Quisquis pro officii sui loco vehementer non exarserit He shall have his portion with Simon Magus the Proto-Simonist the first unlawful buyer of holy graces which according to his place doth not do his best to suppresse the sin of Simonie that is the buying and selling of spiritual graces and promotions I will a little unfold the heynousness of this sin that as many of them I fear are settled in their resolutions to continue the doing of it so they may the better know hereby what they do and what a horrible sin they do commit to the great dishonour of God and the damage of the Church of Christ And I say that the Pope is the prime and principal father of this Bastard-brood Simonie usually practised in Rome and by former Popes and that nothing was wont to be rifer at Rome than this sin of Simonie which did therefore seem the lesse sinful because it was acted by the more powerful Patron And though we read it in their own Decrees that Tolerabilior est Macedonii haeresis qui â—sserit Spiritum Sanctum esse servum patris filii quà m haec Symonaica pactio quia isti faciunt Spiritum Sanctum servum suum ut ait Terasius Patriarcha Constantinopolitanus This selling of Church-Livings is more intolerable than the heresie of Macedonius who said That the Holy Ghost was the servant of the Father and of the Son because they make the Holy Ghost to become their servant as Bern. in Convers Pauli Sermâ—ne 1. Terasius saith to Pope Adrian Yet S. Bernard that saw much but not all saith Sacrigradus dati sunt in occasionem turpis lucri quaestum aestimant pietatem Holy Orders are now become the occasion of filthy lucre and gain is counted godliness And this Simonie is Sacriledge indeed and not only Musculus citeth these Verses that were made of Pope Musculus in cap. 6. Johan Alexander Vendit Alexander claves altaria Christum Vendere jure potest emer at ille prius but Durandus also saith That Simonie doth so reign in the Church of Rome Durand de mo do celebrandi Câ—ncilii Extra de officio judicis delegati ex parte N. in Olâ—ssâ— as if it were no sin at all And their Canonists as Bartolus Felinus Theodoricus and some others of the Pope's parasites are so impudent as to averr that the selling of these things and taking monie for Ecclesiastical promotions can be neither Sacriledge nor Simonie in the Pope because he is the Lord of them all and accounteth them all his own But since we have bidden Adieu to him and his corruptions his Simonie and his Sacriledge blessed be God for it doth not so much prejudice us and therefore letting him to do what he will with his own and either to stand or fall to his own Master I will address my self to shew the manifold evils and wickednesse of our own Sacrilegious and Simonaical Pâ—trons that sell those Benefices which they should freely bestow And I say 1. That this buying and selling of Church-goods for both these acts are The selling of Ecclesiastical-Livings against all Laws 1. Of Moses Gen. 47. 22. relatives and to be put in the same predicament when as nothing is sold that is not bought è contra is a thing contrary to all Laws and to the judgement of all good men for 1. The Laws of Moses provided so liberally for the Priests and Levites that the buying and selling of Priests places was never known nor heard of among the Jews until Jeroboam's time who as he sold them so he sold himself to do evil and to commit wickedness 2. Pharaoh was so religious that when in the great Dearth all the land 2. Of the Gentiles of Aegypt was sold the Priests had such a portion of Corn allotted them that they needed not to sell one foot of their land and therefore I doubt not but Pharaoh will rise in judgement against all those that take away the lands of the Priests as our Gentlemen and Souldiers strive to do or do sell the Spiritual promotions unto the Priests as our Simonaical Patrons do 3. The Law of Grace saith Freely have you received that is all the 3 Of grace graces and gifts of God therefore freely give especially what you give Math. 10. 8. to God and for the Service of God and sell it not 4. The Civil and Ecclesiastical Laws forbid nothing more and with 4. Of the Civil and Canon-Law greater care than the buying and selling of Spiritual Offices And the ancient Fathers learned Schoolmen and all the later Classes of Casuists Jesuites and of our zealous purest Protestant Writers together with the wisest Princes and Statesmen that have established many Statute-Laws against this sin are all infinitely deceived if this buying and selling of Ecclesiastical preferments be not infinitely prejudicial to the Church of God and therefore a most heynous and a horrible sin against the Law of God 2. I say that this buying and selling of Church-Livings will be the diminution 2. This selling and buying of Church-Livings will be the decay of Learning and Religion of all Learning and the lessening of the number of Learned men for when the world seeth that after a man hath spent his time first in School where he suffereth a great deal of sorrows and thinks no creature more miserable than himself when he seeth all others free and himself only as he supposeth bound under the rod then in the Vniversity where most of the Schollers are as Phalaris saith to Leontides 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 needy of all things but of hunger and How difficult it is to become a Scholar fear or else if they escape these rocks the better part do with continuall watching and studying wear their bodies and tyre their spirits and spend all the means they can procure from their friends for many years together and in the end after all this cannot get a poor Parsonage or Vicarage unless they pay for the lease of their wearied and almost worn out life to the hazarding of their soules and all other Preferments when the truth of their buying is made known What Fathers will be so improvident I had almost said so irreligious I may truly say so unworldly wise or so little prudent in managing of their estates as to cast away their means and their sons upon such sourges I think I may say with the Poet Invitatus ad haec aliquis de ponte negabit A beggars brat knowing these inconveniencies would scarce accept these Offices and discharge those duties they do owe upon these conditions But you will say that we must not and ought not to respect our own Obj. gain and look after our own profit but as the Apostles and servants of Christ our chiefest care should be for the peoples good because our reward shall be great in Heaven I answer that as in the Common-wealth we owe our selves and our
there remaineth nothing of us to be any waies prejudiced nor any thing any waies at all and the Doctrine of the Stoicks is nothing different when as Seneca though he seemed to be a friend to that Principle of the Immortality of the Soul yet this is one of his proper Aphorismes that non potest esse miser qui nullus est he cannot be a wretched man that is no man and to shew that after death there is no more tidings of any man he writes unto Martia quod How many men denied the immortality of the soul and the life that is to come mors omnium est solutio ultra quam mala nostra non exeunt that death is the resolution and period of all things beyond which our evils cannot extend and Cicero tels us that his friend Atticus was hardly perswaded to believe the immortality of the Soul and before him Cebes in Plato was of the same mind and Dicâ—archus that as Cicero saith wrote three Books of the mortality of the soul and Panetius whom Cicero in all his Offices doth so much commend and so often imitate and divers Philosophers as Epicurus and Democritus that lived in the time of Alexander the Great were in like manner so blinded by the devil as not only to doubt but also to believe this damnable Doctrine and Pliny judgeth this Doctrine to Plin. Nat. Hist l. 2. c. 7. Arnob. in Oâ—t be puerile deliramentum a childish simplicity and so likewise Cecilius as Arnobius â—estifieth calleth these Tenets of the Christians Anniles Christianorum Fabulas old wives Fables and Nicephorus writeth that Synesius the Platonist quoad Nicephorus l. 14. c. 55. alia quae Christiani proâ—itentur promptum se facilem praebuit approved well of all other points that the Christians professed sed Resurrectionis doctrinam nefandam ac detestandam judicavit but the Doctrine of the Resurrection he liked not and the Poets cried out with Theocritus Non est Spes ulla sepultis But as Catullus saith though Soles occidere redire possunt the Sun and Moon may Catul. ad Lesâ— p. 3. lie down and rise again yet nobis cum semel occidit brevis lux nox est perpetua una dormienda when once our short life is fallen down we shall have one perpetual night to sleep and so Lucretinus and Enninus and many more were of the same faith And which is wonderfull in the School of Christ we finde some of the same minde as of old time Hymenaeus and Philetus with whom joyned the Valentinians Carpocratians Cerdonians Gnosticks Marcionites Selucians Manichees Hieracliâ—â—s Priscillianists and the rest of that litter as Saturninus Basilides Secundus Marcus Appelles and some of the Popes themselves with John the 23 and Leo the 10. that as they were transcendently wicked so they were wickedly tainted with this errour and liked not of this truth and many more of their associates in these our own dayes that following Hobbs his Leviathan have fallen away from the faith and as if per 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 animarum the souls of these Hereticks had entred into their bodies they will neither believe the resurrection of the body nor the immortality of their souls and therefore they labour not for their union with this Eternity Yea and that which is more to be admired such is the corruption of our nature and the madness of our mindes that although the continual sight and most sensible apprehension of our vanity and the shortness of our lives in this world mingles all our best wine with most bitter waters and puts a stop unto our pleasures and many sad thoughts into our heads and perplexities into our hearts yea though it seemeth that there is in a man a kinde of inclination and disposition of nature and an earnest desire to continue and perpetuate his being and that it is a thing universally religiously because it is the principal foundation of all Religion and peaceably received and concluded throughout all the Christian world especially by an outward and publick profession that the soul of man is immortal and shall so continue for ever and that there shall be a resurrection of the body and another life after this yet seriously and inwardly in their hearts not onely the Epicures and the Hereticks aforenamed and the Sadduces the That many worldly professours of the Christian Religion do believe neither the immortality of the soul nor the resurrection of their bodies nor any other life after this life greatest Lords of the Jews that did not stick with open mouth to deny it but also the greatest part of these our Christian Professours as I fear do believe neither the immortality of the soul nor the resurrection of the dead nor any other life after this the short life of their vanity For is it possible that men should be so haughty and so proud so covetous and such oppressours of their Neighbours so sacrilegious and such robbers and spoylers of God himself as we see men are so as the Poet saith Vnde habent curaest pancis sed oportet habere Is it possible I say they should be such if they did believe that their souls are immortal that after this momentary life of their vanity their bodies shall awake and rise out of their graves and that Christ shall come to judge them according to the works they have done in this life and as he saith himself To render unto every one as his deeds shall be No surely it cannot be that they do believe these things but as the Fool whatsoever he profest with his mouth to deceive the world yet said in his heart There is no God so they whatsoever they say in words yet factis negant their deeds tell us to their faces that they do but dissemble and deceive themselves but they cannot deceive God nor all wise men that will rather believe their own eyes in what they see them do than their words in what they say they do believe And therefore as when Carbo swore any thing in the Senate the Senators and What a persidious fellow Carbo was the people of Rome presently sware they did not believe him So when these sacrilegious persons and these grievous oppressours of the poor and the roorers out of the innocent from their possessions do profess that they believe these things I do profess unto you that I believe them not But as Apollodorus the What Apollodorus dreamed Tyrant dreamed that he was taken and flead by the Scythians and his heart thrown into a boyling Caldron should say unto him I am the cause of all this mischief so I say The hearts of these men deceive them for as the Wise man saith The heart is deceitfull above all things and for a man to deceive himself is the worse deceit in the world for excepting the worst of thoughts which is the thought of the Fool that said in his heart There is no God there cannot be a more
