interposing also your selves the half-fasts of the Stations and your selves other whiles also as each pleases living on meer Bread and Water The same Tertullian before he was a Montanist testifies in his Book of Prayer c. ult Sic die Paschae c. So also on the day of Christs suffering whereon is observed the common and as it were publick Religion of Fasting In the same Age S. Telesphorus Bishop of Rome did not first institute Lent-Fast as Zanchy observes l 1. m 4m Praeceptum Cited by B. Gunning in his Appendix but only added certain days to be observed over and above by the Clergy His words are Certe Telesphorus c. Assuredly Telesphorus who was the seventh Bishop of the Roman Church and a Martyr about the year of Christ 139. makes mention of this the Quadragesimal time above mentioned as observed before him in the Church For he added certain days which he would have observed by Clerks and Priests over and above what were observed by the Laity We ordain says he that all Clergy-men i. e. such as are called into the Lot of our Lord fast from flesh seven whole weeks before Easter because as the life of Clergy-men ought to be distinguish'd from the Conversation of the Laity so ought there to be a difference in their Fasting also Now the Church of Rome professing in her self a power to Institute Holy-days or Fasting-days had any of her Bishops first ordained Lent-Fast she would have made no more difficulty of Registring who it was then She does of telling us when and by whom was first Constituted the Feast of Corpus-Christi and divers other Ritual Observances Moreover in the same Age there was a difference betwixt S. Polycarp Disciple of S. Iohn and by him ordained Bishop of Smyrna together with Thraseas Bishop of Eumenia and S. Anicetus Bishop of Rome with other Western Bishops on the other side about which difference Polycarp came to Rome Anicetus professing to follow the Rule received from S. Peter and S. Paul by the Instruction of his Predecessors Xystus Telesphorus Hyginus Pius and Polycarp professing to follow what S. Iohn and other of the Apostles had practised The words of Irenaeus concerning Polycarp whom he had seen and heard are these That Anicetus could not perswade Polycarp to vary from what he had observed ever with John the Disciple of our Lord and the rest of the Apostles with whom he had Conversed or spent his time Iren. ap Euseb. l 5 c. 24. The same difference revived again about the 97th year after S. Iohn betwixt Polycrates Bishop of Ephesus with other Asian Bishops and Victor Bishop of Rome with others of the West Polycrates pleading the Authority of S. Iohn and S. Philip and Victor pleading the Authority of the Tradition of S. Peter and S. Paul Sozom. 1. 7. c. 19. Polycrates and they of Asia contending That from antient Tradition they deemed that they ought to observe the Feast of the Salutary Pasch on the 14th day of the month as being of duty altogether on that day upon what soever day of the week it fell to put an end to or dissolve their fastings On the other side which was Victors it was alledged No such Custom to observe on that mauner in the rest of the Churches throughout the whole World they observing from Apostolical Tradition which come down to that time that only on that day which should be also the weekly day of the Resurreci on of our Lord they ought to dissolve or end their Fastings You see both parties had a Tradition that the Feast of Easter was to conclude certain Fasting days and all this is witnessed in Eusebius l. 5. c. 23 24. About Easter-day it self they had indeed different Traditions S. Iohn and S. Philip finding it useful in those parts of Asia where many Iews Inhabited by condescention to observe the Christ an Easter on the same day with the Jewish Easter But S. Peter and S. Paul where no such cause was prescribed as meet not to disjoyn their Anniversary from their weekly memorial day of Christs Resurrection as B. Gunning reflects We have then S. Iohn taught S. Polycarp to Fast before Easter as testifies Irenaeus who saw and heard S. Polycarp Moreover in this Age the same Irenaeus tells Victor in an Epistle to him that there was Controversie not only concerning the day it self of Easter but also touching ' the manner it self of the Fast but none disputed whether there was to be a Fast or no before Easter His words are Neither is the Controversie only about the day of Easier but also concerning the ' form it self of the Fast for some think they ought to fast one day some two others also more and some by forty hours of Day-time and of Night commensurate their day And such variety of those that keep this Fast hath not been made or begun now in our Age but very long before with our Ancestors who as it is meet to believe not accurately retaining the manner of the Fast above-mentioned have changed the Custom which was simple and plain into that which was afterwards Now what uniform Custom could there precede in the Christian Church and not be from the Apostles Irenaeus writing thus about the 97th year after S. Iohn's death Though he seems not to speak of the whole Lent-Fast but only of the Fasts of the Paschal week In the very Age of the Apostles we have the Testimony of S. Ignatius their Contemporary in an Epistle to the Philippians His words are Do not Contemn Lent for it contains an imitation of the Conversation of God Neither do you despise Passion-week Fast upon Wednesday and Friday giving what you leave to the Poor Philo the Jew in his Book of the Religious says Eusebius l. 2. c. 16 17. describes the Religious Life of certain Apostolical persons of the Hebrew Nation at Alexandria having not only seen them but accurately taken knowledge of them describing there such their Conversation as is to be found in the Christian Religion only and he adds according to the Gospel and such Religious fastings says he which have descended down accurately the same even unto our times which more eminently were exercised in Fastings and whole Nights Watchings and attentions unto the Word of God at the Solemnity of the Passion of our Saviour It is manifest to every one that Philo comprised in that Writing Customs delivered in the beginning from the Apostles Hitherto Eusebius Now let us hear Philo's own words These Assemble themselves especially by the space of seven weeks Wine in those days is not brought in unto their Tables And their Table hath not any thing of that which had Blood but Bread for their Food and Salt for that which they eat with their Bread Some for the space of three days receive no Food and scarce by the space of six days did they refresh themselves with their natural Food A week they observed by a pure and holy Virgiral
days within twenty should have been utterly destroyed I remember to have read how that the Primitive Christians to excite in their souls a more lively sense and apprehension of our B. Saviours humble Birth and painful Death were wont often to go to Bethlehem and Mount Calvary there to make their Prayers and Meditations reflecting and no doubt with a singular profit to their Souls that there their dear Redeemer was humbly born and here the same Redeemer pitiously died for them But the Devil envying these good Christians their so profitable Devotions by a cunning device thus thought to deterr them from them He suggested to the Pagans to set up the Statue of Adonis in the Stall of Bethlehem and the Statue of Venus on the Mount of Calvary so that the Devout Christians could not now go either to the one place or the other to help their Religious Piety without seeming superstitiously to worship Venus and Adonis A lively representation me-thinks this of the notorious abuse the same Devil has put upon us Christians in our yearly Observations of Christmas in memory of our Saviours Birth and weekly Observation of Friday in memory of his Death The Primitive Christians weekly observed the day of our Lords bitter Death and Passion afflicting their Souls for their sins with penitential sorrow and their bodies with rigorous Fasting both the quantity and quality of their Diet rather expelling Death than cherrishing Life The same first Christians yearly observed the time of their Lords Nativity but so Religiously as it was manifest their study was to fatten their souls with devout Meditations not to pamper their bodies with delicious fair The Devil envying the Church of Christ so great profit from the pious observation of these Holy Times he suggests to sensual Libertines so to prophane the Holy Time of Christmas with excessive Rioting that none could profess to keep it without playing the Debauche and so to abuse the Religious Fast of Friday and other times of Christian Abstinence by an intolerable excess in all sorts of Fish and Wine and dainty Comfitures that none could pretend to observe them without playing the Hypocrites professing to afflict their bodies with Austere Fasting when they pampered them by delicate Feasting But what Remedy Abandon the profane Abuse and recall the first Pious use Demolish the Statues of Venus and Adonis but help your Devotions still by Visiting the Sanctified places of our Lords Birth and Passion Though you must give me leave to tell you that I fear were the matter well