before that his Highnesse alwayes fought against and proved in the end that to be a true compleat Christian Captain or Souldier was not to become a meer Cyplop without any feeling of God or sense of Religion and that the Lord who has pulled down the mighty from their Seats and does exalt the humble and meek will alwayes blesse the endeavours of such as those Poverty therefore may be said to resemble the Isle of Ithaca which as Archesilas tells us though rough and bushy failed not to breed the bravest men of Greece and has not our great Vlisses proved the same in England and herein his Highnesse has not onely shewed an especial piece of his incomparable Conduct but proved himself to be likewise full of the Divine wisdom which hides alwayes its most precious Treasures under the bark and mantle of persons base and abject in appearance as we read in Scripture Quae stulta sunt mundi elegit Deus God chose the foolish things of the world to confound the wise For simple Fishermen almost as dumb and mute as the very fishes themselves are set apart and chosen to catch in their Nets Philosophers Kings Cities Provinces and Empires and thus in the old Law the Master Statesman and Captain of the World our Patriarch Moses being but a poor stammering Shepherd in shew is chosen out to carry the Word to a most puissant Monarch to shake and to overturn with a poor wand the Pillars of his Empire to divide Seas to calme Billowes to open the bowels of Rocks to command all the Elements and fill the World with wonders So did he make a like Election of his Officers and Souldiers and do the workes of Gyants with the reputed Pygmies of the world I hope I have not hitherto undeservedly brought him for my late Lord Protectors pattern d Indeed this is the ordinary custom of Almighty God to keep his richest Pearls in shells and most precious perfumes in poor boxes Men of this World we know do quite contrary as we saw manifestly proved by the other party where moved the old Magadepies of the Church and Butter-flies of the Court with some other great things called Lords who because they had it may be a gallant valiant man forsooth for the Grandfather thought that they might very securely be Cowards so spending still upon the stock of their great Antecessors though to be doubted whether they were lawfully begot or not ruined their own selves These pretty gawdy things lived in the world just like Snailes keeping their glorious houses over their heads and in their grave Majestick courses almost as slow as theirs too made very fine long silver traces but were nothing else indeed within but meer froth They had alwayes their backs like Cushions covered with Velvet Sattin and what not but their inwards we see were nothing but hay or straw They made a glorious ostent of leaves to the World and a fair verdure like an over-grown wood but are within replenisht with nothing but Serpents These persons sure having nothing at all praise-worthy in them would dignifie their persons with apparel shewing us plainly that they had like Peacocks little heads lesse brains beautiful feathers and a long taile which yet it seems by their strutting about the streets are non clypt short enough with some of them though in good time I doubt not but they will be So I passe from these pitiful nothings whom his Highnesse inspired prudence and skilful conduct would never admit to serve under his Ensignes to some other more worthy piece of his Mosaical Conduct and the next shall be the exact Discipline our second Moses alwayes observed which is indeed the very soul of an Army and without which they would march as the Historian tells us Multi homines pauci viri Many bodies but a few men or indeed more like Salvages than Christians From the neglect of this it is that we have seen in time of War so many Caniballs in arms that cast nothing but fire and blood from their throats Menaces alwayes marching before them into Quarters and ruine and desolation bringing up the Reare Barbarous villains that think because they have a sword by their side they are therefore to be Masters of the lives and estates of other men It is most certain great courage is necessary to make a true Martial Discipline be observed but yet it is to be done as we see in this very Army of our late Lord Protector that he has left behind him to be in truth a mirrour of Armies and never yet was equalled no not by that which Alexander Severus commanded as Lampridius relates all whose souldiers marched to the Persian War like Senators and the Country Peasants loved them as their Brothers and honoured their Emperour as a god Nor yet by that which Marcus Scaurus writes of whose Regiments encamped round about a great Tree laden with fruit and yet the souldiers were kept in such order as not to dare though they were to depart the next morning to take one apple from the Master of the place In this very manner did our glorious second Moses alwayes conduct his men giving them that Admirable Lesson which the most pious Emperour Aurelian gave to some of his Officers My friends said he if you will be Captains nay if you will live contain your souldiers in their duties I will not that a Peasant so much as complain that he has been wronged in the value of a chicken nor that any has taken a grape from his Vine without his permission I will have an account of every grain of salt or drop of oil unjustly exacted I desire my souldiers should grow rich with the spoiles of enemies and not by the teares of my Subjects I would have them carry their riches on their swords not into their Hutts or Cabbins I would have them chast in the houses of their Hosts and not any the least quarrel or disorder heard of amongst them c. If Heathens could teach us such Lessons of civil deportment in armes what a shame is it then for some Christians to march as we see them do more like Scythians and Arabians and that men who are made we know for the support of men and who are not strong but for the defence of the feeble should be more pernicious one to another than Wolves and Beares nay than fire hail serpents inundations and famins By this means it is that warfare otherwise a most honourable profession is made a detestable trade and the Commanders of those unruly Armies are likely the first that suffer by them themselves and all the countenancers of such debaucht doings must find the cup of Divine anger mingled with gall and the poison of Dragons poured forth upon their guilty heads All this his late most Serene Highnesse alwayes abhorred and prevented for which reason it was sure that all the hearts of the poor people of this Nation which so much sighed under the
mending are no great matters but the least flaw in a Diamond is hugely considerable yea their personal faults become National injuries It is held by the Learnedst amongst the Ancients that when the Sun stood still in the time of Joshua the very Moon and all the Stars did make the like pause so all Princes and Governours whose spirit is the first wheel whereunto all the other are fastned it is necessary should give a good and godly motion Our sacred second Moses therefore found himself as his Princely Archetype before him did obliged to be exemplary to his people in all kindes of piety proposing no Highnesse to himself equal to that which he enjoyed in his humiliation before his God he never found himself well at ease but when he was paying those duties of piety praise honour and glory reverend service and worship to his Divine Majesty Insomuch that we may more truly say of him that which the Pagan Orator said of his Emperour Sanctiores effecit ipsos Deos exemplo suae venerationis He made the gods themselves more holy by the example of his pious worship that is he gave a reverence extraordinary to Religion by his manner of serving it The verity of this is evident for we find that he has so happily inflamed all his people about him and such as well studied him to so high a pitch of piety by his most exemplary good words and works that we can esteem them no otherwise than as Thunder-claps to Hindes for the powerful production of Salvation His Highnesse was unquestionably one of the greatest patterns of Princely piety that ever the World produced since that of our first Moses He had so great a fear of the Lord that he apprehended the least