to spirituall from temporall to eternall from the Kings of Israell to the King Messias and so also there is often passage the other way from the spirit to the letter and so in the rest It is also made very hard by the Equiuocatiō (n) The ambiguity of the Hebrew tongue of words wherof the Hebrew tongue is so full Which since it was the first and consequently the most compendious and short of all others it must necessarily containe many seuerall significations in few words And from hence it growes that generally such variety hath bene found in the Translations of the old Testament and some part also of the new Nay (o) The misplacing of points c. the very difference in placing a point doth make sometimes a different sense and so doth the manner either of writing or pronouncing a proposition As namely whē it is ambiguous whether any thing be affirmatiuely or Ironically or Interrogatorily to be read This with more is shewed by Father Salmeron For these and for many other reasons the vnderstanding of holy Scripture is very hardly learnt and we see by sad experience what diuisions doe abound in the world by occasion therof when men will call disobedience and pride by the name of holy Ghost and Euangelicall liberty There are amongst Sectaries of seuerall cuts and kindes sixteene different opinions concerning their Doctrine of Iustification All which they seuerally doe yet pretend to be grounded in holy Scripture and yet this Scripture it is which they will haue to be so cleere and plaine And vpon those fower words Hoc est corpus meum This is my body there are almost fourescore diuersities of opinion Our aduersaries themselues doe by their deeds of disagreement with one another proclayme the difficulty of holy Scripture which yet in words they will deny that so they may be excused in making it say what they list The truth is this That indeed it is full of difficulty and our Lord who made it so did with infinite loue prouide therin for our good and that more wayes then one For (p) The many and great goods we get by the very difficulty of holy Scripture See Salmeron vhi supra therby we are obliged as Father Salmeron doth also further shew to confesse the vnspeakeable wisedome (q) We are brought to a great beliefe of the high wisedom or God of Almighty God which doth infinitely surpasse all knowledge or conceyte of ours euen then when he vouchsafeth to expresse himselfe by words the ordinary signification wherof we vnderstand And (r) Our pride is humbled by this meanes he depresseth pride in vs and depriues vs of all confidence in our selues Heerby (s) It spurres vs on to prayer Psalm 119. he doth also stirre vs vp to make with all humility most earnest prayer to his diuine in maiesty that he will open to vs the secrets of his law as we see S. Augustine did and all the Saints haue done especially King Dauid who was euer singing of this songe It also growes through the great obscurity of holy Scripture that the Church is filled with much variety (t) It breds great variety of diuine knowled◠in the Church of diuine knowledge neither is there that possibility to draw seuerall true senses out of plaine easy places as out of such as are obscure According to that of S. Augustine The obscurity of diuine Scripture is profitable for this that it begetteth bringeth to light seuerall Doctrines of truth whilst one man vnderstandeth it after one manner and another after another And (u) It breeds diligence in study and care to conserue in memory for this very reason also learned men are incited to a more diligent and earnest study therof And consequently they wil entertaine that knowledge with more gust which they haue acquired with more labour This (x) It inuiteth vs to purity of life obscurity is also a cause which makes vs purify our soules the more because like loues his like And holy things will neuer be well comprehended but by holy persons Moreouer it helpes to maintaine and make good that order (y) It helpes to maintaine the Church in due sub ordinatiō Order in the Church which our Lord God hath thought fit to hold in the dispensation of his guifts and graces For as the superiour Angells doe illuminate them who are inferiour so hath he bene pleased that amongst men some should excell others in learning and diuine knowledge who as Doctours and Pastours might interpret the same to others It (z) It saueth Pearles from being cast to swyne keepes impure and wicked persons from knowing those misteries which belong to God wherof they are vnworthy vncapable since they will not vse them well And our Lord himselfe hath said in his Ghospell that so it was fit to be and that seeing Marc. 4. Matt. 7. they might not see and that hearing they might not vnderstand and that pearles must not be cast before swyne And lastly the frailty of our corrupted nature is excellently prouided for by this meanes since through the difficulty which we find in holy Scripture we are (a) It nourisheth vs in reuerence and a holy awe kept in reuerence and in a kind of holy awe wheras if throughout they were familiar and gaue easy accesse to all cōmers they might