earth for one is your Father he that is in Heaven neither be ye called Masters for one is your Master Christ he that is the greater of you shall be your servitour And he that exalteth himself shall be humble and he that humbleth himself shall be exalted Moralities 1. IT is a very dangerous errour to think that our Saviour in this Gospel had a purpose to introduce an Anarchy to make all men equall He sheweth in many places that he would have Kings Princes Magistrates Fathers and Doctours But he would not have men come to honours by a vain ambition nor others to honour them but onely as they have dependency upon the power of God Almighty Let every soul saith the Apostle be subject to higher powers for there is no power but it cometh from God He gives us superiours not for us to judge but to obey them If a man cannot approve their manners he must at least reverence the character of their authority They should be good Christians for themselves but they are superiours for us He that resisteth their power doth resist God who ordained them And all the great evils happening by heresies and rebellions proceed from no other fountain but from contempt of powers established by the decree of heaven A man may pretend zeal but there is no better sacrifice then that of obedience If great persons abuse their offices God will find it out and as their dignities are great so their punishment shall be answerable 2. One of the greatest disorders of this life is that we go for the most part outwardly to please the world and are little carefull of a good inward application of our selves to please God Instead of taking the way of Gods Image from whence we all come we are content to have virtues onely by imagination and vices in their true essence Nembroth professed himself a servant of the true God and yet adored the fire in secret Jesus hath many worshippers in words but few in truth Some stand upon formalities others upon disguised habits others amuse themselves about ceremonies others go as upon certain springs to make themselves counted wise Most men would seem what they are not and much troubled to be seen what they are All their time doth passe in fashions and countenances but death and Gods judgements take of all those maskes 3. To say that we have seen a man exteriously devout and spirituall except he be so inwardly is to say wee have seen a house without a foundation a tree without a root a vessell move upon the sea without a bottome and an excellent clock without a spring For the same which the foundation is to a house the root to a tree the bottome to a ship and the spring to a clock the same is a mans interiour life to all virtue What is a man the better who resembles window cushions which are covered with velvet and stuft with hay or to be like the picture of Diana in Homers Island which wept to some and laught to others A little spark of a good conscience is better then all the lights of the world Why do we crucifie our selves with so many dissimulations so many ceremonies so many enforcements upon our natures to serve and please men onely to get smoke He that sows wind saith the Prophet shall reape a storm Let us live to our selves in the purity of a good conscience and of a perfect humility if we desire to live for ever with God Those shadowes of false devotion proceed from the leaves of that figtree wherewith Adam and Eve covered their nakednesse do not we know that hyprocrisie is the same thing to virtue which painting is to faces and that it is the very moth which devours sanctity and will at the day of judgement make all those appear naked which to the world seem well apparelled Aspirations O God of all trueth wherefore are there so many fictions and counterfeit behaviours Must we alwaies live to please the eyes of others and runne after the shadow of vanity which leaves nothing but illusion within our eyes and corruption in our manners I will live unto thee O fountain of lives within whom all creatures have life I will retire my self into my own heart and negotiate with it by the secret feeling of a good conscience that I may treat with thee What need I the eyes of men if I have the eyes of God They alone are sufficient to do me good since by the aspect they give happinesse to all the Saints I will seek for thee O my beloved Lord from the break of day till the dead time of the night All places are solitary where thou art not and where thou art there onely is the fullnesse of all pleasures The Gospell upon Wednesday the second week in lent S. Mat. 20. The request of the Wife of Zebedee for her sonnes Iames and Iohn ANd Iesus going up to Ierusalem took the twelve Disciples secretly and said to them behold wee go up to Ierusalem and the Son of man shall be delivered to the cheif Priest and to the Scribes and they shall condemne him to death and shall deliver him to the Gentiles to be mocked and scourged and crucified and the third day he shall rise again Then came to him the mother of the sonnes of Zebedee with her sonnes a loring and desiring something of him who said to her what wilt thou She saith to him Say that these my two sonnes may sit one at thy right hand and one at thy left hand in thy Kingdome And Iesus answering said you