that he omitteth all kinds of Disciplinary Fasts very necessary for the mortification of the sinfull flesh of his Disciples he breakes the affirmatiue part of the same commandements This last obiection is of my text And that which heretofore I haue shewed at large to be the very depth of Sathanisme and of all deuilish policie it is vttered against Christ not by the Pharises Disciples who might be suspected to obiect of malice and whom in Leui his house Christ had alreadie answered but it is vttered in the open hearing of thousands by the deuoutest Disciples of his vndoubted and best friend that most famous liuing sanctimonie Iohn Baptist The Disciples of Iohn say vnto him not The Disciples of the Pharises say vnto him Why doe we and the Pharises Fast much 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or most seuerely nay not only fast but pray not only fast and pray much 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but as Saint Luke hath it more fully 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say very thickly and often but thy Disciples Fast no disciplinarie Fasts at all but eate and drinke and take their ordinarie meales euery day Vnto this so subtle so weightie so graue true accusation in regard of the Antecedent though most false and friuolous in regard of the Consequent our glorious Sauiour in these two parables giueth two Apologies worthy of himselfe the former in this former Parable taken from his owne person the other in the other Parable taken from the Quality and person of his Disciples and followers He himselfe was now not onely the husband but euen the Bridegrome of his Church in the honiemoone and sweetest feruencie of her first loue As for the children of his Bride-chamber his Disciples and neere attendants he was able to keepe them in his Fathers name without any paedagogicall or disciplinarie exercise of sorrow and humiliation for sinne Iohn 17.12 To fast to mourne to eate the bread and water of affliction was now the portion of his festiuall bride Cup. To be wed to all kindes of sorrowes and penance was his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 his owne proper worke alone as he now came to be mans whole and alone Redeemer a worke not without manifest derogation thereof nor without a necessarie infeebling and weakning of the Christian faith any waies communicable to the shoulders of his followers They should indeede heereafter when that which he counted his Bridall feast of afflictions was once ended and fully solemnized by him all of them aboue all other men with the two sonnes of Zebedee be baptized with his bloodie baptisme wherewith he was now to be bathed and baptised They should indeede heereafter all drinke hartily and soundly of his Bride Cup of penance and of death wherof he was now to drinke first himselfe But afore his Bride or they could tast any whit deeply or kindly of this his Bride Cup it was first his honest and necessarie dutie to be himselfe in himselfe as Moses was to Zipporah a bloodie husband vnto her and as her true louing Bridegrome and Redeemer to beginne therein vnto her himselfe drinking the hartiest draught euen to the bottome of the dregges of all the iust punnishments of sinne If they or his Bride her selfe did now whilest the Bridall lasted bride it as it were and sip a little thereof that surely might be all that could yet vpon so high a feast day well become her In a word he was now to treade and to be troden in the wine presse of his Fathers wrath alone He alone and no other with him was now to giue his soule an offering for our sinnes as the Prophet Isay had fore prophecied He now was that one man of whom Caiaphas so extraordinarily prophecied that it was expedient that one man should die for the people that the whole nation perish not Seeing then that all cause of mourning or humbling of the soule which is the first and chiefe end of Fasting is by his bodily presence with them so necessarily absent from them Can any reasonable man make the children of the Bride-chamber fast while the Bridegroome is with them Thus standeth Christs former Apologie taken from the maiestie and greatnes of his owne person On the other side in regard of the weaknes and vnfitnes of his Disciples euen of the Disciples of Iohn and of the Pharises themselues to fast Euangelicall Fasts his other Apologie is this His Euangelicall or Gospel-fasts are as shreds of new cloth strong durable able and fit to mend a rent or a decay in the strongest and most holy soules But they who had fasted none but legal or propheticall Fasts