eternally in his Glory S. Climacus Article XXXVI St. John Climacus distinguishes the desires of Death which the Devil suggests unto us from those which Grace inspires and of this Doctrine he composes one degree of his holy Ladder Degree 6. n. 4. where he shews That the Meditation of Death is the most profitable of all Spiritual practises AS all apprehensions of Death are not criminal Degree 8. n. 3. 4. Ibid. 8. so all the desires of Death are not always lawfull According to Nature Man dreads to die and Christ Jesus himself was apprehensive of it to make it clearly appear to men that he had taken upon him all the weaknesses of humanity and that there were two Natures united in his Person If God had not given to the Soul this natural adhesion for her Body she would not remain there shut up one instant This adhesion is therefore an order of Providence and not a disorder of Sin But to know whether the Desires or Fears of Death are criminal or commendable we must examine the reasons which move us to dread it or to desire it There are some who by a motive of Despair desire to die when they find themselves oppress'd with sickness or with affliction and these are very faulty in not receiving these chastisements from the hand of God with patience and humility Others after they have imbraced a Penitent Life are discouraged and grow weary of suffering for the expiation of their Sins and these surely are very unhappy for they lose the fruit of all the good works which they have formerly performed They have kept their Lamps along time lighted and they let them go out at the hour perhaps in which the Bridegroom is ready to come Others there are who being puffed up with a vain presumption imagin that they are arrived at the soverein peace of Soul and have gotten a comâ—eat victory over all their Passions because they have no longer any fear of Death They perceive not that this Pride is a thousand times worse than the fear of Death and that the malice of our invisible Enemies is so great 7. Degree n. 68. that they convert the seeds of Virtues into Vices Some others more conformable to the Spirit of Christianism seeing that the violence of their evil Customs makes them to relapse incessantly into Sin desire Death with thoughts of repentance and of humility These sentiments are laudable 22. Degree n. 25. and yet they are but the beginning of Christian perfection One arrives at this perfection when being dead to all the affections of the World to the World it self 6. Degree n. 20. and to Sin one desires to die upon no other motive than only to be entirely united to Christ Jesus 'T is by this mark that one may know the difference between the natural apprehensions of Death 6. Degree n. 6. and the fear which proceeds not from the feeling of Nature between the Impatience which comes from Despair and the desire which the hope of a better Life produces For he who hath not renounced all created things and his own will 6. Degree n. 20. and 11. betrays himself and is like to a Soldier who should present himself with his hands tyed in the day of Battle They who during their Lifetime have their Heart and Spirit link'd to Heaven 26. Degree n. 106. mount up to Heaven after their Death But they who have had their Soul link'd to the Earth descend under the Earth 26. Degree n. 377. The goods and the honours of the World are as so many rotten steps of a Ladder upon which the humble man cannot set his foot without puting himself in danger to lose his Humility He who voluntarily resigns himself to Death and who expects it without fear 6. Degree n. 12. hath some Vertue But he who at every hour desires it may pass for a Saint We cannot live holily one sole day if we do not desire that it may be the last day of our Life rather than to offend God in it The continual thought of Death extinguishes at last all Vices And as a perfect Charity renders a man exempt from falling into Sin so a perfect Meditation of Death renders him uncapable to fear any thing but the Judgements of God Ib. n. 14. And surely there is reason to admire that the Pagans themselves have said something not unlike unto this when they declared That Phylosophy or the love of Wisdom is nothing else but a continual study of Death Article XXXVII St. Bernard teaches us That Hope is the portion of true Christians and that this Virtue enables them to suffer patiently all the evills of this Life and to Love and Desire Death THe Children of darkness sleep in the night season Ser. 6. in Ps 90. alibi but as for us my Brethren who are Children of light let us watch in expectation of the days coming in which we are to sleep the sleep of Death S. Bernard Let us arm our selves with a holy Hope to fight against this drowsiness of the World Let Sensualists shut their eyes against the beams of this Hope and let them repose in the wantonness of a voluptuous Life Let them say we are in peace and in security who can discover us what can trouble the enjoyment of our pleasures The day will come when they shall be overwhelm'd with an un-foreseen ruine as a Woman is surprized by the pangs of Childing How terrible are your judgments how incomprehensible are your words â—ap 17. O Lord Whilst the Wicked insult over the holy Nation of your Elect and flatter themselves that they shall always domineer a stroke of your hand lays these fugitive slaves in the dust who fancied they could steal themselves from your eternal Justice They who were seen to triumph over your Patience are all enwrap'd in the shadows of a long and dismall night as many Criminalls are fast linked together with one and the same Chain As for us O my God! who have no share in their Sleep nor in their Blindness we lift up our Eyes incessantly towards Heaven from whence we expect our help You O Lord Psal 15. are our good and all our portion This part which is fallen to our Lot is rich and delicious Our hereditary share is of an incomparable excellency S. Ber. 