examin'd it would be found that not others uncouth exotick manner of Fasting but our own Inordinate desire of eating when we will what we will and as much as we will that is of not Fasting at all is the true cause of our Cavilling at the Holy Fast of Lent and other times of Abstinence Let it be Some who pretend to Fast do nothing less abstaining indeed from Flesh but giving scope to their Sensuality in other things But they say Carpere vel noli vel meliora face Either do not carp at our Fasting or else Fast more strictly your selves And those who are so forward in Reproaching to their Neighbours their Mock-fasts I fear if they were obliged to Fast would find but difficulty enough even to fast so largely as they do whose Fastings they carpe at And though indeed you may find too too many Libertines who study by all means possible to avoyd the difficulty of Church-Fasts by excessive Drinking and intemperance in Meats not prohibited yet those of a better Conscience though they come far short of the rigor of the Primitive Christians in their Abstinence yet do so Fast as their fasting days are days of real Mortification unto them As for Libertins it s rather to be wondered they will deny themselves even to abstain from Flesh than that they take the liberty they do upon Fasting-days Do not so wholly fix your Eyes upon the Cockle as you take no notice at all of the good Corn. But to the Point undertaken to be proved How may one who with his soul desires nothing more than to observe most Religiously all Apostolical Ordinations be satisfied that the Holy Apostles of our Lord Jesus ordained the Quadragesimal Fast of Lent as a time of Abstinence and Humiliation for all Christians Let him throughly satisfie himself that Fasting is a Christian duty and has a singular force to cast out the Devil to obtain the Holy Ghost to appease the Allmighties just Anger and which shall have a singular reward in Heaven And moreover let him reflect if any Credit be to be given to the Old and New Scripture and to Eccesiastical History the more eminent any one has been for Piety and Sanctity the more exemplar have they been for Fasting and Abstinence Moyses Elias Daniel Iudith Anne great Fasters under the old Law St. Iohn Baptist our Blessed Saviour St. Mary Magdalen and all the Apostles under the Gospel St. Paul testifies of himself that he Fasted often Our B. Saviour assures us concerning all his Disciples that when he was taken from them they should Fast. To say nothing of our Basils Hieroms and Augustines c. whose Fasts were very frequent and very rigorous and yet we cannot without injury to the Apostolical Colledge surmise that those later Fathers of Christs Church should surpass either in Piety or Abstinence the first Planters of Christianity By which it is evident to every Christian Man that Fasting in general is very well becoming every good Christian and that he hardly deserves the name of a Christian who wanting neither health nor strength yet Fasts not at all And indeed if we examin the matter well we shall find that one great end of our Lord Jesus His coming into the World was to save us from our sins by Teaching by his Doctrin and by enabling us by his Example and other gracious Assistances fervourously to practise the propitiatory Humiliation of Fasting Our All-wise Mediator understanding very well that could he but bring us heartily to Repent us of our sins and to express the sincerity of our interior Contrition by exterior Humiliation or Fasting such was the genius of his Eternal Father that he could not but pardon us how great or how many soever our sins might be But on the contrary we refusing to Repent and that even in Sack-cloath and Ashes that is with such a Repentance as shows it self by some exterior acts or other no Prayers no Tears no Blood no Death of his could possibly obtain our pardon except we would Repent Perish we must and that Eternally But what conduces this to perswade Lent-Fast was appointed by the Apostles Very much For we having hence that Fasting is a necessary Christian duty and strangely conducing to save the World from sin it evidently follows it was well worthy the Apostles the better to secure so useful a practice to determin certain days every yeâ—r in which all Christians should be obliged to
of the Sacred Christian Pen-men written a Book on purpose to declare the whole manner of Christian worship like Moyses his Exodus or Leviticus we might reasonably have expected an account what days Christians were to set apart for Fasting or Religious Feasting what Garments they were to use in time of Divine Worship c. Buâ— they only as is manifest writing Books for other intents and purposes by way of History for example or moral Exhortations and making mention only by the by of some of our Christian Rites as they occurred nothing can be more unreasonable then to expect in their said Writings an express clear mention of every Christian Ceremonial Observance The four Gospels are a History of our Blessed Saviours Life and Death who lived as to the external Rites of Religion according to the Jewish Law and so we cannot reasonably in any of them expect what Fasting or Festival days we Christians are to observe Indeed had the Act of the Apostles been intended as an exact Narration how the Apostles lived as to the whole course of their Life what days they kept Holy and what they Fasted c. We might reasonably have expected some mention there of Lent and Easter But that holy Book making mention only of some few particular passages of two or three of the Apostles lives the Apostles might well keep Lent and Easter too and teach them also to their first Converts and yet there be a profound silence of them in the Book of their Acts As for S. Iohn's Prophetical Book it were no ways proper in it to speak of Easter or Lent The rest of the New Testament are certain Epistles or Letters of Spiritual Counsels written by S. Paul or some other Apostle to particular persons or whole Cityes already instructed in the Christian way of worship But why they should needs make mention therein of Lent I understand not unless perchance the persons they wrote unto had been deficient in observing of it But does not S. Paul expresly decry the keeping of Lent in one of his Epistles and tell the Christians he wrote to he was afraid he had laboured in vain amongst them by reason of their superstitious Observations of Days and Times Gal. 4. v. 9 10. How are ye Converted again to weak and beggarly Elements which you will serve again Ye observe Days and Months and Times and Years I am afraid of you lest I should have laboured amongst you in vain Was then the Holy Apostle afraid lest the Galatians should leave Christianity and return to Judaism or Pagaism because of their observing Lent in memory of our Blessed Saviours Fasting 40. days or Easter in memory of his Resurrection Is this a likely Story Or is it not evident from the Context of their returning again to weak and poor Elements that because of their returning to the Observation of Iewish days commanded by Moses or Pagan days in honour of Iupiter Mars c. he was afraid they would relinquish the Gospel by them received and become Jews again or Pagans But does not the same Apostle 1 Tim. 4. tell us expresly that Abstinence from certain M 〈…〉 the Doctrin of Devils and that nothing which God has made 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 be rejected by us but eaten with thankfulness Now the Spi 〈…〉 eth expresly that in the later times some shall depart from the 〈…〉 heed to Seducing Spirits and Doctrins of Devils speaking 〈…〉 Hypocrisie having their Consciences scared with a hot Iron fo◠〈◊〉 to Marry and commanding to abstain from Meats which God 〈…〉 to be received with Thanksgiving of them which believe and know the Truth For every Creature of God is good and nothing to be refused if it be received with Thanksgiving That we may rightly understand these words of S. Paul we must reflect that upon a double account we may abstain from certain Meats or Drinks First we may abstain from certain Meats as thinking them out of Error and Superstition naturally unclean and unholy And to teach Abstinence from certain Creatures upon such an account is deservedly called the Doctrin of Devils And with this Heresie the Manicheans are charged by S. Austin and other Fathers And that the Apostle meant such like Abstainers from certain Creatures is manifest by the reason he gives why Christians should not Abstain upon such an account to wit because every Creature of God is good and consequently we ought not to reject any as in themselves evil and unclean Secondly we may abstain from certain Meats or Drinks as less suitable to a time of Humiliation or appeasing of Almighty God for our sins by Penitential works of Fasting Weeping and Mourning or for some other Spiritual end And such an Abstinence as this is so far from being prohibited by S. Paul or any other of the Apostles that it is commended not only by the light of Nature but also by the Holy Scriptures and the examples of the Holiest Men that ever lived upon Earth Thus S. Tymothy Abstained from Wine continually for Mortification so that S. Paul thought fit to exhort him not always to