were rebells and enemies to the Lord of life till that tyme obeying sense and bestiallity in all things and hating not onely Religion but euen very common sense and reason But he like a true sunne dispersed those clouds cleered vp the mist of ignorance and errour in our progenitours Who together with almost the whole world were so miserable as to worship stockes and stones insteed of God Nor were they more darke in the vnderstanding part then they were depraued in their will and if we be now in any better case we must onely impute such a diuine effect to an omnipotent cause which was the loue of our Lord who was wholly impatient to differ our conuersioÌ„ any longer and therfore vpon the very day of his Natiuity he directed and commaunded that Starre to prepare a way for the Epiphany The Prophet (h) This place deserues particular consideration Cap. 60. Esay in this mystery forseeing the beginning of the glorious state of the Church of Iesus Christ our Lord did thus by way of anticipation expresse himselfe Arise be illuminated Ierusalem because thy light is come and the glory of our Lord is risen vpon thee For behold darkenes shall couer the earth and a mist the people but vpon thee shall our Lord arise and his glory shall be seene vpon thee and the Gentills shall walke in thy light and Kings in the brightnes of thy rysing Lift vp thine eyes round about and se how all these are gathered together They are come to thee thy sonnes shall come from farre and thy daughters shall come from thy side Then shalt thou see and abound and thy hart shall meruaile and be enlarged when the multitude of the Sea shall be conuerted to thee the strength of the Gentills shall come to thee The inundation of Camells shall couer thee The Dromedaries of Madian and Epha All they of Saba shall come bringing gold and Frankenceuse and shewing forth payse to our Lord. The (i) How both the parts of this Prophesy are fulfilled latter part of this prophesy was most litterally fulfilled vpon this day of the Epiphany vpon these holy Magi as we clearly see by the sacred Euangelicall Text. And the former part which announceth the glory of the Christian Church hath bene as cuidently accomplished in the Communion of the holy Catholike Aposiolike Romane faith in the light wherof the Gentills were to walke And so many successions and Series of Kings when first they should be conuerted from Paganisme to this faith were to goe on in the brightnes of the rysing therof And such multitudes were then to come in to do her homage both from farre and neere as should amaze strike her through with ioy Nor was he able to expresse the plenty and abundance of that people otherwise then by the name of seas and inundations And (k) I dare make my reader my Iudge heere let any man who hath but the vse euen of coÌ„mon sense consider in what community of Christian people this prophesy hath bene fulfilled whether in the Catholike Romane which is spread farre and neere in all the fower quarters of the earth as Europe Affrique Asia and America or in any other present Sect of these parts of the world which neuer went further then to some Prouinces of Europe only Nor was euer euen heer such as now it is but onely since the tyme of Luther when also it is deuided into a world of sects Whether in the Catholike which conuerted all the Countries which euer were coÌ„uerted from Paganisme to the faith of our Lord or in any Sect at all which neuer conuerted any one but insteed therof hath peruerted as many as it could from the true faith to their owne carnall fancies Whether in the Catholike wherof such a world of Emperours and Kings and Queenes haue bene or els in any other now on foote which neuer had any one who was and did contynue of their coÌ„munion We (l) They are Catholiques only who adore our Lord Iesus as the Magi did Catholikes are they to whome our Lord did manifest himselfe according to the prediction of his holy Prophets We who finde him in the stable in the armes of his sacred and all-immaculate mother and We who adore him and present him not only with our hartes as his enemies do also pretend themselues to doe but with our Gold also by almes and all kind of Charity with our Incense by deuoâ—ion and piety and with our Mirrhe by mortification and pennance in vnion of that infinite loue of his wherby he hath made choice of vs to whome he would vouchsafe to be made knowne And therfore let vs follow S. Leo his counsell Ser. 2. de Epiphan who like a true supreme Pastour spake thus to the vniuersall flocke committed to his charge Let this most sacred day of the Epiphany be honoured by vs wheron the author of our saluation appeared and let vs adore him in heauen being so omnipotent to whome the Magi did expresse such veneration he being in his Cradle but an Infant It is shewed by the Presentation of our Lord Iesus in the Temple how infinite loue he bare to vs. CHAP. 17. THIS Omnipotent Lord Iesus hauing as it were emptied his fulnes or rather abridged the shew of his greatnes by growing into the narrow compasse of being a child in his Natiuity and hauing also submitted himselfe both to paine and shame in his Circumcision where he tooke to himselfe the sweet name of Iesus for our eternall good did proceed yet further shortly after in a most amourous obedience to that Law which we alone were subiect to Vnder the obligation heerof he was and vvould needs be presented in the Temple to Almighty God Luc. 2. as the first borne of all parents vvere bound to be in memory of that destruction Exod. 12. Exod. 13. Leuit. 12. vvhich God brought vpon the first borne of the Agyptians and so deliuering his ovvne people vvhich vvas the Children of Israell by meanes therof So punishing his enemies because they presecuted his friends or rather so punishing his enemies that they also might become his friends if they vvould not resolue to be their ovvne greatest enimies But yet vvitha I it vvas ordeyned in the old lavv that the first borne so offered by the parents vvhen once they had done that homage to the God of all things should not be so appropriated to his seruice as that the parents vvere vvholly to loose the comfort of them But (a) See heer the tender goodnes of almighty God towardes man Num. 8. all except they vvere of the Tribe of Leui vvho vvere to serue in Ecclesiasticall function might be redeemed recouered backe againe And that at so loe a rate as should not vndoe them hovv poore soeuer they might chance to be The beasts indeed and only they vvere to be sacrificed in Specie as they vvere offred to our Lord. This Oblation was therfore made by the people
She was iustly therfore said to be full of grace who alone obtayned the grace which neuer was merited by any other of being filled by the authour himselfe of grace But that which (c) Of the valew of the vulgar translatioÌ„ of the Bi. ble by S. Hierome ought to serue our turne is the vulgar edition which was made by the most learned S. Hierome and is authorized by the decrees of the Catholike Church Besides that diuers Councells haue also acknowledged her to haue bene full of grace in coÌ„formity of this salutation of the Angell And (d) Our B. Lady was saluted by the Angell in the Syriake toÌ„gue moreouer the Syriacke readeth thus Peace be to thee O thou full of grace And it is most probable and as good as certaine that the Angell did speake to our B. Lady in Syriacke which was the language of that time place and not originally in Greeke which for ought we know our B. Lady did not 〈◊〉 at that tyme. So that for our parts we will coÌ„template her with holy S. Bernard Ser. de Natiuit Virginis as a slower which the ayre of the holy Ghost did not only blou vpoÌ„ but breath through that so her delicious odours might abundantly bestow themselues vpon the world This salutation of the Angell with full of grace in his mouth was such a one and deliuered in such a sense as by the Testimony of S. Ambrose had neuer bene heard In 1. Lucae or found before according to the vnderstanding wherin it was allowed to her but was only reserued for her who was to be made the most worthy Mother of our Lord God Now what can be imparted more pretious in this life then the Treasure of (e) The incompable excellency of the Grace of God Grace or what proportion can exceed the fulnes therof The true value of this iewell is only to be exactly vnderstood by our Lord God himselfe because he only vnderstands the infinitnes of his glory which is that fruite wherof Grace is the seed He only is able out-right to penetrate the true deformity of sinne which is so incoÌ„patible with Grace as that although a soule were defiled withal the sinnes of the whole world one degree of Grace would expell and kill them all at the very instant that it should enter into that soule And so if any one soule had all that Grace which is in all created soules any one mortall sinne would instantly expell it all Not only doth it remoue deformity but it indues the soule with such excessiue beauty as makes it of odious to God and obnoxious to the eternall fires of hell most dearly amiable in the sight of that diuine Maiesty and it giues it tytle and right to the kingdome of heauen Not only doth it beautify but it doth dignify the soule subliming it as S. Peter saith to consort with God himselfe and that not after any ordinary manner but euen to partake of his diuine nature and such a soule is treated to all purposes as a daughter of the eternall Father a sister to Christ our Lord a most beloued spouse of the holy Ghost and a fellow-cittizen and sweet companion to all the Angells and Saints in the kingdome of God This Grace is no load but it lightneth it is no dead thing but perpetually it is liuing working wonders if it meete with no impedimeÌ„t in the soule as in our B. Ladies it neuer did As she was full of Grace so was that Grace full of fruite For Grace in a soule is the mother of all vertue nay if it be not fruitefull it is not Grace In that soule of the Blessed Virgin it did fructify in such strange proportion as no created thought can coÌ„prehend though shortly I will procure with reuerence to point therat But in (f) The misery of such as forfait the Grace of God for the coÌ„mitting of a vile sinne the meane tyme if the dignity and excellency of Grace be such how miserable is that man who for his inordinate desire of a temporall delight which besides that it drawes him downe to hell is past as soone as the name is vttered or for a sume of honour which at the most can make him happy but by heare-say or for the rickes of this world which is but durt one degree remoued and which may be stolne and must be left and whilst it is inioyed cannot make a man either healthfull or stronge and much lesse learned holy or wise will be so deadly foolish as to depriue himselfe of this celestiall patrimony of Grace which was bought for him at the high rate of the passion and death of Christ our Lord and was imparted to him with so much loue to the end that by him and with him and in him he might eternally be happy The (g) The vniust Cauill of some men against our B. La. dies honour in being full of Grace Act. 2. Act. 6. aduersaries of our Blessed Ladyes exellency whilst they deny her to be full of Grace deny that to Gods Mother which yet they must graunt to many seruants of his of whome the holy Scripture saith that they after their manner were also full of Grace Namely the Apostles and they who were present with them when the holy Ghost came downe And particularly it is said of Saint Stephen the Protomartyr That he was full of Grace And yet againe on the other side they doe vniustly accuse vs as though when we say that she was full of Grace we sought to equall her with her Sonne our Lord of whome it is also said by the beloued Disciple that he was full of Grace But (h) Of seueral plepitudes of Grace Ioan. 1. euen that disciple both in the same very place makes vs know that there are seuerall kindes of plenitude of Grace And that the plenitude of Christ our Lord was of the only begotten Sonne of God which was infinitely after a fort beyond the plenitude of our B. Lady as heâ—s being as of Mother was also incomparably beyond that of the Apostles and S. Stephen and all the Saints and Angells put togeather who are but wayters in the Court of heauen Not that there is any difference in the very being full amongst them who all are ful but the difference is in the capacity of the vessel into which that treasure is infused wherof some are more extended more capable and others lesse And it doth also consist in the various kindes of graces wherof some are more intense as also more pretious and sublime theÌ„ others The plenitude therfore of the B. Virgin presumes not to make the least comparison with that of Christ our Lord but so also must not the plenitude of other seruants and Saints once enter into competition with the plenitude of the most worthy mother of the euer liuing God The plenitude of Christ our Lord was of the originall fountaine of all Grace that of our Blessed Lady as of a sweet
both extremely laborious withall very lickerish after all the delightfull obiects which it lookes vpon And for listening gazing it growes first to cheapning then to buying by the disorder distēpered heate therof it blowes with vehemet desire vpon them And so it rayseth a dust into the eye of the vnderstāding wherby it is made as blind almost as the blind will it selfe And wherby it growes persuaded that how deere soeùer that cōterfeit ware do cost it may proue a kind of sauing bargaine to vs in the end Now what a case are we therfore in if our Loue being so restles a thing as it is so resolued to be euer feeding vpon some obiect or other we suffer that to be such a one as besides the endles tormes of the next life can neuer bring vs to any true rest in this For the soule can neuer rest in the possession or fruition of any creature The reason heerof is playne because the rest of any thing consisteth in the attayning inioying of that last end to which it was ordayned in the creation therof And therfore the soule of man being made for the fruition of God whose glorious vision is only able to make vs say It is inough what meruaile is it that it can take no lasting true contentment in any thing which is lesse then God The holy S. Bernard sayth heervpon to this essect It is no meruaile that the soule of man can neuer be satisfied with the possessions honours pleasures of this world For the soule desires to feed vpon such a meat as may carry proportion to it selfe Now the entertaiments of this life carry no proportion at all to the soule in the way of giuing it entiere satisfactiō For the soule is spirituall immortall and all these obiects are either temporall or carnall And therfore as he who were ready to starue for lacke of meate would be ridiculous if he should thinke to kill his hungar by going to a window gaping there like some Camelion to take in the ayre which ayre is no cōpetent and proportionable food for a body of flesh bloud iust so a man who shal pretend to satisfy fulfill the desires of a spirituall immortal substāce as we know the soule to be by feeding fowly vpon the Carrion of Corporall thinges is at least as very a foole as the former And besides his folly his losse of labour in the meane time he wil heerafter grow to suffer by it so much more hē the otherr as the eternall dānation of a soule is a matter incōparably more considerable then the death of a mortall body No it is God alone who can quēch the infini e appetite of his reasonable creatures He alone made the whole world for vs vs for himself he only is our Center place of rest He only is that first Truth which our vnderstāding should aspire to know the only Good which our Will should be so inflamed to Loue. And because as hath bene said the question is but of the Meanes wherby we must tend to this most perfect End and for that by the treachery of our sēses we are induced to place our harts the affectiōs therof vpon dāgerous vicious obiects it is therfore shat I am procuring to set that one before vs which is the most strōg sweet perfect meanes which may not only inuite but assist vs also admirably otherwise towards the ariuing to our last End The line which leades to this faire full point the way which guides vs to this eternall habitation is that top of beauty and excellency Iesus Christ our Lord vpon whom if we can perswade our selues to fasten the rootes of allour Loue we shall not only be happy there but euē heere And to the end that we may consider the innumerable inualuable reasons which we haue to loue this Lord of ours I haue laboured first to shew the vnspeakeable dignity of his person then the infinite loue it selfe which he hath borne to vs. And this I haue deduced out of the principal misteries of his most sacred life bitter death as they haue bene deliuered to vs in holy Scripture And although whilst I treate of the Loue of our Lord to vs in euery one of the particular mysteries I do also shew the straite obligation into which we are cast of returning loue for loue to him yet I procure to do it more expresly towards the end of the book in the two last Chapters The holy ghost be he who by sweetly breathing vpō our soules may inable vs to do this duty well which hath bene so highly deserued of vs which only is able to make vs happy OF THE LOVE OF OVR LORD IESVS CHRIST declared by shewing his Greatnes as he is God CHAP. 1. THE Loue of our Lord Iesus Christ to this wretched and wicked creature Man is such a Sea without any bottome and such a Sunne without all Eclipse that not only no fadome can reach it must not so much as any eye behould it as indeed it is And whither soeuer we looke either vp or downe or towards any side we shall find our selues ouer wrought by the bulke and brightnes thereof Now (a) The quality of the persōs which loue each other giueth price and value to the loue it selfe because the loue of any one to any other doth take a tincture from the quality of the persons betweene whome it pasles therefore the loue of our Lord to vs is proued heereby to be infinite and incomprehensible because the dignity and Maiesty of his person is incomprehensible and infinite It will therefore be necessary to declare some part of the excellency of his person And for his sake who loued vs with so eternall loue I beg in this beginning an exact attention Because (b) The reason why exact attention is heere required what I am to say in this place being the ground whereon the rest of this discourse must rise will both giue it clearer light and greater weight and more certaine credit Nor can any thing which shall be deliuered in the progresse heerof be so high or deep or wide or hard to the beliefe whereof the soule wil not be able to flye at full ease and speed betweene the wings of faith and loue when it considers and ponders well who it is of whō we speake Our Lord Iesus Christ being perfect God and perfect Man as God is the only begotten eternall sonne of his Father and wholy equall to him And because (c) The generatiō of the Son of God he is begotten of him by an act of Vnderstanding proceeding out of that inexausted fountaine of his wisedom as if it were out of a wombe he is therefore called the Wisedome begotten the Word the Image and the Figure of his Father from whome togeather with the Sonne the Holy Ghost proceeds And for as much as the
euer the beatificall vison of God Ioan. 8. Ioan. 11. our Lord Iesus as he was man had euer the beatificall vision of God This truth is thus declared in the Ghospell by the mouth of Christ our Lord I speake those thinges which I haue seene with the Father and where I am that is to say in Glory there shall my seruant also be For since he was from and in the very beginning the naturall Sonne of God and the vniuersall Father and head both of men Angells the influence whereof was to be deriued into all the members it was but reason and it could not be otherwise but that his Soule should be endued with this Beatificall knowledge as is declared by the holy Fathers By this knowledge he beheld and did contemplate the most B. Trinity after a manner incomparably more sublime and noble then any or all the other creatures put togeather And because by how much the more cleerely God is seene so much the more are creatures seene in him it will follow that the Soule of Christ our Lord did behould in God not only innumerable thinges but euen outright all those things concerning creatures which euer were at any tyme or which are or shall heereafter be since (c) It belongeth to Christ our Lord as le is our Iudge to know all â—â—inges vhich coÌ„terne the creatures vhom he is to iudg Matt. 28. â—8 he is the Lord of all the Iudge of all and hath all power giuen to him both in heauen and earth for the iust and orderly execution wherof it is euident that he must haue the knowledge of them all The Catholike Fathers and Doctours do also ascribe a second kind of knowledge to the soule of Christ our Lord which (d) Christ our Lord a Man had also infused knowledg they call Infused as being a kind of supernaturall light whereby it did certainely and clearely discerne and know all thinges created And although it be not so expresly contayned in holy Scriptures that Christ our Lord was indued with this knowledge in particular and distinct manner since they only affirme That he knew all thinges which is sufficiently made good by that beatificall vision whereof I spake before yet are there pregnant consequences weighty reasons which exact at our hands a firme beliefe that he had also this other Infused knowledge For the soule of Christ our Lord was alwayes truely Blessed he vvas not only a Runner tovvardes felicity as all other humane creatures are in this life but he vvas a Comprehender of it euen from the very first instant of his Conception It vvas necessary therfore that his soule being Blessed should haue all the endowments of a blessed Soule vvherof this Infused knowledge is one and vvhereby it did certainly and clearely know all thinges created vvhether they vvere natural or supernaturall And that in themselues and in their proper kind or element as they call it and not as only appearing and shining in another glasse as they are seene by that former Beatificall vision but directly and immediatly in themselues And for this it is that the incomparable S. Augustine doth declare That the Angels are endued both with a Morning and an Euening knowledge vnderstanding by the former the beatificall vision and by the latter the knowledge vvhich they call infused Our Lord Iesus had moreouer a third kinde of knowledge which is termed by the name of Experimentall This (e) Of the experimentall knowledg of Christ our Lord. knowledge is acquired by the industry of the senses and it was the fame in Christ our Lord for as much as concernes the meanes wherby it was gathered with the knowledge which we coÌ„passe in this life But yet with this great difference That in Christ our Lord it was without any danger of errour wheras in vs it is with very great difficulty of iudging right And it is in consideration of this kind of knowledge that the holy Euangelist affirmed Christ our Lord to proceed and grow Luc. 2. But those miserable men wherof I spake before hauing the sight of their Faith so short as not to discerne in his sacred soule any other kind of knowledge then this last did absolutely impute ignorance to it at sometymes of his life more then others as if it had not beene Hypostatically vnited to God in whome not onely the knowledge of all things but (f) Nothing is but so far as it is in God euen the very things themselues remayne and if they did not so remaine they could not be Now vpon this which concerneth the knowledge of Christ our Lord it followeth cleerly that he knew all things playnely which are which shall be and which euer were It followeth also that he neuer ceased in any one minute of his life from the consideration of what he knew since he had such knowledge as was wholly independant vpon those images or formes which vse to be impressed vpon the Phansy therfore the working of his knowledge was no way interrupted euen when he was sleeping And yet againe it followeth that hauing a perfect comprehension of all things created together with the causes and effects of them all he (g) Christ our Lord as Man was indued with the perfect knowledg of all arts and sciences consequently was endued with the truth of all Arts and Sciences He had moreouer a most sublime guift of (h) He had a most sublime guift of Prophesy Prophesy and that not after a transitory manner as others haue bene enriched with it by God but permanently and sticking as it were as close vnto him as his owne Nature And lastly it must follow that he was the possessour of all (i) Christ our Lord as Man was a most perfect possessor of prudence Prudence and the partes therof which might any way be fit either for the ordering of his owne actions or for the direction and gouerment of others So that by vvhat vve haue seene he might vvell be naturally the Maister and guide of al mankind which yet will more cleerly appeare by the Power and Sanctity of that pretious Soule The Power and Sanctity of the Soule of Christ our Lord is considered wherby we may also the better see his excessiue Loue. CHAP. 3. BESIDES the Consideration of the deuine Wisedome and knowledge of Christ our Lord I should deserue no excuse if vvhen there is question of his infinite Loue to vs I should not also touch vpon the Power and the Sanctity of his soule Which if they be seriously considered vvill greatly serue though I meane but euen to touch and go to set forth his dignity in himselfe and consequently it vvill put a more expresse and perfect stampe of value vpon his infinitely deere tender loue to vs. For (a) How euery seuerall excellency in Christ our Lord doth iustly rayse the valew of his loue the more he knowes and the more continually he cares and the more wisedome he enioyes and
the more power he practiseth the more holynes he possesseth the more happy are the creatures vvhom he loues The (b) The power of Christ our Lord as man Power therfore vvhervvith Christ our Lord vvas endued as man vvas so vvonderfully great that he could vvorke vvhat miracles he vvould and at his pleasure vvas he able to inuert the order of all naturall things and all this by vvhat meanes he would think fit This Power he also had in as permanent a manner as vve haue said already that he had his Prophesy nor vvas it only obtayned for him by his particular prayers made to God from tyme to tyme according to the exigence of occasions as it hath beene graunted to some of the seruants of God But vve read that vvhen he vvas passing and doing other thinges Luc. 8. yet vertue euen then issued out of him vvherby the vvorking of miracles is meant And els vvhere it is also affirmed that the vertue which issued out of him Luc. 6. cured all diseases And the leaper vvho vvas recouered in the Ghospell vvas inspired by the good spirit of God to say thus to Christ our Sauiour O Lord if thou wilt Matt. 8. thou canst make me cleane And our Lord did shevv that he vvas not deceaued therin For instantly he said I will Be cleane Novv all this Power he employed for our good both corporall and spirituall but especially for our spirittuall good For euen in the Ghospell vvhen he cured mens bodyes by way of illuminating their eyes enabling their limmes and restoring their liues he cured also many of their soules and the seuerall infirmities vvhich they vvere subiect to as vvill be shevved els (c) In the discourse of the Miracles of Christ our Lord. vvhere Nor vvrought that holy omnipotent hand of his any outvvard miracle vvherin some invvard mystery was not locked vp as some rich Ievvel might be in some rare Cabbinet The (d) The sanctity of the soule of Christ our Lord. Sanctity also of Christ our Lord vvas supreme For Sanctity being nothing but a constant and supernaturall cleanes and purity of the soule wherby it is made acceptable and deare to God hovv holy must that soule needs be vvhich vvas so highly (e) The soule of no Saynt in heauen was to haue been any other then odious in the sight of God but for the merits of Christ our Lord. deere to him as that it is only in regard of that soule that all other soules are not odious and vgly in his sight Supreme I say was the Sanctity of Christ our Lord for by the grace of the Hypostaticall vnion he was made holy after a most high and incomprehensible manner and he became The beloued Sonne of God receauing grace beyond al power of expression That so from thence as from the treasure-house of Sanctity all men might take according to their capacity Not only as from the greatest Saint but as from the sanctifyer of them all and as I may say from the very dye of sanctity whereby all they who euer thinke of becomming Saints must take their coulour and luster all they who will may fetch what they desire out of this store So that we may see with ease inough how incōparably much more the Sāctity was of Christ our Lord then that of any or all the other creatures put togeather For among them God hath giuen drops to some and draughts to others but to him grace was communicated by streames and floudes beyond all measure or set proportion His soule indeed could not haue beene vnited to the diuinity without a most speciall grace but that being once supposed the other could not chuse but follow as connaturall And by the force of this Sanctity of Christ our Lord he was wholy naturally made incapable of sinne yea and of any morall defect whatsoeuer Concerning the Vertues which are called Theologicall namely Fayth Hope and Charity the last only of the three could lodge in him for the former two being (f) Why christ our Lord was vncapable of Fayth Hope Hope and Faith were incompatible with the cleare vision and perfect fruition of God which he still enioyed But (g) Christ our Lord possessed all the morall vertues in all perfection as for the morall vertues as Liberality Magnanimity Patience Purity Mercy Humility and Obedience withall the rest it appeares by the history of his sacred life and death that he had them all and that they were most perfect in him and euer most ready to be put in practise as not being impeached by so much as the offer of any contraryes All the guifts of Gods spirit were in him nay he was the resting and reposing place of that spirit This Soule of Christ our Lord was therefore inhabited by all the vertues Isa 11. and graces of God as heauen is by so many seueral quires of Angells in heauen but that which did sublime them all was Charity This soule if it be well considered will looke as if it were some huge wide bottomlesse sea of Christall but (*) The vnspeakeable working of the soule of Christ our Lord in the spirit of loue a Christall sweetly passed and transpierced with a kind of flame of loue It was vnspeakably quiet and yet in a kind of perpetuall agitation by the impulse thereof like the flame of some torch which is euer mouing and working yet without departing from it selfe It is like that kind of Hawke which keeping still the same pitch aloft in the ayre doth stirr the winges with a restlesse kind of motion whilest yet the body doth not stirre It spendes but wasteth not it selfe by spreading grace vpon all the seruants of God after an admirable manner Sometymes looking into the hartes of men and by that very looking changing them sometymes by sending as it were certaine inuisible strings from his hart to theirs and so sweetly drawing them to himselfe whilst (h) No soule can moue one pace towardes God but drawn by the loue of Christ our Lord. yet the world would ignorantly conceaue that they went alone But aboue all that which may strike our weake and darke mindes with wonder is to consider the profoundity and (i) The admirable order with still was held in the soule of Christ our Lord notwithstanding the wonderfull multiplicity of acts with he exercised al at once order which is held in that diuine Soule though it looked vpon almost infinite thinges at once Still did it adore the Diuinity still did it abase and euen as it were annihilate his owne humanity still did it most straitly imbrace with strong armes and patronize with the working bowels of tender mercy all the miseryes of al the Creatures in the whole world vnspeakably ardently thirsting after the glory of God and the felicity of man and eternally keeping all the facultyes of his mind erected vpon that high and pure law of Charity So excellent and so noble was this
reuiue and rayse it vp to receaue that homage without asking him so much as leaue O pretious sweet Humanity of Christ our Lord And (g) We at worthy of all punihment if wee become not euen the slaues of the Humanity of Christ our Lord. how shall we who know that thou wert humaned for vs and diddest not only descend to be a man but diddest degrade thy selfe further downe for the loue of vs how I say shall we sufficiently admire and loue thy Beauty which was so great euen in their externall eyes who had not withall the internall eyes of Faith wherwith thou hast enriched our soules And where shall we finde either holes or hills to hide or couer vs from thy wrath if we who are Christiās doe not by the eternall obsequiousnes of our harrs outstrip those obstinate but yet withall inconstant Iewes Obstinate in their mindes when they were grown to malice but inconstāt in mantayning those tender thoughts which they excellētly did sometymes oblige them to in the performance of so many Soueraigne signes of honour The admirable visible grace and disposition of the person of Christ our Lord is further declared CHAP. 6. VVHAT heauen on earth could euer make a man so happy as to haue beheld this sacred persō of our Lord Iesus in any of those postures which are described by the hand of the holy Ghost in holy scripture To haue (a) The incomparable grace of Christ our Lord in all his actions seen that god made mā as he was walking before the front of the Tēple whē his hart the while like a true Incensary was spending it selfe into the perfume of prayers which ascended before the Altar of the diuine mercy euen then and euen for them who there went in and out contemning and maligning him in the highest degree Mar. 11. Ioan. 20. To haue seene him walking and bestowing those deere limmes of his vpon those sands Mattb. 4. with incredible grace loue neere to that lake or sea of Galilea as if it had looked but like a kind of recreation when his enamoured soule was yet the while negotiating with his eternall Father Ibid. the vocation of his Apostles and by them the saluation of the whole world To haue seene him Luc. 4.16 c. standing vpon his sacred feet whilst with reuerence he would be reading in the Synagogue and then sitting downe afterwards when he would take vpon him the office of a teacher Ibid. 20. so pointing vs out by any little motion of his to the purity and perfection of euery action Marc. 3. To haue seene him sitting in the mindst of a roome with all that admiring multitude round about him whilst newes was brought him of the approach of his all-immaculate mother and of his kindred and domesticke friends who had reason to thinke euery minute to be a world of ages till their eies might be restored to that seate and Center of all ioy And he the while with diuine sweetnes and modesty looking round about him and lending a particular eye of mercy to euery soule there present and extending his liberall hand with an incomparable sweet noble grace did with his sacred mouth and with such a hart of loue as God alone is able to vnderstand adopt both them and all the world into his neerest deerest kindred vpon condition that they would do his Fathers will which was the only meanes to make them happy To (b) The infinite gratious goodnes of Christ our Lord. haue seene that sonne of God whose face is the delight and glory of all the Angells in heauen and at whose sacred feete they fall adoring with so profound reuerence deueste himselfe first of his vpper garment with such louely grace Ioan. 13.4 c. and gird the Towell about his virginall loynes with such modesty and fill the vessell full of water by the labour of his owne delicate armes with such alacrity and cast himselfe with such bottomelesse humility charity vpon those knees to which all the knees of heauen and earth were obliged to bow and from which the eternall Father was only to haue expected such an homage at the feete and for the comfort and conuersion of that diuell Iudas Yea and to wipe those very feete when he had washed them first and that perhaps with the teares of his owne sacred eyes to see if yet it might be possible to soften the hart of that Tygar who was able to defile such a beauty and to detest such a goodnes and who in despight of that prodigious mercy would needs be running post to hell by cōmiting that abhominable treachery They say the vale discouers the hill the darke shadow of a picture sets off the body which there is drawen Neuer was there such a peece of chiaro oscuro such a beautifull body as that of Christ our Lord neuer vvas there such a blacke shadovv as that vvretched man whome for the infamy of his crime I vvil forget to name But in fine to haue seene through the vvhole course of his life that holy Humanity sometymes svveating vvith excesse of labour some tymes grovvne pale vvith the rage of hungar some tymes pulled and vvracked seuerall vvayes at once by importunities sometymes pressed and as it were packed vp into lesse roome then his owne dimensions did require by crowdes of people and (c) Christ our Lord maintayned his grace and Beauty notwithstāding all the incōmodities to which he was put euer to haue beheld in his very face such an altitude of peacefull piety and such a depth of humility and such an vnlimitted and endlesse extent of Charity by remouing all diseases and dangers both of body and soule as heereafter (d) In the discourse vpon his Miracles will be shewed more at large for a man I say to haue had the sight of such an obiect would be sure I think to haue freed him from euer longing after any other Of Titus it was said that he was deliciae humani generis the very ioy and comfort of the world for the sweet receptiō which he vouchsafed to make to all commers Of Iulius Caesar it is recorded that being threatned with danger of a mutiny and defection in his army he spake to his souldiers this one only word Quirites (e) That word did shew that he held them no longer for souldiers of his but only as citizens of Rome and that thought pierced theyr harts with sorrow shame wtih such circumstances of grace and wisedome as that he drew al their hartes towards him at an instant It is true and it was much and there haue not beene many Caesars in the world But yet away with Caesar a way with Titus they were but durt and filth when they were at the best and now like damned spirits their soules are cursing God in hell And what Titus or Caesar dares shew himselfe when once there is question of grace and wisedome in presence
