was there known to all the world and the disdain of that ungratefull Nation closed the hands of his great bounty Is it not a great unhappiness to be weary and tyred with often communicating to be wicked because God is good and to shut up our selves close when he would impart himself to us Men make little account of great benefits and spiritual helps for that they have them present They must lose those favours to know them well and seek outragiously without effect what they have kickt away with contempt because it was easily possest 2. The choices and elections of God are not to be comprehended within our thoughts but they should be adored by our hearts He is Master of his own favours and doth what he will in the Kingdoms of Nature Grace and Glory He makes vessels of Potters earth of gold and silver He makes Holy-dayes and working-dayes saith the Wiseman his liberalites are as free to him as his thoughts We must not examine the reason why he doth elevate some and abase others Our eye must not be wicked because his heart is good Let us content our selves that he loves the humble and to know that the lowest place of all is most secure No man is made reprobate without justice no man is saved without mercy God creates men to repair in many that which he hath made and also to punish in the persons of many that which he hath not made 3. Jesus doth not cure his brethren and yet cures strangers to shew that his powers are not tied to any nation but his own will So likewise the graces of God are not to be measured according to the nature of him who receives them but by the pure bounty of him who gives them The humility of some doth call him when the presumption of others doth estrange him The weak grounds of a dying law did no good to the Jews who disdained the grace of Jesus Christ And that disdain deprived them of their adoption of the glory of the New Testament of all the promises and of all Magistracy They lost all because they would keep their own wills Let us learn by the grace of God to desire earnestly that good which we would obtain effectually Persons distasted and surfetted cannot advance much in a spiritual life And he that seeks after perfection coldly shall never find it Aspirations THy beauties most sweet Jesus are without stain thy goodness without reproch and thy conversation without importunity God forbid I should be of the number of those souls which are distasted with Monna and languish after the onions of Egypt The more I taste thee the more I incline to do thee honour Familiarity with an infinite thing begets no contempt but onely from those whom thou doest despise for their own faults O what high secrets are thy favours O what Abysses are thy graces We may wish and run But except thou cooperate nothing is done If thou cease to work all is undone I put all my happiness into thy hands It is thou alone which knowest how to chuse what we most need by thy Sovereign wisdom and thou givest it by thy extream bounty The Gospel upon Tuesday the third week in Lent S. Matth. 18. If thy brother offend thee tell him of it alone BUt if thy brother shall offend against thee go and rebuke him between thee and him alone if he shall hear thee thou shalt gain thy brother and if he will not hear thee joyn with thee besides one or two that in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may stand And if he will not hear them tell the Church and if he will not hear the Church let him be to thee as the Heathen and the Publican Amen I say to you whatsoever ye shall bind upon earth shall be bound also in heaven and whatsoever ye shall loose upon earth shall be loosed also in heaven Again I say to you that if two of you shall consent upon earth concerning every thing whatsoever they ask it shall be done to them of my Father which is in heaven for where there be two or three gathered in my name there am I in the midst of them Then came Peter unto him and said Lord how often shall my brother offend against me and I forgive him until seven times Jesus said to him I say not to thee until seven times but until seventy times seven times Moralities 1. THe heavens are happy that they go always in one measure and in so great a revolution of ages do not make one false step but man is naturally subject to fail He is full of imperfections and if he have any virtues he carries them like dust against the wind or snow against the sun This is the reason which teaches him that he needs good advice 2. It is somewhat hard to give right correction but much harder to receive it profitably Some are so very fair spoken that they praise all which they see and because they will find nothing amiss they are ordinarily good to no body They shew to those whom they flatter their virtues in great and their faults in little they will say to those who are plunged in great disorders they have no other fault but that they are not sufficiently carefull of their own health Others do correct with such sharpness and violence that they wound their own hearts to cure other mens and seem to have a greater mind to please their own passions than to amend those whom they would instruct Correction should be accompanied with sweetness but it must carry withall a little vigour to make a right temper and to keep a mean between softness and austerity Jesus in the Prophet Isaiah is called both a rod and a flower to shew us according to Origen that he carries severity mingled with sweetness to use either of them according to the diversity of persons 3. It is not a very easie thing to receive brotherly correction patiently we are so far in love with being well thought of And after we have lost the tree of life which is virtue it self we would keep the bark of it which is onely reputation All shadows proceed from those bodies upon which somewhat shines honour is the child of a known virtue and many when they cannot get one lawfull are willing to have a Bastard This is the cause why so many resemble those serpents which requite them with poison who sing to them pleasant songs Whatsoever is spoken to instruct them makes them passionate and dart out angry speeches against those who speak to them mild and gentle words of truth and tending to their salvation Rest assured you can never get perfection except you count it a glorie to learn and discover your own imperfections 4. There is nothing of more force than the prayers of just men which are animated by the same spirit and cimented together with perfect concord They are most powerfull both in heaven and earth When they desire what
