foot was and ought to be more to mee than the eternall sleepe of Lazarus could be to thee And as thy teares for him were tokens of thy humane nature not signes of thy diffidence in that thou knew'st he would forthwith arise so are mine for thee witnesses of my wretched estate not of my distrust who am assured of thy speedy resurrection Nor doe I onely grieve my owne griefe for as for mans sake I rejoyce in thy Fathers Grace who delivers thee to death and in thy Charity who dost suffer it So likewise in mans behalfe I am griev'd that he should be the cursed cause of those thy extreme torments for as not to joy in the benefits thy death hath brought with it would argue his ingratitude so not to condole for the tortures that attend it would demonstrate his cruelty And here I faithfully promise thee that both I while life and thy Church while the world doth last shall yearely spend this dolefull time of thy Tragicall expiration in Prayer fasting severity of discipline maceration of the flesh and contrition of the spirit as becomes thy mournefull Mother and thy gratefull Spouse to doe Thus condoling thus bemoaning hers and the generall losse she attended his herse to the Sepulchre provided by Ioseph where never man was laid before for it was not fit that Incorruptibility should succeed corruption in the same lodging This fragrant Flower was no sooner set in the ground but she sent many a deare drop after it to fasten it at the root for she knew within three dayes it should spring up againe not to grow in the earth but to be translated into Heaven there for ever to flourish and perfume the celestiall habitation Nor were her eyes saith Damascen closed with his Monument but watched themselves almost blinde with a greedy expectation to see the temple of his body built up againe which three dayes since was destroyed After many a longing looke she espied the Tombe to open and her onely joy to issue forth whom full well she knew by the countenance and figure of his Humanity but farre better by the cleere proofes of his Godhead for the Graves delivered up their dead many of which appear'd to their friends in the holy City Some and those of great authority in the Church affirme that after his Resurrection she of all others saw him first and wheras the Scripture seemeth to inferre that Mary Magdalen first beheld him they thus expound it That the Evangelists would not make his Mother the first witnesse of his Resurrection though indeed she was knowing that her testimony by the Iewes would be more suspected than that of Mary Magdalen I dare not positively conclude any thing herein but I may safely maintaine that this her delight for his Resurrection counterpois'd her griefe conceived for his death In her was now made good that of the Psalmist According to the multitude of the griefes of my heart thy Comforts have rejoyced my soule and that of her Sonne Blessed are they that mourne for they shall bee comforted And who makes question but that she who with such unutterable pleasure discover'd his Resurrection faithfully and closely waited on him till his Ascention She who was as inseparable to him as his shadow without doubt was on the Mount Olivet with other of the faithfull when in the sight of them all he ascended She heard doubtlesse his last words received his last benediction and her sight waited on him till the clowds imbrac't him which it in vaine essay'd to penetrate What Soule not in selfe transported with the view of a heavenly object can suppose much lesse expresse what her contentment was when she saw her owne flesh flye above the reach of Envie into the Armes of Glory When she beheld this high Priest his Sacrifice ended and God fully appeas'd enter Heaven there to sit on the right hand of his Father and to be the uncessant and eternall Mediatour betwixt him and man With bended knees erected hands and eyes she worships him ascending and when her sight failes her adoration continues Her zeale passeth all the orbes betweene him and her with greater facility and subtility then the Lightning shooteth through the Ayre Great is the vigour and force of the Spirit when all things else set apart it is wholly intentive on the Meditation of its Creatour When by contemplation it is separated from the body it thinkes onely on him lives onely to him and is as it were drown'd in an inundation of his love When it hath extinguisht the scorching lawlesse desires of the flesh and kindled the holy ones of the Spirit the body rebels no longer but becomes obedient to it in all things When it hath once fixed its eyes on this beloved object it never removeth them thence When it is once illuminated with the beames of the holy Ghost it is presently turn'd into all Eye all Spirit all Light no otherwise than those things the fire once layes hold on are turn'd into fire it selfe Of those who live in Wedlocke it is said that they are two in one flesh and why may it not be said of Christ and the Soule wedded to him that they are two in one Spirit And if ever it might be reported