nature Sensitive and Rationall and the first doth naturally lead and conduce to the other But because by the languor and faintnesse of our nature we lazily rest there and for the most part goe no further in our journeys therfore out of this ordinary indisposition Aquinas pronounceth that the inclination of our sensitive nature is against the law of reason And this is that which the Apostle calls the law of the flesh and opposeth against the law of the spirit Now although it be possible to sinne and transgresse against this sensitive nature which naturally and lawfully is inclined upon bonum delectabile by denying to it lawfull refreshings and fomentations yet I think this is not that law of nature which these abhorrers of SELF-HOMICIDE complaine to bee violated by that Act. For so they might aswell accuse all discipline and austeritie and affectation of Martyrdome which are as contrarie to the Law of sensitive Nature SECT IX And therefore by law of nature if they will meane any thing and speak to be understood they must entend the law of rationall nature which is that light which God hath afforded us of his eternall law and which is usually call'd recta ratio Now this law of nature as it is onely in man and in him directed upon Piety Religion Sociablenesse and such for as it reacheth to the preservation both of Åšpecies and individualls there are lively prints of it in beasts is with most authors confounded and made the same with jus gentium So Azorius and so Sylvius delivers That the law of nature as it concerns only reason is jâ—… gentium and therefore whatever is jus gentium that is practised and accepted in most especially civil'st nations is also law of nature which Artemidorus exâ—…mplifies in these two Deum colere mulieâ—…ibus vinci How then shall we â—…ccuse Idolarry or immolation of men to be sinnes against nature For not to speak of the first which like a deâ—…uge overflowed the whole world and only Canaan was a little Ark swimming upon it delivered frâ—…m utter drowning but yet not from stoâ—…mes and and leakes and dangerous weather-beatings immolation of men was so ordinary that almost every nation though not batbaâ—…ous had received it the Dâ—…uids of France made their divinations from sacrifices of men And in their wars they presaged also after the same fashion And for our times it appeares by the Spanish relations that in only Hispaniola they sacrific'd yearly 20000 children SECT X. However since this is receiv'd that the nature of every thing is the forme by which it is constituted and that to doe against it is to doe against nature since also this forme in man is reason and so to commit against reason is to sin against nature what sin can be exempt from that charge that it is a sin against nature since every sin is against reason And in this acceptation Lucidus takes the law of nature when he sayes God hath written in our hearts such a law of nature as by that we are saved in the coming of Christ. And so every act which concurres not exactly with our religion shall bee sinne against nature Which will appeare evidently out of Jeremies words where God promiseth as a future blessing that he will write his lawes in their hearts which is the Christian law So that the Christian law and the law of nature for that is the law written in hearts must be all one Sinne therefore against nature is not so enormous but that that may stand true which Navar saith that many lawes both naturall and divine doe bind onely ad veniale And so nor disputing at this time whither it be against reasonal waies or no for reason and vertue differ no otherwise than a close box of druggs and an emplaister or medicine made from thence and applyed to a particular use and necessitie and in the box are not onely aromatike simples but many poysons which the nature of the disease and the art of the Administrer make wholsome This SELF-HOMICIDE is no more against the law of nature then any other sinne nor in any of the acceptations which we touch'd before And this is as much as I determined for this first Distinction Distinction II. SECT I. THere is a lower and narrower acceptation of this law of nature which could not well be discerned but by this light and fore-discoursing against which law this sinne and a very few more seeme to be directly bent and opposed For Azorius sayes That there are sinnes peculiarly against nature which are contra naturalem usum hominis which he exemplifies in unnaturall lusts and in this And of the former example Aquinas sayes That there are some kinds of lusts which are sinnes against nature both as they are generally vices and as they are against the naturall order of the act of generation In the Scriptures also this sinne of mis-using the Sexe is called against nature by S. Paul And once in the vulgar edition in the old Testament But as I intimated once before this sinne against nature is so much abhor'd not because the being against nature makes it so abominable but because the knowledge therof is so domestique so neare so inward to us that our conscience cannot slumber in it nor dissemble it as in most other sinnes it doth For in that example of the Levite in the booke of Judges if those wicked men did seeke him for that abominable use which Iosephus sayes was onely for his wife And when himself relates to the people the history of his injury in the next chapter he complains that they went about to kill him to enjoy his wife and of no