shadow of sin as death Then he had a love so tender towards his God that his heart was alwayes as a flaming lamp that burnt perpetually before the Sanctuary of the living Lord. His faith had a bosome as large as that of eternity his hope was as the bow of Heaven ail furnisht with Emralds which can never loose its force more than they their luster and so his piety must of necessity have been an eternal source of blessings His care to gather together so many living-stones for the edification of Gods house that is to say so many good godly and religious men has been more than all theirs that have heapt together so many dead ones in stately piles of Temples Finally his whole heart we know was perpetually towards God his feet were ever walking towards the Church or his other devout retirements his armes were perpetually employed in all manly and pious exercises and works of charity and his whole body was most dutifully disposed to the sacrifices and victims of his soul and both his soul and body with all his faculties were a constant Holocaust to the Lord Insomuch that neither all the cares and confusions of this World nor multiplicity of affairs that he has been ever involved in have been at all able to withdraw any part or parcel of him from the course of true piety but he has alwayes appeared in the midst of all those encombrances as those sweet Fountains which we read of that are found in the salt-sea or those happy fishes that do still preserve their plump white substance fresh and free from the infection of all the brackish waters that they live in his pious spirit could be never so much disturbed as to be extinguisht or taken off from the refreshment of his devotions as we shall see more at large in our next Ascent and happy Parallel The twentieth Ascent MOses was endowed by God with a most singular gift and spirit of prayer by which he was extraordinary powerful with the Lord and prevailed with him almost how he pleased We find in the sacred Text that he had so great a familiarity with the Lord that he was called the friend of God it is no wonder then that he should be endowed with so extraordinary a spirit of prayer the onely means to communicate with the Almighty and violently perswade him to divert his indignation from his people First let us see how by the power of our Moses his prayers and by the frequent spreading of his hands before and crying unto the Lord all the plagues that were inflicted upon hard-hearted Pharaoh himself and his perverse people were graciously removed By the same powerful means does he appease the great anger of the Lord kindled against his own rebellious people for their frequent murmurings and clamorous repinings against himself and his servant Moses imputeing constantly no lesse than murder base ambition and malitious designs unto him yet for all that the Lord confers nothing but miracles upon them at the importunity of our Moses his prayers And first he makes bitter waters sweet for such unsavory sinners as they were then he procures bread to fall down from heaven as from a replenisht Oven to fill their rebellious bellies Then no lesse than a stony-rock yet not so hard as their obdurate hearts must be set on broach and made to afford a River of water to satisfie their contumacious thirsts In short our Moses prevailed so often with his prayers to mollifie the Lords displeasure against them that one would think that reades the Story there had been a vy between mercies and rebellions and a sharp contention between the Lord and them whether they should offend or he forgive oftenest Then see the unnatural sedition of his brother Aaron and his companion Miriam and her leprosie cured by his prayer But there is one thing yet that we may well instance in for all when the peoples inveteratenesse in sin had added idolatry to all their other disobediences and made themselves worse than beasts in rendering the honours due to God alone to a pitiful creature of their own makeing a gay Golden Calf forsooth and the Lord was so highly offended with them that he would have utterly destroyed them all for it then our Moses betook himself again to this his tryed weapon of prayer and openly assaults the Lord so with his close arguments expostulations and importunities as if he had been fencing with him beseeching him after this most earnest and humble manner Lord why doth thy wroth wax hot against thy people which thou hast brought forth of the Land of Egypt with a great power and with a mighty hand wherefore should the Egyptians say for mischief did he bring them out to slay them in the mountains and to consume them from the face of the earth Turn thee from thy fierce wroth and repent thee of this evil against thy people Remember Abraham Isaac and Israel thy servants to whom thou swarest by thine own self and saidst unto them I will multiply your seed as the Stars of Heaven and all this Land that I have spoken of will I give unto your seed and they shall inherit it forever Then the Text
direction for the government of people if not enlightned with the true rayes of God and that light is not to be had but by the means of prayer The practise therefore of this holy duty has been ever stiled and esteemed by the holy Fathers of the Church The Key of Heaven and the confusion of Hell the Standard of our Christian warfare the conservation of our peace the bridle of our impatience the guardian of our temperance the seal of chastity the advocate of offenders the consolation of the afflicted the passe-port of the dying c. for the Just do live and dye in prayer as the Phoenix in her perfumes A Christian doubtlesse without prayer is no more than a Bee without a sting which can neither make honey nor wax From the defect of this duty have proceeded all the desolations of the earth from hence are dayly derived so many falls so many miseries for that men will not apply themselves to tast the things of God in prayer as our glorious Patriarch and his Parallel have alwayes done No man living can deny sure but that it was the perpetual preservation of the children of Israel that their Moses had that happy faculty to its perfection for it is manifest that they had otherwise been swallowed up by the Divine vengeance and in stead of being brought to the Land of Canaan they had been fearfully cut off from the land of the Living I hope it is already made as evident in our past Parallels that we have received as great Deliverances and preservations by the means of our second Moses which could never have been but by his free frequent and powerful accesses to God in prayer as I shall shew more at large presently In the mean time I will be bold from these two great patterns of piety to draw a closing Corollary and lay down the whole state of the question if it may be worthy to be called one in one single naked Proposition Every good Prince being a publick Person and charged with so important affairs that depend wholly upon Providence and expect the motion of the Divine will ought after these two grand exemplars of Piety and Policy to consider That he is to hold a great deal of commerce with Heaven where his businesse so much lies and therefore should resolve to set apart according to the proportion of his time and other occasions some principal hours of leisure shall I say or business at least of retirement to negotiate with God particularly about his government in imitation I say of these two greatest Statesmen our first and second Moses who had so familiar a recourse to the Almighty that as the one was so the other for ought I know may be entitled The friend of God O matchlesse Title His most incomparable Piety knew sufficiently what Gregory Nazianzen tells us That if we are to have the Lord in our minds so often as we do breath How much more suitable it is to a Statesman to be conversant in that holy duty having most need to suck in the life-giving spirit as from the Fountain of the Word by the means of prayer It is not therefore unfitly stiled The spirit of prayer for it is the breath of the inward-man Os meum aperui saith the Scripture attraxi spiritum I opened my mouth and drew in the spirit We are all ready to be choaked with flesh and fat and to be devoured with flames of concupiscence unlesse we upon all occasions open our mouths to take in that gentle air