shall have three sorts of accusers 1. Christ himself who is their Judge 2. Their own conscience whom they have injured and blotted with characters of death and foul dishonour 3. The Devill their enemy whom they served 1. Christ shall be their accuser not only upon the stock of those direct injuries which I before reckoned of crucifying the Lord of life once and again c. But upon the titles of contempt and unworthinesse of unkindnesse and ingratitude and the accusation will be nothing else but a plain representation of those artifices and assistances those bonds and invitations those constrainings and importunities which our dear Lord used to us to make it almost impossible to lye in sin and necessary to be sav'd For it will it must needs be a fearfull exprobration of our unworthinesse when the Judge himself shall bear witnesse against us that the wisdome of God himself was strangely imployed in bringing us safely to felicity I shall draw a short Scheme which although it must needs be infinitely short of what God hath done for us yet it will be enough to shame us * God did not only give his Son for an example and the Son gave himself for a price for us but both gave the holy Spirit to assist us in mighty graces for the verifications of Faith and the entertainments of Hope and the increase and perseverance of Charity * God gave to us a new nature he put another principle into us a third part of a perfective constitution we have the Spirit put into us to be a part of us as properly to produce actions of a holy life as the soul of man in the body does produce the naturall * God hath exalted humane nature and made it in the person of Jesus Christ to sit above the highest seat of Angels and the Angels are made ministring spirits ever since their Lord became our Brother * Christ hath by a miraculous Sacrament given us his body to eat and his bloud to drink he made waies that we may become all one with him * He hath given us an easie religion and hath established our future felicity upon naturall and pleasant conditions and we are to be happy hereafter if we suffer God to make us happy here and things are so ordered that a man must take more pains to perish then to be happy * God hath found out rare wayes to make our prayers acceptable our weak petitions the desires of our imperfect souls to prevail mightily with God and to lay a holy violence and an undeniable necessity upon himself and God will deny us nothing but when we aske of him to do us ill offices to give us poisons and dangers and evill nourishment and temptations and he that hath given such mighty power to the prayers of his servants yet will not be moved by those potent and mighty prayers to do any good man an evill turn or to grant him one mischief in that only God can deny us * But in all things else God hath made all the excellent things in heaven and earth to joyn towards holy and fortunate effects for he hath appointed an Angell to present the prayers of Saints and Christ makes intercession for us and the holy Spirit makes intercession for us with groans unutterable and all the holy men in the world pray for all and for every one and God hath instructed us with Scriptures and precedents and collaterall and direct assistances to pray and he incouraged us with divers excellent promises and parables and examples and teaches us what to pray and how and gives one promise to publique prayer and another to private prayer and to both the blessing of being heard * Adde to this account that God did heap blessings upon us without order infinitely perpetually and in all instances when we needed and when we needed not * He heard us when we pray'd giving us all and giving us more then we desired * He desired that we should aske and yet he hath also prevented our desires * He watch'd for us and at his own charge sent a whole order of men whose imployment is to minister to our souls and if all this had not been enough he had given us more also * He promised heaven to our obedience a Province for a dish of water a Kingdome for a prayer satisfaction for desiring it grace for receiving and more grace for accepting and using the first * He invited us with gracious words and perfect entertainments * He threatned horrible things to us if we would not be happy * He hath made strange necessities for us making our very repentance to be a conjugation of holy actions and holy times and a long succession * He hath taken away all excuses from us he hath called us off from temptation he bears our charges he is alwaies before-hand with us in every act of favour and perpetually slow in striking and his arrowes are unfeathered and he is so long first in drawing his sword and another long while in whetting it and yet longer in lifting his hand to strike that before the blow comes the man hath repented long unlesse he be a fool and impudent and then God is so glad of an excuse to lay his anger aside that certainly if after all this we refuse life and glory there is no more to be said this plain story will condemn us but the story is very much longer and as our conscience will represent all our sins to us so the Judge will represent all his Fathers kindnesses as Nathan did to David when he was to make the justice of the Divine Sentence appear against him * Then it shall be remembred that the joyes of every daies piety would have been a greater pleasure every night then the remembrance of every nights sin could have been in the morning * That every night the trouble and labour of the daies vertue would have been as much passed and turned to as very a nothing as the pleasure of that daies sin but that they would be infinitely distinguished by the remanent effects 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 So Musonius expressed the sense of this inducement and that this argument would have grown so great by that time we come to dye that the certain pleasures and rare confidences and holy hopes of a death-bed would be a strange felicity to the man when he remembers he did obey if they were compared to the fearfull expectations of a dying sinner who feels by a formidable and afrighting remembrance that of all his sins nothing remains but the gains of a miserable eternity * The offering our selves to God every morning and the thanksgiving to God every night hope and fear shame and desire the honour of leaving a fair name behinde us and the shame of dying like a fool every thing indeed in the world is made to be an argument and an inducement
is full of wine cannot be full of the spirit of God St. Paul noteth the hostility Be not drunk with wine but be filled with the Spirit a man that is a drunkard does perire cito he perishes quickly his temptations that come to him make but short work with him a drunkard is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 our English well expresses it it is a sottishnesse and the man is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an uselesse senselesse person 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of all the evils of the world nothing is worse to a mans self nothing is more harmfull then this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 said Crobylus it deprives a wise man of his counsell and his understanding now because it is the greatest good that nature hath that which takes it away must needs be our greatest enemy Nature is weak enough of it self but drunkennesse takes from it all the little strengths that are left to it and destroyes the spirit and the man can neither have the strengths of nature nor the strengths of grace and how then can the man do wisely or vertuously Spiritus sanctus amat sicca corda the Spirit of Godloves dry hearts said the Christian Proverb and Josephus said of Samson 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it appears he was a Prophet or a man full of the Spirit by the temperance of his diet and now that all the people are holy unto the Lord they must 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Plutarch said of their consecrated persons they must have dry and sober purities for by this means their reason is usefull and their passions not violent and their discourse united and the precious things of their memory at hand and they can pray and read and they can meditate and practise and then they can learn where their naturall weaknesses are most urgent and how they can be tempted and can secure their aides accordingly but how is it possible that such a man should cure all the evils of his Nature and repair the breaches of Adams sin and stop all the effect which is upon him from all the evils of the world if he delights in seas of drink and is pleased with the follies of distemper'd persons and laughs loud at the childish humours and weak discourses of the man that can do nothing but that for which Dionysius slew Antiphon and Timagenes did fall from Caesars friendship that is play the fool and abuse his friend He cannot give good counsell or spend an hour in wise sayings but half a day they can talk ut foret unde corona cachinnum tollere possit to make the crowd laugh and consider not And the same is the case of lust because it is exactly contrary to Christ the King of Virgins and his holy Spirit who is the Prince of purities and holy thoughts it is a captivity of the reason and an inraging of the passions it wakens every night and rages every day it desires passionately and prosecutes violently it hinders businesse and distracts counsell it brings jealousies and enkindles wars it sins against the body and weakens the soul it defiles a Temple and drives the holy Spirit forth and it is so intire a prosecution of the follies and weaknesses of nature such a snare and a bait to weak and easie fools that it prevails infinitely and rages horribly and rules tyrannically it is a very feaver in the reason and a calenture in the passions and therefore either it must be quenched or it will be impossible to cure our evill natures The curing of this is not the remedy of a single evill but it is a doing violence to our whole nature and therefore hath in it the greatest courage and an equall conduct and supposes spirituall strengths great enough to contest against every enemy 4. Hither is to be reduced that we avoid all flatterers and evill company for it was impossible that Alexander should be wise and cure his pride and his drunkennesse so long as he entertain'd Agesius and Agnon Bagoas and Demetrius and slew Parmenio and Philotas and murder'd wise Calisthenes for he that loves to be flattered loves not to change his pleasure but had rather to hear himself cal'd wise then to be so Flattery does bribe an evill nature and corrupt a good one and make it love to give wrong judgement and evill sentences he that loves to be flatter'd can never want some to abuse him but he shall alwaies want one to counsell him and then he can never be wise 5. But I must put these advices into a heap he therefore that will cure his evill nature must set himself against his chiefest lust which when he hath overcome the lesser enemies will come in of themselves He must endevour to reduce his affections to an indifferency for all violence is an enemy to reason and counsell and is that state of disease for which he is to enquire remedies 8. It is necessary that in all actions of choice he deliberate and consider that he may never do that for which he must aske a pardon and he must suffer shame and smart and therefore Cato did well reprove Aulus Albinus for writing the Roman story in the Greek tongue of which he had but imperfect knowledge and himself was put to make his Apologie for so doing Cato told him that he was mightily in love with a fault that he had rather beg a pardon then be innocent Who forc'd him to need the pardon And when beforehand we know we must change from what we are or do worse it is a better compendium not to enter in from whence we must uneasily retire 9. In all the contingencies of chance and variety of action remember that thou art the maker of thy own fortune and of thy own sin charge not God with it either before or after The violence of thy own passion is no superinduced necessity from him and the events of providence in all its strange variety can give no authority or patronage to a foul forbidden action though the next chance of war or fortune be prosperous and rich An Egyptian robber sleeping under a rotten wall was awaken'd by Serapis and sent away from the ruine but being quit from the danger and seeing the wall to slide thought that the Daemon lov'd his crime because he had so strangely preserved him from a sudden and a violent death But Serapis told him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I saved you from the wall to reserve you for the wheel from a short and a private death to a painfull and disgracefull and so it is very frequently in the event of humane affairs men are saved from one death and reserved for another or are preserved here to be destroyed hereafter and they that would judge of actions by events must stay till all events are passed that is till all their posterity be dead and the sentence is given at Dooms-day in the mean time the evils of our nature are to be look'd upon without all accidentall appendages as
the precepts of the Gospell were impossible to be kept because it also requiring the heart of man did stop every egression of disorders for making the root holy and healthfull as the Balsame of Judaea or the drops of Manna in the evening of the sabbath it also causes that nothing spring thence but gummes fit for incense and oblations for the Altar of proposition and a cloud of perfume fit to make atonement for our sins and being united to the great sacrifice of the world to reconcile God and man together Upon these reasons you see it is highly fit that God should require it and that we should pay the sacrifice of our hearts and not at all think that God is satisfied with the work of the hands when the affections of the heart are absent He that prayes because he would be quiet and would fain be quit of it and communicates for fear of the lawes and comes to Church to avoid shame and gives almes to be eased of an importunate begger or relieves his old parents because they will not dye in their time and provides for his children lest he be compled by Lawes and shame but yet complains of the charge of Gods blessings this man is a servant of the eyes of men and offers parchment or a white skin in sacrifice but the flesh and the inwards he leaves to be consumed by a stranger fire And therefore this is a deceit that robs God of the best and leaves that for religion which men pare off It is sacriledge and brings a double curse 2. He that serves God with the soule without the body when both can be conjoyned doth the work of the Lord deceitfully Paphnutius whose knees were cut for the testimony of Jesus was not obliged to worship with the humble flexures of the bending penitents and blinde Bartimeus could not read the holy lines of the Law and therefore that part of the work was not his duty and God shall not call Lazarus to account for not giving almes nor St. Peter and St. John for not giving silver and gold to the lame man nor Epaphroditus for not keeping his fasting dayes when he had his sicknesse But when God hath made the body an apt minister to the soul and hath given money for almes and power to protect the oppressed and knees to serve in prayer and hands to serve our needs then the soul alone is not to work but as Rachel gave her maid to Jacob and she bore children to her Lord upon her Ministresse knees and the children were reckoned to them both because the one had fruitfull desires and the other a fruitfull wombe so must the body serve the needs of the spirit that what the one desires the other may effect and the conceptions of the soul may be the productions of the body and the body must bow when the soul worships and the hand must help when the soul pities and both together do the work of a holy Religion the body alone can never serve God without the conjunction and preceding act of the soul and sometimes the soul without the body is imperfect and vain for in some actions there is a body and a spirit a materiall and a spirituall part and when the action hath the same constitution that a man hath without the act of both it is as imperfect as a dead man the soul cannot produce the body of some actions any more then the body can put life into it and therefore an ineffective pity and a lazie counsell an empty blessing and gay words are but deceitfull charity Quod peto da Caï non peto consilium He that gave his friend counsell to study the Law when he desired to borrow 20 l. was not so friendly in this counsell as he was uselesse in his charity spirituall acts can cure a spirituall malady but if my body needs relief because you cannot feed me with Diagrams or cloath me with Euclids elements you must minister a reall supply by a corporall charity to my corporall necessity This proposition is not only usefull in the doctrine of charity and the vertue of religion but in the professions of faith and requires that it be publick open and ingenuous In matters of necessary duty it is not sufficient to have it to our selves but we must also have it to God and all the world and as in the heart we beleeve so by the mouth we confesse unto salvation he is an ill man that is only a Christian in his heart and is not so in his professions and publications and as your heart must not be wanting in any good profession and pretences so neither must publick profession be wanting in every good and necessary perswasion The faith and the cause of God must be owned publiquely for if it be the cause of God it will never bring us to shame I do not say what ever we think we must tell it to all the world much lesse at all times and in all circumstances but we must never deny that which we beleeve to be the cause of God in such circumstances in which we can and ought to glorifie him But this extends also to other instances He that swears a false oath with his lips and unswears it with his heart hath deceived one more then he thinks for himself is the most abused person and when my action is contrary to men they will reprove me but when it is against my own perswasion I cannot but reprove my self and am witnesse and accuser and party and guilty and then God is the Judge and his anger will be a fierce executioner because we do the Lords work deceitfully 3. They are deceitfull in the Lords work that reserve one faculty for sin or one sin for themselves or one action to please their appetite and many for Religion Rabbi Kimchi taught his Scholars Cogitationem pravam Deus non habet vice facti nisi concepta fuerit in Dei fidem Religionem that God is never angry with an evill thought unlesse it be a thought of Apostasie from the Jewes religion and therefore provided that men be severe and close in their sect and party they might roll in lustfull thoughts and the torches they light up in the Temple might smoke with anger at one end and lust at the other so they did not flame out in egressions of violence and injustice in adulteries and fouler complications nay they would give leave to some degrees of evill actions for R. Moses and Selomoh taught that if the most part of a mans actions were holy and just though in one he sinned often yet the greater ingredient should prevail and the number of good works should outweigh the lesser account of evill things and this Pharisaicall righteousnesse is too frequent even amongst Christians For who almost is there that does not count fairly concerning himself if he reckons many vertues upon the stock of his Religion and but one vice upon the stock of his infirmity
our faculties is to serve God and doe justice and charities to our Brother For if we doe the work of God in our own day wee shall receive an infinite mercy in the day of the Lord. But what that is is now to be inquired What wee have done in the body But certainly this is the greatest terror of all The thunders and the fires the earthquakes and the trumpets the brightnesse of holy Angels and the horror of accursed Spirits the voyce of the Archangel who is the Prince of the heavenly host and the Majesty of the Judge in whose service all that Army stands girt with holinesse and obedience all those strange circumstances which have been already reckoned and all those others which wee cannot understand are but little praeparatories and umbrages of this fearfull circumstance All this amazing Majesty and formidable praeparatories are for the passing of an eternall Sentence upon us according to what we have done in the body Woe and alas and God help us all All mankind is an enemy to God his nature is accursed and his manners are depraved It is with the nature of man and with all his manners as Philemon said of the nature of foxes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Every fox is crafty and mischievous and if you gather a whole herd of them there is not a good natur'd beast amongst them all so it is with man by nature he is the child of wrath and by his manners he is the child of the Devill wee call Christian and wee dishonour our Lord and we are Brethren but we oppresse and murther one another it is a great degree of sanctity now a-days not to be so wicked as the worst of men and wee live at the rate as if the best of men did design to themselves an easier condemnation and as if the generality of men consider'd not concerning the degrees of death but did beleeve that in hell no man shall perceive any ease or refreshment in being tormented with a slower fire For consider what we doe in the body 12 or 14 years passe before we choose good or bad and of that which remaines above halfe is spent in sleep and the needs of Nature for the other halfe it is divided as the Stag was when the beasts went a hunting the Lyon hath five parts of sixe The businesse of the world takes so much of our remaining portion that Religion and the service of God have not much time left that can be spar'd and of that which can if we consider how much is allowed to crasty arts of cousenage to oppression and ambition to greedy desires and avaritious prosecutions to the vanities of our youth and the proper sins of every age to the meer idlenesse of man and doing nothing to his fantastick imaginations of greatnesse and pleasures of great and little devices of impertinent law-suites and uncharitable treatings of our Brother it will be intolerable when we consider that we are to stand or fall eternally according to what we have done in the body Gather it all together and set it before thy eyes Almes and Prayers are the summe of all thy good Were thy prayers made in feare and holinesse with passion and desire Were they not made unwillingly weakly and wandringly and abated with sins in the greatest part of thy life Didst thou pray with the same affection and labour as thou didst purchase thy estate Have thy alms been more then thy oppressions and according to thy power and by what means didst thou judge concerning it How much of our time was spent in that and how much of our estate was spent in this But let us goe one step further How many of us love our enemies or pray for and doe good to them that persecute and affront us or overcome evill with good or turn the face again to them that strike us rather then be reveng'd or suffer our selves to be spoil'd or robbed without contention and uncharitable courses or lose our interest rather then lose our charity And yet by these precepts we shall be judged I instance but once more Our blessed Saviour spake a hard saying Every idle word that men shall speak they shall give account thereof at the day of Judgement For by thy words thou shalt be justified and by thy words thou shalt be condemned and upon this account may every one weeping and trembling say with Jcb Quid faciam cum resurrexerit ad judicandum Deus What shall I doe when the Lord shall come to judgement Of every idle word O blessed God! what shall become of them who love to prate continually to tell tales to detract to slander to back-bite to praise themselves to undervalue others to compare to raise divisions to boast 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Who shall be able to stand upright not bowing the knee with the intolerable load of the sins of his tongue If of every idle word we must give account what shall we doe for those malicious words that dishonor God or doe despite to our Brother Remember how often we have tempted our Brother or a silly woman to sin and death How often we have pleaded for unjust interests or by our wit have cousened an easie and a beleeving person or given evill sentences or disputed others into false perswasions Did we never call good evill or evill good Did we never say to others thy cause is right when nothing made it right but favour and money a false advocate or a covetous Judge 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so said Christ every idle word that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so St. Paul uses it every false word every lie shall be called to judgement or as some Copies read it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 every wicked word shall be called to judgment For by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Idle words are not meant words that are unprofitable or unwise for fooles and silly persons speak most of those and have the least accounts to make but by vaine the Jewes usually understood false and to give their mind to vanity or to speak vanity is all one as to mind or speak falshoods with malicious and evill purposes But if every idle word that is every vain and lying word shall be called to judgment what shall become of men that blaspheme God or their Rulers or Princes of the people or their Parents that dishonour the Religion and disgrace the Ministers that corrupt Justice and pervert Judgment that preach evill doctrines or declare perverse sentences that take Gods holy Name in vain or dishonour the Name of God by trifling and frequent swearings that holy Name by which wee hope to bee saved and which all the Angels of God fall down and worship These things are to be considered for by our own words we stand or fall that is as in humane Judgements the confession of the party and the contradiction of himselfe or the failing