other kind of injury though the Host which had harbor'd him disswade the men thus solum non operemini hoc contra naturam will any man say that the offer which he made them to extinguish their furious lust to expose to them his owne daughter a virgine and the wife of his guest which Iosephus encreases by calling her a Levite and his kins-woman was a lesse sinne then to have given way to their violence or lesse against nature because that which they sought was contra naturalem usum Is not every voluntary pollution in genere peccati as much against the law of nature as this was since it strayes and departs from the way and defeats the end of that facultie in us which is generation The violating therefore of the law of nature doth in no acceptation aggravate the sinne Neither doth the Scripture call any other sinne then disorderly lust by that name S. Paul once appeals to the law of nature when arguing about the covering of heads of men or women at publique prayer hee sayes Judge in your selves And Doth not nature teach you that if a man have long haire it is a shame Not that this was against
reach to our destruction which is the neerest step to the last act of doing it intirely our selves SECT VIII Of which last act as we spoke whilst we considered the Law of Nature and must againe when we come to understand those places of Scripture which seeme to ayme towards it so before wee conclude this part of the Law of Reason we may fitly present such deductions comparisons and consequences as may justly seeme in reason to annihilate or diminish this fault Of which because most will be grounded either upon the conscience of the Doer or upon the Churches opinion of the fact when it is done wee will onely consider how farre an erring Conscience may justifie any act and then produce some examples of persous guilty of this and yet canonized by the Church by admission into the Martyrologe and assigning them their Feasts and Offices and Vigils and like religious Celebrations Therefore to make no use of Pythagorus example who rather then hee would offend his Philosophicall conscience and either tread upon the Beanes himselfe or suffer his Scholers to speake before their time delivered up himselfe and forty of them to his Enemies sword And to avoide the ambages and multiforme entangling of Schoolemen herein we will follow that which is delivered for the common opinion which is that not onely a conscience which errs justly probably and Bona side that is after all Morall industry and diligence hath beene used yet I meane not exquisite diligence but such as is proportionall to the person and his quality and to the knowledge which that man is bound to have of that thing at that time is bound to doe according to that mis-information and mis-perswasion so contracted But also if it erre negligently or otherwise viciously and mala side as long as that errour remaines and resides in it a man is bound not to doe against his conscience In the first case if one in his conscience thinke that hee ought to lye to save an innocent or that he ought to steale to save a famished man he is a Homicide if he lye not or steale not And in the second case though he bee not bound to any Act yet it is lawful to him then to omit any thing necessary otherwise And this obligation which our Conscience casts upon us is of stronger hold and of straighter band then the precept of any Superiour whether Law or person and is so much juris naturalis as it cannot be infringed nor altered beneficio divinae indulgentiae to use their owne words Which Doctrin as it is every where to be gathered among the Casuists so is it well collected and amassed and and argued and confirmed especially by Azorius If then a man after convenient and requisite diligence despoiled of all humane affections and self-interest and Sancto bonaee impatientiae igne exardens as Paulinus speaks do in his conscience beleeve that he is invited by the Spirit of God to doe such an act as Ionas Abraham and perchance Sampson was who can by these rules condemne this to be sinne And therefore I doubt there was some haste and praecepitation in Cassianus his judgement though otherwise a very just esteemer and valuer of works of devotion and obedience who pronounces that that apparition of an Angell to Hero an Eremit after 50 yeares so intense and earnest attending of Gods service and religious negligence of himselfe that he would scarse intermit Easter day from his strict fasting and being now Victoriarum conscientia plenus as the Panegyrique saies was an illusion of the Devill to make him destroy himselfe Yet Hero being drawn out of the Well into which he had cast himselfe and living three dayes after persisted in a devout acknowledgement that it was the Spirit of God which sollicited him to that and dyed in so constant an assurance and alacrity that Paphnutius the Abbat though at first in some suspence did not number him inter Biathanatos which were persons reputed vitiously to have killed themselves Nor may it be necessarily concluded that this act was therefore evill if it appeared to be from the Devill For Wierus tells us of a maid whom the Devill perswaded to goe such a Pilgrimage and at such an Altar to hear a Masse for recovery of her health Certainly if as Vasquez holds it be not Idolatry to worship the Devill in an Apparition which I thinke to be God it can be no offence to beleeve him after I have used all meanes to discerne and