of God By this blessed means it was that our incomparable Paire our first and second Moses have arrived at this great perfection to whom the Lord has vouchsafed so much of his familiarity as to treat with them as friends and to declare himself as it were unable to deny them any thing As for the first we have seen enough already in sacred Story and for our glorious second Moses our own manifold observations and frequent experimental knowledges may be sufficient to inform us For that his late most Serene Highnesse had the purity and excellency of this precious spirit is not onely manifest to those that have had the happinesse to be present at his daily spreading of his hands and pouring forth of his spirit before the Lord and to joyn with him in his Devotions but to the whole Nation except the most stupid and malitious part of it that either will not or cannot be sensible of the great benefits that we have for so long a time received by his powerful addresses unto God How many times has the Divine vengeance been diverted from falling upon our sinful heads by his importunate intercessions How many pestilences famines and other plagues which our impenitency hardnesse of heart and ugly ingratitude had as well deserved as either the cursed Egyptians or murmuring Israelites have been kept off from us by his means Has he lesse often than the former Moses conquered his enemies more by his own prayers than his souldiers armes Has he not by that means obtained as we have seen a secret vertue to be fastened to his Standards making windes and tempests to fight under his Ensign that we may almost cry out with the Poet O nimium dilecte Deo c. How often has he opened as aforesaid Lands inaccessible calmed stormy Seas taken Towns impregnable and with petit handfuls of men discomfited huge Armies How often have we seen him give me leave to repeate those wonders cleaving of Rocks hewing through Mountains and to do the works of Gyants with the reputed Pygmes of the World and find facility in all that humane reason conceived impossible And how I say again could all this be but that the Lord could no more deny any thing to the prayer of this his dear servant and favourite our second than he could to the former Moses His fair soul was no whit lesse elevated upon the pitch of highest contemplations from his very infancy than the former great Moses was His high soul was not unlike that Ibis the stately bird of Egypt that always builds her nest in Palmes So it was perpetually conversant in high contemplations and had no more impressions of earth than the supream Sphere of celestial Bodies Or else more truly yet resembling the Palme-tree it self where that brave Bird builds which as it is the tallest and streightest of all trees so beares its best and most solid strength on its top So had our most gracious Protector and second Moses all his vigour alwayes in God and for God His life was a perpetual Sabbath Sabathum delicatum a delicious Sabbath as the Prophet calls it nourishing and reposing his soul with the constant draught of this holy spirit of prayer He made it not onely his lock and key of the day but his bolt of the night nor onely so but his very meales and recreations and all that his Highnesse did more in a becoming silence than any exteriour ostent
all his promised assistance to him by which means he wrought stupendious miracles in Egypt and by those so quickly brought to a confusion all the Learning Policy Sorcery and Malice of the Egyptians And indeed to go about to prove that there is fidelity in the Lord of Heaven and Earth towards his servants here below would be altogether as impertinent as to demonstrate water to be in the Sea or light in the Sun especially when he that is the eternal Truth has said it that he is righteous in all his wayes and faithful in all his words and works Our Moses is now to meet with men and devils but the Lord will enable him as he promised to withstand and subdue all their malitious and magical oppositions First Pharaoh upon our Moses his coming to Court and receiving his first summons instead of being obedient to the Lords commands and giving the people their desired liberty to go and serve him calls his Cabinet-Council about him and by their politick advices encreaseth presently the Israelites Taskes on purpose to inflame them to a mutiny and make them murder those that came about to deliver them But the Lord who stills the roaring of the waves and the madnesse of the people is pleased quickly to pacifie them and make them comfortably to submit to their barbarous burdens and peaceably and patiently to expect the day of their desired Redemption When this subtile piece of king-craft would not serve proud Pharaohs turn and all his politick Junto were at a stand the Devil must be presently employed and all the Magicians of the Land sent for that they forsooth may beard this great Embassadour of God and vye with their diabolical enchantments divine Miracles So Moses could no sooner cast his Rod down upon the ground to become a Serpent but those devilish Sorceres would do as much though all theirs were to be devoured by the Divine Rod. Nay Rivers turned into blood and producing of innumerable Frogs could not out-do their cheating inchantments But when the sacred Rod was to be stretcht forth again and the dust of the earth smitten into lice then Ars tua Typhe jacet the Magicians are all at a gaze there their Sorcery is quite confounded and they are constrained to confesse that the Devil their good Lord and Master hath a power limited for silly lice of which man is naturally a creator are enough to confound these great Negromancers and make them acknowledge and adore the finger of God Now after all this when malice and Magick could do no more yet the Tyrant will be stiff still till his Court and Kingdom too be infested and invaded with huge Armies of flies whose grievous swarms boldly stormed the Royal Chamber of Pharaoh then he begun to be inclined to let the children of Israel go but he had no sooner got from under the Rod but he relapseth into his old disobedience obstinacy and hardnesse of heart neither would he let the people go Then followed the miraculous Murrain upon beasts with the plague of boiles and blaines upon the more beastly and brute men with the most stupendious storm of fire and water mingled together that ever the earth felt before or since before Pharaoh would be brought to incline to our Moses and his peoples request But he had no sooner got once more a respit from those plagues but he stood at a defiance with God Almighty again and his Embassadour too Then must millions of Locusts be sent for to make his hard heart relent which he did again soon for a little time but returned presently to his insolence and Tyranny Then prodigious palpable darknesse must be sent a darknesse thick enough to be felt yet proud Pharaoh himself had no feeling longer than he remained under the importunity of the plague still relapsing into his old obduration of heart till the Lord was pleased at midnight to smite all the first-born of the Land of Egypt from the first-born of Pharaoh that sate on the Throne to the first-born of the captive lying in the dungeon and all the first-born of cattel Then was the Tyrant throughly startled he rose up in the night he and all his servants and all the Egyptians and there was a great cry in Egypt for there was not a house where there was not one dead This was a blow indeed that reacht to the very heart of Pharaoh and all his people who now with tears in their eyes are turned from being Tyrants to be suppliants and do humbly beseech their Petitioners to be masters of their own desires nor onely so but offer to accommodate them for their journey with all necessaries lend them all their Jewels of Silver and Jewels of Gold and Rayment and to give all such things as they required O wonderful conversion but yet Tantae molis erat c. So great difficulties had our great Patriarch Moses to encounter before he could arrive to be a Captain-General And now he has begun his most miraculous March with a Pillar of a Cloud before him for his Quita sol by day and a Pillar of fire for his Torch by night Yet Pharaoh will have another fling at him and thinks now by force of arms to destroy those abroad whom he could not