drink water but to make use of a little Wine for his Stomack-sake and frequent infirmities Whereas had it been Superstition to abâ—â—ain from certain Creatures of God upon a Religious account he ought to have disswaded him from his Abstinence by telling him such an Abstinence from the good Creatures of God was the Doctrin of Devils Wil-worship c. Eating Flesh and drinking Wine are very Lawful and Laudable when done in their due and proper season but are no ways suitable to days or times when I am called upon by my lawful Superiors to appease God Almightys Anger for my own and others sins by Fasting Weeping and Mourning Hear not me but the Holy Prophet Isa. ch 22. v. 12 13 14. And in that way did the Lord God of Hosts call to Weeping and to mourning and to Baldness and to Girding with Sack-cloath And behold Ioy and Gladness slaying Oxen and killing Sheep eating Flesh and drinking Wine Let us eat and drink for tomorrow we shall dye And it was revealed in mine Ears by the Lord of Hoasts surely this Iniquity shall not be purged from you till ye dye saith the Lord God of Hosts Now they seem not so much to be a-sleep as dead who hear not God Almighty crying out unto them and calling them to Fasting Weeping and Mourning this Holy and Penitential time of Lent after all the Authorities above-cited for its Apostolical Institution To say nothing of the abounding of all sorts of wickedness amongst us and the heavy Spiritual Plagues of blindness of mind and insensibility of Divine things which has seized upon us and no doubt call aloud for Penitential Humiliations But if Abstinence from certain Meats upon a Religious account be true Christian Piety what shall we say to S. Paul Rom. 14. v. 2. One believeth that he may eat all things another who is weak eateth Herbs and v. 6. He that eateth
eateth to the Lord for he giveth God thanks and he that eateth not to the Lord he eateth not and giveth God thanks and v. 17. The Kingdom of God is not Meat and Drink but Righteousness and Peace and Ioy in the Holy Ghost So that it seems by the H. Apostle that it matters not whether I eat Flesh or I abstain from Flesh in Lent so I give God thanks I am every whit as good a Christian though I eat as if I abstained Read the 14 v. and that will help you to correct your mistake I know and am perswaded by the Lord Iesus that there is nothing unclean of it self but to him that esteemeth any thing to be unclean to him it is unclean By which words it 's manifest the Romans case and ours is quite different The scrupulous Romans seem to have had a difficulty to eat Flesh or drink Wine as imagining them to be in themselves unclean either for that they had been offered up to Idols or prohibited by the abolished Law of Moses or as naturally unclean and necessarily enclining them to sin but we abstain from them upon none of all these accounts but judge them as clean in themselves as any other Creatures of God only we deem them less suitable to a Penitential time then drier and less savory Viands and smaller sorts of drink But moreover you must give me leave to tell you that according to the doctrin of S. Paul in this very Chapter you ought if you will walk Christianly to abstain from Flesh in Lent at least upon the account of not scandalizing your weak Brethren who think themselves obliged to abstain from Flesh those days of Christian Pennance Hear the Apostles own words v. 15. If thy Brother be grieved with thy meat now walkest thou not Charitably and v 21. It is good neither to eat Flesh nor to drink Wine nor any thing whereby thy Brother stumbleth or is offended or is made weak Though as I was telling you our case is quite different from the Christians at Rome to whom S. Paul writes We abstain from flesh in Lent not as deeming it in it self unclean as some scrupulous weaklings amongst them did but having Testimonies from all Christian Countrys and from the undoubted writings of the prime Pillars of Christianity in the most Primitive Times that the Apostles so ordained and being besides commanded so to do by our Civil and Ecclesiastical Superiours who are ordained of God to countenance Well doers and to watch for our souls good as they who must give an account whom we think our selves obliged in Conscience to obey in all their Lawful commands but especially in such commands which when sincerely and undeceitfully observed tend to the great Spiritual advantage of our souls There are other places commonly urged by mis-understanders of Holy Scriptures against Abstinence from Meats upon a Religious account but to any one that considers the whole context and all circumstances they evidently appear nothing to the purpose For they are all intended against Superstitious Abstinence from Meats either as unclean by Creation or as unclean because prohibited by the Antiquated Law of Moses or as having been offered up to Idols or as because eaten with unwashen hands against frivolous and useless Traditions of men Thus when our B. Saviour S. Mat. 15. 11. tells us Not that which goeth into the mouth defileth a man but that which cometh out of the mouth this defileth a man It s manifest by the occasion of his saying those words v. 2. The Scribes and Pharisees quarrelling with his Disciples for not washing their hands before they did eat Bread and by what follows v. 20. To eat with unwashen hands defiles not a man that he never intended by those words to signifie that we might upon a day or time of publick Humiliation recommended to us by our Superiors without defiling our selves eat what we please when we please or as oft as we please But at least is it not against the Laws of the Land to abstain from certain Meats upon a Religious account Here you must distinguish To abstain from certain Meats upon a pretendedly Religious but indeed Superstitious account as if some Meats were less Holy or more unclean than others is both against God's Laws and Mans Laws but to obstain from certain Meats upon a truly Religious and indeed pious account as judging some Meats more suitable to Penitential days and seasons than others is according both to the Laws of God and our Nation Hear our Laws themselves and be your own judges of the meaning of them Statute 2. and 3. Edward 6. c. 19. The Kings Subjects having a more clear light and thereby perceiving that one Meat is not more holy more pure or more clean than another and that no Meats can defile Christian Men so that they be not used in Disobedience or Vice yet for as much as divers of the Kings Subjects have of late time more than in times past broken and contemned such Abstinence which hath been used in this Realm upon the Friday and Saturday the Embring days and other days commonly called Vigils and in the time commonly called Lent and other accustomed times the Kings Majesty considering that due and Godly Abstinence is a means to Vertue and to subdue mens Bodys to their Soul and Spirit and considering also that Fishers c. doth Ordain and Enact with the Assent of the Lords Temporal and Spiritual c. That no person or persons of what Estate Degree or Condition he or they be shall at any time after the first day of May 1549. willingly or unwittingly eat any manner of Flesh upon any Friday or Saturday or the Ember days or in any day in the time commonly called Lent Take Bishop Gunnings Reflection hereupon The scope and reason and motive of which Law if it be considered according to the principal end of it subduing the Flesh to the Soul and Spirit for there is added another end also which was political may well admonish us though it was hard to contain the particulars in a Law to abstain also at such times of Mortification from what soever Food else is more delicate costly of hotter nature and of higher nourishment The formers of that Law which is now the Law of our Land had no doubt before their eyes the approbation of God and his gracious answer to Daniel so Chastening himself as in the holy Scripture is described Dan. 10. 2 3. 12. In those days I Daniel was Mourning three full weeks I ate no pleasant Bread neither came Flesh nor Wine in my mouth neither did I anoynt my self at all till three whole weeks were fulfilled Then said he unto me Fear-not Daniel for from the first day that thou didst sâ—t thine heart to understand and to chasten thy self before thy God thy words were heard and I am come for thy words Which that Ministers of Gods Word should not as well have before their eyes as our civil