Sacrament the effects and admirable issues of which we know not and perceive not we loâ—e because we desire not and choose to lose many great blessings rather then purchase them with the frequent commemoration of that sacrifice which was offered up for all the needs of Mankind and for obtaining all favours and graces to the Catholick Church 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 God never refuses to hear a holy prayer and our prayers can never be so holy as when they are offered up in the union of Christs sacrifice For Christ by that sacrifice reconcil'd God and the world And because our needs continue therefore we are commanded to continue the memory and to represent to God that which was done to satisfie all our needs Then we receive Christ we are after a secret and mysterious but most reall and admirable manner made all one with Christ and if God giving us his Son could not but with him give us all things else how shall he refuse our persons when we are united to his person when our souls are joined to his soul our body nourished by his body and our souls sanctified by his bloud and cloth'd with his robes and marked with his character and sealed with his Spirit and renewed with holy vows and consign'd to all his glories and adopted to his inheritance when we represent his death and pray in vertue of his passion and imitate his intercession and doe that which God commands and offer him in our manner that which he essentially loves can it be that either any thing should be more prevalent or that God can possibly deny such addresses and such importunities Try it often and let all things else be answerable and you cannot have greater reason for your confidence Doe not all the Christians in the world that understand Religion desire to have the holy Sacrament when they die when they are to make their great appearance before God and to receive their great consignation to their eternall sentence good or bad And if then be their greatest needs that is their greatest advantage and instrument of acceptation Therefore if you have a great need to be serv'd or a great charity to serve and a great pity to minister and a dear friend in a sorrow take Christ along in thy prayers in all thy ways thou canst take him take him in affection and take him in a solemnity take him by obedience and receive him in the Sacrament and if thou then offerest up thy prayers and makest thy needs known if thou nor thy friend be not relieved if thy party be not prevalent and the war be not appeased or the plague be not cured or the enemy taken off there is something else in it but thy prayer is good and pleasing to God and dressed with circumstances of advantage and thy person is apt to be an intercessor and thou hast done all that thou canst the event must be left to God and the secret reasons of the deniall either thou shalt find in time or thou maist trust with God who certainly does it with the greatest wisdome and the greatest charity I have in this thing onely one caution to insert viz. That in our importunity and extraordinary offices for others we must nor make our accounts by multitude of words and long prayers but by the measures of the Spirit by the holynesse of the soul and the just nesse of the desire and the usefulnesse of the request and its order to Gods glory and its place in the order of providence and the sincerity of our heart and the charity of our wishes and the perseverance of our advocation There are some as Tertullian observes qui loquacitatem facundiam existimant at impudentiam constantiam deputant They are praters and they are impudent and they call that constancy and importunity concerning which the advice is easy Many words or few are extrinsecall to the nature and not at all considered in the effects of prayer but much desire and much holinesse are essentiall to its constitution but we must be very curious that our importunity do not degenerate into impudence and a rude boldnesse Capitolinus said of Antonius the Emperour and Philosopher sanè quamvis esset constans erat etiam verecundus he was modest even when he was most pertinacious in his desires So must wee though wee must not be ashamed to aske for whatsoever we need Rebus semper pudor absit in arctis and in this sense it is true that Stasimus in the Comedy said concerning Mear Verecundari neminem apud mensam decet Nam ibi de divinis humanis cernitur Men must not be bashfull so as to lose their meat for that is a necessity that cannot bee dispensed withall so it is in our prayers whatsoever our necessity calls to us for we must call to God for and he is not pleased with that rusticity or fond modesty of being ashamed to ask of God any thing that is honest and necessary yet our importunity hath also bounds of modesty but such as are to be expressed with other significations and he is rightly modest towards God who without confidence in himself but not without confidence in Gods mercy nor without great humility of person and reverence of addresse presents his prayers to God as earnestly as he can Provided alwayes that in the greatest of our desires and holy violence we submit to Gods will and desire him to choose for us Our modesty to God in prayers hath no other measures but these 1. Distrust of our selves 2. Confidence in God 3. Humility of person 4. Reverence of addresse and 5. Submission to Gods will These are all unlesse also you will adde that of Solomon Be not rash with thy mouth and let not thy heart be hasty to utter a thing before God for God is in heaven and thou upon earth therefore let thy words be few These things being observed let your importunity be as great as it can it is still the more likely to prevaile by how much it is the more earnest and signified and represented by the most offices extraordinary 3ly The last great advantage towards a prevailing intercession for others is that the person that prayes for his relatives be a person of an extraordinary dignity imployment or designation For God hath appointed some persons and callings of men to pray for others such are Fathers for their Children Bishops for their Dioceses Kings for their Subjects and the whole Order Ecclesiasticall for all the men and women in the Christian Church And it is well it is so for as things are now and have been too long how few are there that understand it to be their duty or part of their necessary imployment that some of their time and much of their prayers and an equall portion of their desires be spent upon the necessities of others All men doe not think it necessary and fewer practise it frequently and they but coldly without interest and deep resentment it
he confesses his sins and is not pardoned he is patient but hath no hope and he that is gone so far towards his countrey and stands in the middle way hath gone so far out of his way he had better have stay'd under a dry roof in the house of banishment then to have left his Gyarus the Island of his sorrow and to dwell upon the Adriatick So is he that begins a state of Religion and does not finish it he abides in the high-way and though he be neerer the place yet is as far from the rest of his countrey as ever and therefore all that beginning of labour was in the prejudice of his rest but nothing to the advantages of his hopes He that hath never begun hath lost no labour Jactura praeteritorum the losse of all that he hath done is the first evill of the negligent and luke-warm Christian according to the saying of Solomon He that is remisse or idle in his labour is the brother of him that scattereth his goods 2. The second appendant evill is that lukewarmnesse is the occasion of greater evill because the remisse easie Christian shuts the gate against the heavenly breathings of Gods holy Spirit he thinks every breath that is fan'd by the wings of the holy Dove is not intended to encourage his fires which burn and smoke and peep through the cloud already it tempts him to security and if an evill life be a certain inlet to a second death despaire on one side and security on the other are the bars and locks to that dore he can never passe forth again while that state remains who ever slips in his spirituall walking does not presently fall but if that slip does not awaken his diligence and his caution then his ruine begins vel pravae institutionis deceptus exordio aut per longam mentis incuriam virtute animi decidente as St. Austin observes either upon the pursuit of his first error or by a carelesse spirit or a decaying slackned resolution all which are the direct effects of lukewarmnesse But so have I seen a fair structure begun with art and care and raised to halfe its stature and then it stood still by the misfortune or negligence of the owner and the rain descended and dwelt in its joynts and supplanted the contexture of its pillars and having stood a while like the antiquated Temple of a deceased Oracle it fell into a hasty age and sunk upon its owne knees and so descended into ruine So is the imperfect unfinished spirit of a man it layes the foundation of a holy resolution and strengthens it with vows and arts of prosecution it raises up the walls Sacraments and Prayers Reading and holy Ordinances and holy actions begin with a slow motion and the building stays and the spirit is weary and the soul is naked and exposed to temptation and in the days of storm take in every thing that can doe it mischief and it is faint and sick listlesse and tired and it stands till its owne weight wearies the foundation and then declines to death and sad disorder being so much the worse because it hath not onely returned to its first follies but hath superadded unthankfulnesse and carelesnesse a positive neglect and a despite of holy things a setting a low price to the things of God lazinesse and wretchlesnesse all which are evills superadded to the first state of coldnesse whither he is with all these loads and circumstances of death easily revolv'd 3. A state of lukewarmnesse is more incorrigible then a state of coldnesse while men flatter themselves that their state is good that they are rich and need nothing that their lamps are dressed and full of ornament There are many that think they are in their countrey as soon as ever they are weary and measure not the end of their hopes by the possession of them but by their precedent labour which they overvalue because they have easie and effeminate souls S. Bernard complains of some that say Sufficit nobis nolumus esse meliores quà m Patres nostri It is enough for us to be as our forefathers who were honest and usefull in their generations but be not over-righteous These men are such as think they have knowledge enough to need no teacher devotion enough to need no new fires perfection enough to need no new progresse justice enough to need no repentance and then because the spirit of a man and all the things of this world are in perpetuall variety and change these men decline when they have gone their period they stand still and then revert like a stone returning from the bosome of a cloud where it rested as long as the thought of a childe and fell to its naturall bed of earth and dwelt below for ever He that says he will take care he be no worse and that he desires to be no better stops his journey into heaven but cannot be secure against his descending into hell and Cassian spake a hard saying Frequentèr vidimus de frigidis carnalibus ad spiritualem venisse fervorem de tepidis animalibus omninò non vidimus Many persons from vicious and dead and cold have passed into life and an excellent grace and a spirituall warmth and holy fires but from lukewarm and indifferent never any body came to an excellent condition and state of holynesse rarissimè S. Bernard sayes very extremely seldome and our blessed Saviour said something of this The Publicans and the Harlots goe before you into the Kingdome of heaven they are moved by shame and punished by disgrace and remarked by punishments and frighted by the circumstances and notices of all the world and separated from sober persons by laws and an intolerable character and the sense of honour and the care of their persons and their love of civill societie and every thing in the world can invite them towards vertues But the man that is accounted honest and does justice and some things of Religion unlesse he finds himselfe but upon his way and feels his wants and groans under the sense of his infirmities and sighs under his imperfections and accounts himself not to have comprehended but still presses towards the mark of his calling unlesse I say he still increases in his appetites of Religion as he does in his progression he will think he needs no counsellor and the spirit of God whispers to an ear that is already fill'd with noyses and cannot atrend to the heavenly calling The stomach that is already full is next to loathing and that 's the prologue to sicknesse and a rejecting the first wholesome nutriment which was entertained to relieve the first naturall necessities Qui non proficit vult deficere said S. Bernard He that goes not forward in the love of God and of Religion does not stand still but goes for all that but whither such a motion will lead him himself without a timely care shall feel by an intolerable experiment In
hic est Sulphureúsque color carnificésque pedes For that is the end of delicacies 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Dio Chrysostom palenesse and effeminacy and lazinesse and folly yet under the dominion of the pleasures of sensuality men are so stript of the use of reason that they are not onely uselesse in wise counsels and assistances but they have not reason enough to avoid the evils of their own throat and belly when once their reason fails we must know that their temperance and their religion went before 3. Though reason be so strictly to be preserved at our tables as well as at our prayers and we can never have leave to doe any violence to it yet the measures of Nature may be enlarged beyond the bounds of prime and common necessity For besides hunger and thirst there are some labours of the body and others of the mind and there are sorrows and loads upon the spirit by its communications with the indispositions of the body and as the labouring man may be supplyed with bigger quantities so the student and contemplative man with more delicious and spritefull nutriment for as the tender and more delicate easily-digested meats will not help to carry burthens upon the neck and hold the plough in society and yokes of the laborious oxen so neither will the pulse and the leeks Lavinian sausages and the Cisalpine tucets or gobbets of condited buls flesh minister such delicate spirits to the thinking man but his notion will be flat as the noyse of the Arcadian porter and thick as the first juice of his countrey lard unlesse he makes his body a fit servant to the soul and both fitted for the imployment But in these cases necessity and prudence and experience are to make the measures and the rule and so long as the just end is fairly designed and aptly ministred to there ought to be no scruple concerning the quantity or quality of the provision and he that would stint a Swain by the commons of a Student and give Philotas the Candian the leavings of Plato does but ill serve the ends of temperance but worse of prudence and necessity 4. Sorrow and a wounded spirit may as well be provided for in the quantity and quality of meat and drink as any other disease and this disease by this remedy as well as by any other For great sorrow and importune melancholy may be as great a sin as a great anger and if it be a sin in its nature it is more malignant and dangerous in its quality as naturally tending to murmur and despair wearinesse of Religion and hatred of God timorousnesse and jealousies fantastick images of things and superstition and therefore as it is necessary to restrain the feavers of anger so also to warm the freezings and dulnesse of melancholy by prudent and temperate but proper and apportion'd diets and if some meats and drinks make men lustfull or sleepy or dull or lazy or spritely or merry so far as meats and drinks can minister to the passion and the passion minister to vertue so far by this means they may be provided for Give strong drink to him that is ready to perish and wine to those that be of heavy hearts let him drink and forget his poverty and remember his misery no more said King Lemuel's Mother But this is not intended to be an habituall cure but single and occasionall for he that hath a pertinacious sorrow is beyond the cure of meat and drink and if this become every days physick it will quickly become every days sin 2. It must alwayes keep within the bounds of reason and never seise upon any portions of affection The Germans use to mingle musick with their bowls and drink by the measures of the six Notes of Musick Ut relevet miserum fatum solitósque labores but they sing so long that they forget not their sorrow onely but their vertue also and their Religion and there are some men that fall into drunkennesse because they would forget a lighter calamity running into the fire to cure a calenture and beating their brains out to be quit of the aking of their heads A mans heavynesse is refreshed long before he comes to drunkennesse for when he arrives thither he hath but chang'd his heavynesse and taken a crime to boot 5. Even when a man hath no necessity upon him no pungent sorrow or naturall or artificiall necessity it is lawfull in some cases of eating and drinking to receive pleasure and intend it For whatsoever is naturall and necessary is therefore not criminall because it is of Gods procuring and since we eate for need and the satisfaction of our need is a removing of a pain and that in nature is the greatest pleasure it is impossible that in its own nature it should be a sin But in this case of Conscience these cautions are to be observed 1. So long as nature ministers the pleasure and not art it is materially innocent Si tuo veniat jure luxuria est But it is safe while it enters upon natures stock for it is impossible that the proper effect of health and temperance and prudent abstinence should be vicious and yet these are the parents of the greatest pleasure in eating and drinking Malum panem expecta bonus fiet etiam illum tenerum tibi siligineum fames reddet If you abstaine and be hungry you shall turne the meanest provision into delicate and desireable 2. Let all the pleasure of meat and drink be such as can minister to health and be within the former bounds For since pleasure in eating and drinking is its naturall appendage and like a shadow follows the substance as the meat is to be accounted so is the pleasure and if these be observed there is no difference whether nature or art be the Cook For some constitutions and some mens customes and some mens educations and necessities and weaknesses are such that their appetite is to be invited and their digestion helped but all this while we are within the bounds of nature and need 3. It is lawfull when a man needs meat to choose the pleasanter even meerly for their pleasures that is because they are pleasant besides that they are usefull this is as lawfull as to smell of a rose or to lye in feathers or change the posture of our body in bed for ease or to hear musick or to walk in gardens rather then the high-wayes and God hath given us leave to be delighted in those things which he made to that purpose that we may also be delighted in him that gives them For so as the more pleasant may better serve for health and directly to refreshment so collaterally to Religion Alwayes provided that it be in its degree moderate and we temperate in our desires without transportation and violence without unhandsome usages of our selves or taking from God and from Religion any minutes and portions of our affections When Eicadastes the Epicure
blessed Saviour out of the Gospel of the Nazarens Nunquam laeti sitis nisi cum fratrem vestrum in charitate videritis Never be merry but when you see your brother in charity and when you are merry St. James hath appointed a proper expression of it and a fair entertainment to the passion If any man be merry let him sing Psalmes But St. Bernard who is also strict in this particular yet he addes the temper Though jesting be not fit for a Christian interdum tamen si incidant ferendae fortassis referendae nunquam magis interveniendum cautè prudentèr nugacitati If they seldome happen they are to be borne but never to be returned and made a businesse of but we must rather interpose warily and prudently to hinder the growth and progresse of the trifle But concerning this case of conscience we are to remember these holy persons found jesting to be a trade such were the ridicularii among the Romanes and the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 among the Greeks and this trade besides its own unworthinesse was mingled with infinite impieties and in the institution and in all the circumstances of its practise was not onely against all prudent severity but against modesty and chastity and was a licence in disparagement of vertue and the most excellent things and persons were by it undervalued that in this throng of evill circumstances finding a humour placed which without infinite warinesse could never pretend to innocence it is no wonder they forbad all and so also did St. Paul upon the same account And in the same state of reproofe to this day are all that doe as they did such as are professed jesters people that play the foole for money whose employment and study is to unclothe themselves of the covers of reason or modesty that they may be laugh'd at And let it be considered how miserable every sinner is if he does not deeply and truely repent and when the man is wet with teares and covered with sorrow crying out mightily against his sins how ugly will it look when this is remembred the next day that he playes the foole and raises his laughter louder then his prayers and yesterdayes groans for no interest but that he may eat A Penitent and a Jester is like a Grecian piece of money on which were stamped a Helena on one side and a Hecuba on the other a Rose and a deadly Aconite a Paris and an Aesop nothing was more contrary and upon this account this folly was reproved by St. Hierom Verum haec à sanctis viris penitùs propellenda quibus magis convenit flere atque lugere Weeping and penitentiall sorrow and the sweet troubles of pity and compassion become a holy person much better then a scurrilous tongue But the whole state of this Question is briefly this 1. If jesting be unseasonable it is also intolerable 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 2. If it be immoderate it is criminall and a little thing here makes the excesse it is so in the confines of folly that as soon as it is out of dores it is in the regions of sin 3. If it be in an ordinary person it is dangerous but if in an eminent a consecrated a wise and extraordinary person it is scandalous Inter saeculares nugae sunt in ore Sacerdotis blasphemiae so St. Bernard 4. If the matter be not of an indifferent nature it becomes sinfull by giving countenance to a vice or making vertue to become ridiculous 5. If it be not watcht that it complies with all that heare it becomes offensive and injurious 6. If it be not intended to fair and lawfull purposes it is sowre in the using 7. If it be frequent it combines and clusters into a formall sinne 8. If it mingles with any sin it puts on the nature of that new unworthinesse beside the proper uglynesse of the thing it selfe and after all these when can it be lawfull or apt for Christian entertainment The Ecclesiasticall History reports that many jests passed between St. Anthony the Father of the Hermits and his Scholar St. Paul and St. Hilarion is reported to have been very pleasant and of a facete sweet and more lively conversation and indeed plaisance and joy and a lively spirit and a pleasant conversation and the innocent caresses of a charitable humanity is not forbidden plenum tamen suavitatis gratiae sermonem non esse indecorum St. Ambrose affirmed and here in my text our conversation is commanded to be such 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that it may minister grace that is favour complacence cheerfulnesse and be acceptable and pleasant to the hearer and so must be our conversation it must be as far from sullennesse as it ought to be from lightnesse and a cheerfull spirit is the best convoy for Religion and though sadnesse does in some cases become a Christian as being an Index of a pious minde of compassion and a wise proper resentment of things yet it serves but one end being useful in the onely instance of repentance and hath done its greatest works not when it weeps and sighs but when it hates and grows carefull against sin But cheerfulnesse and a festivall spirit fills the soule full of harmony it composes musick for Churches and hearts it makes and publishes glorifications of God it produces thankfulnesse and serves the ends of charity and when the oyle of gladnesse runs over it makes bright and tall emissions of light and holy fires reaching up to a cloud and making joy round about And therefore since it is so innocent and may be so pious and full of holy advantage whatsoever can innocently minister to this holy joy does set forward the work of Religion and Charity And indeed charity it selfe which is the verticall top of all Religion is nothing else but an union of joyes concentred in the heart and reflected from all the angles of our life and entercourse It is a rejoycing in God a gladnesse in our neighbours good a pleasure in doing good a rejoycing with him and without love we cannot have any joy at all It is this that makes children to be a pleasure and friendship to be so noble and divine a thing and upon this account it is certaine that all that which can innocently make a man cheerfull does also make him charitable for grief and age and sicknesse and wearinesse these are peevish and troublesome but mirth and cheerfulnesse is content and civil and compliant and communicative and loves to doe good and swels up to felicity onely upon the wings of charity In this account here is pleasure enough for a Christian in present and if a facete discourse and an amicable friendly mirth can refresh the spirit and take it off from the vile temptations of peevish despairing uncomplying melancholy it must needs be innocent and commendable And we may as well be refreshed by a clean and a brisk discourse as by the aire of Campanian wines
XXV SERMONS PREACHED AT GOLDEN-GROVE Being for the VVinter half-year BEGINNING ON ADVENT-SUNDAY UNTILL WHIT-SUNDAY By JEREMY TAYLOR D. D. Vae mihi si non Evangelizavero LONDON Printed by E. Cotes for Richard Royston at the Angel in Ivie-Lane M. D C. LIII To the right Honourable and truely Noble RICHARD Lord VAUHAN Earle of Carbery c. MY LORD I Have now by the assistance of God and the advantages of your many favours finished a Year of Sermons which if like the first year of our Saviours preaching it may be annus acceptabilis an acceptable year to God and his afflicted hand-maid the Church of England a reliefe to some of her new necessities and an institution or assistance to any soule I shall esteem it among those honors and blessings with which God uses to reward those good intentions which himselfe first puts into our hearts and then recompenses upon our heads My Lord They were first presented to God in the ministeries of your family For this is a blessing for which your Lordship is to blesse God that your Family is like Gideons Fleece irriguous with a dew from heaven when much of the voicinage is dry for we have cause to remember that Isaac complain'd of the Philistims who fill'd up his wells with stones and rubbish and left no beauvrage for the Flocks and therefore they could give no milke to them that waited upon the Flocks and the flocks could not be gathered nor fed nor defended It was a designe of ruine and had in it the greatest hostility and so it hath been lately undique totis Vsque adeo turbatur agris En ipse capellas Protenus aeger ago hanc etiam vix Tityre duco But My Lord this is not all I would faine also complaine that men feele not their greatest evill and are not sensible of their danger nor covetous of what they want nor strive for that which is forbidden them but that this complaint would suppose an unnaturall evill to rule in the hearts of men For who would have in him so little of a Man as not to be greedy of the Word of God and of holy Ordinances even therefore because they are so hard to have and this evill although it can have no excuse yet it hath a great and a certain cause for the Word of God still creates new appetites as it satisfies the old and enlarges the capacity as it fils the first propensities of the Spirit For all Spirituall blessings are seeds of Immortality and of infinite felicities they swell up to the comprehensions of Eternity and the desires of the soule can never be wearied but when they are decayed as the stomach will be craving every day unlesse it be sick and abused But every mans experience tels him now that because men have not Preaching they lesse desire it their long fasting makes them not to love their meat and so wee have cause to feare the people will fall to an Atrophy then to a loathing of holy food and then Gods anger will follow the method of our sinne and send a famine of the Word and Sacraments This we have the greatest reason to feare and this feare can be relieved by nothing but by notices and experience of the greatnesse of the Divine mercies and goodnesse Against this danger in future and evill in present as you and all good men interpose their prayers so have I added this little instance of my care and services being willing to minister in all offices and varieties of imployment that so I may by all meanes save some and confirme others or at least that my selfe may be accepted of God in my desiring it And I thinke I have some reasons to expect a speciall mercy in this because I finde by the constitution of the Divine providence and Ecclesiasticall affaires that all the great necessities of the Church have been served by the zeale of preaching in publick and other holy ministeries in publick or private as they could be had By this the Apostles planted the Church and the primitive Bishops supported the faith of Martyrs and the hardinesse of Confessors and the austerity of the Retired By this they confounded Hereticks and evill livers and taught them the wayes of the Spirit and left them without pertinacy or without excuse It was Preaching that restored the splendour of the Church when Barbarisme and Warres and Ignorance either sate in or broke the Doctors Chaire in pieces For then it was that divers Orders of religious and especially of Preachers were erected God inspiring into whole companies of men a zeal of Preaching And by the same instrument God restored the beauty of the Church when it was necessary shee should be reformed it was the assiduous and learned preaching of those whom God chose for his Ministers in that work that wrought the Advantages and persuaded those Truths which are the enamel and beautie of our Churches And because by the same meanes all things are preserved by which they are produc'd it cannot but be certaine that the present state of the Church requires a greater care and prudence in this Ministerie then ever especially since by Preaching some endevour to supplant Preacbing and by intercepting the fruits of the flocks to dishearten the Shepheards from their attendances My Lord your great noblenesse and religious charitie hath taken from mee some portions of that glory which I designed to my selfe in imitation of St. Paul towards the Corinthian Church who esteemed it his honour to preach to them without a revenue and though also like him I have a trade by which as I can be more usefull to others and lesse burthensome to you yet to you also under God I owe the quiet and the opportunities and circumstances of that as if God had so interweaved the support of my affaires with your charitie that he would have no advantages passe upon mee but by your interest and that I should expect no reward of the issues of my Calling unlesse your Lordship have a share in the blessing My Lord I give God thanks that my lot is fallen so fairely and that I can serve your Lordship in that ministerie by which I am bound to serve God and that my gratitude and my duty are bound up in the same bundle but now that which was yours by a right of propriety I have made publick that it may still be more yours and you derive to your selfe a comfort if you shall see the necessitie of others serv'd by that which you heard so diligently and accepted with so much pietie and I am persuaded have entertain'd with that religion and obedience which is the dutie of all those who know that Sermons are arguments against us unlesse they make us better and that no Sermon is received as it ought unlesse it makes us quit a vice or bee in love with vertue unlesse we suffer it in some instance or degree to doe the work of God upon our soules My Lord in these