securely keep at home in quiet bondage by all his arts and policies But behold the Prodigy of all Prodigies The Red Sea is cut into a Royal high-way for the Israelites and made a dreadful grave for the Egyptians Those mighty waters stand all on heaps and congeale themselves into walls as it were of brasse for the defence and safe passage of the people of God but dissolve themselves into liquid floods for the overthrow of Pharaoh and all his Chariots who were no sooner entred than overwhelmed and so they sunk down as lead in those mighty waters as our great Moses himself expresseth it in his Song of thanksgiving to God for that stupendious Deliverance I should be infinite if I went about to relate the Myriads of wonders that our Moses shewed afterwards in the Desart in the conduct of this chosen Army which quickly becoming faithlesse and mutinous yet by the prayers and for the sake of our most admirable Moses was the Almighty pleased never to forsake them but to feed them constantly with miracles showring Quailes upon them for flesh and the Bread of Heaven for them to eat and gave them continual Prodigies to drink from the very first bitter waters at Marah which he turned to be sweet to the strange tapping of the Rock in Horeb. So happy are the people who have the Lord for their God and so dear and dutiful a servant of his for their Leader as this our first Moses was and our second cannot but appear to be The Parallel I believe truly that there is no intelligent Person living that looks upon this long Story of our present Ascent but would take the particulars of the children
idlenesse was a meer moth of Noble mindes and iron it self sure if it had the reason to discourse understanding to chuse its one commodity would cry out to us that it better loved to be kept in constant use and exercise than to lie rusting and consuming in the corner of a horse Wherefore we see that God does not ordinarily entertain great souls in the pleasures of an idle life but in the rigid exercises of vertue for we know that there are many most excellent fishes that will die in standing waters and are delighted in the most bubbling sluces and turbulent seas and rivers and the best birds will alwayes be abroad in the most troubled air Our glorious Eagle therefore was alwayes seeking out for action and never to be found lazing or beating of his wings in the lower Regiment of the air but soaring alwayes aloft amongst the furies of Lightnings Tempests and Whirle-winds playing with Thunder-claps and ever having his eye where the day was to break His painful vigilancies were so great in Court as well as Camp City and Field that we may say of him as was once of the Great Constantine Tam assiduus in actione sua constitit ut vel labore refici ac reparari videretur He was so conversant in action that it seemed to be nothing but his continual recreation Gaudent siquidem saith the same Author divina perpetuo motu jugi agitatione se vegetat aeternitas His constitution was so strenuous that it must needs have been akin to those celestial bodies that refresh themselves with their own motion and perpetual agitation So true it is what Seneca tells us Contempta res est home nisi supra humana se erexit A man is a very pitiful vile and contemptible thing unlesse he be ambitious to raise himself above all the ordinary courses of the World but that saying is to be verified in no sort of men so much as the Noble Souldier whose honour depending upon the most superlative degree of vertue must seek out and pursue wayes beyond all equality and such a person is sure of attaining his end for Polyaenus has assured him that Voluntas ad laborem propensa cuncta vincere superare consuevit A propense will or a soul prone to labour has been ever wont to conquer and overcome all difficulties And Appian gives the like encouragement when he proclaims Nihil tam arduum quod industria animi fortitudine superari non possit Nothing so high or hard but is to be compassed and overcome by industry and a willing valiant mind What these and all the Philosophers Poets Orators or Historians have said or could prescribe his late most Serene Highnesse has alwayes fully understood and most perfectly practised as no one of the Army that has served under him but must bear him witnesse how present he would be upon all Guards and Watches as if he were ubiquitary how incessant in all his Actions and Labours as if he were impassible how alwayes taking order for and moving about his body as if he were immortal Indeed this laborious vertue which is no small one in an officer his Highnesse was more Master of than any that I ever heard or read of If any Work were to be raised his hand must be in it first if any duty to be done his president must be still the foremost so by rare skill mingling the Captain and the common Souldier together he did both intend the diligence of others from whom he might though not so effectually have exacted it and ease the burden of their labour by making himself a companion and partaker of their pains and travel But of this and his other great pieces of Conduct we shall say more in our next Ascent where we shall represent him a most compleat Captain-General The thirteenth Ascent WE have found our Moses a most valiant and vertuous Souldier and a most vigilant skilful and careful Officer but that he might be all and yet not fit to command in Cheif and a shepherd is not very likely to make a great General fitter he must be sure in the opinion of most to lead his flocks than to conduct an Army of men Yes we shall find him a most glorious and accomplisht Captain-General otherwise he would never have been selected sure by the Divine Wisdom to conduct and command so great and troublesome a body as that of the most mutinous perverse and rebellious people in the World and to carry them in his bosom as a Nurse beareth her sucking child or if there could be yet any danger of doubt in any of this I would refer that doubting person to the whole current of holy Scripture where he shall find by the exact discipline observed in his Army the ordering of his several Marchings and Encampings the Election of his ablest Officers as well as Souldiers and the fighting of his Battels his extraordinary and incomparable skill in Military Conduct The Parallel Good Souldiers get honour to their Captains and Officers and all together being gallant men must of necessity make a glorious General It highly concerns him therefore who is to Command in Cheif to let his prime and principal care be placed in the Election of his inferiour officers as our first and second Moses have so exemplarily done for this is the first step of all Military Conduct wherein I am sure he has out-done all the Generals that ever were before him unlesse this to which he is so parallel Is it not plain that his Highnesse found such horrid abuses in all the former Armies that he was faine to new modell this to bring about those his great and mighty workes that he has done And what sort of Officers were they that he chose and instruments that his inspired wisdom pickt out and fitted for his purpose even such as his Souldiers were before spoken of men of clean hands and purer hearts that were to fight the Lords Battels He rejected ever those gay gawdy outsides of the world those petit spirits of the Abyss before spoken of sprung from the race of Cadmus I mean those silly fencing fellows swaggering swashbucklers and Hectors aforesaid who appear like Comets of fire and blood to bring murder pestilence and poison into houses who as I said make the Pillars of Heaven to tremble with their blasphemies have nothing else of souldiers in them but to pill and ravage in their Quarters like Harpies and feed themselves with humane blood who are ever readier to shew their valour for a cold countenance an extravagant word or a Caprichio of spirit than they would either be for God their Country or the whole World A most wretched and abominable sort of men that never think of or look up to Heaven but to blaspheme it indeed more like Centaurs than men and have their hearts all spotted over like the skin of a Panther No these were the pitiful things as we have said