saith that vpon the very first (p) The soueraigne power which the aspect of Christ our Lord had ouer creatures aspect it was able to draw all such as lookt vpon it For if there be such vertue in a lodestone or a peece of amber as that it can draw to it rings of iron and straw how much more easely saith this Saint could the Lord of all the creatures draw to himselfe whom he was pleased to call So delighfull therfore and soe plentifull was this beauty and dignity of our Lord IESVS And if it appeared powerfull in their eyes at the first when they beheld it but by startes and glances much (q) The felicity of thē who might behold the person of Christ our Lord at pleasur Bernard serm 20. in Cant. more would it doe so afterward in the sight of his Apostles Disciples who had liberty and commodity to feed their senses at large vpon that sacred obiect In contemplation of this beauty in great part it was that they gaue themselues away to him without resuming themselues any more husbands forsaking theyr wiues and children their parents rich men their whole estates poore men the very instruments of their profession that they might haue the honour happines to follow him And to such excesse they grew therin that they did not endure Matth. 16. to heare so much as any speach euen of the Passion it selfe of our Lord though by it their redemption were to be wrought For till the Holy Ghost was sent to inhabite their soules after his Ascension they could (r) The vnspeakeable gust which the Apostles had to be euer looking vpō Christ our Lord. not content themselues to weane the outward man from the gust and ioy of looking on him But though our Lord were pleased to nourish their faith and withall to teach them how to find him reigning in their hartes by with drawing his corporall presence frō their eyes yet that loue was iust and due which they bore to him whome God had giuen to be Incarnate for a spouse to the Church and to all elected soules so to draw their hartes more powerfully by that sacred sight of his person then formerly they had beene withdrawne by vnlawfull pleasures Nay euen great part of our felicity in heauen is to consist in our behoulding the most sweete presence of the humanity of our blessed Sauiour and to enioy his embracemēts and yet the forme of his diuine face shall be the very same which in this life it was For (s) The figure of the persō of our Lord Iesus was so excellent as that neither doth glory now make it other thē it was neither did passibility mortality disgrace it Matth. 17.3 part q. 45. art 1. ad 1. so we find that after his Resurrection he continued to be knovvne by his former countenance and so he was also before that in his Transiguration as S. Hierome notes S. Thomas teacheth That his forme was not changed into another but onely that there was an addition of such splendour as belonged to a glorified body As on the other side the Passibility and Mortality which for our good he would haue it subiect to did no way depriue it both of perfect most powerfull beauty How this infinite God and super excellent Man our Lord Iesus Christ did with incomparable loue cast his eye of mercy vpon mankind CHAP. 8. VVE haue now beheld with the eye of our Consideration being illuminated by the light of Faith the incomparable excellēcy of the person of Christ our Lord and Sauiour consisting of his Diuinity as God and of his most holy soule and most beautifull and pretious flesh and bloud as Man And now this eternall God this second person of the euer Blessed Trinity the consubstantiall sonne of the eternall Father Colos 2. In whome the treasures of knowledge and wisedome were laid vp and in whome and by whome Ioan. 1. for whome were created all things and without him was made nothing that was made This God I say with being all that I haue already expressed being infinitely more then we know yea and more then we can explicitely beleeue did not onely cast the eye of his compassion vpon the misery of man but he resolued to reach out his helping hād towards the redresse therof He had created the world and made this man the Lord of it and (a) The indowments of Adam at his first creation indued him in the person of Adam with many precious guifts wherof some were supernaturall as Originall Iustice Grace and a kind of Immortallity with many others and some were incident as Connaturall to that condition wherof he was made namely an Vnderstanding freewill wherwith he was to know and loue Apoc. 2. first last the Creatour and Center of vs all A precept of Obedience was giuen to this forefather of ours to abstaine from tasting of the forbidden fruite which he contemning vpon his wiues pernicious counsell did (b) Vpon the first sinne of Adam his supernaturall guifts were destroyed his naturall guyfts decayed forfaite out right those supernaturall guiftes and deserued that those others which were but naturall should be so wounded and weakned as vve find them to be by sad experience This trying of conclusions cost him deere for instantly the vvhole state of his house vvas changed and his Passions vvhich vvere meant to be but inferiour officers became the Lords of that Reason vvhich vvas appointed to gouerne both them and him Novv then it is no meruaile if vvhen this vvas done he played the vnthrift and laid so many debtes and rent-charges vpon his land that in some sense a man may say The profits do scarce quitt the cost For (c) How soone the roote of sinne did beare aboundāce of bitter fruyte hence grevv that pride that enuy and malice vvhich being rooted in the hart did fructify so shortly after in the hand of the accursed Cain and in a vvord that consummation of all impiety grevv from thence vvhich did prouoke and dravv vvith a kind of violence a resolution from Almighty God to drovvne the vvhole vvorld except eight persons But euē those fevv vvere inough to make the rest of mankind the heires of their corrupted nature And so vve see vvhat a vvorld vve haue of this vvherin vve liue What a coyle doth this (d) The disorder of the Irascible Concupiscible is the ground out of which almost all our sinnes do grow Irascible and Concupiscible keepe in our bodies and soules vvhen either vve desire that for our selues through an inordinate loue of our selues vvhich lookes vpon vs vvith a face of ioy or pleasure or vvhen we vvould inflict matter of greefe or paine vpon others through an inordinate auersion from them The very schooles of sinne haue beene sett open in the vvorld and revvards haue bene propounded for such as haue excelled therin The Prouinces of the earth haue often
(c) The meanes of our Redemption was a more noble benesitt then the very Redemptiō it selfe meanes then by the guift of his owne only sonne as hath been said Though yet he might sufficiently haue done it either by the creating of some nevv man or by employing of Angells for that purpose or in fine by any one of so many millions of meanes as to his wisedome would neuer haue bene wanting if he had not bene pointed out to this by his loue to vs which did so abound But his Incarnation was the meanes wherby he would vouchsafe to accomplish the worke of our Redemption which may well be called a mystery as indeed it is for the many and diuine deepe secrets which are locked vp therin For by this the Pride of mā which sticks incomparably more close to his soule in our corrupted nature then any skinne doth to a body hath been shewed the way by an oueruling kind of reason how it might learne to (d) The Incarnation of Christ our Lord doth first reade vs a lesson of Humility and then of Glory become h̄ble By this the basenes of man was also taught how to clyme vp so farre as to grow to be a kind of God by a diminution as it were of the diuinity and an infusion and laying it as one may say to steep in the humility of the humanity of Christ our Lord that so by meanes of Grace we might swallow and sucke it vp as an infant would doe his nurses milke Hearken how diuinely S. Augustine doth expresse the altitude of Gods mercy and wisedome in particular and if euer you will admire the height and sanctity of that great man of God it may be now I (e) Obserue pōder the diuine discourse of this great Saynt D. Aug. Confes l. 7 cap. 18. was saith he in search of a way how to gett some strength which might be fit for the enioying of thee o God but I could meete with none till I imbraced the mediatour betwene God and man Christ Iesus who is also God aboue all things blessed for all eternities And who calleth vs and saith I am the way the truth and the lise And who is the food which yet I wanted strength to disgest till he mingled himselfe with our flesh that so thy (1) The second person of the B. Trinity wisdome by which thou didst create all things might frame it selse into the nature of (2) By his Humanity he did accommodate himself to our Capacity milke wherof we might sucke in this infancy of ours But I not being humble could not apprehend my Lord Iesus Christ who was so very humble Nor yet did I vnderstand what he meant to make vs learne (3) He meant to teach vs Humility thereby by that infirmity of his For thy (4) The sonne of God word which is the eternall truth being so highly exalted aboue the highest of thy Creatures doth rayse them vp vnto it selfe (5) The good Angells who were confirmed in grace for their humility who were obedient subiect to it And heere below among thy (6) The race of Adam inferiour creatures it built for it selfe (7) The precious body of Christ our Lord. a poore house of the same clay wherof we were made By (8) Humanity of Christ our Lord. which they were to be depressed frō their high concert of themselues (9) No mā who is not humble can be a true mēber of Christ our Lord. who would become subiect thervnto and so it might sucke draw them vnto it curing the tumour of their Pride and nourishing their loue (10) Christ our Lord became Incarnate to destroy our Pride To the end that they might not goe further on in vanity through any confidence in themselues but might rather acknowledge their owne infirmity when they should see the Diuinity it selfe lying as it were (11) By the participation of our fraile nature infirme before their feete by being content to weare the garment of our slesh and bloud And (12) Our Lord disdaines vs not though we come not to him till we be weary of the tyranny of sinne so being weary they might deiect and prostrate themselues vpon this (13) The way of ascending by the diuinity of Christ our Lord is first to prostrate our selues vpon his humanity humanity of Christ our Lord and it ascending vp might rayse them also vp together with it To such excesse grew the loue of Christ our Lord to vs degrading himselfe that he might exalt vs afflicting himselfe that he might ease vs and imptying himselfe of hiselfe that he might make vs full of him which first was made apparant euen to these eyes thē selues of our flesh and blood by the admirarable mystery of his Natiuity Of the immense Loue of Christ our Lord expressed to Man in his holy Natiuity CHAP. 11. VVE haue no reason to find it strāge that our Lord should be more taken by the circumstances of that seruice which he expecteth and exacteth of vs thē by the very seruice it selfe The whole world is his and he needs not any thing which we can giue He (a) The reason why God is more pleased with the manner and mind wherwith we do him any seruice then with the thing it selfe is the plenitude of all things and can receaue no substantiall increase at all but he is only capable of honour and glory at our hands and that doth only accrew to him on our part by the affection wherwith it is procured by vs. Now this truth of his regarding more the minde manner wherwith and wherin things are done then the very things themselues is declared to vs many wayes but (b) Our Lord did practise that in his owne person which he expecteth of vs. especially by the soueraigne example it selfe of Christ our Lord. For as if his pleasure to redeeme vs from the torments of hell and the slauery of sinne had been nothing as if his Incarnation which was an ineffable descent for the Diuinity to make had bene no great matter he letts vs further see by the manner of it what a meaning he had to binde vs yet faster to him by the chaynes of loue It would haue cost him nothing since he would needs become man for vs to haue vested his soule with the body of a perfect man all at once and as fully complete in all the functions and actions therof as afterward his owne sacred body was At ease he might also since there was no remedy but that he would needs become a Creature haue taken so much of the greatnes of the world to himselfe as would haue made him incomparably more glorious more triumphāt and more abundantly happy by a floud of temporall felicity then Salomon and all the Caesars did enioy But not the substance of our Redemptiō not the substance of his owne Incarnation could satisfy and quench the ardent desire which reigned in
restrayning it according to those conditions to which then he vouchsafed to let himselfe be subiect But howsoeuer he vvas no sooner deliuered from thence theÌ„ the poore (c) How our Lord as soone as he was borne did intertaine those poore she pheardes with a Quire of Angells Sheephards were wooed by him to receaue the token of his impatient and incomparable loue And according to that infinite finite wisedome which became his God head which is woÌ„t to gouerne inferiour Creatures by such as are superiour to them as also because he would both call and free those poore men at once from errour he disdayned not to sollicit them by a quire of Angells that the glory of so supernaturall and sublime a visioÌ„ might auert them from all that vvant of faith vvhich his poore appearance might easily haue inclined them to Those Angells proclaymed did appropriate as it vvere (d) All glory is due to God All glory to God vvhich vvas so highly and truly due to him per excellentiam for the admirable humility and charity vvhich vvas expressed by him in this act vvithall they published and applyed all good and peace to men But yet to men not so farre forth as they might only chance to be mighty or witty or noble or wealthy or learned And much lesse to such as should be giuen to repine or who should be so abounding and regorging with sensuall pleasures all which are the sadd effects of selfe loue and very contrary to the loue of our Lord Iesus in whome alone originally true peace is found but only it was bequeathed to men of a good will The (e) The condition of a will which is truly good property of which true good wil is to put euery thing in his due place And what place can deserue that the loue of our hartes should be lodged in it by vs but that deuine person of our only Lord and Sauiour Iesus Christ Who in this little space of one night hath knit vp such a world of testimonies of his deere loue to vs and who did cast himselfe downe from the top of glory to the bottome of misery that so he might carry vs vp to the place from whence himselfe was come And who though he were not only the true owner but the sole Creatour of the whole world and who created it no otherwise then by filling it with his very selfe was yet content to see his owne sacred humanity so depriued turned out of all as that no place should be emptye for the receauing of him Quia non â—rat ei locus in diuersorio but only such a one as might seeme rather to haue bene taken from beasts then giuen by men These (f) How rich those poore shepheards were mada at an instant Sheepheards indeed were of that good will which was so commended by the Angells and as such they carried not only peace from that sight of Christ our Lord and his blessed mother but ioy also And that no ordinary but an excessiue ioy which is another guift of the holy Ghost and a meere and mighty effect of his diuine loue To the participation wherof together with a most entire thanksgiuing the holy Catholike Church inuiteth all her faithfull Children in these most glorious and magnificent words vpon the day of this great Festiuity The Preface of the Masse vpon Christmasse day in the Preface of the most holy Sacrifice of the Masse Verè dignum instum est aequum salutare nos tibi semper vbique gratias agere Domine sancte pater Omnipotens aeterne deus Quia per incarnati verbi mysterium noua mentis nostrae oculis lux tuae clariatis infulsit vt dum visibiliter Deum cognoscimus per hunc in inuisibilium amorem rapiamur Et ideo cum Angelis Archangelis cum Thronis Dominationibus cumqueue omni miliâ—ia caelestis exercitus hymnum gloriae tuae canimus sine siue dicentes Sanctus Sanctus Sanctus Dominus Deus Sabaoth Pleni sunt caeli terra gloria tua Hosanna in excelsis Benedictus qui venit in nomine Dommi Hosanna in excelsis It is reason that we giue thee eternall thankes O holy Lord O omniporent Father and eternall God in regard that by the mistery of the Incarnate Word a new light of thy splendour hath cleered vp the eyes of our minde That so whilst we are growne to know God after a visible manner we may be vehemently carried vp to the loue of inuisible things And therfore together with the Angells and Archangells with the Thrones and Dominations with all those Squadrons of that Celestiall Army we sing out this Himne of glory saying to thee without end Holy Holy Holy Lord God of Saboath the heaueÌ„s earth are ful of thy glory HosaÌ„ana in the highest Blessed be he who cometh in the name of our Lord Hosanna in the highest Thus I say doth our holy mother the Church exhort vs to reioyce and giue thankes to God for his great mercy in this diuine mistery and he is no true sonne of that mother who will not hearken to her voyce Of the vnspeakeable loue which our Lord Iesus expressed to vs in his Circumcision CHAP. 13. Luc. 2. BVT as for the loue which our Lord did shew to those poore Sheephards some ignorant carnall person may chaunce to say or at least to thinke That it did not cost him much Let such a one therfore looke vpon his painefull and shamefull Circumcision Paynefull and shamefull to him but of vnspeakeable loue and benefit to vs. And first for as much as concernes the paine it deserues to be considered that the soule and body of Christ of our Lord had another manner of vnderstanding (a) The soule and body of our B. Lord were more sensible of shame and payne theÌ„ any other and delicate feeling then any other Creature hath euer bene acquainted with Exod. 4. Num. 5. D. Aug. lib. 2. de gratia Christ cap. 31. Which circumstance I will not heere dilate because when afterward I shall haue reason to speak of his sacred passion the occasion will be fayrely offered But the paine must needs be excessiue to haue a part of the body so cut of by a violent hand and that not with a kinfe or any such sharpe instrument which would haue brought it to a speedy end but according to the custome with a stone which was ground into a blunt kind of edge and which must needs prolonge the torment of the patient Yet (b) Dishonour to a noble hart is far more insufferable then payne paine how great soeuer is but a toy to a generous minde in respect of reproach and shame And amongst all degrees of shame that is farre the greatest which implyeth the party to haue deserued it and that in the deepest kind Now as when there is question of pride the affectation and desire to haue a fame of sanctity is farre superiour
Apostle saith He who is circumcised is bound therby to fulfill the Law And lastly Gal. 5. when he who was the eternal spring the ouerflowing riuer and the bottomlesse sea of all sanctity would be contented for our good for the drawing vs by his example to loue paine and shame to be accounted by men for a creature as odious and abhominable in the sight of God as all sinners are But he thought not all this too much so that he might free vs from the curse of that law to which he would be subiect Aduising and enabling vs heerby to Circumcise (l) The corporall Circumcision of Christ our Lord must teach vs how to circumcise our affections the inordinate affections of our harts which are as so many veynes wherby the bloud of lise is drawne from that true loue which is only due to such a Lord as this who is all made of loue Now because this miserable race of men would not fully correspond with that incomparable Charity of Christ our Lord it was so much the more agreable to the iustice of God the Father to acknowledge and revvard this vnspeakable humility of his sonne And therfore then it vvas that he stampt vpō him the name of Iesus Luc. 2. Phillip 2. to which the knees of all Creatures should be obliged to bow Celestiall vvhose charity he had surpassed terrestriall vvhose life he had instructed and Infernall vvhose pride he had confounded And heerby vve further see hovv infinitely are vve bound to this Lord for this strange loue of his vvho vvhen there should be question of taking such aname as might be proper to him laid all such names aside as might expresse the Maiesty of himselfe and made only choyce of that name of Iesus vvhich might declare his Soueraigne mercy to vs. The Names vvhich grovve from God are farre vnlike to those which are imposed by men for these latter are meere extrinsecall denominations and the former are a most exact abridgement and mappe of those Conditions which grow within So that together vvith this name our Lord Iesus vvas sublimed to the office and dignity of a perfect Sauiour of mankind Not (m) What an yowor thy and weake Sauiour Christ our Lord is made by the Sectaries such a Sauiour as the Sectaries of our age are miserably vvont to make him vvho conceaue him to haue only saued our soules from Hell vvhich is but a punishment of sinne as vvas sayd before and vvhich punishment hovv great soeuer it be is incomparably of lesse deformity and true misery and vvere farre rather to be accepted and chosen then the least sinne it selfe vvhich can be committed but such a one as doth chiefly saue our soules from the guylt of sinne and that by sanctifiyng vs indeed vvith his inherent grace and not by a kind of Iustice vvhich only is imputed to vs vvhilst the vvhyle indeed it is none of ours Through the vvāt vvherof the leaprousy of our soules should not be cleansed and cured but only they should be couered and clad as those deceauedmen conceaue with the robe of his innocency Our Lord giue them light to see and knovv hovv deeply dangerously they deceaue themselues and dishonour him vnder the pretence of piety and peruerse and counterfaite humility vvhilst they make him but such a Sauiour as this Audi Piliacap 88. This errour as Doctour Auila saith proceedeth from the want of knowing the loue which Iesus Christ doth beare to such as are in the state of grace whome his bowells of mercy would not permit that whilst himselfe was iust full of all good things he should say to such as he instifyed Content your selues with this That I abound with these good things and esteeme them for your owne in regard that they are in me although in your selues you remaine vniust impure and naked There is no head which would hold such language as this to his liuing members nor one spouse to another if he should deerly loue her And much lesse will that Celestiall spouse say so who is giuen for a patterne to the spouses of this world that so after his resemblance they may treate and loue their fellow spouses You mensaith S. Paule loue your wiues as Christ loued his Church who gaue himselfe ouer for it to sanctify it and to clense it by baptisme and by the word of life If then he sanctify and wash and clense it and that with his owne bloud which is the thing that giueth power to the Sacramēts to cleanse soules by his grace which they impart how can that soule remaine vniust and silthy which is washed and cleansed by a thing which is of so extreme efficacy And in conformity of that which was affirmed before the same Doctour Auila doth also cleerly shew afterward that such opinions as that do no way serue (n) The doctrine of imputatiue Iustice is expresly impugned by holy scripture and doth impeach the honour of Christ our Lord. either towards the verifying of the Scriptures or for the doing of Iesus Christ sufficient honour For since the payne sayth he which is due to sinne is a lesse euill to any man then the guilt of the same sinne and the iniustice and deformity which is caused therby it cannot be said that Christ our Lord doth saue his people from their sinnes if by his merits he only obtaine that they may not be imputed to them for their punishment vnlesse first he should take the guilt away by the guift of grace Nor yet that he obtayneth purity and piety for men vnlesse by detesting sinne they may keepe the law of God This is the iugdement of Doctour Auila We (o) The catholik Doctrine concerning this poynt therfore according to that truth which is reuealed by Almighty God and propounded to vs to be beleeued by the holy Catholike Church his imaculate Spouse doe cōfesse to the ioy and triumph of our hartes with irreuocable vowes of the highest gratitude that we can conceaue for such an infinite benefit not only that he is the Sauiour of vs from hell which is but as an effect but from sinne also it selfe which is the iust cause therof And not only so but that he saues vs further also from the want of all those helpes graces of the holy Ghost which are conueniēt vt sine timore Luc. 1. de manibus inimicorum nostrorum liberati seruiamus illi in sanctitate institia coram ipso omnibus diebus vitae nostrae That being deliuered from the hands of our enemyes we may serue him without feare in holynes iustice before him all the dayes of our life At the end of which dayes we shall be admitted to see a day in heauen which hath no end and which admits no cloud This I say is to be the precious fruyte of this morning sacrifice of his Circumcision to put vs into a state which can admit no euening For as S. Augustine sayth dies
septimus sine vesper a est nec habet occasum quia sanctificasti eum ad permansionem sempiternam That seauenth day of thine Conf. lib 13. cap. vlt. O God is without any euening nor doth that sunne euer set because thou hast sanctisied it to an eternall continuance This is that infinite benefit which is to be imparted to vs by this blessed Lord of ours and the meanes to conuey it is the office of his being our Sauiour which is declared in this Circumcision by his holy name of Iesus and wherof the next Chapter will tell vs more Of the name of Iesus the incomparable loue which our Lord doth shew to vs by that name CHAP. 14. FOR as much as there is no Name which can go neer to expresse the nature of God the holy (a) The reason of giuing so many seuerall names to God as God Scripture to make some kind of signification of the infinite Beinge the other infinite petfections of his diuinity of the benefits which he besto wes vpon vs doth giue him many attributes and many names which may in some small measure declare the effects of his diuine perfections the Offices which he performeth towards his Creatures as namely to be Almighty of infinite wisedome of infinite goodnes of infinite mercy of Creatour of Conseruour of Gouernour of Father of the beginning and end of all things and the like In the selfe same manner (b) The reason also of giuing so many seuerall names to Christ our Lord. to expresse that immense sea of perfections and graces which the whole blessed Trinity did impart to Christ our Lord as man that is to say to that most sacred humanity vnited to the person of the sonne of God the eternall word those incomparable and innumerable guifts and benefits which he communicated to vs by meanes therof the same holy Scripture doth giue him also many seuerall Names and Titles as of King of Priest of Pastour of Doctour of Law-giuer of Spouse of Mediatour of Aduocate of Redeemer of Sauâ—our diuers others wherby he may the better be conceaued since he cannot be sufficiently declared by any one Of all these names of al the rest which may be raunged and reduced to these there is none so excellent nor which doth so include the rest as doth the superexcellent name of Iesus which declareth our Losd to be the Sauiour of the world S. Bern. serm 2. de Circum Dom. serm 15. sup Can. This was that Name which the holy S. Bernard could by noe meanes be made coÌ„tent to want amoÌ„gst so many other most honorable appellations as the Euangelicall Prophet Esay applyed to him This Prophet being full of ioy vpon the fore seing of our Redeemer doth expresse himselfe thus as S. Bernard noteth Puer natus est nobis filius natus est nobis c. A child is borneto vs A sonne is giuen to vs his principality is placed vpon his shoulder his name is called Admirable CoÌ„scllour The stroÌ„ge God The Father of the future age The Prince of Peace Great saith S. Bernard are these names but where is (c) The name of Iesus is the most comfortable of al the names of Christ our Lord. that name which is aboue all names that name of Iesus in which euery knee shall bow The freinds and fauourites of Christ our Lord haue walked in a very different way froÌ„ that wherin such persons of our tymes as are disaffected to this sacred Name wil needs imploy theÌ„selues We see how that both Cherubim Seraphim of flesh bloud the beloued disciple of our Lord Iesus his Apostle and Euangelist S. Iohn who sucked in such a bundance from the diuine fountaine of that brest to which he vsed to lay his mouth did paint out no other word so often as that holy and diuine name of Iesus S. Paul (d) The great Deuotion of S. Paul to the Holy name of Iesus that full vessell of election being reprehended in that high vision of our B. Sauiour though in a most amourous and tender manner for persecuting him in the persoÌ„ of the ChristiaÌ„ Church was told by our Lord himselfe that he persecuted he saith not God nor Christ nor the Lord though he were all that but only Iesus And afterward he sayd moreouer to Ananias that this was the Name which Paule as a vessell of election was to carry ouer the earth among Gentiles and Kinges And so as I was saying it is admirable to consider how he was all taken with an vnspeakable delight to be euer in repetition of that sacred name in all his Epistles See also how the incomparable S. Augustine doth in his Confessions to our Lord relate that he was vehemently delighted in the reading of certaine bookes of Philosophy lib. 3. c. 4. which pointed him out to the search of wisedome But yet saith he in that so great delight this only cooled me tooke me off that I found not the name of thy Christ therin For this name O Lord through thy mercy this name of my (e) The name of Christ our Lord which S. Augustine had so greedily sucked vp in his infancy was the name of Sauyour of Iesus note how this Saynt esteemes the guift of deuotion to this holy name as a particular mercy Bern. ser 15. in Cant. Sauiour thy Some my yong and tender hart had euen in the very milke of my mother dronke vp deuoutly and carefully retayned and if any discourse whatsoeuer though neuer so learned so elegant and so true had wanted this name it did not carry me away entierely The same discourse concerning the holy Name of Iesus is further prosecuted CHAP. 15. THE day had need be long wherin I would pretend to make particular mention of the incredible deuotion and tender affection which the Saintes and holy seruants of God haue carried to this blessed name of Iesus S. Bernard whom I mentioned before shal therfore serue this turne insteed of many whose fifteenth Sermon vpon the Canticle I beseech my Reader euen in the name of Iesus that he will procure to read For there he may see how in this holy name it is that we meete with the remoue of al our cares He applyes to it that clause of the Canticles Oleum essusum nomen tuum Thy name (a) Note and loue this sweet contemplation of of S. Bernard vpoÌ„ the holy name of Iesus saith he is a pretious Oyle powred forth O blessed name O oyle which euery where is powred forth How farre froÌ„ heauen into Indea and from thence it runs ouer the whole earth We may well say it is powred forth since it hath not only distilled abundantly both in heauen and earth but it hath sprinkled euen them who are below the earth This Christ this Iesus being insused to the Angells and essused or powred out vpon men and those men who were growne rotten like beasts in their