most incredulous heart if it were not filled with all blindness could not conceive the least thought against it Yet because the Devil is still tempting mâ—n to incredulity and to doubt of these things and is still so powerfull with these worldlings that he quite blindeth them so that they cannot see the clearest light noâ— understand the plainest truth Therefore to undeceive these silly souls that do so miserably deceive themselves we are still bound to defend and vindicate these truths and in that respect I likewise shall not think much to produce some few Reasons that the Devil himself cannot answer to make it manifest that although man in this life is altogether vanity and but a blast of no continuance as hereafter I shall shew unto you yet God made man to be perpetual for God made all things thâ—â— they might have their being and especially man not to be reduced to nothing and he made the soul of man immortal and never to dye but to live for ever For 1. Moses tells you that when God had framed and made man of the dust of Arguments proving the immortâ—lity of the Soul and the life to come the earth He breathed into his nostrils the breath of life and so man became a living soul and not a dying soul or a soul that should dye but such a soul as should live for ever because the soul is the cause of our natural spiritual and eternal life whence the Latines do call the soul Life 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 quia vivificat corpus dum adest seipsam cum abest à corpore And when God threaâ—ned Adam that if he did eat of the forbidden fruit he should dye the death that death signifieth Or surely dye Gen. 2. 17. not the death of the soul or the aâ—nihilation of the body but the dissolution or separation of the soul from the body that as iâ— was made out of the dust so it might return to the dust again which while the soul remained in it unseparated it could not return and this St. Paul sheweth plainly when he saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If our earthly house be dissolved that is disjoynted 2 Cor. 5. as a house that we pull down is separated one part from another but not destroyed so is the soul separated from the body and neither of them destroyed and reduced into nothing but the soul remaineth still immortal for ever and as God saith the body returneth to the dust from whence it was Gen. 3. 19. taken 2. It is said that Abâ—l being unnaturally murdered by his blood-thirsty Brother vox sanguinum clamabat ad deum and the Hebrew word saith Collerâ—s signiâ—ieth ex ingenti animi dolore exelamare to cry out with a vehement grief of mind queritando vociferari and to complain with a most lamentable voice therefore surely his crying soul was still alive though his slaâ—ghtered body was lain dead 3. God saith unto Moses I am the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob and the God of your Fathers therefore Abraham Isaac and Jacob Exod. 3. 15. and the rest of their Fathers were still alive 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 secundum aliquid and that is in respect of their Souls because as our Saviour saith unto the Sadduces God is not the God of the dead but the God of the living and the bodies of these men that were turned to dust could not be said either to be alive or to be Abraham Isaac or Jacob therefore Abraham Isaac and Jacob were still alive in respect of their Soules 4. Moses is said to have died in the Land of Moab and to be buried in a valley â—ver against Beth-peor and yet S. Matth. saith that when Jesus was transfigured Deut. 34. 5 6. Mat. 17. 3. on the Mount Moses and Elias appeared to the Apostles talking with Christ therefore Moses was dead and not dead and was buried and not buried 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. dead in respect of his body and living in respect of his Soul and so Moses and Elias were still alive and they themselves in respect of their Souls and not their shadows or phantasmes which can no waies be â—aid to be Moses and Elias did then appear unto the Apostles 5. David saith I will not die but live and declare the works of the Lord and yet David is dead and was buried therefore it is his Soul that liveth 6. The wise man saith that when a man dieth then shall the dust that is his Eccl. 12. 7. body return to the Earth and the Spirit shall return to God that gave it and being with God it cannot be dead but remain immortal for ever 7. When Lazarus died he is said to be carried up by the Angels into Abrahams bosom i. e. in respect of his Soul for his Body was not carried up into his Luke 16. 22. Bosom And so Dives being in torments must be understood in respect of his Soul for it is said that being dead he was buried in respect of his Body and therefore the Souls both of the good and of the bad do still remain immortal 8. Our Saviour saith Fear not them which kill the Body but are not able to kill the Soul therefore the Soul is immortal whenas all the strength of man and all the Mat. 10. 28. power of Hell is not able to kill it 9. The hope of Glory and Reputation and the desire that every man hath of the continâ—ance and perpetuity thereof how vain soever it be yet doth it carry a great evidence of the Immortality of our Soules 10. The impression of that vice which robbeth a man of the knowledge of humane Justice and is alwaies opposite to the Justice of God and indelibly imprinted in every mans Conscience doth infallibly conclude that the Justice of God requireth the same should be chastised after death and therefore that our Soules must needs be immortal 11. In the Book of Wisdom it is most plainly said the souls of the righteous are in the hands of God and there shall no torment touch them in the sight of the unwise Sap. 3. 1 2 3. they seemed to die but they are in peace A place so plain that sense can desire no plainer And many more Reasons might be produced to confirm this Truth but these are sufficient demonstrations to shew unto you that although man in respect of his being in this life is altogether Vanity yet simply considered he is to be eternal and to have a perpetual Being because God never made man to have an end and to be reduced to nothing but as the wise man saith he created all things and much rather man that they might have their being And what madness is it therefore that men will not believe this Truth especially Sap. 1. 14. considering it is most certain that the remembrance of their end and the shortness of their
ruled by it 4. And lastly I say that the Regal Government or Temporal State and civil Government of the Common-wealth is not meerly secular and worldly as if Kings and Princes and other civil Magistrates were to take no care of mens souls and future happiness which they are bound to do and not to say with Cain Nunquid ego custos fratris Am I obliged to look what shall become of their souls But they are called Secular States and civil Government because the greatest though not the chiefest part of their time and imployment is spent about Civil affairs and the outward happiness of the Kingdom even as the Ecclesiastical persons are bound to provide for the poor and to procure peace and compose differenâ—es among neighbours and the like civil offices though the most and chiefest part of their time and labour is to be spent in the Service of God and for the good of the souls of their people And so Johannes de Parisiis another man of Johannes de Parisiis Can. 18. the Roman Church doth very honestly say Falluntur qui supponunt quod potestas regalis sit Corporalis non Spiritualis quod habeat curam corporum non animarum quod est falsissimum They are deceived which suppose that the Regal power is only coâ—poral and not spiritual and that it hath but the care and charge over the bodies of his Subjects and not of their souls Wâ—ich is most false 2. They say as I have said even now that similitudes and examples Obj. nihil ponunt in esse and are no apodictical proofs for any weighty matters especially the examples of the old Testament to confirm the doing of the like things under the new Testament because that for us to be guided and directed by the examples of the old Law is the high-way to lead us to infinite inconveniences Therefore it followeth not that because the Kings of Israel and Juda did such things as are fore shewed unto the Priests and Levites and the setling of the Service in the Temple therefore our Moderne Princes should have the like Authority to do the like things unto the Bishops and Priests of the new Testament about the Worship of God and the Government of his Church and especially in the censuring of them that are appointed by Christ to be the Prime Governours of the same To this I answer 1. That this is as the Schooles say Petitio principii and Sol. a begging of the Question for we say that although for the pâ—rfecting of the Saints for the work of the Ministery for the edifying or building up of Ephes 4. 12. the body of Christ that is the Church God hath set in his Church first Apostles secondarily Prophets thirdly Teachers and so Bishops and Priests 1 Cor. 12. 28. primarily and principally to discharge the aforesaid Offices and Duties yet this proveth not that they are simply and absolutely the Prime Governours and Chief Rulers of the Church but that the Kings and Princes in the In what sense the Bishops Priests and in what sense Kings Princes may be said to be the prime Governours of the Church Esay 49. 