Sermons I have medled with no mans interest that onely excepted which is Eternall but if any mans vice was to be reproved I have done it with as much severitie as I ought some cases of Conscience I have here determined but the speciall designe of the whole is to describe the greater lines of Dutie by speciall arguments and if any witty Censurer shall say that I tell him nothing but what he knew before I shall be contented with it and rejoyce that he was so well instructed and wish also that he needed not a Remembrancer but if either in the first or in the second in the institution of some or the reminding of others I can doe God any service no man ought to be offended that Sermons are not like curious inquiries after New-nothings but pursuances of Old truths However I have already many faire earnests that your Lordship will bee pleased with this tender of my service and expression of my great and dearest obligations which you daily renew or continue upon My noblest Lord Your Lordships most affectionate and most obliged Servant JEREMY TAYLOR Titles of the Sermons their Order Number and Texts SErmon 1. 2. 3. Dooms-day Book or Christs Advent to Judgement Folio 1. 15. 30. 2 Cor. 5. 10. For we must all appear before the Judgement seat of Christ that every one may receive the things done in his body according to that he hath done whether it be good or bad Sermon 4. 5. 6. The Return of Prayers or The conditions of a Prevailing Prayer fol. 44. 57. 69. Joh. 9. 31. Now we know that God heareth not sinners but if any man be a worshipper of God and doth his will him he heareth Sermon 7. 8. 9. Of Godly Fear c. fol. 83. 95. 114. Heb. 12. part of the 28th 29th vers Let us have grace whereby we may serve God with reverence and godly fear For our God is a consuming Fire Sermon 10. 11. The Flesh and the Spirit fol. 125. 139. Matt. 26. 41. latter part The Spirit indeed is willing but the Flesh is weak Sermon 12. 13. 14. Of Lukewarmnesse and Zeal or Spiritual Terrour fol. 152. 164. 179. Jer. 48. 10. first part Cursed be he that doth the work of the Lord deceitfully Sermon 15. 16. The House of Feasting or The Epicures Measures fol. 191. 204. 1 Cor. 15. 32. last part Let us eat and drink for to morrow we die Sermon 17. 18. The Marriage Ring or The Mysteriousnesse and Duties of Marriage fol. 219. 232. Ephes. 5. 32 33. This is a great mysterie But I speak concerning Christ and the Church Neverthelesse let every one of you in particular so love his Wife even as himselfe and the Wife see that she reverence her Husband Sermon 19. 20. 21. Apples of Sodome or The Fruits of Sin fol. 245. 260. 273. Rom. 6. 21. What fruit had ye then in those things whereof ye are now ashamed For the end of those things is death Sermon 22. 23. 24. 25. The good and evill Tongue Of Slander and Flattery The Duties of the Tongue fol. 286. 298. 311. 323. Ephes. 4. 25. Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth but that which is good to the use of edifying that it may minister grace unto the hearers Titles of the 28 Sermons their Order Numbers and Texts Being the second Volume SErmon 1 2. Of the Spirit of Grace Fol. 1. 12. Rom. 8. ver 9 10. But ye are not in the flesh but in the Spirit if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ he is none of his * And if Christ be in you the body is dead because of sin but the Spirit is life because of righteousness Sermon 3 4. The descending and entailed curse cut off fol. 24. 40. Exodus 20 part of the 5. verse I the Lord thy God am a jealous God visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me 6. And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me and keep my commandments Sermon 5 6. The invalidity of a late or death-bed repentance fol. 52. 66. Jerem. 13. 16. Give glory to the Lord your God before he cause darkness and before your feet stumble upon the dark mountains and while ye look for light or lest while ye look for light he shall turn it into the shadow of death and make it grosse darknesse Sermon 7 8. The deceitfulness of the heart fol. 80. 92. Jeremiah 17. 9. The heat is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked who can know it Sermon 9 10 11. The faith and patience of the Saints Or the righteous cause oppressed fol. 104. 119. 133. 1 Pet. 4. 17. For the time is come that judgement must begin at the house of God and if it first begin at us what shall the end be of them that obey not the Gospel of God 18. And if the righteous scarcely be saved where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear Sermon 12 13. The mercy of the Divine judgements or Gods method in curing sinners fol. 146. 159. Romans 2. 4. Despisest thou the riches of his goodnesse and forbearance and long-suffering not knowing that the goodnesse of God leadeth thee to repentance Sermon 14 15. Of growth in grace with its proper instruments and signs fol. 172. 173. 2 Pet. 3. 18. But grow in grace and in the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ to whom be glory both now and for ever Amen Sermon 16 17. Of growth in sin or the several states and degrees of sinners with the manner how they are to be treated fol. 197. 210. Jude Epist. ver 22 23. And of some have compassion making a difference * And others save with fear pulling them out of the fire Sermon 18 19. The foolish exchange fol. 224. 237. Matth. 16. ver 26. For what is a man profited if he shall gain the whole world and lose his own soul or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul Sermon 20 21 22. The Serpent and the Dove or a discourse of Christian Prudence fol. 251. 263. 274. Matth. 10. latter part of ver 16. Be ye therefore wise as serpents and harmlesse as doves Sermon 23 24. Of Christian simplicity 289. 301. Matth 10. latter part of verse 16. And harmless as Doves Sermon 25 26 27. The miracles of the Divine Mercy fol. 313. 327. 340. Psal. 86. 5. For thou Lord art good and ready to forgive and plenteous in mercy to all them that call upon thee A Funeral Sermon preached at the Obsequies of the Right Honorable the Countess of Carbery fol. 357. 2 Sam. 14. 14. For we must needs dye and are as water spilt on the ground which cannot be gathered up again neither doth God respect any person yet doth he devise means that his banished be not expelled from him A Discourse of the Divine Institution necessity sacredness and separation of the Office
Ministerial Sermon I. ADVENT SUNDAY DOOMS-DAY BOOK OR CHRIST'S Advent to Judgement 2 Cor. 5. 10. For we must all appear before the Judgment seat of CHRIST that every one may receive the things done in his body according to that he hath done whether it be good or bad VErtue and Vice are so essentially distinguished and the distinction is so necessary to be observed in order to the well being of men in private and in societies that to divide them in themselves and to separate them by sufficient notices and to distinguish them by rewards hath been designed by all Laws by the sayings of wise men by the order of things by their proportions to good or evill and the expectations of men have been fram'd accordingly that Vertue may have a proper seat in the will and in the affections and may become amiable by its own excellency and its appendant blessing and that Vice may be as naturall an enemy to a man as a Wolf to the Lamb and as darknesse to light destructive of its being and a contradiction of its nature But it is not enough that all the world hath armed it self against Vice and by all that is wise and sober amongst men hath taken the part of Vertue adorning it with glorious appellatives encouraging it by rewards entertaining it with sweetnesses and commanding it by edicts fortifying it with defensatives and twining with it in all artificiall compliances all this is short of mans necessity for this will in all modest men secure their actions in Theatres and High-wayes in Markets and Churches before the eye of Judges and in the society of Witnesses But the actions of closets and chambers the designs and thoughts of men their discourses in dark places and the actions of retirements and of the night are left indifferent to Vertue or to Vice and of these as man can take no cognisance so he can make no coercitive and therefore above one half of humane actions is by the Laws of man left unregarded and unprovided for and besides this there are some men who are bigger then Lawes and some are bigger then Judges and some Judges have lessened themselves by fear and cowardize by bridery and flattery by iniquity and complyance and where they have not yet they have notices but of few causes and there are some sins so popular and universall that to punish them is either impossible or intolerable and to question such would betray the weaknesse of the publick rods and axes and represent the sinner to be stronger then the power that is appointed to be his bridle and after all this we finde sinners so prosperous that they escape so potent that they fear not and sin is made safe when it growes great Facere omnia saevè Non impunè licet nisi dum facis and innocence is oppressed and the poor cry and he hath no helper and he is oppressed and he wants a Patron and for these and many other concurrent causes if you reckon all the causes that come before all the Judicatories of the world though the litigious are too many and the matters of instance are intricate and numerous yet the personall and criminall are so few that of 20000 sins that cry aloud to God for vengeance scarce two are noted by the publick eye and chastis'd by the hand of Justice it must follow from hence that it is but reasonable for the interest of vertue and the necessities of the world that the private should be judg'd and vertue should be tyed upon the spirit and the poor should be relieved and the oppressed should appeal and the noise of Widows should be heard and the Saints should stand upright and the Cause that was ill judged should be judged over again and Tyrants should be call'd to account and our thoughts should be examined and our secret actions view'd on all sides and the infinite number of sins which escape here should not escape finally and therefore God hath so ordained it that there shall be a day of doom wherein all that are let alone by men shall be question'd by God and every word and every action shall receive its just recompence of reward For we must all appear before the Judgement seat of Christ that every one may receive the things done in his body according to that he hath done whether it be good or bad 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so it is in the best copies not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The things done in the body so we commonly read it the things proper or due to the body so the expression is more apt and proper for not only what is done 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the body but even the acts of abstracted understanding and volition the acts of reflexion and choice acts of self-love and admiration and what ever else can be supposed the proper and peculiar act of the soul or of the spirit is to be accounted for at the day of Judgement and even these may be called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because these are the acts of the man in the state of conjunction with the body The words have in them no other difficulty or variety but contain a great truth of the biggest interest and one of the most materiall constitutive Articles of the whole Religion and the greatest endearment of our duty in the whole world Things are so ordered by the great Lord of all the creatures that whatsoever we do or suffer shall be call'd to account and this account shall be exact and the sentence shall be just and the reward shall be great all the evils of the world shall be amended and the injustices shall be repaid and the divine Providence shall be vindicated and Vertue and Vice shall for ever be remark'd by their separate dwellings and rewards This is that which the Apostle in the next verse cals the terror of the Lord it is his terror because himself shall appear in his dresse of Majesty and robes of Justice and it is his terror because it is of all the things in the World the most formidable in it self and it is most fearfull to us where shall be acted the interest and finall sentence of eternity and because it is so intended I shall all the way represent it as the Lords terror that we may be afraid of sin for the destruction of which this terror is intended 1. Therefore we will consider the persons that are to be judged with the circumstances of our advantages or our sorrowes We must all appear 2. The Judge and his Judgement seat before the Judgment seat of Christ. 3. The sentence that they are to receive the things due to the body good or bad according as we now please but then cannot alter Every one of these are dressed with circumstances of affliction and afrightment to those to whom such terrors shall appertain as a portion of their inheritance 1. The persons who are to be judged even you and I and all the world Kings and
Priests Nobles and Learned the Crafty and the Easie the Wise and the Foolish the Rich and the Poor the prevailing Tyrant and the oppressed Party shall all appear to receive ther Symbol and this is so farre from abating any thing of its terror and our dear concernment that it much increases it for although concerning Precepts and Discourses we are apt to neglect in particular what is recommended in generall and in incidencies of Mortality and sad events the singularity of the chance heightens the apprehension of the evill yet it is so by accident and only in regard of our imperfection it being an effect of self-love or some little creeping envie which adheres too often to the infortunate and miserable or else because the sorrow is apt to increase by being apprehended to be a rare case and a singular unworthinesse in him who is afflicted otherwise then is common to the sons of men companions of his sin and brethren of his nature and partners of his usuall accidents yet in finall and extreme events the multitude of sufferers does not lessen but increase the sufferings and when the first day of Judgement happen'd that I mean of the universall deluge of waters upon the old World the calamity swell'd like the floud and every man saw his friend perish and the neighbours of his dwelling and the relatives of his house and the sharers of his joyes and yesterdaies bride and the new born heir the Priest of the Family and the honour of the Kindred all dying or dead drench'd in water and the divine vengeance and then they had no place to flee unto no man cared for their souls they had none to goe unto for counsell no sanctuary high enough to keep them from the vengeance that raip'd down from heaven and so it shall be at the day of Judgement when that world and this and all that shall be born hereafter shall passe through the same Red sea and be all baptized with the same fire and be involv'd in the same cloud in which shall be thundrings and terrors infinite every Mans fear shall be increased by his neighbours shriekes and the amazement that all the world shall be in shall unite as the sparks of a raging furnace into a globe of fire and roul upon its own principle and increase by direct appearances and intolerable reflexions He that stands in a Church-yard in the time of a great plague and hears the Passing-bell perpetually telling the sad stories of death and sees crowds of infected bodies pressing to their Graves and others sick and tremulous and Death dress'd up in all the images of sorrow round about him is not supported in his spirit by the variety of his sorrow and at Dooms-day when the terrors are universall besides that it is in it self so much greater because it can affright the whole world it is also made greater by communication and a sorrowfull influence Grief being then strongly infections when there is no variety of state but an intire Kingdome of fear and amazement is the King of all our passions and all the world its subjects and that shrieke must needs be terrible when millions of Men and Women at the same instant shall fearfully cry out and the noise shall mingle with the Trumpet of the Archangell with the thunders of the dying and groaning heavens and the crack of the dissolving world when the whole fabrick of nature shall shake into dissolution and eternall ashes But this generall consideration may be hightned with four or five circumstances 1. Consider what an infinite multitude of Angels and Men and Women shall then appear it is a huge assembly when the Men of one Kingdome the Men of one Age in a single Province are gathered togother into heaps and confusion of disorder But then all Kingdomes of all ages all the Armies that ever mustered all that World that Augustus Caesar taxed all those hundreds of Millions that were slain in all the Roman Wars from Numa's time till Italy was broken into Principalities and small Exarchats all these and all that can come into numbers and that did descend from the loins of Adam shall at once be represented to which account if we adde the Armies of Heaven the nine orders of blessed Spirits and the infinite numbers in every order we may suppose the numbers fit to expresse the Majesty of that God and the terror of that Judge who is the Lord and Father of all that unimaginable multitude Erit terror ingens tot simul tantorúmque populorum 2. In this great multitude we shall meet all those who by their example and their holy precepts have like tapers enkindled with a beam of the Sun of righteousnesse enlightned us and taught us to walk in the paths of justice There we shall see all those good men whom God sent to preach to us and recall us from humane follies and inhumane practises and when we espie the good man that chid us for our last drunkennesse or adulteries it shall then also be remembred how we mocked at counsell and were civilly modest at the reproof but laugh'd when the man was gone and accepted it for a religious complement and took our leaves and went and did the same again But then things shall put on another face and what we smil'd at here and slighted fondly shall then be the greatest terror in the world Men shall feel that they once laugh'd at their own destruction and rejected health when it was offered by a man of God upon no other condition but that they would be wise and not be in love with death Then they shall perceive that if they had obeyed an easie and a sober counsell they had been partners of the same felicity which they see so illustrious upon the heads of those Preachers whose work is with the Lord and who by their life and Doctrine endeavoured to snatch the Soul of their friend or relatives from an intolerable misery But he that sees a crown put upon their heads that give good counsell and preach holy and severe Sermons with designs of charity and piety will also then perceive that God did not send Preachers for nothing on trifling errands and without regard but that work which he crowns in them he purposed should be effective to us perswasive to the understanding and active upon our consciences Good Preachers by their Doctrine and all good men by their lives are the accusers of the disobedient and they shall rise up from their seats and judge and condemn the follies of those who thought their piety to be want of courage and their discourses pedanticall and their reproofs the Priests trade but of no signification because they prefer'd moments before eternity 3. There in that great assembly shall be seen all those Converts who upon easier terms and fewer miracles and a lesse experience and a younger grace and a seldomer Preaching and more unlikely circumstances have suffered the work of God to prosper upon their
spirits and have been obedient to the heavenly calling There shall stand the men of Ninevch and they shall stand upright in Judgement for they at the preaching of one man in a lesse space then forty dayes returned unto the Lord their God but we have heard him call all our lives and like the deaf Adder stopt our ears against the voice of Gods servants charme they never so wisely There shall appear the men of Capernaum and the Queen of the South and the Men of Berea and the first fruits of the Christian Church and the holy Martyrs and shall proclaim to all the world that it was not impossible to do the work of Grace in the midst of all our weaknesses and accidentall disadvantages and that the obedience of Faith and the labour of Love and the contentions of chastity and the severities of temperance and self-deniall are not such insuperable mountains but that an honest and a sober person may perform them in acceptable degrees if he have but a ready ear and a willing minde and an honest heart and this seen of honest persons shall make the Divine Judgement upon sinners more reasonable and apparently just in passing upon them the horrible sentence for why cannot we as well serve God in peace as others served him in war why cannot we love him as well when he treats us sweetly and gives us health and plenty honours or fair fortunes reputation or contentednesse quietnesse and peace as others did upon gibbets and under axes in the hands of tormentors and in hard wildernesses in nakednesse and poverty in the midst of all evill things and all sad discomforts Concerning this no answer can be made 4. But there is a worse sight then this yet which in that great assembly shall distract our sight and amaze our spirits There men shall meet the partners of their sins and them that drank the round when they crown'd their heads with folly and forgetfulnesse and their cups with wine and noises There shall ye see that poor perishing soul whom thou didst tempt to adultery and wantonnesse to drunkennesse or perjury to rebellion or an evill interest by power or craft by witty discourses or deep dissembling by scandall or a snare by evill example or pernicious counsell by malice or unwarinesse and when all this is summ'd up and from the variety of its particulars is drawn into an uneasie load and a formidable summe possibly we may finde sights enough to scare all our confidences and arguments enough to presse our evill souls into the sorrowes of a most intolerable death For however we make now but light accounts and evill proportions concerning it yet it will be a fearfull circumstance of appearing to see one or two or ten or twenty accursed souls despairing miserable infinitely miserable roaring and blaspheming and fearfully cursing thee as the cause of its eternall sorrowes Thy lust betray'd and rifled her weak unguarded innocence thy example made thy servant confident to lye or to be perjur'd thy society brought a third into intemperance and the disguises of a beast and when thou feest that soul with whom thou didst sin drag'd into hell well maist thou fear to drink the dregs of thy intolerable potion And most certainly it is the greatest of evils to destroy a soul for whom the Lord Jesus dyed and to undoe that grace which our Lord purchased with so much sweat and bloud pains and a mighty charity And because very many sins are sins of society and confederation such are fornication drunkennesse bribery simony rebellion schisme and many others it is a hard and a weighty consideration what shall become of any one of us who have tempted our Brother or Sister to sin and death for though God hath spar'd our life and they are dead and their debt-books are sealed up till the day of account yet the mischief of our sin is gone before us and it is like a murther but more execrable the soul is dead in trespasses and sins and sealed up to an eternall sorrow and thou shalt see at Dooms-day what damnable uncharitablenesse thou hast done That soul that cryes to those rocks to cover her if it had not been for thy perpetuall temptations might have followed the Lamb in a white robe and that poor man that is cloathed with shame and flames of fire would have shin'd in glory but that thou didst force him to be partner of thy basenesse And who shall pay for this losse a soul is lost by thy means thou hast defeated the holy purposes of the Lord 's bitter passion by thy impurities and what shall happen to thee by whom thy Brother dies eternally Of all the considerations that concern this part of the horrors of Dooms-day nothing can be more formidable then this to such whom it does concern and truly it concerns so many and amongst so many perhaps some persons are so tender that it might affright their hopes and discompose their industries and spritefull labours of repentance but that our most mercifull Lord hath in the midst of all the fearfull circumstances of his second coming interwoven this one comfort relating to this which to my sense seems the most fearfull and killing circumstance Two shall be grinding at one mill the one shall be taken and the other left Two shall be in a bed the one shall be taken and the other left that is those who are confederate in the same fortunes and interests and actions may yet have a different sentence for an early and an active repentance will wash off this account and put it upon the tables of the Crosse and though it ought to make us diligent and carefull charitable and penitent hugely penitent even so long as we live yet when we shall appear together there is a mercy that shall there separate us who sometimes had blended each other in a common crime Blessed be the mercies of of God who hath so carefully provided a fruitfull shower of grace to refresh the miseries and dangers of the greatest part of mankind Thomas Aquinas was used to beg of God that he might never be tempted from his low fortune to Prelacies and dignities Ecclesiasticall and that his minde might never be discomposed or polluted with the love of any creature and that he might by some instrument or other understand the state of his deceased Brother and the story sayes that he was heard in all In him it was a great curiosity or the passion and impertinencies of a uselesse charity to search after him unlesse he had some other personall concernment then his relation of kindred But truly it would concern very many to be solicitous concerning the event of those souls with whom we have mingled death and sin for many of those sentences which have passed and decreed concerning our departed relatives will concern us dearly and we are bound in the same bundles and shall be thrown into the same fires unlesse we repent for our own sins and double our