of God for the perpetuating of the memory of so great a benefit Though yet no oblation was able to make that infinite Maiesty of the eternall God a Sauer for his hauing deliuered them by the death of the first borne of their enemies till he was pleased that his only sonne should come and offer himselfe in flesh and bloud for theyr deliuerance Coloss 1. he who was the first begotten of all Creatures and who performed that in deed and truth which all other oblations and Sacrifices did but only as figures in respect of him Now this Act of the Presentation of our Lord Iesus was made by our B. Lady Or rather he offered himselfe in those sacred and most pure hands of hers which he enabled for that excellent purpose with vnspeakeable and most ardent loue And as hereafter we shall see that he chiefely made oblation of himselfe in his sacred passion by way of propitiation for our sinnes and impetration of grace So the Presentation seems to carry a particular respect to worke by way of thanksgiuing for all the benefits which that open hand of God was by moments rayning downe vpon the Creatures And to the end that the goodnes of this Lord of ours may not be cast away vpō vs it will be necessary both now and very often heerafter to cast a carefull and well considering eye vpon the former (*) Cap. 2. discourse wherin we obserued the vnlimited knowledg of that diuine soule of Christ our Lord and wherby it is euident that all things concerning the Creatures for whome he would vouchsafe to be offered whether they were past or to come were as present to him as the very instant of tyme wherin then he liued In so much as there was not nor euer could be imparted the least benefit to mankind by Almighty God which was not present to his incomprehensible but all-comprehēding mind and for which our Lord Iesus did not offer himselfe then by way of thankes with most particular loue So that now we see our Lord surrendred vp into the hands of his eternall Father as if the world after a sort vvere dispossessed of him But so full of Charity vvas that Father as to ordayne the sonne to be sould backe againe (b) What soeuer is giuen to God is giuen vs backe againe with aduantage for the imparting of all those diuine sauours vvhich appeare to haue bene done to vs by him in the vvhole progresse of his holy life and death And vvheras he exercised vvith a perpetuity of burning loue those offices of a Lawgiuer a Maister a Father a Freind a Spouse and lastly of an omnipotēt Redeemer by his fiue sacred vvounds in this mistery vve find him to haue bene recouered and brought backe to vs vvith the payment of fiue Sicles vvhich according to the most probable opinion of computation doe not exceed tvvo shillings O omnipotent loue of our Lord IESVS who so would giue himselfe to vs as that indeed he choose rather not to giue himself but rather to innoble vs so farre as to enable vs to giue him somewhat for himselfe though the price fell infinitely short of the thing which was to be redeemed A price it was which fell short euen of being able to buy a very slaue and what proportion then could it carry with purchasing a God and King of glory sauing that his loue did make vp the rest His loue which was as pretious as God himselfe for God is loue and he being man is also God and so he was not only willing but euen able to pay as much as God was able to exact But we the while besides the contemplation of our owne obligation may doe wel to consider that course of prouidence loue which from the beginning of the world hath bene held with man in addressing him to an expectation and firme beleefe and loue of this diuine Redeemer Euen in the law of nature all was full of figures sacrifices were also offred then and (c) There is no truth of Religion where there is no visible Sacrifice wheresoeuer there is no visible Sacrifice there neither is nor cā there be any true Religion nor true worship of God and the mindes of many were indued with light according to the exigency of their state which ledd their inward eyes towards this marke In the tymes of the written Law another curtaine as a man may say was drawne and the faith of men grew more explicite then the Maiesty of the Church was increased the figures were both more and more significant and more euident and there was store of Prophets who expresly foretold the qualities of the Messias to come But now that he was indeed arriued no tyme was lost such loue as that could not be slacke and we haue seene how instantly the Sheepheards and in their persons such others as were neere at hand were inuited to that feast of ioy by the call of Angells After that the Magi and in their persons all the Gentills though neuer so farre off either in respect of tyme or place were drawne vnder the conduct of a Starre And now that such as were most particularly deputed for Gods seruice might be farre from not knowing their redeemer behould how he (d) Our Lord was declared by Saint Simeon to be come for the saluation both of Iewes and Gentils declares himselfe in the Temple to all the world by the mouth of holy Simeon Anna to be the Sauiour therof to be the glory of the Iewes and the light of the Gentills That so there might be none who should not tast of that fountaine of loue which was distilling into al those hartes which would receaue it It came not doubtles downe by drops into that of Simeon For instantly vpon the taking of that celestiall infant who was the Lord of life into his dying armes he fell into an extasis of ioy withall into a diuine deepe wearines of the world and was so deadly wounded by the loue of our Lord that he could not endure to looke vpon him but vpon the price of being willing to liue no longer How in the flight which our Lord Iesus made to Egypt he discouered his vnspeakeable Loue to man CHAP. 18. OVR Lord Iesus was no sooner brought backe into the power and designed to the vse of men but he was disposing himselfe by this incessant Charity to doe and suffer strange things for them For what stranger thing could there be then that he who created the whole world and who carries conducts it all by the word of his power in whose sight the Angells tremble the gates of heauen doe shiuer and in (a) What a poore Nothing the whole world is in comparison of God Matt. 2. comparison of whome all creatures are not so much as one poore single naked desolate grayne of dust that he I say should be content for loue of vs to feare and fly from such a thing as
Herod was That thing which once vvas Nothing and now was growne to be so hideously worse then Nothing as it is incomparably worse to be an enemy and persecutour of Christ our Lord then not to be at all But imediatly after the Presentation in the Temple our Lord Iesus was carryed to Nazareth a place remote almost fourescore myles And (b) The occasions of Herods feare Matt. 2. Luc. 2. the noyse of his Natiuity and of the Starre which ledd the Magi and of the Presentation in the Temple together with the prophesies of the King of the Iewes to be borne at Bethleem gaue Herod an all-arme of extreme feare least he who indeed was come to giue vs the kingdome of heauen had meant to rob men of earthly kingdomes But what sayth S. Augustine will his tribunall Ser. 30. de Tempore when he shall sitt as iudge be able to doe now that his Infaurs cradle is able so to fright proud Kings How much better shall those kings doe who seeke not to kill Christ like Herod but rather desire to adore him as the Magi did Him I say who at the hands of his enemies and for his very enemies did endure that death which now his enemies designed him to who being killed afterward did kill that very death in his owne body Leâ— (c) The duty of King sto this King of Kinges Kings carry a pious feare towards him who is sitting at the right hand of his Father whome this impious king did so feare whilst he was sucking at the breast of his mother This cruelty of his did extend so farre as to commaund the death of all the Infants within two yeares of age in Bethleem and all the places neere adjoyning who are esteemed as appears by Ecclesiasticall history to haue arriued to the number of about (*) Vide Salmeron Tom. 3. Tract 44. foureteene thousand That so he might be sure at least as he conceaued to make our Lord away who had not then in likelyhood the age of so many monthes But because some Children are more forvvard in grovvth then others and some errour might chaunce to arriue by the mistaking of age vvithin a little compasse he thought it vvas lesse ill to murther thousands more then needed then to aduenture the escape of that one vvho yet came voluntaryly to dye euen that the tyrant himselfe might not perish So different are the designes of God and man so different are their desires And the successe is also so very different as that the diuine Maiesty doth take sometymes the (d) God draweth good out of euill peruerse will of man yet without hauing any part in the peruersenes therof for the execution of his iust decrees yea not only such of them as are founded in iustice but euen in mercy also It would seeme to some who iudge of God by the lawes which they vse to prescribe for themselues that it had beene much more agreable to the greatnes of such a God as we describe not to haue permitted that such a Tyrant should liue to commit so vast a cryme as this How easely could our Lord with the least breath of his mouth Deutr. 4. which is a consuming fire haue blowne downe that painted wall how little would it haue cost him to haue strocken Herod lame or blind or mad or dead or to haue damned him to hell for all eternity and at an instant How soone could he haue sent that infamous Rebellious little worme who presumed after a sort to spit in the face of that high Maiesty into the bottomelesse pit of Nothing from whence with mercy he had beene drawne It might haue bene instantly and most easely done But the wisedome of God tooke pleasure to drawe great good out of great euill and his loue was that which did set his wisedome so on worke For (e) The wise mercy of God by this permission of his and by the publishing of Herods cruelty the notice of the mistery of his owne Natiuity was much inereased that so his loue to the soules of men might be declared And besides if tyrants were not permitted on earth there would be no Martyrs in heauen as S. Augustine saith And if this tyrant had then beene strocken by some suddayne death the mercy of God might haue seemed lesse wheras now by forbearance euen Herod also had tyme of penance though his Malice were such as that it made no vse therof And * The happines of the Innocents and their mothers against their owne the Tyrants will as for the happy Innocents who were murthered by that Tyrant vpon the occasion of Christ our Lord it is plaine that the world which would deplore their misery yea and their afflicted mothers who did also lament their owne infelicity were farre from iudging as they ought For how much better was it for those mothers to be created mothers of so many Martyrs who instantly went to a seat of rest and presently after the Resurrection of Christ our Lord were placed as a garland vpon his owne sacred head and carryed into an eternity of glory for hauing bene murthered in despight and for the hate of him then to haue contynued as they were but the mothers of Children like the rest Who if they had runne on in their owne naturall course they might perhaps haue ended it with the losse of their soules wheras novv they vvere not only saued but vvhich is more it vvas done vvithout their hauing euer so much as once offended God and so they vvere made the very flovver and first fruits of martyrs So that the loue of our Lord vvas exercised heerin vpon them all And (f) The loue of our Lord Iesus entreth euery where and vpon all occasions vvhere may vve not looke for this loue And vvhat place can be found vvhich is voyd therof since euen in the poysned Cuppe of the Tyrants hate the pretious liquor of his diuine loue did svvym so high as to fill the same To himselfe he tooke the most sad and painefull and shamefull part The compassion vvhich he had of the holy Innocents paine and death I meane of that little which they felt of paine in that passage for his sake vvas a kind of infinite thing That of the mothers vvas extreme for the sacred Text discribes them by vvay of Prophecy to haue bene so profoundly afflicted Ierem. 31. Matt. 2. as that not only they could not but euen they would not receaue comfort But as the loue of the tendrest mother to the only infant of her vvombe may go euen for hatred if it be compared to those vnspeakable ardours of affection vvhervvith the hart of our Lord doth euer flame tovvards all the Creatures for vvhome he dyed Esay 49. for although a mother should forget her sonne yet can not I forget you saith our Lord so may their griefe hovv great soeuer be termed a kind of ioy in respect of his Theirs grovving our of selfe loue
vvould faine haue hindred their childreÌ„s death but his grovving out of pure and perfect loue out of a thirst of their instant and eternall good he permitted it to his ovvne bitter griefe And by (g) A stroÌ„g comfort to such as are persecuted for the cause of Christ our Lord. the selfe same measure vve may also discerne the same loue vvhich by our Lord is borne to all the rest of his seruants vvhome he suffereth to suffer for his truth and he deserueth to be adored vvith all our soules since he makes euen them vvho pretend meane to be our greatest enemies to be the chiefest instuments of our glory and good The great Loue of our Lord Iesus is further shewed in his flight to Egypt CHAP. 19. THIS act of so great loue vvas in the hart of our Lord Iesus but he contents not himselfe to loue vs only vvith his hart vnlesse vvithall he may put himselfe to further paine and shame And behould vvhen he vvas fast a sleepe in those deere armes of his all-imaculate and most holy mother and in house with that holy Patriarcke S. Ioseph an Angell appeared to that Saynt being also at that tyme a sleepe Requiring him to rise Matt. 2. and take the child and his mother and to fly into Egipt and there to remaine till he should be willed to returne because Herod would procure to destroy the child But where shall we find meanes wherewith to admire and adore this Lord of ours Who for the discouery of the infinitenes of his loue would vouchsafe so farre to ouer shadow the omnipotency of his power as that he being the Lord of Angells would be directed by an Angell a Obserue the strange humility charity patience of our Lord in this Mystery and being God himselfe would be disposed of by a man and being the seate and Center of all true repose would be raysed from his rest at midnight together with that heauenly Virgin to be sent flying from the face of an angry tyrant in so tender yeares into a Country so remote so incommodious so barbarous and so Idolatrous It was a iourney of (*) Three hundred English â—â—yles See Baradius Tom. 1. l. 10. cap. 8. twelue daies at the least for any stronge traueller could not be of lesse then thirty or forty for this little family which was forced to be fleeting thus from home This family which was compoÌ„ded of a man in yeares who loued to conuerse in the howse of his owne holy hart a most pure and most delicate virgin who was not wont to be shewing herselfe to strange places and persons and that excellent diuine infant who would permit himself to want as much assistaÌ„ce as that weake state could need which must needes increase the trouble both of them and him Their pouerty without all doubte was very great for though the Magi when they opened and offred of their treasures to him must be thought to haue left inough for the contynuall entertainement of such a company yet by a circumstance which may be considered heere it will be euident that they were growne poore againe For at the Prosentation of our Lord in the Temple wherof I haue already spoken but heer it will be fit to looke backe vpon it once agayne our B. Lady was and would be purified Not that she had need of being purisied she in comparison of whose high purity the most pure Seraphims of heauen are but drosse and dust but because our Lord her Sonne would be subiect to the imputation of sinne by Circumcision our B. Lady his mother would be thought subiect to the comon shame of mothers by purification To which heroicall act of contemning her selfe our Lord by his example had drawne her thereby withall did make vs knowe that it was not impossible for meere creatures by meanes of that grace (b) The omnipotency of Gods grace which is imparted to vs with so much loue to abandon and dispise our selues and not only to be content but euen delighted in being dispised by others Now at the Purification of al women an oblation was to be made by order of the law and a lambe was to be offred by the rich and a paire of Turtle doues or two yong Pigeons Leuit. 12. by the poore And (c) A demonstration to prooue what shift our B. Lady made to grow quickly poore agayne since this latter was the offring which the B. Virgin made it is cleere that through her charity to others her selfe would needs become poore againe She hauing such a stronge example of pouerty before her eyes as that God should make himselfe a naked child for the good of men and she not fayling to learne and lay vp the lesson of this vertue which was the first that was made to her by our B Lord. So that since they were persons so very poore and so vnfit for trauaile and to take a iourney of so great imcommodity and lengh without so much as an ynch of any ground of hope that after such or such a tyme expired they should returne was such a dish ful of difficultyes for them to feed vpon as could neuer haue been digested if it had not been dressed and sawced with the most ardent loue of our Lord lesus By this example of his he hath giuen vs stronge comfort in all those banishments distresses which we may be subiect to And it hath wrought so well with the seruants of God as that they haue triumphed with ioy for the happines of being able to suffer shame or sorrow for his sake But (d) The great change which was wrought in Egypt after the Presence of our Lord Iesus especially did it worke wonders in that rude and wicked Country of Egypt For he had no soeuer perfected the mistery of our redemption vpon the Crosse but through the odour of his sacred infancy that Prouince did early get a kind of start beyond all the others of the vvorld in breeding and nursing vp huge troopes of famous Marlyrs Anchorites Eremits and other holy Monks in the strongest Mortification and penance which hath beene knovvn in the Christian vvorld And novv let vs see vvho hath the face vvhervvith to deny or the hart vvhervvith to doubt the effects of the infinite loue vvhich our Lord did shevv by this flight of his into Egipt Where such a renouation of the invvard man vvas made as that insteed of dogs and catts and serpents and diuels vvhich vvith extraordinary diligence of superstition were vsually there adored beyond the other parts of the world so many Tryumphant Arches were erected there so shortely after in honour of Christ our Lord as there were high and happy soules who consecrated themselues to his seruice in a most pure and perfect manner with detestation of all those delights which flesh and bloud is wont to take pleasure in And they imbraced with the armes both of body and soule all those difficulties
publishing his Ghospell did expresse in his holy Baptisme and consequently to that Charity which cast him vpon the practise of this profound impenetrable humility For it was (a) Our Lord Iesus began all from Charity we must beginne all from Humility not in him as it is in vs who must beginne with acts of humility as with the foundation that so we may arriue to Charity afterward which is the consummation of a spirituall building But in him all moued at the very first from pure and perfect Charity which was as a kind of cause of his humility They want not good ground of reason who affirme that betwene the Birth and death of Christ our Lord he neuer performed an act of greater loue then in being thus Baptized For as the expression of true loue consisteth more in doing then in saying so consisteth it also much more in suffering then in doing And as the least sinne is more abhorred by a soule which is faithfull to God then the sensible toâ—ments euen of Hell it selfe So the dishonor for that soule to be thought sinfull which is not only pure but wholly impeccable as that of Christ our Lord and Sauiour was doth sarre outstrippe all other aspersion and infamy whatsoeuer as was also insinuated else where Yet (b) By how rugged waies our Lord Iesus was content to passe in his loue to vs. by these rugged wayes would he passe and vpon these bitter pills would he seed yea and he did it with vnspeakeable ioy for loue of vs. And not only had he bene content to be Circumcised which shewed as if he had bene obnoxious to Originall sinne but to declare that the his loue longer he liued amongst vs the more care he to vs. tooke to shew how he loued vs he now vouchsafed to be baptized which according to all apparence did betoken as if he had been subiect euen to actuall sinne To this let it be added that since Circumcision was ordayned by the law to which although he were not boÌ„d indeed yet was it thought that he was bound it might not only seeme fit but euen iust that he should be Circumcised both to doe honour to the law and to preuent all scandall of the people But for him to receiue the Baptisme of S. Iohn was no appointement of the law of God but a meere voluntary deuotion which might haue bene forborne without any sinne or the iust offence of any man And (c) It was a farre greater act of humility for our Lord to be baptized theÌ„ to be circumcised therfore as I was saying it was admirable humility performed out of vnspeakeable charity that for our example and benefit our Lord would fasten such a marke of actuall sinne vpon himselfe But the gratious eye of our Lord being lodged vpon the miseries of man and his hart beeing full of most ardent desire of our felicity he contemned himselfe and resolued to enter into the waters Luc. 7. And though S. Iohn being then the greatest among the sonnes of men did well know and with a most deiected faythfull hart acknowledge how farre he was from being worthy to baptize that true naturall Sonne of God yet so precise was the pleasure of Christ our Lord in this particular that the holy Baptist betooke himselfe to his obedience And our Lord vouchsafed to let him know and vs withall that perfect Iustice is not obserued where the heroycall acts of Humility and Charity are not performed S. Iohn had bene preaching the doctrine of pennance to the levves immediatly vvherupon they vvere baptized by him in Iordan Matt. 3. And the holy Scripture affirmes that Christ our Lord vvas baptized after them as resoluing belike to be the last of the company And vvithall it is very probable by the sacred Text Ibid. that he vvould also be present at the sermon of S. Iohn like a common Auditour and being the increated wisedome of God he vouchsafed to seeme as if he had needed to be taught by man What proclamations are these of his affection to vs and of direction how we are to proceed with others It being reason that we should blush euen to the bottome of our harts when we take our selues in the manner of striuing for precedence euen of our equalls whilst yet we see the SoÌ„ne of God place himselfe after all his inseriours And (d) Lay good hold on these lessons when we shall thinke much to resort for Sacraments other spirituall comforts to such as we conceaue to be any way of inferiour TaleÌ„ts to our selues Or els when we shal haue shame to frequent the remedies of sinne when heere we may behould the Sauiour of all our soules and the institutor of all the holy Sacraments through ardent charity assist at a sermon and receaue the water of Baptisme with profound humility from the tongue from the hand of a mortall man himselfe being the King and the God of men But the seuerall spirituall aduices which our Lord IESVS did giue vs by the example of his high vertues in this mistery though they be in themselues of great importance towards the shewing of his loue yet doe they lessen when they are compared to that maine drift which he had in this holy Baptisme of his For his prime (e) The principall scope which it seemes that Christ our Lord had in his being baptized meaning was vpon the cost of his Humility and Charity expressed by his being thus baptized to institute a more high soueraigne Baptisme in the nature of a Sacrament By the grace wherof all soules might be washed and cleansed from sinne as certainly as any body is from spots vpon the application of common water O boundles sea of loue which no baÌ„cks of our iniquity could keepe in from breaking out ouer the whole world His loue it was which made him vndergoe the paine of putting his pure naked body vnder water and of shame to be thought a sinfull creature That so by the merit of such loue as water washeth other creatures himselfe might wash euen the very water yea and sanctify all the water in the world towards the beautifying of soules by the meanes of his pretious merits How clearly doth it shew that Christ our Lord is an equall and incomparable kind of friend to all for he placed the remedy of all the Originall sinne of little children and both of the Originall sinne and actuall of such as are already coÌ„uerted baptized to the faith of Christ our Lord when they are of yeares not (f) How good cheape a Christian man be Baptized in the taking of generous wines nor in the application of costly Bathes nor in the drinking pearles and pretious stones distilled into some pretious liquor but only in being touched by a little pure simple water wherin the beggar is as rich as the King And howsoeuer his holy Church which is inspired and guided by his holy spirit hath ordeyned in the exercise
and vse of Baptisme that ordinarily it shall be administred by her Priests and in her Churches and solemnized with her sacred and most significant * Ritual Roman Ceremonies as namely the signe of the holy Crosse Exorcisines Insufflations Inpositiou of hands together with salt and holy Oyle with diuers others vvhich are thought fit to accompany an action of so great importance and the figures vvherof vvere deliuered and recomended by Christ our Lord himselfe as S. Ambrose notes vvhen he cured that person vvho vvas possessed by a diuell both dumbe and deefe by putttng spittle vpon his tongue and thrusting his fingars into his eares and saying Ephata vvhich is Be opened at most of vvhich Ceremonies though Sectaries vvill take liberty to laugh and scoffe vve Catholikes vvill not be ashamed to reueale them as vve are taught to doe not only though chiefely for the authority and custome it selfe of the holy Church but partely also because vve see in the vvritings of most auncient and holy Doctours Vide Bellar de Sacram Bap. l. 18. c. 26. both frequent and venerable mention to be made therof Hovvsoeuer I say all this be true yet neuerthelesse it vvas the gratious pleasure of our blessed Lord and it is the practise of his true Spouse the holy Church in case that the person to be baptized be in any extremity of daunger to forbeare all those ceremonies vvhich cannot then conueniently be vsed And it sufficeth for the eternall saluation of that soule that the vvater be applyed those fevv sacred vvords pronounced vvhich are prescribed And this in those cases may be done not only by lay men but euen by vvomen and all in the vertue and through the loue and by the merit of the Baptisme of Christ our Lord. Lib. 2. in Luc. Tom. 5. ser de Baptismo For one man was went as S. Ambrose sayth but he washed all the world One man descended that we might all ascend One man tooke vpon him the sinnes of all that so the sinnes of all might dye in him Our Lord was baptized not meaning to be cleansed by those waters but to cleanse those very waters that so they being washed by the flesh of Christ our Lord which knew no sinne might be intytled to the right of Baptisme Ser. de Temp. And S. Augustine doth also say A mother there was who brought forth a sōne yet she was chast the water washed Christ and it was made holy by him For as after the birth of Christ our Lord the Chastity of the B. Virgin was glorisied so after his Baptisine the sanctisication of the waters was approued To her saith he afterward was virginity imparted and vpon it fecundity was bestowed as we shall instantly and cleerly see The discourse concerning Baptisme is contynued and the great Loue of our Lord in the institution of that Sacrament is more declared CHAP. 22. THIS Baptisme instituted thus by Christ our Lord is both a mistical kind of death and withall it is a new begetting of a soule to life The first Adam is put to death that Christ our Lord who is the second Adam may be formed in vs. The whole world lay drowned till thus it was fetcht from vnder water The holy Apostle speakes of Baptisme as of a kind of death Cap. 6. For he tells the Romans that they he were washed together with Christ our Lord by Baptisme vnto death that is to sinne which is the worker and cause of death That as our Lord rose from the dead by the glory of his Father so we may walke in newnes of life And shortly after whosoeuer of vs are baptized in Christ Iesus are baptized to his death And againe to the Colossians you are buried together with him in Baptisme in whom you are risen to life This Baptisme is also a Regeneration wherby we are made the adopted sonnes of God and the brethren Coheires and liuing members of Christ our Lord. And the same Lord sayth Ioan. 3. Vnlesse you be borne againe of water and the holy Ghost I. Pet. 1. you shall not enter into the kingdom of God And besides he hath regenerated vs into a liuing hope This ioynt Resurrection with our Lord is made to that newnes of life wherof the Apostle speakes els where Colos 2. Rom. 6. For by this Lauer we are renewed by which we are also borne agayne So that we see how this Baptisme of Christ our Lord according to the seuerall partes therof was a figure in the exteriour both of the burying of our soules from sinne and of the begetting therof to grace his descending into the waters signifying the one and his returne out of them the other This Sacrament which was procured for vs by the labour and loue of our Lord IESVS in a most particular manner doth imprint a Caracter vpon the soule which is indeleble for all eternities and wherby we are maked and knowne to be the sheepe of Christ our Lord. It is the gate or entrance of all the other Sacraments and auowed to be such by the Councell of Trent Concil Trident. sess 7. Can. 9. de Sacram in genere It is a necessary meanes for the taking away of Originall sinne and for cloathing the soule with the primitiue stole of Iustice. In former ages they who were baptized were called Illuminated persons and baptisme it selfe was called Illumination and the Sacrament of Faith Yea baptized persons are said to be Illuminated by the Apostle himself It takes away both the sinne and all that penalty which may by due to it It fills the soule which grace and vertue and it is both necessary to saluation it guideth to it The weight of which word (a) What thing the word Saluation doth import Saluation whosoeuer doth consider well withall that it is applyed to vs by such an obuious and familiar meanes as this will not be so apt to snarle and quarrell at the Ordination of God as if it were a point of cruelty to separate such persons from himselfe as reach not Baptisme through his inscrutable iudgments for the sinne of Adam to which the whole race of man is subiect as they will be to admire his mercy and adore his Charity for chalking out such an easy way wherby so many millions of creatures might with great facility decline the euerlasting torments of hell and be entytled to the eternall ioyes of heauē For this is the happy case of all them who dye in their infancy after Baptisme hauing formerly bene subiect to Originall sinne and the curse therof which is double death although afterward they were to haue had no effectuall meanes of euer producing so much as any one good thought For these soules are instantly to be translated by the only meanes of this holy Sacrament to the habitation and possession of that celestiall kingdome And there doe they feele and there doe they tast the incorruptible fruite of that incomparable
fit to encounter with all the difficulties to which man is subiect and for that the charity of man as man is so very could as not to looke vpon the miseries and calamities of others with that compassion which becomes the fellow creatures of so good a God vnlesse first they haue tryed the variety of Temptations in their owne persons and because it is not possible for a man without a more extraordinary grace then can be expected to apply fit remedies to such soules as shall be subiect to Temptation vnlesse himselfe haue bene sicke of the same or the like disease our Lord is therfore (c) They are not good Physitiās of others in spirituall diseases who haue not been sicke thēselues wont to suffer euen his best seruants such as he meanes to imploy most in making warre against vice and sinne to be infested in this kind with the assaults of the enemy But yet so as that he enableth them withall by his grace if they will not be wanting to themselues to returne victorious out of the battaile And not only by these skirmishes to abate the fury of their foes but to eate out the rust which their soules had contracted by their owne former sinnes insteed therof to fill them full of merit in themselues to make them expert and safe guides of others and in fine by such knocks to hammer out and to build vp and most richly to furnish such a house in their hartes as wherin the God and King of glory may not only be cōrent but euen glad to dwell They are therfore deepely in errour who thinke it be a signe of Gods disfauour if he suffer a soule to be much tempted The argument is rather good on the other side to proue that it is a token of his loue For vve see how Christ our Lord himselfe would be vsed heerin to secure vs therby that it was a happy state since himselfe did choose to be possest therof Especially (d) The example of our Lord Iesus in this Temptation of his doth both sanctify Temptatiōs to vs strengthen vs agaynst them considering that by going so before through his Temptations he hath brokē the hart of such others as should afterward lay hold on vs besides that he instructs vs how we are to carry our selues therin euen whilst they last And infallibly the loue of our Lord to vs is so very tender and so pure that by the merit of this Temptation of his he would haue obteyned the destruction and death of all Temptations if he had not forseene that they should suruiue for our greater good in case that we would vse them wel And we may iustly beleeue that since God refused to graunt the suite of the holy Apostle when he had begged thrice that Sathan might no longer buffet him with the motions of sense 2. Cor. 12. it was only for the preseruing him in humility and way of prouision of greater glory and he made him a promise of sufficient grace wherby he should tryumph after victory Besides this assistance of the grace of God which yet alone ought to be anchor inough for the soule of man in any difficulty whatsoeuer so that the man for his part doe concurre therwith as his frailty will permit it is certaine that his diuine Maiesty is so indulgent a Father to his deere children and doth so thirst not only after their solid good in the next life but euen after their comfort and ioye in this that ordinarily when he permitteth them to vndergoe any grieuous Temptation of the enemy he either armeth them before hand with some extraordinary comfort by way of preparatiue or els he visiteth them afterward in some most gratious manner by way eyther of remedy or reward We see that it is iust so in this Temptation of Christ our Lord and that before it in his Baptisme the heauens were opened to him and the holy Ghost did visibly descend vpon him And after it the Angells did make court about him and doe him homage and did serue at his table when the fast was ended And we also as miserable as we seeme to be in this life haue a promise from truth it selfe in another part of the holy Ghospell Luc. 22. that they who shall haue remayned faithfull to him in his Temptations that is to say in such afflictions as God doth either send or suffer shall both eate and drinke at his table in his Kingdome of eternall glory And to the end that this might happen to vs more completely it was the gratious pleasure of our Lord to permit himselfe to be assalted (e) The seuerall kinds of Temptatiō which were offered to our Lord Iesus by three seuerall wayes wherein all kinds of Temptations might be lodged or to which at least they might be all reduced That so in them we might be instructed and enabled to ouercome in all by his example helpe as we shall see the Chapter following The Temptations which the Diuell did seeketo put vpon our Lord Iesus are declared and opened CHAP. 25. THE first (a) The 2. Temptation was delight or pleasure Matt. 4. Luc. 4. was a Temptation of delight or pleasure where the deuill moued our Lord by occasiō of that cause of h̄gar wherin he found him to turne stones into bread if it were true that indeed he was the sonne of God But our Lord who knew that the Feend of hell would reape no proffit by the manifestatiō of his diuinity for as much as he was confirmed for al eternity in malice vpon his first fall frō Grace vvould not worke that miracle to no purpose and especially at the discretion of the deuill Or rather he would not through his deare and tender loue to vs worke a miracle wherby he was to be freed from suffering the paine of hungar which he felt afterward for our sakes But whilst he (b) In what kind our Lord was feeding whilst he was fasting fasted in one kind he was feeding vpon a banquet in another For the food which gaue him exquisite delight was to be doing the will of his eternall Father suffering for the deliuerance and good of men And from corporall food he would abstaine in this first publique act of his if it were but to reuerse that misery which was come into the world by Adam when he fedde with inordinate appetite vpon the forbidden fruit of Paradise In the meane tyme his refusal to make bread wherby he might haue bene fed in that wildernes was liberally rewarded to our Lord by his eternal Father afterward euen in the same very kind in the selfe same or like place of his so great merit For in a wildernes as he would needs suffer hungar he had meanes afterward to multiply a few loaues and fishes to such a quantity as serued to seed and ouerseed thousands of men besides women and children To shew that as according to that diuine saying of S.