were yet as old worne thredbare cloth worne out with the obseruation of the old customes of the ragged beggarly vndurable rudiments of the ceremoniall law which law was not now to indure or to be mēded stitched vp any longer His Gospel-fasts againe are as new vigorous spiritous vertuous strong wine full of Spirit and truth But they yet were not Sanctified with his truth They knew not yet whether there were any holy Ghost and newe renewing spirit or no They were yet as old leaking vnstancht bottels not able so 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so to containe and absteine as after his Ascension and bodily departure from them The promise of his Father and the Grace and truth of his Gospel should instruct and enable them The rent in the fasters through this vnsuteablenes would now bee made worse if such fasting should be applied The Fast it selfe being too strong would take vent and runne out into manifest losse What reason then that such fasters should be set in the paedagogie or disciplinarie exercise of such a Fast This double Apologie I take to be thus rightly meant in these two parables and thereby the deuillish and slanderous consequent of the diffamation of our Sauiours offensiue or dissolute breach of the affirmatiue part of the sixt and seuenth commaundements to bee most notably and clearely ouerthrowne He did not with his disciples omit the keeping of the generall or essentiall duties of mortification absolutely commanded in the affirmatiue part of those two commaundements Only in regard of his owne quality and person and in regard of the quality and person of his Disciples he did together with them intermit rather then omit some duties tending to the Bene esse of mortification which were not vniuersally and absolutely commanded My text therefore thus But the daies will come when the Bridegrome shal be taken frō them or The daies will come when new shreds shal be applied to new cloth new wine shall be put into new bottels that both may be preserued then shal they Fast is to be annexed in common too with both the parts of this double Apologie as a necessary anticipation and preuercion of that obiection which might yet further worthily haue proued our glorious Sauiour to be an obstinate patrone of fleshly libertie For though
as the Caricke Figs so much commonded by Iulian the Apostata the costliest Pepper Almonds Dates the finest Flowre bread called Simnels Hony and the most daintie Bladder nuts vsed by wantons to prouoke lust what a Madnesse is this we doe not onely trouble and vexe our selues our Caterers Cooks and other seruants but we do trouble and vexe Nature by forcing her in our Orchards and Gardens to bring forth some kinde of feed or fruit which we may eat in stead of our ordinary bread from the which in our fasts wee are commanded by the Church to abstaine and from which Daniel and the holy ones of God haue abstained in their ordinary Fasts Lastly of their hating superstitious and foolish abstinence with a perfect hatred Saint Austins learned and large discourses against the Manichaeans Delicata Abstinentia as Erasmus doth fitly terme it are a plentifull witnesse For the mad Mannichaeans did as our fond superstitious Papists doe at this day absteine altogether from flesh yea and from wine too which the Papists doe not but yet euen in their deuoutest Fasts they glutted them selues with the costliest banketting dishes and with other the strongest drinkes that their Parasiticall Caterers Apothecaries Brewers could possibly deuise to prouide for them in the whole Country where they liued So that as Cato in Plutarch complaineth of the Bellie-gods of Rome in his time the same might truely haue beene spoken of the Epicurisme of the Mannichaeans and may be truely verified at this day of the Romish Cleargie making their bellie their god and their glory their shame More is giuen for some daintie strang Fish then for a sed Oxe To shut vp therfore my answer to this third question Touching the seuerity of Church-fasts namely with what moderation they are to be broken and what abstinence is fittest to be vsed when we break them the practise of the Saints of God wherewith I haue now confirmed my Answere that the breaking of them ought to bee Seuere but not Sauadge is sufficient to resolue and settle him who hath any wit in his head and is not fondly contentious And surely heerein I cannot but by the way greatly commend the good wisedome and happinesse of the Gouernours of our English Church euer since the puritie of Gods truth and the ancient maners of the best ancient