of any surely of this Holy Virgin who though she was devided from her Redeemer in Body yet in soule she was united to him When her eyes were growne dimme with her so long dwelling on that part of Heaven where they left and lost him she cast them downe on the earth the poverty whereof she commiserated in that it was deprived of this one Iewell in value above all it had left And now She returnes into the holy City not disconsolate and dejected as other women are when they lose their onely childe but with a cheerfull look for her Sons victory who had triumphed not onely over the Iew but death and hell it selfe She made her will lacky Gods and though she desired to be dissolved and be with Christ yet since it was his best pleasure she should continue longer here below she readily assented resolving by her example on earth to furnish heaven with Saints Dammianus sayes that after her Sonnes decease she remained ten daies in Prayer and Fasting expecting with a fervent longing the promised comming of the Spirit Saint Luke witnesseth that sixe score men and women were assembled in one rome and joyned in hearty prayer of the which Mary the Mother of IESUS was one And as he names her last so her wonted Humility perswades me that she had the last and lowest place and sate beneath the other sinfull women of inferiour quality in remembrance of her humble Lord now exalted And it is more than probable that she was present with the Apostles when the Holy Ghost came upon them and that she there received the first fruits of the Spirit After which time we reade no more of her in holy Writ For where and with whom how
superlatives Charity obedience pietie virginity all were in her at height Nothing in her was wanting but the Deity it selfe Yet was not her vaine-glory such that she desired with Dina to visit the daughters of other Regions and to enlarge the renowne of these her Excellencies being onely studious in the government of her owne little inward common-wealth Her fixed resolution was not onely to confine her person but her fame which had it penetrated forreigne Countries Kings would have come suppliants to her cottage and on their knees have petition'd for her love But the bonds of her Matrimony were already askt in heaven and no impediment found why she might not wedde God himselfe Yet at the earnest solicitation of the reverend Priests saith Mantuan was she content to be betroth'd to Ioseph not that he should do the office of an husband but serve as a barre to the importunity of other Sutours that so she might the more freely enjoy the inconceiveable pleasure she tooke in her vowed virginity Lu. 1 The Salutation 28. And the Angel came in vnto her and said Haile thou that art Highly fauoured the LORD is with thee Blessed art thou Among women But now the time is come when she must be to the astonishment of the world a Mother and yet remaine a Virgin The marriage betweene God and Nature is concluded on in heaven and Gabriel the Ambassador concerning mans Redemption prepares himself for his journey decreed from all eternity He receives instructions from the hands of Gods owne transcendent Mercy and therefore no doubt but they are gentle and pleasing Clad in white as an Emblem of his innocencie he sets forth without any other guard then his owne right Arme able to destroy Legions The Chaldaeans carried in their Ensignes a towring Flame the Babilonians a Dove the Scythians Lightning the Persians a Bow and Arrows the Romans an Eagle And this extraordinarie Ambassadour of peace being to descend from the higher to the lower world from the Creatour to the creature an Angell to men beares along with him in his very name the signe of his Power and Fortitude that sends him The gates saith Vernulaeus of the celestiall pallace stand wide open and the sacred Trinity gladly beholds the departure of this divine Messenger The Angels clap their wings and make the heavenly roofe ring with Haleluiahs The Saints attend and send their vows after him that his presence may be without terrour and his sweet delivery win consent in the heart of their glorious Empresse The vaste space betweene the Poles is filled with troopes of holy spirits who give a convoy to this their fellow-servant graced above the rest in having so important an affaire as the worlds salvation committed to his charge The Starres put on new and brighter aspects as seeming to foretell what they foresee not The Earth bedeckt with all imaginable ornaments presents him with variety of sents and colours even to her selfe new and layes her prime dainties under his feet Onely her stupid Inhabitants whom his Embassie most concern'd were altogether unsensible of his arrivall and of the eternall benefit he brings them receiving him rather like an Herald then an Ambassadour And which encreased his wonder at his entertainment his first approach was unwelcome to the Saint whose Votary he was He found her as some thinke alone separated as well in body as minde from the world She was not ignorant that piety was nearer pollution