distinguish For not onely those Rules which are delivered ordinarily to know him by are apparantly false which are a difference in his hands or feet or some notable deformity by hornes or a tayle of which Binsfeldius seems confident of the first and h Menghi of the second But that Rule that God alwaies infuseth or commands good things if it be understood of that which is good in the common and naturall course is not alwaies safe for it held not in Abraham nor the Israelites case Therefore though Vasquez his first excuse That such a worship is not Idolatry because by reason of our immediate relation to God we never arrest nor stop upon the Devill by the way will doe no good in our case of beleeving yet his other will which he hath in the same place That there may be an invincible ignorance and that in that any exterior act whatsoever proceeding from a sincere and pure intention of the mind is an act of true Religion For safelier then the Panegyrick could say to Constantine Suacuique Prudentia Deuâ—… est may we say of every mans conscience thus rectified If therefore they will still turn in their circle and say God concurs to no evill we say nothing is so evill but that it becomes good it God command it and that this is not so naturally evill that it requires a speciall commission from Godâ—… but as it becomes good if he commands it so it becomes indifferent if he remove the reasons with which the precept against it was conditioned If they returne to S. Augustins two reasons against Donatus whereof the first was we have authority to save thy body against thy will And the second None of the faithfull ever did this act we are thereby hastned to the other consideration how they which have done it have been esteemed of by the Catholique Church But to speake a little in passing of Saint Augustines second reason for the first hath very little force since though it may be lawfull to preserve a man willing to die yet it is not alwaies of merit nor obligatory And therefore Ignatius doth so earnestly dehort the Româ—…ns from endeavouring to succour him And Corona Civica which was given to any which had rescued a Citizen in the warres was not given though he produced witnesses of the fact except the person so rescued confessed that he
purposes Conformably to which Law Paracelsus sayes It is all one whether God or the Devill cure so the Patient be well And so the Canons have prescribed certain rules of doing evill when we are overtaken with perplexities to chuse the least of which S Gregory gives a naturall example That a man attempted upon a high wall and forced to leape it would take the lowest place of the wall And agreeably to all these the Casuist say That in extreame necessitie I siâ—… not if I induce a man to lend me mony upon usury And the reason is because I incline him to a lesse sinne which is usury when else he should be a hâ—…icide by not releiving me And in this fashion God him selfe is said to work evill in us because when our heart is full of evill purposes he governs and disposes us rather to this then to that evill wherin though all the vitiousnesse be ours and evill yet the order is from God and good Yea he doth positively encline one to some certain evill thus That he doth infuse into a man some good thoughts by which he out of his vitiousnesse takes occasion to thinke he were better doe some other sinne then that which he intended Since therefore all these lawes and practises concurre in this that we sometime doe such evill not onely for expresse and positive good but to avoid greater evill all which seems to be against this doctrine of S. Paul And since whatsoever any humane power may dispence withall in us we in extream necessity in impossibility of recourse to better counsell in an erring conscience and in many such cases may dispence with our selves for that Canon of duo mala leaves it to our naturall reason to judge and value and compare and distinguish betweene those two evills which shall concurre And since for all this it is certaine that no such dispensation from another or from my selfe doth so alter the nature of the thing that it becomes thereby the more or the lesse evill to mee there appeares no other interpretation safe but this That there is no externall act naturally evill and that circumstances condition them and give them their nature as scandall makes an indifferent thing hainous at that time which if some person go out of the roome or winke is not so The Law it selâ—…e which is given us as a light that we might not stumble and by which we see not what is evill naturally for that we see naturally and that was so even to us before the law declared it but what would bee evill that is produce evill effects if we did it at that time and so circumstanced is not absolutely good but in such measure and in such respects as that which it forbids is evill And therefore Picus comparing the Law to the firmament as Moses accepts the word as he observes that the second day when God made the firmament he did not say that it was good as he did of every other days work and yet it was not evill for then saith Picus it could not have received the sunne as if it had beene good it had not needed it So he reprehends the Manichees for saying that the Law was evill yet he sticks to that of Ezechiel That it was not good That evill therefore which by this place of S. Paul is forbidden is either Acts of infidelity which no dispensation can deliver