'T is for this that our Heart rejoyceth and that we sing with alacrity because you will not leave the Soul of the Just in Hell nor will you suffer him whom you have made holy to see corruption Thus O Lord the inheritance of the Children of Jacob is more worth than the riches of the Children of Esau for when they should possess the whole Earth when the Goods which the World promises them should be great the possession thereof is not peaceable the duration is but short the end is uncertain and the loss of them is follow'd with an infinite number of miseries
difficulty to undeceive themselves from the vanities of the World to contemn Life and even to take an extreme pleasure in seeking after Death because they are assured that no one can be perfectly happy S. Gregory of Nazian untill he dies for Christ Jesus and untill he reigns with him in his Heavenly Kingdom St. Gregory of Nazian in his Funeral Orations furnishes excellent thoughts concerning the obligations which Christians have to despise Life and to desire Death and particularly in the Elogium he composed for his Brother Cezarius WHen I consider the happiness which our Kindred have acquired by dying and the little they have lost in loosing this unhappy Life so far am I from afflicting my self that I feel my self transported with joy and I say to God When shall it be O Lord that you will take us as you have them out of this strange Land and that we shall go into our lovely Countrey to joyn our selves with them who are there arrived before us When shall it be that Death shall put us in a condition to partake with them the pleasures of Paradise and to lead together an eternally happy Life In effect my Brethren what can we expect during the short time which remains of our Life but to see day after day more miseries to-suffer more evils and to câ—mmit more Sins than we have hitherto committed 'T is therefore this consideration and not the loss of our Freinds 't is the danger of offending God to which we are exposed during our Life and not the grief for their Death which ought to be the true subject of our Tears Let 's weep my Brethren but let us weep as David did for that our Pilgrimage is prolonged Le ts afflict our selves for that our Exile is not ended Le ts weep because we love a Life subject to so many miseries and which incessantly exposes us to lose the Grace of God This is my Brethren a just cause 〈◊〉 our sighs and tears 〈◊〉 therefore sigh over our selves with the holy Apostle and let us say 2 Cor. c. 4. and 5. This base Cottage built of clay wherein we now lodg shall it never be destroy'd Shall we not soon dwell in that other house which is not made by the hand of man and which shall endure eternally For how long shall we yet ly oppress'd under the weight of this mortal Body And till when must we trayl after us in all places a living Sepulcher where our Soul is as it were buried in the Flesh and infected with a corruption greater than that of reall Graves 〈◊〉 my Brethren if the â—â—â—th of Sin is not the subject of your griefs and affliction you have no subject that is legitimate But that which ought to cover us with shame is That we love this Life all miserable as it is and that we make much of this Body which detain's our Soul captive 'T is true that we are unwilling to offend God but we are willing to continue in a state of offending him at least 't is that which we desire when we desire to Live Do you then know for what a true Christian ought not to afflict himself I repeat it over again to you a true Christian ought not to afflict himself 〈…〉 he lives too long 〈…〉 thing that delays his 〈◊〉 delays also his happiness but what happiness A happiness which is pure in its enjoyment immense in its greatness and eternal in its duration Finally a happiness which comprehends the possession of God himself and which consequently surpasses the intilligence and the desire of man Behold that which ought to make us sigh without creasing towards Heaven and to say with the Prophet Psal 118 v. 81. My Soul languishes O Lord she falls almost into a swoun in the expectation of your Salvation For my own part through 〈…〉 of God I fear 〈…〉 my Body should 〈◊〉 since it's nature is to be perishable I am perswaded that the ruine of that which is materiall and terrestriall in me cannot chuse but be very advantagious unto me Let 's leave to the wicked the care to flatter a Body which kills the Soul and which one cannot keep long alive Those unhappy wretches tast not the goods of the Spirit because they have no feeling of Hope for another Life And surely I do not at all wonder that they place their soveraign good in this mortall Life in Health in good cheer and in the other pleasures of the senses But for us my Brethren who are convinced that all those goods are but vanity