truely we have no little reason to rejoyce in those very sufferings congratulate with our selves the blood-shed it self of those barbarous Wars if we could at no cheaper rate have aquired the enjoyment of those most inestimable blessings and benefits which we have since received and above all the rest the soveraign influence of that most precious person our late Lord Protector and second Moses Thrice blessed England in such a purchase though with so much cost and paines O happy voice of Thunder which made this Hinde bring forth so glorious a birth after so many terrible throws and such direful agitations of many years And for the happy close of all this we may again remarke another piece of Heavens especial Providence and quiet all the distempers of our souls with an humble acknowledgement of that mercy and submission to the Divine Justice which in short amounts to this When the Lord is pleased to purge a Kingdom or Nation defiled with sin he chooseth alwayes a people more righteous and religious than they were it being forever most just and reasonable that they should enjoy their goods who will have no share in their vices So our Moses and his Israelites pillaged and overthrew the wicked Egyptians So Arbaces vanquisht the debauched Sardanapalus So Alexander conquered the effeminate Persians And so the Goths gained the Empire of Rome as holy Salvian more at large illustrates So to return to our late great Generals successes and dispatches which as it is notorious have been so stupendous that the present spectators of them did take them as aforesaid more for visions than realities The celerity of his Expeditions was so great a vertue so much commended in Julius Caesar that he alwayes as far out-went his veni vidi vici as ever he did the Cunctator Fabius Jebu a man of an active spirit was employed against the house of Ahab to bring it to a quick confusion for God Almighty when he means to shave clear alwayes chooseth a Razor with a sharp edge and never sends a slug upon a message that requires hast So our great Oliver we see when he came into General command dispatcht more work in one year than all the Armies of England had done in three or four before This it was to have one of the Lords own election to command over us and so much according to his own heart that we see he has constantly tyed as aforesaid a secret vertue to his Standards making winds and tempests to fight under his Ensignes opening for him lands inaccessible calming stormy Seas makeing him with petit handfuls of men to discomfit huge Royal Armies to take in Towns impregnable cleave Rocks and hew through Mountains nay to do the works of Gyants as aforesaid with the reputed Pigmies of the World and find facility in all that humane reason conceived impossible So that we may count more Victories of his than Encounters his Palmes being perpetually verdant as well in the frozen ice of Winter as in the scorching heats of Summer Nor was England alone the Scene of his great Actions but the very mists and foggs of Scotland as well as the woods and boggs of Ireland will all come in to attest his glories for the barrennesse of the one nor the barbarisme of the other could set a period to his proceedings or give a foile to his fortune Now to summe up all his Souldier-like Excellencies for I must hasten out of this large Field least I be lost in 't if we may by the most eminent qualities of inferiour creatures be capable to conceive his matchlesse perfections The most exquisite character of a compleat Captain or Man at Armes is by several Authors delivered to us thus That is one who has the assault of the wild Bull the defence of the wilde Boare the flight of the Wolfe the courage of a Lion and the craft of a Fox This strange composition his Highnesse had to its highest perfection as he has been sufficiently seen in all postures but above all what a spectacle it was sometimes to behold him in his Lion-like posture and almost covered over with blood and dust amongst the ranks of his afrighted men and performing both the office of a great Captain and most Couragious Souldier and so by that means restoring a Day in danger to be lost Then sometimes again to see him leading his well Disciplin'd Army into enemies Quarters and by his meer Conduct conquering vast Armies and reducing their strongst Garrisons without one drop of blood and such dry Victories were alwayes his dearest delight as indeed they are alwayes most honourable Ingens victoriae decus citra domesticum sanguinem bellanti saith Tacitus The greatest glory of a Victory is that which a Captain gaines by the least expense of home-bred blood And this was his Highnesse his constant study to do nay his endeavour likewise was to save as much as he could of his very enemies blood He never sought to purchase fame by such a cruel vanity as Pompey the Great did who building a Temple to Minerva caused to be engraven over the Gate of it how he had taken routed and slain two millions one hundred fourscore and three thousand men pillaged and sunk eight hundred forty six Ships made desolate one thousand five hundred thirty eight Cities and Towns If this be the way to glory his late Highnesse sure has steered a clean contrary course for he has written and engraven by his Actions on the Gate of the Temple of Eternity the Men Ships Cities and Towns that he has preserved Haec divina potentia est gregatim publicè servare saith the most excellent Seneca It is a piece of Divine power to save publickly and by Troops By the other way it may be his Highnesse might have rendred himself more remarkable and terrible like a dreadful Comet by the ruine of the World but our glorious Protector knew nothing could be so honourable as to save So we never saw his Highnesse put up his sword but his anger too ever holding with Nicetus that Naturae injuriam facit humanitatis legem violat qui ultra victoriam iracundiae indulget He offers an injury to nature and violates a law of common humanity that can continue his anger after a Victory Nay I 'le be bold to add that it is a most unpolitick proceeding likewise for which his Highnesse onely may be sufficient witnesse who after his most bloody Battels alwayes Conquered as much with sweetnesse as he had done before with the Sword which has been under God the most happy cause that after so fierce and quick a War we have not scarce a foot-steep to be seen of it not a Town fired and very hardly now a man mist our cattel as plentiful as ever our fields no lesse fertil and fragrant nor yet our hillocks are lesse filled with ears of corn all which we must needs attribute to his Highnesse his pious preservation in whose power
am sure to incur the censure of flattery for it amongst fools And I le begin with his chief Minister or Secretary of State the intelligence of his Counsels and as it were the Angel-Guardian of his Government who was so present with his great Master our second Moses in all his actions counsells interests and designs as certain flowers are said to wait on the Sun and penetrated to the very Center of his great Soul so could not but contract many of his most Mosaical perfections He is certainly known to be what his name renders him by Anagramm a True Holy one that is a Statesman after Moses his manner viz. fearing God and dealing truly c. a person of most incomparable piety and parts Prudent as a Serpent and yet pure as a Seraphim vertues so rare in a Statesman that we may justly call him the true holy Phoenix Polititian of the Age. I have not time nor paper to insist so particularly upon every one of his Highnesse most honourable Privy Council but this I can affirm that never was a more compleat body of Council or more exquisite composition of so many excellent Tempers together in the World insomuch that we see notoriously in every dayes dispatches how they are that perfectly what the old Historian Velleius sayes of Sejanus flatteringly That he was Actu otiosis simillimus in earnest a most excellent character howsoever of a Statesman that he seemed in the middest of his greatst employments as if he were idle My Lords likewise of his Highnesse Council are so exactly knowing in affairs that it was never heard that any of those six common obstacles did ever obstruct their dispatches which are disorder confusion passion sollicitude irresolution and precipitation so they have done all things warily fully and peaceably without shewing the least anxiety