through our fault grow instantly to be contemned On the (b) The Scripture is wouen both with hard and easy thinges and this is of great vse to vs. other side if all the parts thereof were hard a like we should giue ouer to seeke that which we despayred to find And therfore the good pleasure of our Lord hath bene to make the holy Scriptures obscure yet with a kind of plainenes and plaine but yet with an obscurenes That by their plainenes in some places they might illuminate vs and by their difficulty in others they might exercise vs. And that the easy places might helpe vs towards the vnderstanding of the hard and the hard might serue to imploy our wits and to make vs know withall how much we are bound to God for hauing made some others easy And this is the substance of that which Father Salmeron hath deliuered both concerning the reasons which make the holy Scriptures hard and the fruits which grow to vs therby Through which we may easily discerne the tender and wise care and loue of this diuine Doctour of our soules Not only in giuing vs such excellent lessons but for hauing done it in such an admirable manner as (c) A demonstration of the loue of our Lord to vs in this particular that whilst we are studying them we must almost in despight of our owne proud hartes be imploying our selues withall both vpon the exercise of prayer and the practise of the solide vertues of humility patience obedience purity and charity And if yet we shal not think that our Lord hath shewed vs loue
Hierusalem that this bread which is seene by vs is not bread although the tast esteeme it to be bread but that it is the body of Christ Many mothers saith (i) Chrysost hom 83. in Matt. S. Chrysostome put out their children when they are borne to be nurst by others but Christ our Lord would not doe soe but doth nourish vs with his owne body and so doth conioyne glew vs to himselfe O miracle (k) Chrysost l. 3. de Sacerde tio O benignity of God sayth the same S. Chrysostome He that sitteth aboue with the Father at the same instant is handled by the hands of all and he deliuers himselfe vp to such as will receaue and imbrace him And in (l) Chrysost hom 24 c. 10.1 Epist ad Corinth another place he sayth thus That which is in the Chalice flowed out of his side and of that doe we communicate This indeed as sayth S. (m) Saint Ephrem who was familiar with Saint Basil the great lib. de natura Dei non serutanda cap. 5. Ephrem exceedeth all admiration all speach and all conceipt which Christ our Sauiour the only begotten sonne of God hath done To vs who are clad with flesh he hath giuen fire and spirit to eate namely his body and his bloud My bread sayth (n) Ambros l. 4. de Sacra menâ—is S. Ambrose is vsuall bread but this bread is bread before the words of the Sacrament but wheÌ„ the coÌ„secration once doth come of bread it is made the flesh of Christ. Let vs therfore settle this point how that which is bread can be made the body of Christ By consecration This consecration of what speach and words doth it consist Of the words and speach of our Lord Iesus For all the rest which is said is either prayse giuen to God or there are particular prayers made for the people and for Kings and others But when he comes to the tyme of making the B. Sacrament the Priest doth no longer speake in his owne words but in the words of Christ The speach therfore of Christ is that which makes this Sacrament What speach of Christ Thevery same wherby al things were made Our Lord commaunded and the heauen was made Our Lord commaunded and the earth was made Our Lord commaunded and the sea was made Our Lord commaunded al the creatures were made Thou seest therfore how effectually the speach of Christ doth work If (o) Note this consequence then there be such power in the speach of our Lord Iesus as to make those things be which were not how much more effectually will it worke towards the making of them be which are and to make them be changed into other then what they were Therefore (p) Marke well the expresse authority of this Saint that I may answere thee I say That it was not the body of Christ before the consecration but after the consecration I say to thee that then it is the body of Christ. Christ was carried sayth (q) Aug. in Psal 33. Conc. 1. Ibid. S. Augustine in his owne hands when commending his body to his Apostles he said Hoc est corpus meum this is my body for then he carried his body in his hands And agayne Our Lord would place our saluation in his body and bloud But how did he commend his body and bloud to vs In his humility For vnlesse he were humble he would not be eaten and drunke The good Pastour sayth (r) Greg. in hom 14. in Euang. S. Gregory the great laid downe his life for his sheepe that he might turne his body and bloud into our Sacrament might feed the sheepe which he had redeemed by the nutriment of his flesh Vnder the species of bread sayth S. (s) Cyril Ierosol in Catech. Myst 4. Cyrillus Ierosolymitanus the body is giuen thee and vnder the species of bloud the wine that so thou maist become participant of his body bloud So shall we