and that they will be dissipated in less time than the dew of the morning let us say with the Apostle would to God that by a lively Faith and by an ardent Charity I had so mortified my Body that it were not capable to detain my Soul for if I could totally bury my self with Christ Jesus I should be assured to be resuscitated and to live with him eternally Article IX S. Gregory Nisse St. Gregory Bishop of Nisse hath made a Discourse to shew That we should be so far from lamenting them who go forth of this Life that we ought to envy and desire their happiness He proves this Truth by many reasons which we give in brief and in the end be explicates it by an excellent comparison of the state of men in this present Life wiih the state of an Infant enclosed in his Mothers Belly He says afterwards That they who lament the Death of their Neighbour or who are afraid to die are as little reasonable as Children who cry when they are born into the World because they are not sensible of the happiness they have in being delivered out of the most dismal of all Prisons THey who excessively afflict themselves at the Death of their Kindred and Friends Orat. de mortuis To 3. are for the most part very weak Spirits who suffer themselves to be ledd by the movings of Nature and of Custom They weep ordinarily because 't is the custome to weep upon such occasions They grieve for themselves in the person of another because in losing him they lose some advantage which they reaped from him or else they weep because they fancy a false honour of appearing to be of a tender and good nature There is moreover a certain pleasure in Tears and one delights to draw compassion or esteem from others by weeping Finally in whatever manner we weep over the Dead 't is always a weakness and we should never fall into it if we gave our selves time to consider That the orders of Providence are unalterable and that human things change incessantly For is it not a folly to grieve for the Dead as if they could have lived always and to live so as if one were never to die To get forth of this errour we need only to consider a little the difference there is between the solid and infinite goods we hope for in heaven and Goods so vain and so short
a Child of God not to tie himself to things present and perishable that he may sooner go towards his Father who stretches forth his arms to receive him This tender affection and this holy impatience spring from the purity of a good Conscience He who is enflam'd with the love of eternal Goods is not puff'd up in Prosperity nor cast down in Adversity He is as it were above the Earth and dwells already in Heaven he conserves a Spirit evermore equall in the inequality of his lives events Finally he is like him of whom it is said in Scripture You stick not either at the Benedictions or at the Maledictions of the World but you are as an Angel of our Lord. 2. Reg. c. 24. v. 17. 2. Instruction of St. Chrysostom That we should be miserable if our Life were never to end and that if we had a faithful and true belief of the Resurrection we should not only not dread Death but we should ardently desire it WHen God gives us Life In cap. 12. Gen. Hom. 32. 't is by an action of his Omnipotency but when he gives us Death In Cap. 5. Gen. Hom. 21. 't is by a wholesome effect of his Bounty What would Life be without Death A long sequell of miseries an eternal Banishment an infinite Punishment In Cap. 5. Gen. Hâ—m 67. and almost as cruel as that of Hell For what more painfull torment could be inflicted upon them who love Serm. in Verba Pauli De dormientibus nolo vos Ser. 29. than to separate them for ever from their beloved object If this Maxim is true in sensual love is it not infinitly more in the Divine love A Heart deeply engaged in this love to which one should say you shall remain always upon Earth and you shall never see God would it not have cause to esteem it self almost as miserable as the Damned It is therefore truly said That if Death is the chastisement of Adams Sin 't is also the greatest favour that God could grant to the Children of Adam after his Disobedience Before the coming of Christ Jesus Death was frightfull because men were its slaves and that they could not obtain of God any more then temporal rewards for their good actions But since he hath ransom'd us by his precious Blood since he hath loved Death and made an alliance with it it is not only no longer an Evil but 't is the greatest of all Goods 't is the source of all imaginable happinesses Thus the fear of dying ought to be consider'd as a weakness of Nature and not as an effect of Reason 'T is true that all Creatures have an extreme desire to conserve their Being but this desire is not pardonable except only in such people who know nothing of any other Life than this The true Christian who hopes after this Death a more noble and a more happy Being than this first Being which he receiv'd by being born into the World not only desires not to conserve it but burns with impatience to loose it that he may acquire the possession of a soverain Felicity There is no truth which Christ Jesus preached and assured more authentically than the Mystery of the Resurrection Ib. Serm. de tridua Domini Resurrec and there is nothing also which the Enemies of Christianism have more thwarted All the World agrees that Christ Jesus died 1 