and who knoweth himself to be deformed and wicked yet faileth not by Nature to be in love with himself So through a love of Concupiscence he may love things which have neither Beauty nor Goodnesse although he daily have a blind feeling of some thing suitable to sensuallity and an unperceivable attractive As for love of reason which is properly Humane love one may be assured it alwayes looks directly upon good and fair not simply but good fair acknowledged agreeable to its contentment This is the root of all reasonable amities and hitherto those great sources Means to make ones self to be beloved worthily of love reduced which are Honesty utilitie Delectation Resemblance reciprocall love obliging and pleasing conversation Within these six heads in my opinion the fifteen means to make one to be beloved are comprised which are touched by Aristotle in the second book of his Rhetorick To wit to love that which a friend loveth to entertain his apprehensions his joyes and his discomforts his hatred and Amities to keep him in a laudable opinion of our sufficiency by good parts of wit courage virtue industrie and reciprocally to hold him in good esteem to love him to oblige him to praise him unto others to bear with him in his humours to trust him with your secrets readily to serve him without forgetfulnesse or negligence to be inviolably faithfull to him which we will more amply deduce in the subsequent section But if you regard its effects I find three great empires Notable effects of love in the 3. worlds it exerciseth in the world naturall civil and supernaturall In the naturall it causeth all simpathies antipathies accords ties generations productions In the civill world it builds two cities as saith S. Augustine very different If it be good it raiseth a Citie of peace wherein chaste Amities sway and with them Truth Faith Honour Virtues contentments delights If it be bad It makes a Babylon full of confusion where cares fears griefs warre enmities impurities adulteries incests sacriledges bloud murther and poison inhabit and all that which commonly ariseth from this fatall plague In the supernaturall world it causeth nine effects which are very well figured by the celestiall throne of love composed of nine diaphanous globes whose effects are Solitude Silence Suspension Indefatigability Languishment Extasie and Transanimation which we more at length will consider in the sequele of this Treatise §. 2. Of Amity AMITY is the medecine of health and Immortality Eccl. 6. Medicamentùm vitae Amity the tree of life of life and in a manner doth that in Civill life which the tree of life in terrestriall Paradise promises in naturall life with an infinite number of sweetnesses and pleasures it immortaliseth us after death in the remembrance of that which is most dear unto us in the world It is that which giveth light to dark affairs certainty It Includeth all blessings to doubtfull support to tottering goodnesse to evil grace to good order to irregular ornament to simple and activenesse to dead By it the banished find a countrey the poor a patrimony great ones find offices the rich services the Ignorant knowledge the feeble support the sick health and the afflicted comfort Should a man live on Nectar and Ambrosia among starres and Intelligencies he would not be happy if he had not friends to be witnesses of his good fortune and we may truly say that Amity continually makes up the greater part of our Felicities It is not here my purpose to extend my self with full sail upon the praise thereof since so many excellent wits have already handled this subject but to shew how good Amities are to be chosen and how to be cultivated There are some who make profession to be friends What amity is Affectus est spontanea suavis animi ad aliquem inflectio Cassiod de amicit and know not so much as what friendship is but Aristotle plainly proves there is difference between affection Good-will Love Amity and Concord Affection is a spark of love not yet throughly formed in which understanding hath some slight passion Good-will A simple Good-will and consent born towards some one although many times there be no great knowledge of the party as it happeneth to such who of two Combatants favour rather the one then the other not knowing either of them Love is an affection already formed and inclined with fervour to the good of Conformity Amity is a love of mutuall well-wishing grounded upon communication Whence may be inferred that all those who love are not friends but all such as are true friends necessarily love The meanest people may love the most eminent but there can be no Amity since they therein find not correspondence There are entranced lovers in the world who are enamoured Miserable lovers of all beauties none returning them love again which deserves either laughter or compassion seeing they may directly go to the first of Beauties where they shall find reciprocall contentment After love followeth concord which is the fruit of it in the