in society than solitude and therefore to shun infection she avoyded company She well knew that the holy Ghost himselfe had dwelt with the Prophets and Apostles in Caves Dens and Dungeons and there pen'd the all-saving Writ That which we call good fellowship and sweet conversation her conscience assured her to be at best but a sociable folly In neighbourhood she feared proximity in vice Well if alone he found her questionlesse she made a divine use of that privacy and meditated how in a corrupible body to preserve a spirit incorruptible The celestiall agent having demanded and obtained audience spake the oration he made not for he was but Interpreter of the holy Spirit in which office he justly gloried The speech assuredly was modest and sutable to the sacred cares it was to enter The beginning of it no doubt consisted of a reverent applause of the perfections God had imparted to her Haile Mary said he full of Grace the Lord be with thee blessed art thou amongst women c. How she tooke this the Text following declares And when she saw him shee was troubled at his saying and thought what manner of salutation that should be No doubt the Angell no sooner pronounc't Haile Mary full of Grace but a blush arose in her bashfull face and verified his words But this colour was not fixed it went quickly back to fortifie her noble heart against the feare that invaded it She saw her selfe alone with one altogether a stranger to her whose face she neither knew nor his intent True it is his language was smooth and even but as faire words as these have often proceeded from a foule heart She trembled at his salutation thinking him to be a man subject to abhorred Lust and therefore feared violence but when she once knew him and his Embassy she then undaunted discours'd with him as an Angell whom before she quak't at as a man I conjure all modest soules that shall peruse this passage by all things deare to them to dwell long upon it as worthily deserving both their admiration and imitation Though she received from him extreme and heavenly praises yet she was afraid because she was alone O Saviour of the World Purity feares an Angell shall not Impurity then suspect a man though in the shape of an Angell when his complement and discourse are sensuall Virginity cannot bee too heedfull which makes it practise the doubt of things safe that so it may accustome it selfe to the feare of things dangerous If heathen women have by nature so abhorred pollution that they have chosen death before it how odious must we judge it to the Angellicall innocency of Gods owne Mother Well what course tooke she She rejected these his commendations not with her tongue but her lookes which put on a dislike of all he had said She had heard that when Castles come to a parley it is a signe of yeelding and therefore thought it her safest way to involve her selfe within humility and a sober silence But the Angell quickly delivered her out of this Agony into a greater out of this feare into a more tormenting care Feare not MARY saith he for thou hast found favour with God for loe thou shalt conceive in thy wombe and beare a Sonne and shalt call his name IESUS He shall be great and shall be called the Sonne of the most high and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father David And he shall raigne over the house of Iacob for ever and of his
to compose which the East and the West joyned their treasures but a Crowne in the making where of every vertue and all the Graces had a hand Nor did any vaine mortall place it on her sacred Temples but God himselfe who thought nothing too deare nor omitted any ornament that might embellish this goodly edifice wherein himselfe meant to reside Having thus adorn'd and honour'd her he plac'd her in this lower world for the good and admiration of all for the conversation of a few Though borne on earth she lived here like a Native of Heaven As we may guesse at the neatnesse of a house by the entry into it so we may judge of her lifes remainder by the very beginning Sabellicus affirmes that she no sooner saw the light but she ador'd the Creator of it and lifted up her heart and eyes to the great Infuser of all her incomparable excellencies She lov'd God ere she had seene man The defect of her tongue could not hinder the operation of her soule in which ere she could speake she acknowledg'd his unspeakeable goodnesse In her Religion preceded the use of reason and she apprehended Gods mercies long ere she was capable of his nature and wisedome Ere she could utter holy words she made holy signs by which she made knowne the sanctity of her heart The first word she learn'd to lispe was Iehovah She sent forth many a sigh for sinne not having committed any and bewailed that of which she was utterly ignorant The rowling of the cradle put her in minde that she was newly enter'd into the tempest of this life the infinite dangers whereof to escape she made Vertue her Pilot. We will not here with some Writers of her Life dispute whether or no she had the same