23. other respects aforenamed may be justly said to be the Prime and Supreme Goverâ—ours as well in all causes Ecclesiastical as Temporal for the Prophet Esay speaking of the Church of the Gospel saith That Kings should be her nursing fathers and Qâ—eens her nursing mothers And I hope you will yield that the fathers and mothers are the Prime and Supremest Governours of their children rather than their School-masters and Teachers But though the progeny of the Pope and our frantick Sectaries would fain thrust out the eyes of the politick Prince and make him just like Polyphemus that had a body of vast dimensions but of a single fight scarce able to see his wayes and to govern himself yet I shall by God's assistance make it most apparent unto you by the testimony of the Fathers Councils and some Popish Authors that the Soveraign Prince hath and ought to have alwayes a peremptory Supreme power as well over the Ecclesiastical persons and causes of the Church as over the Civil persons and causes of the Temporal State and Common-wealth For 1. S. Augustine writing against Parmenian the Donatist that would with 1. The testimony of the Fathers Aug. p. 1. Cont. Epistâ—lam Parmon our Disciplinarians that are the very brood of those Donatists unarme the King of his Spiritual Sword saith An forte de Religione fas non est ut dicat Imperator vel quos miserit Imperator Cur ergo ad Imperatorem vestri venerunt legati Cur eum fecerunt causae suâ— judicem Is it not lawful for the Emperour and so the Prince or whomsoever he shall send to treat and determine matters of Religion If you think it is not Why did your Messengers then come unto the Emperour And why did they make him the Judge of their cause Whereby you see S. Augustine judgeth the Emperour or any other Supreme Prince to have a lawful power to hear and to determine the points and matters controverted among the Bishops and so to have a Spiritual jurisdiction as well as a Temporal Nicephorus also in his Preface to the Emperour Immanuel saith Tues Nicephorus in praefatione ad Immanuel Imperat Dux professionis fidei nostrae tu restituisti Catholiâ—am Ecclesiam reformasti Ecclesiam Dei à mercatoribus coelestis Doctrinae ab hâ—reticis per verbum veritatis Thou art the Captain of our Profession and of the Christian Faith and thou hast Restored or Reformed the Catholick Church and cleansed it from those Merchants of the heavenly Doctrine and from all the Hereticks by the word of Truth And I think nothing can be said fuâ—â—er and clearer than this to justifie the Spiritual jurisdiction of the Prince and Supreme Magistrate in causes Ecclesiastical Yet Theodoret and Eusebius say as much Theodoretus l. 1 c. 7. of Constantine the Great 2. You may read in the Council of Chalcedon That all the Bishops and 2. The testimony of the Councils Clergy that were gathered together to that place as the Members of our Parliament use to do were wont to lay down the Canons they had agreed upon in the Council until the Emperour should come to confirm them with his Royal assent and when the Emperour came they said These Decrees seem good unto us if they seem so to your Sacred Mâ—jesty And the Bishops of the Council of Constantinople that was after the first Council of Ephesâ—s Concil Chalcedon Artic. 1. pag. 831. wrote thus submissively unto the Emperour Theodosius We humbly beseech your Clemency that as you have honoured the Church with your Letters by which you have called us together Ita finalem conclusionem decretorum nostrorum corrobores sententia tua sigillo So you would be pleased to strengthen and confirm the last conclusion of our Decrees by your Royal
deal of difference betwixt a lawful King and an Usurper 2. Example answered An impertinent example of Israel but an alien an usurper and a scourge to them for their sinne and therefore no pattern for others to rebell against their lawful King 2. For the example of Ezechias rebelling against the King of Assyria it is most impertinently alledged for Ezechias was the lawful King of Juda and the King of Assyria had no right at all in his Dominions but being greedily desirous to enlarge his territories he incroached upon the others right and for his injustice was overcome by the sword in a just battell and therefore to conclude from hence that because the King of Juda refused to obey the King of Assyria therefore the inferiour Magistrates or Peers of any Kingdome may resist and remove their lawful Prince for his tyranny or impiety surely this deserves rather fustilus retundi quà m rationibus refelli to be beaten with rods then confuted with reasons as Saint Bernard speaketh of the like Argument And whereas they reply that it skilleth not whether the Tyrant be forreign as Eglon and the King of Assyria were or domestique as Saul Achab The absurdity of their replication and Manasses were because the domestique is worse then the forreign and therefore the rather to be suppressed I will shew you the validity of this argument by the like The seditious Preachers are the generation of vipers nay farre worse then vipers because they hurt but the body onely and these are pernicious both to body and soul therefore as a man may lawfully kill a viper so he may more lawfully kill any seditious Preacher But to omit their absurdity let us look into the comparison betwixt domestique Quia Dare absurdum non est solvere argumentum and extranean Tyrants and we shall find that domestique Tyrants are lawfully placed over us by God who commandeth us to obey them and forbiddeth us to resist them in every place for the Scripture makes no distinction betwixt a good Prince and a Tyrant in respect of the honour reverence and obedience that we owe unto our superiours as you see the Lord doth not say Touch not a good King and Obey righteous Princes but as God saith Honour thy father and thy mother be they good or bad so he saith Touch not the King resist not your Governours speak not evil of the Rulâ—rs be they good or be they bad and therefore Saint Paul when he was strictly charged for reviling the wicked high-Priest answered wisely I wist not brethren that he was Gods High-Priest for if I had known him to be the true High-Priest I would not have spoken what I did because I know the Law of God obligeth me to be obedient to him that God hath Bad kings to be obeyed as well as the good placed over me be he good or bad for it is Gods institution and not the Governours condition that tyeth me to mine obedience So you see the mind of the Apostle he knew the Priest-hood was abolished and that he was not the lawful High-Priest therefore he saith God shall smite thee thou whited wall But if he had known and believed him to be the true and lawful High-Priest which God had placed over him he would never have said so had the Priest been never so wicked because the Law saith Thou shalt not revile thy Ruler But for private robbers or forreign Tyrants God hath not placed them over us nor commanded us to obey them neither have they any right by any Law but the Law of strength to exact any thing from us and therefore we are obliged by no law to yield obedience unto them neither are we hindred by any necessity either of rule or subjection but that we may lawfully repell all the injuries that they offer unto us 3. For the peoples hindring of King Saul to put his son Jonathan to death 3. Example answered Saul was contented to be perswaded to spare hâ—s son I say that they freed him from his fathers vow non armis sed precibus not with their weapons but by their prayers when they appealed unto himself and his own conscience before the living God and perswaded him that seâ—ting aside his rash vow he would have regard unto justice and consider whether it was right that he should suffer the least damage who following God had wrought so great a deliverance unto the peohle as Tremelius and Junius in their Annotations do observe And Saint Gregory saith The Gâ—egor in 1 Reg. 4. people freed Jonathan that he should not die when the King overcome by the instanâ—e of the people spared his life which no doubt he was not very â—arnest to take away from so good a son 4. Touching Ahikam that was a prime Magistrate under King Jehoiakim 4. Example answered I say that he defended the Prophet not from the Tyranny of the King but from the fury of the people for so the Text saith The hand of Ahikam that is saith Tremelius the authority and the help of Ahikam â—erem 26. 24. was with Jeremy that They that is his enemies should not give him into the hands of the people which sought his life to put him to death because Ahikam had been a long while Counsellour unto the King and was therefore very powerful in credit and authority with him And you know there is a The act of Ahikam no colour for Rebellion great deal of difference betwixt the refraining of a tumultuous people by the authority of the King and a tumultuous insurrection against the King That was the part of a good man and a faithful Magistrate as Ahikam did this of an enemy and a false Traytor as the opposer of Kings use to do 5. For the defection and revolting of the ten Tribes from Rehoboam 5. Example answered their own natural lawful King unto a fugitive and a man of a servile condition and for the Edomites Lybnites and others that revolted against King Joram and that Conspiracy which was made in Jerusalem against 2 Chrâ—n 21. 2 Reg. 14. 19. Amazia I answer briefly That the Scriptures do herein as they do in many other places set down rei gestae veritatem non facti aquitem the truth of things how they were done not the equity of the things that they were rightly done and therefore Non ideô qura factum â—ctions commanded to be done are not to be imitated by us unlâ—sse we be sure of the like commandement legimus faciendum credamus ne violemus praeceptum dum sectamur exemplum We must not believe it ought to be done because we read that it was done lest we violate the Commandement of God by following the example of men as Saint Augustine speaketh for though Joseph sware by the life of Pharaoh the Midwives lyed unto the King and the Israelites robbed the Aegyptians and sinned not therein yet we have no warrant without sinne to follow