union of judgement and will Now well to understand how to choose good Amities the Species or kind of them must be known wherein I find that one Hippodamus a great Platonick Philosopher hit right when he established three sorts of Three sorts of amity Amities whereof one belongs to beasts the other to men and the third to Demi-gods Animall-Amities are those which subsist onely in Animal-amity Nature and which are common to us with beasts Thus saith S. Augustine a mother which loveth Pro mugno laudarurus sum in homine quod videam in Tigride August 410. homil 38. her children for flesh and blouds sake not otherwise raising her thoughts towards God doth but as a Hen a Dove a Tigresse a Serpent and so many other living creatures which have so great affection towards their little ones It is not that these Amities are not very necessary since Nature inspires them and powreth them into the veins with the soul by admirable infusions which preserve the estate of the world entire It is good much to affect ones own but we must build upon the first elements of Nature and by Grace and Reason raise the edifice of true charity Parents ought to love their children as a part of their own bodies which Nature hath separated from themselves But Amity should never divide their hearts Children are bound to love their parents as fishes their water Brothers cannot too much esteem the love and Concord which they mutually maintain together A husband and a wife are bound to a most strict commerce of Amity since as God produced a word in heaven and with the word the holy Ghost So he hath been pleased to create Adam on earth as his own Image and out of this Image he hath drawn Eve to be unto a man a spirit of peace and a love of a perpetuall lasting There is no doubt but that to fail in
it is that hath stirred up the ashes of Rabelais nor who hath been versed in this putrefaction but by a manifest vengeance from heaven we daily behold new vermine to arise which endeavour to gnaw and dissipate all that which hath any piety or fear of God in Christianity Blind creatures you know not the evil and therefore Aug. in Psal 99. Siquis forte propterea non cognoseit quia non advertit advertat de caetero atque utinam inveniat quod advertat nè Deus inveniat quod evertat Sed tamen quia non quiescunt nasci spinae in male exultantibus advertamus jubilationem improbandam offeramus Deo jubilationem coronandam you make no account to correct it you find not what to reprehend therein but God will find for what to destroy you You have thorns in the middest of your feasts and recreations which will pierce you even to the drawing of bloud Take away the solaces of a Pagan and present to God the alacrity of Christians know you not that the grashoppers of the Apocalyps have the visage of virgin and the tayl of a scorpion All these tants and scoffs have the seeming apparence of generosity but the poison is in the tail Behold in part the disorders which at this day proceed from three sorts of tongues the vain the reproachful the scoffing without speaking at all of oaths perjuries blasphemies which have the language of hell What a deluge of corruption issueth from one small member of man Alas what remedy is there for all this it being one of the greatest obstacles of salvation and Christian perfection The mischief is not onely in the tongue it is in Remedies the heart and thereto remedy must be applied considering both the deformity and punishment of the like vices The vain tongue which is practised in babble lies flatteries and impertinent chatter ordinarily proceedeth from a sleight shallow idle spirit As it is sleight it is full of foppery as shallow it is servilely subject to complacence as idle it seeketh employment in vanity not being able to find it in virtue This imtemperance of tongue is an effect of ill-governed idleness and there it is where the searing-iron must be applied to make it a serious soul much pleased with entertainments worthy of a man able to resist idle toys and to settle it in a firm posture in good employments to the end it may have no leisure to diffuse it self in vain superfluities The Lips of the spouse S. Thomas in Cant. 4. Eccl. 18. Sicut vitta coccinea labia tua lips of the bride as S. Thomas notably observeth are compared to a carnation ribband to inform us that the ribband serves women to bind up their hair and the discretion of lips ought to tie up our thoughts least they be scattered in a thousand follies of speech S. Ambrose interpreting these words of the Wiseman Sepi possessionem tuam spin◠which admonish to make a hedge of thorns about our inheritance saith We have not any better possession than our Possessio tua mens tua est aurum tuum cor tuum est Argentum tuum eloquium tuum est Ambr. 1. officior c. 2. soul no better gold than our heart no better silver than our words it is about this treasure we ought to make our wall Rivers are tributaries to the Ocean for all their drops of water and you at the last judgement of God for every word Is not this worthy of a little consideration to stay a vain tongue As for the reproachful the one proceedeth from a From whence calumny proceedeth very stupid and gross in consideration from an ill liberty from a dangerous custom which maketh that one sometimes slandereth not purposely and this must be corrected by prudence and careful observation the other taketh birth from an enraged soul full of gall and acrimony which casteth its froath out by the tongue finding torment and punishment in anothers happiness and searching out its contentment in the diminution thereof but it there encountereth a new torture beholding its reproches as the foam of the sea which beateth on the foot of rocks and flieth not to the steepy top Great minds dissipate calumnies