ordinary Education with other children nor with them affirme that she entred the Temple at three yeares old and lived close by the Altar and was fed miraculously by an Angell as also that it was there revealed to her that she should be deliver'd of the Messias I will not make one steppe out of Gods own path frō which I never yet saw the greatest wit to swerve but it was in danger of sticking fast Yet hath a pious charity often swallowed more than all this If from the hand of an Angell she there received food naturall or supernaturall sure I am the wonder is not so great as that of the Incarnation where the wombe included the Word And why should we with difficulty beleeve that this white spotlesse soule was illuminated with Revelations by the divine object of her chaste vowes who undoubtedly deserved to be rapt up if it were possible a story higher than was Saint Paul It is likely enough saith Mantuan God would have the Temple of his Spirit to dwell in the Temple of his service The same Author affirmes that she there liv'd a pretty Nun and Spunne and wove the sacred Vestments till her eleventh or twelfth yeare when her prudency and shame and the care of her Reputation forbade her to accompany even the very Priests themselves men whom God had selected out of the Masse of the vulgar to teach his Will to instruct his people and to sing his praise These curiosities and bold conjectures let us rather beleeve then contest with the broachers for it is wisedome to grant what we cannot confute Let us then imagine that this holy Recluse confined her body to this sacred solitude and a spare diet and warily kept her soule from the surfets to which carnall delights invite all things humane And it is consonant both to reason and truth that her exercise there was pious like the place They who goe about to take away her writing and reading tongue are impiously ridiculous since in evidently appeares that she was well read in the Scriptures by her divine Hymne uttered in Zacharies house On her reading attended Meditation on her Meditation Prayer or her Prayer Action as the louely fruit of the precedent Thus busied the day left her the night found her Her sleeping cogitations we may suppose were sutable to her waking and her very dreames divine She had not a thought that was her owne all belong'd to God She was slow to speake saith Sabellicus but ready to obey all holy advice Her tongue was not so swift as her Wit which made it follow for direction in all the requisites of speech In a word she might well usurpe that of the Church When I was a little one I was pleasing to the most high When upon mature deliberation she left the Temple she still liv'd as if she had beene in it Though in body she was sociable she fetter'd her soule from wandring abroad her true conversation being in heaven This flourishing Vine planted her selfe amongst the Olives She was more choice of her company then of her food or rayment both which God knows were course enough She knew temperancy to be Gods and Natures Favorite in that it conduceth to the service of the former and the preservation of the later She therefore made this heavenly vertue judge of her Appetite lest it should long after excesse the mother of all uncleannesse Her soule gave laws to her body which it could not infringe without the injunction of a strict pennance She devour'd Gluttony it selfe and made the flesh subject to the command of the spirit Her fare saith Cedrenus required no vessell nor need she to wash her hands after her greatest meale Her dyet defide the fire as of no use From the Earths face the Cows dugge and the Fountains brimme she readily fetched her sustinance She was as ignorant of the Persian luxury as the superstition To this her cloathing was correspondent for which her backe was beholding to her fingers Her hands were the purveyours to her other members She had one eye fixed on heaven and the other cast upon the earth being intentive on the Glories of the one and the Necessities of the other and at once acted Martha and Magdalene It is very credible that she sowed and spunne and maintain'd life with labour Hee who gives life to all things suffer'd his then adopted and since naturall mother to gaine her living with sweat and care that her example might give pride the checke and teach Majesty Humility In her he made manifest that mortall felicity is not the parent of the immortall She was not solicitous for the feather the looking-glasse or any outward bravery being onely carefull to cover her shame and at once to expell two deadly enemies to her foule and body pride and cold Her outward simplicitie was in all things answerable to her inward Well now she began to write woman and her fifteenth yeare approached and hand in hand with the increase of time went the acquisition of all Graces Her least perfection would render another most accomplisht In her all vertues were at strife all overcame Nothing was here meane she being no other then an union of