Cor. 18.23 The Jews looked upon his Cross as a Scandall and the Gentiles as a Folly But as for the Resurrection they all absolutely deny it only the Christians believe that and God gives to them all sorts of proofs thereof He permits that Souldiers should be placed around his Sepulchre he rises forth of the Tomb in their presence the Stone is overturned the Earth trembles the Guards are affrighted the Women find him not where they had layd him and the Angells assure them that he was risen He appeared to his Disciples in particular in publick in divers places in many encounters He stays with them Forty days he there drinks he there eats and when one of them protests that he would believe nothing of it unless he could see him with his Eyes and touch him with his Hands our Saviour presents himself unto him shews him the Wound of his side will have him to put his Finger into it and finally forces him by this last proof to cry out I doubt no longer John 20. v. 28.29 you are my Lord and my God Thou hast believed answered Jesus because thou hast seen Blessed are they who believe without having seen Can one desire testimonies more evident and more authentical of his Resurrection If we are Christians we must believe it If we will be Happy we must believe it without seeing it any otherwise than by the Eyes of Faith What Happiness ought we to expect from the Rusurrection and from the Promises of Jesus Christ Is it not to be resuscitated as he is that we may reign with him But to have a share in his Resurrection and in his Kingdom we must necessarily die Death therefore is an inestimable advantage and happiness and thus we ought not to dread it but with all our hearts to desire it What advantage can we find by living longer Old age and the Infirmities which accompany it do they not render us imsupportable to others and to our selves Consider an old man overwhelm'd with years his spirits dejected his Body extenuated his face full of wrinkles his eyes half shut up his voyce trembling his head hanging down towards the Earth as it were seeking for a Sepulchre wherein to be buried Is not this a kind of Monster in nature But that which is here more monstrous in him is the desire to live in despight of so many incommodities and to trail along his Soul captivated and burthened with such heavy chains Strange blindness of man This passion is more violent in the very caducity and feebleness it self than in the most tender youthfulness Whatever tye a man advanced in age hath for his dignities and for his treasures he would willingly destrip himself of all to prolong his Life for some years and he would employ these years in acquiring other honours and other riches of which he should destrip himself Madd man Weak Worm of the Earth Reffuse of the Universe Learn that in so deplorable an estate thou hast nothing more to desire but Death nor any thing to hope for but the Resurrection Serm. 20. in verba De tormientibus An Engraver hath made a fair Statue he finds it afterwards to be eaten with Rust and spoiled by the injury of time The love he hath for his own work moves him to take compassion on it he breaks it in pieces casts the mettal into the fire and frames a Figure fairer then the former This is that which God did having seen that Man who was his Image and his Head-work was disfigured by Sin By what right and upon what
only with wild Roots my Imagination ingenious to persecute me ceased not to entertain it self with the delights of the Roman Citty I pass'd the day in sighing and the night in weeping for my Sins But the more I strove to quench with my Tears the secret fire of my Concupiscence the more that rebell was enkindled even in the marrow of my bones If sometimes the wearinesses of my penance forced me to abandon my self to sleep I paid not that tribute to Nature but against my will and to free my self quickly from it I suffer'd my body to fall to the ground it being extenuated with watchings and as it were broken with all sorts of macerations I had no other Pillow than a Stone no other Garment then a Hayr-cloath no other Drink than Water nor other Food than Herbs and Roots and when the weakness of my Stomack obliged me to eat them boyled for a more easy disgestion I durst not satisfy my hunger fearing to commit an excess in making good cheer This Abstinence and the heat of the Climat joyned to the ardour of my temper had dryed me up like a Skeleton and one might have counted all the Nerfs through a Skin more tawny than that of the Ethiopians In this sad estate I had more horrour of my self than of the Scorpions and of the Serpents which were round about me and yet my Spirit would escape on a sodain even amidst my most holy Meditations and quit Prayer to dream of the Roman Dames running over all the assemblies I had frequented formerly where the Devil had laid his mortall Baits to entrap Chastity Then being irritated at the revolt of my Senses which these thoughts had excited against me I massacred my breast with a thousand blows and I left not off striking it untill the Grace of our Lord had calmed my Passions He knows what my sorrow was after such strange Conflicts I blushed with shame Life was insupportable unto me All the corners of my Grot all the Rocks of my Solitude seem'd to me so many Censurers of my Life and so many Witnesses of my Weaknesses For this cause I often chang'd