by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is Carryers of Christ when we shall haue receiued his body and bloud into our body and so as S. Peter saith we shall be made consorts of the diuine nature And according to that of S. (t) Cyril l. 10. in Iohn c. 11. Cyrill if any man shall mingle wax which is melted by fire with other wax which is also melted in such sort that they both doe seeme to be but one made of both so by the coniunction of the body and bloud of Christ our Lord he is in vs and we in him S. (u) Greg. l. 4. Dialog c. 58. Gregory doth surther say What faithfull soule can doubt but that in the very hower of the Sacrifice the heauens doe open at the voyce of the Priest and that in this mystery of Christ Iesus the Quires of the Angells doe assist the highest and the lowest things doe meete Terrestriall and Celestiall things are ioyned and there is made one thinge of things which are visible and inuisible Heere then we are taught by the holy Fathers of the Church whome I might haue cited to this purpose both more at large and more in number the inscrutable loue of our Lord IESVS to mankind expressed in these high mysteries of the blessed Sacrament and the holy Sacrifice of the Masse But how shall we be able to disingage our selues for being euen ouerwhelmed with the huge weight therof since the superexcellent Humanity of our (x) The incompable dignity of the person of Christ our Lord. Lord IESVS consisting of that pretious body which first was framed out of purest bloud of the all-immaculate Virgin by the only hand of the holy Ghost and of that glorious soule which in the first instaÌ„t of the creation therof was hypostatically vnited to God the sonne the second person of the most B. Trinity and the same person being indiuisible from the other two of God the Father and God the holy Ghost that this person I say of Christ our Lord should be communicated to all the Priests of the holy Catholike Church to be offred daily ouer all the world and to be receiued into the brest both of them and al the other faithfull children of that mother as often as theÌ„selues should desire What Cherubim is able to discouer the greatnes of this benefit and what Seraphim hath his hart hoat inough to breath out such ardent flames of loue as grow due to God vpoÌ„ this account How full of reason was the exclamation and admiration of holy Dauid when he said Psalm 34. 9. That there was none like to God in the cogitations which he interteyned for our Good No man no creature could euer haue aspired to such a happines or so much as to haue conceaued that euen the diuine nature it selfe had bene able to expresse such goodnes But God is God and God is loue and the loue euen of Creatures is full of (y) How full of Inuention great loue is inuention for
hath framed the partes of this world of ours and of all the bodies conteyned therin with such exact perfectiō that nothing can either be added or dimished without making it either lesse faire in it selfe or lesse fit for the other parts therof The very least of these things he gouerneth with that depth of Wisedome and addresseth it to the seuerall ends by soe apt and admirable wayes that not so much as a haire can fall frō a head nor a sparrow light on the ground nor a fly can eyther liue or dye but by his pleasure and prouidence (h) A most strange but most certaine truth euen that little miserable thinge doth serue as a part without which the whole as hath beene said would be lesse beautifull Nothing happens to him by channce nothing by surprise but all things are done by eternall Councell And which increaseth the wonder al this is determined by one simple act of his without any deliberation at all or the interposing of the least delay and this so perfectly and so fully that hauing with his owne infinite Wisedome contemplated his owne workes by the space of infinite ages he could neuer find that any thing was not most wisely done nor any thing which was capable of the least amendment or alteration The (i) The infinite goodnes of Christ our Lord as he is God infinitenes of his Goodnes doth also appeare by innumerable wayes but especially by this That although his diuine Iustice be euery whit as infinite as his Mercy yet his Mercy extending it selfe first to vs euen out of his owne intrinsecall eternall goodnes to vs and vpon no originall motiue on our parts his (k) How the mercy of God may be sayd to be greater then his Iustice whilst yet both are infinite Psal 44. Ose 13. Iustice doth neuer exercise or imploy it selfe vpon his Creatures but by reason of some former expresse prouocation from them and therfore it is most truely said That his mercy is aboue all his workes and that the perdition of Israell is from it selfe What shall we say in further proofe of his Goodnes but that he hauing made vs all of nothing and being able with the same ease to make a million of better worlds then this he doth yet so court wooe vs to loue him to be intirely happy in him as if himselfe might not be so vnlesse we would be pleased to graunt his suite To these miserable vngratefull creatures of