his taking care for his Mother was of his Piety He gives Temperancy the custody of Chastity and commends these to each other who were resolved to live and dye Virgins Saint Bernard sayes these words of Christ to his Mother included much bitternesse for they put her in minde that she was to make a dammageable exchange of Christ for Iohn of the Servant for his Lord of the Disciple for his Master of the Sonne of God for the sonne of Zebedaeus And this was the reason if we give beliefe to Mantuan that he called her Woman not Mother lest the very sound of that deare word should make her more sensible of his approaching losse and force her into an immoderate griefe But sorrow was no Noveltie to her for that saying of Christ In this world you shall have affliction was in her verified whose life contained more miseries then minuts which she patiently underwent knowing that the more distressed she was here the more blessed she should be hereafter And if we shall adde the light of Reason to the Evangelicall Truth we shall soone perceive that a fatall sadnesse haunted her from the birth of her onely Sonne to his buriall When she was great with him and readie to lye downe the inhumanity of the Bethlemites was such that they confined her and the Lord of all things to a Stable and would not supply her with as much as Linnen a Mantle and other necessaries wherewithall she might defend her selfe and her sweet Babe from the moysture of the night the sharpenesse of the winter and other intollerable inconveniences When her Childe was eight daies old she saw him loose bloud in his Circumcision which her divining soule misgave her to be a Type of the deare remainder he was to shed Then againe her minde was infinitely vexed for the butchery of those guiltlesse Children which were murthered for the sake of her owne innocent Infant of the sorrow and miserie of whose Mothers her tender compassionating heart was a most competent Iudge From this bloudy Massacre to save her Saviour she was constrained without taking leave of her friends or disposing of what was hers to take her flight with him through danger darknesse and horrour to make her way into Aegypt When he was twelve yeeres old she lost him an Accident more grievous than any of the former for heretofore her study had been to preserve what she had now her care was to finde what she had not What an Agony her soule suffer'd at the lamentable tydings of the beheading of her Sonnes Forerunner I leave to the consideration of all thankefull soules for she could not without being stayned with ingratitude but mourne for his absence and violent departure out of the world who had received so much joy at her presence before he came into it But above all these the unequall'd Treacherie of Iudas who deliver'd this Lambe of God as a prey to these Wolves the infidelity of his other Disciples the malignity of his Iudges the cruelty of his Executioners conspir'd to make her miserable Nor is it unlikely that she bewailed the ingratitude the obstinacy and impiety of her Nation who revil'd him that blessed them and tortur'd him who came to save them With what amazement and sadnesse was her heart surprised think ye when the newes came of her Sonnes being apprehended But when she saw him forsaken by his friends bound by his enemies accused before the high Priests derided by Herod despis'd by the people scourg'd and tortur'd by the command of Pilate his body trembling torne and pierced besmear'd with his owne bloud and hung between two Theeves then and never till then did the Sword foretold by Simeon passe through her Soule Luther saies this Prophecy of Simcon was spoken to her not to Ioseph for on her alone the whole weight of sorrow was to be laid True it is that many differ about the interpretation of this Sword To cleare all doubts we must take notice that the holy Scriptures mention foure sorts of Swords The first is a Corporall or materiall sword and of this Christ speakes to Peter All that use the Sword shall perish with the Sword The second is a spirituall Sword of which Saint Paul makes mention when he saies Receive the sword of the Spirit which is the word of God The third is a Sword of Scandall or Ambiguity with which the Apostles themselves were strucken when they forsooke their Master The fourth is the Sword of Griefe or Tribulation With this the Prophet David averres the Soule of Ioseph to have beene pierc'd when his death was plotted first by his trecherous Brothers next by his incontinent Mistresse That this Sword whereof Simeon Prophecied could be no materiall one is evident in that we read not of any violent death she suffered That it could not be the sword of the Spirit is manifest for the word of God was her daily delitious food at the same time when Simeon made this Prophecy Origen indeed will have it to be the sword of Ambiguity or Infidelity which erroneous opinion of his is refuted by many great Fathers of the antient Church and by Franciscus Lumbertus an accute Protestant Doctor of the moderne in these words Those saith he who will have this to be the sword