humble themselves by Abstinence as to the quantity and quality of their Food they knowing very well by the Unction of the Holy Ghost what we know by too sad experience that the generality of the people being left to Fast when they pleased would please to Fast seldom or never at all Nay moreover it follows hence that the Institution of set-days of Abstinence was not only well worthy of the Apostles but also that it cannot well be understood how they could be faithful to their charge of the Souls of the whole World and neglect by the proviso of such an Ordination to propagate to all Generations an Universal practice of Fasting amongst Christians For though it were granted that the Primitive Christians were so fervorous both in Piety to God and in Mortification to themselves as they neither stood in need of set Holy-days to invite them to their Prayers nor of set Fasts to invite them to Penitential works Every day was a Lords day to them so long and frequent were their devout Prayers and other spiritual Exercises the whole year was one continued Lent unto them so rigid was their daily Abstinence Although I say all this were granted to the Honour of the Primitive Christian fervor yet it lying upon the Apostles to secure all Christian practices not only for their own days but to all Generations as much as in them lay and they foreseeing by the light of the Holy Ghost how apt tepid Posterity would be to excuse themselves from all obligation of the hard and troublesome duty of Fasting upon any set-times had they been left free to Fast when and how they pleased this I say the H. Apostles foreseeing their very Office seems to have obliged them from the beginning to ordain not only certain Festival days but certain Fasting days also lest after-Generations should say Our Ancestors went to Heaven without Fasting-Lent or other set Fasts and why may not we And indeed had not the Holy and long Fast of Lent been instituted by the first planters of Christianity over all the World Provincial or General Councils would have found it too hard a task to have obliged all Christian Countrys to an observation so repugnant to the natural inclination of Man-kind And this consideration alone does not a little encline me to believe that the Apostles of our Lord Jesus did actually and indeed ordain the Christian Lent Fast. For is it a likely Story that the Apostles and Primitive Christians Fasted as seldom and in such a manner as our Non Conformists do only deferring their good Flesh-meal till three a Clock in the Afternoon for five or six times a year But when Christians in after-Ages grew cold in all Christian exercises they fell to Abstinence from flesh contenting themselves with less nourishing and less savory Viands towards the Evening three days every Quarter and forty days every Year besides the Eves of several Festivities and two days of Abstinence every week Is this I say a likely story Or is it not rather much more likely that the Holy Apostles all over the World taught their first Converts both by their Example and Doctrin to Fast very often and very strictly but after-Ages growing more languid as in all Christian exercises so especially in Fasting as hardest and most contradictory to flesh and blood at length they came to Fast so remisly even upon days of the very Apostles Ordination that they added to one full Meal about Noon a Collation at Night and that such a one too as would hardly have been allowed a Primitive Christian Faster for his whole dayes Refection I desire the impartial Reader would be pleased to consider which of these two is the more likely story and to encline accordingly towards the belief of Lents being an Apostolical Ordination Or did the Primitive Christians Fast indeed very often and very strictly urged hereunto by their extraordiuary fervor but without any extrinsical Law obliging them hereunto upon any set-days or times but in after-Generations the Primitive inward fervor being lost did Christians generally Fast seldom and very remisly which their Pastors observing and watching for their souls good Did they hereupon Ordain Lent and other Fasting days as an extrinsical help to recover in their languishing Flock the Primitive Christian practice of Fasting According to that of the Apostle The Law is not made for the Iust Man but for the Vnjust 1 Tim. 1. 8. This might not without some probability be surmized were it not contrary to all Ecclesiastical History which makes mention of Lent in the most Primitive times as I shall say hereafter But Efficaciously to prove the holy Fast of Lent was taught the Christian world by the Apostles of our B. Saviour I confess I was not present when St. Peter or S. Paul or any other of the Apostles Preached to their first Converts the observation of Lent Neither were you present I believe when S. Paul writ his Epistle to the Romans and yet I perswade my self you think you are able to satisfie any reasonable man that he did write it Then why may not I be able also to prove satisfactorily that the holy Apostles did teach the Observation of Lent though I was not present at any of their Sermons or Exhortations to that purpose Or perhaps will you say You matter not who writ the Epistle to the Romans Having diligently Read and perused it you fear not with all confidence to aver whosoever writ this Letter I am sure the Holy Ghost Indited it I know it by its very stile and its other intrinsecal Vertues there 's a Divine Character stamp'd upon it by which I clearly distinguish it from all human Writings and this suffices me to make me receive it as a rule of my Faith and Manners But this would be small satisfaction to a Pagan who doubts of the Divine Authority of that holy Epistle unless you could make him also discern that Sacred Impress which you say you so clearly distinguish take heed you do not mistake 'T is Education I fear has made both you and me bear that Reverence we do to that and whatsoever else Portion of holy Writ we receive Had we been Educated in Judaism in all likelihood we should have as little regarded the New Testament as we do now Mahomets Alcaron I could tell you also that I know by the nature of Lent it self it must be Instituted and first taught by Missionants sent from Heaven and enumerating the singular benefits that accrue to a devout soul Religiously observing of it I could moreover make even you or any other Non-observer of it as well as my self see it must needs at first come from a good Spirit that wished Man-kind well for that it so strangely conduces to the perfecting of human Nature and to the adorning of it with many excellent Vertues For example If I Fast to afflict and humble my self before God Almighty for my sins my Fasting is an act of Repentance If I eat
should be transmitted to Posterity untainted for many Generations Especially when our Lord had promised that he would so firmly settle and found his Church that all the power of Hell should never be able to prevail against it But me-thinks our Adversaries might extend their Charity to the Christians of the fourth fifth and sixth Century and not think they would have so little regard to the Religion taught them and Seal'd to them by their Ancestors with their dearest blood as immediately to change and corrupt it and by it so altered and corrupted infect themselves and their Posterity as much as in them lay to all Generations with a dangerous Superstition and Will-worship Let us suppose then that for the first 300. years of Christianity the Church of Christ in England Italy Greece and other Countrys observed no such thing as Lent-Fast and consider by what means possible the fourth Age could not only bring it in all over the Christian World but bring it in so secretly and covertly that the prime Doctors of the fifth Age should not be able to discern that this new burden was superadded to Chriâ—tianity by their immediate Progenitors but should be verily perswaded that such an observation had immemorially from Generation to Generation descended to them from the first Planters of Christianity the Apostles And yet its evident that the fifth Age did not only keep Lent but also kept it as an Apostolical Institution and the prime Christian Doctors of that Age have left it upon Record in their diservedly admired works that they kept this Holy-fast as an Observance taught them by Tradition from the Apostles Hear their own words St. Hierom in his Epistle to Marcella We Fast one Lent Quadragesimam within the compass of the whole year according to the Traditions of the Apostles in a season fit for us The Montanists keep three Lents in the year as if three Saviours had suffered Now if for the first 300. years there had been no such observance by Christians at Rome but if in the fourth Century some Bishop of Rome or some Provincial or general Council or Christian Emperor had first introduced it could a Priest of Rome and one well versed in all Ecclesiastical matters as S. Hierom was err so grosly as to mistake so new an Institution for an Apostolical Tradition that is for an Observance taught the City of Rome from Father to Son from the Apostles For the Greek Church hear the Testmimony of Theophilus Patriarch of Alexandria to the Patriarches of which See it was entrusted by the first General Council that they should yearly signifie beforehand to the rest of the Churche as well as their own the true time of Easter In his first Paschal Epistle he writes thus Let us cure the divers wounds of Vices c. And so may we enter the Fasts at hand beginning Lent the 30th day of the Month Mechir as it were our February the Egyptians reckoning 30. days in every month The week of the salutary Pasch on the 5th day of the Month Pharmuth or April and ending the Fasts according to the Evangelical Traditions on the Evening of the Saturday being the tenth of Pharmuth and on the next Lords day the 11th of the same moneth let us Celebrate the Feasts The like he says in his second Paschal Epistle and again he says according to the Evangelical