by the innocency Horrour of calumny of their life as the chrystal current of rivers carry along the small flying dust All the arrows of reproach return upon the calumniatour who oftentimes liveth in this world as a solitary wolf tormented with a thousand mortal affrightments of a wicked conscience which make him to begin his hell in this world and finish it in the other without end For what mercy can there be for a calumniatour who dieth in obloquies So many reproches are so many man-slaughters wherewith all bloudy he goeth to the judgement of God to receive the reward of his wickedness Saint Clement witnesseth S. Clomens ep 1. ad Jacob. Sunt homicidae interfectores fratrum sunt homidae detractores corum that this is the doctrine of Saint Peter who distinguisheth two sorts of homicides The one of the hand the other of the tongue both punishable with one and the same pain There is no other remedy but to take away brotherly hatred by charity and seriously bridle this untamed tongue until it be mastered As for the scoffing tongue it proceedeth from a Danger of scoffing ridiculous soul light feeble and languishing in the relishes of God and if it further pass on to mock at things sacred it is a bud of the same impiety Such goblins and pratling devils are not commonly cured by reason their hearts are worm-eaten and become rotten with infidelity they are the sons of Cham unbridled and dissolute creatures which will fall into a thousand disasters in this life if they do not powerfully amend themselves and shall in the other world find a heap of anger and vengeance for punishment of their crimes Their laughter is the crackling of thorns or song of snails in the flames Flie O Noblemen such plagues and well Tongue the incensory of the Divinity remember what a great person said That your tongue is as the incensory of the Divinitie use the matter so that your words may be presented to the throne of God as the true perfume of Heaven The eighth OBSTACLE Curiositie in the resentment of affronts and disgraces AS men are allured by vain praises and bathe themselves in flatteries as in rose-water so are they extreamly sensible of affronts whether they be real disgraces or have no subsistence at all but in the imagination One cannot touch this string of point of honour so slightly but it will eccho forth some sound The least word of disdain raiseth a storm Apprehensi on of affronts in the mind a disgrace is a clap of thunder and one scornful countenance of a Prince breedeth more fear and terrour than a canon These worldly respects cause a main impediment in the exercise of virtue and a soul which shall feed
Contemplation also is divided into divers degrees Divers degrees of contemplation For there is one ordinary which maketh use of imagination and of sensible species drawn from the sight of objects though it subtilize and purifie them by the help of the understanding There is another termed immediate and perfect which goes directly to God without any mixture of fantasies or aid of creatures but if it be much discharged from all things create it is called dark contemplation because the soul being in it wholly dazeled and as it were blinded with rays of the divine Essence frameth not to it self any sensible idaea of God but beholdeth him by the way of negation banishing all representations and resemblances of creatures the more firmly to adhere unto the simplicity of the first Being But if it proceed in a superiour manner then it mounteth S. Ambros l. 3. de virginibus Influentibus divinis corporeus peregrinatur affectus usus ille exterioris hominis exâ—lesâ—it to the contemplation termed the most eminent which is the whole-sister of the beatified vision and the last heaven whereunto S. Paul was rapt a sphere totally enflamed with seraphical love where the use of sense and exteriour man seems quite annihilated and the spirit transported to the ineffable conversation with the Divinity Now we must observe upon this discourse what S. Thomos in 3. dist 52. the learned S. Thomas said That whilest our life is shut up in this mortal body its manner of actuating proceedeth by simple and ordinary ways which conduct us to the Creatour by contemplation of creatures and if any one understand spiritual things in this sublime nakedness which is discharged of images it is an admirable way and surpasseth all humane things First it is necessary to have a pious affection The ordinary manner of proceeding in things divine to matters divine thence we pass to meditation from meditation to ordinary contemplation which is attended by admiration and admiration by a certain spiritual alacrity and this alacrity by a certain fear with reverence and fear by fervent charity diffused into the exercise of good works These are the most assured ways to walk in spiritual life But these transcendent souls will in the beginning Illusions of this transcendent devotion lift a man up from the earth and make a Seraphin of him from the first day of his apprentiship To meditate well is nothing else but to make a review of our self and actions to adapt them to the commandments of God and counsels of Jesus Christ You must flie fervently even to the third Heaven and remain there rapt without knowledge whether one be on this side or that side of the world But alas how many times happeneth it these Eagles descend from this false emperial heaven to fish some wretched frog in the marsh of this inferiour earth After all these large temples of prayers gilded with so goodly words we see in the Sanctuary a pourtraict of a Rat a soul faint and pusillanimous shut up in self-love tied to petty interests imperiously commanded by so many tumultuous passions which play their prize whilest the spirit slumbers in this mystical sleep and living