of Infidelity are not to be hearkened to for besides that they can produce no proofe of this their opinion it is contradictory to the Text most rash and most untrue How can it be that the sword of Infidelity should penetrate the brest of Gods sacred Mother into which infidelity never made the least impression From the beginning her Faith was most firme and intire Let therefore those Blasphemies and wicked slanders of carnall men be put to silence I will attribute nothing to the blessed Virgin but what I reade in the holy Writ where she is pronounced blessed because shee beleev'd We have many testimonies of her Faith but of her Infidelity not one word is extant in the sacred Scriptures Yet this prophane assertion is not a whit strange or to be marvelled at in Origen who held that Christ dyed for the Angels and the Starres and whose soule was indeed no other than a Mynt of Heresies Melancton affirmes that her sorrow was much asswaged by her Faith which assured her of his Resurrection She knew she had borne the Messias whose bloud was to wash away the sinnes of the world Wherefore she might well be amaz'd distrustfull she could not be at all The holy Spirit certified her this was not a destroying death but a triumphing Her Faith the oftner it was tryed in the furnace of affliction the brighter still it shewed She stood with the affection of a Mother the passion of a woman but with the constancy and fortitude of a man in beholding her owne bloud spilt her owne flesh rent and mangled before her face With an unshaken confidence and a true internall valour she beheld his body naked
strictly and how piously she liv'd after the Ascention of Christ till the houre of her death saith Idelphonius is onely knowne to God the searcher of hearts and to the Angels her diligent Visiters The reason which many alledge why neither the rest of her life nor death are penned by the holy Evangelists is this that the Apostles were so busied about the conversion of the Iewes and the Gentiles enlarging of the Christian Church That they had no time to set downe the particular Acts of her life after her Sonnes Ascention nor the severall Circumstances of her death as where when and how she dyed Some Authours peremptorily maintaine upon what ground I know not that she liv'd to her seaventieth yeare and to her last houre dwelt in Ierusalem neare to her Sonnes Sepulchre Others upon no better warrant averre that she went with Iohn into Asia and continued with him at Ephesus till her death and urge the authority of Ignatius who affirmes that she wrote to him in these words I will come with Iohn to see thee and thy friends c. Concerning her death Some avouch that the Apostles and the most eminent of the Primitive Church were present at it Damascen saith that Christ was also there in person and that he thus spake to her Come my blessed Mother into the rest I have prepar'd for thee and that shee thus in way of answer prayed to him Into thy hands O my Sonne I commend my Spirit Receive that deare Soule which thou hast preserved free from all rebuke As I will not justifie all these their Assertions for true so on the other side I will not condemne them as erroneous not being able to convince them of untruth and for ought I know they may have pass'd by unwritten Tradition from man to man I will therefore affirmatively say nothing but this that most assuredly her death was welcome to her in that she had so often both meditated and practised it having many times by austerity and contemplation departed this life ere she left it If that of Seneca be true that to dye well is to dye willingly then certainly she dyed the death of the Righteous She was not ignorant that Death to the just is no other than a delivery from prison a laying downe of a burthen the end of a Pilgrimage the unmanacling of the Soule the discharging of a due debt to Nature the returne into our true Country the dore that opens into a never fading life the entrance into the celestiall Kingdome and the Vsher that was to conduct her to her blessed Saviour with whom she had mentally conversed ever since he left the earth Since which time there be who avouch that she never willingly saw any man The Assumption What honor could to this great Queene be done More then be taken up to heauen high And there haue GOD for Father Spouse sonne The Angells wayte the world stand wondring by The same modesty I have shew'd in treating of her death I shall reserve in discoursing of her Assumption which by many of the Fathers all of the Romish Church and some of the Reformed is held for an undoubted truth though upon no sounder proofes than the former produce concerning her departure hence Bullinger directly backs this opinion We doe beleeve saith he that the wombe of the God-bearing Virgin and the Temple of the holy Ghost that is her sacred body to have beene assumed into heaven Brentius leaves it indifferent to us to beleeve whether or no she ascended in Soule in body or both It might well be saith he that as Enoch was translated in body