Traditions I add the Testimony of S. Cyril Patriarch of the same Alexandria in the next Age in his 20th Homily de festis Paschalibus So to let us keep a pure Fast beginning the Holy Lent from such a day ending also the Fasts on the 7th day of Pharmuth late in the Evening according to the Traditions Apostolical The same S. Cyril in 19. other of his Homily cited by B. Gunning de festis Paschalibus Preached in so many several years refers the same Fasts of Lent to Tradition Appointment or Instruction Evangelical The Law of Abstaining in Lent was always in the Church says the above-cited Theophilus Alexandrinus Now can it be imagined that these two Learned Patriarches to whom by the whole Christian Church was committed the care of signifying the due time of Lent and Easter had the Holy Fast of Lent been so lately brought in by some Universal Ecclesiastical or civil Authority could be ignorant of it and think and tell all the World also that they had been so taught to end Lent from Generation to Generation from the Apostles Let it be The Pastors of Christs Church in the fourth Century met together in a General Council though for the first 300. years there had been no such Custom amongst Christians to Fast Lent might make a Law of Abstinence from certain Meats for 40. days before Easter and command the whole Christian World to obey it but they could not possibly have the Impudence to annex to such an Ordination and thus we have been taught to Fast by Tradition from the Apostles when they all must needs know themselves to be the first Ordainers of such an Observance Nor could they possibly impose upon their Posterity such a belief but their Posterity must needs know that such a custom was no Antienter than their immediate Progenitors Which being so how comes it to pass that S. Hierom and other Learned Doctors in the fourth and fifth Century tell us that they kept Lent by Tradition from the Apostles if the Holy Apostles were not the first Teachers of it but some particular Preachers or a General Council or some civil Ecclesiastical power since The first opposers of Lent though they had the Impiety to call it Superstition and Will-worship yet they had not the Impudence to say they had been so taught to call it from Father to Son ever since the Apostles but pretended their Ancestors for many hundred years had been in blindness and ignorance but they by reading the Holy Scriptures and Writers of the first 300. years found there was no such observance in the Primitive Church In like manner had the keeping of Lent been an Innovation the first Introducers of it must have pleaded for it in the fourth or other Century as the Opposers of it in this latter Age pleaded against it They must not have said Abstain from certain Meats in the Holy Time of Lent for so we have been taught to do from Father to Son from the Apostles for every one would have known this to be a notorious Lye but they must have pretended to have more light than their immediate Progenitors and have said the Apostles and Primitive Christians used such Abstinence but fervor of Piety decaying the world for some Centuries had laid aside that holy but troublesome Mortification and they were stirred up by Almighty God to retrieve that Religious Primitive custom But no Ecclesiastical History in so much as any one Christian Country in the world makes mention of any such manner of introducing the Holy Fast of Lent but on the contrary wheresoever Lent is observed the Observers
were so many Metropolitans and of so great Erudition and Learning as they were almost all able to dispute of Dogms to whom when their gathering together in one seemed to add a confidence of daring and decreeing something from themselves yet notwithstanding they would presume nothing arrogate nothing at all to themselves but take all possible heed lest they should deliver to their Posterity what themselves had not received from their Fathers and not only well disposed the matter for the present but also give example to them that were to come to wit that they should reverence the Dogms of Sacred Antiquity and condemn adinventa the additional inventions of prophane Novelty Had Abstinence from certain kind of Meats for 40. days before Easter been a Superstitious Novelty its manifest no Introducer of it could have perswaded it to a Christian Church thus principled as the Doctors of this Age were They would all unanimously have reclaimed nothing must be Innovated besides what has been delivered to us by our Ancestors Or was Lent first taught in the Age fore-going and were the present Pastors of this 5th Age in the actual belief and practice of it If so how possibly could they profess to be such Zelots for Antiquity and such Exploders of Novelty and yet themselves most Religious Observers of a Superstitious practice never heard of till it was of late invented by their immediate Progenitors And how would their Adversary Nestorius have upbraided them with it when they objected to him the Novelty of his Doctrin Or perhaps was Lent first introduced in the third Age But that could not be neither the Doctors of that Age being no less Zealous for delivered doctriâ—s and practices nor less Opposers of Novelties than the 5th Age as is manifest by the contest betwixt the Bishop of Carthage and the Bishop of Rome and his Collegues where the Assertors of Re-baptization wanted neither Wit nor Eloquence nor number nor verisimilitude of truth nor Oracles of the Divine Law but understood after a bad and a new manner as S. Vincent says chap. 9 10. How then came they to lose their cause S. Stephen and his Collegues reclaimed Nihil novandum nisi quod traditum est Nothing is to be innovated besides what has been delivered to us Agrippinus Bishop of Carthage holding Rebaptization against the Divine Canon against the rule of the Universal Church against the sense of all his fellow-Priests against the Custom and Institutions of his Ancestors and hereby as S. Vincent observes giving a form of Sacriledge to all Hereticks this overthrew him This then was not an Age wherein to Introduce either Novel practices or Doctrins into the Church nor any other before S. Vincent For he tells us chap. 9. Mos iste c. That Custom has always flourished in the Church and by how much any one has been more Religious the more readily has he opposed new Inventions We have hereof plenty of examples every where And this manner of discoursing proves a Priori that had Lent been a Superstitious Novelty it could not possibly have been brought into the Christian Church for the first 500. years and yet its manifest by all the Christian Writes of the 4th and 5th Age that it was then Universally practised both in the Eastern and Western Church whence it follows that it is no Superstitious practice but true Christian Piety and was taught the World by the first planters of Christianity Although our Learned Adversaries deny not but that the prime Doctors and chief Champions of Christianity of the 4th and 5th Age were Zealous Observers and Preachers of the Quadragesimal Fast of Lent and for this cause appeal to the first 300. years yet for the satisfaction of others less Learned I have thought fit to Transcribe their Testimonies as they are cited by Bishop Gunning in his Learned Treatise in defence of the Paschal or Lent-Fast Hear then the Testimonies of the Christian Doctors of the 4th and 5th Century and if you have the least grain of Christian modesty dread to call that Superstition which so many Grave Fathers extol as singular Christian Piety S. Basil in his Sermons de Iejunio makes mention of Lent-Fast For he makes mention of five days Fasting together commanded to be observed by all degrees all over the world which returned by an orderly course Now in other his Contemporaries we find express mention of a Forty-days Fast nor was there ever by Christians Fasted five days consequently but in Lent and the reason he mentions five days is because the Grecians only Fasted five days in every week in Lent leaving out Saturday and Sunday Hear his own words Hom. 1. Let us as becomes Saints receive the days that are at hand not with a sad Soul but with a chearful affection Be not sad when thou art Cured Whoever amidst sumptuous Feasts and continual delights was made partaker of any Spiritual gift Moses that he might a second time receive the Law needed a second Fast. Doest thou not eat Flesh But thou eatest up thy Brother Doest thou abstain from Wine But thou doest not forbear to injure thy Neighbour Thou expectest the Evening before thou take thy refection but spends the whole day in Law-Courts Let not Drunkenness introduce thee to the mysteries of Fasting The Wrestler is exercised before he wrestle for the Prize the Faster is prepared to Fast by Temperance Do not as if thou would'st Revenge thy self on the days of Fasting or mock the Author of the Law lay up against these five days the Treasure of Surfetting Our Lord who has brought us to the recourse of this time give us as to Combatants throughout these days in which we are called out to Combate to declare the strength and Nerves of Continence Orat. 2. Fasting is at all times profitable to those who voluntarily undertake it but much more at this time when the denuntiation of Fasting is proclaimed all over the World Nor is there any Island nor Continent nor City nor Nation nor the farthest corner of the World where the Edict of Fasting is not heard S. Gregory Nazianzen Orat. 4. Christ Fasted a little before his Temptation we before the Paschal feast And Orat. 41 42. Yesterday I was Crucified with Christ to day I am as it were glorified with him S. Epiphanius In expositione fidei Catholicae The same Church has been wont to observe Lent continuing in Fastings But the 6. days of the week before Easter all the people continue in dry dyet using then Bread Salt and Water at the Evening Yet those that are very devout pass two three and four days and some the whole week untill Cock-crowing on easter-Easter-day S. Ambrose in his book de Helia Jejunio A Lent is fasted with us all days except Saturday and the Lords-day And Serm. 25. Our Lord after he had fasted 40. days overcame the Devil not but that he could have overcome him before his fastings but that he might shew unto us that then