Augustine which since it is so highly and clearly true I would to God it were written and worne about the neckes Aug. Cōfes lib. 1. cap. 22. and in the harts of all the world Iussisti Domine sic est vt poena sua sibi sit omnis inordinatus animus Thou hast ordeyned it O Lord and so it is That the very inordinate affection it selfe of euery one should be an affliction to him that hath it so the merit of euery action which is purely vndertaken and faithfully performed for the loue of God especially if it haue any thing in it of the heroicall will be sure to affect the mind with a particular kind of remuneratiō yea so particular as that the soule shall know it is for that The second (c) The 2. Temptaon was riches power att 4. c. 4. Temptation wherwith this inueterate lyer did tempt our Lord was by offering all riches and power which he shewed him from the Top of a high mountaine and he promised to giue him the whole world if he would adore him A lyer I say he is and so he was from the begin ning But yet amongst all his lyes he neuer told a greater then this That it should be in his power to giue the whole world away he who is not the owner of one leafe which growes therin nor is able to moue the least indiuisible graine of dust vpon the earth nor any moate in the ayre without the particular leaue of our Lord God All power is of God all pleasure is of him and in him And whatsoeuer is in creatures is but a poore participation of the infinite which in him is found And that which the deuill can doe is only to tempt vs to steale it from the true owner Wheruuto when he hath induced vs and that we once returne into our selues that which he leaueth behind in our soules is nothing but a miserable remorse of mind and an experimentall knowledge of extreame calamity and penury insteed of plenty and of infamy insteed of glory and of consuming paine insteed of any pure and perfect ioy Confes lib. 4. cap. 12. And most iustly as Saint Augustine sayth doth that which in it selfe is sweete grow bitter to thee if thou commit such an act of iniustice as vpon the reason of that sweetues to forsake and ossend our Lord who made it sweet And thou commest as he diuinely expresseth in another place To turne and tosse thy minde Confes l. 2. cap. 2. vp and downe superba deiectione inquieta lassitudine with a proud kind of basenes a resiles kind of wearines This is that bargaine to which the deuill if we hearken to him can bring a soule but to giue it one haires bread of happines is neither in his power nor in his will For his enuy and his hate to vs is such as that the smal counterfaite pleasure which we find in the act of any sinne is no small vexation griefe to him And if it were in his hand to make vs sinne without taking any corporall delight at all and to tosse vs from torments in this life to torments in the next he would find malice inough for that purpose and we should be sure neuer to tast any one drop of ioy by his consent But where was it that our Lord found patience and (d) The incomprehensible meeknes of our Lord Iesus meeknes inough to keepe him from rebuking that impure spirit from creating a new hell of torments into which he might haue bene precipitated for desiring to be adored by one whome he suspected ought to haue known to be the sonne of God where did he find it or where could he find it but in his owne pretious hart which is a profound Sea of loue to all such as will be capable therof and of pitty and patience euen to such as hunt after nothing but his dishonour 1. Pet. 2. For whē afterward our Lord was reuiled he answered not and when he was cursed he prayed for them who cast theyr curses vpon him And when now he was tempted he did not so much as turne against the deuill himselfe but stood only fast in his owne defence against that Prince of the Rebellious Angells who was still following his old maxime of beleeuing that he was fit to be adored will neuer be taught to chaunge it euen by the experience of those paines of hell which he hath tasted already for so many ages and is to doe for all eternities So spirituall so stiffe and so tough a sinne is that of Pride which as it will nouer be forsakē by those deuils so also is there none to which the misery of man in this life is more obnoxious The deuill knowing this at the least as well as we did reserue the Temptation of (e) The 3. temptatiō was to Estimation and Honour Honour for the last place he drew it as the most daungerous and deadly wounding arrovv out of his quiuer vvhervvith he hoped to fasten vpon the soule of Christ our Lord. He tooke him therfore out of the desert and carryed him to the pinnacle of the Temple and placing him vpō the top therof he would faine haue induced him to cast himself dovvn through an insinuation of sanctity vvhich might be in him For sayth he If thou be the sonne of God thou mayst safely doe it for it is written that he hath giuen his Angells charge ouer thee and that in their hands they shall beare thee vp Matt. 4. least perhaps thou knocke thy foote against a stoue The deuill is no foole or babe but he knovves it is most true that if any thing be able to shake a vertuous soule it is a Temptation of Pride an ambitiō of Honour for the sanctity which is imparted to it by our Lord God because through any yeilding to this Temptation both that sanctity is lost God vvith it With hovv pestilent successe hath he put this tricke vpon vvhole multitudes of mē at seuerall tymes vvho at those tymes vvere faythfull seruants Saints of God But this blast of vanity did so vndermine their soules as that they fell dovvne and rotted and did but serue to make a fire vvherat the deuill might vvarme himselfe But heer he mist his marke and although be brought the ground of his Temptation of Christ our Lord out of holy Scripture levvdly applyed the only true sense vvherof the spirit of Christ our Lord did knovv after his Ascension the holy Ghost hath still imparted it to the holy Catholique Church vvhere the spirit of God doth yet only rest and vvherby it is able to interprete truely that holy Scripture yet our Lord vvas easily able to giue him such an ansvvere out of the same Scripture as made him depart vvith shame inough It is shewed how we are to carry our selues in the vse of holy Scripture and we are instructed concerning Lent we are
endeauoured to procure and increase And if this haue appeared in the misteries of his holy Baptisme and Temptation it vvill doe so no lesse if not rather more in that vvhich novv shall present it selfe concerning the vocation of his Apostles Disciples to his seruice Of the great Loue which our Lord Iesus shewed to mankind in the Vocation of his Aposiles CHAP. 27. IT is not strāge that God should shew himselfe like God nor consequently that in all the actions of Christ our Lord who as man was Gods most excellent instrument his soueraigne power and wisedome and goodnes should much appeare This is true in them all especially is it so in this of the Vocatiō of his Apostles wherin he doth admirably declare quòd disponat omnia suauiter pertingat à fine vsque ad finē fortiter That he disposeth of all things sweetly yet reacheth from one end to the other with a hand of strength His (a) The end of the Incarnation and Passion of Christ our Lord. busines in this world was to redeeme it by his pretious bloud the merit wherof was to be applied to mens soules by faith and loue and that was to be rooted in them by the preaching of his doctrine the administration of such Sacraments as he came to institute in that Church which he meant to plant And because himselfe was to returne to his Father and the reconciliation of mankind to God was to contynue in acting till the end of the world he resolued vpon ordayning and sending Ambassadours into it for that purpose 2. Cor. 5. As Saint Paul affirmed afterward Pro Christo ergo legatione fungimur c. We Apostles and all Apostolicall men are Ambassadours sent into the world by Christ our Lord for the reconciliation of it to God The Hypostaticall Vnion wherby the Diuinity of the second person of the B. Trinity was vnited to the humanity of Christ our Lord gaue him power to doe what and when he would And he might haue called his Apostles either in his infancy or afterward by only inuisible inspirations or els as foone as he meant to appeare in the office of teaching But to giue vs example how to carry our selues in all our actions and especially in such as concerne the glory of God and the good of soules he would not enter vpon this busines till himselfe had visibly beene baptized and auowed by a voyce from heauen to be the welbeloued sonne of God in reward of that deepe humility which he exercised by such an act as that He also differred to call them instantly after he was baptized because at the first they would not haue been fit to accompany him in such austerity as he resolued to endure in the desert Whereby he also gaue vs a lesson both to vse prudence and charity when we haue cause to serue our selues of others He was neuer in any danger of being distracted from God in any one moment of his life neither yet was he in doubt but that he should call his Apostles in such sort as would be most agreable to the diuine will but yet before he would vndertake it Luc. 6. he retyred himselfe into a mountaine all alone And that blessed soule spent the whole night in prayer and (b) The soueraigne excellency and vse of prayer therby he gaue vs an example how in all things we were to haue recourse to God by that most holy exercise as the means wherby we might both get light for our vnderstanding and heate and strength towards the accōplishing of his most holy will by the obedience of ours The same Lord God who was the Creator of man would needs also be his Redeemer And for as much as he had made him did well discerne all the windings and turnings of his soule he was able with admirable facility felicity to guid him according to his nature With that skil he proceeded in the Vocatiō of his Apostles some of whom he called by himselfe and some were brought by others whome formerly himselfe had called Some he drew to him by the force of some short single speach and others by discourse or dialogue of greater length And of S. Peeter it is said in holy Scripture that when S. Andrew had brought him to our Lord he looked vpon him which is not said of any other Ioan. 2. Intuitus autem eum Iesus dixit Tu es Sinion filius Ionae tu vocaberis Caephas quod interpretatur Petrus Thou art Symon the sonne of Ionas thou shalt be called Caephas which is by interpretation Peter Ibid. Which word in Syriacke and that was the language with our Lord did speake and the only language with S. Peter vnderstood at that tyme doth signify aswel a Rocke as the name of a mā And the word Intuitus est doth implye that our Lord did enuisage and looke in earnest manner vpon his face Which I hope we shall not thinke but to haue bene both done and sayd vpon some reason of great mistery especially since we see that he bespeakes him for the office of being a Rocke wherupon next to himself he would build his Church In cōformity of which diuine purpose he affoarded him many most particular fauours he cured his mother (1) Luc. 4. in law in his house he (2) Luc. 5. would needs teach men out of his ship and to omit those passages of holy Scripture wherby (3) Matt. 16. Ioan. 21. he inuested him with that highest dignity in his Church in expresse termes he (4) Matt. 17. fetcht a miraculous tribute out of the fishes belly which he paid not only for himselfe but for S. Peter also as for the heire of his house It had bene easy for him to haue imployed Angells in that ministery to which he vouchsafed to depute S. Peter the rest of the Apostles but the (c) The sweet prouidence of our Lord. sweetnes of his prouidēce did exact that men should gouerne men The Angells who were impeccable would neuer haue bene so attractiue of sinners to pēnance for we should haue feared to approach to such humility purity as theirs with such frailty and pride as ours But our Lord was pleased to gouerne vs by men who were obnoxious to our infirmities That so by the experience of what had passed in their ovvne soules they might haue the more compassion of ours and so we might also vvith the more probability of successe aspire to their practise of vertue And they in the meane tyme were to absolue vs not only for once or for an hundred or a thousand tymes but for as often as we should sinne if we grew afterward to be indeed truly penitent But yet at least since he would needs dispatch the great busines of gayning soules by the meanes of mortall creatures a man would haue thought according to all dictamen of humain reason that he should haue chosen the most worthy and well qualified
persons aliue Either for nobility and power out of the Citty of Rome which was the Empresse of the world or out of the Prouinces of Greece which was the Seminary of all morality and learning or out of the citty of Hierusalem which the opinion of sanctity the maiesty of Religious rites did easily outstrip all other places But (d) Why our Lord made not choyce of the noble wise or learned men of the world for conuersion therof 1. Cor. 1. he who afterward did condemne the pride pleasure of the world vpon the Crosse had before in the choice of his Apostles both confounded all discourse of flesh and bloud and withall he tooke care to magnify the attributes wherof I spake before of his power his wisedome and his goodnes By choosing as S. Paul affirmeth the meane things of the world to confound the noble the weake to cōfound the strong and the things which scarse were thought to haue any substance or being at all to confound other things which seemed as it were to beard and braue the vvorld It is true that he admitted of some few learned men for his Disciples as Gamaliel and Nathanael And of some fevv vvho vvere rich and noble as Lazarus Nicodemus and Ioseph of Arimathia that so he might not seeme to disdaine nobility and learning but yet his Apostles in a manner vvere all obscure and poore vnlearned men Both because such persons are vvont to goe more vvillingly after the call of Gods holy inspirations and partly also yea and chiefely to make the vvorld cōfesse that vvhen it should see vvhole Prouinces subdued to the faith of Christ our Lord by the preaching of his doctrine out of such ignorāt mouthes as theirs vvere knovvne to be it might be obliged to impute the same to no other cause but the omnipotēt povver of God the Father the infinite vvisedome of God the sonne vvho is Christ our Lord and the inexhausted goodnes of God the holy Ghost vvhich was able to doe such vvonders by such weake instruments Novv that (e) How Moyses in some respect was an extract of the Apostles 2. Cor. 2. vvhich vvas heere fulfilled in the person of the rude Apostles vnder the lavv of grace vvas punctually prefigured vnder the vvriten lavv in the person of Moyses vvho vvas but a sheepheard and a stammerer and so could haue no grace or guift of speech But Virtus Dei in infirmitate perficitur The strength and power of God is perfected and proclaymed in the weakenes of man And Moyses could not be so vntovvard either in fortune or nature for the busines which God imployed him in but the same God could vvith ease doe those wōderfull things by his meanes which he designed for the deliuery of his people from the seruitude of Pharao And this he wrought aftervvard in a more admirable māner by the ministery of his poore Apostles in freing soules from the tyranny of the spirituall Pharao which is the deuill The rebellious Angells and our fraile forefather Adam were grounded at the first in great priuiledges both of grace and nature but through disobedience and pride they all fell headlong downe The Angells to hell Adam into a deepe darke hole full of infirmity and worldly care But the Apostles had their foundation and first beginning in pouerty ignorance and simplicity and in fine in a being nothing of themselues And now as the pride of the former was abased so the humility of these latter as we shall see in the Chapter following was exalted by the holy and mighty hand of God whose name be euer blessed for the glory which he giues himselfe by his owne goodnes The incomparable Loue wherwith our Lord instantly rewarded the speedy obedience of the Apostles CHAP. 28. SVCH men as these they were whome our Lord designed to the Apostolate which yet was the most excellent and most eminent office in the Church of God And he vouchsafed to inuite them with such strength as well as with such tendernes of loue that they came when they were called They did it instantly and cheerfully and absolutely Saint Peter and S. Andrew Marc. 1. were casting their netts into the Sea and immediatly vpon the fight and voyce of our Lord Iesus who bad them come and follow him Matth. 4. they went and left their netts in the act of their falling into the water without staying so long as might serue to draw them vp againe And much lesse did they delay till they saw what draught they might chaunce to haue Ibid. S. Iohn and S. Iames were in the act of mending their netts and vpon the very first sight and hearing of the voyce of Christ our Lord who called them to him they did not so much as fasten one stitch or tye one knot but immediatly they put themselues vpon following him Leauing not only their netts but abandoning euen their very father through the desire they had to comply at full speed with the inspiration of God which spake more lowdly to their harts then the voyce of Christ our Lord as man had done to their eares of flesh and bloud S. Matthew as is touched Matt. 9. both before and afterward was in the (a) The admirable conuersion of S. Matthew Custome house in the midst of a world of reckonings accounts he was in the very act of sinning the company which he was in would not faile to encourage him in doing ill but yet our Lord had no sooner bid him follow him but he left all at the very instant without so much as saluting his friends yea this he did with such excesse of ioy as that to shew the comfort of his hart he feasted his new Lord and maister The world is full of men who can write and read but there are not so very many who cast account so well as this B. Apostle knew how to doe Preferring God before the world and the treasures of diuine grace before the corruptible riches of this life and lending such a watchfull and listning care to the inspirations of almighty God in the obedience wherof it was but for our Lord to call and him to come But neither he nor those others were in danger of (b) Men are far frō loosing by giuing much to God loosing any thing by obeying the voyce of Christ our Lord. To vvhom although for the tryall of their loue and for the increase of their merit he made no promise at all vvhen he called thē but only to those fishers that he would make them fishers of men yet aftervvards he made them knovv that they had to doe vvith a liberall God And for as much as they had left their little comodities to follovv him vvho seemed to haue lesse and for that they had so generously contemned the care of friends and goods for his loue and in regard that they had put themselues instantly and franckly vpon his seruice vvithout asking any day or desiring to be
transfigured before them That his face did shine like the sunne That his garments were as white as snow That Moyses and Elyas appeared also and were speaking with him That their discourse was of that excesse of loue which he would shew in the passion through which he was to passe in Hierusalem That S Peter was so rapt with ioy as to say That it was good being there and to beg of our Lord that there they might haue still remayned but that before he had ended his speach a bright cloud came downe which ouershadowed them and this voyce was thundred out from thence This is my beloued sonne in whome I am well pleased heare him Vpon the noyse of this voyce the Disciples fell prostrate vpō their faces as being much a frayd but our Lord Iesus drew neere and touched them said withall rise vp and doe not feare and when they looked vp they saw none but only Iesus And as they were going downe the hill he cōmaunded them not to speake of that vision till he should be risen from the dead This glorious miracle did shine in the exteriour of our Lord so vehemētly as to send the beames therof to his Disciples but it vvas the flame of loue which burning so hot in his diuine hart did breake out much more vpon them that so their soules and ours by theirs might be set on fyre He had then lately been telling them of his passion which was to come That he was to endure many and grieuous things That he was to be condemned by the high Priests That he was to suffer death and then to rise He had further said that for their good they must be imitatours of him and that howsoeuer the way of the Crosse might fall out to be hard and stony yet there was no remedy but they must runne it through And now least their mindes might haue bene oppressed with inordinate griefe or else assaulted afterward with vnbeliefe or at least discouraged by the difficulties of this life which he knew was to proue so painfull to them for the seruice of God his (c) A particular reason why our Lord would be transfgured before some of his Apostles hart of loue could no longer hould from expressing it selfe towards thē in some such kind as might not only strengthen them against all feare of future harme but might solace them also in aboundant māner both with the present sense of excessiue ioy and an infallible expectation of much more to follow afterward And when he had conueyed the notice of his passion like a bitter dose of pills into their mindes he did like a carefull Phisitian put a spoonfull of Conserue after it into their mouthes least otherwise they might chance to haue cast their Phisicke As generally in holy Scripture so particularly in this mistery of the Transfiguration and of the ioy which was commuicated to the Disciples by meanes therof the expressiōs euen of things which are very great are yet very positiue and playne as I shall also shew elsewhere And Saynt Peter only said Bonum est nos hic esse It is good for vs to be heere But (d) This seemes to haue been but a smal expressiō of ioy but inded it was very great and why though this may seeme to be but a leane and hungry kind of signification of his ioy for his hauing beene made participant of that high vision yet indeed it vvas such a one as could not well be more endeared To haue said that it had beene better to be in the top of that high mountaine with Christ our Lord then to haue bene in the midst of all the treasures and pleasures of the world below had bene to allow a kind of goodnes to these other things though infeririour to that which there he felt For to say that one thing is better then another doth leaue a power in that other thing to be good But by only saying that this was good it rather seemes to follow that whatsoeuer vvas lower and lesse then this would not be good S. Peter was heere in a kind of midle Region of the ayre betewne ordinary grace below glory aboue And as he could not say that his then present condition was any more then good in regard that nothing of this life was so good or indeed that it was absolutely good at all so neither could he say that it was any more then good in regard of the ioyes which are felt in heauen And therfore he said not that it was a soueraigne or an infinite good which is only enioyed in that next life by the sight of God Exod. 33. That sight is that Omne bonum which was promised by our Lord God that he would shew his seruant Moyses in heauen This other is that bonum which now was shewed to his Apostles heere on earth But though it were but bonum in comparison of that infinite good yet if this such as it vvas had bene set by the vvhole vvorld of worldly pleasures they would all haue streight appeared to be but durt and trash and this would haue shined like a second heauen of glory in comparison of them We must therfore be farre from thinking meanely of it but rather we are to call our wits about vs and to argue thus If some (e) What wonders the holy ghost doth worke in the soule of man influence or visitation of the holy Ghost whilst it doth but slip into the soule of man be able to comfort him when he was laid though neuer so low in the bed of distresse and desolation If some extraordinary communication of Gods Spirit can eleuate the soule not only aboue all other creatures but euen aboue it selfe so as not only to disgust it and that for euer from all humane hopes or feares but to make it halfe forget that there is any other thing but God If some true Reuelation or diuine imaginary vision such as our Lord doth sometymes cōmunicate to his friends fauorites in this life when and why it pleaseth him as we find recorded in their liues doth sometymes so inebriate and fixe and transforme thē into him as they may rather be said to swym and bath at ease in a sea of comfort then to trauell and trudge by land in a desert full of difficulties distresse what effect shall we thinke this vision of visions did worke in the mind of the B. Apostles Who saw not what they saw by imagination only but they had before the eyes both of their body and minde the humanity of Christ our Lord all in glory with Moyses and Elias doing him homage in the name of both those worlds which liued eyther vnder the law of nature or the written law The incomparable ioy which the Apostles tooke through the loue which our Lord Iesus shewed them in his Transfiguration and how himselfe was content to want the glory of it both before and after for the loue of them CHAP. 30. THE sunne
most excellent instructions which our Lord through his loue did giue to man in this mistery of the Transfiguration CHAP. 31. I Should enlarge my selfe too much if I would particularize and presse those instructions which our Lord did giue to all his disciples both liuing then and succeeding afterward in that silent sermon of his Transfiguration and we haue reason to take them all as so many tokens of his tender loue to vs. But because they may seeme so rather by inference and reflection then by way of lineall and direct expression I will content my selfe briefly to point them out In the first place we are told that he assumed those holy and happy disciples of his vp the hill and therby we are taught that we cannot clymbe but when he takes vs by the hand By telling vs also that he would not be transfigured before them but vpon the hill he tells vs that vnlesse she aspire towards (a) No solide and sublime gust in God with out a serious study of perfection Perfction we must content our selues without tasting the delicious fruites of ConteÌ„plation Againe we are heere expresly told that Christ our Lord went vp to pray and that whilst he was in prayer this rapt of Transfiguration came vpon him So that as it was by prayer and coÌ„uersation with God that Moyses came downe from the hill with such a deale of light in his face by prayer also it is that we may receaue innumerable graces and may grow to be transformed in minde which imports vs more then to be transfigured in body By letting vs know that he was transfigured only for that tyme he giues vs to vnderstand how he hid his excellencies both till then and euer afterward and therby he proclaimes to vs by a loud voyce how (b) The more we hide our selues froÌ„ the view of men the more open shall we be to the gracious eyes of God Ibid. carefull we must be to hide our faâ—ours and priuiledges from the eyes of men And the same was also taught yet againe when our Lord IESVS commaunded afterward that they should not speake of that vision till he were risen from the dead By mentioning the Passion when he was in the midst of the Transfiguration we are instructed how to carry our selues in the varieties and changes of this life For in the winter of distresse we must keep our selues aliue by the memory or hope of some consolation eyther to come or past And in the spring or Sommer of spirituall ioy we must free our selues from growing vayne or giddy by thinking of some approach of desolation By the feare of the holy Apostles we may see the misery of mans nature Confel lib. 11. cap. 9. which was so ill drest by Adam that as S. Augustine saith Sic infirmatus est in egestate mea vigor meus vt non sufferam bonum meum So is my vigor taken downe in this infirmity of my condition that I cannot so much as indure mine owne good as heere the Apostles were frighted euen by the fight of so much glory as attends the speaking of a word from heauen And how then must we reuere with a most profound internall awe that God of inaccessible light and infinite Maiesty whose essence is wholly vnconceaueable since his words cannot be heard without extreme apprehension by such wormes of misery as we are By the coÌ„ming of that voyce which was so soone to breake off the vision whilst they were in the midst of those celestiall ioyes by which voyce our B. Lord was declared to be the beloued sonne of God and that they were comaunded to heare him they we are made to know that we are not in this world to looke for a state of contynuall inioying but of labouring The (c) This is a world of sowing and the other of reaping seeing of God and the being to doe so eternally belongs to heauen in this life we are not to looke for seeing but we must attend to hearing and which is meant therby to obeying Heerby he also tells vs that we must not demurre euen in the most spirituall gusts which we may haue when obedience or charity commaunds the contrary Especially since our Lord himselfe made such hast to giue ouer his Transfiguration that he might descend and so proceed first to preaching then afterwards towards his pasion For there was his hart because his loue was euer looking towards vs and had not that same very loue of vs obliged him to be glorious at that tyme for our sakes since the members could not partake of any such influence which came not first from the head yea and euen if they could haue done it yet would it not haue bene so full of sauour to them vnlesse first it had passed from him it appeares well inough both by the antecedents and consequences of his sacred life that he was not eyther greedy after pleasure or weary of taking paines for vs. Loue and pure loue it was which kept his glory all that while in silence Loue it was which made him mortify himselfe as a man may say with taking into his mouth that only tast of ioy And lastly an euerlasting loue it was which carried him in such hast from Mount Thabor to Mount Caluary where he was to be transfigured a fecoÌ„d tyme but after a far other manner For (d) How our Lord Iesus was Transsigured the second tyme vpoÌ„ mount Caluary insteed of glory he was to be all clad with a kind of Leprosy His face was not to be resplendent but loaden partly with impure spittle and partely vvith his ovvne pure svveat and pretious bloud which made a strange kind of marriage together in that sacred and most venerable Temple of the diuinity His garments were no more to be white but spotted with dust and filth the souldiers were to dispose of them by lotts He was not to be placed betwene a Moyses an Elias but to giue him the more solemne bitter scorne he was to be lodged betwene two murthering thecues No bright shyning cloud was there to appeare to doe him honour but the Sunne would be ashamed to behould the soÌ„ne of man so lewdly treated and darknes would couer the whole earth Since therfore we see such deadly signes of loue in his pretious hart towards vs we may haue the honour to be taught by him how to guide our liues let vs dispose our selues with supreme reuerence to giue our eares and hartes (e) Our Lord Iesus is declared our Doctour from heauen to the diuine words of his mouth since he is made our Doctour by no lesse then a voyce which comes from heauen it selfe and that in the name of the eternall Father saying That Christ our Lord is his beloued sonne in whome he is so highly pleased and that him we must be sure to heare We will besides adore him for presenting vs with this admirable vision wherby he hath so aboundantly