They have by their great piety and prudence kept this State so well united within the bands of concord and charity that it cannot but appear to forreigners themselves as it were a little Temple of Peace though in the very heat and hurry of War embracing all affairs governing them with that sweet temper and equality of spirit that they resemble those active spirits which move the whole Heavens not using in themselves the least agitation Amber-Greece is nothing so sweet in it self as when it is compounded with other things so these Godly Wise Couragious and every way Excellent Counsellours improve themselves by the communication of their counsells together and do even as Flint-stones which by their proximity do make their sparkles to flie by a holy emulation which they use in the pursuite of God not onely enlighten others but enkindle in each others hearts a more sensible and pious apprehension of God and all good things by a mutual reverberation But I must hasten for when I have said all that can Be said it will fall short of their most Mosaical merits So I shall conclude with them in saying onely that they are all persons composed according to Jethro's character and that when our second Moses adopted them into his secret counsells we could none of us deny nor can yet but that it seemed his late Highnesse had drawn so many Angels from Heaven to fix them at the stern of his Estate for they are all of them as unlike their Predecessors as all the World can wish them Then if we but consider a little the excellent choice his Highnesse has made of Commissioners and Keepers of his Great Seal we cannot but acknowledge that they are persons without any exception fitted for so great a work that carry a constant Court of Chancery engraven in their breasts and bear jus aequum bonum written in their very foreheads For the Lords Commissioners of his Highnesse Treasury they cannot be questioned to be of as exact a choice and equal disposition for the great Trust still men of our Mosaical temper fearing God and dealing-truly and so we may safely affirm that our second Moses selected Persons for that employment as well as other to whom he might as safely have reposed his conscience as he did his purse Men all as honourable in their breedings as Noble by their births of as profound Learning and ability in the Laws as of sublime honesty and fidelity to their Country and of a most unspotted integrity both towards God and his Highnesse their late Mosaical Master I should be infinite to insist upon all the particular men of Honour employed by his Highnesse So I shall speak onely something to our Parallel of Mosaical Judges to which our present Ascent naturally leads us and leave the rest to be made out by ingenuous Readers themselves And first for that incomparable pair of my Lords the Chief Justices with the several Sets of ingenious and godly Judges Attorny and Solicitor-General all his Highnesse's Council at Law with other Officers and Appendices to each Court They are all such select and eminent Persons and indeed the plurality of Lawyers from the Purple to the Sable Robe of this present Age so accompplisht with piety and parts that the Divine Themis her self will not be ashamed to call her self a prostitute in former Ages and acknowledge this production of hers to be onely genuin and their generation onely own to be Legitimate and all this we must attribute to his late Highnesse his most Mosaical influence Their Lordships I mean those excellent persons in supreme Judicature are known to live the Laws as well as to see them put in execution Evecti in excelsum inde magis vitia despiciunt as the wise Cassiodorus well expresseth it They know that God and his Highnesse have set them on high for no other cause but to behold vices beneath them which whosoever does exalt will find himself quickly trampled underfoot by them and made to drink the greatest part of the poison which he mingles for others and he that breakes down the hedge as the Scripture threatens the Snake shall sting him first Their Lordships I say have given sufficient evidence to the World that they know all this and practice the contrary course They know themselves to be lookt upon as Stars in the firmament and Philosophy tells us that the more light a body has the more it ought to have of participation and favourable influences for objects that are in a lower degree than it Nihil vile nihil cupidum judices decet claras suas maculas reddunt si illi ad quos multi respiciunt aliquâ reprehensione sordescant sayes the same excellent Cassiodorus Nothing vile or covetous becomes Judges the spots of persons in power are quickly spyed for they being aloft every eye dwells upon them We have seen in forreign parts and heretofore here in England Judges enough neglectful of their duty and Courts of Justice resembling rather old Cyclopean Cavernes than Temples of peace for which we have seen the very fields themselves weeping nay filled with large pools and standing waters
tamen conjuratio praematura mors oppressit quod elatior populo blandiri senatoribus assurgere gravaretur aut nesciret verbis quoque uteretur asperis c. Though he was hugely commendable for his Clemency Liberality and Courage yet he fell under a sad Fate for want of a little complacency with the people and soothing the Senate with some complement and had alwayes too much asperity in his tongue Could any of these imputations ever light upon our Mosaical Protector No he was ever as distant from them as the Sphere of fire can be from the Center of the Earth so that we may securely conclude that his late Highnesse has as much out-done Julius Caesar in this as in all his other glories never was that great Title of Serenity so truly given to any Prince as to him for it was born with him Thus we have seen these two great Persons of Honour our first and second Moses entering this grand Theater of the World from the first Scene of their humble retirements to the last issue and Catastrophe of all their happinesses attired with nothing but humility that still accompanying and crowning all their Actions as it was the basis so it was the vertical point of all their greatnesse nay the very Orb and Element that all their other Vertues moved in and by which they arrived at all their glories so disproving the Philosophy of Seneca who sayes that Servitus est magnitudinus non posse fieri minorem That it is the slavery of greatnesse not to be made lesse which though may be true in bodies they have proved to be contrary in souls and what Pliny assures us to be more true that Natura nusquam magis quà m in minimis tota est nature is most entirely it self and whole in the least things This sweet littlenesse of theirs is that which has rendred them so great in the sight of God and man for by so lessening and annihalating themselves they have enlarged their glories and raised themselves so many degrees towards Heaven as erected eternal Trophes to their honour upon earth and those as great as ever were written or can be in the Records of Fame Thus we have I hope happily finisht the whole Stair-case of all our Mosaick difficult Ascents we shall now beg a little breathing-space upon the top of this holy Mount before we dare to adventure any higher and yet we have but halfe a dozen short and easie Ascents more left us to climb for they are Ascents of Favour and Prerogative before we can introduce this glorious Couple our first and second Moses within their blessed Tabernacle of Repose and so we do intend to conclude though it can never be sufficiently accomplished this high piece of Mosaick Work Six Transcendental ASCENTS To the top of the MOSAICK MOUNT OR BLESSED TABERNACLE OF REPOSE The first Transcendental ASCENT MOses being premonisht by God of his approaching end made his most humble suite unto the Lord for to nominate his Successor that the people might not suffer by the vacancy of so great a Charge and the form of his Petition is very remarkable which runs thus Let the Lord God of the Spirits of all Flesh set a man over the Congregation which may go out before them and which may lead them out and which may bring them in that the Congregation of the Lord be not as sheep which have no Shepherd and the Lord said unto Moses Take thee Joshua the son of Nun a man in whom is the