we shall be able to overcome the Devil when by 40. days we have been through fasting Victors over our Carnal desires For neither Brethren is it a little fault to break by greediness of the Belly the Lent indicted to Believers and the Consecrated Fast. Serm. de Jejunio Elia. Behold through the mercy of God we have past through the indicted Fasts of Lent and have fulfill'd by the devotion of Abstinence the Commands of our Lord. Theophilus Patriarch of Alexandria lib. 3. Pasch ad totius Aegypti Episcopos By no means let us in the days of Lent as Luxurious Rich men are wont to do long after a Cup of Wine They that keep the Precepts of the Laws tast not Wine on fasting days refuse to eat Flesh c. S. Hierom in his Comment upon Ionah c. 3. Our Lord himself the true Jonas sent to Preach unto the World fasted 40. days and leaving us the Inheritance of fasting under this number prepares our souls for the eating of his Body In his Comment on Isaiah 58. Our Lord fasted 40. days in the Wilderness that he might leave unto us the solemn days of Fasts S. Chrysostom in his 11th Lent-Sermon upon Genesis Wherefore in every thing due measure and moderation is best According whereunto therefore concerning this season also of the Holy Lent we shall now find it to have been ruled out unto us For as in publick Conveyance of Travellers there are certain Stages and Inns that the wearied Passengers may rest themselves and intermitting their Labours they may again set upon their Iourney In like manner here also in Holy Lent our Lord has indulged these two weekly days the Saturday and the Lords-day to such as undertake this course of this fast like certain Stages or Inns Shores or Havens that both the body may be a little relaxed from its labours of fasting and the mind comforted that when these two days shall be past over they may again with chearfulness set upon this their good and profitable Travelling in this way S. Gregory Nyssen in his zd. Oration of the Resurrection Matthew added the time when it began to dawn towards the first day of the week The Night saith he was so far passed that it was now the time of Cock-crowing which giveth warning that the light of the approaching day is at hand For this cause also at this time viz. far in the Night before Easter-day and not in the very Evening of the Saturday dissolving or ending the Fastings we begin the Ioy the Custom that obtains with all men consenting thereto This for the fourth Age. In the 5th Age S. Augustin in his 119th Epist to Ianuarius The Lent truly of Fastings has Authority both in the old Books out of the Fast of Moses and Elias and out of the Gospel because our Lord Fasted so many days In what part therefore of the year more aptly could the Observation of Lent be Constituted then in that which is Conterminous and next unto the Passion of our Lord. That those 40. days before Easter should be observed the Custom of the Church has Corroborated In his 118. Epist to the same Januar. But those things which we keep being not written but delivered down which are observed throughout the whole world are given us to understand that they are retain'd as commended and appointed either by the Apostles themselves or by Plenary Councils whose Authority in the Church is most wholsome as for example that the Passion of our Lord and his Resurrection and Ascension into Heaven and the coming of the Holy Ghost are Celebrated with an Anniversary Solemnity S. Leo the Great Bishop of Rome in his 6. Sermon of Lent That the Apostolical Institution may be fulfilled in the Fast of forty days not by sparing from our Dyet only but especially by abstinence from sins And in his 9th Serm of Lent In which days of the Paschal Fast with good cause severer Fastings were ordained by the Apostles through the teaching of the Holy Ghost that by a common comparticipation of the Cross of Christ we also should do something in that which he did for us as the Apostle says if we suffer with him we shall also be glorified with him S. Chrysologus That we Fast Lent is not a human Invention it is of Divine Authority S. Cyril Patriarch of Alexandria is above-cited at large This for the 5th Age. In the following Ages the observation of Lent in all Christian Countrys is so manifest that no body any whit Versed in Church History can possibly doubt of it Now after the manifest Testimonies of so many and so Learned and so holy Doctors of Christs Church the Opposers of the Holy Fast of Lent must give me leave to bespeak them in the words of the great S. Augustin by him directed to Iulian the Pelagian after a like Citation about another matter of these very Holy Fathers by me now cited as to a great part of them Tu qui am crebro c. Thou sadly deluded Zelot that doest so often object to us Catholick Christians the name of Will-worshippers the crime of Superstition for Religiously observing the Holy Fast of Lent If thou beest awake see what and what kind of men and glorious defenders of the Christian Faith thou darest to bespatter under our names with so execrable a Crimination Go now and object to us the crime of Superstition dissemble and feign thy self not to know what they say in this point overlook them as it were and attack us only as not knowing that under our name they are reviled and confidently insult over so many and so great Doctors of the Church of Christ who after a most Saintly Life and having beaten down the Errors of their times most gloriously went out of this Life before you and your Comrades bubled up Doest thou see with what kind of Men we sustain thy Reproaches Doest thou see with whom we have the same common cause which without any sober consideration thou calumniates and endeavours to expugn Doest thou see proud Zelot how pernicious it is unto thy self to object so horriable a Crime of Will-worship to such men as these and how glorious it is to us to sustain the charge of any Crime together with such Doctors as these Or if thou doest see see and hold thy peace and let so many Catholick tongues silence thy Phanatical tongue The Ruffian Polemus to compleat his wild ramble would needs early in the morning half drunk with his Night Revels go to the School of the grave Sophist Xenocrates to affront him and his Schollars But he was no sooner entred the School of that sober Platonist but the very sight of the modest and grave Comportment of the Philosopher and his Schollars did so strike my young Gallant that he was quite out of Countenance and ashamed of himself he pull'd off his Drunken Bayes and composed himself to modesty and became his Convert whom be came on purpose to deride and scoff at
observance which was preparatory to the greatest Feast which was followed with the 50. days Solemnity Thus Philo contemporary of the Apostles concerning the Hebrew Christians in and about Alexandria where S. Mark was set Bishop by S. Peter I omit the Testimony of the 68. Canon of the Apostles for that Ecclesiastical Writers do not unanimously agree that those Canons at least all of them were made by the Apostles although the sixth General Councel Celebrated above a 1000. years agoe received and approved 85. of them There can be no doubt but they are very antient Bishop Gunning thinks they were made in the second Century by the Successors of the Apostles who in that Age were commonly as he says called Apostles The 68â—h Canon runs thus If any Bishop or Priest or Deacon or Lector or Cantor shall not Fast the sacred Lent Quadragesimam before Easter or Wednesday or Friday let him be deposed unless he be hindred by weakness of body But if he be a Laick let him be deprived of the Communion Indeed the Canon does not seem first to institute Lent but rather supposes it and urges its observance by inflicting a penalty upon Non-observers All which makes for my designed purpose for who could so early except the Apostles be the first Authors of such an Institution when as yet there had been no General Council except that of the Apostles at Hierusalem But have we no Scripture for the Observation of Lent Fast We have Scripture that our B. Saviour Fasted 40. days and we have also in Scripture that if any man says he is in Christ he ought to walk as he walk'd