little stones or sands vpon the shore therof Yea be thou yet cleane at last be pure away with thy wicked thoughts out of my sight Make once an end of being peruerse Learne to doe wel seeke iudgment succour the oppressed Doe iustice to the Orphane defend the widdowe and then come and reproach me if I make not good my word For if thy sinnes should be as scarlet they shall become as while as snow and if they should be as red as vermilion they shall be as cleane as the purest wooll I know thou hast said Dixit Sion Dorminus dereliquit me c. Isa 49. Our Lord hath forsaken me our Lord hath forgotten me But what can the mother forget her infant or can she faile to take pitty vpon the child of her owne wombe And though she should yet will not I forget thee Behould I haue ingrauen thee in my very hands Quare ergo dixie populus c. Lerem 2. Why hath my people said to me We vvill depart and come to thee no more Can the virgin forget her gorgeous attires or can the Spouse forget the ornament which she weareth vpon her beast Yet my people hath forgotten me I cannot tell how long Vulgo dicitur c. Ierem. 3. It is commonly said among you if a man dismisse his wife and she marry another will that husband euer resort to her againe Shall not that woman be held for an impure defiled creature But thou hast committed Fornication with many louers and yet returne to me sayth our Lord and I will receaue thee Looke vp and consider where thou hast not prostituted thy selfe Thou hast gotten the face of a Harlot and thou wouldst not blush Yet now at last call vpon me and say Thou art my Father Et dixi c̄ fecisset haec omnia c. lerem 3. Thou art the conductor of my virginity For I for my part haue said to Sion after she had committed all her sinnes Returne to me and yet she returned not Returne to me O thou vntoward Israell saith our Lord I will not turne my face from thee because I am holy saith our Lord Ad punctum in modico dereliqui te c. Isa 54. In funiculis Adam c. Ose 11. and I will not be angry with thee for euer I haue forsaken thee for a short tyme but I will gather thee vp in great mercies For an instant of indignation I hid my face from thee but I haue taken pitty on thee with eternall mercy saith thy Lord and thy redeemer I will draw thee to my selfe in the cords af Adam in the bonds of loue And I will be as one who takes the yoke from off the necke of his cattle and giues the raines to his horse that he may feed These are the words of the holy Ghost by them doth he expresse the infinite loue which is borne to man And now it doth but remaine that we answere such loue withall the loue we haue To which if this Chapter will not haue obliged vs by making vs see the expression of Gods mercies in the old Testament wo be to vs but yet let vs try what may be done by the consideration of that which passed in the New wherof the next Chapter will informe vs. The infinite tender Loue of Christ our Lord which is expressed in the Scriptures of the new Testament CHAP. 40. SVCH as hath been seen is the stile which the God of heauē earth doth hold with his miserable and most sinfull creatures and this he hath held from all eternity he went executing it thus in tyme euen vnder both the law of nature and the written law when yet his Sonne our Lord had not taken flesh But as the mercies which were vouchsafed expressed by our Lord God to men in the old Testament were yet all designed and imparted by him in contemplation of Christ our Lord who was then to come so when the fulnes of that tyme was arriued and that indeed the increated word become incarnate for the saluation of man it was (a) It was fit not only in mercy but euen in iustice that vnder the law of grace the loue of God should appeare more cleerly thē before agreable not only to mercy but euen to iustice it selfe that the loue of God should triumph for our benefit more then euer And that not only in the solid proofe of loue but euen in the sweet and tender demonstrations therof For now our Lord spake no longer to vs by his Angells nor by his Prophets only but by his Sonne himselfe who was no more a perfect man then he was God And this God without the interposition or interpretation of any other creature did now in person conuerse with men He taught them by the words of his owne sacred mouth He cured them of all diseases by his miracles He assumed some to the dignity of being his Apostles and all the world to the honour and happines of being his Disciples He (b) How the seruants of God are dignified by Christ our Lord. declares how they who obey the will of God are his brothers his sisters and euen as it were his very mother Sometymes he calls men his seruants and when they haue carried themselues well therin he aduaunceth them to be not so much his seruants as his friends professing to impart all his secrets to them Looke in his last Sermon recorded by S. Iohn Sometymes he cals them his children yea and sometymes by the name of Filioli his little children to shew that innocent carefull tender kind of sweet affection which a mother would carry to her Infant We may see the whole history of his most blessed life all imbrodered by the hands of the holy Euangelists heere with teares there with sighes and euery where with abundance of corporall and spirituall labours both actiue and passiue for loue of vs Matt. 10. euen before the tyme of his pretious death Is any thing more liberall then his promisses where he entayles the inheritance of heauen to the guift of a cup of cold water Matt 25. without our bestowing so much cost as euen to heate it Nay and he is content to say that whosoeuer should performe any little worke of charity to any seruant of his he would take it in as deare part as if it had bene affoarded to his very selfe Is (c) His earnest protestations any thing more serious then his protestations of that truth which he came to teach vs for our good Amen Amen dico vobis Verily verily I tell you this and that And was it not a strāg descent for that Prima Veritas that roote and fountaine of all truth to helpe our blindnes and backwardnes in beleeuing by protesting things to be so as if his simple word had not deserued so well as to haue bene taken Is any thing more vniuersal then his Proclamations which thus he makes to all
infallible truth we might be beaten blind with seeing and starued with surfetting as we see many others are and the very vastnes of those misteries which are opened to vs for our cōfort by Christ our Lord would make vs halfe doubt whether they were or could be true or no. The beloued Apostle and Euangelist S. Iohn had lodged himselfe so long so neere the hart of our blessed Lord that he was easily able to discerne and declare how excellently he loued vs from the beginning and that withall his loue continued towards vs to the end Iesus autem Ioan. 13. cùm dilexisset suos in finem dilexit eos Nay the motion of the loue of his diuine hart towards man hauing bene so naturall in him it is no meruaile if it vvent more violently in the end of his sacred life then at the beginning All the passions of that happy soule were intyrely subiect to the commaund of his reason and he held it to be a thing agreable to the dignity immutability of the God he was to speake of all things as was toucht before after a positiue manner and wonderfully as we vse to say within compasse Superlatiues and Exaggerations vsed to be thin sowed in the blessed mouth of our Lord IESVS Nor is he in effect euer found to haue said any thing as seeming to haue bene transported with any extraordinary or passionate desire or care but (b) When he came towardes the passiō our Lord did seem to breake his pace only concerning that which he was to suffer in his sacred Passion and that which he was to doe in the night precedent to the same When formerly he was aduising his Apostles to haue great confidence in the prouidence of God by letting them see what a care he had euen of sparrowes and inferring therby that he would incomparably more haue care of them he exaggerated not the matter Matt. 10. but did only aske If themselues were not to be more esteemed then many sparrowes Wheras yet one soule is more in the sight of God not only thē many sparrowes but then al the whole material world put together When he had a mind to tell them what a misery it was for that wretch that he would make himselfe the betrayer of the sonne of man Matt. 8◠he only said wo be to that man it had been better for him if he had neuer been borne which was but a very plaine and positiue manner of expression For as much as not only this greatest sinne which euer was perhaps conceaued but the least mortall sinne that can be imagined without repentance doth make a man much more vnhappy then if he were vtterly depriued of being When he professed the omnipotency of his eternall Fathers power to deliuer him out of the hands of them who tooke and tyed him he told them only Matt. 26. that if he should pray for any helpe of that kind his Father would send more then twelue legions of Angells to his succour Wheras he might as good cheape haue said twelue thousand as twelue legions But our Lord IESVS was not wont to vse any superlatiue manner of speach and he hath had many seruants who haue carefully imitated him in this as in the rest But yet neuer thelesse whē he reflected vpō the thought of that passiō which he was resolued to vndergoe for the Redēption of mā the very desire of the approach of so happy a day made him cōfesse that he was in paine till it did arriue Luc. 12. Baptismo habeo baptizari quomodo coactor donec veniat Or rather he did not so much say that he was in paine as by words of interrogation in the way after a sort of seeming impatient he asked himselfe this very question in effect How much am I payned how straitely am I imprisoned til I haue my fil of suffering for the loue of man Iust (c) Our Lord did long for the tyme when he might institute the B. Sacrament so may we see that when the time of celebrating the feast of the Paschal lambe was come he grew euen greedily desirous to eate it in the company of his B. Apostles before his Passion And for their comfort he would not choose but say Luc. 22. Desiderio desider aui manducare vobiscum hoc Pascha antequam patiar That he desired it and that with desire vpon desire and such desire as could neuer be appeased till he were satisfied till that tyme of the last supper were past wherin he had resolued to impart vnspeakeable tokens of his loue to them and so the other tyme of his Passion wherin he was to endure the depth of all torments and affronts for the same loue were then immediatly to come In the euening therfore and within few howers of his Passion this enamoured Lord of ours hauing all the parts and passages therof in his eye and looking as it were in the very face of death and such a death he yet (d) Our Lord kept the shew of all his sorrow to himselfe Ioan. 13. laid vp all the sorrow in his owne hart and would discouer to his Apostles no other semblance then of ioy and comfort least his griefe might be a cause of theirs He conuersed with them after his ordinary and familiar manner he disposed himselfe first to eate the Paschall lambe with them After that he sate downe with them to a common Supper He kept his diuine countenance full of quietnes and peace He tooke them close about him on all sides He cheered them vp with his gratious eyes and he carued them with his liberall hands Nay with those hands to the dispēsation wherof his eternall Father had cōmitted all things he disdayned not then to wash the vncleane feete of those poore Apostles For which purpose first he put of his vpper garment as any hired seruant was to haue done Ioan. 13. and by the force of his owne armes he tooke a big vessell full of water out of that he silled a lesser He girt himselfe with a towell into which he tooke their corporall vncleanes as a figure of how he would purify their harts by his sacred Passion For then he was to beare the deformity of their sinnes vpon the shoulders of his body which was a kind of winding sheet to his soule When our Lord had thus performed this act of religion in eating of the Paschall lambe and of incomparable suauity in his conuersation of vnspeakeable humility in the Lotiō of his Apostles feete he returned to the table and amazed all the (e) The Angells might well be amazed to see the sonne of God giue his owne body in food to sinners Angells of heauen whose vnderstāding did euen agonize in seeing him performe that supereminent act of Charity when he instituted the blessed Sacrament of the Altar and ordeyned the holy Sacrifice of the Masse which was so worthy of an infinite God This was done by diuine
goodnes immediatly vpon his hauing washed the Apostles feete And our Lord was pleased by that vnspeakeable humility of his to prepare and exalt them to a participation of so high mysteries as were to follow Ioan. 7. The holy Ghost was not then descended because the sonne of man was not ascēded vp to heauen And therfore it is no meruaile if S. Peter were at that tyme to seeke concerning the reasō why our Lord would vse such an excesse as that But he was told that he should vnderstand the mystery afterward Ioan. 13. and then he would easily know withal that (f) The great purity which is requisite to a Catholique Priest no purity in this world could be too great for the disposing of themselues to that which they went about which was to be ordeyned Priests and not only to partake but also to dispense the pretious body and bloud of our blessed Lord. Our Lord IESVS did therfore take bread into his hands he blessed it and gaue therof to his Disciples when first he had pronounced the words of Consecration ouer it Declaring and consequently making it to be that very body of his which was to be offred vpon the Crosse That being done he also tooke the Chalice and he consecrated that in like manner affirming and therby also making it to be that very bloud which was to be powred out afterward for the saluation of the world He authorized and commaunded them withall to doe the like in commemoration of what he should haue done and suffered for them Now incomparable was the loue which our Lord shewed heerin both in substance circumstance In (g) Most strong in substance most sweet in circumstance substance because he gaue himselfe for the food of his seruants and in the manner of it because he did it in such a sweet and tender fashion towards them at such a tyme when yet his owne hart was oppressed with sorrow through the foreknowledge and expectation of his bitter Passiō which was thē at hand Nay he was pleased as appeareth by the words of the sacred Text to be (h) In the very consecration he speake and thought of his Passion feeding his thoughts actually vpon how he was to giue his body vp by his bitter Passion and to shed his bloud by a violent and most dishonorable effusion euen whilst he was graunting that legacy and consecrating the same body and bloud of his for the comfort and ioy of mankind vnder the familiar and delightful formes of bread wine He was taking his leaue of them though yet he knew not how to leaue them But as he went from them in that visible manner according to which he had conuersed vvith thē til that tyme so yet he vvould bind himself to come in person to them for their comfort though in another forme vvhensoeuer they should haue a mind to call him How our Lord would not harken to those reasons which might haue disswaded him from shewing this great mercy to man Of the necessity of a visible Sacrifice and how our Lord himselfe doth still offer it CHAP. 46. IF reason might haue preuailed it seemes that he should haue taken heed vvhat he vvas about doe Matt. 7. That if Pearles were not to be cast to swyne much lesse vvas this inualuable ievvell to be mis-spent vpon so many vvho vvould continually be vvallovving in the filth of sinne That there vvould be a vvorld of Pagans Iewes Heretiques and vvho vvould not beleeue and would blaspheme the truth therof That millions of Catholikes though they did beleeue it would not yet frequent it but would rather for beare this bread of life this fountaine of heauenly water then the muddy miserable gust of some carnal pleasure or some base interest of the world which yet doth but lead them from a Purgatory in this life to a Hell in the next That some would do worse then to abstayne for notwithstanding that they resolued still to sinne they would yet presume with Sacrilegious mouth to prophane this Lord of heauen and earth to bring God into that house wherof the deuill had possession and dominion And in fine that they would be too few who would often resort to it with due reuerence of that Maiesty with hungar after true sanctity with loue of that immense beauty and with that purity of hart which might forbid them to lauish and wast themselues away in pursuite of creatures This might haue seemed to be the voyce of reason which was to haue diuerted our blessed Lord from submitting himselfe to such indignity as he seemed by his mercy to grow subiect to But (a) How the infinite loue of our Lord made answere in our behalfe to this infinite wisedome he on the other side would needs vnderstand it to be otherwise And that he being an infinite God it vvould become him well to be infinitely good That it should not be long of him if all the world were not inchayned to him by loue That if any man would either vnder-value the benefit and much more if he would abuse it otherwise a most rigorous account should be asked therof And that in the meane tyme it would be comfort inough for him if such as were resolued to serue him might be incorporated to him not only by supernaturall grace but by this supersubstantiall bread which should cause an vnspeakeable vnion betwene him them This was a principall reason why our Lord was pleased to institute both this diuine Sacrifice and Sacrament in this last supper of his but he did it besides for the fulfilling of Prophesies and the perfecting of the figures of the old Testament He was not come as himselfe had formerly affirmed To breake the law but to fulfill it And therfore as he was pleased to eate the Paschall lambe with all those Ceremonies which the law required and which till then were to be of force so (b) The Paschall lambe was a figure both of the death of Christ our Lord and of the B. Sacrament the same being partly a figure of the Passion and Death of our Lord IESVS and much more properly of the Blessed Sacrament and the holy Sacrifice of the Masse it became his Truth and Goodnes to ordaine and institute them at that tyme. For his Church in euery one of the states therof aswell vnder the law of nature as the written law was the Spouse of Christ our Lord and in vertue of that only coniunction it vvas acceptable and pleasing to the eternall Father But particularly it was to be so vnder the Law of Grace vvhen once it should come to be fed by his sacred body and inebriated by his pretious bloud And therfore as in those former tymes the Church of Christ our Lord had neuer bene without her Sacrifices neither is there indeed or can there be any true Religion without a reall and proper Sacrifice so much lesse vvould he permit that Spouse vnder the lavv of
Hierusalem that this bread which is seene by vs is not bread although the tast esteeme it to be bread but that it is the body of Christ Many mothers saith (i) Chrysost hom 83. in Matt. S. Chrysostome put out their children when they are borne to be nurst by others but Christ our Lord would not doe soe but doth nourish vs with his owne body and so doth conioyne glew vs to himselfe O miracle (k) Chrysost l. 3. de Sacerde tio O benignity of God sayth the same S. Chrysostome He that sitteth aboue with the Father at the same instant is handled by the hands of all and he deliuers himselfe vp to such as will receaue and imbrace him And in (l) Chrysost hom 24 c. 10.1 Epist ad Corinth another place he sayth thus That which is in the Chalice flowed out of his side and of that doe we communicate This indeed as sayth S. (m) Saint Ephrem who was familiar with Saint Basil the great lib. de natura Dei non serutanda cap. 5. Ephrem exceedeth all admiration all speach and all conceipt which Christ our Sauiour the only begotten sonne of God hath done To vs who are clad with flesh he hath giuen fire and spirit to eate namely his body and his bloud My bread sayth (n) Ambros l. 4. de Sacra menâ—is S. Ambrose is vsuall bread but this bread is bread before the words of the Sacrament but wheÌ„ the coÌ„secration once doth come of bread it is made the flesh of Christ. Let vs therfore settle this point how that which is bread can be made the body of Christ By consecration This consecration of what speach and words doth it consist Of the words and speach of our Lord Iesus For all the rest which is said is either prayse giuen to God or there are particular prayers made for the people and for Kings and others But when he comes to the tyme of making the B. Sacrament the Priest doth no longer speake in his owne words but in the words of Christ The speach therfore of Christ is that which makes this Sacrament What speach of Christ Thevery same wherby al things were made Our Lord commaunded and the heauen was made Our Lord commaunded and the earth was made Our Lord commaunded and the sea was made Our Lord commaunded al the creatures were made Thou seest therfore how effectually the speach of Christ doth work If (o) Note this consequence then there be such power in the speach of our Lord Iesus as to make those things be which were not how much more effectually will it worke towards the making of them be which are and to make them be changed into other then what they were Therefore (p) Marke well the expresse authority of this Saint that I may answere thee I say That it was not the body of Christ before the consecration but after the consecration I say to thee that then it is the body of Christ. Christ was carried sayth (q) Aug. in Psal 33. Conc. 1. Ibid. S. Augustine in his owne hands when commending his body to his Apostles he said Hoc est corpus meum this is my body for then he carried his body in his hands And agayne Our Lord would place our saluation in his body and bloud But how did he commend his body and bloud to vs In his humility For vnlesse he were humble he would not be eaten and drunke The good Pastour sayth (r) Greg. in hom 14. in Euang. S. Gregory the great laid downe his life for his sheepe that he might turne his body and bloud into our Sacrament might feed the sheepe which he had redeemed by the nutriment of his flesh Vnder the species of bread sayth S. (s) Cyril Ierosol in Catech. Myst 4. Cyrillus Ierosolymitanus the body is giuen thee and vnder the species of bloud the wine that so thou maist become participant of his body bloud So shall we by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is Carryers of Christ when we shall haue receiued his body and bloud into our body and so as S. Peter saith we shall be made consorts of the diuine nature And according to that of S. (t) Cyril l. 10. in Iohn c. 11. Cyrill if any man shall mingle wax which is melted by fire with other wax which is also melted in such sort that they both doe seeme to be but one made of both so by the coniunction of the body and bloud of Christ our Lord he is in vs and we in him S. (u) Greg. l. 4. Dialog c. 58. Gregory doth surther say What faithfull soule can doubt but that in the very hower of the Sacrifice the heauens doe open at the voyce of the Priest and that in this mystery of Christ Iesus the Quires of the Angells doe assist the highest and the lowest things doe meete Terrestriall and Celestiall things are ioyned and there is made one thinge of things which are visible and inuisible Heere then we are taught by the holy Fathers of the Church whome I might haue cited to this purpose both more at large and more in number the inscrutable loue of our Lord IESVS to mankind expressed in these high mysteries of the blessed Sacrament and the holy Sacrifice of the Masse But how shall we be able to disingage our selues for being euen ouerwhelmed with the huge weight therof since the superexcellent Humanity of our (x) The incompable dignity of the person of Christ our Lord. Lord IESVS consisting of that pretious body which first was framed out of purest bloud of the all-immaculate Virgin by the only hand of the holy Ghost and of that glorious soule which in the first instaÌ„t of the creation therof was hypostatically vnited to God the sonne the second person of the most B. Trinity and the same person being indiuisible from the other two of God the Father and God the holy Ghost that this person I say of Christ our Lord should be communicated to all the Priests of the holy Catholike Church to be offred daily ouer all the world and to be receiued into the brest both of them and al the other faithfull children of that mother as often as theÌ„selues should desire What Cherubim is able to discouer the greatnes of this benefit and what Seraphim hath his hart hoat inough to breath out such ardent flames of loue as grow due to God vpoÌ„ this account How full of reason was the exclamation and admiration of holy Dauid when he said Psalm 34. 9. That there was none like to God in the cogitations which he interteyned for our Good No man no creature could euer haue aspired to such a happines or so much as to haue conceaued that euen the diuine nature it selfe had bene able to expresse such goodnes But God is God and God is loue and the loue euen of Creatures is full of (y) How full of Inuention great loue is inuention for
and within our selues and to one another And then wil that be fulfilled which the blessed Apostle sayth 1. Cor. 10. That we are all one bread and one body we who are partakers of that diuine bread and of his Chalice But though this may be truly said to some proportion of all such as doe carefully and deuoutly come to this blessed Sacrament yet most eminently is it true of them who are fed therby in the state of holy Religion Whose perfect (g) The vnion of religious persons is a kind of miroculous thing Vnion hath so very much of the miracle in it that it conuinceth euen the most malicious tookers on For euen they when they are in their wits cānot ascribe it to any other cause then the powerful presēce of the grace of God the powerfull grace of his presēce that such a world of persons of so different incompatible nations ages humours descent dispositions and talents should liue together in as perfect a mutuall consent of mind as if they were all the twynnes of one and the same naturall mother The (h) Of other circumstances which do greatly shew the loue of our Lord. ardent loue of our Lord IESVS doth also as liuely appeare in other circumstances of this diuine Sacrifice and Sacrament of the Altar It is true that such as receaue Christ our Lord with great purity of hart are content as it were to be at cost and care to adorne their soules when they to be sit at this celestiall Banquet are receiued by him with an vnspeakeable communicatiō of himselfe and he imbraceth them with armes of so great delight and ioy as is very different from what he ordinarily doth to such as approach Iesse deuoutly to him At this we are not to wonder for the loue of our Lord IESVS to vs is not like the loue of men which if it be very great it puts them as it were out of their wits But the (i) The loue of our Lord doth no way derogate from his infinite wisedom loue of our Lord God doth not take him one haires breadth from home nor doth it derogate at all from his high wisedome Nor are there in the world any weights either of gold or diamonds so precise or nice as the weights of the wisedome of our Lord God whereby he values euery thought of preparation which is made more or lesse when we approach to his presence And accordingly he receaues vs either like his seruants or like his Sonnes But yet still this is true that there is no person in state of grace who may not celebrate if he be a Priest nor no other man or woman but may communicate otherwise of the body and bloud of Christ our Lord with great profit This (k) Our Lords loue doth still more and more appeare by the cōsideration of other circumstances Lord might haue annexed this incomparable benefit to the only state of perfect Chastity or only to such persons as had performed certaine grieuous penances or at least to such alone as had neuer dishonored or profaned either this soueraigne Sacrifice or most venerable Sacrament by ill receiuing it But his Charity would not endure that any one should be excluded from such a benefit if at last he would be content to loue him He might haue abridged vs to one only tyme of cōmunion in all our life or at least that we should not communicate aboue once a yeare But so farre he was from giuing any such restraint as this that he desires nothing more then that we should often repaire to this food of life Yea and he hath inspired his holy Church by his holy Spirit to counsaile her children to frequent it and to driue them out of her company by (l) They are excōmunicated who doe not communicate once in the yeare excommunication if at certayne tymes they doe not satisfye the longing which he hath to become therby one with them There is no necessity or important occasion in the world either corporall or spirituall either publicke or priuate for which this holy Sacrifice may not be offered And not only brings it profit to liuing men but to such as haue led vs the way to Purgatory where the paines are much discounted heereby as S. Augustine De cura pro mortuis possim and many other of the Fathers doe aboundantly shew So also in our receiuing the blessed Sacrament we of the layty are put to no stint heerin but euery Christian may communicate as often as his owne ghostly Father shall thinke fit And as when (m) The King of Glory vouchsafes to come and visit in person euery beggar we haue health of body we may in euery Church goe to him so when we are sicke we neede take no care in this for he wil be sure to come to vs. And if it were an incomparable mercy as we haue seene it to be in the last discourse of the miracles for our Lord IESVS to visit and cure the sicke of corporall diseases whilst himselfe was mortall how much more is he to be magnified by all the powers of our soules since he cōsines himselfe as a man may say to our Altars and bindes himselfe to be there at all the howers both of day and night and to be ready in all weathers and vpon all warnings and sometimes with small attendance to transport himselfe to the death-bed of euery beggar yea and of euery sinner who may perhaps haue profaned him in the same Sacrament to cure and comfort their afflicted soules And all this he doth now that he is glorious in heauen and sitting at the right hand of God Sometymes (n) He is pleased to be exposed for our cōfort opon our Altars for many howres together he is pleased that we shall not only receaue him which action is begun and ended as it were at an instant but moreouer vpon great solemnities as also vpō other particular occasions of the Church we may haue the cōfort to see the blessed Sacramēt with our corporal eyes for some good tyme together And sometymes it is exposed for the space of forty howers vpon our Altars And because he reapes much honor and vve much good by the meeting of many pious affections in one and for that the multitude of the faithfull is so great in euery good towne that no one Church can hould them for that purpose this mercifull Lord of ours is content to be carried in procession through the streets and publicke places and so to take homage from whole Cittyes at once whereby they (o) How we reuerse the dishonour which was done to our Lord in tyme of the Passion doe the best they can to reuerse the ignominies and affronts which he receiued in the many most paynfull and most shameful processions which he made to the house of Aunas of Cayphas of Pylate of Herod and of Mount Caluary in that night and morning of his bitter Passion for