the Papists in Ireland and to get that Act to purchase all the Lands of the Rebels had tasted too much of this bitter root of such destructive Doctrine whereby you see how the Religion of these men robbes us of our Estates keeps no faith with us and takes away our lives 7. Though among the works of God every flower cannot be a Lilly 7. They would have a party among all men both in Church and Common-wealth Gal. 5 6. Câ—l 3. 11. every beast cannot be a Lyon every bird cannot be an Eagle and every Planet cannot be a Phoebus yet in the School of these men this is the doctrine of their to be new erected Church that with God there is no respect of persons and neither Circumcision availeth any thing nor uncircumcision but whether they be bond or free masters or servants Jew or Gentile Barbarian Scythian a country-Clown or a Court Gallant rich or poor it is all one with God because these Titles of Honour Kings Lords Knights and Gentlemen are no entities of Gods making but the creatures of mans invention to puffe him up with pride and not to bring him unto God and therefore though for the bringing of their great good work to passe they are yet contented to make the Earl of Essex their General and Warwick their Admiral and so Pym and Hampden great Officers of Stateâ— yet when the work is done their Plot perfected and their Government established then you shall find that As now they will eradicate Episcopacie and make all our Clergie equall as if all had equally but one talent and no no man worthier than another so then there should be neither King Lord Knight nor Gentleman but a parity of degrees among all these holy brethren And to give us a taste of what they mean as the Lords concurrence with them inabled them to devour the Kings poweâ— so they have since with great justice prevailed with the House of Commons to swallow up the Lords power and have most fairly invaded their priviledge when they questioned particular Members * As my Lord Duke and my Lord Digbie 8. They would have no man to pray for temporal things Matth. 33 34. Matth 6. 1â— 9. Not to say the Lords Prayer 10. Not to say God Speed you 2 John 10. 11 12 Not to pray for the Malignants 1 John 5. 16. for words spoken in that House and then the whole House when they brought up and countenanced a mutinous and seditious Petition which demanded the Names of those Lords that consented not with the House of Commons in those things which that House had twice denied 8. Because our Saviour saith Seek ye first the Kingdom of Heaven and the righteousnesse thereof and all these things that is meat drink and cloathes and all other earthly things 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 shall be cast unto you and again Be not carefull for to morrow they teach their Proselytes that they ought not to pray by any means for any of these things whereas Christ biddeth us to say Give us this day our daily Bread 9. They cannot endure to say the Lords Prayer for that 's a Popish superstition but their Prayers must be all tautologies and a circular repetition of their own indigested inventions 10. You must not say God speed you to any neighbour or any traveller lest he intends some evill work and then you shall be partaker of his sin 11. They will not allow any of their Disciples to pray for any of the Reprobates and therefore they do exceedingly blame us and tear our Liturgie because we say That it may please thee to have mercy upon all men 12. Because Christ saith Call no man father on earth for one is your Father which is in Heaven the child must not call him that begat him and nurseth him his father nor kneel unto him to ask him blessing nor perform many other such duties which the Lord requireth and the Church instructeth her children to do to this very day and this foolish Doctrine of calling no man Father no man master or Lord and the like in their sense because they understand not the divine meaning of our Saviour's words hath been the cause of such undutifulnesse and untowardnesse such contempts of superiours and such rebellions to Authority as is beyond expression when as by their disloyalty being thus bred up in them from their cradle they first despise their father then their Teachers then their King and then God himself CHAP. IX Sheweth three other speciall points of Doctrine which the Brownists and Anabaptists of this Kingdom do teach 13. BEcause they can find no Text in Scripture when as the Alcoran is not so impudently hellish as to justifie the action for to warrant men to absolve our consciences from any Oaths that we have voluntarily taken for the performance of any businesse I cannot say that they do professedly teach but I do hear they do usually practise this most damnable sin as that Master Marshall and Master Case did absolve the Souldiers taken at Brainceford from their Oath which they took never to bear Arms against his Majesty which is a sin destructive both to body and soul when their Perjury added to their Treason makes them two-fold more the children of hell than they were before and if they be taken again they can expect nothing but their just deserved death and therefore I do admire that any man can challenge the name of a Divine which doth either preach or practise a point so devilish 14. Because Saint Paul saith These hands have ministred to my necessities 14. They think sacriledge to be no sin Acts 20. 34. 1 Thes 2. 9. 1 Cor. 1. 12. and to them that were with me and again Labouring night and day because we would not be chargeable to any of you we preached unto you the Gospel of God and because the rest of the Apostles and Disciples were Fishermen Tradesmen or professours of some Science either liberal or mechanick as Saint Luke was a Physician Joseph a Carpenter and the like who did live by their manual crafts and were chargeable to none of their people but sought them and not theirs to win their souls to God and not their monies unto themselves therefore they think it no robbery to take away all the revenues of the Church nor sacriledge to rob the Clergy of all the means they have because they should either labour for their livings as the Apostles did or live upon the peoples Almes as many poor Ministers do to the utter undoing of many souls in many distressed and most miserable Churches But because this revenue of the Church and the Lands of the Bishops is that golden Wedge and the brave Babylonish garment which the Anabaptistical Achans of our time do most of all thirst after in this their pretended holy Reformation I must here sistere gradum stay awhile and let you know 1. That the taking away of any Lands or goods given and
much leisure that they were wont to judge of the quarrels of Christians yet they did not so spend their time in judging their contentions that they neglected their Preaching and Episcopal function and now that they do judge in civil causes consuetudine Ecclesiae introdâ—ctum est ut peccata caverentur And Bellarmine saith Non pâ—gnat cum verbo Dei ut unus Bellar. de Rom. Pont. l. 5. c. 9. homo sit Princeps Ecclesiasticus politicus simul it is not against the Word of God that the same man should be an Ecclesiastical and a Secular Prince together when as the same man may both govern his Episcopacy and his Principality And therefore we read of divers men that were both the Princes and the Bishops of Theod. l. 2. c. 30 the same Cities as the Archbishop of Collen Mentz Triers and other German Princes that are both Ecclesiastical Pastours and great secular Princes Henr. of Huntingson Hist Angl. And Hâ—bert Archbishop of Canterbury was for a long while Vicerâ—y of this Kingdom And so Leo. 9. Julius 2. Philip Archbishop of York Adelboldus Innocent 2. Collenutius and Blâ—ndus and many others famous and most worthy Bishops both of this â—sland and of other Kingdoms have undertaken and exercised both the Functions And Saint Paul recommendeth secular businesses and judgements unto the Pastours of the Church as S. Augustine testifieth Aug. tom 3. de operib Monach c. 29. at large where he saith I call the â—ord Jesus a witness to my soul that for so much as concerneth my commodity I had rather work every day with my hands and to reserve the other houres free to read pray and exercise my self in Scriptures then to sustain the tumultuous perplexities of other mens causes in determining secular Controveâ—sies by â—udgement or taking them up by arbitrement to which troubles the Apostle hath appointed us not of his own will but of his that spake in him And as this excellent Father that wrote so many worthy volumes did notwithstanding imploy no small part of his time in these troublesome affairs so S. Ambrose twice undertook an honourable Embassie for Valentinian the Emperour unto the Tyrant Maximus And Marutha Soâ—rat â—ccl hist lib 7. Bishop of Mesopotamia was sent by the Romane Emperour an Ambassadour to the King of Persia in which imployment he hath abundantly benefitted both the Church and the Emperour and we read of divers famous men that undertook divers Functions and yet neither confounded their offices nor neglected their duties for Spiridion was an husbandman and a Bishop of the Church a Pastouâ— of sheep and a feedeâ— of soules and yet none of the ancient Fathers that we read of either envyed his Farm or blamed his neglect in his Bishoprick but they admired his simplicity and commended his sanctity they were not of the spirit of our hypocritical Saints And Theodoret writeth Theodor. lib. 4. c. 13. that one James Bishop of Nisib was both a Bishop and a Captain of the same City which by the help of his God he manfully preserved against Sapor King of Persia And Eâ—sâ—bius Bishop of Samosis managing himself with all warlike habiliments ranged along throughout all Syria Phaenicia and Paâ—â—stina and as he passed erected Churches and ordained Priests and Deacons and performed such other Ecclesiastical pensions as pertained to hiâ— office in all places and I â—ear me the iniquity of our time will now call upon all Bishops that are able to do the like to preach unto our people and to sight against God's enemies that have long laboured to overthow his Church as we read of some Bishops of this Kingdom that have been driven to do the like and if these men might do these things without blame as they did why may not the same man be both a Bishop and the Kings Counsellour both a Preacher in the pulpit and a Justice of the peace on the Bench and yet the callings not confounded though the same man be called to both offices for you know the office of a Lawyer is different from the office of a Physitian and the office of a Phyâ—tian as different from the duty of a Divine and yet as Saint Luke was an exâ—ellent Physitian and a heavenly Evangelist and S. Paul as good a Lawyer as he was a Preacher â—or he was bred at the feet of Gamaliâ—l as was 〈◊〉 Calvin too as good a Civilian as he was a Divine for that was his first profession so the same man may as in many places they do and that without blame both play the part of a Physitian to cure the body and of a Divine to instruct the soul and therefore why not of a Lawyer when as the Preachers duty next to the teaching of the faith in Christ is to perswade men to live according to the rules of Justice and Justice we cannot understand without the knowledge of the Laws both of God and men and if he be obliged to know the Law why should he be thought an unfit man to judge according to the Law But. CHAP. IX Sheweth a full answer to four special Objections that are made against the Civil jurisdâ—ctions of Ecclesiastical persons their abilities to discharge these offices and desire to benefit the Common-wealth why some Councils inhibited these offices unto Bishops that the King may give titles of honour unto his Clergy of this title LORD not unfitly given to the Bishops proved the objections against it answered â—â—x special reasons why the King should confer honours and favours upon his Bishops and Clergy 1. IF you say the office of a Preacher requireth the whole man and where Ob. 1. 2 Cor. 2. 16. the whole man is not sufficient to one duty for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 then certainly one man is never able to supply two charges I answer that this indefinite censure is uncertainly true and most certainly Sol. false as I have proved unto you before by many examples of most holy men that discharged two offices with great applause and no very great difficulty to themselves for though Saint Matthew could not return to his trade of Publican because that a continued attendance on a secular business would have taken him from his Apostâ—late and prove an impediment to his Evangelick ministration yet Saint Peter might return to his nets as he did without blame because that a temporary imployment and no constant secession can be no hinderance to our Clericall office when there is no man that can so wholly addict No man is alwayes able to do the same thing himselfe to any kinde of art trade or faculty but that he must sometimes interchangeably afford himselfe leisure either for his recreation Vt qâ—â—mvis animo possit sufferre laborem or the recollection of strength and abilities to discharge his office by the undertaking of some other exercise which is to many men their chiefest recreation as you see the husband-mans change of labour doth still inable him to