Churches and Counsells haue beene restored and reformed in it For who seeth not how wisely and happily they haue with those ancient Fathers seene and shewed vnto the world Quid intersit to vse still Saint Austin◠words inter portum religionis sirenas superstitionis What necessary difference there is betwixt the hauen of true religion and betwixt the Syrens or the Syrenian Rockes of Popish superstition The Papists had so nuzled vs vp in the admiration of their church authoritie as that the people of this land thought their decrees to bee the very vnuariable Oracles decrees and customes of the Sonne of God and that to disobey them was as mortall a sinne as to breake the absolute commandements of the morall law Whereas therefore at this day we are commanded to fast vpon the Wednesdayes and Fridayes c our Church gouernours doe teach vs that this commaund is to bee obeyed as an exercise of Religion commanded conditionally by Christ as pertaining to the well being of that Mortification which is absolutely commaunded by him But in that we are commaunded when wee breake our Fasts at night for our gouernours would haue vs to follow the example of better times and not to eate any thing adnutritionē for the space of twentie foure houres in that I say we are commanded when wee breake our fasts at night to absteine from flesh and to eate fish our Church gouernours doe set downe this distinct kinde of abstinence and this positiue commaunde what in speciall we shall eate not as an exercise of Religion but as an exercise of our Ciuill obebience to the Ciuill Magistrate whom for conscience sake also that euen to the shedding of our dearest heart blood much more in the restraint of shedding the blood of Sheepe Calues Bullockes and in the killing seething and broyling of a few seelie fishes we are to obey as the vndoubted Deputie of Christ So that Turbae imperitorum quae vel in ipsa vera religione superstiosae sunt as Saint Austin saith of them The vnlearned Frie of multitudes who are still prone to superstition especially in this old doting age of the decrepit dimsighted world euen in those Churches of Christ where the truth of Religion is taught most reformedly and sincerely cannot nowe in England Fast superstitiously though they would nor any longer in a stubburne minde to shewe their good will towards the Church of Rome and their traiterous hearts against the Church of England vpon out Fasting dayes absteine from Egges white meates as it is an abstinence inioyned superstitiously in the Church of Rome a particular Church and not the Catholicke Church of our Creed no wayes at all binding their consciences who are not visible members of the same particular Church Sect. IIII. TO the fourth Question Touching the seuere obeying of this commaunde of Disciplinarie Ordinarie Fasts as it is further determined by Saint Lukes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Then shall they mourne pray Fast often I answere that although many religious men euen to the number of three thousand together in each Monasterie haue fasted all the yeare through and although in regard of the great necessitie of our common and ordinarie 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to bee taken by vs of our inordinate appetite whereby Adam and Eue did first transgresse brought this miserable estate of sin the wrath of God vpon vs their posterity it were to be wished as not onely Diogenes an heathen man but also Saint Hierom one of Christs Saints sometimes wished that we could alwaies Fast and liue without meate yet the Church of God considering the frailtie and weaknesse of man haue thought their obedience to bee acceptable vnto Christ and answerable inough vnto this his consultatorie commaunde if they appointed Fasts at some times onely and not at all times of the yeare These Fasts briefely are either Conceptiua ieiunia to borrowe tearmes Docendi causa from Macrobius or they are Statiua Stata ieiunia Conceptiua ieiunia are Fasts appointed at an vncertaine Such were those Primitiue Fasts Sacrorum ordinum appointed and kept first at an vncertaine by these children of the Bride-chamber these neere Attendants of Christ these blessed Apostles For it is plaine out of the 13. and 14. of the Acts that because the Church of God was then as Noahs Arke floating vpon the waters of affliction and was as the Doue of Noahs Arke carrying the Oliue branch of spirituall Peace and rest in her mouth but finding no bodily peace or rest for the rest and abode of the sole of her foot therefore they could set no