from the reach of the Law or els such acts as being by our nature and reason and approbation of nations reputed evill or declared by law or custome to be such because of there ordinary evill effects doe cast a guiltines upon the doer ordinarily and for the most part and ever except his case be exempt and priviledged This moved Chrysostome whom I cited before to think aâ—…ly and a consent to adulttery not evill in Sarah and this rectified S. Augustines squeamishnes so farre as to leave us at liberty to think what we would of that wifes act which to pay her husbands debt let out her self one night For if any of these things had been once evill naturally they could never recover of that sicknesse but as I insinuated before as those things which we call miracles were written in the history of Gods purpose as exactly and were as certainly to come to passe as the rising and setting of the sunne and as naturally in 〈◊〉 compagine naturae for there is no interlining in that book of God So in that his eternall Register where he foresees all our acts he hath preserued and defended from that ordinary corruption of evill purpose of inexcusable ignorance of scandall and of such other inquinations of indifferent things as he is said to have done our B. Lady from originall sinne in her inanimation Some of those acts of ours which to those who doâ—… not studiously distinguish circumstances or see not the doers conscience and testimony of Gods spirit may at the first tast have some of the brachishnes of sin Such was Moses killing of the Egyptians for which there appears no especiall calling from God But because this falls not often S. Paul would not embolden us to do any of those things which are customarily reputed evill But if others be delighted with the more ordinary interpretation of this place that it speaks of all that which we call sinne I will not refute that interpretation so they make not the Apostles rule though in this place this be not given properly and exactly for a rule more strickt than the morall praecepts of the Decalogue it self in which as in all rules there are naturally included and incorporated some exceptions which if they allow in this they are still at the beginning for this case may fall within those exceptions Otherwise that the generall application of this rule is not proper as by infinite other places so it appears evidently by that in Bellarmine where he says that by reason of this rule a man may not with neglecting a poore neighbour adorne a church Yet there are a great many cases wherein we may neglect this poore neighbour and therefore that is not naturally evill And certainly whosoever is delighted with such arguments and such an application of this text would not only have objected this rule to Lot when he offered his Daughters for there it might have colour but would have joyned with Iudas when the woman anointed Christ and have told her that allthough the office which shee did were good yet the wast which shee made first was evill and against this rule SECT IIII. The same Apostle doth in divers other places use this phrase That we are the Temples of the Holy Ghost And from thence is argued that it is an unlawfull Sacriledge to demolish or to deface those Temples But wee are so the Temples of God as we are his Images that is by
his residing in our hearts And who may doubt but that the blessed Soules of the departed are still his Temples and Images Even amongst heathens those Temples which were consecrated to their gods might in cases of publique good or harme be demolished and yet the ground remaine sacred And in the two first places is oneâ—… a Dehortation from polluting our hearts which are Gods Temples with Idolatry oâ—… other sinne In the other place he calles our materiall body the temple and he makes it to us an argument that we should flye from fornication because therein wee trespas against our owne body And so here arises a double argument that we may not doe injurie to our owne body neither as it is ours nor as it is Gods In the first of these then he sayes A Fornicator sinnes against his body for as hee sayd two verses before Hee makes himselfe one body with an Harlot and so hee diminishes the dignity of his owne person But is it so in our Case When he withdrawes and purges it from all corruptions and delivers it from all the inquinations and venime and maligne Machinations of his and Gods adversaries and prepares it by Gods insinuation and concurrence to that glory which without death cannot bee attained Is it a lesse dignitie that himselfe bee the Priest of God and that himselfe be the Sacrifice of God then that he be the Temple But sayes Paul Your body is the Temple of God and you are not your owne But saies Calvine here you are not so your owne that you may live at your owne will or abuse your body with pollutions and uncleannesse Our body is so much â—…r owne as we may use it to Gods glory aâ—… it is so little our owne as when hee is pleased to have in we doe well in resigning it to him by what Officer soever he accept it whether by Angell Sicknesse Persecutron Magistrate or our selves Onely bee carefull of this last lesson in which hee amasses and gathers all his former Doctrine Glorifte God in your body and in your spirit for they are his SECT V. The place of the Ephesians hath some assinity with this which is But let us follow 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in love and in all things