our Redemption The misery is shewed and the errour is partly conuinced of such as doe not imbrace the beliefe of those diuine Mysteries CHAP. 50. VVHo shall therfore be euer able inough to admire this Soueraigne Lord of loue for the mercy which he hath shewed vs in this blessed Sacramēt of his most pretious body and bloud and for the care he hath taken of the cōpletenes of our comfort heerin Psalm 105. Quis loquetur potentias Domini auditas faciet omnes landes eius Who I say shall be able to declare Gods power and to proclaime his prayses And how much reason therfore is it that there should not be in the world any Priest or other faithfull Christian who will not set vp the rest of all his comfort in this life in frequenting this bread of heauen and in spending some part of his dayes and nights in preparing to receaue this diuine food with due deuotion If our Lord IESVS Lue. 14. tooke it ill in the Ghospell that they would not resort to that supper of his which was indeed a type of heauen it selfe and yet withall of this heauenly mystery how heauily wil he lay it to our charge if we be negligent in comming to this Table whē himselfe is both he who inuites to the banquet the very bāquet it self But O (a) The lamentable ingratitude of such as are not Catholiques misery to be eternally deplored euen with teares of bloud that in these woefull dayes of ours there should be any found with the name of Christians vpon their forehead who yet renounce the benefit yea and expresly blaspheme the inuiolable truth of this mystery Miserable creatures they are a thousand tymes miserable who do by this meanes eyther ignorantly or maliciously degrade and depose themselues from the most soueraigne point of Christian dignity which the infinite wisedome and loue of God himselfe was euen able with all his omnipotency to impart to the meanenes and weakenes of sinfull men Yet some of them being pressed as it were to death by the euident words of Hoc est corpus meum so often iterated by so many of the holy Euangelists haue begun of late yeares to affirme that they beleeue the reall presence of our Lord in the blessed Sacrament as well as wee but only that they dare not pronounce de modo But (b) Theyr speach de modo is a false and foolish stift our Lord doth know that they speake not as they meane but only to abuse the people Neither can they beleeue it as we doe according to their other particular declarations concerning this doctrine And yet in truth if they did beleeue the thing it selfe and did only differ de modo as they say they doe amongst which modo's or wayes they vnderstād our doctrine of Transubstantiation to be one how could they dare so wickedly blaspheme this our Doctrine cōcerning the modus yet professe that they are ignorant of the modus or way how the reall presence comes to be in the B. Sacrament But this (c) The scope of this book is not to teach faith but loue Treatise is not intended for the setling of the truth of the Catholike faith and to conuince them of errour who inpugne it but only to inflame the hart of the true Christian to heate of loue vpon those reasons and motiues which are already ministred by the light of faith to our soules That other taske hath bene performed by multitudes of our learned Authors wherof the world is ful I will only beseech them for the loue of our Lord IESVS that they will procure to purify their hartes from sensuality and other sinne which blindes that soule wherin it raignes till then we will wonder the lesse that men of so bestiall life as the founders of their religion were had no sight wherwith to pierce into so pure mysteries The carnall man cannot discerne of things belonging to God 1. Cor. ◠and if not of things which are but belonging to him how much lesse of the substance of this blessed Sacrament which is God himselfe as truly God as he is God who made heauen and earth In the meane tyme these people deserue much pitty at our hands who whet the teeth not only of infidelity against God but euen of Enuy against themselues For what doth it looke like but enuy since they refuse to beleeue and to imbrace so great a good vpon this cheife reason because they thinke it is too good to be true And (d) The counterfeyt sanctity and preposterous pretence of the humility of Sectaries this peruerse and preposterous humility togeather with a seeming to take such a counterfayte care of the dignity and Maiesty God is one of those bucklers vnder which they hide themselues from the darts of loue which he would faine be shooting at their soules For they say it is an indignity and what if a rat or a dogge should eate the blessed Sacrament and I know not what vnsauoury stuff of the kind But they consider not the while that God receaues farre more dishonour in being prophaned by a Iudas or any other obstinate sinner then if the body of our Lord should be eaten by as many rats as there are blaspheming Heretikes in the world That Sunne true Sunne of Iustice can well inough tell how to keep his beames from being defyled vpon any filthy dunghill And if he could not it would goe hard with him For the diuinity of Christ our Lord IESVS is actually intrinsecally in all the parts of all the creatures of the whole world both by essence presēce and power yea and in all the deuills of hell as truly as in any Angell of heauen or els that thing would instantly giue ouer to be And now if the (e) Note this most certay ne and apparant consequēce diuinity of Christ our Lord be in all vile places without any indignity the humanity how noble soeuer it be will be farre from disdayning to keep it company Little doe these deceaued creatures consider how low our mercifull Lord could be content to descend for the loue of man towards the receauing if there should be cause of dishonour by the meanes either of beasts or other men And I should thinke that the Temptation of Christ our Lord by the Prince of darkenes in the wildernes Matt. 4. might read them a lowd lesson vpon this subiect For there our B. Lord was not only tempted by the deuill but that diuine goodnes did suffer that sacred Sonne of the blessed Virgin to be taken as hath been said posted vp downe in those armes or hands which the infernall Spirit had assumed to himselfe for that purpose Or if they had rather looke vpon the Sonnes and slaues of the deuill then vpon himselfe Let them (f) Note also this consequēce behould how that holy humanity being so knit to God as that it made the selfe same person with him was
griefe and who did euen possesse the knowledge of infirmity His face was as if it were hiddden and despised and we had him in no estimation It was he indeed who bare our infirmities and who suffered our paines and we esteemed of him as of some Leaprous person and as one who had bene strucken by the hand of God and so deiected How truly were these things performed in the persō of Christ our Lord throughout the course and current of his Passion wil instantly be represented heere when first you (b) In the consideration of the Passion of Christ our Lord it is necessary to ponder his infinite Maiesty as he is God shall haue bene desired to looke a little backe with the eye of your consideration vpon the first Chapters of this whole discourse wherin the dignity of the person of Christ our Lord is touched For so when we shall haue coupled that former excellēcy with this present infamy shall withal haue weighed how the only reason that moued him to dispoyle himselfe of the one and to vest himselfe with the other was a desire of the glory of God which might redound to him by our good And that he emptyed himselfe out of his owne felicity to the end that we might partake therof in heauen And did euen as it were inebriate himselfe with the Chalice of affliction affronts and desolation that so in the strength of that he might secure vs from the eternall chaines of fire in hell I (c) The vse of these consideratiōs thinke we shal not be so blindly bold nor so wickedly vngratefull as not to detest our sins which were the cause of all his sorrow and continually to lament and serue loue that Lord who was pleased to vndergoe such penance for them Consider therfore I say that he whose Passion you are to read was the only Sonne of the sacred Virgin Mary that most excellēt and perfect pure Creature that euer was Cōsider that his humanity was framed by the hād and skill of the holy Ghost out of her Royall and all-immaculate bloud Consider that he was beautifull aboue all the Sonnes of men for cōplexion for constitution Psalm 44. and for grace and motion Consider the complete sanctity of his holy soule which animated that body so full of beauty The high purity the wide charity the profound humility the entyre conformity and transformity of his will into the will of God with al other vertues in the highest degree which God could communicate to a creature Consider the other incomparable guifts and graces which were imparted to him or rather ingulfed in him beyond all measure proportion That guift of Prophesy and Miracles That treasure of incorruptible wisedome That euer flowing riuer of his infallible Knowledge Experimentall Infused Beatificall Cōsider that this body and soule were knit by the indissoluble bond of Hypostaticall vnion to the second person of the most blessed Trinity who according to the words of the Creed of the Councell of Nice is God of God light of light true God of true God begottens not made consubstantiall with the Father by whom all things were made Consider if thou canst the infinite eternall simple vnchangeable independant essence and wisedome and power goodnes of this diuinity It being the fountaine of Immortality Purity Liberty Verity Clarity Peace Plenty Grace Glory Swauity Excellency Beauty Maiesty Felicity Prouidence Preseruation Protection Iustice Mercy Pitty Longanimity and Loue. Consider that to euery of these Attributes there belongs an addition of being infinite and that in a word he is the substāce and the summe the circumference and the Center of all Originall created perfection Of the most tender and diuine Loue and care which our Lord Iesus shewed at his entrance into the Passion in his last sermon and long prayer to his eternall Father CHAP. 53. THIS man this God this God and man did abandon himselfe so farre as to suffer hideous things for the loue of vs. And we are bound with our whole harts not onely to carry great compassion towardes him but to fly a mayne from all that which is any way offensiue to him who did voluntarily and with a kind of infinite charity cast himselfe into such a bed of Thornes for our sakes For as soone as our Lord had instituted the blessed Sacrament of the Altar and the holy Sacrifice of the Masse and had therby (a) The Apostles ordayned Priests with authority to ordayne others to the end of the world ordayned his Apostles Priests who in the person of their successours and such as should lawfully be sent by them might perpetuate the celebratiō of those diuine misteries till the end of the world he went disposing himselse to that Passion which Iudas was already gone to bring vpon him And notwithstanding that he knew how vast things they were to be yet desired he with excessiue appetite to imbrace them This is plainely insinuated by that expression of the holy Prophet who saith of Christ (b) Our Lord did long for his fill of suffering for our sakes Ierem. Thren 30. our Lord Saturabitur opprobrijs which implyes a being hungry after the enduring of reproach and scorne for vs as a man might be after some curious and costly banquetting dish and that at the tyme of his Passion he should be sure to haue his longing satisfied But before he went forth to the place where he knew he should be betrayed and apprehended he resolued to take a kind of leaue of his Apostles he had intertayned thē with a large and amourous and most mysterious discourse And although as a man may say one of his feete were already in the graue and that he was soone to find the whole rage and fury of hell vpon him for the sending of the other after it he (c) Out Lord was tenderly carefull to comfort his Apostles in the middst of his owne greatest sorrowes applyed himselfe yet to comfort them and to forget himselfe as was sayd before with such a courage as might well become that man who was the naturall Sonne of God and with such a loue as might well declare the diuine pitty which he carried to the Sonnes of men For from hence it came that he tooke such tender care to arme them against all future feares He told them to this effect and almost in these very wordes That indeed he was to goe away but withall Ioan. 14.15.16.17 that he went to prouide a place for them He assured them that their afflictions whensoeuer they might happen should not last but quickly be conuerted into ioy and such a ioy as neuer should be taken from them He insinuated himselfe to their rude capacities by sweet and tender comparisons He made the eternall Father to be a husbandman that so himselfe might be the vine wherof they were to be the braunches He told them what care the Father himselfe would take to purge and purify their soules from tyme
you looke for some Traytour or seditious enemy of God and man your leuell is ill layed Though yet for the glory of God for the exercise of all vertue and for the recouery of the world from hell and sinne I am content to be mistaken for such a one Yet nothing could induce them to relent But as the manner is with men who when they are desperately resolued to doe a thing which their conscience telleth them that reason requires them to forbeare the greater the force of that reason is which is prest against them the more eagarly are they inflamed euen blinded with rage to worke their will As soone therfore as they had apprehēded bound him with far greater cruelty then any Christian hart knowes how to imagine it cannot be chosen but that they would dragge him more like a dogge then a man Not (g) What soeuer incommodity they indured was reuéged by the vpō our Lord. that he went vnwillingly but because the presse must needs be great and they were also in bloud against him and would all so desire to be the executioners of some particular affliction and affront vpon him that they could not but hinder one another And then if any of them were iustled if any chanced to st̄ble or fall vpon whom would they reuenge themselue but vpon him who with patience which was indeed diuine permitted himselfe to be carried in that painefull iourney to the howse of Annas vnder that cruell cudody which the accursed Iudas had aduised them to keep him in Of the blow which was giuen vpon the face of our B. Lord in the high Priests howse of the fall of S. Peter How our Lord was taxed first of Blasphemy and of the excessiue Loue of our Lord in dll these particulars CHAP. 60. SHALL I need to say that it shewed an infinite kind of loue in our Lord that he vvould vouchsafe to be presented before Annas and then before Cayphas at their seuerall hovvses Matt. 26. Luc. 22. Ioan. 18. and before all that race of persidious Ievves vvho thē very thē cōspired his death That he being the fountaine of vvisedom knovvledge and the King of glory vvould for our sakes be arraigned and be contented to passe vnder the censure of those slaues of the deuill vvho vvas his slaue And he in their prosecuting of that suite against him to maintaine that inuincible patience and profund silence notvvithstanding all their clamours and so seldome to haue opened that blessed mouth of his He referred himselfe that first tyme when he vvas examined about his Doctrine to the iudgment of themselues Ioan. 18. vvho had heard him teaching in the Temple And vvhen for saying but so in the vvay of anvvere to the high Priest a barbarous vvretch Ibid. vvho vvas attending in that Court knevv that he should please his betters by it stroocke that face vvith his polluted hand vvhich the Angells doe so reuere and reioyce to see he did not damne him nor strike him dead 1. Pet. 1. vvhich yet most easily most iustly he might haue done nor so much as sharpely rebuke or reprehend him for it though it vvere so levvd an affront as is neuer vvont to be put vpon any slaue in the vievv of Iustice But he asked him only vvith great meeknes why he strooke him if he had spoken well and if he had spoken ill Ibid. why did he not informe the Court against him By vvhich kind of plea our Lord though he vvere the Creatour of all things did not assume to himselfe the least aduantage aboue the vvickedest and basest thing aliue That so by suffering he might shevv hovv much he loued vs. For the more he suffered the more rich the Church vvas to be of merits so the more copious our Redemption Whilst these things vvere acting Psalm 120. in the house of Cayphas S. Peter who at the apprehension of Christ our Lord vvas fled avvay vvith the other Apostles for (a) Our Lord was euer in care to giue vs comfort our Lord IESVS vvas content to be vvholly abandoned euen by his dearest friends that it might serue for our comfort vvhen vve are forsaken by ours could find no resting place for his thoughts till together vvith S. Iohn he came after our Lord to the hovvse of Cayphas But vvhether it vvere that his countenance complayned of some perplexity or that the manner of his speach or habit made it be thought that he vvas a Disciple of Christ our Lord he vvas questioned by diuers and he denied his Maister to them all and said vvith oathes and protestations Marc. 14. that he did not so much as know the man A great offence in it self a iust punishmēt of a former fault which he had made in presuming vpon his ovvne strength For that vnspeakeable loue vvhich he bare to our blessed Lord vvhich vvas not only as of a friend to a friēd or as of a Disciple to his Doctour but of any indulgēt father who might halfe doate vpon a Sonne did seeme novv to him to be so cōnatural to his very soule as that he thought he could not loose it but vvith his life Wheras in very deed it vvas the meere guift of God and for such he ought to haue acknovvledged it and so distrusting himselfe he should haue confided in our Lord. It vvas therfore pleasing to our deere Redeemer to permit that denyall out of infinite loue both to S. Peter and to vs though it could not but goe the vvhile very deeply to his ovvne tender hart that S. Peter who was not only one of his friends but of his fauourities should forsweare that he did not so much as know him He (b) How our Lord did loue S. Peter euen in suffering him thus to full Ibid. loued S. Peter in suffering him thus to fall for therby he taught him how to stand more firmely afterward which is neuer to be done by any soule but vpon the ground of humility He loued him also most deerly in making him rise againe so soone both by the shew of his corporall presence to the others eyes of flesh and bloud and by the sweet pure light of his grace which was imparted to the eyes of his soule And that light had so much heat also with it as to draw vp the vapours which powred themselues down afterward at full speed through his cloudy eyes Our Lord be euer blessed for his owne infinite goodnes who in the bitterest of those sorrowes shewed such mercy and had such memory both of him and vs. For thus the world is filled with Sea-markes which instruct vs how to saile through the Tempest of this life towards the safe port of heauen That when we passe by a Iudas we may take heed of auarice and enuy because it ends in desperation And when we passe by a S. Peter we may forbeare to fall vpon selfe conceipt which will put vs vpon many sinnes and
which afterward will cost and can be only cured by penance It was also an act of excessiue charity in Christ our Lord to let him feed vpon the experience of his owne frailty that so hauing a resolution to make him the supreme Pastour of his Church and to giue him the keyes of pardoning Matt. 16. and reteyning sinnes he might easily pitty others since he had fallen into so deepe a pit himselfe and all others also might be kept very farre from presuming to confide in their owne vertue since euen S. Peter was not able to secure himselfe from growing worse But as for those (c) A defence of S. Peter from the reproach which sectaries would lay vpnn him Luc. 22. wicked people who in the hatred they haue to the Catholike Church would impute to the head therof that in this denyall of his he had lost his faith they are not so much as to be heard For the holy Scripture insinuates no such things but the very contrary since Christ our Lord himselfe declared how he had prayed already to his eternall Father that S. Peters faith might neuer faile and moreouer the voyce of reason and the streame of all the holy * Aug. de correp gra c. 8. Chryshom 81. in Matth. Theophilact in c. 22. Lucaeâ— alij passim Fathers doth condemne that errour And we see how soone he returned to bitter penance for his fault And it was farre from the loue of our Lord to suffer that this most excellent Apostle should fall out-right into infidelity who had neuer offended him before but venially and only out of too free a hart Nor euen now but by the meere mistaking of the confines of Grace and nature which were not so well set out till afterward by the comming of the holy Ghost And of this we are certaine that before he had loued our Lord most vnspeakably tenderly and at a clap he had left all the world (1) Matt. 9. for him and had cast himselfe into the very (2) Matt. 14 Sea to approach him and at the apprehension of our Lord he had drawne his (3) Ioan. 18. poore single sword in his defence against so many hundreds of Armed men and he had woÌ„ded one of the hoaâ—est of them it was nothing but euen (4) Mare 14. the very passion of loue to our Lord that seized his hart which could carry him so instantly into so apparaÌ„t danger as it must be for him to put himselfe in the high Priests howse when he was but then newly come from wounding his seruaÌ„t Malchus And though this sinne of denying our Lord IESVS were a very great one yet all the deuills of hell cannot make it more then of meere frailty and his pennance for it began almost at the very instant when it was committed and that continued till the last moment of his life At which tyme he gaue insteed of teares his bloud vpon a Crosse as our Lord had done for him but with his head turned downeward through humility And the holy Scripture sheweth Luc. 24. how our Lord appeared to him alone after his Resurrection we heare not that he once rebuked him for that former sinne And before his Ascension vve are very sure since the holy Ghost it selfe hath said so that our Lord making S. Peter declare the loue which he bare him at three seuerall tymes before the Apostles he gaue him the charge both of them and all the rest who would be either lambes or sheepe of his flocke Ioan. 15. Now since our Lord himselfe vvho vvas offended and vvho best can tell hovv deepely did so svveetly and so magnificently forgiue and forget S. Peters sinne it is but a signe of a cankered and malicious minde to be exagerating the same vpon al occasions And let them vvho are so insolent in taxing this Prince of the Apostles for his sinne of frailty in denying Christ our Lord vvho is the head Note at that tyme vvhen truth could be discerned but as by the light of a candle Let them I say take heed that dayly themselues be not committing farre greater sinnes against the same truth vvhilst they are not only denying but blaspheming and afflicting it in the body of Christ our Lord which is his Church vvhich truth Isalm 19. they yet may see as by the light of the Sunne For in she sunne God hath placed his Tabernacle vvhich S. Augustine vnderstandeth of his Church The vvicked Priests suborned false vvitnesses against our Lord but he vvould not so much as reproach them for it much lesse conuince them of levvd practice nor enen open his mouth vvhen it might any vvay haue bene in his ovvne discharge Only vvheÌ„ Cayphas coniured him in the name (d) The high seuerence which our Lord did carry to the name of God Matt 26. of God to say whether he were the Sonne of God or no both because he had the place of high Priest at that tyme and yet further for the high reuerence vvhich he carryed to the holy name of God his ansvvere vvas expresse and cleere though short and meeke That he was the sonne of God And heerpon they declared him to be vvorthy of death as a blasphemer O false painted face of the world how vayne and deceiptfull are thy iudgments and how many are there now a dayes who if they should see a Cayphas sit with great solemnity authority and attendance vpon the cause of Christ our Lord who were coÌ„temptibly staÌ„ding at a barre and should heere a Cayphas affirme that he were an ennemy to the word of thé Lord or the State would infallibly ioyne with him against our Lord be drawne by those vayne appearances to beleeue for the tyme that they said true But whatsoeuer the thought of the people was of Christ our Lord his enamoured hart did so deadly thirst after their good and ours vpon any termes as that he being God did not abhorro to be accounted a blasphemer of God so that by the applicatioÌ„ of that pretious merit to vs we might of slaues become the Sonnes of his eternall Father And (e) The loue of our Lord Iesus to vs made him easily ouercomâ— all difficulties Ibid. howsoeuer it was an vnspeakeable detestation of that thing which raigned in his most reuerent soule yet was his loue to the name and imputation therof in effect as vnspeakeable since the more deeply he had cause to be auerted from it the more aboundantly he deserued by it for vs. But the Priest cried our Blasphemy what need haue we now of any witnesses Those hypocryticall eyes were cast vp to heauen the garments were rent and our Lord without his answering any one word was esteemed and decreed by them all to be worthy of death We haue read of Saints who haue bene armed with patience against all other affronts but when they haue bene called Heretiques they could not chuse but breake their pace and declare
Grace And from any one of these Vnions not only could he neuer be separated indeed but not so much as doubt that he might be so To say therfore that he was forsaken by God in respect of any of those former wayes of Vnion is grieuously to blaspheme the God of heauen and earth and to prophane the dignity and Maiesty of the soule of Christ our Lord and impiously to interprete and attribute that excesse of his diuine charity to the deepest dishonour which he could receâ—ue as that most wicked (*) Caluin Lib. 2. Instit. cap. 26. §. 10.21.12 in harm mc. 27. Matth. Sectary hath presumed to doe Affirming that our Lord despayred of Gods mercy vpon the Crosse when he vttered those words And that he felt the very paines of the damned in his soule the greatest wherof is the knowledge and feeling of hauing lost Almighty God And although he will pretend that he exalts the mercy of God heerby since God suffered his Sonne to endure the very paynes of hell for the reliefe of man yet besides the hideous blasphemy which these words doe euen of themselues inuolue the wretched Heretique is so blind withall as not to know or so wicked as not to confesse (d) A demonstratioÌ„ wher by that blasphemy is defected that the dignity of Christ our Lord was such in regard of the hypostaticall vnion with the diuinity that any one single sigh alone of his being applyed by faith and charity had bene of merit to saue innumerable millions of worlds of meÌ„ though euery of them had bene as wicked as that most wicked man himselfe If therfore one only sigh had beene inough for the redemption of the world then certainly those other many and most sublimely accomplished acts of vertue which that happy soule of Christ our Lord did worke through the whole course of his diuine life being accoÌ„panyed by those vnspeakable torments which he endured with a kind of infinite loue to vs in his sacred passion before his death will make his redemption of vs most superabundantly copious without needing to haue recourse to any such impious and hereticall blasphemy as that miserable man suckt from the authour of lyes to be dispersed by the disciples of his lewd Doctrine The Catholike Doctrine the truth is that which hath already bene declared That our Lord IESVS was content to be depriued of all sense feeling of diuine comsort which he expressed by those dolorous words of his And his pleasure also was that we should be told that he vttered them with a loud voyce Ibid. To (e) Why our Lord spake those words with a loud voyce the end that euen from the most remote corners of our hard harts we might heare theÌ„ and adore him for them And now as he asked not that question with a lowd voyce as if the eternall Father could not haue heard him if he should haue spokeÌ„ softly so neither did he aske it at all as not knowing or needing to be certified why he was so forsaken by him since our Lord knew all things And how should he be ignorant of that which so much concerned himselfe he who knew the secrets of all harts and how the eternall Father would dispose therof Colos 23 and in whome the all treasures of knowledge wisedom were heaped vp But he asked that question to the end that we might seeke for the Answere of it and seeking it might find it and finding it out might learne to know both the grieuousnes of sinne therby which was so sharpely punished vpon Gods owne only Sonne the infinite torments from which we are to be deliuered by such a costly meanes the inestimable value of grace for the purchase wherof to our vse Christ our Lord was content to sel whatsoeuer he could part withall both in body and reputation euen in the inferiour part of his very soule the vnspeakeable glory of the kingdome of heauen which was only to be opened thus by the Golden maister-key of the infinite loue of Christ our Lord. For vpon the only turning of this key towards vs those lockes do all fly open wherin the eternity of selicity is treasured vp for vs in the house of God Of the excessiue loue which our Lord Iesus did expresse by the silence and solitude wherwith he endured those vnspeakeable torments vpon the Crosse and how the whyle he was negotiating our cause with God CHAP. 73. THIS Passion opens the doore of eternall felicity to vs but heere we see how for the tyme it did shut the gate of comfort against our B. Lord. For betwene the end of his three first speaches and this complaint which he made to his eternall Father which was the first of his fower last there passed vpon the point of three full howers during all which tyme this Sonne of the Virgin did not once so much as open his blessed mouth O that our Lord would heere graunte the suite of his humble seruants whilst they desire to haue some sight and tast of that dolorous condition wherin then he was lodged for our sinnes O that we might partake some little part of that amazement wherwith al the quires of heauenly spirits did abound when they saw their Creator planted in the ayre vpon a Crosse deformed from head to foote with torments prophaned with blasphemies attended in sileÌ„ce by darkenes yet withall so far from taking reuenge of any dishonor that had bene done him as that he suffered still with entire submission and with inuincible loue both of God and man But that which still me thinks makes the rest more strange and wherin more of the God appeares is that straÌ„ge kind of silence (a) The admirable silence of our Lord and how he did not once coÌ„plavne either of his paynes or our sinne wherof I spake before and that totall absence of expressing any manner of complaint by so much as any one word yea or euen sigh or groane It was said before that our Lord himselfe had inuited the world to behold the case wherin he was and if we were content to do so vpon the summons of Pilats Ecce homo how much more are we to six our harts vpon this tragicall figure of our owne making now that we are called to it by Christ our Lord. I cannot thinke of this strange spectacle what me thinkes I would nor can I yet say what I thinke but in weake and cloudy manner Our Lord giue vs grace to thinke and say heerof as we ought and that we any doe as he deserues But certainly since he hath giuen vs such faculties of mind as wherwith to wonder at strange things his meaning is that we should imploy them vpon such an obiect as is his bottomles hart in this tyme of his hanging vpoÌ„ the Crosse For then was he sacrificing himself vpon that Crosse as vpoÌ„ the Altar of whole world at once Then (b) The infinite affaires our Lord did