The fift worthy end of our Fasting is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the adorning of the Doctrine of the Gospell by it when wee remember what the Apostle saith 1. Cor. 10.31 Whether yee eate or drinke or Whatsoeuer yee doe else doe all to the glorie of God and what Zacharie complaineth against the hypocrisie of the Iewes in Babylon for omitting this end of Fasting in their Fasts These 70. yeares in your foure deuout Fasts yee haue not Fasted vnto me saith the Lord Zachar. 7.5 We bring honour to the truth of the Gospell which we professe either priuatiuely by stopping the slanderous mouths of the aduersaries thereof as Christ doth heere in my Text by adding this Anticipation Then shall they Fast or Positiuely by confirming to the consciences of all men that our Hypocrisie in words is that which the Fathers tearme Sanctam Hypocrisin the odde kind of holy Hypocrisie when we speake indeed much of mortification of the flesh by Fasting but practise more in Fasting then we speake First wee stop the blasphemous mouths of Gentill Philosophers who brag so much of their Pythagoras his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 his eating but about a pinte of meale in a day and of Iulian that famous Apostata who in one of his extant Greeke Epistles saith that the Christian life in his daies was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was but a swinish life in comparison of his owne austere life and of the austere liues of Iamblichus Plotine Maximus and other his fellow Sophisters These Cerberean mouths of hell are presently stopped when they heare vs tell them of Moses Elias Christ their fortie dayes and fortie nights Fasting or of the abstinence and austerenesse of Dauid Ionadab Daniel Iohn Baptist Anna the Prophetesse Saint Paul or but of the Ordinarie and Extraordinarie Fasting of common Christians S. Chrysostom Ambrose Hierom Austin or but euen of their followers either in monasteries or in secular states who besides their contenting themselues with the stint of their one Gomera day that is with one spare homely meale a day throughout the yeare did oftentimes Fast extraordinarilie for the remouing of Gods iudgements from themselues and their neighbours three dayes and three nights together Saint Ambrose witnesseth of his people Lib. 1. De paenitent Chap. 16. That they did Sulcare continuis fletibus genas ieiuno ore semper pallido mortis speciem spiranti in corpore praeferentes That they did make deepe furrowes in their Lenten-cheekes through the continuall dropping and falling of teares from their eyes and hearts for their sinnes and the miseries of this life carrying alwayes about with them a very gastly picture of death in their weake breathing bodies and in their pale Lenton faces The remembrance and true euidence of these Fasters putteth to silence the outward Aduersary the Gentile the Apostata the Atheist The like remembrance and true euidence of Christian Fasting in the Orthodoxall Protestant at this day charmeth the lawlesse tongue of the Inward Aduersary the schismaticall Brownist or haereticall Papist Caluin Latimer Bradford Iewell Whitgift Whitakers Fox who haue in their Extraordinary and Ordinary Fasts and in the perpetuall moderation of a temperate appetite farre excelled the superstitious fraudulent hypocriticall Mannichaean Fast of the Church of Rome are worthy and true Euidences hereof What should I speake of these principall worthies of our Dauid Christ Iesus or of any of their Compieres the kindliest childreÌ„ of the ancient Fathers and the rightest successors of these children of the Bride-chamber Surely I am perswaded that euen wee who keepe but our Ordinarie Church-fasts throughout the yeere and doe especially all these fortie dayes of Lent I meane the weeke dayes take vnto vs only a morsel of browne bread and a draught of ordinary drinke after our daily Morning prayer and at night againe take our meales meat as we call it moderately and sparingly making it to consist of the homeliest dishes and smallest drinke are able to beat the deuoutest Papist at this his best spirituall weapon religious Fasting For mine owne part giue me leaue to speake somewhat fondly of that which my selfe haue often experienced truely I could neuer yet for the space of these ten yeeres meet with any Popish fauorite or proselyte since I first began to know what Fasting meant either in the Vniuersitie or in the Countrie who hath beene either willing or able to hold out with me in this which I take to be our right Canonicall English Church-Fast Namely in this vnfraudulent eating but