grow up into him which is the head that is Christ till we are all met together unto a perfect man By which wee receive the honour to be one body with Christ our head which is after more expressely declared We are Members of his body of his flesh and of his bone And therefore they say that to withdraw our selves which are limmes of him is not onely homicide of our selves who cannot live without him but a Paricide towards him who is our common Father But as in Fencing Passion layes a man as open as unskilfulnesse and a troubled desire to hitt makes one not onely misse but receive a wound so out of an inordinate fervour to strike home hee which alledgeth this place over-reacheth to his owne danger for onely this is taught herein that all our growth and vegetation flowes from our head Christ. And that he hath chosen to himselfe for the perfection of his body limmes proportionall thereunto and that as a soule through all the body so this care must live and dwell in every part that it be ever ready to doe his proper function and also to succour those other parts for whose reliefe or sustentation it is framed and planted in the body So that herein there is no litterall construction to be admitted as though the body of Christ could be imperfited by the removing of any man For as from a tree some leaves passe their naturall course and season and fall againe being withered by age and some fruits are gathered unripe and some ripe and some branches which in a storme fall off are carryed to the fire So in this body of Christ the Church I meane that which is visible all these are also fulfilled and performed and yet the body suffers no maims much lesse the head any detriment This place therefore is so farre from giving encouragement to any particular man to be carefull of his owne well being as the Expositors of what perswasion soever in controverted points accept from hence an argument that for the establishing and sustentation of the whole body a man is bound to depart with all respects to himselfe and give his life to strengthen them which are weake And this place as a common Conduit head hath affoorded justification for Martyrdomes for pestilent visitations and for all those Desertions of our selves and of our naturall right of preserving our selves which wee had occasion to insist upon before SECT VI. As therefore that construction doth well consist with those words so doth it also with the words in the next Chapter No man ever hated his owne flesh but nourished it c. Of which Hate because we are to speake when wee come to Christs Commandement of Hating our life we will here onely say with Marlorate upon this place He hates not his flesh who hates the desires thereof and would subject it to the Spirit no more then a Goldsmith hates that gold which hee casts into a furnace to purifie and reduce to a better fashion And because out of the Armory of Scripture I have not found that they take any better weapons nor any more we may here end this Distinction Distinction IV. SECT 1. IN the next our busines is to try of what force and proofe their armes are against their adversaries forces Of which we shall oppose two sorts The first naturall and assured Subjects which are Reasons arising naturally from places of Scripture and these in this distinction The other Examples as Auxiliaries For though we rely not upon them yet we have this advantage in that kind that our aduersaries can make no use nor profit of Examples And therefore that answer which both Peter Martyr and Lavater from him make that we must not live by examples and that if examples proved any thing they had the stronger side that is there have beene more men which have not killed themselves then which have may well seeme from pâ—…rem proâ—…inesse and lazinesse and impossibillity of better defence to have too much allay to be currant To prepare us therefore to a right understanding and application of these places of scripture we must arrest awhile vpon the nature and degrees and effects of charity the mother and forme of all vertue which shall not onely lead us to heaven for faith opens us the doore but shall continue with us when we are there when both Faith and Hope are spent and uselesse We shall no where find a better pourtrait of charity then that which S. Augustine hath drawne she loves not that which should not be loved she neglects not that which should be loved she bestows not more love upon that which deserves lesse nor doth
by prayer and penance We must therefore seek another definition of sinne which I think is not so well delivered in those words of Aquinas Omnis defectus debiti actus habet rationem peccati as in his other Peccatum est actus devians ab ordine debiti finis contra regulam naturae rationis aut legis aeternae For here lex aeterna being put as a member and part of the definition it cannot admit that vast and large acceptation which it could not escape in the description of S. Augustine but must in this place be necessarily intended of lex divina Through this definition therefore we will trace this act of Self-homicide and see whether it offend any of those three sorts of Law SECT VI. Of all these three Laws of Nature of Reason and of God every precept which is permanent and binds alwayes is so compos'd and elemented and complexion'd that to distinguish and seperate them is a Chymick work And either it doth only seeme to be done or is done by the torture and vexation of