be the last of his life But (b) The reason why our Lord declared his thirst this Lord of ours was pressed so close by his spirituall thirst of suffering as it were infinite things for the loue of vs and for the gayning instructing our soules by these examples of his inuincible patience as that it made him contemne euen forget his owne materiall thirst though it were to him of excessiue paine This Originall of Religious Obedience which is Christ our Lord doth also shew heerby the forme wherin Religious persons are to expresse themselues to their Superiours Which (c) A good lesson for Religious men is not to be so much by way of earnest desire of that which they would haue as by way of declaration of that wherof they are in want and when that is done the Superiours are to proceed as they see cause For so did Christ our Lord forbeare to desire to drinke and he only said That he was thirsty to those souldiers who were made his Superiours by his owne admirable humility and charity submitting himselfe entirely to their wills who were bribed and bent to doe him all the mischiefe they could For when he told them of his thirst what was it which they could find in their harts to giue him The same thing which they had offered him before in iest and in the way of scorne the same they were content to giue him now in earnest for a conclusion to all their cruell courtesies When they were going to crucify him they would not giue him wine til it were distempered with Gaul Matt. 27. Marc. 25. which is the Embleme of malice and bitternes And now that he is giuing vp the Ghost they present him with a spunge full of Vinegar which is the Embleme of rage and sowernes O vncharitable wretches and who made you of men such sauage monsters But O infinite Charity and meekenes and patience of Christ our Lord who accepted of al without the least reproofe of their impiety And as at the foote of the Crosse he had refused to drinke of that Gaul because it was mingled with wine to the end that he might be suffering whilst he liued without any drop of the wine of comfort yea or so much as the being knowne to want it so now that he was vpō the very point of death he refused not to drinke of that pure vinegar because it was all sharpe and sower He left those draughts which should haue any mixture of comfort in them with Crosses for those Martyrs whome he meant to make glorious by following his diuine example And by his taking the vinegar of tribulation he did conuert it into the wine of strength cōfort after a cōtrary māner to that wherby wicked men are wont through their ingratitude to turne the wine of his blessings into the vinegar and Gaul of sinnes agaynst him Abusing the abundance of his mercy and making that a motiue of their wicked liberty which would tye any honest hart so much the more inseparably to his seruice He also dranke this vinegar to (d) The many excellēt reasons why our Lord was pleased both to endure and to declare his thirst the end that as already he had sanctified the mortificatiō of the other senses by his example for the instruction and consolation of his faithfull seruants so also they might be taught by this to be far and very farre from all superfluous care of meate and drinke and much more from all inordinate delight therin since all the sweete meates wherwith our blessed Lord was pleased to make vp his mouth in this mortall life was but a draught of vinegar out of a sponge at his death By this drinking therfore he enableth vs to be content with course and common and vnpleasant meat and drinke and by the merit of his thirsting after this corporall drinke he hath killed and quenched our spirituall thirst after vaine and vicious delights which nourish and feed vp our soules in sinne And so also on the other side according to S. Augustines expositiō of the sixty eight Psalme our Lord IESVS did not only declare his extreme thirst of corporall drinke but also his ardent thirst after the saluation of his enemies and of all the world How infinitely therfore shall we be without excuse if we giue him not to drinke of our good deeds since he is so greedy of them and was so tormented for want therof Yea and how worthy shall we be of all reproach and paine if he hauing begun to vs in so sad a Cup with desire thirst of our good we shall not procure to resemble him by thirsting both in body and soule after the aduancing and increasing of his Glory Of the entyre consummation of our Redemption which was wrought by Christ our Lord vpon the Crosse and of the perfection of his diuine vertues expressed there CHAP. 75. OVR Lord IESVS hauing drunke this vinegar declared that whatsoeuer had bin prophesied to be accomplished by himselfe was now fulfilled and he signified it by saying this word Consummatum est All is fulfilled And as he who only refresheth and filleth the soule of man with whole flouds of ioy was already content to be tormented with thirst so now for the apparailing of our soules with the life of Grace he was ready to deuest himselfe of the life of Nature He had formerly complyed with the care which he had of our instruction and now we haue seeue how he hath accomplished our Redēption by his Passion By meanes of this Passion he finished the building of his Church And since he had formerly layd a note of folly Ioan. 19. vpon such a man as should beginne to rayse a building and not bring it afterward to perfection our Lord who was the increated Wisedome of the Eternall Father must needs be farre from falling into any errour of the same kind And indeed it was wholy necessary that in his great goodnes to vs he should not depriue vs of such a diuine example of perseuerance as now we haue obtayned by the Cons̄mation of his course of Passion vpon the Crosse since (a) All labour is lost without perseuerance Deut. 23. without perseuerance all our labour is but lost Our Lord did therfore perseuere and he did perfect that which he had begun If the workes of God are most truly sayd to be entirely perfect his Passiō was to be so in most particular māner which amōgst these other workes is said with a kind of eminency to be his worke Now what sufferance could be more perfect in the way of humility then for the Lord of life and glory most willingly to endure a death of excessiue contumely and shame at the hands of his Rebellious Sonnes and most wicked slaues What more perfect in the way of patience and purity of hart then to suffer without the accesse of any imaginable comfort as Christ our Lord vouchsafed to doe What more perfect in the
paine that is to say any spirituall Crosse which the holy wise hand of God shall think fit to send vs and to do it for his sake who dyed vpoÌ„ that materiall Crosse And now we haue seene by all this holy History of our Lord IESVS that whether he be aliue or dead he is all ours and in despight of sinne he will make vs also wholy his if we will but now and then consider how he sold and abandoned himselfe for our benefit Psalm â—â— It was sayd by his seruant in his person Sicut aqua effusus sum I am powred out and spilt like water which euery base creature treads vpon Now water besides is a most obedient kind of thing It easily takes what impression you will it applyes it selfe to whatsoeuer place you will put it to Looke backe therfore and see if our Lord haue not bene powred out like water What place or posture or what kind of punishment did he refuse which they would put him in Or what thing was that which they would not make him subiect to which eyther the head could inueÌ„t or the hart inflict or the hand could act He seemed not in that part to haue bene so much a man as a very thing a passiue substance a liuelesse instrument a pile of grasse in the presence of a great winde vpon which they had all power to worke their will for he had giuen his away He turned head at nothing but accepted of all the scorne and paine which they could load him with In the (d) How our Lord was subiect to all kinds of oppressioÌ„ Garden we haue seene how for waÌ„t of others he was his own executioner tooke such sad thoughts into his hart as himselfe was not ashamed to expresse In his appreheÌ„sion or taking he was subiect to the fury of a popular tumult though it were coÌ„tenanced afterward by the lying face tongue of Iustice in the house of Annas and Cayphas to make that seeme laudable which indeed was damnable He was subiect in that house to the hypocrisy and enuy of the Priests of his owne Law togeather with the indignity which the Sycophant did him by that blow vpon his diuine face In the imprisonment of that night he was wholy subiect to the courtesy of those keepers of his who had only a care not to kill him before day that then they might after a manifold kind of manner In the examinations of Pilate he would submit himselfe to the Tribunall of a Pagan and in that of Herod to the scorne of the secular power of his owne Religion And both there afterward in Pylates Court to all the torments and shame which could be deuised by those disolute souldiers In his way to Mount Caluary he would be silent to that world of clamour and when he was arriued to the top of the hill those bloudy executioners were not so insolent cruell in commaÌ„ding as he was mild ready to obey If (e) How entirely our blessed Lord would needs submit himselfe to al kind of insoleÌ„cies they had a minde to binde him he meekely offered them his armes for that purpose If they had a mind to box beate him to plucke him by the venerable hayre or beard if to spit vpon his diuine face he neuer so much as turned it either from their rage or scorne but they strocke spit vpon him at their pleasure If they had a minde to strip him starke naked they did it he replyed not against it though I nothing doubt but that it was the greatest torment which he endured and they stripped him not only once but fower seuerall tymes and the last tyme of the fower did continue till that happy syndon his winding sheete receiued shut him vp from their eyes If they had a mind to scourge him he let them doe it in most bloudy manner which transformed that vnspeakeable beauty into a kind of leprousy at an instant If they would resolue that his imperiall head should be also wounded that after a manner both of torment reproach beyond example he did not so much as aske by what commission they did it but he submitted that diuine head to a crowne of long piercing thornes If not content with that they were yet desirous to renew his paines to giue him at once many wounds in that most sensible part of his body and that as often as they should list he lent them a Reed wherwith they might doe it by striking him vpon the head at theirfancy If yet they should resolue to pierce his body through through in the most liuely parts therof with cruell nayles he extended his hands feete to admit what soeuer they could deuise to doe If they had an humour to scoffe and to blaspheme him he had eares wherwith to heare them and yet he had a hart wherwith to pray for them whilst they were cursing him So truly and so entirely did he powre himselfe out as any water might be spilt which costeth nothing He powred forth his sighes and prayers in the presence of God and his teares in the view both of God and man He powred forth his bloud both through the anguish of his minde through the torments of his body He powred forth his honour in being so prophanely blasphemed and so opprobriously spit vpon and in being so shamefully and so often buffeted and stript of all his cloathes in the sight of all those worlds of people and lastly he powred forth his precious life which he resigned into the hands of his eternall Father A Conclusion of this discourse of the Passion of Christ our Lord and the vse which we are bound to make thereof For the greater that the loue and mercy is which he expressed therein the more excessiue will his rigour be for our contempt therof CHAP. 78. BVT howsoeuer this water of the fountaine of life were spilt with strange liberality for our good yet there fel not one drop for which we shall not be called to a most strict account if we be so wretched as not to saue it from being lost For we (a) The mystery of the Passion death of Christ our Lord doth looke very many wayes at once are to vnderstand that it was not any one onely part which was represented by Christ our Lord vpoÌ„ the Crosse but they were very many it coÌ„cernes vs much to marke theÌ„ all Not only doth the infinite mercy of God shine brightly in this mistery wherin we see that his own increated Sonne was content to dy for the saluation of man but his infinite Iustice also doth no lesse appeare since it would not be satisfied with lesse then the death of such a Sonne Not only may we heere discerne the pitty which he beareth towards sinners but he giueth vs also as cleere a prospect vpon his vnspeakeable detestation of sinne since for the abolishing therof he was then to imploy no lesse
and the world In the former three he aymed at our only good and in the latter to his owne which yet withall was also ours In the first of those three which was the prayer to his Father Pater dimitte illis non enim sciunt quid faciunt Father forgiue them for they know not what they doe those persecut ours of Christ our Lord were principally intēded by that diuine goodnes but yet withall those men were a kind of figure and represented after a sort all the sinners of the whole world in their persons and so he prayed for the forgiuenes of them all Luc. Ibid. In the second which was his speach to the good Thiefe Amen dico libi hodie mecum eris in Paradiso I tell thee that for certaine thou shalt be with me in Paradise this very day the same good thiefe was assured of his saluation after a most eminent manner but yet withall he was a Type and his person did expresse the character of all sinners truly penitent whome our Lord doth instantly restore to his grace fauour Ioan. 19. vpon their humble and constant desire thereof In the third which was the speach to his B. Virgin-Mother and his most beloued disciple Mulier ecce filius tuus and then Ecce mater tua woman behould thy sonne then to him behold thy mother as this sacred Virgin and this Disciple were in most particular manner designed to be the Mother and Sonne of one mother so yet S. Iohn therin did carry the person of all mankind by being made the Sonne of that most excellent Mother Such was the stile which our Lord held in his death and such it had euer bene throughout the whole course of his life to speake (c) How the speaches of Christ our Lord were many of thē meant chiefly to such as were then present to him and yet expresly also to such as were to succeed in the world afterward chiefly to thē who were present and yet expresly also to those others who were absēt thē vnborne And this truth doth abundantly appeare by the Euangelicall history and to doubt heerof were to say the sunne is darke Since God was content to be made man for the loue of men we are brought more easily to belieue that man shall be made a kind of God in heauen And so when we know and consider that through Christ our Lord who is the naturall Sonne of God we may all become the adopted Sonnes of God yea and so we are if we dispose our selues to be like God our Father and consequently to Christ IESVS our elder brother for that the Father and Sonne are so very like that one of thē is well knowne by the other it (d) How we are made the brothers of our Lord Iesus both by the fathers the Mothers side will seeme lesse strange and nothing disagreable to the infinite mercy of our Redeemer that as he had vouchsafed to make vs his brethren by the Fathers side who is God he would also be pleased to make vs his brethren by the mothers side as he was man adopting vs in the person of S. Iohn to be all the Sonnes of the sacred Virgin Nor did that deernes of his loue shine lesse in that he would cōmunicate his mother to vs thē in that he was pleased that al his other blessings should be common betwene him and vs. And as Ioseph the Patriarke loued his brother Gen. 41. by the mothers side with most tendernes so it seemes as if our Lord would euen oblige himselfe to affect vs with a greater tēdernes of loue now that he had receaued vs as it were into the same very bowells of purity which had borne himselfe As our Lord IESVS is our brother for many reasons especially because we are made his coheyres of eternall glory in the kingdom of heauen so in regard that we are made so by the benefit and purchase of his redemption consequently that he begot vs by so excellent a meanes to that rich inheritance he (e) How Christ our Lord is not only our brother but our father also Isa 9. Ephes 2. is also in holy Scripture called not only our brother but our Father And so the holy Euangelicall Prophet Esay speaking of the glorious Tytle of Christ our Lord setteth this downe among the rest that he is Pater futuri saeculi The Father of the future age that is of Christians whome by his faith and Sacraments he would beget to God This Tytle of Father cost him very deere for was there any Mother who by the way of naturall birth did bring forth any child with such excesse of torment to her selfe as this Father of ours IESVS Christ our Lord did with excesse of anguish and affliction beget euery one of them who of the children of wrath were to be made by his meanes the Sonnes of God And therefore as in course of naturall descent Christ our Lord was the Sonne of the sacred Virgin so if we consider him as the Father and regeneratour of vs all to grace then our Lord and the blessed Virgin may in some sort be accompted rather as the spouses then as the Sonne and Mother of one another This way of cōsidering Christ our Lord our B. Lady ought not seeme strange to vs since partly holy Scripture and partly the cōsēt of the holy Fathers of the primitiue Church do so expresly set it forth to our sight 1. ad Cor. 15. For frō hence it is that Christ our Lord is so often called the (f) How our Lord Iesus is called the second Adam our B Lady the second Eue. second Adam who was to repaire the ruines which the former had drawne downe about the head and eares of mankind And hence also it is that we see it manifestly insinuated in holy Scripture and cleerly and euidently expresled by the holy Fathers that as Christ our Lord came to supply the place of the former adam so our B. Lady was to vs a second a better Eue then the former that she wrought both for her selfe vs as a most eleuated instrument and partly as a cause of our restitution to that inheritance which had bene forfeited by the former But yet with this great difference that as betwene the former Adam and Eue the Originall prime poyson of the first sinne came chiefly and primitiuely from the serpent to Eue and then in a second kind of degree from her to Adam and frō him to vs So betwene this latter Adam and Eue which is Christ our Lord our B. Lady the roote ground of that grace wherby the redemption of the world was wrought came originally and fundamentally from God to Christ our Lord and after a secondary instrumentall manner through her Sonne our Lord to our B. Lady It is shewed how our Blessed Lady and Eue doe resemble one another and how they differ and our Blessed Lady is
Virgin But this which I haue already said will suffice to shew how the one was a type and figure of the other and that the holy Fathers of the Church declare that howsoeuer they are both our Mothers in seuerall respects yet that the East and West are not so farre off from one another as this latter holy humble Eue doth in sanctity excell the former And now to the point of her being the Mother of vs all see further how * De sanct Virgin c. 6. Ambr. apud Bonau in spec Virg. c. 8◠Cyrillus Alex. hom con tra Nestorium S. Augustine saith she is the spirituall Mother of the members of the Church for as much as she cooperated to the end that the faithfull might be borne in the same Church S. Ambrose also saith If Christ be the brother of all beleeuers how can she choose but be the mother of Christ And so doth S. Bonauenture deliuer the blessed Virgin to be not only the particular Mother of Christ our Lord but the vniuersall mother of all the faithfull And S. Cyrill giues a massy reason heerof when speaking as to the blessed Virgin he professeth himselfe in these words By thee all those creatures who are retayned in the errour of Idolatry are conuerted to the knowledge of truth But the (b) An excellent cōsideration of S. Bernard vpō the sweet prouidēce of our Lord God concerning the B. Vir. cited by Pa. Arias Bern. ser sup missus est holy S. Bernard shall conclude this point when he saith to this effect Christ our Sauiour did suffice for the reparation of mankind because all our sufficiency doth come to vs by him and all that also wherof we haue need for our saluation Yet was it most conuenient for our good and comfort that he should be associated in this reparation of ours by such a companion as might be a mother and such a mother as that she being the mother of God might be also ours This holy Saint in the same place doth giue many reasons heerof full of conueniency and consolation which heere I shall not need to represent In his booke de imitat B. Virg. But it appeares clearly inough that as Father Arias notes for the multiplication of mankind in the course of nature God framed our first Father Adam And notwithstanding that he might haue giuen sufficiency of power to him alone for the multiplication of mankind if he had bene so pleased yet he would not doe it but he resolued to giue him a companion and helper which was our Grandmother Eue according to the sweet disposition of his diuine prouidence In the selfe same name Arias l. de imitat B. Virg. when the world was lost by sinne our Lord God hauing resolued to beget and multiply iust men who might be heires to the kingdome of heauen he gaue his only begotten Sonne to be Incarnate who by his life and death might beget and breed vs to saluation And although it be most true that this Father of ours is all sufficient by himselfe alone to performe this worke of our Regeneration because he is of infinite vertue and who according to the rigour of Iustice doth merit grace and glory for his children and doth obtaine pretious fauours and satisfy for all kind of sinne yet neuerthelesse God was pleased according to the designe of his owne excellent wisedome to giue to Christ our Lord the most sacred and most holy of all meere creatures his All-immaculate Virgin Mother Mary to be a companion to himselfe in the spirituall generation of the world as the mother therof who might assist and serue him in so great a worke Not by way of praying for vs or of iustifying vs or of giuing vs grace or glory as of her owne guift for al that is proper to the redeemer and Sauiour of the world but to the end that she might concurre to the reducing of sinners by the way of sweetnes and loue interceding and praying for them and offering vp for their good all those excellent operations seruices which she performed in this life to her blessed Sonne our Lord and so obtayning celestiall fauours for them and facilitating their way to heauen by discouering the infinite mercy and suauity of Almighty God to the eyes of their mind And if (c) A cleer consequence 1. Cor. 4. S. Paul might say in the word of truth I haue begotten you to the Ghospell how much more might this blessed Lady say it in a most eminent manner who did beare and bring forth our Lord IESVS and did both therby and otherwise so admirably and immediatly cooperate towards the saluation of the whole world Not only do many particular Fathers ascribe the title of Mother to our blessed Lady but the holy Catholike Church doth ioyntly glory in calling her by that sweet name and esteemes her selfe happy that she may haue recourse to her as such Nor giues she only way to all her faithfull children to acknowledge this maternity of hers in priuate manner but in that publike Office In the Office of the Church wherin she celebrates the prayse and memory of her Spouse at all the howers both of euery day and night as one who well vnderstands by that spirit of sanctity and truth in which she is guided that no honour doth more delightfully redound to our Lord IESVS then that which magnifyeth the happy creature who gaue him a body of her owne all-immaculate flesh and bloud The externall Excellencies and attractiuenesse of our Blessed Lady The reasons of congruity which prooue her innocency and purity and the innumerable motiues which oblige the world to admire loue her CHAP. 81. TO the end that we may be inuited and incouraged to gratitude towards Almighty God for giuing his glorions mother to be also ours and that we may both conceaue of her dignity comply with our own duty as is fit I wil procure to shew both what kind of excellent creature she is in her selfe of how admirable vse and aduantage to vs. Touching the (a) The glorious and holy extraction of our B. Lady Nobility of her descent it wil suffice to heere what S. Bernard saith There is somewhat of the celestiall Ber. ser super Signum magnum Apoc. 12. which shineth in the progeny of Mary That euidently she is descended of Kings that she is of the seed of Abraham that she is sponge from the stocke of Dauid And if this be little let it be further added that by a speciall priuiledge of sanctity she was knowne to haue bene granted to the world from heauen That long before she was pointed at from aboue to our forefathers That she was prefigured by misticall miracles and fore tould by propheticall Oracles For as much as may further concerne the sanctity of her extraction we must know that it came frō the tribe of Leui as wel as from that of Iuda For howsoeuer seuerall tribes were not generally
the mother of God The B. (a) A iust consideration of the excellency of our B. Lady drawen from he◠her high Office Hebr. 1. Apostle inferred the supreme excellēcy of Christ our Lord from the name of Sonne which God had giuen him and that therfore he did infinitely excell the Angells For to which of them saith the Apostle was it sayd at any tyme Thou art my Sonne this day haue I begotten thee Now the same kind of discourse hath also place in honour of our B. Lady For since togeather with the name Office the God of power and wisedome is wont to giue all the abilities and ornaments which may concerne the same what thought can there be that there should be any thing in any meere creature yea or in all of them put togeather which might presume to compare with the superexcellent mother of the immortall God And therfore it is no speculation or streined conceite but a consequence which flowes apace or rather flyes as a man may say downe the hill That as the dignity of Gods mother is incomparably beyond the dignity of Patriarks Prophets Precursours Apostles and whatsoeuer is high or holy in the kingdome of God so also doth her sanctity exceed theirs as farre as a mountaine exceeds a moate or as the sea exceeds any shallow brooke And the meanest act of vertue which euer was practised by this B. Lady did in the intensenes of it farre and farre excell the greatest of that kind which euer was exercised by any other except her Sonne our only Lord Sauiour Farre be it from any Christian to conceaue by the reserued manner and speach which sometymes is held by Christ our Lord to our B. Lady in holy Scripture wherby he did but meane to teach the world certaine lessōs or els to deliuer some hidden mysteries that he could haue any intention to rebuke her as faulty in the least degree yea or euen to reprehend her as not being worthy of all honour But it is to be considered that our Lord IESVS was a Priest after the order of Melchisedeth Hebr. 5. 7. of whome it is recorded that he was without Father and mother As man our Lord was without a Father and though he had such an excellent mother as we know yet in the eye of the world he would giue little notice therof at some particular tymes any more then to that eye he would giue any knowledge of the dignity of his owne diuine persō Luc. 1. When our (b) Of the great honour which is done to our B. Lady by Saints by Angells and by our Lord God himselfe Luc. ibid. B. Lady and the Angell were in conference togeather we haue partly seene the honour and homage which was performed to her by that celestial Spirit a high Prince of Gods heauenly Court When our B. Lady was single with S. Elizabeth in the performance of her Office of humble charity we know how that Saint that Prophetesse that mother of the great Precursour of Christ that Kinswoman of our B. Lord was in confusion to receaue the honour of a visit from her And she was drawne to forget as a man may say euen the very rules of modesty by crying out with a lowd voyce in admiration of the blessed Virgins excellency and felicity When Christ our Lord was priuate not in the exercise of his publicke Office of Doctour of the world in which priuacy he continued for thirty of the three thirty yeares of his whole life who can doubt with how perfect profound reuerence that Sonne of God and very God would be sure to carry himselfe to his sacred mother The holy Scripture expresly saith that when he returned frō being found in the Temple he continued subiect Luc. ◠not only to our B. Lady who was his natural and most worthy mother but to S. Ioseph also who was but his putatiue Father It would (c) Note the force of his reason therfore be strange if when we are taught by so expresse euidence what honour was done to this sacred Virgin by Angells and Saints and euen by God himselfe in this mortall life during those thirty yeares of his subiection to his parents excepting that only instant tyme of his teaching in the Temple at twelue yeares of age we should argue any vnderualew to haue bin in the mind of such a Sonne towards such a mother or of any irreuerence or want of care and due respect in the mind of such a mother towards such a Sonne And all this but only vnder the colour of some words which our Lord might say to her in the hearing of others at such tymes as when he considered her not so much as he knew her to be the mother of himselfe whe was God but as she seemed in all appearāce to be which was a carpenters wife Angells in heauen but because as it was incomparably Superiour to it in proportion so yet it carried a kind of resemblance in the condition therof So that if any man should aske me what was the true name and as it were the very nature of Christ our Lord I would say God Incarnate and so also if he should aske me the same question concerning the Mother of God I would not doubt but to say that she were Vertue or Sāctity or the Angelicall nature incarnate and that the perfection of all created sanctity vnder that alone of Christ our Lord had taken vpon it the habit of her holy flesh and bloud therby to illuminate and inflame the world And that (f) Our Lord Iesus is the only mediatour of Redemption and our B. Lady is the most excellent mediatour of Intercession vnder him to God the father and between him self vs. as Christ our Lord was to be the Mediatour of Redemption betwene God the Father and man so was she vnder him to be the most excellent Mediatour of intercession betwene vs and him as the holy S. Bernard doth expresly affirme How the sanctity of our B. Lady doth much import to the honour of Christ our Lord. How notwithstanding all her excellency we anow her to be nothing in respect of Christ our Lord as God and by innumerable degrees inferiour to him as man and how much more honourably our Lord redeemed her then others CHAP. 83. IF a man who were full of want should need the helpe of a woman towards the obtayning accomplishing of some honorable and vsefull designe of his and if she should cheerfully concurre therin and so the end desired should be obtayned by him could that man be so wicked as not to acknowledge the merit of that other creature and not to inrich and honour her as far as her condition would beare especially if he were mighty and not to be made the poorer by it Or at least if the case should be so put as that his owne future honour were so interessed in the honour excellēcy of that other as that they two