when the hairy scalpe of such as still go on in their wickedness will not so easily be rubbed off I should say to every King put your trust in Gods assistance and as the Holy Ghost saith to the King of Kings Gird Psal 45. 3. thee with thy sword upon thy thigh O thou most mighty ride on with thine honour and let thy right hand teach thee terrible things and those thine enemies that would not thou shouldst reigne over them cause them to be brought and let them be slain before thee so shalt thou be a ruler in the midst of thine enemies and some Luke 19 27. think that it were but just if our King though he be never so loath should now at last turn the leafe and follow the example of God himself who when his children regard not his grace and set at naught all his counsels will laugh at their calamity and mock when their destruction cometh as a whirle-winde and should Prov. 1. 16 17. make London as Hierusalem and as other the like rebellious Cities that the Lord in his just revenge of their iniquity hath suffered to be destroyed and The wealth pride of the City of London have brought this misery and calamity upon all the kingdome of England to be made an heape of stones because the Londoners have shewed themselves in many things worse then the Jews and for Rebellion have justified all the Cities of the world or if the King will not do this though I dare not say of them as Antoninus after he had heard the confession of a miserable covetous wretch said unto him Deus misereatur tui si vult condonet tibi peccata tua quod non credo perducat te in vitam aeternam quod est impossibile yet seeing their sins are so intolerable among men and so abhominable in the sight of God it is much feared that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 after their hard hearts Rom. 2. 5. which cannot repent they will still proceed to heape upon themselves the heavy wrath of God till there be no remedy to preserve them from utter ruine and destruction though from my heart I wish them more grace and pray to Almighty God that Nullum sit in omine pondus Or if this cannot be that they may escape that damnation which the Apostle Rom. 13. 2. 6. Prayers for the King threatneth to all them that resist this ordinance of God 6. The last but not the least part of that honour which is due to our King is our prayers to God for him and as the other duty was to be performed by the practice 〈◊〉 c 2. p. â—8 Tertul ad Scap. Ita Marâ—us Anreliuâ— Christ anorum militum orationibus ad Deum factis imbres victoriam in expeditione Germanica impetravit of all good Subjects so is this to be observed by the precept of the Apostle who though the Kings were Ethnicks and Tyrants yet commanded us to pray for them and that you may know what manner of prayer the Christians made for their persecuting Kings Tertullian that lived under the Emperour Severus saith in behalf of the Church Omnibus Imperatoribus precamur vitam prolixam imperium securum domum tutam exercit us fortes senatum fidelem popâ—lum probum orbem quietum quaecunque hominis Caesaris vota sunt and I fear me our Rebels pray for none of these things to a most Christian King Nam orare pro aliquo in exitium ejus machinari annon haec sunt sibi contraria for to pray for ones health and long life and to do our best to worke his destruction Non benè conveniunt can never proceed from a true heart but as the uncharitable Papists prayed for the successe of the Gun-powder Plot which was a Treason sine exemplo quia crudelis sine modo saying Gentem aâ—ferto perfidam Credentium de sinibus Vt Christo preces debitas Persolvamus alacriter So the practice of these Rebels makes us believe their prayer is Regem auferto perfidum Credentium de finibus c. * I am ashamed to set down how the factious and malicious Preachers of the rebellious Cities either neglect to pray at all or pray most seditiously and unchristianly for their own Liege Lord and gracious King and therefore the curse of Judas lights upon them that their prayer is turned into sin which should make them pray that Judas his end should not fall unto them But we that desire to follow the Apostles Precept considering the greatnesse of his cares and charge that he doth undergo and the multitude of dangers that he is lyable to will most heartily pray to God both in our Morning and our Evening Prayers both at our sitting and at our rising from our meat Vt vivat Rex exurgat Deus dissipentur inimici that God would give his Angels charge over him to preserve him in all his wayes that he dash not his foot against a stone that his enemies may be cloathed with shame and that he may flourish as the Lilly that he may raign long and happily here and raign for ever in Heaven this shall be my prayer for ever CHAP. XVIII The persons that ought to honour the King and the recapitulation of one and twenty Wickednesses of the Rebels and the faction of the pretended Parliament 3. HAving seen the Person that is to be honoured and the honour that is 3. The persons that must honour the King due unto him we are now to consider in the last place who are to honour him included in this word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 honour ye him which being unlimited and indefinite is equivalent to an universal and so Saint Paul doth more plainly express it saying 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Let Rom. 13. 1. every soul be subject to the higher powers which is an Hebrew Ideome or Synecdochical speech signifying the whole man the world 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 being usually taken in Scripture pro toto composito for the whole man composed of body and soul as where it is said that Jacob went down into Aegypt with 70 soules and S. Peter Gen. 46. 62. 27. Act. 2. by one Sermon converted 3000 soules and the abstract word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is here taken 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to shew that our subjection obedience and honour which we are to ascribe unto our King must be not as hypocrites render it in shew from the teeth outward but really and indeed ex animo from our soules and the bottome of our hearts as Aquinas glosseth it and the concrete 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 added unto it makes it the more energetical to shew that all mortal men none excepted are obliged to do this honour and to yield this subjection unto their King for seeing every man both spiritual and temporal and every sex both man and woman and every degree of men young and old rich and poor one
with another hath an immortal soul as well as a mortal body it must needs follow that all cujuscunque gradûs sexûs conditionis are obliged both in soule and body to honour and obey their King And yet it is strange to see how many men can exempt themselves and grant The Pope and his Clergy would be freed from the subjection of Kings a dispensation unto their soules for the performance of this duty for the Pope will be freed because he hath a power above all powers to depose Kings and to dispose of their Kingdomes at his pleasure and the Popish Clergy will perform no duty unto their King because their Function is spiritual but to all these I may truly say as our Saviour doth to the lâ—wd servant ex ore tuo out of the Fathers whom they acknowledge and out of their own Authors they are confuted for Saint Chrysostome saith that whether he be an Apostle or Evangelist or Prophet Sen quisquis tandem fuerit or whosoever else he be Pope Cardinal or Deacon he is commanded to be subject to the higher power and that you may see what power he meanes he pointeth out the same by the symbol that is of him that carryeth the sword which you know must be the secular Prince and not the spiritual Pope and so not onely Eâ—thym Theophylact Oâ—cumenius and other Greek Commentators do avouch but also those Epistles which are recorded by Binius and quoted by the Bishop of Durham as Leo 1. ep â—6 35. Simplicius 1. ep 4. Felix 3. ep 2. Anastasius 1. ep 78. Pelagius 1. ep 16. Martinus 1. ep 3. Agatho 1. ep ad Herac. Hadrian 1. ep ad Constant do make this most manifest unto vs and therefore Espencaeus convinced Espeâ—c in Tit. 3. 1. Digres 10. p. 5. 13. Paris 1568. The wickednesses of the pretended Parliament shewed by their actions by such a cloud of witnesses confesseth very honestly that the Apostle here Docet omnes credentes mundi potestatibus esse subjectos nempe sive Apostolus sive Evangelista c. ut tâ—net Chrysost Euthym. qui non Graeci And as the Popelings will be free so the Presbyterians and the faction of this Parliament will be as free as they and because every wickednesse laboureth to exceed that which preceeded these do not agree with the Catholiques as Herod and Pilate did to crucisie Christ in the same conclusion and tenet of exemption but they will go a note beyond Ela and surmount both Jesuite and Pope and therefore they not onely dishonour and disobey their King but they have violated and incroached upon all his rights and assumed the same into their own hands for to recapitulate some of their choycest wickednesses 1. As the Church of Rome and the Jesuites teach in Aphorismis confessariorum ex Doctorum sententiis collectis p. 249. that Rex potest per rempublicam privari ob tyrannidem si non faciat officium suum cum est causa aliqua justa eligi alius à majore parte populi which falshood their own Divines confute when Royard saith Rege constituto non potest populus â—ugum subjectionis repellere Royard in dom 1 advent They teach the deposition of kings so these men maintain that diabolical tenet that the Regal power is primarily in the collective body and derived to the king cumulativè not privatiuè and therefore upon the kings neglect or male-administration it comes back again to the collective body in whom it resideth supplectivè to discharge the royal duty when the king faileth to do the same and then the king so falling from his right they may refuse obedience and if they see cause which they can soone do they may depose him from his office which impudent falshood I have fully confuted in this Treatise 2. They say the Regall Majesty is a humane creature or the ordinance of men primarily and therefore may be deposed by men when as Cunerus could say Sive electione sive postulatione vel successione vel belli jure princeps fiat principi tamen facto divinitùs potestas adâ—st and therefore they have no power to take away that which God hath given him 3. They have with Nadab and Abihâ— adventured to offer strange fire upon Gods Altar and with Vzza to lay their prophane hands upon Gods holy Arke they have rejected the Lawes that the King with the advice and consultation of all his learned Clergy hath made * Though now I reckon not this among their wickednesses and they themselves sit in Moses chaire and have undertaken to reforme the Church to make Lawes and compose Articles of our saith with the advice of a few facticus men that were never esteemed otherwise then fax Cleri not worthy to be the Curates of those worthy Divines whose feet they hurt in the stocks and send the iron into their soules 4. They have cast out all the Bishops and all the faithfull Ministers of Christ How they persecute the Bishops and the best of the Clergy out of all offices that might further the