Spirit and lay thine hand upon him c. Then we find this testimony of Joshua afterwards That he was full of the Spirit of Wisdom for Moses had laid his hands upon him and the children of Israel hearkned unto him and did as the Lord commanded Moses The Parallel We have hitherto throughout all our past Ascents seen this incomparable pair marching most amicably coupled hand in hand together as well in all their painful actions as sufferings And a glorious spectacle none sure can deny it to be I am sure holy Cyprian tells us that it is To see such invincible courages counterbufft with stormes and tempests on whom it would seem that heaven it self would burst and fall in pieces to behold two such men I say amidst the threats of the air and the ruins of the world alwayes standing upright like to great brazen Colossuses and scorning them all as mists and small flakes of snow What can we do lesse in such a case than exclaim with Seneca Heu quanta sublimitas inter ruinas humani generis stare erectum O what a sublimity it is to be erect in heart and countenance amongst the ruines of mankind and give thanks to God with Typotius Quod digni visi sint Deo in quibus experiretur quantum humana natura possit pati That he hath deemed them worthy to serve as a trial of humane Nature to see to how high a pitch it could arrive And truly if we do but rightly consider the rise as well as the progresse of these two great Personages we shall find them exactly to correspond with that ingenious devise of Lewis the twelfth of France which was a celestial Cup advanced in rayes of Gold amongst a crowd of eclipses with this Motto Inter ecclypses exorior I rise between eclipses We have seen I say this devise fully verified in our first and second Moses and yet their Clemency and Piety was alwayes so great as to pardon and pray for their very eclipsers and persecutors themselves like all the ancient Martyrs who when laden with torments opened so many mouths as they had wounds to beg a pardon for the very causers and inflictors of them and more like to Jesus Christ himself now sitting in the midst of those Martyrs and quickning by the effusion of his blood even those who had their hands deep in the shedding of it We have seen this matchlesse couple onely Parallel to themselves in all their most elate stirring and astonishing great actions too wherein they have ever shewed their courage like Eagles confronting all stormes like Lions which oppose all violences like Diamonds never to be broken like Rocks scorning all waves and Anvills resisting all the stroakes of hammers and in a word like to nothing so much as to the River Tygris which as blessed Ambrose observes Quodam cursu rapido resistentia quaeque transverberat neque aliquibus cursus ejus impedimentorum haeret obstaculis amongst all the streams of the earth hath a current so swift and violent that with an unresistible rapidity and impetuosity it combateth and surmounteth all the obstacles that can be opposed against it So the Courage of these two great and most incomparable Captains did use to flie through all perils break through and work it self a passage against a whole world of contrarieties We have seen these two super-excellent Persons in all their eminencies of State likewise Supreme
they yet feel to satisfie with their sweat and blood the avarice of some curst particular Officers who are notwithstanding as greedy as fire and more insatiable than the Abyss or Hell it self But I shall forbear at present to prosecute this dispute any further for I conceive by what is already said there is no sober Christian but will conceive that Cyclopaean piece of policy is so far from being Mosaical profitable to or becoming the dignity of a Christian Prince that it must be absolutely contrary and destructive both to Prince and people nay fitter to be stiled Barbarisme than a Civil Government So I hope we may now securely proceed to the conclusion of our precious and happy Parallel And as for this great point of Piety in not pressing upon the peoples purses or squeezing their estates so remarkable in our former Moses there is no man sure so perverse as to deny our second to be his perfect Parallel for though Bella sustent antur pecuniarum abundantiâ as Dionysius Halicarnassaeus tells us The support of all Wars is from a great treasure and plenty of money and what Tacitus observes is most certain that Dissolvitur imperium si fructus quibus Res-Pub sustinetur diminuantur There is no State or Kingdom can continue long without a certain and a large revenue yet his late Mosaical Highnesse has been ever so tender of intrenching upon the particular purses of his people to supply those publick occasions of State that he has been almost guilty of transgressing in the other extreme by permitting the General good to be neglected at least to suffer some prejudice for want of it Much lesse sure can any such thing as unjust coveting or craving of other mens estates for himself be objected to him which most of his malitious adversaries before mentioned have been guilty of in the highest degree Their fingers were like Talons and Claws of Harpies to scratch and scrape what they could for themselves His hand and heart were alwayes open to do good to others as appeared by his manifold charities in the relief of the poor especially such as were made so by the sad distresse of War and I dare say his expense that way has been far greater than all the sharers of the Church and Kingdoms spoiles put together have disburst There was a notable Inscription upon one Gillias as Valerius Maximus tells us Quod Gillias possidebat omnium quasi commune patrimonium erat hic ipsius liberalitatis praecordioe habuit domus ejus quasi quaedam munificentiae officina fuit What Gillias had was the possession of all mankind this man had his heart and entrails composed even of charity it self his house was a shop of bounty and all this sure was never more applicable to any person than to his late Mosaical Highnesse whose hands were kist by millions when he was alive in acknowledgement that they were the gracious distributors of so many blessings and his grave now he is dead will be sprinkled with as many flowers in gratitude for the preservation of so many lives His bounty I say was a most eminent vertue in him ever holding with Cassiodorus that Periculosissima res est in imperante tenuitas That narrownesse of soul and griping hands were the most perillous qualities that could appear in a Prince and with the same excellent Writer concluded likewise that Regnantis facultas fit ditior cum remittit acquirit nobiles thesauros famae neglecta utilitate pecuniae A Kings Treasure is encreased by giving and forgiving and the lesse money he plucks into his Exchecquer the more glory he carries about his Court. Did his most Serene Highnesse ever draw any thing from private men but in order to their own preservation He never desired or studied any thing more than that we should be safe nor never sought ours but us He never accounted himself rich but when his people were so making their hearts as that great Alexander did his best Exchecquer In fine what was once said of Hadrianus Caesar must be acknowledged to be his Highnesse his most especial Character Sic suum semper gessit Principatum ut res sit Populi tota non sua Whatsoever he has done in his Government has been more for our advantage than his own he has not onely forborne to burden us himself but has most mercifully released us from many of the heavy Taxes that were imposed upon us by our terrible Task-masters of the long Parliament and like a true Soul of Honour never sought for any other recompense of his great Actions than the glory of doing well and the private satisfaction of his own conscience Thus are hearts gained here and Crowns of immortality hereafter Thus truly is Heaven it self obliged and Earth made tributary to vertue for by that means he has rendred himself to be truly that which was said of Octavianus Caesar Deliciae humani generis The love and delight of all mankind which cannot but more and more appear to us as we proceed to mount higher upon our Mosaical Ascents and Parallels The ninteenth Ascent MOses was a most exemplary person in all manner of Piety towards God a duty most becoming a great Prince to be highly zealous for