into heaven and as many bodies of the Saints did rise with Christ So Mary also might in body be assumed into Heaven But most certain it is that she obtained everlasting Felicity And some ther be who demand why God might not manifest his power by her privy to so many divine secrets and mysteries as well as by an Angell or as by Elias who after long prayer was taken up in a Fiery Chariot Some againe who hold that the dead who arose with Christ ascended with him into Glory and were not againe reduc't into Ashes thinke the Assumption of Mary altogether as likely Damascen saith the workes of the Deity are therefore possible because omnipotent and that there are some things which though they are wholly omitted in holy Scriptures yet upon evident reasons they are believ'd and exemplifies his position in the Assumption of the Virgin Mary Dammianus argues thus That as conceiving without sinne shee brought forth her Sonne without paine a curse laid on all other women so might it well be that she who was without sinne might overcome Death the reward of it Some goe about to prove it by the Text Arise Lord into thy rest thou and the Arke of thy Sanctification Nay I have read a moderne Oratour who thus elegantly describes the manner of it When saith hee the Soule of this Sweet one reactuated her body she arose in Triumph from her Sepulcher and was assumed into Heaven In her passage thither the orbes bowed and bended themselves to make her a triumphant Arch through which shee might passe in greater state The Sunne with his brightest beames imbrac't her that it might be said A woman was cloath'd with the Sunne The Moone stooped to her that it might be divulg'd the Moone was under her feet The brightest of the Starres interwove themselves to make her a radiant Crowne c. But this description is no more theologicall than the consent of the orbes is Philosophicall and is no way correspondent to the dignity of our Sacred subject on whose triumphant entry into Heaven having beene a faithfull and reverent Attender I will now returne to vindicate her honour here on Earth and make an Apology to Christians with shame and horrour I speake it for Christs owne Mother It may please then the gentle Reader to understand that two questions arise amongst the Moderne Divines The one whether or no she merited to be the Mother of God the other which way she could deserve that greatest of Glories For the first they affirm that never any Creature merited so great a blessing as the incarnation of Gods owne Sonne For he sent say they his Sonne into the world not urg'd thereto by our merits but out of his owne meere Grace and Goodnesse It was a worke of his Charity and condescending not of retribution or obligation and therefore that he chose not the Virgin Mary to be the Mother of Christ as she was a Virgin humble obedient adorn'd with Faith Charity and other divine vertues but because God had decreed her to beare his onely Sonne therefore his best pleasure was she should be Mistresse of perfections suteable to so high a Calling Wherfore Saint Paul saies Because God hath predestinated us therefore he calles justifies and glorifies us and not because we are just therefore he electeth us
make thee famous above the women of all Ages and againe Mary by behaving her selfe wisely is guilty neither of Malice nor any wickednesse which caused us to breath our soule into her Lastly that Many men have beene perfect but no woman was ever found perfect but Mary the Mother of Iesus But though truth is to be imbrac't where ever we finde it yet it will appeare more gracefull in the mouthes of Christians whose most learned most eloquent and most judicious Doctour we will produce giving this Testimony of this our dearest Lady Except saith he the holy Virgin Mary whom for the honour I owe my Lord and Master I will not name when sinne is my subject whom to have had grace infus'd into her wholly to subdue sinne wee know by this that shee was thought worthy to conceive and bring forth him who assuredly was without sinne This Virgin I say excepted if we could Recall and Assemble together all the Saints departed and should aske them if they were without sinne they would unanimously thus answere If we should say we have no sinne we deceive our selves and there is no truth in us But because the Fathers are no way suspected of neglect towards her we will spare their verdicts and chiefly insert their Commendations of her who were the first Reformers of our Church Luther shall be their Leader who saith That none but the Virgin Mary either was or ever shall be so holy That the fruit of her wombe shall be blessed since no other conceives without pleasure and sinne and againe In this is Mary blessed That so great gifts are given to her as surpasse humane understanding For hence all honour and beatitude proceeds that in the Vniversall humane race one person should be superiour to the rest to whom none should be equall because one and the same Sonne is common to her with the heavenly Father This he applyes to that