Gospell and administer justice unto the people they do rob them of their meanes and count sacriledge to be no sin and in very deed they have persecuted the worthiest Clergy in many particulars far worse then ever Julian that wicked Apostata did the Lord of Heaven give us patience to indure it and suffer us not for feare of any villanie or calamity to be dejected and so fall away from his truth 5. They have called and continued an Assembly which the Pope would not do without the Emperours leave contrary to the Kings command which is a meere and mighty usurpation of the Regall right 6. They have seized upon the Kings Revenues Castles â—orts Townes Ships and all that they could lay hard on and do in a hostile manner with all violence detaine them from him but what he gaines by his sword to this very day 7. They have fought against him shot at His sacred Person and sought most Barbarously to kill him under the colour to preserve him which is the finest piece of Logicke that ever was read 8. They have rayled at him slandered him and most apparently and falsly belyed him and laid to his charge the things which we his Majesties Subjects and Servants that attend Him do know that He neither did nor knew 9. They incouraged and countenanced their ignorant brazen-faced Chaplains most uncivilly to rayle at Gods Anointed in the Pulpit and so they brought the abomination not of desolation but of most horrible transgression into the holy place and made Moses chaire the seat of railers 10. They taxe the Subjects at their pleasure and have raised infinite summes of money and no man but themselves knowes how they have disposed or what they have done therewith 11. They discharged Apprentices they send out their Warrants and their Edicts without and against the Kings authority which are but nugae and the minims
Ordinances are made against all Lawes equity and conscience 213 CHAP. XX. Sheweth how the rebellioâ—s Faction forswore themselves what trust is to be given to them how we may recover our peace and prosperity how they have un-king'd the Lords Annointed and for whom they have exchanged him and the conclusion of the whole 127 PSAL. 39. 5. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Verily every man living or in his best estate is altogether Vanity Sela. OUR Blessed Lord and Saviour saith the night cometh when no man can work therefore I must work the Works of him John 9. 4. that sent me whilst it is day and S. Paul tels us the time will come when men will not endure sound Doctrine but after their 2 Tim. 4. 3. own lusts they shall heap to themselves Teachers that is Teachers enough in every place and every time so the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifieth but what kind of Teachers shall they heap unto themselves the Apostle tels you they shall be teachers after their own lusts that is such Tub-teachers of the new Order as will study rather to satisfie their lusts and to preach what they please best than to edifie their soules And I believe all wise men see that time is now and not till now fully come therefore it behoves all the true Teachers to bestir themselves to work the works of him that sent them while it is day while they have any time and while there is any true Light yet remaining before the sad night and darksom clouds of Errours and Heresies be grown so far and to prevail so much against the Truth that you shall scarce find any place or person where or by whom the new lights may be confronted and the old Truth confirmed unto us So it behoveth me and it is my duty to employ my Talent to the uttermost of my power against these false Prophets of the Great Antichrist that is now come into the world and by these heaps of his Emissaries laboureth quite to overthrow the Church of Christ And as Clement recordeth that when Barnabas came to Rome to preach the Gospel of Christ and divers rejected it he briefly said In vestra potestate est vel recipere quae annuntiamus vel spernere It is in your choice either to receive what we teach or to reject it but we may not be silent and not speak quod vobis expedire novimus what we know to be expedient and necessary for you quia nobis si taceamus damnum est vobis quae dicimus si non recipiatis pernicies est so Clem. Recoâ— l. 1. p. 6. say I. And therefore that you may be somthing and so happy I beseech you listen to these words that testifie that in your selves you are nothing â—ut Vanity For verily every man And the nearest way to exchange this Vanity for Eternity and so to make us happy that are in misery is to know our own vanity and to understand our own misâ—ry For Knowledge saith Hugo Card. is the way to God and undeâ—standing saith the Prophet David is that which distinguisheth and differenceth man from Psal 49. 12 20. beast for man though he be never so great in honour never so powerful in place and never so rich in wealth yet if he hath no understanding he is compared to the beasts that perish And the two chiefest parts which are like the Body and Soul of all the Knowledge that makes us happy are these two Precepts so much commended and so often urged unto us even by the Heathens themselves that yet notwithstanding were destitute of all true Knowledge that could make them happy because they knew rightly neither of those two things that they so much commended which were For 1. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Know God 2. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Know thy self 1. Our Saviour tels us this is eternal Life to know God i. e. to know the Father John 17. 3. 1. To know God the only way to make us happy to be the only true God and whom he hath sent Jesus Christ For the Heathens know that God alone is the fummum bonunt and the only true and perfect Eternity to which all men naturally have a propensity and desire to be united but yet cannot because they know him not and therefore is that Precept to know him so often urged And the reason why we know not so much of God as we should and which The reason why we know not so much of God as should make us happy should make us happy is because we know not our selves we know not our own vanity and misery for the nearest way to bring us to Eternity is to understand our own vanity and the first step to happiness is to know our selves to be unhappy and that this unhappiness was derived unto us by that sad accident of sin which separated us from God who is felicity and eternity and made us wholly to become vanity and replenished with all misery and therefore 2. The very Philosophers could tell us that to know our selves is the ready way 2. To know our selves the best way to know God both to know God and to enjoy God For as he that knoweth God will never relie on himself so he that knoweth himself will alwaies seek to rely on God because he seeth his own vanity his weakness and his frailty to be such and so great that he cannot subsist without God and therefore Socrates seeing this sentence 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Know thy self engraven upon the Portal of the Temple of Apollo and considering with himself that there could be no access unto God but through his House and no entrance into the House but by the Door and then seriously musing with himself why this Sentence should be set upon the door he concluded that the readiest way to come to God was to know himself and therefore he left the course and practise of other Philosophers that searched into the motions of the Heavens and the influence of the Planets and applied their studies rerum cognoscere causas to understand the causes of all natural things which they conceived was the only thing that could make them happy and bring them to enjoy the summum bonum and he gave himself wholly to learn the knowledge of himself and he conceived there was no folly comparable to this to be painful and diligent to know all other things and to be ignorant and know nothing of himself to study Arts and Sciences and to forget himself and therefore non se quaesiverit extra but he employed all his time and his pains to know himself because he conceived that the knowledge of himself would be more beneficial to him than the knowledge of all other physical things whatsoever For which cause and no other the Oracle seeing him preferring the moral Philosophy before the Natural pronounced him the wisest man in Greece not because his knowledge was more compleat or his
sufficiency greater than others but because his knowledge of himself was far better than the knowledge of others that studied other things and neglected to understand themselves And no marvel that the Oracle should proclaim him for the wisest man that doth best know himself because it is not only very good and profitable but also a very hard and difficult thing for a man fully and truly to know himself that is to know Not only the quiddities and the qualities both of his body and of his soul which notwithstanding in themselves are most admirable and excellent if we consider 1. The Parts and composition of the Body which as the Prophet saith are fearfully and wonderfully made yea so admirably composed that Galen saith the Galenus de usu partium 1. The admirable structure of mans body true expression or the tight Anatomization of them is as an holocaust or Sacrifice most acceptable to God that hath by that excellent composure of this incomparable structure shewed his own most incomprehensible wisdom as you see the least finger and the least Joynt of any Finger hath his use and cannot be spared by any means 2. That far more noble part of man that Spark of heavenly fire and immortal 2. The difficulties of understanding the particularities of the Soul spirit which is his Soul in the Original Essence Faculties Operations Use End and the like almost infinite Points thereof wherein and about which the best Philosophers have so puzled themselves that they rather bewrayed their own Ignorance than truly expressed any point of the most necessary knowledge of this Substance as learned Suarez in his voluminous work de Anima sheweth and Aristotle himself confesseth when he saith that the more knowledge a man hath of these things the more occasion of doubting is offered unto him which made him as many â—eâ— think to define the Soul to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 corporis phisici organici Arist de Anima l. 2. c. 1. tâ—x 6. Cicero l. 1. Tujcul q. What man should chiefly know concerning himself vitam habentis potentia which is ignotum per ignotius a definition harder or at least as hard to be understood as the thing defined Whenas Cicero reading 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 translateth the same to signifie a continued and perpetual motion wâ—â—ch is far short of the right definition of the Soul But especially to know mans Original how he came into the world his duty whâ—t â—e should do and how he should behave himself while he continueth in the world his state and condition how he standeth in relation to his God that made him preserveth him and giveth to him all that he hath while he liveth in this world and what shall become of him when he dieth and departeth out of this world these and the like Considerations concerning man are hard to know and few men do learn them which is the reason that few do attain to Eternal Life Yeâ— as the Poet saith Plagae dant Animum What effects Afflictions do work in us And as S. Greg. saith Oculos quos culpa claudit poena apperit the eyes which sin and transgrestions have blinded afflictions and punishments have opened because as the Greek proverb saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Persecutions bring Instructions and suffering teacheth understanding as the Children of Jacob being questioned and afflicted in Egypt about their Brother whom they had sold unto the Ishmaelites had their eyes opened and their sin which for so many years they hâ—d buried in the Grave of Forgetfulness and in the Pit where they had thrown their Brother is now revived and makes them to confess and to say one to another We are verily guilty concerning our Brother in that we saw the anguish of his Soul when he besought us and we would not hear therefore is this distress Gen. 42. 