his he doth so deerly and so many waies communicate himselfe as that no one of thē doth exist which doth not in euery moment of tyme participate of his diuine Goodnes in most abundant and various manner He seekes vs when we are lost he calls vs when we goe astray he imbraceth vs as soone as we dispose our selues to returne notwithstanding the millions of sinnes which we may haue cōmitted against him He (l) The diuers wayes whereby God communicateth his misteries to vs. makes himself all in all to vs now performing the office of a King by commaunding now of a Captaine by conducting now of a Mother by cherishing and continually of a Pastour by feeding vs sometymes with Comforts wherby we may be incouraged and sometimes by Crosses through the ouercomming wherof we may be fortified and refined Nor (m) Consider of this truth with great attention for it is of vnspeakable comfort is there any one instant in this whole life of ours wherin by vertue of his former grace we may not euen by some act of our very thought alone acquire new degrees of grace as will be shewed more largely afterward to euery one of which degrees a seuerall degree of eternall glory in heauen doth correspond and euery one of which degrees of glory though it should last but for an instāt is incomparably more worth them all the pleasures and treasures and honours which euer were or will be tasted in this world by all the race of man betweene the creation of Adam and the day of Iudgment If we consider this truth as we ought and if God of his mercy will inable vs to feele it in our very harts we shall instantly admire the infinite liberall goodnes of his diuine Maiesty who would not so much as permit any euill at all in the world if it were not to deriue more good from thence then otherwise would haue accrewed without that euill Rom. 8. For all thinges do cooperate to the good of Gods seruants as S. Paul affirmes and S. Augustine inferreth thereupon That euen our very sinnes when they are forsaken do cooperate as seruing to inflame vs with greater loue of God and consequently they bespeake for vs more resplendent thrones of glory in the kingdome of Heauen then without those sinnes we should haue had So infinite I say is the goodnes of God and so excessiue is his loue as will further yet appeare by that which followes wherby the excellency of the soule of Christ our Lord as Man is to be declared The Loue of our Lord Iesus as he is Man is much commended to vs by the consideration of the Excellency of his Soule CHAP. 2. SINCE the dignity of the Soule of Christ our Lord is a great part of the ground of his immense loue to Man as will be shewed particularly afterward it may heer come fitly in to point at the supreme excellency of this Soule First therefore it must be taken for graunted that Christ our Lord had an Vnderstanding which was created at that instant when he was endued with a true and naturall soule of man Heereupon it followeth that he had a knowledge also which was created which was distinct from his diuine knowledge This truth was thus declared by Pope Agatho S. Synod Act. 6. 8. We publish and confesse that the two Natures of Christ our Lord and ech of them had the naturall proprietyes which respectiuely belonged to such naturs And the Councell of Calcedon doth in like sort define That he tooke to himselfe a perfect reasonable soule without the want of any propriety belonging to such a one and that in all thinges it was like to that of ours excepting sinne There was anciently indeed an heresy of certaine persons who were called Gnostici as S. Irenaeus relates Affirming that Christour Lord was ignorant of many thinges Iran lib. 1. aduer haer ca◠17. and that he learned many thinges vnder the direction of some Maister as other men might doe And so also (a) The heretikes of al ages are lead by the same spirit of errour Calu. in Harmoni◠passim do Sectaries of this last age of ours blaspheme being lead by the same spirit of errour as well in this as many other thinges whilst they lay an imputation of ignorance vpon Christ our Lord. But the holy Catholike Church abhorreth all such impious conceit as this and so al her Doctours with S. Thomas do auow That (b) Christ our Lord man had
reuiue and rayse it vp to receaue that homage without asking him so much as leaue O pretious sweet Humanity of Christ our Lord And (g) We at worthy of all punihment if wee become not euen the slaues of the Humanity of Christ our Lord. how shall we who know that thou wert humaned for vs and diddest not only descend to be a man but diddest degrade thy selfe further downe for the loue of vs how I say shall we sufficiently admire and loue thy Beauty which was so great euen in their externall eyes who had not withall the internall eyes of Faith wherwith thou hast enriched our soules And where shall we finde either holes or hills to hide or couer vs from thy wrath if we who are Christiās doe not by the eternall obsequiousnes of our harrs outstrip those obstinate but yet withall inconstant Iewes Obstinate in their mindes when they were grown to malice but inconstāt in mantayning