my habitation hoping to find out some one where I might have more quiet but my evil did not change because I bore every where about me the subject of my disquiet I avouch that in the height of my torments I ardently desired to die and that I could have wished it had been permitted me to go forth of the World When one day I was press'd with this thought more violently than I was wont I took up the Book of the sacred Scripture which was my sweetest comfort and as God would have it I fell upon that passage where the Prophet Amos says these terrible Words Joel 2.11 Accursed be they who inconsiderately desire the day of our Lord. Soph. 1.15 Who urges you thus to desire it That day of our Lord is a day without Light Amos. 1.18 a day of darkness and obscurity When you shall be weary of your misery overwhelm'd with infirmities persecuted with temptations rejected by the injustices of others when you shall be disgusted with the whole World and irksom to your self expect the hour of our Lord with patience Amos. â— 19 For what doth it avail a man to shun the meeting of a Lion if he falls into the paws of a Bear S. Ierom. It is not in his power to hinder his Soul from going forth when that hour shall be come Eccl. 8.8 and he hath no right to hasten or to slacken the day of his Death After this sacred Instruction I suffered Life patiently being resolv'd to employ all the moments thereof in doing good works and being perswaded that we may well desire Death but that it is not permitted us to advance or further it nor even so much as to demand it of God with overmuch impatience because although we ought to contemn Life yet we must not omit to conserve it Article XXI An Excellent Instruction of the same St. Jerome That Death ought to be looked on as an order of the Divine Providence rather than as an effect of human Infirmity and that so we ought to die by Obedience and by Love A True Christian looks upon Death not only as upon a subject of consolation Lib. 9. in Isaiam alibi but moreover as upon an object of love and of respect because it must be granted that it is God who makes us live and die when he pleases and that the end of our days is more an effect of the Divine Will than of human infirmity For if the fall of the least Sparrows happens not without the order of God as himself says in the Gospell we ought to believe by a stronger reason That the last fall of our Body never happens but according to the immutable decree of his Will We should therefore look on Death with Love considering it as an effect of the eternal Providence We must take from it that which Nature finds horrible in it and think that God sends it not to them whom he loves but to the end they should always love him In effect the greatest testimony he can give them of his love is to withdraw them out of the World and to free them from the slavery of their Body and of Sin to render them Saints and make them eternally happy I say yet much more we are in some sort made partakers even upon Earth of this happiness when we submit to his will with this Confidence And as the last mark we can give of our Love towards God is to receive Death with an entire Obedience and even with Joy when it summons us to go forth of the World so the most perfect act of our Faith and of our Piety towards Christ Jesus is to resign our selves before hand to what ever God shall ordain of our Life and of our Death Let us therefore with David say to him Ps 89. Behold we are ready O Lord Cut of the threed of our miserable Life when you please And surely what is the duration of our days They pass away more speedily than the Word We live ordinarily but Seaventy Years and the stronger scarcely pass Fourscore But should our Life endure a Thousand years before your eyes a Thousand years are no more then yesterday which is past and gone Death hurries them away as a Whirlwind and they disappear as a Dream So that how long soever our Life is it will be counted for nothing unless it is pleasing to you Grant then Sap. 3. O Lord that we may count our days by our Good Works and that we may know their shortness to the end we may acquire Wisdom of Heart Article XXII St. Jerome or the Authour of some Epistles attributed to him which are placed at the end of his Works urges this Doctrine yet farther and teaches That a Christian ought not only not to dread Death but that he ought also to
Evil or by the Remedy The Soul hath no less weak nesses and miseries than the Body You see her one day deceived by Hope and on the morrow troubled with Fear Anger transports her Sadness dejects her Joy dissipates her Envy gnaws her and nothing contents her One Passion follows another and sometimes for one that is destroy'd there spring up a thousand The sacred Scripture compares this agitation to the dreadful Tempests which are raised upon the Waters Isa 57 20. Who can then says the Prophet number all the Waves of the Sea Nevertheless 't is yet a harder task to count the desires of Man who goes astray in the errour of his Heart Jacob. v. 6. He will and he will not at the same time the same things He seeks with impatience what he hath not and he is presently disgusted with what he possesses Vice is followed with remorse Virtue is accompanied with pains he knows not to which of the two he should apply himself His first motion inclines him to Good and yet he doth the Evil