know not what you desire Can ye drink of the cup that I shall drinke of They say to him we can He saith to them My cup indeed you shall drinke of but to sit at my right hand and left is not mine to give to you but to whom it is prepared of my Father Moralities 1. WHat a short life have we and yet such large and vast ambitions We fear every thing like mortall men and yet desire all as if we should be immortall upon earth It is a strange thing to observe how the desire of honour slides even amongst the most refined devotions Some one is counted an Angell of heaven amongst men who hath not forsaken his pretences upon earth Ambition sleeps in the bosomes of persons consecrated for the Altars It overthrowes some whom luxury could not stir and moves those whom avarice could not touch We desire all to be known and to seem what we are not but this seeming is that which doth bewitch us All passions grow old and weaker by age only the desire of worldly riches honours is a shirt which we never put off till we come to the grave Why do we so extremely torment our poor life by running after this shadow of honour which we cannot follow without trouble nor possesse without fear nor lose without sorrow Is it not astrange folly that men love such vanities till the very last instant
ENTERTAINMENTS For LENT First Written in French and Translated by Sir B. B. The delight of sinne is momentary the torment Eternal LONDON Printed for I. W. and are to be sold by Philemon Stephens the younger at the Kings Arms over against the middle Temple gate in Fleet-streete 1661. To the most Excellent Majesty of Henriette Maria Queen of Great Britain Madame AMongst all the publick joyes for your Majesties happy return I know not better how to expresse my own particular then by most humbly presenting to your Majesty my Translation of this excellent French Book in the solitude of a Prison which was made more easie by some relation it had to your Majesties service And I presume the rather upon this Dedication because all that good which is derived to us from France wherof I conceive this may be a part should receive honour and inâ—rease of value from your Majesty that it may so diffuse it self with moâ—e authority and profit amongst those who may be capable to receive â—t Your Majestie having read the Orginall â—oth well know that the principall scope of it is â—o teach the love of God and contempt of this world with many other principall virtues And for the practice of them all this age â—ould not have hoped for so rare an example to â—nstruct all the great Ladies of Christendome â—s it hath found in your Majesty as well by â—our admirable fortitude and perfect resignation to Gods holy will in all your Majesties extreme afflictions dangers and pressures at Sea and Land as also by your Majesties many sacred retirements in the most holy time of the year to sprinkle your pleasures voluntarily with some of that Gall which was upon our Saviours lips when he suffered his bitter passion and death for our sins Our great Divines affirm that the present sufferings of Mount Calvary lead directly to the future glories of Mount Thabor And therefore since your Majesty hath patiently endured so many unjust and rigorous Crosses in the Mount Calvary of this World we have great reason to hope that our blessed Saviour hath prepared for your Majesty a most glorious Crown in the next which will never have end And this shall ever be the incessant and fervent prayer of Madame Your Majesties poor and most humbly devoted Beadsman Basil Brook Table of all the Gospels and particulars of our Saviours passion mentioned in this book with their Moralities and Aspirations UPon the word of Genesis lib. 1. cap. 3. Thou art dust and to dust thou shalâ— return Fol. 1 Vpon the Gospel of Saint Matthew cap. 6. Of hypocriticall fasting 4 Vpon Saint Matthew the 18. af the Centurions words O Lord I am not worthy 8 Vpon Saint Matthew the 5. Wherein we are directed to pray for our enemies 12 Vpon Saint Matthew the 6. Of the Apostle danger at sea 15 Vpon Saint Matthew the 4. Of our Saviours being tempted in the desart 19 Vpon Saint Matthew the 25. Of the judgement day 25 Vpon Saint Matthew the 21. Iesus drove out the buyers and sellers out of the Temple 30 Vpon Saint Matthew th 12. The Pharisees demand a sign of Iesus 33 Vpon Saint Matthew the 15. of the woman of Canaan 38 Vpon S. Iohn c. 15. Of the probatick pond 42 Vpon Saint Matthew the 17. Of the transfiguration of our Lord. 46 Vpon Saint Iohn the 8. Iesus said to the Iews Where I go ye cannot come 5â— Vpon Saint Matthew the 23. Iesus said the Pharisees sit in Moyses chair believe therefore what they say 54 Vpon S. Matthew the 20. The request of the wise of Zebedee for her sons Iames and Iohn 58 Vpon Luke the 16. Of the rich Glutton and poor Lazarus 62 Vpon Saint Matthew the 21. Of the master of the vineyard whose sonne was killed by his farmers 67 Vpon S. Luke the 16. Of the prodigall Child 71 Vpon Saint Luke the 11. Iesus cast out the devil which was dumbe 77 Vpon S. Luke the 4. Iesus is required to do miracles in his own countrey 81 Vpon Saint Matthew the 18. If thy brother offend thee tell him of is alone 85 Vpon Saint Matthew the 15. The Pharisees