those tender thoughts which they excellētly did sometymes oblige them to in the performance of so many Soueraigne signes of honour The admirable visible grace and disposition of the person of Christ our Lord is further declared CHAP. 6. VVHAT heauen on earth could euer make a man so happy as to haue beheld this sacred persō of our Lord Iesus in any of those postures which are described by the hand of the holy Ghost in holy scripture To haue (a) The incomparable grace of Christ our Lord in all his actions seen that god made mā as he was walking before the front of the Tēple whē his hart the while like a true Incensary was spending it selfe into the perfume of prayers which ascended before the Altar of the diuine mercy euen then and euen for them who there went in and out contemning and maligning him in the highest degree Mar. 11. Ioan. 20. To haue seene him walking and bestowing those deere limmes of his vpon those sands Mattb. 4. with incredible grace loue neere to that lake or sea of Galilea as if it had looked but like a kind of recreation when his enamoured soule was yet the while negotiating with his eternall Father Ibid. the vocation of his Apostles and by them the saluation of the whole world To haue seene him Luc. 4.16 c. standing vpon his sacred feet whilst with reuerence he would be reading in the Synagogue and then sitting downe afterwards when he would take vpon him the office of a teacher Ibid. 20. so pointing vs out by any little motion of his to the purity and perfection of euery action Marc. 3. To haue seene him sitting in the mindst of a roome with all that admiring multitude round about him whilst newes was brought him of the approach of his all-immaculate mother and of his kindred and domesticke friends who had reason to thinke euery minute to be a world of ages till their eies might be restored to that seate and Center of all ioy And he the while with diuine sweetnes and modesty looking round about him and lending a particular eye of mercy to euery soule there present and extending his liberall hand with an incomparable sweet noble grace did with his sacred mouth and with such a hart of loue as God alone is able to vnderstand adopt both them and all the world into his neerest deerest kindred vpon condition that they would do his Fathers will which was the only meanes to make them happy To (b) The infinite gratious goodnes of Christ our Lord. haue seene that sonne of God whose face is the delight and glory of all the Angells in heauen and at whose sacred feete they fall adoring with so profound reuerence deueste himselfe first of his vpper garment with such louely grace Ioan. 13.4 c. and gird the Towell about his virginall loynes with such modesty and fill the vessell full of water by the labour of his owne delicate armes with such alacrity and cast himselfe with such bottomelesse humility charity vpon those knees to which all the knees of heauen and earth were obliged to bow and from which the eternall Father was only to haue expected such an homage at the feete and for the comfort and conuersion of that diuell Iudas Yea and to wipe those very feete when he had washed them first and that perhaps with the teares of his owne sacred eyes to see if yet it might be possible to soften the hart of that Tygar who was able to defile such a beauty and to detest such a goodnes and who in despight of that prodigious mercy would needs be running post to hell by cōmiting that abhominable treachery They say the vale discouers the hill the darke shadow of a picture sets off the body which there is drawen Neuer was there such a peece of chiaro oscuro such a beautifull body as that of Christ our Lord neuer vvas there such a blacke shadovv as that vvretched man whome for the infamy of his crime I vvil forget to name But in fine to haue seene through the vvhole course of his life that holy Humanity sometymes svveating vvith excesse of labour some tymes grovvne pale vvith the rage of hungar some tymes pulled and vvracked seuerall vvayes at once by importunities sometymes pressed and as it were packed vp into lesse roome then his owne dimensions did require by crowdes of people and (c) Christ our Lord maintayned his grace and Beauty notwithstāding all the incōmodities to which he was put euer to haue beheld in his very face such an altitude of peacefull piety and such a depth of humility and such an vnlimitted and endlesse extent of Charity by remouing all diseases and dangers both of body and soule as heereafter (d) In the discourse vpon his Miracles will be shewed more at large for a man I say to haue had the sight of such an obiect would be sure I think to haue freed him from euer longing after any other Of Titus it was said that he was deliciae humani generis the very ioy and comfort of the world for the sweet receptiō which he vouchsafed to make to all commers Of Iulius Caesar it is recorded that being threatned with danger of a mutiny and defection in his army he spake to his souldiers this one only word Quirites (e) That word did shew that he held them no longer for souldiers of his but only as citizens of Rome and that thought pierced theyr harts with sorrow shame wtih such circumstances of grace and wisedome as that he drew al their hartes towards him at an instant It is true and it was much and there haue not beene many Caesars in the world But yet away with Caesar a way with Titus they were but durt and filth when they were at the best and now like damned spirits their soules are cursing God in hell And what Titus or Caesar dares shew himselfe when once there is question of grace and wisedome in presence