by reflexion at the same time when he condemns it The Apostle St. Paul says Rom. 7.18 I find in my self a Will to do Good but I find not the means to accomplish it For I do not the Good to which I have a will and I do the Evil which I would not There is nothing good in Man He is submitted both together to the Law of God according to the Spirit and to the Law of Sin according to the Flesh God and the World draw him by turns He is a Compound of all that which is most motley in Nature always and in every thing unlike to himself His manners his opinions his desires all his actions all his thoughts are in a continuall instability Finally one may sooner stop the course of the Winds and the rapidity of a Torrent than fix his inconstancy by the sole force of Reason Thus the more our Soul examins her self the less she knows her self Who am I for example I who make so many reflections upon others What is the Beginner that stirs all the parts of my Body By what means do they come to know the orders of my Will How can they execute them with so much readiness But this will what makes it spring up in me Whence proceeds this intelligence which guides it these lights which clear it these darknesses which sometimes encompass it It walks upon the wings of the winds upon the points of the Waves it penetrates the highest Heavens it descends into the center of the Earth it carries its curiosity into every corner and yet the most common and the most sensible objects hide themselves from its knowledge in a word it knows not what it self is Man thinks and he knows not what it is to think he reasons and he cannot say what reason is The Soul is united to the Body and she conceives not how she is united to it she enters not there and she goes not from thence when she pleases the matter which she animates serves her for a Prison and by an inclination opposit to her nature she loves this Prison which keeps her captive The Senses which should be in all things subject unto her revolt incessantly against her deceive her and corrupt her 'T is an assembly of qualities which are mortal and immortal which are corruptible and incorruptible Water is not so contrary to Fire as these Qualities are contrary among themselves yet all agree together in one and the same subject notwithstanding that 't is impossible to say either what makes their mutual intelligence or what breaks it One cannot number all the kinds of Diseases which may separate the Soul from the Body and yet the Soul acts as if nothing were able to separate her from it She heaps up designs upon designs hopes upon hopes and there needs no more than a blast to overturn all O Man thou confused Pile of uncertainties and of miseries Eccles. 7 and 8. learn not to pry into that which is above thee since thou knowest not thy own self since thou art ignorant of that which is proper to thy self during thy Life and in this little number of days design'd for thy Pilgrimage upon Earth which pass as the shadow of a smoak 'T is the Wisest among men who hath said No one knows how he is to finish his course And even as the Fishes are caught by the hook of the Fisher and Birds are taken in the Nets of the Fowler so Men fall into the ambushes of Death when they least dream of it What is Man O my God that he should by you be so highly honoured Why do you east your eyes and employ your thoughts upon a Vessel so feeble and so full of iniquity Job 7.19 You visit him in the Morning and presently you exercise him by strong Tryalls He hath scarcely begun to see the day light before he falls into Darkness Psal 15. His Body is but a heap of dust and his Life fleets away as the Grass it blooms in Morning like the Flowers of the Field and in the Evening the smallest blast of wind withers it it dwindles away and there remains no track of the place where it but now flourished It seems as if after you had formed man you had abandon'd him to his own conduct Eceli 15. You have set before his eyes the Water and the Fire Life and Death Good and Evil to the end you might leave him the liberty of choyce which is almost always unlucky to him There are none who have understanding Psal 13. and light There are none who seek God They are gon astray from the right path They are all corrupted There is not any one who of himself doth good no there is not one Lord why do you leave them to be a prey to their Passions and to the hardness and malignity of their own Heart Know you not that our fall is inevitable as soon as you withdraw your hand from holding us up Do not then estrange your self from us O Lord you who are our only prop and our strength Draw us out of the mire of the World that we may not sink down and be drown'd in it Deliver us from those worldlings who have made choyce of this present Life for their portion S. Gregory Overwhelm them with an abundance of your riches and of your treasures wherewith they may satiate their cupidity But as for us who have placed our treasure in Heaven our Heart is where our Treasure is Grant then O my God that we may perfectly renounce all the goods of the Earth and that we may surmount all the miseries of our Nature 2 Cor. 4. Grant that we may carry evermore in our Body the death of our Lord Jesus to the end that the Life of Jesus may appear also in our Body For we who live for him are every hour deliver'd up to Death for him that we may live