death They will in the beginning go equal with the seraphical souls of Saints who arrived at this purity of prayer by great mortifications and most particular favours from God But they imitate them so ill that in stead of being suited with great and solid virtues they retain nought but ostentous forms and a vain boast of words What importeth it a devote who cannot tell how to govern her house to know the retire introversion extroversion simplification dark prayer mystical sleep spiritual drunkenness tast fire quiet the cloud of glory and so many other kinds which serve to disguise devotion Know we not many spirits of young women loose themselves herein and seeking too much to refine ancient piety have made it wholly to vapour out in smoke finding themselves as void of humility as they were puffed up with presumption From thence often proceeds the curiosity of matters ravishing and extraordinary to gain to themselves the reputation of great spiritual persons and to sooth themselves with the opinion of a false sanctity When one is once gained by a false pretext of errour it is no hard matter to be perswaded all we think on is a vision all we say is a prophesie and all we do is a miracle The evil spirit finding souls drunk with this self-love hath played strange pranks which may be read in Epiphanius and Cassianus and whereof it would be an easie matter to produce many examples were it not much better to deplore than recount them 8. This vanity not satisfied to harbour in the mind The word of God altered in chairs by the extravagant opinions of hearers which bred it extendeth to the chairs of Preachers where the curious and phanatical spirits of Auditours would willingly hatch chymaera's for such as are yet but young beginners in the mystery One will have that use be made of thoughts transcendent and extraordinary and many times extravagant entangled with a perplexity of periods which leave nothing but noise in the ear and arrogance in the mind the other who is most ignorant startles at this quaint Theologie and seeks to wrest mysteries and disjoynt mens judgements thereby to draw upon all sorts of people discourses of the Trinity and Incarnation involved in visionary imaginations and turned about on a counter-battery of affected antitheses and if this be not as ordinary in all sermons as was the Delphick sword which heretofore served for all purposes in sacrifices it is to be ignorant in the ways of souls elect The other delighteth in doctrines unheard-of in a vast recital of Authours and forreign tongues as if he went about to exercise devils and not instruct Christians some one boasts to alledge neither Scripture Fathers nor any passage whatsoever for fear of marring the plaits of his periods he makes trophey to take all within his own fancy and to borrow nothing of the Ancients as if Bees who rob flowers in the garden to make honey of them were not much better than spiders who spin their wretched webs out of their own substance There are of them who desire to bundle up an endless train of fantastical conceptions without Scripture or reason who seem to tell wonders and rarities most ravishing but if any man will weigh them in an equal ballance he shall find vanities onely big with noise and wind They who have the itch of ear Sapientiae atque facundiae caupones Tertul. l. de anima c. 3. are devoted to the beauty of language and bestir them rather to talk than speak in a sermon They adore discourses replenished with a youth full eloquence and devested of wisdom having no sinews for support and less sting to transfix a heart Good God! how knowing would Preachers be did they understand as saith S. Paul how to speak
find the like to whom wouldst thou have me go but to thy self who doest not yet cease to call me The Gospel upon the third Sunday in Lent S. Luke 11. Jesus cast out the Devil which was dumb ANd he was casting out a devil and that was dumb And when he had cast out the devil the dumb spake and the multitudes marvelled And certain of them said in Belzebub the Prince of Devils he casteth out Devils And others tempting asked him a sign from Heaven But he seeing their cogitations said to them Every Kingdom divided against it self shall be made desolate and house upon house shall fall And if Satan also be divided against himself how shall his Kingdom stand because you say that in Belzebub I do cast out Devils And if I in Belzebub cast out Devils your children in whom do they cast out Therefore they shall be your judges But if I in the finger of God do cast out Devils surely the Kingdom of God is come upon you When the strong armed keepeth his court those things are in peace that he possesseth but if a stronger than he come upon him and overcome him he will take away his whole armour wherein he trusted and will distribute his spoils He that is not with me is against me and he that gathereth not with me scattereth When the unclean spirit shall depart out of a man he wandreth through places without water seeking rest and not finding he saith I will return into my house whence I departed And when he is come he findeth it swept with a besom and trimmed Then he goeth and taketh seven other spirits worse than himself and entering in they dwell there And the last of that man be made worse than the first And it came to pass when he said these things a certain woman lifting up her voice out of the multitude said to him Blessed is the womb that bare thee and the paps that thou didst suck But he said Yea rather blessed are they that hear the word of God and keep it Moralities 1. THe Almond-tree is the first which begins to flourish and it is often first nipt with frost The tongue is the first thing which moves in a mans body and is soonest caught with the snares of Satan That