one course meale a day whilst Lent lasteth How much more then will stricter Abstinence and Fasting of stronger deuotioned Protestants amongst vs confound them and al their great Brags of I know not what their Great Fasting But not onely Priuatiuely doe wee honour Christs Trueth by keeping that calumnious Retortion of Iobs speech spoken of Behemoth vnderstood of the Diuel and of all fleshly Epicures Vires eorum in Lumbis eorum virtus eorum in vmbilico ventris sui Their strength is in their lasciuious venereous Loines and their vertue consists in a bene curata cute in their bellie timber and in their soft pubble skins Not onely I say when we fast Christs Fasts doe we keepe this diuellish calumny and reproach from beeing retorted vpon Christs Church and Christs Trueth amongst vs but Positiuely also we confirme vnto Gods Saints and vnto our selues all these principall Conclusions of our Christian Religion namely That we are here as in the house of mourning absented from the bodily presence of our soules Bridegroome That we here as Pilgrimes trusse vp our loines and spend no more vpon our bellies and backs then strangers doe who are farre from their natiue home making onely a hard shift for a time vntill wee come into our heauenly Iâ—haâ—a the Paradise of Christ That we liue not by bread onely but by euery word of power and promise that proceedeth out of the mouth of God That Christ is our Manna and heauenly Bread That for the demonstration whereof Moses Elias Christ did principally Fast the Law the Prophecies the Gospel are altogether spirituall and not carnall And lastly That as Saint Ieromes speech is in an Epistle to Rusticus by liuing in carne sine carne in the flesh as it were without the flesh we may begin already to haue our conuersation in heauen beeing already translated from death vnto life conforming our vile bodies what we can to Christs glorified body making our earthly fleshly bodies a certaine type in themselues vnto themselues of their vndoubted and certaine future being hereafter heauenly spirituall bodies according to Gods promise in which dwelleth righteousnesse The sixt and last safe intention and lawfull end of our Religious Fasting in the time of the Gospel is the assured Purchase of that great vndefiled Reward which by a kinde of Metalepsis is out of Gods promises Imputatiuely due vnto our Fasting but properly is due onely vnto the onely true and proper
lying vpon the ground to listen if they might chance to heare the soft and sodaine comming of the feet of the thiefe of the night the stealing of the day of iudgement vpon them or to heare the first blast and sound of the last Trumpet of God or the first showt of our Lord at his last descending in the Cloudes or the first word of the voice of the Archangel or at least the crowing of S. Peters Cocke to call them out of their dead sleeps or light slumbers of fleshly security that they might go out weepe bitterly for their sinnes taking but one spare homely meale on the weeke day all this time of Lent reconciling themselues to their aduersaries in any suite of law or in any offensiuenesse whatsoeuer and giuing largely to the poore especially abating their poore debtors their debts tenants their rents as an Easter Iubilee and as a true fruit of that Christian fast which God hath chosen Let not this this I say be still still the burning Egyptian shame of our Church of England that so many make no difference at all betwixt Lent Christmas hauking hunting carding dicing Horsracing playing at Football letting loose the reines of our flesh to all things lawfull or vnlawfull casting nets ouer our simple brethren following and hoately pursuing all vantages quarrels demaunds actions about worldly matters neuer thinking of the nearest nearenesse of the great day of the great iudgement continually forgetting the continually gasping mouth of hell whiche euery other yeare by Popish treacheries either at home or abroad is gasping and opening vpon vs neuer thanking the Lord for so miraculous and often shutting it accounting our selues to be with Iohn the Apostle whom Christ loued impaled within the armes and breast of Christ the Bridegroome shut in there as it were out of the perill of all gunshot and out of all danger of Plagues inundations vnseasonable weather terrible Tuesdayes terrible by the Gouraean conspiracie terrible by that Gun powder treason terrible by our late strang winds winds of that breath of Gods wrath wherewith the fire of hell is kindled If wee cannot Fast with one spare and homely meale a day all the weeke dayes of