21. come upon us and so Crosses and Afflictions do reduce our sins unto our remembrance and extort Confession of their Misdeeds from many others And therefore the Prophet David either upon the consideration of Absolons unnaturâ—l Rebellion and Persecution of him that was both his King and his What moved the Prophet David to compole this Psal Father or of some other violent and virulent Temptation that had seized upon him or else upon a Prophetical foresight of the Captivity of his people in Babylon as he sheweth in another place saying By the waters of Babylon we sate down and wept when we remembred thee O Sion or as others think upon the considâ—â—â—tion Psal 137. 1. of the sad state and distressed condition of many good Christians labourâ—â—g unâ—er the Cross and Persecutions in this world he composeth this most Excellent Psalm of the brevity and shortness of mans life that he need not fear he shall continue long in affliction and he directeth the same to Jeduthins a chief Musician because the chiefest Artist can give most grace and the best life to any thing and the best is best cheap Physitian Preacher Lawyer or whom you will And here in this Verse which I have read unto you the holy Prophet endeavouring to teach us how we may overcome all our maladies and pertâ—rbations even as himself had done with patience he setteth down a brief definition or rather a short description of man not Phylosophically with Aristotle to teach A brief Theological description of man us what he is in his Essence Animal rationale risibile a reasonable and a sociable creature but Theologically by the light of Gods Spirit to instruct us what he is in his state and condition and that is Ammal miserabile mortale a most miserable mortal wretch a worm and no man a vain thing or meer vanity and that is to be understood while he liveth in this world for as all Divines conclude there be three states of man 1. Institutionis 2. Destitutionis 3. Restitutionis That is 1. Of his Innocency That there be three states of man in Paradise where he was created in holiness and true righteousness after the very Image of God himself 2. Of his sinfull condition and corruption while he liveth here now in this world 3. Of his Restauration begun here by grace in this life and perfected with glory in the life to come And as Origen well observeth the Prophet David describeth here not what Of what state of man the Prophet speaketh we were in our Creation nor what we shall be in our Glorification but what we are now in our natural state and corrupted condition of our peregrination or pilgrimage here in this world whereof he saith Verily every man living or every man in his best estate is altogether vanity Where summarily you may see that Man is the subject of the Discourse and Vanity is the Possession the Inheritance and the definition of every man for though God made not Death but made man for perpetuity to be united to himself in
brutish and perverse thought than to imagine that the soul perisheth when the body is dissolved for what need we care what evil we do what need we fear what Judge condemn us or why should we abstain from any of our desires if our souls dye when our bodies are dead But to shew you that whatsoever they say yet they do not believe in any The former point proved eternal being either of body or soul after the end of this their vanity I pray you look into an excellent Book though sleighted by some Fanatick spirits where the Wise-man sheweth how the prophane worldlings and the worldly Atheists do make this conclusion of their incredulity to be the ground and foundation of all their impieties for they say but not aright Our life is short and tedious and in the death of a man there is no remedy neither was there any man known to have returned from the grave for we are born at all adventure and we shall be hereafter as though we had never been for the breath in our nostrils is as smoak which being extinguished our body shall be turned into ashes and our spirit shall vanish as the soft air Sap. 2. 1 2 3. This is their faith and therefore they make this conclusion saying Come let us injoy the good things that are present and let us speedily use the creatures like as in youth Cap. â—od v. 6 7â— 8 9 10 11 let us fill our selves with costly Wine and Oyntments and let no flower of the Spring pass by us let us crown our selves with Rose-buds before they be withered let none of us go without part of his voluptuousness for this is our portion and our lot is this Let us oppress the poor righteous man let us not spare the widow nor reverence the ancient gray hairs of the aged let our strength be the Law of Justice and let us lye in wait for the righteous And this was the very reasoning of Sardanapalus Ede bibe lude post mortem nulla voluptas There is no felicity after death therefore soul take thine ease sit down and be merry and I fear it is the occasion of so much wickedness in many men and of such a deluge of sin in these dayes that doth overflow both the Church and Commonwealth to the destruction and ruine of many thousand souls that in their hearts they scarce believe their souls to be immortal or that there shall be ever any resurrection of their bodies or any account to be given for what they do for so you see the reason why they oppress the poor and rob both God and man and satisfie themselves with all kinde of delights because their breath in their nostrils is as smoak which being extinguished their bodies shall be turned into ashes and their spirit as they suppose shall vanish as the soft air And truly I think the conclusion very good if there were any truth in the premises for though Plato and Socrates and Seneca and the like vertuous men did so much love vertue for the very beauty of vertue and did hate vice onely for the ugliness of vice and Anselimus is reported to have said he had rather to be vertuous though severely punished for it than be vicious though never so highly rewarded yet because these Ejaculations spring from more than ordinary knowledge no less than some sparks of the motions of Gods Spirit which God sometimes wrought in the hearts of the Heathens and much more in Anselimus that was a Christian It is contrary to all shew of reason that a man which believeth The incredulity of the life to come the cause that men commit much wickedness the mortality of the soul should have any desire to be vertuous or any fear to be most vicious unless it be onely for fear of some Temporal punishment For if our time be but a very shadow that soon passeth away and after that our end there is no returning why should I endure so much labour and suffer so much want or want so much pleasure as the reach of my wit or the laws of my strength can any wayes afford me or why should I abstain from any vice from any villany and fast and weep and mourn and go in sackcloath and ashes if after one moment of time I shall be reduced to nothing and be never more questioned and neither rewarded for my good deedâ— nor punished for my evil doings Therefore I think that this Aâ—hâ—istical conceit of the aâ—nihilation of the soul and the incredulous thought of the immortality thereof is the main cause of so much wickedness as is now raging in the world And on the other side if men did but seriâ—usly think and faithfuâ—â—y believe that after this short time of a few dayes pilgrimage our souls shall remain for ever and receive either everlasting joyes if they do well or eternal punishments if they do evil I do assure my self that men would have some care for the time to come and like Moses choose rather to suffer a mâ—mentary affliction with the people of God than to enjoy the pleasures of â—in for a season and so engage themselves to â—ndure Heb. 11. 25. the punishment of sin for ever And therefore to root ouâ— so pestilent an errour and to confirm so necessary a The necessity of rooting out this incredulity truth as is the doctrine of the Immortality of the soul for the perpâ—tuating of man all wise men that had any love of goodness in them and all the holy men of God both in the Old and New Testament and all the Fathers of the primitive Church and their successours the Bishops and other godly Preachers to this very day have been carefull to preach this truth and have shewed themselves very punctual and plentifull in this point for to let pass what Ovid saith Morâ—â— carent animae and what Propertiâ—s saith Sunt aliquid maâ—â—s lathum non omnia Ovid. Mâ—tam Tibul. l. 4. Propertius Claud. Manilius l. 4. Plato in Tim. Cicero de repub somâ—o Scip. l. 1. Tusc quest finit luridaque evictos effâ—git umbra rogos and what Claâ—dian saith Hâ—c sola manet bustoque superstes evolat and to pass over the testimony of Pherâ—cides that was Master unto Pythagoras and of Socrates and Platâ— and Cicero and the rest of the Philosophers and Orators that with unanswerable arguments have maintained the souls of men to be immortal and so likewise to pasâ— by the unanimous consent of the Fathers that were so plain and so plentifull to prove the same as you may see in S. Clement Recog l. 1. Iren. l. 2. c. 63. 64. cont Valent. Tertul. de res carnis S. Aug. dogmat Eccles c. 16. Arnobius de side resur and the rest of them almost in every place I finde the Prophets and our Saviour himself and his Apostles be very exact and diligent to declare the same and to prove it so fully that the