asked why do thy Disciples contradict ancient traditions 90 Vpon Saint Luke the 4. Iesus cured the fever of Simons mother in law 94 Vpon Saint Iohn the 4. Of the Samaritan woman at Iacobs well near Sichar 98 Vpon Saint Iohn the 8. Of the woman found in adultery 104 Vpon Saint Iohn the 6. Of the five fishes and two barley loaves 107 Vpon Saint Iohn the 6. Of the whipping buyers and sellers out of the Temple 113 Vpon Saint Iohn the 7. the Iews marvell at the learning of Iesus who was never taught 117 Vpon Saint Iohn the 9. Of the blind man cured by clay and spittle 121 Vpon Saint Luke the 7. Of the Widows son raised from death to life at Naim by our Saviour 128 Vpon Saint Iohn the 11. Of the raising up Lazarus from death 132 Vpon Saint Iohn the 8. Of our Saviours words I am the light of the world 137 Vpon Saint Iohn the 8. Of these words Who can accuse me of sin Vpon Saint Iohn the 7. Iesus said to the Pharisees you shall seek and not find me and he that is thirsty let him come to me 145 Vpon Saint Iohn the 7. Iesus went not into Iury because the Iews had a purpose to take away his life 149 Vpon Saint Iohn the 10. The Iews said If thou be the Messias tell us plainly 153 Vpon Saint Iohn the 7. Of Saint Mary Magdalens washing our Saviours feet in the Pharisees house 158 Vpon Saint Mary Magdalens great repentance 162 Vpon Saint Iohn the 11. The Iews said What shall we do for this man doth many miracles 164 Vpon Saint Iohn the 12. The chief Priests thought to kill Lazarus because the miracle upon him made many follow Iesus 167 Vpon Saint Matthew the 21. Our Saviour came in triumph to Ierusalam a little before his passion 172 Vpon Saint Iohn the 12. S. Mary Magdalen anointed our Saviours feet with precious ointment at which Iudas repined 177 Vpon Saint Iohn the 13. Of our Saviour washing the feet of his Apostle 181 Moralities upon the garden of Mount Olivet 187 Moralities of the apprehension of Iesus 192 Aspiration upon Saint Peters passionate tears 193 Moralities upon the Pretorian or Iudgement Hall 194 Moralities for Good Fryday upon the death of Iesus Christ 198 The Gospel for Easter day Saint Mark the 16. 211 The Gospel for Easter Munday S. Luke 24. 215 The Gospel on Tuesday S. Luke 24. 220 The Gospel on Low Sunday Saint Iohn the 20. 224 Entertainments for Lent And for the first Day upon the Consideration of Ashes THou art Dust and to Dust thou shall return Gen. 3. 1. It is an excellent way to begin Lent with the consideraon of dust whereby Nature gives us beginning and by the same Death shall put an end to all our worldly vanities There is no better way
the day of his Ascension did place our Soveraigne good Onely Serpents and covetous men desire to sleep among treasures as Saint Clement saith But the greatest riches of the world is poverty free from Covetousnesse Aspirations I Seek thee O invincible God within the Abysse of thy brightnesse and I see thee through the vail of thy creatures Wilt thou alwaies be hidden from me Shall I never see thy face which with a glimpse of thy splendour canst make Paradise I work in secret but I know thou art able to reward me in the light A man can lose nothing by serving thee and yet nothing is valuable to thy service for the paine it selfe is a sufficient recompense Thou art the food of my fastings and the cure of my infirmities What have I to do with Moles to dig the earth like them and there to hide treasures Is it not time to close the earth When thou doest open heaven and to carry my heart where thou art since all my riches is in thee Doth not he deserve to be everlastingly poor who cannot be content with a God so rich as thou art The Gospel upon the first Thursday in Lent S. Matthew 18. of the Centurions words O Lord I am not worthy ANd when he was entered into Caphearnaum there came unto him a Centurion beseeching him and saying Lord my boy lieth at home sick of the palsie and is sore tormented And Iesus saith to him I will come and cure him And the Centurion making answer said Lord I am not worthy that thou shouldest enter under my roof but onely say the word and my boy shall be healed For I also am a man subject to Authority having under me souldiers and I say to this go and he goeth and to another come and he cometh and to my servant do this and be doth it And Iesus hearing this marvelled and said to them that followed him Amen I say to you I have not found so grea faith in Israel And I say to you that many shall come from the East and West and shall sit down with Abraham Isaac and Iacob in the kingdome of heaven but the children of the kingdoms shall becast out into the exteriour darknesse there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth And Iesus said to the Centurion go and as thou hast believed be it done unto thee And the boy was healed in the same houre Moralities 1. OUr whole Salvation consists in two principals The one is in our being sensible of God the other in our moving toward him the first proceeds from faith the other comes of charity other virtues O what a happy thing it is to follow the example of this good Centurion by having such elevated thoughts of the Divinity and to know nothing of God but what he is To behold our heavenly father within this great family