for he hath done all his share towards it every wicked man takes his head from the blessing and rather chuses that the Devill should rejoyce in his destruction then that his Lord should triumph in his felicity And now upon the supposition of these premises we may imagine that it will be an infinite amazement to meet that Lord to be our Judge whose person we have murdered whose honour we have disparaged whose purposes we have destroyed whose joyes we have lessened whose passion we have made ineffectuall and whose love we have trampled under our profane and impious feet 3. But there is yet a third part of this consideration As it will be inquir'd at the day of Judgement concerning the dishonours to the person of Christ so also concerning the profession and institution of Christ and concerning his poor Members for by these also we make sad reflexions upon our Lord. Every man that lives wickedly disgraces the religion and institution of Jesus he discourages strangers from entring into it he weakens the hands of them that are in already and makes that the adversaries speak reproachfully of the Name of Christ but although it is certain our Lord and Judge will deeply resent all these things yet there is one thing which he takes more tenderly and that is the uncharitablenesse of men towards his poor It shall then be upbraided to them by the Judge that himself was hungry and they refused to give meat to him that gave them his body and heart-bloud to feed them and quench their thirst that they denyed a robe to cover his nakednesse and yet he would have cloathed their souls with the robe of his righteousnesse lest their souls should be found naked in the day of the Lords visitation and all this unkindnesse is nothing but that evill men were uncharitable to their Brethren they would not feed the hungry nor give drink to the thirsty nor cloath the naked nor relieve their Brothers needs nor forgive his follies nor cover their shame nor turn their eyes from delighting in their affronts and evill accidents this is it which our Lord will take so tenderly that his Brethren for whom he died who suck'd the paps of his Mother that fed on his Body and are nourished with his Bloud whom he hath lodg'd in his heart and entertains in his bosome the partners of his Spirit and co-heirs of his inheritance that these should be deny'd relief and suffered to go away ashamed and unpitied this our blessed Lord will take so ill that all those who are guilty of this unkindnesse have no reason to expect the favour of the Court. 4. To this if we adde the almightinesse of the Judge his infinite wisdome and knowledge of all causes and all persons and all circumstances that he is infinitely just inflexibly angry and impartiall in his sentence there can be nothing added either to thè greatness or the requisites of a terrible and an Almighty Judge For who can resist him who is Almighty Who can evade his scrutiny that knows all things Who can hope for pity of him that is inflexible Who can think to be exempted when the Judge is righteous and impartial But in all these annexes of the great Judge that which I shall now remark is that indeed which hath terror in it and that is the severity of our Lord. For then is the day of vengeance and recompenses and no mercy at all shall be shewed but to them that are the sons of mercy for the other their portion is such as can be expected from these premises 1. If we remember the instances of Gods severity in this life in the daies of mercy and repentance in those dayes when Judgement waits upon Mercy and receives lawes by the rules and measures of pardon and that for all the rare streams of loving kindnesse issuing out of Paradise and refreshing all our fields with a moisture more fruitfull then the flouds of Nilus still there are mingled some stormes and violences some fearfull instances of the Divine Justice we may more readily expect it will be worse infinitely worse at that day when Judgement shall ride in triumph and Mercy shall be the accuser of the wicked But so we read and are commanded to remember because they are written for our example that God destroyed at once five cities of the plain and all the country and Sodome and her sisters are set forth for an example suffering the vengeance of eternall fire Fearfull it was when God destroyed at once 23000 for fornication and an exterminating Angell in one night killed 185000 of the Assyrians and the first born of all the families of Egypt and for the sin of David in numbring the people threescore and ten thousand of the people dyed and God sent ten tribes into captivity and eternall oblivion and indistinction from a common people for their idolatry Did not God strike Corah and his company with fire from Heaven and the earth open'd and swallowed up the congregation of Abiram And is not evill come upon all the world for one sin of Adam Did not the anger of God break the nation of the Jewes all in pieces with judgements so great that no nation ever suffered the like because none ever sin'd so And at once it was done that God in anger destroyed all the world and eight persons only escaped the angry Baptisme of water and yet this world is the time of mercy God hath open'd here his Magazines and sent his holy Son as the great channell and fountain of it too here he delights in mercy and in judgement loves to remember it and it triumphs over all his works and God contrives instruments and accidents chances and designs occasions and opportunities for mercy if therefore now the anger of God makes such terrible eruptions upon the wicked people that delight in sin how great may we suppose that anger to be how severe that Judgement how terrible that vengeance how intolerable those inflictions which God reserves for the full effusion of indignation on the great day of vengeance 2. We may also guesse at it by this if God upon all single instances and in the midst of our sins before they are come to the full and sometimes in the beginning of an evill habit be so fierce in his anger what can we imagine it to be in that day when the wicked are to drink the dregs of that horrid potion and count over all the particulars of their whole treasure of wrath This is the day of wrath and God shall reveal or bring forth his righteous Judgements The expression is taken from Deut. 32. 34. Is not this laid up in store with me and sealed up among my treasures 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I will restore it in the day of vengeance for the Lord shall judge his people and repent himself for his servants For so did the Lybian Lion that was brought up under discipline and taught to endure blowes and eat the
praesens huic erant dieculae but this will be but an ill account when the rods shall for the delay be turned into Scorpions and from easie shall become intolerable Better it is to suffer here and to stay till the day of restitution for the good and the holy portion for it will recompense both for the suffering and the stay But how if the portion be bad It shall be bad to the greatest part of mankinde that 's a fearfull consideration the greatest part of men and women shall dwell in the portion of Devils to eternall ages So that these portions are like the Prophets figs in the vision the good are the best that ever were and the worst are so bad that worse cannot be imagined For though in hell the accursed souls shall have no worse then they have deserved and there are not there overrunning measures as there are in heaven and therefore that the joyes of heaven are infinitely greater joyes then the pains of hell are great pains yet even these are a full measure to a full iniquity pain above patience sorrowes without ease amazement without consideration despair without the intervals of a little hope indignation without the possession of any good there dwels envie and confusion disorder and sad remembrances perpetuall woes and continuall shriekings uneasinesse and all the evils of the soul. But if we will represent it in some orderly circumstances we may consider 1. That here all the troubles of our spirits are little participations of a disorderly passion A man desires earnestly but he hath not or he envies because another hath something besides him and he is troubled at the want of one when at the same time he hath a hundred good things and yet ambition and envie impatience and confusion covetousnesse and lust are all of them very great torments but there these shall be in essence and abstracted beings the spirit of envie and the spirit of sorrow Devils that shall inflict all the whole nature of the evill and pour it into the minds of accursed men where it shall sit without abatement for he that envies there envies not for the eminence of another that sits a little above him and excels him in some one good but he shall envie for all because the Saints have all and they have none therefore all their passions are integral abstracted perfect passions and all the sorrow in the world at this time is but a portion of sorrow every man hath his share and yet besides that which all sad men have there is a great deal of sorrow which they have not and all the Devils portion besides that but in hell they shall have the whole passion of sorrow in every one just as the whole body of the Sun is seen by every one in the same Horizon and he that is in darknesse enjoyes it not by parts but the whole darknesse is the portion of one as well as of another If this consideration be not too Metaphysicall I am sure it is very sad and it relies upon this that as in heaven there are some holy Spirits whose crown is all love and some in which the brightest jewell is understanding some are purity and some are holinesse to the Lord so in the regions of sorrow evill and sorrow have an essence and proper being and are set there to be suffer'd intirely by every undone man that dies there for ever 2. The evils of this world are materiall and bodily the pressing of a shoulder or the straining of a joynt the dislocation of a bone or the extending of an artery a bruise in the flesh or the pinching of the skin a hot liver or a sickly stomach and then the minde is troubled because its instrument is ill at ease but all the proper troubles of this life are nothing but the effects of an uneasie body or an abused fancy and therefore can be no bigger then a blow or a cousenage then a wound or a dream only the trouble increases as the soul works it and if it makes reflex acts and begins the evill upon its own account then it multiplies and doubles because the proper scene of grief is open'd and sorrow peeps through the corners of the soul. But in those regions and daies of sorrow when the soul shall be no more depending upon the body but the perfect principle of all its actions the actions are quick and the perceptions brisk the passions are extreme and the motions are spirituall the pains are like the horrors of a Devill and the groans of an evill spirit not slow like the motions of a heavie foot or a loaden arme but quick as an Angels wing active as lightning and a grief then is nothing like a grief now and the words of mans tongue which are fitted to the uses of this world are as unfit to signifie the evils of the next as person and nature and hand and motion and passion are to represent the effects of the Divine attributes actions and subsistence 3. The evill portions of the next world is so great that God did not create or design it in the first intention of things and production of essences he made the Kingdome of Heaven 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from the foundation of the world for so it is observable that Christ shall say to the Sheep at his right hand Receive the Kingdome prepared for you from the beginning of the world but to the Goats and accursed spirits he speaks of no such primitive and originall design it was accidentall and a consequent to horrid crimes that God was forced to invent and to after create that place of torments 4. And when God did create and prepare that place he did not at all intend it for man it was prepared for the Divill and his Angels so saith the Judge himself Go ye cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the Devill and his Angels 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which my Father prepared for the Devill so some copies read it God intended it not for man but man would imitate the Devils pride and listen to the whispers of an evill spirit and follow his temptations and rebell against his Maker and then God also against his first design resolved to throw such persons into that place that was prepared for the Devill for so great was the love of God to mankind that he prepared joyes infinite and never ceasing for man before he had created him but he did not predetermine him to any evill but when he was forced to it by mans malice he doing what God forbad him God cast him thither where he never intended him but it was not mans portion he designed it not at first and at last also he invited him to repentance and when nothing could do it he threw man into anothers portion because he would not accept of what was designed to be his own 5. The evill portion shall be continuall without intermission of evill no dayes of rest no nights of
creatures for it and is it not just in God to stop his own fountaines and seal the cisterns and little emanations of the creatures from thee who shuttest thy hand and shuttest thy eye and twistest thy bowells against thy brother who would as fain be comforted as thou It is a strange Iliacall passion that so hardens a mans bowells that nothing proceeds from him but the name of his own disease a Miserere mei Deus a prayer to God for pity upon him that will not shew pity to others We are troubled when God through severity breaks our bones and hardens his face against us but we think our poor brother is made of iron and not of flesh and bloud as we are God hath bound mercy upon us by the iron bands of necessity and though Gods mercy is the measure of his justice yet justice is the measure of our mercy and as we doe to others it shall be done to us even in the matter of pardon and of bounty of gentlenesse and remission of bearing each others burdens and faire interpretation Forgive us our trespasses as wee forgive them that trespasse against us so we pray The finall sentence in this affair is recorded by St. James Hee that shews no mercy shall have justice with out mercy as thy poor brother hath groan'd under thy cruelty and ungentle nature without remedy so shalt thou before the throne of God thou shalt pray and plead and call and cry and beg again and in the midst of thy despairing noyses be carryed in the regions of sorrow which never did and never shall feel a mercy God never can heare the prayers of an unmercifull man 2. Lust and uncleannesse is a direct enemy to the Praying man and an obstruction to his prayers for this is not onely a prophanation but a direct sacriledge it defiles a Temple to the ground it takes from a man all affection to spirituall things and mingles his very soul with the things of the world it makes his understanding low and his reasonings cheap and foolish and it destroys his confidence and all his manly hopes it makes his spirit light effeminate and fantastick and dissolves his attention and makes his mind so to disaffect all the objects of his desires that when he prays he is as uneasy as an impaled person or a condemned criminall upon the hook or wheel and it hath in it this evill quality that a lustfull person cannot pray heartily against his sin he cannot desire his cure for his will is contradictory to his Collect and he would not that God should hear the words of his prayer which he poor man never intended For no crime so seises upon the will as that some sins steale an affection or obey a temptation or secure an interest or work by the way of understanding but lust seises directly upon the will for the Devil knows well that the lusts of the body are soon cured the uneasynesse that dwels there is a disease very tolerable and every degree of patience can passe under it But therefore the Devill seises upon the will and that 's it that makes adulteries and all the species of uncleannesse and lust growes so hard a cure because the formality of it is that it will not be cured the will loves it and so long as it does God cannot love the Man for God is the Prince of purities and the Son of God is the King of Virgins and the holy Spirit is all love and that is all purity and all spirituality And therefore the prayer of an Adulterer or an uncleane person is like the sacrifices to Moloch or the rites of Flora ubi Cato spectator esse non potuit a good man will not endure them much lesse will God entertaine such reekings of the Dead sea and clouds of Sodome For so an impure vapor begotten of the slime of the earth by the feavers and adulterous heats of an intemperate Summer sun striving by the ladder of a mountaine to climbe up to heaven and rolling into various figures by an uneasy unfixed revolution and stop'd at the middle region of the aire being thrown from his pride and attempt of passing towards the seat of the stars turnes into an unwholsome flame and like the breath of hell is confin'd into a prison of darknesse and a cloud till it breaks into diseases plagues and mildews stink and blastings so is the prayer of an unchast person it strives to climbe the battlements of heaven but because it is a flame of sulphur salt and bitumen and was kindled in the dishonorable regions below deriv'd from hell and contrary to God it cannot passe forth to the element of love but ends in barrennesse and murmur fantastick expectations and trifling imaginative confidences and they at last end in sorrows and despaire * Every state of sin is against the possibility of a mans being accepted but these have a proper venome against the graciousnesse of the person and the power of the prayer God can never accept an unholy prayer and a wicked man can never send forth any other the waters passe thorough impure aquaeducts and channels of brimstone and therefore may end in brimstone and fire but never in forgivenesse and the blessings of an eternall charity Henceforth therefore never any more wonder that men pray so seldome there are few that feel the relish and are enticed with the deliciousnesse and refreshed with the comforts and instructed with the sanctity and acquainted with the secrets of a holy prayer But cease also to wonder that of those few that say many prayers so few find any return of any at all To make up a good and a lawfull prayer there must be charity with all its daughters almes forgivenesse not judging uncharitably there must be purity of spirit that is purity of intention and there must be purity of the body and soule that is the cleannesse of chastity and there must be no vice remaining no affection to sin for he that brings his body to God and hath left his will in the power of any sin offers to God the calves of his lips but not a whole burnt-offering a lame oblation but not a reasonable sacrifice and therefore their portion shall be amongst them whose prayers were never recorded in the book of life whose tears God never put into his bottle whose desires shall remaine ineffectuall to eternall ages Take heed you doe not lose your prayers for by them you hope to have eternall life and let any of you whose conscience is most religious and tender consider what condition that man is in that hath not said his prayers in thirty or forty years together and that is the true state of him who hath lived so long in the course of an unsanctified life in all that while he never said one prayer that did him any good but they ought to be reckoned to him upon the account of his sins Hee that is in the affection or in the habit or
concerning the finall issue of their souls For return to folly hath in it many evils beyond the common state of sin and death and such evils which are most contrary to the hopes of pardon 1. He that falls back into those sins he hath repented of does grieve the holy Spirit of God by which he was sealed to the day of redemption For so the Antithesis is plain and obvious If at the conversion of a sinner there is joy before the beatified Spirits the Angels of God and that is the consummation of our pardon and our consignation to felicity then we may imagine how great an evill it is to grieve the Spirit of God who is greater then the Angels The Children of Israel were carefully warned that they should not offend the Angel Behold I send an Angel before thee beware of him and obey his voyce provoke him not for he will not pardon your transgressions that is he will not spare to punish you if you grieve him Much greater is the evill if we grieve him who sits upon the throne of God who is the Prince of all the Spirits and besides grieving the Spirit of God is an affection that is as contrary to his felicity as lust is to his holinesse both which are essentiall to him Tristitia enim omnium spirituum nequissima est pessima servis Dei omnium spiritus exterminat cruciat Spiritum sanctum said Hennas Sadnesse is the greatest enemy to Gods servants if you grieve Gods Spirit you cast him out for he cannot dwell with sorrow and grieving unlesse it be such a sorrow which by the way of vertue passes on to joy and never ceasing felicity Now by grieving the holy Spirit is meant those things which displease him doing unkindnesse to him and then the grief which cannot in proper sense seise upon him will in certain effects return upon us Ita enim dica said Seneca sacer intra nos Spiritus sedet bonorum malorúmque nostrorum observator custos hic prout à nobis tractatus est ita nos ipse tractat There is a holy spirit dwels in every good man who is the observer and guardian of all our actions and as we treat him so will he treat us Now we ought to treat him sweetly and tenderly thankfully and with observation Deus praecepit Spiritum sanctum utpote pro naturae suae bono tenerum delicatum tranquillitate lenitate quiete pace tractare said Tertullian de Spectaculis The Spirit of God is a loving and a kind Spirit gentle and easy chast and pure righteous and peaceable and when he hath done so much for us as to wash us from our impurities and to cleanse us from our stains and streighten our obliquities and to instruct our ignorances and to snatch us from an intolerable death and to consign us to the day of redemption that is to the resurrection of our bodies from death corruption and the dishonors of the grave and to appease all the storms and uneasynesse and to make us free as the Sons of God and furnished with the riches of the Kingdome and all this with innumerable arts with difficulty and in despite of our lusts and reluctancies with parts and interrupted steps with waitings and expectations with watchfulnesse and stratagems with inspirations and collaterall assistances after all this grace and bounty and diligence that we should despite this grace and trample upon the blessings and scorn to receive life at so great an expence and love of God this is so great a basenesse and unworthynesse that by troubling the tenderest passions it turns into the most bitter hostilities by abusing Gods love it turns into jealousie and rage and indignation Goe and sin no more lest a worse thing happen to thee 2. Falling away after we have begun to live well is a great cause of fear because there is added to it the circumstance of inexcuseablenesse The man hath been taught the secrets of the Kingdome and therefore his understanding hath been instructed he hath tasted the pleasures of the Kingdome and therefore his will hath been sufficiently entertain'd He was entred into the state of life and renounced the ways of death his sin began to be pardoned and his lusts to be crucified he felt the pleasures of victory and the blessings of peace and therefore fell away not onely against his reason but also against his interest and to such a person the Questions of his soul have been so perfectly stated and his prejudices and inevitable abuses so cleerly taken off and he was so made to view the paths of life and death that if he chooses the way of sin again it must be not by weaknesse or the infelicity of his breeding or the weaknesse of his understanding but a direct preference or prelation a preferring sin before grace the spirit of lust before the purities of the soul the madnesse of drunkennesse before the fulnesse of the Spirit money before our friend and above our Religion and Heaven and God himself This man is not to be pityed upon pretence that he is betrayed or to be relieved because he is oppressed with potent enemies or to be pardoned because he could not help it for he once did help it he did overcome his temptation and choose God and delight in vertue and was an heir of heaven and was a conqueror over sin and delivered from death and he may do so still and Gods grace is upon him more plentifully and the lust does not tempt so strongly and if it did he hath more power to resist it and therefore if this man fals it is because he wilfully chooses death it is the portion that he loves and descends into with willing and unpityed steps Quà m vilis facta es nimis iterans vias tuas said God to Judah 3. He that returns from vertue to his old vices is forced to doe violence to his own reason to make his conscience quiet he does it so unreasonably so against all his fair inducements so against his reputation and the principles of his society so against his honour and his promises and his former discourses and his doctrines his censuring of men for the same crimes and the bitter invectives and reproofs which in the dayes of his health and reason he used against his erring Brethren that he is now constrained to answer his own arguments he is intangled in his own discourses he is shamed with his former conversation and it will be remembred against him how severely he reproved and how reasonably he chastised the lust which now he runs to in despite of himself and all his friends And because this is his condition he hath no way left him but either to be impudent which is hard for him at first it being too big a naturall change to passe suddenly from grace to immodest circumstances and hardnesses of face and heart or else therefore he must entertain new