the true honour and Divine worship of his Almighty Maker the Lord of Heaven and Earth And this plainly appeared not onely in his frequent spreading of his hands and sometimes falling down upon his face before the Lord and prostration we know is the highest part of Religious worship but also in his most indefatigable pains speedy care and expedition in preparing of the Tabernacle with all its appertinencies and providing offerings for it Then in his punctual and precise care for the ordering of the particular Ceremonies and Circumstances of Divine Service to the very Garments of Aaron the Vrim and the Thummim and the Consecration of Priests Then in the constitution of many most costly and reverent Sacrifices as the continual Burnt-offering the Meat-offering the Peace-offering the Sin-offering c. Then in his erection of the Altar of Incense his appointment of the course for the ransom of Souls for the making of the holy annointing Oil the manner of making with the ingredients for the composition of the holy Perfume Then in taking order for an infinity of other Rights Ceremonies and holy Feasts as the Feast of Passeover the Feast of Weeks the Feast of Trumpets and the Feast of Tabernacles c. Finally giving the people such a Law so solemn and so strict in the Service of the Lord as if they should have nothing almost else to do but to render their duty to the Omnipotent and spend all their time in paying him the honours of a glorious Service as is to be seen at large throughout his Sacred Writings The Parallel If we look upon the Piety of this our Great Patriarch or his happy Parallel our late Lord Protector in the
largest extent of it we should find it as boundlesse as the Sea and our selves swallowed up in the contemplation of it So we have restrained our selves to the discourse of that part of their piety onely which has relation to God-ward and a true zeal to his holy Worship And first we find our Patriarch so severe and punctual in all his performances that he would have the least omission of a puntillo of them to be a mortal at least a capital sin the offender being to be cut off from the World or from communion with the people and so sumptuous he was in his appointed worship that all the World might see that he thought nothing too costly for a bare ceremony of Divine Service and that the people should take notice that the All they had was from the Lord to whom they were to pay back so large a proportion in Sacrifice A most Royal Stately and Magnificent manner of Worship it was which every man must acknowledge that reads the several solemnities instituted by him in those blessed Books and worthy of the spirit of so great a Prince Prophet and Patriarch as our great Moses was Now has our glorious second Moses shewed lesse Religious zeal or true Princely piety towards God or lesse extraordinary care and pious curiosity in providing for the honour splendour worship and service of his Holy Name No his Mosaic Highnesse full well knew that if all the mountains of the World were amassed into one and all the woods of the Earth made into one Libanus and were set on fire and all the beasts of a thousand fields and forrests were turned into victims for his Sacrifices they would be all as nothing in value in respect of his heavenly Majesty and if all the voices of men were tuned into one and that one voice so musically made could speak like Thunder and be heard loudly to proclaim from Pole to Pole the glory of the Almighty it could not be sufficient so resound his holy praises To this purpose it was that his Highnesse was pleased frequently to approve that worthy and ingenious fancy of Philo that great and Learned Jew who has a Story though in it may be nothing at all of verity yet I am sure the morality of it is very excellent This great man in a Book of his called Noe's Plant relates as a certain tradition of the Sages of his Nation from the very beginning of the World That God the Creator after that he had formed this goodly Globe of the Vniverse and composed it as a glorious Scutcheon of his own immense Greatnesse a compendium or contracted table of his chiefest Titles and a perfect Mirrour of his Divine Wisdom and Power demanded of those blessed Spirits about him which were the Angels it may be then in glory what they thought of that great piece of Work upon which one amongst the heavenly throng after he had very highly commended the curious Architecture of the Vniverse acknowledging it to be a most compleat Fabrick in all things but one and that one thing he said was wanting to the perfection of so goodly a Frame which he required as a noble Seal to set upon so incomparable a Piece What is that said the Eternal Father I would desire replyed the holy Spirit That there might be a strong powerful and penetrating harmonious voice which borne upon the wings of the winds Coaches of the clouds and Charioted thorough the air might replenish all the parts of the World with an applause of so accomplisht a Piece of Work and incessantly to eccho forth both night and day the glories of God with praises and thanksgivings for his Divine Majesties most inestimable benefits This Story truly may passe very well for a pretty invention at least and not unworthy of an Angelical spirit that was zealous for the honour and glory of the Lord his Master and Creator Yet by the leave of this good spirit I must be bold to say that his exception if we take it as so was in something very frivolous or his Complement if we take it as so was over-officious For first the Almighty had sufficiently provided against that pretended defect in composing the World in the frame chat we behold as a fair large Clock and then proportionably giving to man the place which this celestial and critical spirit seemed to require Now that this great Clock of the Universe should be alwayes in tune to his service and Divine disposition he has laid his particular commands and orders upon each wheel and pin to do their parts The first wheel of this grand Clock is that primum mobile which we find in Philosophy the continual motion and the secret influencies of antipathies and sympathies which lie as it were hidden in the bowels of Nature The hand of this universal Horologe is that goodly embowed piece of checkerwork and frettizing of the heavenly Orbes which we behold with our eyes The twelve Signs in the Zodiack serve as it were for distinctions of the twelve hours of the day The Sun it self exerciseth the office of the steel and gnomon to point out time to us and in its absence the Moon the other Lights and Stars contribute thereto their lustrous brightnesse The Sea gives in the azure of its waves for ornament as also the Earth produceth its varieties of herbs flowers and fruits for enamel of the outside and its whole body for a perfect counter-poise its stony Quarries Mettals and Minerals for to exercise the wisest and learnedst Naturalists in the search and knowledge of this great Creator The lesser and inferiour animals are the small chimes and Man himself is the great Clock which is to strike the several hours and so perpetually to render thanks honour glory praise service and worship to this Almighty Maker And the most vocal Clock to celebrate the praises of his Creator that these later Ages have produced was this Man of men our most pious late Lord Protector All this I say his Highnesse knew full well as our great Patriarch his Prototype did and the necessity too that there was on the peoples parts to give the most gracious Lord of Heaven and Earth all adoration due to him wherefore we find how he enjoyned such solemne observancies upon them which though but barely typical and ceremonial yet were hugely necessary to strike a reverend dread of the Divine Majesty into so rebellious a people Our Princely Patriarch therefore and his Parallel our late Lord Protector knowing themselves as all other Rulers and persons in power are to be set upon Pinacles to change their words into Laws and lives into Examples were the first and foremost always in the practise of this and all other piety The lives of Princes they knew are more read than their laws and generally more practised yea their examples passe altogether as current as their coin and what they do they seem to command to be done cracks in glasses though past