of the world who effects all things by his single word Creates by his power governs by his councell orders by his goodness this great universality of all things The most insensible creatures have ears to hear him Feavers and tempests are part of that running camp which marcheth under his Standard They advance and retire themselves under the shadow of his command he onely hath power to give measures to the heavens bounds to the sea to joyn the east and west together in an instant and to be in all places where his pleasure is understood 2. O how goodly a thing it is to go unto him like this great Captain To go said I Nay rather to flie as he doth by the two wings of charity and humility His charity made him have a tender care of his poor servant to esteem his health more dear then great men do the rarest pieces in their Cabinets He doth not trust his servants but take the charge upon himselfe making himself by the power of love a servant to him who by birth was made subject to his command What can be said of so many Masters and Mistresses now adayes who live alwayes slaves to their passions having no care at all of the Salvation health or necessities of their servants as if they were nothing else but the scumme of the world They make great use of their labours and service which is just but neglect their bodies and kill their soules by the infection of their wicked examples Mark the humility of this souldier who doth not thinke his house worthy to be enlightened by one sole Glimpse of our blessed Saviours presence By the words of Saint Augustine we may say he made himself worthy by believing and declaring himself so unworthy yea worthy that our Saviour should enter not only into his house but into his very soul And upon the matter he could not have spoken with such faith and humility if he had not first enclosed in his heart him whom he durst not receive into his house 3 The Gentiles come near unto God and the Iews go from him to teach us that ordinarily the most obliged persons are most ungratefull and disesteem their benefactpurs for no other reason but because they receive benefits daily from them If you speak courteously to them they answer churlishly and in the same proportion wherein you are good you make them wicked therefore we must be carefull that we be not so toward God Many are distasted with devotion as the Israelites were with Manna All which is good doth displease them because it is ordinary And you shall finde some who like naughty grounds cast up thorns where roses are planted But we have great reason to sâ—ar that nothing but Hell fire is capable to punish those who despise the Graces of God and esteem that which comes from him as a thing of no value Aspirations O Almighty Lord who ' doest govern all things in the family of this world and dost binde all insensible creatures by the bare sound of thy voice in a chaine of everlasting obedience Must I onely be still rebellious against thy will Feavers and Palsies have their ears for thee and yet my unruly spirit is not obedient Alas alas this family of my heart is ill governed It hath violent passions my thoughts are wandering my reason is ill obeyed Shall it never be like the house of this good Centurion where every thing went by measure because he measured himself by thy commandments O Lord I wil come resolutely by a profound humility an inward feeling of my self since I am so contemptible before thine eyes I will come with Charity towards these of my houshold and toward all that shall need me O God of my heart I beseech thee let nothing from henceforth move in me but onely to advance my coming toward thee who art the beginning of all motions and the onely repose of all things which move The Gospel for the first Friday in Lent S. Mat. 5. Wherein we are directed to pray for our Enemies YOu have heard that it was said thou shaâ—e love thy neighbour
O Spectacles of horrour but Abysse of goodnesse and mercy I feel my heart divided by horrour pity hate love execration and adoration But my admiration and being ravished carries me beyond my self Is this then that bloudy sacrifice which hath been expected from all ages This hidden mystery this profound knowledge of the Cross this dolorous Iesus which makes the honourable amends between heaven and earth to the eternal Father for expiation of the sinnes of humane kind Alas poor Lord thou hadst but one life and I see a thousand instruments of death which have taken it away Was there need of opening so many bloudy doors to let out thine innocent soul Could it not part from thy body without making on all sides so many wounds which after they have served for the objects of mens cruelty serve now for those of thy mercy O my Iesus I know not to whom I speak for I do no more know thee in the state thou now art or if I do it is onely by thy miseries because they are so excessive that there was need of a God to suffer what thou hast indured I look upon thy disfigured countenance to find some part of thy resemblance and yet can find none but that of thy love Alas O beautifull head which dost carry all the glory of the highest heaven divide with me this dolorous Crown of Thorns they were my sinnes which sowed them and it is thy pleasure