man deserves to be speechless all his life who never speaks a word better than silence 2. Jesus the eternal word of God came upon earth to reform the words of man his life was a lightening and his word a thunder which was powerfull in effect but always measured within his bounds He did fight against ill tongues in his life and conquered them all in his death The gall and vinegar which he took to expiate the sins of this unhappy tongue do shew how great the evil was since it did need so sharp a remedy He hath cured by suffering his dolours what it deserved by our committing sins Other vices are determined by one act the tongue goes to all it is a servant to all malitious actions and is generally confederate with the heart in all crimes 3. We have just so much Religion as we have government of our tongues A little thing serves to tame wild beasts and a small stern will serve to govern a ship Why then cannot a man rule so small a part of his body It is not sufficient to avoid lying perjuries quarrels injuries slanders and blasphemies such as the Scribes and Pharisees did vomit out in this Gospel against the purity of the Son of God We must also repress idle talk and other frivolous and unprofitable discourses There are some persons who have their hearts so loose that they cannot keep them within their brests but they will quickly swim upon their lips without thinking what they say and so make a shift to wound their souls 4. Imitate a holy Father called Sisus who prayed God thirty years together every day to deliver him from his tongue as from a capital enemy You shall never be very chaste of your body except you do very well bridle your tongue For loosness of the flesh proceeds sometimes from liberty of the tongue Remember your self that your heart should go like a clock with all the just and equal motions of his springs and that your tongue is the finger which shews how all the hours of the day pass When the heart goes of one side and the tongue of another it is a sure desolation of your spirits Kingdom If Jesus set it once at peace and quiet you must be very carefull to keep it so and be very fearfull of relapses For the multiplying of long continued sins brings at last hell it self upon a mans shoulders Aspirations O Word incarnate to whom all just tongues speak and after whom all hearts do thirst and languish chase from us all prating devils and also those which are dumb the first provoke and loose the tongue to speak wickedly and the other bind it when it should confess the truth O peace-making Solomon appease the divisions of my heart and unite all my powers to the love of thy service Destroy in me all the marks of Satans Empire and plant there thy Trophees and Standards that my spirit be never like those devils which seek for rest but shall never find it Make me preserve inviolable the house of my conscience which thou hast cleansed by repentance and clothed with thy graces that I may have perseverance to the end without relapses and so obtain happiness without more need of repentance The Gospel upon Munday the third week in Lent S. Luke 4. Jesus is required to do Miracles in his own Countrey ANd he said to them Certes you will say to me this similitude Physitian cure thy self as great things as we have heard done in Capharnaum do also here in thy Countrey And he said Amen I say to you that no Prophet is accepted in his own Country In truth I say to you there were many widows in the dayes of Elias in Israel when the heaven was shut three years and six moneths when there was a great famine made in the whole earth and to none of them was Elias sent but into Sarepta of Sidon to a widow woman And there were many Lepars in Israel under Elizeus the Prophet and none of them made clean but Naaman the Syrian And all in the Synagogue were filled with anger hearing these things And they rose and cast him out of the Citie and they brought him to the edge of the hill whereupon their Citie was built that they might throw him down headlong But he passing through the midst of them went his way Moralities 1. THe malignity of mans nature undervalueth all that which it hath in hand little esteems many necessary things because they are common The Sun is not counted rare because it shines every day and the elements are held contemptible since they are common to the poor as well as the rich Jesus was despised in his own Countrey because he
greatest of all conquerours Charity drew her from home to seek health for her daughter because like a good mother she loved her not with a luxurious love but in her affliction feeling all her dolours by their passionate reflection upon her heart Her faith was planted upon so firm a rock that amongst all the apparances of despair her hope remained constant Humility did effect that the name of Dog was given her for a title of glory she making profit of injuries and converting into honour the greatest contempt of her person Her words were low and humble but her faith was wonderous high since in a moment she chased away the devil saved her daughter and changed the word Dog into the name of a Sheep of Christs flock as Sedulius writes Perseverance was the last of her virtues in the Combat but it was the first which gained her Crown If you will imitate her in these four virtues Love Faith Humility and Perseverance they are the principal materials of which the body of your perfection must be compounded Aspirations O Jesus Christ Son of David I remember well that thy forefather did by his harp chase away the devil from Saul And wilt not thou who art the Father of all blessed harmonies drive away from me so many little spirits of Affections of Appetites and Passions which trouble and discompose my heart This poor soul which is the breath of thy mouth and