ab Epicuro soluti non metuimus Deos said Cicero and thence came this acceptation of the word that superstition should signifie an unreasonable fear of God It is true he and all his scholars extended the case beyond the measure and made all fear unreasonable but then if we upon grounds of reason and divine revelation shall better discern the measure of the fear of God whatsoever fear we find to be unreasonable we may by the same reason call it superstition and reckon it criminall as they did all fear that it may be call'd superstition their authority is sufficient warrant for the grammar of the appellative and that it is criminall we shall derive from better principles But besides this there was another part of its definition 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the superstitious man is also an Idolater 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one that is afraid of something besides God The Latines according to their custome imitating the Greeks in all their learned notices of things had also the same conception of this and by their word Superstitio understood the worship of Daemons or separate spirits by which they meant either their minores Deos or else their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 their braver personages whose souls were supposed to live after death the fault of this was the object of their Religion they gave a worship or a fear to whom it was not due for when ever they worship'd the great God of heaven and earth they never cal'd that superstition in an evill sense except the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the◠that beleeved there was no God at all Hence came the etymology of superstition it was a worshipping or fearing the spirits of their dead Heroes quos superstites credebant whom they thought to be alive after their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Deification or quos superstantes credebant standing in places and thrones above us and it alludes to that admirable description of old age which Solomon made beyond all the Rhetorick of the Greeks and Romans Also they shall be afraid of that which is high and fears shall be in the way intimating the weaknesse of old persons who if ever they have been religious are apt to be abused into superstition They are afraid of that which is high that is of spirit and separate souls of those excellent beings which dwell in the regions above meaning that then they are superstitious However fear is most commonly its principle alwaies its ingredient For if it enter first by credulity and a weak perswasion yet it becomes incorporated into the spirit of the man and thought necessary and the action it perswades to dares not be omitted for fear of an evill themselves dream of upon this account the sin is reducible to two heads the 1. is Superstition of an undue object 2. Superstition of an undue expression to a right object 1. Superstition of an undue object is that which the Etymologist cals 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the worshipping of idols the Scripture addes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a sacrificing to Daemons in St. Paul and in Baruch where although we usually read it sacrificing to Devils yet it was but accidentall that they were such for those indeed were evill spirits who had seduced them and tempted them to such ungodly rites and yet they who were of the Pythagorean sect pretended a more holy worship and did their devotion to Angels But whosoever shall worship Angels do the same thing they worship them because they are good and powerfull as the Gentiles did the Devils whom they thought so and the error which the Apostle reproves was not in matter of Judgement in mistaking bad angels for good but in matter of manners and choice they mistook the creature for the Creator and therefore it is more fully expressed by St. Paul in a generall signification they worshipped the creature 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 besides the Creator so it should be read if we worship any creature besides God worshipping so as the worship of him becomes a part of Religion it is also a direct superstition but concerning this part of superstition I shall not trouble this discourse because I know no Christians blamable in this particular but the Church of Rome and they that communicate with her in the worshipping of Images of Angels and Saints burning lights and perfumes to them making offerings confidences advocations and vowes to them and direct and solemn divine worshipping the Symbols of bread and wine when they are consecrated in the holy Sacrament These are direct superstition as the word is used by all Authors profane and sacred and are of such evill report that where ever the word Superstition does signifie any thing criminall these instances must come under the definition of it They are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a cultus superstitum a cultus Daemonum and therefore besides that they have 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a proper reproof in Christian Religion are condemned by all wise men which call superstition criminall But as it is superstition to worship any thing 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 besides the Creator so it is superstition to worship God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 otherwise then is decent proportionable or described Every inordination of Religion that is not in defect is properly called superstition 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 said Maximus Tyrius The true worshipper is a lover of God the superstitious man loves him not but flatters To which if we adde that fear unreasonable fear is also superstition and an ingredient in its definition we are taught by this word to signifie all irregularity and inordination in actions of Religion The summe is this the Atheist cal'd all worship of God superstition the Epicurean cal'd all fear of God superstition but did not condemn his worship the other part of wise men cal'd all unreasonable fear and inordinate worship superstition but did not condemn all fear But the Christian besides this cals every error in worship in the manner or excesse by this name and condemns it Now because the three great actions of Religion are to worship God to fear God and to trust in him by the inordination of these three actions we may reckon three sorts of this crime the excesse of fear and the obliquity in trust and the errors in worship are the three sorts of superstition the first of which is only pertinent to our present consideration 1. Fear is the duty we owe to God as being the God of power and Justice the great Judge of heaven and earth the avenger of the cause of Widows the Patron of the poor and the Advocate of the oppressed a mighty God and terrible and so essentiall an enemy to sin that he spared not his own Son but gave him over to death and to become a sacrifice when he took upon him our Nature and became a person obliged for our guilt Fear is the great bridle of intemperance the modesty of the spirit and the restraint of
gaieties and dissolutions it is the girdle to the soul and the handmaid to repentance the arrest of sin and the cure or antidote to the spirit of reprobation it preserves our apprehensions of the divine Majesty and hinders our single actions from combining to sinfull habits it is the mother of consideration and the nurse of sober counsels and it puts the soul to fermentation and activity making it to passe from trembling to caution from caution to carefulnesse from carefulnesse to watchfulnesse from thence to prudence and by the gates and progresses of repentance it leads the soul on to love and to felicity and to joyes in God that shall never cease again Fear is the guard of a man in the dayes of prosperity and it stands upon the watch-towers and spies the approaching danger and gives warning to them that laugh loud and feast in the chambers of rejoycing where a man cannot consider by reason of the noises of wine and jest and musick and if prudence takes it by the hand and leads it on to duty it is a state of grace and an universall instrument to infant Religion and the only security of the lesse perfect persons and in all senses is that homage we owe to God who sends often to demand it even then when he speaks in thunder or smites by a plague or awakens us by threatning or discomposes our easinesse by sad thoughts and tender eyes and fearfull hearts and trembling considerations But this so excellent grace is soon abused in the best and most tender spirits in those who are softned by Nature and by Religion by infelicities or caâ—es by sudden accidents or a sad soul and the Devill observing that fear like spare diet starves the feavers of lust and quenches the flames of hell endevours to highten this abstinence so much as to starve the man and break the spirit into timorousnesse and scruple sadnesse and unreasonable tremblings credulity and trifling observation suspicion and false accusations of God and then vice being turned out at the gate returns in at the postern and does the work of hell and death by running too inconsiderately in the paths which seem to lead to heaven But so have I seen a harmlesse dove made dark with an artificiall night and her eyes ceel'd and lock'd up with a little quill soaring upward and flying with amazement fear and an undiscerning wing she made toward heaven but knew not that she was made a train and an instrument to teach her enemy to prevail upon her and all her defencelesse kindred so is a superstitious man zealous and blinde forward and mistaken he runs towards heaven as he thinks but he chooses foolish paths and out of fear takes any thing that he is told or fancies and guesses concerning God by measures taken from his own diseases and imperfections But fear when it is inordinate is never a good counsellor nor makes a good friend and he that fears God as his enemy is the most compleatly miserable person in the world For if he with reason beleeves God to be his enemy then the man needs no other argument to prove that he is undone then this that the fountain of blessing in this state in which the man is will never issue any thing upon him but cursings But if he fears this without reason he makes his fears true by the very suspicion of God doing him dishonour and then doing those fond and trifling acts of jealousie which will make God to be what the man feared he already was We do not know God if we can think any hard thing concerning him If God be mercifull let us only fear to offend him but then let us never be fearfull that he will destroy us when we are carefull not to displease him There are some persons so miserable and scrupulous such perpetuall tormentors of themselves with unnecessary fears that their meat and drink is a snare to their consciences if they eat they fear they are gluttons if they fast they fear they are hypocrites and if they would watch they complain of sleep as of a deadly sin and every temptation though resisted makes them cry for pardon and every return of such an accident makes them think God is angry and every anger of God will break them in pieces These persons do not beleeve noble things concerning God they do not think that he is as ready to pardon them as they are to pardon a sinning servant they do not beleeve how much God delights in mercy nor how wise he is to consider and to make abatement for our unavoidable infirmities they make judgement of themselves by the measures of an Angell and take the accounts of God by the proportions of a Tyrant The best that can be said concerning such persons is that they are hugely tempted or hugely ignorant For although ignorance is by some persons named the mother of devotion yet if it fals in a hard ground it is the mother of Atheisme if in a soft ground it is the parent of superstition but if it proceeds from evill or mean opinions of God as such scruples and unreasonable fears do many times it is an evill of a great impiety and in some sense and if it were in equall degrees is as bad as Atheisme for he that sayes there was no such man as Julius Caesar does him lesse displeasure then he that sayes there was but that he was a Tyrant and a bloudy parricide And the Cimmerians were not esteemed impious for saying that there was no sun in the heavens But Anaxagoras was esteemed irreligious for saying the sun was a very stone And though to deny there is a God is a high impiety and intolerable yet he sayes worse who beleeving there is a God sayes he delights in humane sacrifices in miseries and death in tormenting his servants and punishing their very infelicities and unavoidable mischances To be God and to be essentially and infinitely good is the same thing and therefore to deny either is to be reckoned among the greatest crimes in the world Adde to this that he that is afraid of God cannot in that disposition love him at all for what delight is there in that religion which drawes me to the Altar as if I were going to be sacrificed or to the Temples as to the Dens of Bears Oderunt quos metuunt sed colunt tamen whom men fear they hate certainly and flatter readily and worship timorously and he that saw Hermolaus converse with Alexander and Pausanias follow Philip the Macedonian or Chaereas kissing the feet of Cajus Caligula would have observed how sordid men are made with fear and how unhappy and how hated Tyrants are in the midst of those acclamations which are loud and forc'd and unnaturall and without love or fair opinion And therefore although the Atheist sayes there is no God the scrupulous fearfull and superstitious man does heartily wish what the other does beleeve But that the evill may be proportionable to
that would confine them to reason and sober counsels that would make them labour that they may become pale and lean that they may become wise but because Riches is attended by pride and lust tyranny and oppression and hath in its hand all that it hath in its heart and Sin waits upon Wealth ready dress'd and fit for action therefore in some temptations they confesse how little their souls are they cannot stand that assault but because this passion is the daughter of Voluptuousnesse and very often is but a servant sin ministring to sensuall pleasures the great weaknesse of the flesh is more seen in the matter of carnall crimes Lust and Drunkennesse Nemo enim se adsuefacit ad vitandum ex animo evellendum ea quae molesta ei non sunt Men are so in love with pleasure that they cannot think of mortifying or crucifying their lust we doe violence to what we hate not to what we love But the weaknesse of the flesh and the empire of lust is visible in nothing so much as in the captivity and folly of wise men For you shall see some men fit to governe a Province sober in their counsells wise in the conduct of their affaires men of discourse and reason fit to sit with Princes or to treat concerning peace and warre the fate of Empires and the changes of the world yet these men shall fall at the beauty of a woman as a man dies at the blow of an Angell or gives up his breath at the sentence and decree of God Was not Solomon glorious in all things but when he bowed to Pharaoh's daughter and then to Devils and is it not published by the sentence and observation of all the world that the bravest men have been softned into effeminacy by the lisping charms and childish noyses of Women and imperfect persons A faire slave bowed the neck of stout Polydamas which was stiffe and inflexible to the contentions of an enemy and suppose a man set like the brave boy of the King of Nicomedia in the midst of temptation by a witty beauty tyed upon a bed with silk and pretty violences courted with musick and perfumes with promises and easie postures invited by opportunity and importunity by rewards and impunity by privacy and a guard what would his nature doe in this throng of evils and vile circumstances The grace of God secur'd the young Gentleman and the Spirit rode in triumph but what can flesh do in such a day of danger Is it not necessary that we take in auxiliaries from Reason and Religion from heaven and earth from observation and experience from hope and fear and cease to be what we are lest we become what we ought not It is certain that in the cases of temptations to voluptuousnesse a man is naturally as the Prophet said of Ephraim like a Pigeon that hath no heart no courage no conduct no resolution no discourse but falls as the water of Nilus when it comes to its cataracts it falls infinitely and without restraint And if we consider how many drunken meetings the Sunne sees every day how many Markets and Faires and Clubs that is so many solemnities of drunkennesse are at this instant under the eye of heaven that many Nations are marked for intemperance and that it is lesse noted because it is so popular and universall and that even in the midst of the glories of Christianity there are so many persons drunk or too full with meat or greedy of lust even now that the Spirit of God is given to us to make us sober and temperate and chaste we may well imagine since all men have flesh and all men have not the spirit the flesh is the parent of sin and death and it can be nothing else And it is no otherwise when we are tempted with pain We are so impatient of pain that nothing can reconcile us to it not the laws of God not the necessities of nature not the society of all our kindred and of all the world not the interest of vertue not the hopes of heaven we will submit to pain upon no terms but the basest and most dishonorable for if sin bring us to pain or affront or sicknesse we choose that so it be in the retinue of a lust and a base desire but we accuse Nature and blaspheme God we murmur and are impatient when pain is sent to us from him that ought to send it and intends it as a mercy when it comes But in the matter of afflictions and bodily sicknesse we are so weak and broken so uneasie and unapt to sufferance that this alone is beyond the cure of the old Philosophy Many can endure poverty and many can retire from shame and laugh at home and very many can endure to be slaves but when pain and sharpnesse are to be endured for the interests of vertue we finde but few Martyrs and they that are suffer more within themselves by their fears and their temptations by their uncertain purposes and violences to Nature then by the Hang-mans sword the Martyrdome is within and then he hath won his Crown not when he hath suffered the blow but when he hath overcome his fears and made his spirit conqueror It was a sad instance of our infirmity when of the 40 Martyrs of Cappadocia set in a freezing lake almost consummate and an Angell was reaching the Crowne and placing it upon their brows the flesh fail'd one of them and drew the spirit after it and the man was called off from his Scene of noble contention and dyed in warm water Odi artus fragilémque hunc corporis usum Desertorem animi We carry about us the body of death and we bring evils upon our selves by our follies and then know not how to bear them and the flesh forsakes the spirit And indeed in sicknesse the infirmity is so very great that God in a manner at that time hath reduced all Religion into one vertue Patience with its appendages is the summe totall of almost all our duty that is proper to the days of sorrow and we shall find it enough to entertain all our powers and to imploy all our aids the counsels of wise men and the comforts of our friends the advices of Scripture and the results of experience the graces of God and the strength of our own resolutions are all then full of imployments and find it work enough to secure that one grace For then it is that a cloud is wrapped about our heads and our reason stoops under sorrow the soul is sad and its instrument is out of tune the auxiliaries are disorder'd and every thought sits heavily then a comfort cannot make the body feel it and the soule is not so abstracted to rejoyce much without its partner so that the proper joyes of the soul such as are hope and wise discourses and satisfactions of reason and the offices of Religion are felt just as we now perceive the joyes of heaven
sottishnesse of lust and the follies of drunkennesse that reflecting upon the change they begin to love themselves too well and take delight in the wisdome of the change and the reasonablenesse of the new life and then they by hating their own follies begin to despise them that dwell below It was the tricke of the old Philosophers whom Aristophanes thus describes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 pale and barefoot and proud that is persons singular in their habit eminent in their institution proud and pleased in their persons and despisers of them that are lesse glorious in their vertue then themselves and for this very thing our blessed Saviour remarks the Pharisees they were severe and phantasticall advancers of themselves and Judgers of their neighbors and here when they have mortified corporall vices such which are scandalous and punishable by men they keep the spirituall and those that are onely discernible by God these men doe but change their sin from scandall to danger and that they may sin more safely they sin more spiritually 2. Sometimes the passions of the flesh spoyle the changes of the Spirit by naturall excesses and disproportion of degrees it mingles violence with industry and fury with zeale and uncharitablenesse with reproofe and censuring with discipline and violence with desires and immortifications in all the appetites and prosecutions of the soule Some think it is enough in all instances if they pray hugely and fervently and that it is religion impatiently to desire a victory over our enemies or the life of a childe or an heir to be born they call it holy so they desire it in prayer that if they reprove a vicious person they may say what they list and be as angry as they please that when they demand but reason they may enforce it by all means that when they exact duty of their children they may be imperious and without limit that if they designe a good end they may prosecute it by all instruments that when they give God thanks for blessings they may value the thing as high as they list though their persons come into a share of the honour here the spirit is willing and holy but the flesh creeps too busily and insinuates into the substance of good actions and spoyles them by unhandsome circumstances and then the prayer is spoil'd for want of prudence of conformity to Gods will and discipline and government is imbittered by an angry spirit and the Fathers authority turns into an uneasie load by being thrust like an unequall burden to one side without allowing equall measures to the other And if we consider it wisely we shall find that in many good actions the flesh is the bigger ingredient and we betray our weak constitutions even when we do Justice or Charity and many men pray in the flesh when they pretend they pray by the spirit 3. In the first changes and weak progresses of our spirituall life we find a long weaknesse upon us because we are long before we begin and the flesh was powerfull and its habits strong and it will mingle indirect pretences with all the actions of the spirit If we mean to pray the flesh thrusts in thoughts of the world and our tongue speaks one thing and our heart means another and we are hardly brought to say our prayers or to undertake a fasting day or to celebrate a Communion and if we remember that all these are holy actions and that we have many opportunities of doing them all and yet doe them very seldome and then very coldly it will be found at the foot of the account that our flesh and our naturall weaknesse prevailes oftner then our spirituall strengths 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they that are bound long in chains feel such a lamenesse in the first restitutions of their liberty 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by reason of the long accustomed chain and pressure that they must stay till Nature hath set them free and the disease be taken off as well as the chain and when the soul is got free from her actuall pressure of sins still the wound remaines and a long habitude and longing after it a looking back and upon the presenting the old object the same company or the remembrance of the delight the fancy strikes and the heart fails and the temptations returne and stand dressed in form and circumstances and ten to one but the man dies again 4. Some men are wise and know their weaknesses and to prevent their startings back will make fierce and strong resolutions and bind up their gaps with thornes and make a new hedge about their spirits and what then this shews indeed that the spirit is willing but the storm arises and windes blow and rain descends and presently the earth trembles and the whole fabrick falls into ruine and disorder A resolution such as we usually make is nothing but a little trench which every childe can step over and there is no civill man that commits a willing sin but he does it against his resolution and what Christian lives that will not say and think that he hath repented in some degree and yet still they commit sin that is they break all their holy purposes as readily as they lose a dream and so great is our weaknesse that to most men the strength of a resolution is just such a restraint as he suffers who is imprisoned in a curtain and secured with dores and bars of the finest linnen for though the spirit be strong to resolve the flesh is weak to keep it 5. But when they have felt their follies and see the linnen vail rent some that are desirous to please God back their resolutions with vows and then the spirit is fortified and the flesh may tempt and call but the soul cannot come forth and therefore it triumphs and acts its interest easily and certainly and then the flesh is mortified It may be so But doe not many of us inquire after a vow And we consider it may be it was rash or it was an impossible matter or without just consideration and weighing of circumstances or the case is alter'd and there is a new emergent necessity or a vow is no more then a resolution made in matter of duty both are made for God and in his eye and witnesse or if nothing will doe it men grow sad and weary and despaire and are impatient and bite the knot in pieces with their teeth which they cannot by disputing and the arts of the tongue A vow will not secure our duty because it is not stronger then our appetite and the spirit of man is weaker then the habits and superinduced nature of the flesh but by little and little it falls off like the finest thread twisted upon the traces of a chariot it cannot hold long 6. Beyond all this some choose excellent guides and stand within the restraints of modesty and a severe Monitor and the Spirit of God hath put a veile upon our spirits and by modesty in
