining vpon vncleane dung-hils is said to cause a greater stench yet no wise man blames the beames of the Sunne but the filthinesse of those putrified heapes for such offence The Sunne of righteousnesse hath sent downe the glorious rayes of his Gospell among vsâ— the wicked hereupon steame out the more noysome and stenchfull fruites Vpon whom shal the accusation light Gods comfortable heate of mercie or our putrid and ranke iniquities Sometimes the Sunnes heat working vpon a muddy and baneful obiect breeds horrid serpents No wonder then if this raine of the Gospel ingender in reprobate minds weeds and prickles The Cicones haue a riuer that doth harden the bowels and make the entrals stony a strange operation in them that drink it But if the water of life do harden the hearts of Pharaohs
and exasperate the mischiefes of a malicious Elimas let the imputation of fault light where it is deserued It was a strange protestatioÌ„ that God had against Israel I haue nourished and brought vp children and they haue rebelled against me I haue brought them vp in my house and taught them my precepts and yet as if my instructions and fauours had made them worse they haue rebelled against me Thus when the Sunne is hottest the springs are coldest and the more feruent the loue of God is to vs the more cold is our charity to him and to others for him As if the sweet dews of Hermon had made the hill of Syon more barren It is written of the Thraeian flint that it burnes with water and is quenched with oyle a fit Embleme of those wicked soules that are the worse for Gods endeuour to better them But such contrary effects hath the Gospell in contrary natures As by the heat of the Sunne waxe is softned and yet clay is hardned so by the preaching of the word the hearts of such as shal be saued are mollified but the hearts of the lost are further obdurate God in his wisâ— iustice wil be euen with men since they will not bee the better for his fauours they shal be the worse Seeing they wil not bring forth herbes they shall cast forth weeds and he that might not in their saluation will be glorified in their subuersion For application This Raine hath falne vpon vs all how haue wee entertained it where bee our herbes It is obiected against vs that our forefathers who wanted this raine brought forth more herbs then we that haue it That they in the daies of ignoraÌ„ce did more then they knew that we in the light of the Gospel know more then we do Apollonius among other wonders writes one most wonderfull that there was a people which could see nothing in the day but all in the night What hath the Sunne blinded vs Cannot wee see to serue God so well in the light as they did in the darke It was once said Ignoti nulla cupido but now it may be inuerted Noti nullus amor we little esteeme the Gospel because it is frequent amongst vs. The long enioying it hath dulled our estimation Full children are weary of their bread and play with it Like the Indians that haue such store of gold and precious stones that they truck them away for glasses and rattles Perhaps the cold legs of custome will bring vs to Church and we are content to heare the Preacher taxing our frauds vsuries oathes oppressions May be for some shew of deuotion wee will aske counsell at his lips but say what he will wee will not part with our sinnes The Princes of Israel came to Ieremie and intreat him to inquire of the Lord fot them promising that whatsoeuer direction the Lord should send they would obey The Prophet accordingly presents their supplication to God God answers You shall not goe into Egypt lest you be destroyed but abide still in Iudah and you shall be safe When they heard this Oracle because it was not their humours they replied We will goe into Egypt This was their purpose from the beginning though they dissembled a will to know Gods mind which if Gods command crosseth they will crosse his command they will goe into Egypt So people will be content to heare what God sayth to them by his Ministers but if hee speake not what pleaseth them they will follow their owne affections Wee are such nice and froward pieces that the more God wooes vs we are the further off As it is with some shallow professors of Musicke sayth the Poet. Omnibus hoc vitium cantoribus inter amicos Vt nunquam inducant animum cantare rogati When they are most earnestly intreated they make most daintie to sing or play So the more the Lord cals for our praises the more hoarse are our voices the more harsh our notes or perhaps we will not sing at all But if God hath giuen vs musicke and we will not dance as Christ reproued the Iewes wee shall mourne in sadnesse for our obstinate refusall of profered mirth You haue heard Herodotus tale of the Piper He came to the water-side and piped to the fishes they would not dance Hee tooke his net and caught some of them and being throwne vpon drie land they began to leape and skip vp Nay quoth the Piper I offered you musicke before and you would none now you shal dance without a pipe Men commonly regard the Songs of Sion as they doe musicke heard late at night in the streets whiles they are in bed