the world by way of generation from her most holy parēts That her soule was so inriched in contemplation of the merits of her only Sonne IESVS Christ our Lord and that by him and him alone she was redeemed but (f) How much more excellently our B. Lady was redeemed by Christ our Lord then any other but yet after a more excellent manner then other creatures as became the dignity and loue of such a Sonne to such a mother For whereas he redeemed all others by applying his merit to their soules in the way of redresse and remedy of the sinnes eyther originall or actuall into which they had fallen he had applyed it to hers by way of preseruatiue and for the keeping it euer in perfect innocency And this kind of more noble Redemption is so far from hauing diminished the glory of Christ our Lord as he is God as that it maketh a cleere demonstration not only of his infinite goodnes and power in regard of her but of his infinite wisedome in respect of himself Since both at all other tymes and especially in the Conception of this Queene of heauen he had a soueraigne care of her sanctity and did so studiously prepare and preserue that holy tree vntoucht by the dew or mist or euen breath of any imperfection or sinne wherof himselfe meant to be the fruite Of the great eminency of our Blessed Lady beyond all others with an authority cited out of S. Augustine and that the way for vs to iudge rightly of her is to purisy our soules CHAP. 84. THIS is therefore that which Catholicks teach concerning the excellency of the mother of God who are farre from fancying that she is any more then a meere creature and who belieue that she originally oweth all her greatnes to the Grace and goodnes of our Lord God But so also doe they belieue and teach that amōgst all the most excellent creatures of God this one doth incomparably excell Sicut lilium inter spinas Cant. 2. as a beautifull and odoriferous Lilly would doe amongst a cōpany of vnpleasant and ill fauoured thornes A beautiful Lilly she was both planted in the Garden of God wherin God planted himselfe as in a Garden Candens folijs virgultas aureas in caelum versas emittens The pure leaues of her excellent conuersation shining brightly in the eyes of all and the cogitations and affections of her soule being highly raysed towards heauen by fyery but most sweet contemplation And albeit this princely mother of God and vs were not free in nature of her selfe from the shame or spot of sinne as her Diuine Sonne was yet had she the high priuiledges of pure and perfect Sanctity granted to her with another manner of care and loue then fauours vse to be imparted by earthly Princes Who yet are wont to be so good to their Queens-mothers as gaue occasion to old Vlpian to record this custome L. Princeps ff de legibus Augusta licet legibus soluta non sit Princeps iamen eadem illi priuilegia concedit quae ipse habet Though the Queene saith he be not free in rigour from the law yet doth the King impart those priuiledges to her which himselfe inioyes In so much as that the incomparable Doctour S. Augustine that bright and burning lampe of the Church of God being in argument with the Heretique Pelagians who extolled the dignity of mans nature beyond the lymits of true faith and whome therfore the Saint was to represse as much as might be by declaring the great generall deformity of mankind and he doth therfore conclude all the world to lye vnder sinne he yet doth wholy except this blessed mother of God lib. 1. de nat gra c. 36. And he saith that euen for the honour of her Sonne our Lord he will not enter into so much as any questiō of her whensoeuer there is speach of sinne For we know sayth he that since she deserued to beare him who had no sinne she was supplyed with such store of grace as serued for the totall conquest of all sinne That Eagle (b) S. Augustine saw that truth with cleere eyes and if the brightnes of our B. Ladyes beauty and glory doe strike the weake sight of owles into a dazeling Let them in Gods name and by the helpe of his gratious hand procure to purify and fortify that sight of theirs and cease (c) The way to conceaue rightly of our B. Lady is to purify our owne soules to quarrell with the sunne for being so cleere For so will they quickly find and farre more to the comfort of their harts thē I can make thē know that our high veneration to the sacred Virgin is so far from derogating from God as that it adds vnspeakeably to the notion which we haue of him and to the supreme adoration which we carry to him For since notwithstanding that our B. Lady is proclaymed by vs to be such a world of purity and perfection as we belieue her to be which yet both came from the liberall guift of God and in comparison of him it is not only not much but euen very nothing at all how easily and yet how highly doe we grow to magnify and dignify God himselfe by the consideration and confession of her greatnes And therfore hauing cleered this doubt and discharged this scruple which in many is made but by hypocrisy and enuy though it goe maskt vnder the pretence of piety and zeale which forbids them as they say to belieue so honourably of our Blessed Lady I proceed for their instruction and our consolation to shew how the spirit of God hath declared it selfe by holy Scriptures and holy Fathers in her honour and fauour Of the great Excellency of our Blessed Lady set out by the Figures Appellations and Allusions of the old Testament CHAP. 85. VVE are now to looke backe vpon what was said and shewed before how Adam was a figure of Christ our Lord Eue of our B. Lady we are also to consider that as there are many other figures of him so are there also of her throughout the whole currēt of the old Testament according to that which was cited before out of holy S. Bernard Ser. super Signum magnum That this Queene of heauen was both cleerly foreseene particularly misteriously foretold by the holy writers who liued vnder the old law The principall figures of Christ our Lord after Adam were Abel Isaac Iacob Ioseph Gen. 2.4.22.29.37 Exod. 2. Ios 1. Iud. 13.1 Reg. 17.3 Reg. 2. Ion. 2. Moyses Iosue Samson Dauid Salomon and the Prophet Ionas And in the selfe same manner God was pleased that as there was an admirable simpathy and conueniency betwene this diuine Sonne and his Blessed Mother in other things so also there should be in this That her excellency in like manner should be prefigured both by Persons and Things throughout the course of holy Scripture Our
prerogatiues prayses of this most gratious most glorious Queene of heauen the ornament both of this and the other world wherby she is delineated in the old Testament may be well content to vanish in the sight of those others which are most perfectly declared in the new The wonderfull excellencies of our B. Lady which are declared in the new Testament be heere set forth CHAP. 86. LET therfore that be first remēbred which was touched before vpon other occasiōs that the holy Scripture is wont to expresse it self in few words that they vse to be deliuered in a very positiue māner least otherwise the earnestnes of asseueration might derogate from the authority of that infallible spirit of truth wherby they are written Let it be also considered that little is said in the whole Euangelicall history of Christ our Lord himselfe in the way and vnder the Tytle of expresse prayse For he was to giue himselfe for a perfect patterne of profōd humnility which permits not a man either to prayse himselfe or to like that it be done by his next fellowes His resolution was that his workes should speake of him and so they did and this was also the case of our Blessed Lady who as she was next him in grace so was she also next him in humility But yet neuerthelesse as it was necessary that Christ our Lord should be declared to the world for the Sauiour of it and for the Sonne of God and of the Blessed Virgin wherby the incomparable excellency of his person was to be discerned and the admirable perfection of his actions discouered so by a necessary consequence of that relation which runs betwene a Sonne and his mother the dignity of her person who was the mother of God must also needs be incidētly not only incidently but expresly also shewed and the matchlesse sanctity of all her actions and operations therby inferred For notwitstanding all the reseruation which I haue said to be vsed in holy Scripture let vs see if it haue bin able to containe it selfe from magnifying our Blessed Lady euen in other termes then by only saying that she was the Mother of God Which word alone had yet bene sufficient to aduance her as farre aboue al the world of creatures both in heauen and earth as a single figure being placed before a whole million of Cyphers would expresse a number which would scarce be told I will first in a word point out the priuiledges and prayses of this perpetuall Virgin which are mentioned in holy Scripture in effect as they ere raunged togeather by Canisius lib. 1. c. 2. that deuout and learned seruant of hers And from thence I will proceed to a short consideration of those diuine vertues which were imparted to her togeather with those prerogatiues which were necessarily to be supposed to be in her by those prayses For of her and to her it was said by the Archangell Gabriel and note that he said it not as in his owne person but as in the person of God himselfe whose Ambassador he was All haile O thou full of Grace Luc. 2. Our Lord is with thee Blessed art thou amongst women Thou hast found grace with God Thou shalt beare a Sonne and thou shalt call his name Iesus That Sonne of thine shall be great and he shall be called the Sonne of the most High Our Lord God will giue him the seate of his Father Dauid He shall raigne in the house of Iacob for euer and that kingdome shall haue no end Vpon thee shall the holy Ghost descend and the vertue of the most high shall ouershadow thee And so therfore that which of thee shall be borne holy shall be called by the Sonne of God Vpon her presence also it was and vpon the first sound of her sacred voyce that S. Elizabeth was indued with the spirit of Prophesy and ful-filled with the holy Ghost Luc. 1. that her Sōne did spring in her wombe with ioy as hath bin said which supposeth the vse of reason then imparted to him Vpon her Visitation it was that S. Elizabeth was not able to containe her selfe but cryed out to this effect with an extaticall kind of loud voyce Is it possible that this poore creature should receaue such a fauour as not only to be saluted by the mother of my Lord but that she should preuent me with such a painefull visit How come I to be capable of such high honour Blessed art thou amongst women and blessed is the fruite of thy wombe Happy I say art thou who hast belieued for whatsoeuer our Lord hath sayd to thee shall be performed And heerupon the humble and loyall soule of the sacred Virgin when she found that her Cosin had receaued a reuelation of the diuine mystery which had bin wrought in her◠lent her tongue to the holy Ghost Luc. 1. who therby pronounced that holy Canticle of the Magnificat And so farre was she (a) The holy Ghost did force the sacred tongue of our B. Lady to giue her selfe due prayse ouerruled therby as prophetically to foretell her own excellency and not only to say That our Lord had done great things to her but that all generations of men should call her blessed It is but reason O Queene of heauen that those Generations should call thee blessed by whose only meanes vnder God his curse is to be remoued from them And if the good (b) A consequence which cānot be denied Luc. 11. womā in the Ghospell vpon the seeing and hearing of Christ our Lord when he was teaching did proclaime the blessednes of that wombe which had borne such a Sonne and of the breasts which had giuen him sucke and if according to the iudgmēt of antiquity she was inspired therin by the holy Ghost Beda l. 4. c. 4◠in Luc 11. she of whome our Venerable Country man S. Bede affirmes that by the example of her faith and deuotion whilst the Pharisies were tempting blaspheming Christ our Lord she did both confound the slaunders of those principall Iewes who then were present and the persidiousnes of those Heretiques who would spring vp in tyme which was then to come how much more are we to blesse her who haue so much more knowledge of her excellencies then the other had For she did but conceaue her at that time to be mother of some great Prophet or man of God wheras we are taught by the light of faith that she was no lesse then the mother of God himselfe How miserable therfore are they who do their best to giue both the holy Ghost and her the lye whilst they acknowledge her not to be truly blessed for as much as they make her subiect both to originall to actuall sinnes An incomparable dignity it was for thee O sacred Virgin to be made the mother of the euer-liuing God And if we with our misty sight discerne that dignity to haue bene so great what did those pure sweet
And she expected the Resurrection with an vndoubt and most constant Faith without fluttering at the sepulcher betwene hope feare as others did How solid was her (g) Our B. Ladies inuincible Hope Hope in God when notwithstanding that S. Ioseph saw that she was great with child knew not at that tyme of the Incarnation of the Sonne of God in her sacred wombe And although she might both with great ease and honour haue vnbeguiled him by declaring the mystery yet she rather chose with strange contempt of herselfe to confide in God that without any help of her he would both preserue the espousalls from being dissolued and the fame of her virginity from being touched How nobly did she conside in God Matt. 2. who hauing bene enriched by the three Kings when they adored her Sonne in that stable made such hast as doubtlesse she did to giue all away to the poore in imitation and admiration of how God had emptied himselfe as it were of his Diuinity that he might fill her wombe with his holy Humanity In so much as that when within a few dayes after she went to Present our Lord IESVS in the Temple Luc. 2. she was (h) Returne to the Chapter of the Presentation of our Lord Iesus in the â—eÌ„ple Luc. â— Leuit. 12. not as was said before worth the price of a Lambe but was faigne to make an oblation of Doues which was appointed as proper to the poorest people Being at that Marriage of Cana where there was want of wine she was touched with pitty of their pouerty And though her Sonne our Lord had wrought no miracle till that tyme yet she conceaued in her hart such a most liuely Hope that by supernaturall meanes he would supply all wants as made her but propound the suite in few plaine words deâ—aunding wine for them in that very forme of only representing the necessity which our Blessed Sauiour himselfe was after pleased to vse when he cryed out Sitio vpon the Crosse Of the most ardent Charity both to God and man which raigned in the hart of the Blessed Virgin CHAP. 89. BVT who shal euer be able to expresse her excessiue Charity to God for his sake to man since according to the measure of the Grace which is infused into any soule so is Charity infused and therfore since we haue found her to be full of Grace we are also as sure that she was full Charity Our Lord make vs so happy as that once we may see that soule in heauen for till then we may ayme but we shall neuer be able to hit the marke of her greatnes We haue a Prouerbe and it is no ill one That (a) Out B. Lady was both a Pilgrime and a Post in her way to God the Pilgrime goes as farre as the Post the reason therof is this Because howsoeuer the Pilgrime walkes but slowly on and the Post runs day and night yet for as much as this latter through the much hast he makes doth vse to catch many falls the former who plaÌ„ts his feete at ease is perhaps at his iorneys end before him But now if the speed of the one and the certainty of the other might be so happy as to meete in any person what a deale of way would that creature ridd especially if the tyme should be long which were deputed to that trauaylo It is thou O Queene of heauen who wert that very creature runing on in the way of Sanctity with those most steady yet most swift affections of thy soule as being both the mother and the daughter of that God man thy Sonne our Lord of whome the Royall Prophet did foresee Psalm 18. and say That he exulted like a Giant who was preparing himselfe for his course Which was to be of lesse way then from that high hill of heauen to this low vale of earth But yet it was with this difference that as he made such hast from thence hither by his Incarnation so the hast thou madest was from hence thither by spiritualizatioÌ„ as I may say of thy selfe through thy growing by instants in all vertue For as in the first moment of her most sacred and Immaculate Conception her soule was indued with such a large portion of diuine Grace as might become the Dignity of Gods Mother to which from all eternity she was designed so did she instantly cooperate therewith in all perfection And that cooperation did as it were oblige Almighty God to inrich her with new degrees of Sanctification and that againe produced new acts of most humble and most faithfull loue in her by way of Retribution And in this manner did that happy (b) The continuall most happy strife betweene the Grace of God the soule of the sacred Virgin strife continue betwene the omnipotent and most communicatiue hand of God and that most capable pure holy hart of the Blessed Virgin during so many millions of millions of moment as might run out in seauenty two yeares of time which according to a very probable opinion was the last period of her mortall life So as this posting Pilgrime did set out in the way of Grace and of the loue of God as early as the first instant of her Immaculate Conception she continued therin till the last of her life which was very long And in all that tyme she lost no one minute and euery one of her acts was performed with incomparable and complete perfection And although in all that iourney they winde was euer on her side since the Fomes peccati or Concupiscence was neuer permitted once to breath against her nor any inclinatioÌ„ of sense to oppose the impulse of reason which droue her on yet in the running through that happy race of hers she was visited besides all the rest at (c) Of two admirable increases of Grace in the soule of the sacred Virgin two seuerall times by such a vehement power of Gods spirit namely at the instant of the Incarnation of the Sonne of God in her sacred wombe againe afterward vpon the descent of the holy Ghost which he sent from heauen into her hart that she had such wings added to her soule as made her no longer goe but fly and she sent all her thoughts into God incoÌ„parably with more force of loue theÌ„ any arrow is shot out of a bow by the strongest hand that liues And who shall then be able to measure that (d) The bottomlesse seâ— of the loue of God wherein the B-Virgin did for euer saâ—â— bottomlesse sea of her loue of God Who shall be able to soare into the height of those diuine contemplations wherby that soule was transformed in him farre and farre beyond the vnderstanding of all the spirits in heauen whilst yet she walked vp and downe the world in a garment of flesh and bloud amongst the children of men What sighes teares of admiration and most humble ioy would she be
dispatching vp to that throne of Maiesty in whose light so inaccessible to other folkes she did so cleerly see the bottomlesse pit of nothing from whence the sweet strong hand of God had brought her and the worse then nothing of sinne from which he had preserued her by his first abundant Grace and that afterward he had inriched and sublimed her so farre as both in dignity and sanctity to make her the very top and Crowne of all meere creatures If (e) A most excellent affect of S. Augustine Confes l. 11. cap 2. S. Augustine could say to God with incredible internall ioy of hart Et intrem in cubile meum c. Let me enter into my most retyred chaÌ„ber and let me singe Loue-songes to thee sighing out certaine vnspeakeable groanes in this pilgrimage of mine And calling the heauenly Ierusalem to remembrance with my hart enlarged and turned vp towards it Ierusalem which is my Country Ierusalem which is my mother And I will remember thee who art the ruler of it and the illuminatour the tutour the Father the spouse the chast and stronge delight the solid and sincere ioy and all vnspeakeable good things put togeather because thou art the only true and supreme good What kind of notes and songes of Angelicall and Seraphicall loue do we thinke that this spiritual Nightingall this Turtle this both euer-liuing and dying Swanne would still be singing and sweetly mourning out to God In respect of whome although S. Augustine being set not only by other men but eueÌ„ by many other Saints were as a furnace of fire being compared with some single coale yet the same S. Augustine in respect of her was no more then a single sparke in respect of a whole sphere of fire An inexplicable thing it is to consider the (f) Profound rest perpetuall motion were coupled in the soule of the sacred Virgin profound rest togeather with the perpetuall strife and motion of her soule of loue which was both continually inioying God and yet coÌ„tinually earning towards him CoÌ„tinually labouring to doe him most faithfull seruice and yet continually feeding vpon the pretious fruits of those very labours But because she foÌ„d that Man was the thing which he most loued next to God as being his Image by Creation and his owne purchase by Redemption and that she most actually most purely cleerly saw the Sonne of God and her at that tyme in such labour and pursuite of mans good with so much forgetfullnes as it were of his owne Maiesty and glory and that afterward he left his life vpon a Crosse for our Saluation it (g) The incomparable and most ardent loue which our B. Lady beares to â— all mankind is not to be declared nor yet conceaued by vs what an vnquenchable loue she also had to the good of men Imploring God for all that mercy which their misery did need and by her owne excellent example giuing them patternes which they were to follow and procuring both increase of comfort to them who had store and the accesse therof to such as she found to be in want therof This may euidently appeare by those two excellent patternes of that whole peece of her loue which haue so often bene produced and which she deliuered at S. Elizabeths house the mariage of Cana. Especially if the circumstances be pondered well both of the difference in Dignity betwene her person and theirs and the hast that she made to be communicating her fauours to Gods creatures Towards whome the ardour of her affection was so great that it seemed by the much hast she made in those two mysteries as if she had not bene able to containe it The impenetrable profound Humility and the perfect supercelestiall Purity of our B. Ladies both body and soule and wherin the height thereof consisteth CHAP. 90. I Come froÌ„ the Theologicall to some chiefe Morall vertues behould how deep she â—aid the foundatioÌ„ of Humility that her building might reach vp as high as heauen She considered with perfect clarity of vnderstanding that from all eternity she had bene nothing as was touched before till the omnipotent mercy of God did preuent her with those first vnspeakeable vnconceaueable graces without any merit on her part She knew well as hath bene said that (a) The ground of our B. Ladyes most profound Humility she was no more then a meere creature of the race of the sinfull Adam and that she might haue fallen into as many as grieuous sinnes as the rest of mankind was subiect to if the sweet goodnes of God had not preuented and presered her still with most particular fauours By the light of this knowledge the most sacred Virgin did esteeme her selfe as the meanest creature of the world and she cordially despised herselfe as a thing in herselfe who deserued to be of no account at all Not but that she well knew what guiftes she had receiued of our Lord God or that she tooke herselfe into contempt as thinking meanely of them for them she esteemed and she reueared God for them as she had cause but she esteemed herselfe in herselfe no more for them then if she had not had them at all She was yet further from conceauing that she was to contemne herselfe as if she had comitted any sinne for true (b) True Humility is euer grounded vpon Truth Humility is grounded euer vpon certaine truth and therfore as indeed she did neuer sinne so neither could she think that she had sinned but she despised herselfe because she cleerly saw that of herselfe alone she had nothing which was good but that all was of God and that to him all thanks were due as they also were for his preseruing her from all those sinns into which she might haue fallen if our Lord had not preuented her by his grace This meane conceipt of her selfe the most sacred Virgin made appeare when she was told by the Angell in the name of God that she was elected to that highest Dignity of being the Mother of the Sonne of the most high which was the greatest Dignity wherof any meere creature could be capable But yet she was so far from taking complacence in her selfe vpon that reason that the text affirmes her to haue bin troubled at them So that the Angell thought it his part to giue her comfort afterward by letting her know that it was not he but God himselfe who did her that honour But (c) How our B. Lady was troubled and in what seÌ„se she was not so the while we must not thinke that this trouble of hers was any such thing as could depriue her of the cleare discourse of reason or of the peace of that immoueable soule though for as much as it was a motioÌ„ of holy feare modest shame to find herselfe so much esteemed it shewes what an impenetrable sort of humility she had in that deepe sweet hart of hers how profoundly she thought
thanks and ardent sighes as cleere and pure as God himselfe had sent them downe without the sticking of one graine or crumme of dust to her And therefore now if she were so absolute in that inward and profound contēpt of herselfe we shall cease to find it strange that so intirely she contēned exteriour things And yet of it selfe what a wonder was it for the Queene of heauen and earth to be so ioyfully deliuered of the euer liuing God in his misterious Natiuity as we haue seene before with all the circumstances of disaduantage dishonour that could be thought But the want of all worldly things was that sumptuous banquet vpon which the soule and body of the B. Virgin loued to feed for loue of him who had emptied himselfe into that Humanity for loue of vs and which obliged vs therby to discharge euen the lawfull loue of all other things wherin the height of purity doth consist Of the inexplicable Conformity of the will of the B. Virgin to the holy will of God in all thinges how deere soeuer it might cost her CHAP. 91. FROM hence did also grow that entyere Conformity of her will with the holy wise will of God which as she had neuer ouershot in the prosperous part of her life as at the salutation of the Angell and S. Elizabeth when her Sonne was adored by the three kings in his royall throne of her lap so did she neuer fall short of it to the breadth of a hayre in any affliction or tribulation We saw before in part what her Humility was and how profoundly low it layd her owne account and how pure she kept her hart frō any cōplacence in her self vpon those highest prayses wherwith the Angell and S. Elizabeth did adorne celebrate her grace greatnes We (a) How deeply true humility abhorreth prayse know withall both by the cleere light of truth and by the faithfull records of Saints liues that an ambitious person cannot more greedily hunt after prayse then a soule truly humble will shrinke in and auoyd and abhorre the same And if euen a man who is but moderatly vaine will not easily be induced euen for very shame to prayse himselfe very much and with deliberation what an vnspeakeable auersion must needs that most humble of all humble soules haue had from all extolling of herselfe But yet since the will of God was such Luc. 1. and that the holy Ghost was pleased to vse the instrument of her tongue which of it selfe was so truly a louer of holy humble silence towards the proclayming of her owne prerogatiues and greatnes she did most ioyfully concurre to prayse herselfe and to avow that God hath done great things to her and that for them all Generations should call her blessed It was the will of God that her Sonne should fly as by the wings of her armes into Egipt for feare of that Kite King Herod and she went vpon a minutes warning with a Conformity (b) How a will which is in a conformity to the will of God must be both supple and stifie as stiff as any rocke withall as supple and gentle as any wax with a resiguation so profound as not so much as to aske when she should be freed from that Crosse It was Gods will that S. Ioseph should haue the honour of the Angels visit Matt. 2◠that she should obey a mā whose incōparable Dignity did much consist in this that he was admitted to take the care of her and to do her seruice yet behould she did punctually obey all his orders in her delight to be complying with the commaundement of our Lord God as if she had bene the beggar he the King And that we may see how many businesses the holy Ghost is able to do at once and how by commāding some one thing he giueth matter for many soules to persorme the acts of most heroicall vertue at the same tyme Vt reuelentur ex multis cordibus cogitationes it will not be a misse to consider as infallibly the thing is true in it selfe that as it was a point of most humble and pure Conformity for the B. Virgin to take law from (c) How holy S. Ioseph was mortified in being obliged to giue orders to our B. Lady S. Ioseph so was it matter of excessiue mortification to his most holy most wise and most faithfull soule to giue directions as by meanes of reuelation to that superexcellent mother of God whome so profoundly he did reueare and admire sauing only that he also would obey the diuine will therin But to returne to the Conformity of the B. Virgin and to make short in this particular and to say the chiefe of that which can be said in a word It was the will of our Lord God that his Sonne and hers being both God and man and euen as man being the most innocent and most excellent holy person that euer was should be put to the grieuous and most ignominious death of the Crosse And she saw that he had bene buffeted and dragged and hoodwincked and scourged Crowned with thornes pierced with nayles and defiled with spittle defamed with slaunders and profaned with blasphemies exposed starke naked to the view of the world vpon that top of a hill and placed betwene a coople of murdring theeues and so he continued till at last he parted with his pretious life being all dissolued into a very fountaine of bloud This I say she saw and because his death was agreeable to the will and the manner of it to the permission of our Lord God she resolued with ineffable strength of minde to will all that part of his death which God would and to permit all that which he (d) The vnspeakeable cōformity of our B. Ladies wil to the will of God permitted And she laid her selfe so wholy aside as not only not to giue it the least impediment but not so much as once to harbour the least thought that way And notwithstanding that she grieued at it more then all the creatures of God togeather could haue grieued though all their griefe had bene summed vp into one drop of griefe since she loued him more then they all could do and the griefe tooke measure by the loue she yet looked on whilst this was done and she stood vpon her feete which is the posture of strength and she turned her hart vp to God by way of offering vp euen that Sonne in vnion of his owne diuine oblation and she endured all that torment with inuincible patience And whilst (e) What a miracle of grace was this Luc. 1. the sword of sorrow which S. Simeon had foretold and which for the space of so many yeares she had with a most steady eye foreseene with the point still turned towards her and with a most carefull hart considered and which she was then in the very act of Feeling to passe and transpierce her