daughter of thine infinite bounties is like the Sun under a cloud possessed with many wicked spirits but it hath none worse than that of self-love Look upon me O Lord with thine eyes of mercy and send me not away with silence since thou art the Word Rather call me Dog so that I may be suffered to gather up the crums which fall from thy table Whatsoever proceeds from thy mouth is sacred and must be taken by me as a relique If thou say I shall obtain my desire I say I will have no other than what thou inspirest and I can be contented with nothing but what shall be thy blessed will and pleasure The Gospel upon Friday the first week in Lent S. John 15. Of the Probatick Pond AFter these things there was a festival day of the Jews and Jesus went up to Jerusalem and there is at Jerusalem upon Probatica a Pond which in Hebrew is named Bethsaida having five porches In these lay a great multitude of sick persons of blind lame withered expecting the stirring of the water And an Angel of our Lord descended at a certain time into the Pond and the water was stirred And he that had gone down first into the Pond after the stirring of the water was made whole of whatsoever infirmity he was holden And there was a certain man there that had been eight and thirty years in his infirmity Him when Jesus had seen lying and knew that he had now a long time he saith to him Wilt thou be made whole The sick man answered him Lord I have no man when the water is troubled to put me into the Pond for whiles I come another goeth down before me Jesus saith to him Arise take up thy bed and walk And forthwith he was made whole and he took up his bed and walked And it was the Sabbath that day The Jews therefore said to him that was healed it is the Sabbath thou mayest not take up thy bed He answered them He that made me whole he said to me Take up thy bed and walk They asked him therefore What is that man that said to thee Take up thy bed and walk But he that was made whole knew not who it was For Jesus shrunk aside from the multitude standing in the place Afterward Jesus findeth him in the Temple and said to him Behold thou art made whole sin no more lest some worse thing chance to thee That man went his way and told the Jews that it was Jesus that made him whole Moralities 1. ALl the world is but one great Hospital wherein so many persons languish expecting the moving of the water and the time of their good fortune The Angels of earth which govern our fortunes go not so fast as our desires But Jesus who is the great Angel of Counsel is always ready to cure our maladies to support our weakness and make perfect our virtues We need onely to follow his motions and inspirations to meet with everlasting rest It is a lamentable thing that some can patiently expect the barren favours of men twenty or thirty years together and yet will not continue three days in prayer to seek the inestimable graces of God 2. The first step we must make toward our salvation is to desire it That man is worthy to be eternally sick who fears nothing else but the loss of his bodily health Men generally do all what they can possibly to cure their corporal infirmities they abide a thousand vexations which are but too certain to recover a health which is most uncertain And as for the passions of the mind some love the Feavers of their own love and their worldly ambition above their own life They suck the head of a venemous aspick and are killed by the tongue of a viper They will not part with that which kills them and if you take from them the worm which makes them itch or the executioner who doth indeed torment them they believe you take away the chiefest of their felicity Happy is that soul which holds nothing so dear in this world but will forsake it willingly to find God and will spare nothing to gain Paradise 3. There is nothing more common nor so rare as man The world is full of vicious and unprofitable men But to find one very compleat in all good things is to find a direct Phenix There are more businesses without men than men without businesses For how many charitable employments might many lazy and idle persons find out So many poor mens affairs continue at a stand so many miserable creatures languish so many desolate persons long to find some man who with little trouble to himself would take some small care of their affairs and make up some little piece of their fortunes Jesus is the man of God desired of all Ages to him we must apply our selves since he is both life and truth By him we may come to all happiness by him we may live in the fountains and streams of life and in him we may contemplate the chiefest of all truths Aspirations WHat patience have I in committing sins and how impatient am I in my sufferings for them I am ever most ready to execute vice and unwilling to abide the punishment O good God there are many years in which I have retained an inclination to this disorder to that sin My soul is bound as it were with iron chains in this unhappy bed will there be no Angel to move the water for me But art not thou the Lord and Prince of Angels Then I most humbly