that thine innocencie should mow them Give me O Sacred mouth give me that Gall which I see upon thy lips suffer me to sprinkle all my pleasures with it since after a long continuance it did shut up and conclude all thy dolours Give me O Sacred hands and adored feet the Nails which have pierced you love binds you fast enough to the Cross without them But do thou O Lord hold me fast to thy self by the chains of thine immense charity O Lance cruel Lance why didst thou open that most precious side thou didst think perhaps to find there the Sons life and yet thou foundest nothing but the Mothers heart But without so much as thinking what thou didst in playing the murderer thou hast made a sepulchre wherein I will from henceforth bury my soul When I behold these wounds of my dear Saviour I do acknowledge the strokes of my own hand I will therefore likewise engrave there my repentance I will write my conversion with an eternal Character And if I must live I will never breathe any other life but that onely which shall be produced from the death of my Iesus crucified The Gospel for Easter Day S. Mark the 16. ANd when the Sabbath was past Mary Magdalen and Mary of Iames and Salome bought spices that coming they might anoint Iesus And very early the first of the Sabbaths they come to the Monument the Sun being now risen And they say one to another who shall roll us back the stone from the door of the Monument And looking they saw the stone rolled back For it was very great And entring into the Monument they saw a young man sitting on the right hand covered with a white Robe and they were astonied Who saith to them Be not dismayed you seek Iesus of Nazareth that was crucified he is risen he is not here behold the place where they laid him But go tell his Disciples and Peter that he goeth before you into Galilee there shall you see him as he told you Moralities 1. THe Sepulchre of Iesus becomes a fountain of life which carries in power all the glories of the highest heaven Our Saviour riseth from thence as day out of the East and appears as triumphant in the ornaments of his beauties as he had been humbled by the excesse of his mercies The rage of the Iews loseth here its power death his sting Sathan his kingdome the Tomb his corruption and hell his conquest Mortality is destroyed life is illuminated all is drowned in one day of glory which comes from the glorious light of our Redeemer It is now saith Tertullian that he is revested with his Robe of honour and is acknowledged as the eternall Priest for all eternity It is now saith Saint Gregory Nazianzen that he reassembles humane kind which was scattered so many years by the sin of one man and placeth it between the Arms of his Divinity This is the Master-piece of his profound humility and I dare boldly affirm saith S. Ambrose that God had lost the whole world if this Sacred virtue which he made so clearly shine in his beloved Son had not put him into possession of his Conquests We should all languish after this Triumphant state of the Resurrection which wil make an end of all our pains and make our Crowns everlasting 2. Let us love our Iesus as the Maries did that with them we may be honoured with his visits Their love is indesatigable couragious and insatiable They had all the day walkt round about the Iudgement Hall Mount Calvary the Crosse and the Sepulchre They were not wearied with all that And night had no sleep to shut up their eyes They forsake the Image of death which is sleep to find death it self and never looked after any bed except the Sepulchre of their Master They travell amongst darknesse pikes lances the affrights of Arms and of the night nothing makes them affraid If there appear a difficulty to remove the stones love gives them arms They spare nothing for their Master and Saviour They are above Nichodemus and Ioseph they have more equisite perfumes for they are ready to melt and distil their hearts upon the Tomb of their Master O faithfull lovers seek no more for the living amongst the dead That cannot die for love which is the root of life 3. The Angel in form of a young man covered with a white Robe shews us that all is young and white in immortality The Resurrection hath no old age it is an age which can neither grow nor diminish These holy Maries enter alive into the Sepulchre where they thought to find death but they learn news of the chiefest lives Their faith there confirmed their piety satisfied there is promises assured and their love receives consolation Aspirations I Do not this day look toward the East O my Jesus I consider the Sepulchre it is from thence this fair Sun is risen O that thou appearest amiable dear spouse of my soul Thy head which was covered with thorns is now â—rowned wiâ—h a Diadem of Stars and Lâ—ghts and all the glory of the highest Heaven rests upon it Thine eyes which were eclipsed in bloâ—d have enlightned them with fires and delicious brightnesse which melâ— my heart Tâ—y feet and hands so far as I can see are enameld with Rubies which after they have been the objects of mens cruelty are now become eternal marks of thy bounty O Iesus no more my wounded but my glorified Iesus where am I what do I I see I flie I swound I die I revive