blunt the Swords of our gallant Souldiers that have just causes to make War for when wickedness groweth so wilfâ—ll as to seek our lives that desire to live in peace or to rob us of our livelihood lands or goods that God hath justly given us then you must know that out God is the God of War as well as the God of Peace and his name is the Lord of Hosts and he will make his sword drunk with blood and will strengthen our hands if we trust in him to scatter all those people that dâ—light in War and to destroy those Enemies that maliciously labour for our destruction What Wars the Author blameth But I blame all shedding of Christian blood in any War either to plant Religion which should be done by preaching and not by fighting which in seeking to make them Christian men will make them no men or dissembling hypocrites in stead of faithfull believers or else to satisfie the ambition of any man that desires to inlarge his Dominion and so unjustly to wrong his neighbours when as every man from the King unto the beggar should be contented with what God hath justly given him and that policy can never be justified which is not every way consonant to equity or especially for any subjects out of a rebellioâ—s discontent or ambitious desire to usurp the Power and Authority of their Soveraign to turn the sweet waters of Peace to become rivers of Christian blood This is that warfare which I chiefly discommend as the greatest of all vanities But 3. If the Sword or Bullet in this warfare taketh not man away yet Age and 3. His egress Sickness will soon summon him to his death and dissolution and till then his whole life is spent inter suspiria lachrymas betwixt sighs and teâ—rs troubles of minde and distempers of body and a thousand such sad accidents that will soon bring hoc vitrium corpusculum this our frail and brittle body and our distressed life to a miserable death and when we dye or as the Psalmist saith When the Psal 146. 3. breath of man gâ—eth forth he shall turn again to his earth and then all his thoughts and all his high designs and vain conceits perish and then it will appear which till then proud man will not believe that the life of man is but a flower that soon withereth a smoak that soon vanisheth and a bubble that suddenly falleth or as others say a shadow a dream a nothing And it were well for many men if as their great thoughts either on some deep plots of state or how to hook unto themselves their neighbours inheritance or to wreak their malice on their poor brethren or the like 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Castles in the air as Aristophanes calleth them do vanish into nothing when their soules part with their bodies so likewise their bodies and their soules should then with their Thoughts return to nothing But that cannot be for that now mans soul must pay for all his evil thoughts and suffer for all the wicked works and the great wrongs that he hath done and though è corpore vermis é vermibus foetor his body turnes to woâ—ms and those wormes yield such Sâ—nt as all the Spices of Arabia cannot keep away yet the living spirit of every wicked man that cannot and shall not die must now for his unrepented evil be hurried into the dreadful Regions of all horror where it must live and lie for ever and ever to suffer unsufferable and unconceivable torments a life that lives not and a death that dies not And so you see that man is Vanity and a wicked man in misery worse than vaniâ—y And therefore Reason should perswade you all to labour to become more than men that is more than meer men and to desire to be born again not of flesh and bloud but of water and of the Spirit of God that you may be brought again to that Union and Communion with God which you had when we were first made by God 2. The Prophet saith that totus lâ—mo vanitas all the whole man that is both 2 Point That whole man is vanity 1. The Body his Body and his Soul is vanity for what is this body of ours but a piece of earth which we tread upon Saccus stercorum saith S. Bernard a fack full of dust to say no worse and a Magazine of all Diseases Coughes Agues Feavers Gouts and what not and when these have satisfied and feasted themselves upon our bodies what are our bodies but a feast for Worms And the Soul though it be a pure Spirit as it proceeded from God yet as it is now traduced from our Parents as many Divines think it is or as it is infused 2. The Soul into our flesh as others do believe and remaineth in our bodies all the Faculties thereof are corrupted the Understanding is darkned with ignorance the Memory dulled with forgetfulness and the Will defiled with Misse-affections And so as Earth is good and Water is good yet being mingled together they do make a dirty Puddle and neither of them can be said to be then a pure Element so the body and soul of man though both were good in their Originals and good in their own kind yet now being both coupled together as Mezentius coupled the dead bodies to the living they are both marred and become so deformed by corrupting one another and associating themselves in their desires that now the eyes are the burning-glasses of Concupiscence and lusting after our neighbours Wives Lands and Goods the Tongue is a Razor of detraction to defame and slander our own Mothers Sons the Throat is an open Sepulchre the Hands Engines of violence to rob wound and kill the Heart a Mint of all Villanies the Feet swift to shed bloud and the whole man is become a Beast saith the Psalmist and a Devil saith our Saviour for one of you is a Devil Psal 74. John 6. 70. And so you see that all the whole man if he be but meer man as he is begotten of flesh and bloud in his best is but vanity in his next iniquity and in his worst consideration a meer misery and so miserable that being but meer man he hath little cause with the Philosopher to thank God that he was made a man when it had been better for him as our Saviour saith of Judas that he had never been made and never born Mark 14. 21. And therefore if we labour not to become more than men that is to be like Bacchus bis genitus as the Poets faign of him to be born again of another Mother That we should labour to become more than meer men the spouse of Christ and so to become double men and to consist of the old man begotten of mortal Seed and of the new man that is begotten by the immortal Seed of Gods Spirit we shall never be happy and never otherwise than as
and the scarcity of Traffick to be generally transported will never permit our Fame to spread it self very far For if the Glory of the Roman People in the time of Cicero when it was most flourishing and they were Terrarum Domini Masters of most places that they knew yet did not passe beyond Mount Caucasus that lieth betwixt Scythia and the Indians as the Orator confesseth then certainly the Glory and Fame of any particular man can never penetrate where the Glory and Trophies of such a Glorious Nation could not pass And therefore all the Honour of this world and the greatest Fame of the Noblest men whether it be for Birth Wealth Valour Learning or what you will yet can it neither last long nor extend it self very far and therefore must it needs be a very great Vanity And so you see that every man in his most Honourable estate is Vanity Nay more than that 4. The most excellent state is thought to be that which is most powerful in Authority 4 Point to rule and command all others but the Vanities that are incident and attendant on this state would require a Volume to display them I will only say what Horace hath most truly and you may daily see how that Saepius vâ—ntis agitatur ingens Pinus Et decidunt Turres feriuntque summos Fulmina Montes And so you see that every man in his best estate let his state be what you will yet he is but Vanity Nay that is not all For 5. Every man living is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 omnimoda Vanitas altogether vanity 5 Point and this is one degree of Calamity further than all the rest For to consider that every man is vanity is bad enough but to be vanity in our best estate is worse and in that estate to be altogether vanity is worst of all because this sheweth unto us that man is but meer Vanity and nothing else but vanity or vain in all that he is and vain in all that he doth as 1. Vain within and vain without vain in his Body and vain in his Soul 2. Vain in his thoughts vain in his words and vain in all his works And 3. Not only totaliter vanitas wholly vanity but also universa vanitas all vanity so that there is no vanity in the world that can be named or found out but you may find the same in man as Pride is vanity and you may find enough of that in man lies are vanities and most men are so addicted and delighted either to invent lies to hear lies or to relate lies that you shall almost finde nothing in most men but lies and so of all other vanities whatsoever they be they are to be found in man Antoninus for methods sake ranketh them into three special Series 1. Instabilitatis of instability which the Preacher handleth from the first Antoninus part 1. tit 2. c. 8. Sect. 3. Chapter unto the fourth Chapter 2. Iniquitatis of iniquity whereof the Preacher treateth from the fourth Chapter unto the twelfth Chapter 3. Paenalitatis of penalty which the said Preacher setteth down in the last verse of the twelfth Chapter For God shall bring every work into judgement with every secret thing whether it be good or whether it be evil Others terme the first degree of Vanities to be the vanity of our Creation The second degree they call the vanity of our Condition The third is the vanity of our Dissolution 1. Touching the vanity of our Creation God put no trust in his servants saith holy Job that is he trusted them not with such a stability or he made them noâ— Job 4. 18. so absolute that they should be independent and free from all possibility of falling and therefore seeing that nihil est omne quod ex nihilo est all in themselves are nothing which are made of nothing as Origen saith this possibility to vary and to be reduced to their first privation and non-entity is nothing else but an innate vanity or a momentary nothing if they be not still upheld and sustained by their Creator who as the Apostle saith Beareth up all things with his mighty word or Heb. 1. with the word of his power that is Jesus Christ Yet 2. The vanity of our Creation was but comparative as the creature stood in collation with Gods infinite purity but when Adam sinned he made himself the destroyer of his own stability the defacer of his own excellency and to be come nothing but meer vanity so that every creature now the worst of all the creatures and all creatures might insult over his Apostasie and say unto him Art thou become like one of us art thou become as vain as we And because all of us were then in the loyns of Adam as Levi was in Abrahamâ— when he meâ— with Melchisedech therefore his calamity was not personal but specifical and his iniquity brought a vanity upon us all which is the vanity of our condition so that now every man is nothing else but vanity the Saint as well as the sinner the rich as well as the poor and the Noble man as well as the beggar for as soon as the noblest of men is inobled with the name of a man so soon doth he inherit the title of a vain man or a man of vanity that is replenished with all vanity because filled with all unrighteousness But 3. The vanity of our Dissolution is the last and the worst of all vanities And this is 1. When they see that they themselves are Beasts these are the very words of the Scriptures For that which befalleth the sons of men befalleth beasts even one Eccles 3. 18 19 20. thing befalleth them as the one dyeth so dyeth the other yea they have all one breath so that a man hath no preheminence above a beast for all is vanity all go unto one place all are of the dust and all turn to dust again 2. When they finde that they themselves are worse than beasts when the spirit of the beast that goeth downward to the earth vanisheth and is reduced to nothing but the spirit of the man that should go upward and be united to Eternity shall descend to be chained in everlasting misery Vbi nec tortores deficientur nec miseri torti morientur sed per mille millia annorum cruciandi nec tamen in secula liberandi Where they shall have torments without ease and be tormented without end and this is a vanity indeed Vanitas vanitatum the greatest of all vanities because the bond of our union with God is here dissolved and we are divorced from all the happy Eternity And thus I hope you see that man be he never so excellent in condition so eminent in place or so powerfull in authority yet here is no exception no ex emption no limitation but he is altogether vanity And though the time will not give me leave to amplifie all the particulars that might be shewed you out