beseech thee O blessed Saviour do thou command and by thy onely word my affairs will go well and receive a happy dispatch my body will become sound my soul innocent my heart at rest and my life an eternal glory The Gospel upon Saturday the first week in Lent and the Sunday following out of S. Matthew 17. Of the Transfiguration of our Lord. ANd after six days Jesus taketh unto him Peter and James and John his brother and bringeth them into a high mountain apart and he was transfigured before them And his face did shine as the Sun and his garments became white as snow And behold there appeared to them Moses and Elias talking with him And Peter answering said to Jesus Lord it is good for us to be here if thou wilt let us make here three Tabernacles one for thee one for Moses and one for Elias And as he was yet speaking behold a bright cloud over-shadowed them And lo a voice out of the cloud saying This is my well-beloved Son in whom I am well pleased hear ye him And the Disciples hearing it fell upon their face and were sore afraid And Jesus came and touched them and he said to them Arise and fear not And they lifting up their eyes saw no body but onely Jesus And as they descended from the Mount Jesus commanded them saying Tell the vision to no body till the Son of man be risen from the dead Moralities 1. THe words of the Prophet Osee are accomplished the nets and toils planted upon mount Tabor not to catch birds but hearts The mountain which before was a den for Tigers and Panthers according to the story is now beautified by our Saviour and becomes a place full of sweetness ravishments Jesus appears transfigured in the high robes of his glory The cloud made him a pavillion of gold and the Sun made his face shine like it self The heavenly Father doth acknowledge his Son as a true Prince of glory Moses and Elias both appear in brightness the one bearing the Tables of the Law and the other carried in a burning Chariot as Origen saith which made the Apostles know him For the Hebrews had certain figures of the most famous men of their Nation in books They both as Saint Luke saith were seen in glory and Majesty which fell upon them by reflection of the beams which came from the body of Jesus who is the true fountain of brightness The Apostles lose themselves in the deliciousness of this great spectacle and by seeing more than they ever did desired to lose their eyes O that the world is most contemptible to him that knows how to value God as he ought So many fine powders so many pendents and favours of Glass so many Towers and Columns of dirt plaistered over with gold are followed by a million of Idolaters To conclude so many worldly jewels are like the empty imaginations of a sick spirit not enlightened by the beams of truth Let us rely upon the word saith Saint Augustine which remains for ever while men pass like the water of a fountain which hides it self in the Spring shews it self in the stream and loseth it self at last in the Sea But God is always himself there needs no Tabernacle made by the hands of man to remain with him for in Paradise he is both the God and the Temple 2. Tabor is yet but a small pattern we must get all the piece we must go to the Palace of Angels and brightness where the Tabernacles are not made by the hands of men There we shall see the face of the living God clearly and at full There the beauties shall have no vails to hide them from us Our being shall have no end Our knowledges will not be subject to errour nor our loves and affections to displeasure O what a joy will it be to enjoy all and desire nothing to be a Magistrate without a successour to be a King without an enemy to be rich without covetousness to negotiate without money and to be ever-living without fear of death 3. But who can get up to this mountain except he of whom the Prophet speaks who hath innocent hands and a clean heart who hath not received his soul of God in vain to bury it in worldly pelf To follow Jesus we must transform our selves into him by hearing and following his doctrine since God the Father proposeth him for the teacher of mankind and commands us to hearken unto him Wee must follow his examples since those are the originals of all virtues The best trade we can practise in this world is that of transfiguration and we may do it by reducing our form to the form of our Lord and walking upon earth like men in Heaven Then will the Sun make us have shining faces when purity shall accompany all our actions and intentions Our clothes shall be as white as snow when we shall once become innocent in our conversations we shall then be ravished like the Apostles and after we have been at Mount Tabor we shall be blind to the rest of the world and see nothing but Jesus It is moreover to be noted that our Saviour did at that time entertain himself with discourse of his great future sufferings and of his death to teach us that his Cross was the step by which he mounted up to beatitude Aspirations O Blessed Palace O magnificent Tabor which this day didst hold upon thee the Prince of Glory I love and admire thee but I admire somewhat else above thee It is the Heavenly Jerusalem that triumphant company that face of God where all those beauties are which shall never cease to be beauties It is for that I live for that I die for that I languish with a holy impatience O my Jesus my most benign Lord transform me then into thee that I may thereby be transformed into God If I have carried the earthly Image of Adam why should I not also carry the form of Jesus Catch me O Lord within those tissued nets and golden toils of brightness which thou didst plant upon this sacred mountain It is there I would leave mine eyes it is there I resolve to breath out my soul I ask no Tabernacles to be there built for me I have long since contemplated thy heart O Father of essences and all bounties as the most faithfull abode of my eternity The Gospel upon Munday the second week in Lent S. John 8. Jesus said to the Jews Where I go ye cannot come AGain therefore Jesus said to them I go and you shall seek me and shall die in your sin Whither I go you cannot come The Jews therefore said Why will he kill himself because he saith Whither I go you cannot come And he said to them You are from beneath I am from above you are of this world I am not of this world Therefore I say to you That you shall die in your sins For if you believe not that I am he ye shall die