women and young persons by reputation in the more aged and by honour in the more noble and by conscience in all have fortified the spirit of Man that men dare not prevaricate their duty though they be tempted strongly and invited perpetually and this is a partition wall that separates the spirit from the flesh and keeps it in its proper strengths and retirements But here the spirit of man for all that it is assisted strongly breaks from the inclosure and runnes into societies of flesh and sometimes despises reputation and sometimes supplies it with little arts of flattery and self-love and is modest as long as it can be secret and when it is discovered it growes impudent and a man shelters himselfe in crouds and heaps of sinners and beleeves that it is no worse with him then with other mighty criminals and publick persons who bring sin into credit amongst fooles and vicious persons or else men take false measures of fame or publick honesty and the world being broken into so many parts of disunion and agreeing in nothing but in confederate vices and grown so remisse in governments and severe accounts every thing is left so loose that honour and publick fame modesty and shame are now so slender guards to the spirit that the flesh breaks in and makes most men more bold against God then against men and against the laws of Religion then of the Common-wealth 7. When the spirit is made willing by the grace of God the flesh interposes in deceptions and false principles If you tempt some man to a notorious sin as to rebellion to deceive his trust or to be drunk he will answer he had rather die then doe it But put the sin civilly to him and let it be disguised with little excuses such things which indeed are trifles but yet they are colours fair enough to make a weak pretence and the spirit yeelds instantly Most men choose the sin if it be once disputable whether it be a sin or no If they can but make an excuse or a colour so that it shall not rudely dash against the conscience with an open professed name of Sin they suffer the temptation to doe its worst If you tempt a man you must tell him 't is no sin or it is excusable this is not rebellion but necessity and selfe defence it is not against my allegiance but is a performing of my trust I doe it for my friend not against my Superiour I doe it for a good end and for his advantage this is not drunkennesse but free mirth and fair society it is refreshment and entertainment of some supernumerary hours but it is not a throwing away my time or neglecting a day of salvation and if there be any thing more to say for it though it be no more then Adams fig-leaves or the excuses of children and truants it shall be enough to make the flesh prevail and the spirit not to be troubled for so great is our folly that the flesh always carries the cause if the spirit can be cousen'd 8. The flesh is so mingled with the spirit that we are forced to make distinctions in our appetite to reconcile our affections to God and Religion lest it be impossible to doe our duty we weep for our sins but we weep more for the death of our dearest friends or other temporall sadnesses we say we had rather die then lose our faith and yet we doe not live according to it we lose our estates and are impatient we lose our vertue and bear it well enough and what vertue is so great as more to be troubled for having sin'd then for being asham'd and begger'd and condemn'd to die Here we are forced to a distinction there is a valuation of price and a valuation of sense or the spirit hath one rate of things and the flesh hath another and what we beleeve the greatest evill does not alwayes cause to us the greatest trouble which shews plainly that we are imperfect carnall persons and the flesh will in some measure prevaile over the spirit because we will suffer it in too many instances and cannot help it in all 9. The spirit is abated and interrupted by the flesh because the flesh pretends it is not able to doe those ministeries which are appointed in order to Religion we are not able to fast or if we watch it breeds gouts and catarrhes or charity is a grace too expensive our necessities are too big to do it or we cannot suffer pain and sorrow breeds death and therefore our repentances must be more gentle and we must support our selves in all our calamities for we cannot beare our crosses without a freer refreshment and this freedome passes on to licence and many melancholy persons drowne their sorrows in sin and forgetfulnesse as if sin were more tolerable then sorrow and the anger of God an easier load then a temporall care here the flesh betrayes its weaknesse and its follies For the flesh complains too soon and the spirit of some men like Adam being too fond of his Eve attends to all its murmurs and temptations and yet the flesh is able to bear farre more then is required of it in usuall duties Custome of suffering will make us endure much and feare will make us suffer more and necessity makes us suffer any thing and lust and desire makes us to endure more then God is willing we should and yet we are nice and tender and indulgent to our weaknesses till our weaknesses grow too strong for us And what shall we doe to secure our duty and to be delivered of our selves that the body of death which we bear about us may not destroy the life of the spirit I have all this while complain'd and you see not without cause I shall afterwards tell you the remedies for all this evill In the mean time let us have but mean opinions of our selves let us watch every thing of our selves as of suspected persons and magnifie the grace of God and be humbled for our stock and spring of follies and let us look up to him who is the fountaine of grace and spirituall strengths 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And pray that God would give us what we ask and what we ask not for we want more helps then we understand and we are neerer to evill then we perceive and we bear sin and death about us and are in love with it and nothing comes from us but false principles and silly propositions and weak discourses and startings from our holy purposes and care of our bodies and of our palates and the lust of the lower belly these are the imployment of our lives but if wee design to live happily and in a better place it must be otherwise with us we must become new creatures and have another definition and have new strengths which we can onely derive from God whose grace is sufficient for us and strong enough to prevail over all our
they are in themselves as they have an irregularity and disorder an unreasonablenesse and a sting and be sure to relye upon nothing but the truth of lawes and promises and take severe accounts by those lines which God gave us on purpose to reprove our evill habits and filthy inclinations Men that are not willing to be cured are glad of any thing to cousen them but the body of death cannot be taken off from us unlesse we be honest in our purposes and severe in our counsels and take just measures and glorifie God and set our selves against our selves that we may be changed into the likenesse of the sons of God 9. Avoid all delay in the counsels of Religion Because the aversation and perversnesse of a childes nature may be corrected easily but every day of indulgence and excuse increases the evill and makes it still more naturall and still more necessary 10. Learn to despise the world or which is a better compendium in the duty learn but truly to understand it for it is a cousenage all the way the head of it is a rainbow and the face of it is flattery its words are charmes and all its stories are false its body is a shadow and its hands to knit spiders webs it is an image and a noise with a Hyaena's lip and a Serpents tail it was given to serve the needs of our nature and in stead of doing it it creates strange appetites and nourishes thirsts and feavers it brings care and debauches our nature and brings shame and death as the reward of all our cares Our nature is a disease and the world does nourish it but if you leave to feed upon such unwholesome diet your nature reverts to its first purities and to the entertainments of the grace of God 4. I am now to consider how farre the infirmities of the flesh can be innocent and consist with the spirit of grace For all these counsels are to be entertain'd into a willing spirit and not only so but into an active and so long as the spirit is only willing the weaknesse of the flesh will in many instances become stronger then the strengths of the spirit For he that hath a good will and does not do good actions which are required of him is hindred but not by God that requires them and therefore by himself or his worst enemy But the measures of this question are these 1. If the flesh hinders us of our duty it is our enemy and then our misery is not that the flesh is weak but that it is too strong But 2. when it abates the degrees of duty and stops its growth or its passing on to action and effect then it is weak but not directly nor alwaies criminall But to speak particularly If our flesh hinders us of any thing that is a direct duty and prevails upon the spirit to make it do an evill action or contract an evill habit the man is in a state of bondage and sin his flesh is the mother of corruption and an enemy to God It is not enough to say I desire to serve God and cannot as I would I would fain love God above all the things in the world but the flesh hath appetites of its own that must be served I pray to be forgiven as I forgive others but flesh and bloud cannot put up such an injury for know that no infirmity no unavoidable accident no necessity no poverty no businesse can hinder us from the love of God or forgiving injuries or being of a religious and a devout spirit Poverty and the intrigues of the world are things that can no more hinder the spirit in these duties then a strong enemy can hinder the sun to shine or the clouds to drop rain These things which God requires of us and exacts from us with mighty penalties these he hath made us able to perform for he knows that we have no strength but what he gives us and therefore as he binds burdens upon our shoulders so he gives us strength to bear them and therefore he that sayes he cannot forgive sayes only that his lust is stronger then his religion his flesh prevails upon his spirit For what necessity can a man have to curse him whom he cals enemy or to sue him or kill him or do him any spite A man may serve all his needs of nature though he does nothing of all this and if he be willing what hinders him to love to pardon to wish well to desire The willing is the doing in this case and he that sayes he is willing to do his duty but he cannot does not understand what he sayes For all the duty of the inner man consists in the actions of the will and there they are seated and to it all the inferiour faculties obey in those things which are direct emanations and effects of will He that desires to love God does love him indeed men are often cousened with pretences and in some good mood are warm'd with a holy passion but it signifies nothing because they will not quit the love of Gods enemies and therefore they do not desire what they say they doe but if the will and heart be right and not false and dissembling this duty is or will be done infallibly 2. If the spirit and the heart be willing it will passe on to outward actions in all things where it ought or can He that hath a charitable soul will have a charitable hand and will give his money to the poor as he hath given his heart to God For these things which are in our hand are under the power of our will and therefore are to be commanded by it He that sayes to the naked be warm and cloathed and gives him not the garment that lies by him or money to buy one mocks God and the poor and himself Nequam illud verbâ—m est bene vult nisi qui bene facit said the Comedy It is an evill saying he wishes well unlesse he do well 3. Those things which are not in our power that is such things in which the flesh is inculpably weak or naturally or politically disabled the will does the work of the outward and of the inward man we cannot cloath Christs body he needs it not and we cannot approach so sacred and separate a presence but if we desire to do it it is accounted as if we had The ignorant man cannot discourse wisely and promote the interest of souls but he can love souls and desire their felicity though I cannot build Hospitals and Colledges or pour great summes of money into the lap of the poor yet if I incourage others and exhort them if I commend and promote the work I have done the work of a holy Religion For in these and the like cases the outward work is not alwaies set in our power and therefore without our fault is omitted and can be supplyed by that which is in our power 4. For that is the
last caution concerning this question No man is to be esteemed of a willing spirit but he that endevours to doe the outward work or to make all the supplies that he can not only by the forwardnesse of his spirit but by the compensation of some other charities or devotion or religion Silver and gold have I none and therefore I can give you none But I wish you well How will that appear why thus Such as I have I will give you Rise up and walk I cannot give you gold but I can give you counsell I cannot relieve your need but I can relieve your sadnesse I cannot cure you but I can comfort you I cannot take away your poverty but I can ease your spirit and God accepts us saith the Apostle according to what a man hath and not according to what he hath not Only as our desires are great and our spirits are willing so we shall finde wayes to make supply of our want of ability and expressed liberality Et labor ingenium misero dedit sua quemque Advigilare sibi jussit fortuna premendo What the poor mans need will make him do that also the good mans charity will it will finde out wayes and artifices of relief in kinde or in value in comfort or in prayers in doing it himself or procuring others 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The necessity of our fortune and the willingnesse of our spirits will do all this all that it can and something that it cannot You have relieved the Saints saith St. Paul according to your power yea and beyond your power Only let us be carefull in all instances that we yeeld not to the weaknesse of the flesh nor listen to its fair pretences for the flesh can do more then it sayes we can do more then we think we can and if we doe some violence to the flesh to our affairs and to the circumstances of our fortune for the interest of our spirit we shall make our flesh usefull and the spirit strong the flesh and its weaknesse shall no more be an objection but shall comply and co-operate and serve all the necessities of the spirit Sermon XII Of Lukewarmnesse and Zeal OR SPIRITVALL TERROVR Part I. Jer. 48. 10. vers first part part Cursed be he that doth the work of the Lord deceitfully CHrists Kingdome being in order to the Kingdome of his Father which shall be manifest at the day of Judgement must therefore be spirituall because then it is that all things must become spirituall not only by way of eminency but by intire constitution and perfect change of natures Men shall be like Angels and Angels shall be comprehended in the lap of spirituall and eternall felicities the soul shall not understand by materiall phantasmes neither be served by the provisions of the body but the body it self shall become spirituall and the eye shall see intellectuall objects and the mouth shall feed upon hymns and glorifications of God the belly shall be then satisfied by the fulnesse of righteousnesse and the tongue shall speak nothing but praises and the propositions of a celestiall wisdome the motion shall be the swiftnesse of an Angell and it shall be cloathed with white as with a garment Holinesse is the Sun and righteousnesse is the Moon in that region our society shall be Quires of singers and our conversation wonder contemplation shall be our food and love shall be the wine of elect souls and as to every naturall appetite there is now proportion'd an object crasse materiall unsatisfying and allayed with sorrow and uneasinesse so there be new capacities and equall objects the desires shall be fruition and the appetite shall not suppose want but a faculty of delight and an unmeasureable complacency the will and the understanding love and wonder joyes every day and the same forever this shall be their state who shall be accounted worthy of the resurrection to this life where the body shall be a partner but no servant where it shall have no work of its own but it shall rejoyce with the soul where the soul shall rule without resistance or an enemy and we shall be fitted to enjoy God who is the Lord and Father of spirits In this world we see it is quite contrary we long for perishing meat and fill our stomachs with corruption we look after white and red and the weaker beauties of the night we are passionate after rings and seals and inraged at the breaking of a Crystall we delight in the society of fools and weak persons we laugh at sin and contrive mischiefs and the body rebels against the soul and carries the cause against all its just pretences and our soul it self is above half of it earth and stone in its affections and distempers our hearts are hard and inflexible to the softer whispers of mercy and compassion having no loves for any thing but strange flesh and heaps of money and popular noises for misery and folly and therefore we are a huge way off from the Kingdome of God whose excellencies whose designs whose ends whose constitution is spirituall and holy and separate and sublime and perfect Now between these two states of naturall flesh and heavenly spirit that is the powers of darknesse and the regions of light the miseries of man and the perfections of God the imperfection of nature where we stand by our creation and supervening follies and that state of felicities whither we are designed by the mercies of God there is a middle state the Kingdome of grace wrought for us by our Mediator the man Christ Jesus who came to perfect the vertue of Religion and the designs of God and to reforme our Nature and to make it possible for us to come to that spirituall state where all felicity does dwell The Religion that Christ taught is a spirituall Religion it designs so far as this state can permit to make us spirituall that is so as the spirit be the prevailing ingredient God must now be worshipped in spirit and not only so but with a fervent spirit and though God in all religions did seise upon the spirit and even under Moses Law did by the shadow of the ceremony require the substantiall worship by cutting off the flesh intended the circumcision of the heart yet because they were to minde the outward action it took off much from the intention and activity of the spirit Man could not doe both busily And then they fail'd also in the other part of a spirituall Religion for the nature of a spirituall Religion is that in it we serve God with our hearts and affections and because while the spirit prevails we do not to evill purposes of abatement converse with flesh and bloud this service is also fervent intense active wise and busie according to the nature of things spirituall Now because God alwayes perfectly intended it yet because he lesse perfectly required it in the Law of Moses I say they fell short in both For 1. They so
half a dozen to God and one for his company or his friend his education or his appetite and if he hath parted from his folly yet he will remember the fleshpots and please himself with a phantastick sin and call it home through the gates of his memory and place it at the door of fancy that there he may behold it and consider concerning what he hath parted withall out of the fears and terrors of religion and a necessary unavoidable conscience Do not many men go from sin to sin even in their repentance they go backward from sin to sin and change their crime as a man changes his uneasie load and shakes it off from one shoulder to support it with the other How many severe persons virgins and widows are so pleased with their chastity and their abstinence even from lawfull mixtures that by this means they fall into a worse pride insomuch that I remember St. Austin said Audeo dicere superbis continentibus expedit cadere they that are chaste and proud it is sometimes a remedy for them to fall into sin and by the shame of lust to cure the devill of pride and by the sin of the body to cure the worser evils of the spirit and therefore he addes that he did beleeve God in a severe mercy did permit the barbarous nations breaking in upon the Roman Empire to violate many virgins professed in Cloisters and religious Families to be as a mortification of their pride lest the accidentall advantages of a continent life should bring them into the certain miseries of a spirituall death by taking away their humility which was more necessary then their virgin state It is not a cure that men may use but God permits it sometimes with greater safety through his wise conduct and over-ruling providence St. Peter was safer by his fall as it fell out in the event of things then by his former confidence Man must never cure a sin by a sin but he that brings good out of our evill he can when he please But I speak it to represent how deceitfully many times we do the work of the Lord. We reprove a sinning Brother but do it with a pompous spirit we separate from scandall and do it with glory and a gaudy heart we are charitable to the poor but will not forgive our unkinde enemies or we powre relief into their bags but we please our selves and drink drunk and hope to commute with God giving the fruit of our labours or effluxes of money for the sin of our souls And upon this account it is that two of the noblest graces of a Christian are to very many persons made a savour of death though they were intended for the beginning and the promotion of an eternal life and those are faith and charity some men think if they have faith it is enough to answer all the accusations of sin which our consciences or the Devils make against us If I be a wanton person yet my faith shall hide it and faith shall cover the follies of drunkennesse and I may all my life relye upon faith at last to quit my scores For he that is most carefull is not innocent but must be saved by faith and he that is least carefull may have faith and that will save him But because these men mistake concerning faith and consider not that charity or a good life is a part of that faith that saves us they hope to be saved by the Word they fill their bellies with the story of Frimalcions banquet and drink drunk with the newes of wine they eat shadows and when they are drowning catch at the image of the trees which hang over the water and are reflected from the bottome But thus many men do with charity Give almes and all things shall be clean unto you said our Blessed Saviour and therefore many keep a sin alive and make account to pay for it and God shall be put to relieve his own poor at the price of the sin of another of his servants charity shall take lust or intemperance into protection and men will not be kinde to their brethren unlesse they will be also at the same time unkinde to God I have understood concerning divers vicious persons that none have been so free in their donatives and offerings to Religion and the Priest as they and the Hospitals that have been built and the High-wayes mended at the price of souls are too many for Christendome to boast of in behalf of charity But as others mistake concerning faith so these do concerning its twin sister The first had faith without charity and these have charity without hope for every one that hath this hope that is the hope of receiving the glorious things of God promised in the Gospell purifies himself even as God is pure faith and charity too must both suppose repentance and repentance is the abolition of the whole body of sin the purification of the whole man But the summe of the Doctrine and case of conscience in this particular is this 1. Charity is a certain cure of sins that are past not that are present He that repents and leaves his sin and then relieves the poor and payes for his folly by a diminution of his own estate and the supplies of the poor and his ministring to Christs poor members turns all his former crimes into holinesse he purges the slains and makes amends for his folly and commutes for the baser pleasure with a more noble usage so said Daniel to Nebuchadnezzar Break off thy sins by righteousnesse and thine iniquities by shewing mercy to the poor first be just and then be charitable for it is pity almes which is one of the noblest services of God and the greatest mercy to thy Brother should be spent upon sin and thrown away upon folly 2. Faith is the remedy of all our evils but then it is never of force but when we either have endevoured or undertaken to do all good this in baptisme that after faith and repentance at first and faith and charity at last and because we fail often by infirmity and sometimes by inadvertency sometimes by a surprize and often by omission and all this even in the midst of a sincere endevour to live justly and perfectly therefore the passion of our Lord payes for thus and faith layes hold upon that But without a hearty and sincere intent and vigorous prosecution of all the parts of our duty faith is but a word not so much as a cover to a naked bosome nor a pretence big enough to deceive persons that are not willing to be cousened 3. The bigger ingredient of vertue and evill actions will prevail but it is only when vertue is habituall and sins are single interrupted casuall and seldome without choice and without affection that is when our repentance is so timely that it can work for God more then we served under the tyranny of sin so that if you will account the whole
reputation against piety the love of the world in civill instances to countenance enmity against God these are the deceitfull workers of Gods work they make a schisme in the duties of Religion and a warre in heaven worse then that between Michael and the Dragon for they divide the Spirit of God and distinguish his commandements into parties and factions by seeking an excuse sometimes they destroy the integrity and perfect constitution of duty or they do something whereby the effect and usefulnesse of the duty is hindred concerning all which this only can be said they who serve God with a lame sacrifice and an imperfect duty a duty defective in its constituent parts can never enjoy God because he can never be divided and though it be better to enter into heaven with one foot and one eye then that both should be cast into hell because heaven can make recompence for this losse yet nothing can repair his losse who for being lame in his duty shall enter into hell where nothing is perfect but the measures and duration of torment and they both are next to infinite SERMON XIII Part II. 2. THe next enquiry is into the intention of our duty and here it will not be amisse to change the word fraudulentèr or dolosè into that which some of the Latin Copies doe use Maledictus qui facit opus Dei negligentèr Cursed is he that doth the work of the Lord negligently or remissely and it implyes that as our duty must be whole so it must be fervent for a languishing body may have all its parts and yet be uselesse to many purposes of nature and you may reckon all the joynts of a dead man but the heart is cold and the joynts are stiffe and fit for nothing but for the little people that creep in graves and so are very many men if you summe up the accounts of their religion they can reckon dayes and months of Religion various offices charity and prayers reading and meditation faith and knowledge catechisme and sacraments duty to God and duty to Princes paying debts and provision for children confessions and tears discipline in families and love of good people and it may be you shall not reprove their numbers or find any lines unfill'd in their tables of accounts but when you have handled all this and consider'd you will find at last you have taken a dead man by the hand there is not a finger wanting but they are stiffe as Isicles and without flexure as the legs of Elephants such are they whom S. Bernard describes whose spirituall joy is allayed with tediousnesse whose compunction for sins is short and seldome whose thoughts are animall and their designes secular whose Religion is lukewarm their obedience is without devotion their discourse without profit their prayer without intention of heart their reading without instruction their meditation is without spirituall advantages and is not the commencement and strengthning of holy purposes and they are such whom modesty will not restrain nor reason bridle nor discipline correct nor the fear of death and hell can keep from yeelding to the imperiousnesse of a foolish lust that dishonors a mans understanding and makes his reason in which he most glories to be weaker then the discourse of a girle and the dreams of the night In every action of Religion God expects such a warmth and a holy fire to goe along that it may be able to enkindle the wood upon the altar and consume the sacrifice but God hates an indifferent spirit Earnestnesse and vivacity quicknesse and delight perfect choyce of the service and a delight in the prosecution is all that the spirit of a man can yeeld towards his Religion the outward work is the effect of the body but if a man does it heartily and with all his mind then religion hath wings and moves upon wheels of fire and therefore when our blessed Saviour made those capitulars and canons of Religion to love God and to love our neighbors besides that the materiall part of the duty love is founded in the spirit as its naturall seat he also gives three words to involve the spirit in the action and but one for the body Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart and with all thy soule and with all thy mind and lastly with all thy strength this brings in the body too because it hath some strengths and some significations of its own but heart and soule and mind mean all the same thing in a stronger and more earnest expression that is that we doe it hugely as much as we can with a cleer choice with a resolute understanding with strong affections with great diligence Enerves animos odisse virtus solet Vertue haâ—es weak and ineffective minds and tame easie prosecutions Loripedes people whose arme is all flesh whose foot is all leather and an unsupporting skin they creep like snakes and pursue the noblest mysteries of Religion as Naaman did the mysteries of Rimmon onely in a complement or for secular regards but without the mind and therefore without Zeal I would thou wert either hot or cold said the Spirit of God to the Angell or Bishop of Laodicea In feasts or sacrifices the Ancients did use apponere frigidam or calidam sometimes they drank hot drink sometimes they poured cold upon their graves or in their wines but no services of Tables or Altars were ever with lukewarm God hates it worse then stark cold which expression is the more considerable because in naturall and superinduc'd progressions from extreme to extreme we must necessarily passe through the midst and therefore it is certain a lukewarm Religion is better then none at all as being the doing some parts of the work designed and neerer to perfection then the utmost distance could be and yet that God hates it more must mean that there is some appendant evill in this state which is not in the other and that accidentally it is much worse and so it is if we rightly understand it that is if we consider it not as a being in or passing through the middle way but as a state and a period of Religion If it be in motion a lukewarm Religion is pleasing to God for God hates it not for its imperfection and its naturall measures of proceeding but if it stands still and rests there it is a state against the designes and against the perfection of God and it hath in it these evills 1. It is a state of the greatest imprudence in the world for it makes a man to spend his labour for that which profits not and to deny his appetite for an unsatisfying interest he puts his moneys in a napkin and he that does so puts them into a broken bag he loses the principall for not encreasing the interest He that dwells in a state of life that is unacceptable loses the money of his almes and the rewards of his charity his hours of prayer and his parts of justice