Perhaps they will step to the windore and listen to it a while and presently to bed againe So men step from the couch of their lusts and sinnes to Church heare the Sermon and then to bed againe lulling themselues in their former securitie There are some that care for hearing it no more but sit downe with a conceit of their owne sufficiencie They know as much as all the Preachers can tell them let the youth go to be Catechized So the sluggish and irreligious Master sits at home whiles hee sends his seruants to Church There is an old tale idle in it selfe the vse may be good A certaine man that would neuer go to Church when hee heard the Saints-bell would say to his wife Goe thou to Church and pray for thee and me One night he dream't that both he and his wife were dead and that they knocked together at Heauen-gate for entrance S. Peter by the Legend is Porter and suffred the wife to enter in but kept the husband out answering him Illa intrauit pro se ette She is gone in both for her selfe and thee As thy wife went to Church for thee so shee must goe to heauen for thee The Morall instructs euery one to haue a personality of Faith and a proprietie of deuotion that himselfe seruing GOD himselfe may bee blessed of God It now remaines to examine more narrowly the nature of the sinnes these vngodly hearts produce They are called Thornes and Bryers Plinie sayth that the Thorne is more soft then a Tree and more hard then an Herbe as if it were some vnkindly thing and but an vnperfect excrement of the earth For the Philosopher sayth It is not the intent of kind that Trees should be sharpe with prickles and thornes but he would haue it caused by the insoliditie and vnfastnes of the tree By which meanes the cold humour is drawne out by the pores ere it bee concocted whereupon for scarcitie of matter it is hardned by the sunne and â—o shaped and sharpned into a thorne But it is vnquestionable truth that God created the thornes and bryers on the earth Some thinke because it is sayd Gen. 3. in mans punishment Maledictâ— esto terra propter te Cursed be the earth for thy sake Thornes and Thistles shall it bring forth to thee
A DIVINE HERBALL Together with A Forrest of THORNES In FIVE SERMONS 1. The Garden of Graces 2. The prayse of Fertilitie 3. The Contemplation of the Herbes 4. The Forrest of Thornes 5. The end of Thornes By THO. ADAMS ESAY 55. 11. My word sayth the Lord shall not returne to me void but shall prosper in the thing wherto I sent it AVGVST de benedict IACO ESAV Simul pluit Dominus super segetes super spinas sed segeti pluit ad horreum spinis ad ignem tamen vna est pluvia LONDON Printed by George Purslowe for Iohn Budge and are to be solde at his shop at the great South-dore of Pauls and at Brittaines Burse 1616. TO THE RIGHT Honourable WILLIAM Earle of Pembroke Lord Chamberlaine of his Maiesties household and one of his Maiesties most honourable Priuie Councel and Knight of the most noble order of the Garter The most noble embracer and encourager of GOODNESSE Right Honourable I Am bolde to present to your Honour a short contemplation of those Herbes cut in rough pieces which grow really and plentifully in your owne Garden and giue so good nourishment to your vertues delightfull taste to the Church and odoriferous sauour to all that like the Vine in Iothams Parable they cheare the heart of both God man Your Honour I â—now cannot dislike that in sight which you so preserue in sense and for a happy reward doth and shall preserue you You are zealously honour'd of all those that know goodnesse and haue dayly as many prayers as the earth Saints Into this number I haue hopâ—fully presuming thrust myselfe as loth to bee hindmost in that acknowledgement which is so nobly deserued and so ioyfully rendred of al tongues dedicating to your Honour some publicke deuotions that can neuer forget you in my priuate I will not thinke of adding one Herbe to your store I onely desire to remember your Honour what hand planted them what dew waters them what influence conserues and enspheares a sweet prouident ayre about them and when gay weedes that shoote vp like Ionas gourd in a night shall wither in an houre for moriuntur quomodo oriuntur Your Herbe of Grace shall flourish be prays'd both ob eminentiam and permanentiam and at last bee transported into that heauenly Paradise whence it receiues the originary roote and being Your Honour will excuse mee for coupling to a Diuine Herball a Forrest of Thornes by a true obseruation in both materiall and mystical Gardens though a Poet records it Terra salutiferas herbas eadernque nocentes Nutrit et vrticae proxima soepe rosa est Your Honour will loue the light better because the darke night followes so neare it That your Sunne may neuer set your noble Garden neuer wither that your honours may bee still multiplied with our most Royall and Religious King on earth and with the King of Kings in heauen is faithfully prayed for by Your Honours humbly deuoted THO. ADAMS To my worthy friend Tho. Adams on his HERBALL THe Herbes which these dead leaues now bring Thy liuing voice did sweetly sing That thy transported Hearers thought