Lent so long as Lent lasteth as our Church would haue vs yet at the least let vs heare the word of God read or preached vnto vs let vs in truth and no longer in profane childish Hypocrisie according to the words of our common Leiturgie Turne vnto the Lord by weeping fasting and praying This whole last weeke of Lent which we call Hebilomadam paenosam the Passion weeke in which we ought if euer to redeeme our ill-kept Lent and to prepare our selues by nailing our sinfull flesh vnto Christs crosse of mortification to the end wee may rise againe with him at Easter vnto iustification with whom we haue died by mortification that also after our suffering with him we may one day ascend and enter into glorie with him As Leo saith truly of the whole Lent fast Quanto sanctius quisque hos dies inuenietur egisse tanto probabitur pascha Domini honorasse religiosius The more holily a man shall be found to haue kept all the Fasting dayes of Lent the more deuoutly will he be found and find himselfe by Experience to haue honoured the feast of Easter or of the resurrection which followeth and endeth Lent so the same also may be saide euen of the holy and deuout keeping of this last weeke of Lent For surely now the Deuill is most buisie to drawe vs from our worthy celebration of this weeke vnto all profanenesse worldlinesse securitie and wantonnesse and at no time of the yeare doth hee so earnestly seeke our destruction by forgetfulnesse of God and of our duties of loue one toward another as he doth this weeke of Christs passion to the end that hee may still in the same weeke crucifie Christ in his members and make vs altogether vnworthy through our profanations and fleshly contentions both of the merits of Christs death of the vertue of Christs resurrection as the same Leo therefore saith of the whole time of Lent That Parum religiosus alio tempore demonstratur qui in his diebus religiosior non inuenitur He hath little or no religion in him at other times who is not more religious on the Lent daies then hee was other common dayes so I may truly say that he hath little or rather no religion at all who is not now contented with those Capernaits in the sixt of Iohn in so short a time before the Feast of the Passeouer to Fast three dayes and three nights together or at least to Fast euery 20. foure houres for the space of sixe dayes in hearing Christ preach vnto him that after such humiliation Christ may by his spirit restifie and comfortably say vnto him as he testified and saide vnto them Cause this man to sit downe who is faint with hunger after righteousnesse and hath followed me Fasting now sixe dayes together that I may refresh him with food at my table because I haue compassion on him To conclude a chiefe cause I say it againe of pride in Magistrates of wantonnesse in rich folke of selfe wilfulnesse and worse then heathenish disobedience and stubburnesse in rude people amongst vs at this day is this our common vnregarded vndisciplined wanton humorous irreligious rude disobeying of Christ and his Church their consultatorie commaunds of this Fast of Lent and other Fasts whatsoeuer The Lord Iesus who hath the keyes of Dauid vpon his shoulders open our eyes and hearts to the seeing and embracing of the truth of the great necessitie of our obedience to this Commaunde Then shall they Fall Amen Amen Ignatius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 FINIS The Earle of Salisburie Not to iudge Vertue according to the skill of common people Neither doe they please the many neither doe the many please them Galat. 5. The Harmony Mat. 9 14.15.16.17 Mar. 2.18.19.20.21.22 Luk. 5.33.34.35.36.37.38.39 The Coherence in which is shewed very briefly how hitherto the Serpent the seed of the Serpent had shewed his Antipathy against the seed of the woman and how the seed of the woman dealeth with him in this Text. Verse 14. Luke 5.33 The Analysis The former Apologie taken from Christs person Math. 20 2â— Isa 63.3 and 53.10 Iohn 11. Salomon was a type of Christ in this For Iudah and Israel were many in his daies euen as the â—and of the sea in number eating drinking and making mery 1. king 4.20 The other Apologie taken from the person of Christs Disciples Colosse 4.12 Iam. 4.12 The Thesis or generall Doctrine necessarily gathered out of this right meaning of the Text. The two parts of the more particular declaration of the text The Nature and Authoritie of the Commaund Then shal they Fast The first Question what Fasts are commanded heere Not Fasts of Absolute coÌ„mand a VpoÌ„ this day Eue and Adam fâ—ll by inordinate