sun may shine under a cloud and a man may rejoyce in persecution and delight in losses that is though his outward man groanes and faints and dies yet his spirit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the inner man is confident and industrious and hath a hope by which it lives and works unto the end It was the case of our blessed Saviour in his agony his soule was exceeding sorrowfull unto death and the load of his Fathers anger crushed his shoulder and bowed his knees to the ground and yet he chose it and still went forward and resolved to die and did so and what wee choose wee delight in and wee thinke it to be eligible and therefore amiable and fit by its proper excellencies and appendages to be delighted in it is not pleasant to the flesh at all times for its dignity is spirituall and heavenly but therefore it is proportioned to the spirit which is as heavenly as the reward and therefore can feel the joys of it when the body hangs the head and is uneasie and troubled These are the necessary parts of zeale of which if any man failes he is in a state of lukewarmnesse and that is a spirituall death As a banished man or a condemned person is dead civilly he is diminutus capite he is not reckoned in the census nor partakes of the priviledges nor goes for a person but is reckoned among things in the possession of others so is a lukewarm person he is corde diminutus he is spiritually dead his heart is estranged from God his affections are lessened his hope diminished and his title cancell'd and he remains so unlesse 1. he prefers Religion before the world and 2. spiritually rejoyces in doing his duty and 3. doe it constantly and with perseverance These are the heats and warmth of life whatsoever is lesse then this is a disease and leads to the coldnesse and dishonors of the grave SERMON XIV Part III. 3. SO long as our zeal and forwardnesse in Religion hath only these constituent parts it hath no more then can keep the duty alive but beyond this there are many degrees of earnestnesse and vehemence which are progressions towards the state of perfection which every man ought to design and desire to be added to his portion of this sort I reckon frequency in prayer and almes above our estate Concerning which two instances I have these two cautions to insert 1. Concerning frequency in prayer it is an act of zeal so ready and prepared for the spirit of a man so easie and usefull so without objection and so fitted for every mans affairs his necessities and possibilities that he that prayes but seldome cannot in any sense pretend to be a religious person For in Scripture there is no other rule for the frequency of prayer given us but by such words which signifie we should do it alwaies Pray continually and Men ought alwayes to pray and not to faint And then men have so many necessities that if we should esteem our needs to be the circumstances and positive determination of our times of prayer we should be very far from admitting limitation of the former words but they must mean that we ought to pray frequently every day For in danger and trouble naturall Religion teaches us to pray In a festivall fortune our prudence and our needs inforce us equally For though we feel not a present smart yet we are certain then is our biggest danger and if we observe how the world treats her darlings men of riches and honour of prosperity and great successe we cannot but confesse them to be the most miserable of all men as being in the greatest danger of losing their biggest interest For they are bigger then the iron hand of Law and they cannot be restrain'd with fear the hand grasps a power of doing all that which their evill heart can desire and they cannot be restrained with disability to sin they are flatter'd by all mean and base and indiligent persons which are the greatest part of mankinde but few men dare reprove a potent sinner he shall every day be flattered and seldome counselled and his great reflexions and opinions of his condition makes him impatient of reproof and so he cannot be restrain'd with modesty and therefore as the needs of the poor man his rent day and the cryes of his children and the oppression he groans under and his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 his uneasie ill sleeping care will make him run to his prayers that in heaven a new decree may be passed every day for the provisions of his daily bread so the greater needs of the rich their temptations and their dangers the flattery and the vanity the power and the pride their businesse and evill estate of the whole world upon them cals upon them to be zealous in this instance that they pray often that they pray without ceasing For there is great reason they should do so and great security and advantage if they do For he that prayes well and prayes often must needs be a good and a blessed man and truly he that does not deserves no pity for his misery For when all the troubles and dangers of his condition may turn into his good if he will but desire they should when upon such easie terms he may be happy for there is no more trouble in it then this Aske and ye shall receive that 's all that is required no more turnings and variety in their road when I say at so cheap a rate a poor man may be provided for and a rich man may escape damnation they that refuse to apply themselves to this remedy quickly earnestly zealously and constantly deserves the smart of his poverty and the care of it and the scorne if he be poor and if he be rich it is fit he should because he desires it dye by the evils of his proper danger * It was observed by Cassian orationibus maximè insidiantur Daemones the Devill is more busie to disturb our prayers then to hinder any thing else For else it cannot be imagined why we should be brought to pray so seldome and to be so listlesse to them and so trifling to them No The Devill knowes upon what hard terms he stands with the praying man he also knows that it is a mighty emanation of Gods infinite goodnesse and a strange desire of saving mankinde that he hath to so easie a duty promised such mighty blessings For God knowing that upon hard terms we would not accept of heaven it self and yet hell was so intolerable a state that God who loved us would affixe heaven to a state of prayer and devotion this because the Devill knowes to be one of the greatest arts of the Divine mercy he labours infinitely to supplant and if he can but make men unwilling to pray or to pray coldly or to pray seldome he secures his interest and destroys the mans and it is infinitely strange that he can and doth prevail so
passion in Religion destroys as much of our evennesse of spirit as it sets forward any outward work and therefore although it be a good circumstance and degree of a spirituall duty so long as it is within and relative to God and our selves so long it is a holy flame but if it be in an outward duty or relative to our neighbours or in an instance not necessary it sometimes spoils the action and alwaies endangers it But I must remember we live in an age in which men have more need of new fires to be kindled within them and round about them then of any thing to allay their forwardnesse there is little or no zeal now but the zeal of envie and killing as many as they can and damning more then they can 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 smoke and lurking fires do corrode and secretly consume therefore this discourse is lesse necessary A Physitian would have but small imployment near the Riphaean Mountains if he could cure nothing but Calentures Catarrhes and dead palfies Colds and Consumptions are their evils and so is lukewarmnesse and deadnesse of spirit the proper maladies of our age for though some are hot when they are mistaken yet men are cold in a righteous cause and the nature of this evill is to be insensible and the men are farther from a cure because they neither feel their evill nor perceive their danger But of this I have already given account and to it I shall only adde what an old spirituall person told a novice in religion asking him the cause why he so frequently suffered tediousnesse in his religious offices Nondum vidisti requiem quam speramus nec tormenta quae timemus young man thou hast not seen the glories which are laid up for the zealous and devout nor yet beheld the flames which are prepared for the lukewarm and the haters of strict devotion But the Jewes tell that Adam having seen the beauties and tasted the delicacies of Paradise repented and mourned upon the Indian Mountains for three hundred years together and we who have a great share in the cause of his sorrowes can by nothing be invited to a persevering a great a passionate religion more then by remembring what he lost and what is laid up for them whose hearts are burning lamps and are all on fire with Divine love whose flames are fann'd with the wings of the holy Dove and whose spirits shine and burn with that fire which the holy Jesus came to enkindle upon the earth Sermon XV. The House of Feasting OR THE EPICVRES MEASVRES Part I. 1 Cor. 15. 32. last part Let us eat and drink for to morrow we dye THis is the Epicures Proverb begun upon a weak mistake started by chance from the discourses of drink and thought witty by the undiscerning company and prevail'd infinitely because it struck their fancy luckily and maintained the merry meeting but as it happens commonly to such discourses so this also when it comes to be examined by the consultations of the morning and the sober hours of the day it seems the most witlesse and the most unreasonable in the world When Seneca describes the spare diet of Epicurus and Metrodorus he uses this expression Liberaliora sunt alimenta carceris sepositos ad capitale supplicium non tam angustè qui occisurus est pascit The prison keeps a better table and he that is to kill the criminall to morrow morning gives him a better supper over night By this he intended to represent his meal to be very short for as dying persons have but little stomach to feast high so they that mean to cut the throat will think it a vain expence to please it with delicacies which after the first alteration must be poured upon the ground and looked upon as the worst part of the accursed thing And there is also the same proportion of unreasonablenesse that because men shall die to morrow and by the sentence and unalterable decree of God they are now descending to their graves that therefore they should first destroy their reason and then force dull time to run faster that they may dye sottish as beasts and speedily as a flie But they thought there was no life after this or if there were it was without pleasure and every soul thrust into a hole and a dorter of a spans length allowed for his rest and for his walk and in the shades below no numbring of healths by the numerall letters of Philenium's name no fat Mullets no Oysters of Luerinus no Lesbian or Chian Wines 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Therefore now enjoy the delicacies of Nature and feel the descending wines distilled through the limbecks of thy tongue and larynx and suck the delicious juice of fishes the marrow of the laborious Oxe and the tender lard of Apultan Swine and the condited bellies of the scarus but lose no time for the Sun drives hard and the shadow is long and the dayes of mourning are at hand but the number of the dayes of darknesse and the grave cannot be told Thus they thought they discoursed wisely and their wisdome was turned into folly for all their arts of providence and witty securities of pleasure were nothing but unmanly prologues to death fear and folly sensuality and beastly pleasures But they are to be excused rather then we They placed themselves in the order of beasts and birds and esteemed their bodies nothing but receptacles of flesh and wine larders and pantries and their soul the fine instrument of pleasure and brisk perception of relishes and gusts reflexions and duplications of delight and therefore they treated themselves accordingly But then why we should do the same things who are led by other principles and a more severe institution and better notices of immortality who understand what shall happen to a soul hereafter and know that this time is but a passage to eternity this body but a servant to the soul this soul a minister to the Spirit and the whole man in order to God and to felicity this I say is more unreasonable then to eat aconite to preserve our health and to enter into the floud that we may die a dry death this is a perfect contradiction to the state of good things whither we are designed and to all the principles of a wise Philophy whereby we are instructed that we may become wise unto salvation That I may therefore do some assistances towards the curing the miseries of mankinde and reprove the follies and improper motions towards felicity I shall endevour to represent to you 1. That plenty and the pleasures of the world are no proper instruments of felicity 2. That intemperance is a certain enemy to it making life unpleasant and death troublesome and intolerable 3. I shall adde the rules and measures of temperance in eating and drinking that nature and grace may joyne to the constitution of mans felicity 1. Plenty and the pleasures of the world are
of good things And this was intimated by S. James Doe not rich men oppresse you and draw you before the Judgment seat For all men are passionate to live according to that state in which they were born or to which they are devolved or which they have framed to themselves Those therefore that love to live high and deliciously Et quibus in solo vivendi causa palato who live not to God but to their belly not to sober counsels but to an intemperate table have framed to themselves a manner of living which oftentimes cannot be maintain'd but by injustice and violence which coming from a man whose passions are made big with sensuality and an habituall folly by pride and forgetfulnesse of the condition and miseries of mankind are alwayes unreasonable and sometimes intolerable regustatum digito terebrare salinum Contentus perages si vivere cum Jove tendis Formidable is the state of an intemperate man whose sin begins with sensuality and grows up in folly and weak discourses and is fed by violence and applauded by fooles and parasites full bellies and empty heads servants and flatterers whose hands are full of flesh and blood and their hearts empty of pity and naturall compassion where religion cannot inhabit and the love of God must needs be a stranger whose talk is loud and trifling injurious and impertinent and whose imployment is the same with the work of the sheep or the calfe alwayes to eat their loves are the lusts of the lower belly and their portion is in the lower regions to eternall ages where their thirst and their hunger and their torment shall be infinite 4. Intemperance is a perfect destruction of Wisdome 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a full gorg'd belly never produc'd a sprightly mind and therefore these kind of men are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 slow bellies so S. Paul concerning the intemperate Cretans out of their owne Poet they are like the Tigres of Brasil which when they are empty are bold and swift and full of sagacity but being full sneak away from the barking of a village dog So are these men wise in the morning quick and fit for businesse but when the sun gives the signe to spread the tables and intemperance brings in the messes and drunkennesse fills the bouls then the man fals away and leaves a beast in his room nay worse 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they are dead all but their throat and belly so Aristophanes hath fitted them with a character carkasses above halfe way Plotinus descends one step lower yet affirming such persons 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they are made trees whose whole imployment and life is nothing but to feed and suck juices from the bowels of their Nurse and Mother and indeed commonly they talke as trees in a wind and tempest the noise is great and querulous but it signifies nothing but trouble and disturbance A full meal is like Sisera's banquet at the end of which there is a nail struck into a mans head 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so Porphyrie it knocks a man down and nayls his soul to the sensuall mixtures of the body For what wisdome can be expected from them whose soul dwels in clouds of meat and floats up and down in wine like the spilled cups which fell from their hands when they could lift them to their heads no longer 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It is a perfect shipwrack of a Man the Pilot is drunk and the helm dash'd in pieces and the ship first reels and by swallowing too much is it self swallowed up at last And therefore the Navis Agrigentina the madnesse of the young fellows of Agrigentum who being drunk fancyed themselves in a storm and the house the ship was more then the wilde fancy of their cups it was really so they were all cast away they were broken in pieces by the foul disorder of the storm Hinc vini atque somni degener discordia Libido sordens inverecundus lepos Variaeque pestes languidorum sensuum Hinc frequenti marcida oblectamine Scintilla mentis intorpescit nobilis Animscsque pigris stertit in praecordiis The senses languish the spark of Divinity that dwels within is quenched and the mind snorts dead with sleep and fulnesse in the fouler regions of the belly So have I seen the eye of the world looking upon a fenny bottome and drinking up too free draughts of moysture gather'd them into a cloud and that cloud crept about his face and made him first look red and then cover'd him with darknesse and an artificiall night so is our reason at a feast Putrem resudans crapulam Obstrangulatae mentis ingenium premit The clouds gather about the head and according to the method and period of the children and productions of darkness it first grows red and that rednesse turns into an obscurity and a thick mist and reason is lost to all use and profitablenesse of wise and sober discourses 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a cloud of folly and distraction darkens the soul and makes it crasse and materiall polluted and heavy clogg'd and loaden like the body 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And there cannot be any thing said worse reason turnes into folly wine and flesh into a knot of clouds the soul it self into a body and the spirit into corrupted meat there is nothing left but the rewards and portions of a fool to be reaped and enjoyed there where flesh and corruption shall dwell to eternall ages and therefore in Scripture such men are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hesternis vitiis animum quoque praegravant Their heads are grosse their soules are immerged in matter and drowned in the moystures of an unwholsome cloud they are dull of hearing slow in apprehension and to action they are as unable as the hands of a childe who too hastily hath broken the inclosures of his first dwelling But temperance is reasons girdle and passions bridle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so Homer in Stobaeus that 's 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 prudence is safe while the man is temperate and therefore 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is opposed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a temperate man is no fool for temperance is the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 such as Plato appointed to night-walkers a prison to restraine their inordinations it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Pythagoras calls it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so Socrates 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so Plato 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so Iämblicus It is the strength of the soule the foundation of vertue the ornament of all good things and the corroborative of all excellent habits 5. After all this I shall the lesse need to add that intemperance is a dishonor and disreputation to the nature and the person and the manners of a Man But naturally men are ashamed of it and the needs of nature shal be the vail for their gluttony and the night shall cover their drunkennesse 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which the Apostle rightly
renders They that are drunk are drunk in the night but the Priests of Heliopolis never did sacrifice to the Sun with wine meaning that this is so great a dishonor that the Sun ought not to see it and they that think there is no other eye but the Sun that sees them may cover their shame by choosing their time just as children doe their danger by winking hard and not looking on 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 To drink sweet drinks and hot to quaffe great draughts and to eat greedily Theophrastus makes them characters of a Clown And now that I have told you the foulnesse of the Epicures feasts and principles it will be fit that I describe the measures of our eating and drinking that the needs of nature may neither become the cover to an intemperate dish nor the freer refreshment of our persons be changed into scruples that neither our vertue nor our conscience fall into an evill snare 1. The first measure of our eating and drinking is our natural needs 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 these are the measures of nature that the body be free from pain and the soul from violence Hunger and thirst and cold are the naturall diseases of the body and food and rayment are their remedies and therefore are the measures In quantum sitis atque fames frigora poscunt Quantum Epicure tibi parvis suffecit in hortis But in this there are two cautions 1. Hunger and thirst are onely to be extinguished while they are violent and troublesome and are not to be provided for to the utmost extent and possibilities of nature a man is not hungry so long till he can eat no more but till its sharpnesse and trouble is over and he that does not leave some reserves for temperance gives all that he can to nature and nothing at all to grace For God hath given a latitude in desires and degrees of appetite and when he hath done he laid restraint upon it in some whole instances and of some parts in every instance that man might have something to serve God of his own and something to distinguish him from a beast in the use of their common faculties Beasts cannot refrain but fill all the capacity when they can and if a man does so he does what becomes a beast and not a man And therefore there are some little symptomes of this inordination by which a man may perceive himself to have transgressed his measures Ructation uneasie loads singing looser pratings importune drowsinesse provocation of others to equall and full chalices and though in every accident of this signification it is hard for another to pronounce that the man hath sinned yet by these he may suspect himself and learn the next time to hold the bridle harder 2. This hunger must be naturall not artificiall and provoked For many men make necessities to themselves and then think they are bound to provide for them It is necessary to some men to have garments made of the Calabrian fleece stain'd with the blood of the murex and to get money to buy pearls round and orient scelerata hoc fecit pulpa but it is the mans luxury that made it so and by the same principle it is that in-meats what is abundant to nature is defective and beggerly to art and when nature willingly rises from Table when the first course of flesh plain and naturall is done then art and sophistry and adulterate dishes invite him to taste and die 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 well may a sober man wonder that men should be so much in love with earth and corrution the parent of rottennesse and a disease that even then when by all laws witches and inchanters murderers and manstealers are chastised and restrain'd with the iron hands of death yet that men should at great charges give pensions to an order of men whose trade it is to rob them of their temperance and wittily to destroy their health 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Greek Fathers call such persons curvae in terris animae coelestium inanes people bowed downe to the earth lovers of pleasures more then lovers of God Aretinas mentes so Antidamus calls them men framed in the furnaces of Etruria Aretine spirits beginning and ending in flesh and filthynesse dirt and clay all over But goe to the Crib thou glutton and there it will be found that when the charger is clean yet natures rules were not prevaricated the beast eats up all his provisions because they are naturall and simple or if he leaves any it is because he desires no more then till his needs be served and neither can a man unlesse he be diseased in body or inspirit in affection or in habit eat more of naturall and simple food then to the satisfactions of his naturall necessities He that drinks a draught or two of water and cooles his thirst drinks no more till his thirst returnes but he that drinks wine drinks it again longer then it is needfull even so long as it is pleasant Nature best provides for her self when she spreads her own Table but when men have gotten superinduced habits and new necessities art that brought them in must maintain them but wantonnesse and folly wait at the table and sickness and death take away 2. Reason is the second measure or rather the rule whereby we judge of intemperance For whatsoever loads of meat or drink make the reason uselesse or troubled are effects of this deformity not that reason is the adequate measure for a man may be intemperate upon other causes though he doe not force his understanding and trouble his head Some are strong to drink and can eat like a wolfe and love to doe so as fire to destroy the stubble such were those Harlots in the Comedy Quae cum amatore suo cum coenant liguriunt These persons are to take their accounts from the measures of Religion and the Spirit though they can talk still or transact the affaires of the world yet if they be not fitted for the things of the Spirit they are too full of flesh or wine and cannot or care not to attend to the things of God But reason is the limit beyond which temperance never wanders and in every degree in which our discourse is troubled and our soul is lifted from its wheels in the same degree the sin prevails Dum sumus in quâdam delinquendi libidine nebulis quibusdam insipientiae mens obducitur saith St. Ambrose when the flesh-pots reek and the uncovered dishes send forth a nidor and hungry smels that cloud hides the face and puts out the eye of reason and then tell them mors in ollâ that death is in the pot and folly in the chalice that those smels are fumes of brimstone and vapours of Egypt that they will make their heart easie and their head sottish and their colour pale and their hands trembling and their feet tormented Mullorum leporúmque suminis exitus