A PARADISE before them brought As if their inward eyes had seene Another EDEN fresh and greene How they will smell or taste thus sent Will be perceiu'd in the euent I stay no censures for my part May they grow greene still in my hart VV. B. R. S. His good-speede to the Herball TRuely thou dost the world disclose which growes Promiscuous here a Thorne there a Rose So shall blacke vices vgly face adde grace Vnto the vertue which shines next in place So when a stinging Thorne shall wound is found An Herbe to heale the Soule and make it sound To the diuine Author of the diuine Herball his true friend dedicateth this small Encomium of that which his pen dispaires to prayse HAd ADAM liu'd till this decayed age And seene an HERBALL so Diuine and Sage He would haue sayd that no succeeding man Might doe for Adam that which Adams can For while he till'd his Garden his darke mind In all that compasse no Herbe-Grace could find This man hath found it and herein is blest Adam was good my Adam's still is best W. R. D. of Physicke To the prayse of the Herball THe Ground Gods Image his word the Raine His Christ the Sunne neuer ecclips'd againe The Cloudes his Ministeriall instruments His Mercy the all-working influence From these a Garden of sweete Herbes doth grow With such a Spring as shall no Autumne know I. STOKES GReat Persons loue a GARDEN for delight To please their nosthrils or content their sight The poore mans state likes it to feast withall Physicians for the vertues medicinall For Odour Ornament and med'cinal worth A sweeter HERBALL neuer yet came forth Cecinit The. Parny A DIVINE HERBALL OR GARDEN Of GRACES HEB. Chap. 6. Vers. 7. 8. For the earth which drinketh in the raine that commeth oft vpon it and bringeth forth herbes meet for them by whom it is dressed receiueth blessing from God But that which beareth thornes and bryars is reiected and is nigh vnto cursing whose end is to be burned I Presume heere is no Atheist to heare and denie The Gospell is the power of God to saluation I hope here is no Libertine if there be let him heare also It is the power of God to confusion It is a double-edged Sword and giues vel vitam vel vindiâ—tam either instruction or destruction It is Fire that doth melt waxe to repentance and harden clay to vengeance It is here a Raine or Deaw falling on the ground of mans heart causing one soyle to bee fertile in good workes another to abound with weedes of impiety For it returneth not backe to him that sent it in vaine That it conuayes grace to vs and returnes our fruitfull gratitude to God is a high and happy mercy That it offers grace to the wicked and by their corrupt natures occasions greater impietie is a heauy but holy iudgement Not to trauell farre for Diuision heere lyes Earth before vs. And as I haue seene in some places of this Iland one hedge parts a fruitfull medow and a barren heath so of this Earth Man the same substance for natures constitution clay of the same heape in the creating hand of the Potter for matter masse and stuffe none made de meliore luto though in respect of Eternities Ordination some vessels of honour of disshonour others here be two kindes a good and a bad soyle the one a Garden the other a desart the former an inclosure of sweet herbes excellent graces the latter a wild and sauage Forrest of Bryars and thornes scratching and wounding offences For the better ground we wil consider 1. The operatiue meanes or working cause of the fertility the raine that commeth often vpon it 2. The thankefull returning of expected fruite it bringeth forth herbes meete for them by whom it is dressed 3. The reward of
tythes must they also nimme away the shreddes must they needes shrinke the whole cloth enough to apparell the Church as the cheating Taylor did to a dozen of buttons Hauing full gorged themselues with the parsonages must they picke the bones of the Vicaredges too Well sayth S. August Multi in hac vita manducant quod postea apud inferos digerunt Many deuoure that in this life which they shall digest in hell These are the Church-briers which let alone wil at last bring as famous a Church as any Christendome hath to beggerie Politicke men begin a pace alreadie to with-hold their children from Schooles and Vniuersities Any profession els better likes them as knowing they may liue well in whatsoeuer calling saue in the ministery The time was that Christ threw the buyers and sellers out of the Temple but now the buyers and sellers haue throwne him out of the Temple Yea they wil throw the church out of the church if they bee not stayed But some may say to me as one aduised Luther when he began to preach against the Popes vsurpation and tyrannie You had as good hold your peace This wickednesse is so powerfull that you will neuer preuaile against it Get you to your study and say Lord haue mercy on vs and procure your selfe no ill will But be it good will or be it ill will we come hither to speake the truth in our consciences And if these Church-thornes will continue their wickednesse bee it vnto them as they haue deserued If they will needs go to hell let them go we cannot helpe it let them perish I had purposed the discouery of more Brambles but the time forbids it I would to God we were well freed from those I haue taxed THE END Of Thornes THE FIFT SERMON ESA. 9. 