saying of Mary Hee that is mighty hath magnified mee c. The same Author in another place sayes Mary is our Mother Christ our Brother and God our Father and that all this is true the Faithfull by effect doe finde Calvin cals her his Mistresse Wee willingly saith he take Mary for our Mistresse to whose doctrine and precepts we are obedient Erasmus stiles her his Savioresse Oecolampadius thus delivers his approbation of her I trust in God it shall never be said of me that I did oppose the dignity of Mary towards whom to be never so little ill affected I hold to be a most certaine signe of a Reprobate minde She who is above all Queene of all whom God above all hath honoured should not she be esteemed amongst all the most eminent Bucerus protesteth That a godly minde will not judge but charitably and piously of her who brought forth Christ our Lord Bullingerus concludes If Mary be blessed amongst all women and to bee pronounced blessed by all Nations most cursed are the Iewes who never cease to revile and slander her and most unhappy are those Counterfeit Christians who being little better than Iewes robbe her of the praise due to her Needs must shee be indued with a singular most select and perpetuall Virginity and purity who is especially chosen by God to be the Temple of his Sonne and the Mother of the most holy Now if any of these contradict themselves by pulling downe in other places those Trophies of her praise which here they haue erected they are to be answered as the Satyre did the Man with whom he said he would no longer converse because he saw hot and cold breath to issue from the same Mouth But to leave them All parts of the world have produced Admirers of her worth Syria hath brought forth Ephraim Antiochia Saint Chrysostome Capadocia Saint Basill and Saint Nazianzen Constantinople Germanus and Proclus Dalmatia Saint Hierome Germany Rupertus Albertus and Agrippa England Baeda France Bernhard Spaine Alphonsus Italy Aquinas and Bonauenture Affrick Saint Cyprian and Saint Austin Greece Dionysius Areopagita c. To these succeed famous Christian Poets antient and Moderne who have written Pannegyricks upon her as Baeda Gregorius Nazianzenus Innocentius Pontifex Actius Sanazarius Adam de Sancto victore Alcimus Avitus Antonius Muretus Aurelius Prudentius Baptista Mantuanus Claudianus Franciscus Petrarcha Godfridus Viterbiensis Hieronymus Vida Paulinus D. Philippus Menzelius Rudolphus Agricola Sedulius Venantius Fortunatus To these I adde many Emperours Princes and Princesses and a world of devout great ones who have beene her professed admirers as Constantine the great Charles the great Pulcheria Augusta Henry the second Emperour Alphonsus the chaste in Spaine Edovardus in Hungarie Bolislaus in Polonia Venceslaus in Bohemia All which are Canonized for Saints and have erected and dedicated Temples to her Memory Neither have the Princes of this our Ile beene defective in doing her all possible honour and in Consecrating Chappels and Temples to her Memory Fredericke the third Emperour made the Contemplation of her almost his onely food Stephanus King of Hungarie called his kingdome the Marian Family In this glorious Family whole kingdomes and Common-wealths have enrolled themselves My Arithmeticke will not serve mee to number all those who have Registred their names in the Sodalitie of the Rosary of this our blessed Lady the originall of which is derived from the battaile of Naupactun gain'd by Iohn of Austria and the Christians which victory was attributed to her intercession with her Sonne The Colonian Sodallity first instituted had out of Lovaine 4000. out of Brabant 30000. out of Gueldria 4000. out of Holland and Zeland 7000. c. Many holy Orders also are of this Sodality as the Benedictines the Cistertians the Franciscans the Carthusians and many others If all these Testimonies and Examples of great worthy and pious people will not move us to honour her we shall be judg'd both unworthy of this life and ignorant of that better to come For shame let not us alone deny her that honour and praise which all the world allowes her After these impartiall witnesses of her worth we will place those divine priviledges imparted to her by the Almighty for which we have if that alone were sufficient the Authority of many pious learned men First they affirme That her Chaste eyes sent forth such divine beames that though her Lovelinesse moved not onely all mindes to honour her and all Eyes to gaze on hers yet they never kindled an unholy fire in the most Adulterate bosome A sacred priviledge peculiar to this Saint alone for it was the will of her omnipotent Sonne that neither Sathan nor his Ministers should conspire the overthrow of that chiefe Temple of his Spirit which his flesh had inhabited so long nor any impure thought ayme at the mudding of this purest Fountaine Whether her prophetick Soule foresaw the snares of the ungodly and so shun'd them they say not once for certaine they averre that Temptations aym'd at her broke like Haile against a Rocke nor