schoole-limbicks which are exquisite and violent distinctions For that part of Gods Law which bindes alwayes bound before it was written and so it is but dictamen rectae rationis and that is the Law of nature And therefore Jsidore as it is related into the Canons dividing all Law into divine and humane addeth Divine consists of nature Humane of custome Yet though these three be almost all one yet because one thing may be commanded divers waies and by divers authorities as the common Law a Statute and a Decree of an arbitrary Court may bind me to do the same thing it is necessary that we weigh the obligation of every one of these Laws which are in the Definition But first I will only mollify and prepare their crude and undigested opinions and prejudice which may be contracted from the often iteration and specious but sophisticate inculcatings of Law and Nature and Reason and God with this Antidote that many things which are of Naturall and Humane and Divine Law may be broken Of which sort to conceale a secret delivered unto you is one And the Honour due to Parents is so strictly of all these Laws as none of the second Table more Yet in a iust warre a Parricide is not guilty yea by a law of Venice though Bodin say it were better the Towne were sunk then ever there should be any example or president therein A sonne shall redeeme himselfe from banishment by killing his Father being also banished And we read of another state and Laws of Civil Common-wealths may not easily be pronounced to be against Nature where when Fathers came to be of an unprofitable and uselesse age the sons must beat them to death with clubs And of another where all persons of above 70 years were dispatched SECT VII This terme the law of Nature is so variously and unconstantly deliver'd as I confesse I read it a hundred times before I understand it once or can conclude it to signifie that which the author should at that time meane Yet I never found it in any sence which might justifie their vociferations upon sinnes against nature For the transgressing of the Law of nature in any act doth not seeme to me to increase the hay nousnesse of that act as though nature were more obligatory than divine Law but only in this respect it aggravates it that in such a sin we are inexcusable by any pretence of ignorance since by the light of nature we might discern it Many things which we call sin and so evill have been done by the commandement of God by Abraham and the Jsraelites in their departing from Aegypt So that this evill is not in the nature of the thing nor in the nature of the whole harmony of the world and therefore in no Law of nature but in violating or omitting a Commandement All is obedience or disobedience Whereupon our Country-man Sayr confesseth that this SELF-HOMICIDE is not so intrinsecally ill as to Ly. Which is also evident by Cajetan where he affirmes that I may not to save my life accuse my self upon the Racke And though Cajetan extend no farther herâ—…in then that I may not bely my selâ—… Yet 〈◊〉 evicts that Cajetans reasons with as much force forbid any accusation of my self though it be true So much easier may I depâ—…rt with life then with truth or with fame by Cajetan And yet we find that of their fame many holy men have been very negligent For not onely Augustine Anselm and Hierâ—… betray themselves by unurged confessi ns but St Ambrose procur'd certain prostitute women to come into his chamber that by that he might be defamed and the People thereby abstaine from making him Bishop This intrinsique and naturall evill therefore will hardly be found For God who can command a murder cannot command an evill or a sinne because the whole frame and government of the world bâ—…ing his he may vse it as he will As though he can doe a miracle he can do nothing against nature because That is the nature of every thing which he works in it Hereupon upon that other true rule whatsoever is wrought by a superior Agent upon a patient who is naturally subject to that Agent is naturall we may safely infer that nothing which we call siâ—…ne is so against nature but that it may be sometimes agreeable to nature On the other side nature is often taken so widely and so extensively as all sinne is very truely said to be against nature Yea before it come to be sinne For S. Augustine sayes Every vice as it is vice is against nature And vice is but habite which being produced to act is then sinne Yea the parent of all sinne which is hereditary originall sin which Aquinas calls a languor and faintnesse in our nature and an indisposition proceeding from the dissolution of the harmony of originall Justice is by him said to be in us quasi naturale And is as he saith in another place so naturall that though it is propagated with our nature in generation though it be not caused by the principles of nature So as if God would now miraculously frame a man as he did the first woman of another's flesh and bone and not by way of generation into that creature all infirmities of our flesh would be derived but not originall Sin So that originall sinne is traduced by nature onely and all actuall sinne issuing from thence all sinne is naturall SECT VIII But to make our approaches neerer Let us leave the consideration of the Law of nature as it is Providence and Gods decree for his government of the great world and contract it only to the law of nature in the lesse world our selves There is then in us a double law of