18. Wickednesse burneth as the fire it shall deuoure the Bryers and Thornes and shall kindle in the thickets of the Forrest and they shal mount vp like the lifting vp of smoke GREG. lib. 4. Dialog Ad magnam iudicantis iustitiam pertinet vt nunquam mortui careant supplicio qui nunquam viui voluerunt carere peccato LONDON Printed by George Purslowe for Iohn Budge and are to be solde at his shop at the great South-dore of Pauls and at Brittaines Burse 1616. THE END Of THORNES THE FIFT SERMON HEB. Chap. 6. Vers. 8. But that which beareth thornes and bryers is reiected and is nigh vnto cursing whose end is to be burned OVr sinnes are thornes to others some wounding with their direct blowes others with their wipes all with their examples Man only hath not felt their blowes our Sauior also so found them when hee was faine for our sakes to set his naked breast his naked heart his naked soule against them They say the Nightingale sleepes with her breast against a thorne to auoide the Serpent Christ was content to bee wounded euen to sleepe to death with thornes that hee might deliuer vs from that deuouring serpent the great infernall Dragon His head was not onely raked and harrowed with materiall thornes Caput Angelicis spiritibus tremebundum coronatur spinis That head which the Angelical spirits adore and tremble at was crowned with thornes But these mysâ—call thornes our iniquities with fiercer blowes drew bloud of his soule They doe in a sort still Heb. 6. 6. They crucifie to themselues the Sonne of God a fresh and put him to an open shame Not in himselfe for they cannot but can them no thankes they would if they could and to themselues they doe it Wretched men will you not yet let Iesus Christ alone and be at rest will you still offer violence to your blessed Sauiour and labour to pull him downe from his throne to his Crosse from his peaceful glorie at the right hand of his Father to more sufferings You condemne the mercilesse Souldiers that platted a crowne of thornes and put it on his innocent head Sinfull wretch condemne thy selfe Thy sinnes were those thornes and farre sharper Thy oppressions wrongings and wringings of his poore brethren offer him the violence of new wounds thy oathes thy fraudes thy pride scratch him like bryers Heare him complaining from heauen Saul Saul why persecutest thou mee These Thornes grow on earth yet they pricke Iesus Christ in heauen Oh wee little know the price of a sin that thus play the executioners with the Lord of life Thinke thinke Christ felt your sinnes as sharpe thornes Lastly you finde them thornes your selues if Christ did not for you When God shall enliuen and make quicke the sense of your nummed consciences you shall confesse your owne sinnes â—ruell thornes to your soules 2. Cor. 12. A thorne in your flesh that shall buffet you with terror For a while men are insensible of their iniquities Christ Math. 13. 22. calls the riches of this world thornes which choke the good seede of the Gospell The common opinion of the world is that they are goodly fine and smooth things furres to keepe them warme oyle to cheare their faces and wine to their hearts of a silken softnesse to their affections But Christ saith they are thorns stinging and choking thornes And the couetous conscience shall one day perceiue in them Triplicem puncturam a threefold pricking Laboris in acquisitione they are gotten with trouble Timoris in possessione they are kept vvith feare Doloris in amissione they are lost with griefe Men commonly deale with their sinnes as hedgers do when they go to plash thorny bushes they put on tyning gloues that the Thornes may not pricke them So these harden their hearts that their owne thornes may giue them no compunction But all vanities are but like the fooles laughter which Salomon compares to the crackling of thornes vnder a pâ—t they make a noise and suddenly go out But sinne neuer parts with the wicked without leauing a sting behind it Luther saith there are two fiends that torment men in this world and they are sinne and a bad conscience The latter followes the former or if you will the former wounds the latter for sinne is the thorne and the conscience the subiect it strikes This thorne often pricks deepe to the very heart Acts 2. to the very bones Psal. 38. There is no rest in my bones because of my sinne Vis nunquam esse tristis bene viue Nunquam securus est reus animus Wouldest thou neuer be sorrowfull liue well A guilty mind cannot be securely quiet An euill mind is haunted and vexed with the thornes of his owne conscience Sinne to the affections whiles it is doing is oleum vngens supple oyle Sinne to the conscience when it is done is tribulus pungens a pricking thorne What extreame contraries doe often wicked conceits runne into In their time of securitie they cannot be brought to think sinne to be sinne At last desperately they thinke it such a sinne that it cannot be forgiuen At first they are delighted with the