Moreover we have yet more express Scriptures as interpreted not by some one or two Fathers but by the whole body of Catholick Christians as Bishop Gunning well observes out of Tertullian cited above They that is the Catholick Christians who are called by him Psychici surely think that in the Gospel those days are determin'd for Fasts in which the Bridegroom was taken away and a little after the Paschal Fast those days in which the Bridegroom was taken away Those words then of our B. Lord in excuse of his Disciples not Fasting whilst he was with them Can you make the Children of the Bridegroom fast while the Bridegroom is with them But the days will come when the Bridegroom shall be taken away from them then shall they fast in those days Those words I say in the sense of the Primitive Church in the second Century were intended by our B. Saviour to signifie that Christians after his departure should Fast yearly upon Good-Friday the day of his death and the rest of the Pascal or Lent-Fast those days in which the Bridegroom was taken away I add whether those words in those days did in the intention of our Saviour signifie Lent-Fast or no it 's evident had not the Primitive Christians Fasted Lent they would never have interpreted our Lords words as they did which is sufficient for my purpose to wit to evince that the most Primitive pure Church did Fast Lent And besides according to common sense who are more likely to understand aright our B. Saviours or his Apostles words they who lived in the next Age to them or we who live sixteen hundred years after Do we or any other Nation in the world understand our written Laws according to the sense a crafty witty Lawyer can wrest them to signifie or accordingly as they have been immemorially understood since the first making of them and as cases and disputes have by our Learned Judges been decided by them More-over suppose but only the Primitive Christians for whose sake the Holy Scriptures were written rightly understood them and let after Generations interpret the same Scriptures in the sense they were interpreted by their Ancestors and let this be their great enquiry how their Fore-elders understood them and its impossible they should ever be mis-understood but leave their Interpretation to every private mans sentiment and you open a gap to all Innovations and Heresies as Bishop Gunning judiciously observes Reason says he pag. 23. and experience and the direction of all Wise men in the Church of God Antient and Modern the House of Wisdom Councels Reverend Fathers and Writers and our Church in particular have directed and commanded us not to interpret the Scripture in things of publick concernment to the Churches rule of believing and doing but as we find it interpreted by the Holy Fathers and Doctors of the Church as they had received it from those before them For that the leaving of every man to make any thing of any Text upon any device out of his own head to the founding of any new and strange Doctrin or Practice as necessary there from or to the opposing any constantly received Doctrin or Practice of the Church-Vniversal for in other matters they may happily with leave quietly abound in their own sense leaves all bold Innovators which can draw any disciples after them to be as much Law-givers to the Church by their uncontrolable Law interpreting as any Pope or Enthusiast can or need pretend to be and hath been and ever will be to the end of the World the ground of most Hâ—resies and Schisms brought into the Church by Men who departing from the teaching and stable Interpretation of the Church in their own Instability and Science falsly so called pervert the Scriptures to their own and others their obstinate followers destruction And indeed he who has so much Pride and Self-conceit as to prefer his own seeming sense of holy Scriptures before the sense which Holy Fathers and Christian. Doctors unanimously attest to have received from their Fore-elders is nextly disposed to vilifie and reject the whole Letter of Sacred Scriptures upon pretext of being uncertain whether the Letter now commonly owned and approved by the unanimous consent of Christian Doctors be indeed that Letter which was left the World by the Apostles But if a yearly Religious Observation of the Holy Fast of Lent be of such singular benefit and Spiritual advantage to all Christians and if also the Apostles of our Lord Jesus did recommend such an Observation to the several Countrys by them Converted to the Christian Faith how comes it to pass that none of all their Writings which have come to our hands makes express mention of it Hear Bishop Gunning p. 138. Ritual Observances being Visible and as it were legible in the Vniversal Churches constant practice needed not to be set down in her written rule Or those which are therein set down not necessarily so evidently but that they might need the Interpâ—etation of such the Churches practice And indeed whoever will impartially consider the nature of the Books of the New Testament will be so far from wondering that all the Rituals of Christianity are not expresly declared in them that he will rather wonder there is so much in them of the exterior Rites of Christian Religion as there is Had any
strength to humble themselves by more and more rigorous Abstinence they have sought by all means possible to cheat those Penitential days Hear not me but S. Basil above concerning those who because a five-days Fast was at hand would make themselves drunk the day before Si cras venias vinum obolens c. If thou comest to morrow smelling of Wine and its putrid and corrupted Crudities how shall I impute to thee thy drunken Surfet for a Fast. In which order shall I place thâ—e Amongst Drunkards or amongst Fasters But in what order think you would the Holy Father have placed those who not barely smell of Wine drunk to excess the day before but upon the very Fasting-day it self drink their skins full of Wine Had we a deep sense how much the health of the soul is to be preferr'd before the pleasure of the body and a strong Faith how exceedingly Fasting conduces to the souls health all the World would be in love with Fasting and though our Constitutions would not permit us to abstain from flesh this Love would wake us so ingenious to Mortifie our selves in a temperate use of flesh that we should no less reap the fruit of Fasting than those who lived upon Fish or Herbs Let us by no means says S. Basil receive the days that are approaching with a sad heart but as becomes Saints with a chearful affection Be not sad when thou art Cured It would be very absurd if we should grieve for the substraction of our Victuals and not rather rejoyce for the health of our soul and so seem to value more the pleasure of our belly than the cure of our mind For fulness causes delight unto the belly but fasting is gainful to the soul. Rejoyce for that is given thee an efficacious Medicine to abolish sin For as Worms which breed in the bowels of Children are expell'd by certain sharp and bitter Medicines so Sin that abides in the inmost recesses of the soul is instantly kill'd and extinguish'd by fasting which purges the bowels of the mind Do not imitate the disobedience of Eve do not again make the Serpent thy Counsellor who under pretext of sustaining thy body perswades thee to eat Do not excuse thy self for thy infirm Constitution do not say thou art not able to endure fasting For thou doest not make those excuses to me but according to the Proverb thou speakest to one who knows the Truth to wit to God who is ignorant of nothing Go to then tell mâ— canst thou not Fast and canst thou fill thy self with variety of Meats canst thou surcharge thy body with the weight of Victuals But we know Physitians are wont to prescribe to such as are infirm not abundance of Food but a spare Dyet and Abstinence How comes it to pass then that you can feast But pretend you can not fast Whether is it more easie to the belly to pass over the Night with a slender Refection or to lye opprest with abundance of Meats Yea indeed not to lye but stretching and groaning continually to turn now to this side and now to that But what modâ—ration in eating and drinking should we do well to use upon Fasting-days Consult God and your own Conscience and such as understand the right exercise and great benefit of true Fasting In three words Be contented with one temperate Meal taken as late as your health and other circumstances will permit Drink no strong drink or very sparingly and this only at your Meal and though you should take some small matter at night Even such an abstinence would not want its singular Spiritual advantages so you exercised it not merely in a Customary manner but for good Christian ends with sincerity as in the sight of God according to the measure of your health and strength Thirdly Be sure to joyn with the exterior Mortification of your body the interior Humiliation of your soul by a hearty sorrow and contrition for your sins Though you give your whole Estate to the Poor if you want Charity it will avail you nothing And though you make your body a mere Skeleton by rigorous Fasting and Abstinence if your heart be not truly Penitent and sorry for