bosome and he sighes deeply Ah tum te miserum malique fati Quem attractis pedibus patente portâ Percurrent mugiléque raphanique The boyes and the pedlers and the fruiterers shall tell of this man when he is carryed to his grave that he lived and dyed a poor wretched person The Stags in the Greek Epigram whose knees were clog'd with frozen snow upon the mountains came down to the brooks of the vallies 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 hoping to thaw their joynts with the waters of the stream but there the frost overtook them and bound them fast in ice till the young heardsmen took them in their stranger snare It is the unhappy chance of many men finding many inconveniences upon the mountains of single life they descend into the vallies of marriage to refresh their troubles and there they enter into fetters and are bound to sorrow by the cords of a mans or womans peevishnesse and the worst of the evill is they are to thank their own follies for they fell into the snare by entring an improper way Christ and the Church were no ingredients in their choice but as the Indian women enter into folly for the price of an Elephant and think their crime warrantable so do men and women change their liberty for a rich fortune like Eriphyle the Argive 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 she prefer'd gold before a good man and shew themselves to be lesse then money by overvaluing that to all the content and wise felicity of their lives and when they have counted the money and their sorrowes together how willingly would they buy with the losse of all that money modesty or sweet nature to their relative the odde thousand pound would gladly be allowed in good nature and fair manners As very a fool is he that chooses for beauty principally cui sunt eruditi oculi stulta mens as one said whose eyes are witty and their soul sensuall It is an ill band of affections to tye two hearts together by a little thread of red and white 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And they can love no longer but untill the next ague comes and they are fond of each other but at the chance of fancy or the small pox or childebearing or care or time or any thing that can destroy a pretty flower But it is the basest of all when lust is the Paranymph and solicits the suit and makes the contract and joyn'd the hands for this is commonly the effect of the former according to the Greek proverb 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 At first for his fair cheeks and comely beard the beast is taken for a Lion but at last he is turn'd to a Dragon or a Leopard or a Swine That which is at first beauty on the face may prove lust in the manners 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 So Eubulus wittily reprehended such impure contracts they offer in their maritall sacrifices nothing but the thigh and that which the Priests cut from the goats when they were laid to bleed upon the Altars 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 said St. Clement He or she that looks too curiously upon the beauty of the body looks too low and hath flesh and corruption in his heart and is judg'd sensuall and earthly in his affections and desires Begin therefore with God Christ is the president of marriage and the holy Ghost is the fountain of purities and chast loves and he joynes the hearts and therefore let our first suit be in the court of heaven and with designs of piety or safety or charity let no impure spirit defile the virgin purities and castifications of the soul as St. Peters phrase is let all such contracts begin with religious affections Conjugium petimus partúmque uxoris at illi Notum qui pueri qualisve futura sit uxor We sometimes beg of God for a wife or a childe and he alone knows what the wife shall prove and by what dispositions and manners and into what fortune that childe shall enter but we shall not need to fear concerning the event of it if religion and fair intentions and prudence manage and conduct it all the way The preservation of a family the production of children the avoiding fornication the refreshment of our sorrowes by the comforts of society all these are fair ends of marriage and hallow the entrance but in these there is a speciall order society was the first designed It is not good for man to be alone Children was the next Increase and multiply but the avoiding fornication came in by the superfetation of the evill accidents of the world The first makes marriage delectable the second necessary to the publick the third necessary to the particular This is for safety for life and heaven it self Nam simulac venas inflavit dira cupido Huc juvenes aequum est descendere The other have in them joy and a portion of immortality the first makes the mans heart glad the second is the friend of Kingdomes and cities and families and the third is the enemy to hell and an antidote of the chiefest inlet to damnation but of all these the noblest end is the multiplying children Mundus cum patet Deorum tristium atque inferûm quasi patet janua propterea uxorem liberorum quaerendorum causâ ducere religiosum est said Varro It is religion to marry for children and Quintilian puts it into the definition of a wife est enim uxor quam jungit quam diducit utilitas cujus haec reverentia est quòd videtur inventa in causa liberorum and therefore St. Ignatius when he had spoken of Elias and Titus and Clement with an honourable mention of their virgin state lest he might seem to have lessened the marryed Apostles at whose feet in Christs Kingdome he thought himself unworthy to sit he gives this testimony they were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that they might not be disparaged in their great names of holinesse and severity they were secured by not marrying to satisfie their lower appetites but out of desire of children Other considerations if they be incident and by way of appendage are also considerable in the accounts of prudence but when they become principles they defile the mystery and make the blessing doubtfull Amabit sapiens cupient caeteri said Afranius love is a fair inducement but desire and appetite are rude and the characterismes of a sensuall person Amare justi boni est cupere impotentis to love belongs to a just and a good man but to lust or furiously and passionately to desire is the sign of impotency and an unruly minde 2. Man and wife are equally concerned to avoid all offences of each other in the beginning of their conversation every little thing can blast an infant blossome and the breath of the south can shake the little rings of the Vine when first they begin to curle like the
company by folly and inconsideration and all these are a faction and a confederacy against the honour and service of God And in this Philosophy is at a stand nothing can give an account of it but experience and sorrowfull instances for it is infinitely unreasonable that when you have discoursed wisely against unchastity and told that we are separated from it by a circumvallation of Lawes of God and man that it dishonours the body and makes the spirit caitive that it is fought against by arguments sent from all the corners of reason and religion and the man knows all this and beleeves it and prayes against his sin and hates himself for it and curses the actions of it yet oppose against all this but a fable or a merry story a proverb or a silly saying the sight of his mistresse or any thing but to lessen any one of the arguments brought against it and that man shall as certainly and clearly be determined to that sin as if he had on his side all the reason of the world 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Custome does as much as Nature can doe it does sometimes more and superinduces a disposition contrary to our naturall temper Eudemus had so used his stomach to so unnaturall drinks that as himself tels the story he took in one day two and twenty potions in which Hellebore was infused and rose at noon and supp'd at night and felt no change So are those that are corrupted with evill customes nothing will purge them if you discourse wittily they hear you not or if they do they have twenty wayes to answer and twice twenty to neglect it if you perswade them to promise to leave their sin they do but shew their folly at the next temptation and tell that they did not mean it and if you take them at an advantage when their hearts are softned with a judgement or a fear with a shame or an indignation and then put the bars and locks of vowes upon them it is all one one vow shall hinder but one action and the appetite shall be doubled by the restraint and the next opportunity shall make an amends for the first omission or else the sin shall enter by parts the vow shall only put the understanding to make a distinction or to change the circumstance and under that colour the crime shall be admitted because the man is resolved to suppose the matter so dressed was not vowed against But then when that is done the understanding shall open that eye that did but wink before and see that it was the same thing and secretly rejoyce that it was so cousened for now the lock is open'd and the vow was broken against his will and the man is at liberty again because he did the thing at unawares 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 still he is willing to beleeve the sin was not formall vow-breach but now he sees he broke it materially and because the band is broken the yoke is in pieces therefore the next action shall go on upon the same stock of a single iniquity without being afrighted in his conscience at the noise of perjury I wish we were all so innocent as not to understand the discourse but it uses to be otherwise Nam si discedas laqueo tenet ambitiosi Consuetudo mali in aegro corde senescit Custome hath waxen old in his deceived heart and made snares for him that he cannot disintangle himself so true is that saying of God by the Prophet Can an Aethiop change his skin then may ye learn to do well when ye are accustomed to do evill But I instance in two things which to my sense seem great aggravations of the slavery and weaknesse of a customary sinner The first is that men sin against their interest They know they shall be ruin'd by it it will undoe their estates lose their friends ruine their fortunes destroy their body impoverish the spirit load the conscience discompose his rest confound his reason amaze him in all his faculties destroy his hopes and mischief enough besides and when he considers this he declares against it but Cum bona verba erumpant affectus tamen ad consuetudinem relabuntur the man gives good words but the evill custome prevails and it happens as in the case of the Tyrinthians who to free their nation from a great plague were bidden only to abstain from laughter while they offered their sacrifice but they had been so us'd to a ridiculous effeminacy and vain course of conversation that they could not though the honour and splendor of the Nation did depend upon it God of his mercy keep all Christian people from a custome in sinning for if they be once fallen thither nothing can recover them but a miraculous grace 2. The second aggravation of it is that custome prevails against experience Though the man hath already smarted though he hath been disgraced and undone though he lost his relation and his friends he is turn'd out of service and disimployed he begs with a load of his old sins upon his shoulders yet this will not cure an evill custome Do not we daily see how miserable some men make themselves with drunkennesse and folly Have not we seen them that have been sick with intemperance deadly sick enduring for one drunken meeting more pain then are in all the fasting dayes of the whole year and yet do they not the very next day go to it again Indeed some few are smitten into the beginning of repentance and they stay a fortnight or a moneth and it may be resist two or three invitations but yet the custome is not gone Nec tu cum obstiteris semel instantique negaris Parêre imperio Rupi jam vincula dicas Think not the chain is off when thou hast once or twice resisted or if the chain be broke part remains on thee like a cord upon a dogs neck Nam luctata canis nodum arripit attamen illi Cum fugit à collo trahitur pars magna catenae He is not free that drawes his chain after him and he that breaks off from his sins with greatest passion stands in need of prosperous circumstances and a strange freedome from temptation and accidentall hardnesse and superinduced confidence and a preternaturall severity Opus est aliquâ fortunae indulgentiâ adhuc inter humana luctanti dum noaumillum exolvit omne vinculum mortale for the knot can hardly be untied which a course of evill manners hath bound upon the soul and every contingency in the world can intangle him that wears upon his neck the links of a broken chain Nam qui ab eo quod amat quà m extemplò suavi is sagittatis percussus est illico res foras labitur liquitur if he sees his temptation again he is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 his kindnesse to it and conversation with his lust undoes him and breaks his purposes and then he dies again or fals upon that stone that with
so much pains he removed a little out of his way and he would lose the spent wealth or the health and the reputation over again if it were in his power Philomusus was a wilde young fellow in Domitian's time and he was hard put to it to make a large pension to maintain his lust and luxury and he was every moneth put to beggerly arts to feed his crime But when his father died and left him all he disinherited himself he spent it all though he knew he was to suffer that trouble alwayes which vexed his lustfull soul in the frequent periods of his violent want Now this is such a state of slavery that persons that are sensible ought to complain 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that they serve worse lords them Egyptian task-masters there is a lord within that rules and rages Intus in jecore aegro pascuntur domini sin dwels there and makes a man a miserable servant and this is not only a Metaphoricall expression under which some spirituall and metaphysicall truth is represented but it is a physicall materiall truth and a man endures hardship he cannot move but at this command and not his outward actions only but his will and his understanding too are kept in fetters and foolish bondage 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 said Marcus Antoninus The two parts of a man are rent in sunder and that that prevails is the life it is the man it is the eloquence perswading every thing to its own interest * And now consider what is the effect of this evill A man by sin is made a slave he loses that liberty that is dearer to him then life it self and like the dog in the fable we suffer chains and ropes only for a piece of bread when the Lion thought liberty a sufficient reward and price for hunger and all the hardnesses of the wildernesse Do not all the world fight for liberty and at no terms will lay down armes till at least they be cousened with the image and colour of it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and yet for the pleasure of a few minutes we give our selves into bondage and all the world does it more or lesse 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Either men are slaves to fortune or to lust to covetousnesse or tyranny something or other compels him to usages against his will and reason and when the lawes cannot rule him money can divitiae enim apud sapientem virum in servitute sunt apud stultum in imperio for money is the wise mans servant and the fools Master but the bondage of a vicious person is such a bondage as the childe hath in the wombe or rather as a sick man in his bed we are bound fast by our disease and a consequent weaknesse we cannot go forth though the doors be open and the fetters knockt off and vertue and reason like St. Peters Angel call us and bâ—at us upon the sides and offer to go before us yet we cannot come forth from prison for we have by our evill customes given hostages to the Devill never to stirre from the enemies quarter and this is the greatest bondage that is imaginable the bondage of conquered wounded unresisting people 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Vertue only is the truest liberty And if the Son of God make us free then are we free indeed 3. Sin does naturally introduce a great basenesse upon the spirit expressed in Scripture in some cases by the Devils entring into a man as it was in the case of Judas after he had taken the sop Satan entred into him and St. Cyprian speaking of them that after Baptisme lapsed into foul crimes he affirms that spiritu immundo quasi redeunte quatiuntur ut manifestum sit Diabolum in baptismo side credentis excludi si sides postmedum defecerit regredi Faith and the grace of Baptisme turns the Devill out of possession but when faith fails and we loose the bands of Religion then the Devill returns that is the man is devolved into such sins of which there can be no reason given which no excuse can lessen which are set off with no pleasure advanced by no temptations which deceive by no allurements and flattering pretences such things which have a proper and direct contrariety to the good Spirit and such as are not restrained by humane laws because they are states of evill rather then evill actions principles of mischief rather then direct emanations such as are u. thankfulnesse impiety giving a secret blow fawning bypocrisie detraction impudence forgetfulnesse of the dead and forgetting to do that in their absence which we promised to them in presence 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Concerning which sorts of unworthinesse it is certain they argue a most degenerous spirit and they are the effect the naturall effect of malice and despair an unwholesome ill natur'd soul a soul corrupted in its whole constitution I remember that in the Apologues of Phaedrus it is told concerning an ill natured fellow that he refused to pay his Symbol which himself and all the company had agreed should be given for every disease that each man had he denying his itch to be a disease but the company taking off the refusers hat for a pledge found that he had a scal'd head and so demanded the money double which he pertinaciously resisting they threw him down and then discovered he was broken bellied and justly condemned him to pay three Philippicks Quae fuerat fabula poenafuit One disease discovers it self by the hiding of another and that being open'd discovers a third He that is almost taken in a fault tels a lye to escape and to protect that lye he forswears himself and that he may not be suspected of perjury he growes impudent and that sin may not shame him he will glory in it like the slave in the Comedy who being torn with whips grinn'd and forc'd an ugly smile that it might not seem to smart * There are some sins which a man that is newly fallen cannot entertain There is no crime made ready for a young sinner but that which nature prompts him to Naturall inclination is the first tempter then compliance then custome but this being helped by a consequent folly dismantles the soul making it to hate God to despise Religion to laugh at severity to deride sober counsels to flie from repentance to resolve against it to delight in sin without abatement of spirit or purposes For it is an intolerable thing for a man to be tormented in his conscience for every sin he acts that must not be he must have his sin and his peace too or else he can have neither long and because true peace cannot come for there is no peace saith my God to the wicked therefore they must make a phantastick peace by a studied cousening of themselves by false propositions by carelesnesse by stupidity by impudence by sufferance and
habit by conversation and daily acquaintances by doing some things as Absalom did when he lay with his fathers concubines to make it impossible for him to repent or to be forgiven something to secure him in the possession of hell Tute hoc intristi quod tibi exedendum est the man must thorough it now and this is it that makes men fall into all basenesse of spirituall sins 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 when a man is come to the bottome of his wickednsse he despises all such as malice and despite rancor and impudence malicious studied ignorance voluntary contempt of all Religion hating of good men and good counsels and taking every wise man and wise action to be his enemy 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And this is that basenesse of sin which Plato so much detested that he said he should blush to be guilty of though he knew God would pardon him and that men should never know it propter solam peccati turpitudinem for the very basenesse that is in it A man that is false to God will also if an evill temptation overtakes him betray his friend and it is notorious in the covetous and ambitious 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They are an unthankfull generation and to please the people or to serve their interest will hurt their friends That man hath so lost himself to all sweetnesse and excellency of spirit that is gone thus farre in sin that he looks like a condemned man or is like the accursed spirits preserved in chains of darknesse and impieties unto the Judgement of the great Day 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 this man can be nothing but evill for these inclinations and evill forwardnesses this dyscrasie and gangren'd disposition does alwaies suppose a long or a base sin for their parent and the product of these is a wretchlesse spirit that is an aptnesse to any unworthinesse and an unwillingnesse to resist any temptation a perseverance in basenesse and a consignation to all damnation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If men do evill things evill things shall be their reward If they obey the evill spirit an evill spirit shall be their portion and the Devill shall enter into them as he entred into Judas and fill them full of iniquity SERMON XXI Part III. 4. ALthough these are shamefull effects of sin and a man need no greater dishonour then to be a fool and a slave and a base person all which sin infallibly makes him yet there are some sins which are directly shamefull in their nature and proper disreputation and a very great many sins are the worst and basest in severall respects that is every of them hath a venomous quality of its own whereby it is marked and appropriated to a peculiar evill spirit The Devils sin was the worst because it came from the greatest malice Adams was the worst because it was of most universall efficacy and dissemination Judas sin the worst of men because against the most excellent person and the relapses of the godly are the worst by reason they were the most obliged persons But the ignorance of the Law is the greatest of evils if we consider its danger but covetousnesse is worse then it if we regard its incurable and growing nature luxury is most alien from spirituall things and is the worst of all in its temptation and our pronenesse but pride growes most venomous by its unreasonablenesse and importunity arising even from the good things a man hath even from graces and endearments and from being more in debt to God Sins of malice and against the Holy Ghost oppugn the greatest grace with the greatest spite but Idolatry is perfectly hated by God by a direct enmity Some sins are therefore most hainous because to resist them is most easie and to act them there is the least temptation such as are severally lying and swearing There is a strange poison in the nature of sins that of so many sorts every one of them should be the worst Every sin hath an evill spirit a Devill of its own to manage to conduct and to imbitter it and although all these are Gods enemies and have an appendant shame in their retinue yet to some sins shame is more appropriate and a proper ingredient in their constitutions such as are lying and lust and vow-breach and inconstancy God sometimes cures the pride of a mans spirit by suffering his evill manners and filthy inclination to be determin'd upon lust lust makes a man afraid of publick eyes and common voices it is as all sins else are but this especially a work of darknesse it does debauch the spirit and make it to decay and fall off from courage and resolution constancy and severity the spirit of government and a noble freedome and those punishments which the nations of the world have inflicted upon it are not smart so much as shame Lustfull souls are cheap and easie trifling and despised in all wise accounts they are so farre from being fit to sit with Princes that they dare not chastise a sinning servant that is private to their secret follies It is strange to consider what laborious arts of concealment what excuses and lessenings what pretences and fig-leaves men will put before their nakednesse and crimes shame was the first thing that entred upon the sin of Adam and when the second world began there was a strange scene of shame acted by Noah and his sons and it ended in slavery and basenesse to all descending generations We see the event of this by too sad an experience What arguments what hardnesse what preaching what necessity can perswade men to confesse their sins they are so ashamed of them that to be conceal'd they preferre before their remedy and yet in penitentiall confession the shame is going off it is like Cato's coming out of the Theatre or the Philosopher from the Taverne it might have been shame to have entred but glory to have departed for ever and yet ever to have relation to sin is so shame-full a thing that a mans spirit is amazed and his face is confounded when he is dressed of so shamefull a disease And there are but few men that will endure it but rather choose to involve it in excuses and deniall in the clouds of lying and the white linnen of hypocrisie and yet when they make a vail for their shame such is the fate of sin the shame growes the bigger and the thicker we lye to men and we excuse it to God either some parts of lying or many parts of impudence darknesse or forgetfulnesse running away or running further in these are the covers of our shame like menstruous rags upon a skin of leprosie But so sometimes we see a decayed beauty besmear'd with a lying fucus and the chinks fill'd with ceruse besides that it makes no reall beauty it spoils the face and betrayes evill manners it does not hide old age or