your sins all 's to no purpose A broken and an humble heart is a Sacrifice which God-Almighty will by no means despise But if contrition of heart be wanting all exterior Mortifications will be rejected And it is want of this which makes Fasting and other voluntary Austerities and Involuntary Crosses seem hard and intolerable unto us A soul deeply humbled with an intimate sense of its deserts for its manifold sins and wickednesses thinks all Meats all Cloaths all Lodging and whatsoever Accommodations too good for it But as exterior acts of Charity beget and encrease true Charity in our hearts so exterior Penitential works are apt to beget and encrease interior Penitential sorrow in our souls And though the interior of Charity Repentance and other Vertues be the chief and main thing we are to aim at yet all interior pretences to any Vertue which show not themselves in exterior acts are to be suspected as Counterfeit What St. Austin says of Charity is no less true of Repentance or any other Vertue Amor si est c. Love if it be in us it will be working if it do not work it is not in us if it be great it will work great things Repentance if it be in us it will be working by Fasting and other Penitential works if it works not it is not in us if it be great it will work great things Christian Vertues with their exterior acts are not unfitly compared to some rich Wine in a Cask or Vessel A rich Wine without a Cask or Vessel to contain it cannot be presented a bare Cask presented without the rich Liquor in it would not be accepted Ioel 2. 12. Therefore also now saith the Lord Turn ye even to me with all your heart with Fasting and with Weeping and with Mourning Fourthly Take heed of corrupting the Mortification of your Fasting by excess in other joyances Holy Daniel in his three weeks Fast abstained not only from pleasant Food but also from Anoynting of himself Ch. 10. v. 3. I ate no pleasant Bread neither came Flesh nor Wine in my mouth neither did I Anoynt my self at all till three weeks were fulfilled Vtamur ergo parcius Verbis cibis potibus Somnio jocis arctius Perstemus in Custodia Let us be more sparing not only in our Meat and Drink but also in our Words Sleep and Recreations and keep a more Vigilant Watch over our selves that in nothing we exceed And the reason is manifest for one great end of Fasting being by that exterior Mortification to beget or encrease interior Contrition and Sorrow of heart for sin it manifestly follows if we seriously design the end of Fasting we ought carefully to moderate all other Joyances however in themselves Lawful and at another time laudable which
manifestly impede our designed end least we pull down with one hand what we go about to build up with the other and make our Spirits as vain and light by frothy Conversations and other Divertisements as we make them grave and sober by Fasting and Abstinence Hear the 4th Council of Toledo c. 5. In omnibus c. In all the foresaid days of Lent we ought to insist on Fasting and Mourning to cover the body with Hair-cloath and Ashes to humble our mind with Mournings to change our Ioy into Heaviness until the time of the Resurrection of Christ when we are with joy to sing Allelujah and turn our heaviness into gladness For this the consent of the Vniversal Church in all parts of the Earth hath confirmed Fiftly Spend more time in Prayer Meditation of Divine things and Spiritual reading and hearing of Sermons for one great end of Fasting is the better to dispose us for these Spiritual exercises Venter non habet aures The pampered paunch is to nothing deafer than to Divine Inspirations Impletus venter non vult studere libenter The full belly has no great mind to study but much less to speak to God-Almighty by devout Prayer or to hear him speak to it by spiritual reading and hearing of Sermons Thus the Antient people of God the Iews spent the fourth part of their days of publick Fasting and Atonement in reading and hearing the Law of Almighty God and another fourth part in worshipping the same God with devout prayers Nehem. 9. v. 1 2 3. Now in the twenty and fourth day of this moneth the Children of Israel were Assembled with Fasting and with Sack-cloathes and Earth upon them And the Seed of Israel separated themselves from all Strangers and stood and confessed their Sins and the Iniquities of their Fathers And they stood up in their place and read in the Book of the Law of the Lord their God one fourth part of the day and another fourth part they confessed and worshipped the Lord their God And the Church of Christ has ever in Lent to Prayers and Fastings annexed more frequent hearing and Preaching God's Word and many of S. Crysostoms Golden Homilies as likewise of others of the Antient Fathers were Sermons Preached day by day in Lent to the people Hear S. Crysostom upon those words of our Blessed Saviour This kind goes not out but by Prayer and Fasting Qui orat c. He that prays with Fasting hath two Wings and those lighter than the Winds themselves for such an one doth not stretch himself or yawn or is drowsie in his Prayer He that fasteth is light and winged and prays with Vigilancy and extinguishes his own evil Lusts and renders God propitious to himself and humbles his own soul that was lift up For this cause also the Apostles in a manner continually Fasted Fasting with Faith brings into the soul a great force and much Philosophy and makes of a man an Angel and helps him to fight with incorporeal powers Sixthly What we defraud our own Appetite of by Fasting let our Lord Jesus eat by the mouth of his Poor And this indeed is another end and fruit of Fasting to make us more able and more willing to relieve those in necessity To feel some hunger our selves sometimes makes us more tenderly compassionate of those who in a manner are continually hungry and its manifest the less we expend on our selves the more we have to bestow on the Needy and Indigents and daily experience teaches us that none are more liberally Chariâ—â—â—ble to others then those who are most Christianly severe to themselves And no wonder their frequent Abstinences demonstratively convincing them that the best use of wealth is to spend as little as they can upon themselves and as much as they can upon their necessitous Neighbors And hence also follows another admirable fruit of Religious Fasting to wit an absolute indifferency to worldly riches and abundance For who will break his Sleep or weary his Limbs to get that which he believes when he has gotten the best use he can make of it is to give it away to others Hear the Antient and Learned Origen Hom. 10. in Levit. 16. Habemus c. We have the days of Lent Consecrated to Fastings we have the 4th and 6th days of the week whereon we solemnly Fast There is also yet another Religious way of Fasting whose praise is set forth in writing from certain of the Apostles for we find in a certain Book that it was said by the Apostles Blessed is he who fasts also for that end that he may relieve the Poor This Mans Fast is much accepted with God Hear S. Chrysolog Serm. 8. de Jejun Eleemosynae c Alms and Prayers are the wings of Fasting by which 't is carryed up to Heaven without which it lyes dead and spiritless upon the Earth Let us therefore O my Brethren when we Fast deposit our Dinner in the hand of the Poor that their hand may preserve for us what our belly would have lost us The hand of the Poor is the Treasury of Christ He that Fasts not to the Poor doth but feign a Fast to God Fasting without works of mercy is but an empty Image of Hunger Without pitty to others 't is but an occasion taken of Covetousness Because by such sparing what is taken down in the flesh swells in the bag In fine hear God-Almighty himself Isa. 58. Is not this the Fast that I have chosen Is it not to deal thy Bread to the Hungry and that thou bring the Poor that are cast out into thy house When thou seest the Naked that thou cover him and that thou hide not thy self from thine own flesh And now would all Pretenders to fast in Lent and upon other Set-days Fast in some tolerable manner according to what right reason Holy Scriptures and Antient Fathers direct us as has been showen the Devil himself would be ashamed to call such Fasting the Doctrin of Daemons Will-worship or Superstition But to Fast truly and Christianly is troublesome to flesh and blood It cannot be denyed And this is indeed the true cause we have so 〈…〉 s of Lent-Fast amongst us The want of express Scripâ—â—◠〈…〉 of Superstition is pretended but the true reason in 〈…〉 om Fast is the difficulty flesh and blood finds in Fasting But as to this we must help our selvas sometimes by calling to mind the bitter eternal torments we have deserved for our sins and this will make us ashamed to complain of the gentle Pennance of the most rigorous Lent-Fast Had God-Almighty upon the account of our manifold sins and wickednesses required of us some great matter for example To have Fasted our whole Lives with Bread and Water ought we not gladly to have done it How much rather then ought we to comply most willingly with his most equitable and gentle command of Fasting moderately sometimes How gladly would a Damned Soul accept of a Methusalem's Age of rigorous