contynue his generall custome in speaking softly but cryed out with a loud voyce and he did it vpon the last day of the feast of the Tabernacles which was a tyme of great solemnity that so he might be heard by the greater number of people and he inuited them all Ioan. 71 to drinke of that water of life with a full mouth Confess l. 12. cap. 10. For he indeed is the true fountaine of life Hunc bibam tunc viuam saith S. Augustiue Let me drinke of him and I shall liue What (f) His ardēt sighes groans scalding sighes what profound internall groanes would that flaming hart be often sending out by his sacred mouth to the Iustice seate of God wherof we finde some expresly to be recorded in the holy Texte that so the diuine Maiesty Marc. 71 beholding the sorrowes of his soule might be obliged to forgiue the sinnes of ours How deere (g) The charming accent of his voice and how delightfull must the ordinary accent be of his heauenly voyce since the accent euer carrieth a kind of neerer coniunction to the mind and which euen for that cause can hardly be described by any words And now the nearer it was to the incomparable soule of Christ our Lord who can doubt but that needs it must be so much the fuller of delight and grace But especially how beautifull were those holy happy (h) The inestimable pure and perfect beauty of his eyes Gen. 49. eyes of his those heauēly Orbes And what felicity was theirs who might at leasure glasse themselues therin they being so full of latent Maiesty but yet sweetned by such Humility and Charity Those eyes which are pulchriores vino as the Patriarch Iacob saith speaking literally of Christ our Lord for the quality they had to inebriate with being looked vpon farre more powerfully and more sweetely then any most pretious wine can doe the man who drinks it With what kind of modest grace do we thinke that he vvould now be raysing them vp Ioan. 11. towards heauen beholding the Creatures in Almighty God and then returning them downe to the earth Ioan. 8. to see God in his Creatures And what kind of fountaines do we thinke they grew to be when they did so often swymme in teares through the compassion of our miseries Haebr 5. ◠Luc. 19. and the remission of our sinnes at the raysing of Lazarus for the ruines of Ierusalem at the giuing vp of his soule into the eternall Fathers hand and those many tymes more which are not set downe in the sacred text How sweetly would they lay themselues to sleepe being folded vp in those liddes the only sheets which any part of him did vse for the releese of that frayle nature which for our sakes he had assumed And he lent them rest with so much the better will because (i) Christ our Lord did negotiate our saluation with God as well whē he was sleeping as waking Ioan. 2. Matt. 4. sleepe gaue no impediment to the working of his minde for our good the knowledge of which mind was no way as hath beene said else where dependant vpon his Fancy as ours is How were they able when he was pleased to do it to pierce the hartes of men by way of terrour when for the zeale of his Fathers glory he punished the buyers sellers in the Temple vvithout their daring once to bring him to the least account for that supposed excesse And by way of powerfull mercy when seing his Apostles he called them at once from the world to his eternall seruice And looking afterward vpon S. Peter in the tyme of his passion by only looking (l) The lookes of Christ our Lord did moue S. Peeter to contrition Luc. 72. Luc. 7. he retyred him at an instant from his sinnes as wil be seen more at large afterward And not only did those eyes so full of maiesty and modesty and humility suauity captiue those hartes which they beheld but others who beheld them were as inseparably also captiued therby as if there had beene no place left for election whether they would be takē prisoners or no. The enamoured (m) How the diuine presence of Christ our Lord did most chastly captiue the soule of S. Mary Magdalen Penitent S. Mary Magdalene who formerly was so abandoned to the pleasure of sense found her soule so maistered by this diuine obiect of our B. Sauiours presence that her former honny did instantly turne gall and she was so ingulfed into a sea of chast and pure delight that in the life tyme of our Lord she did euen as it were nayle her selfe to his sacred feet Nay she forsooke them not in his very passion when they were nayled to the Crosse She was in chase of them till his Resurection and after his Ascension she confined her selfe for all those thirty yeares of her suruiuing to a rude and most retyred desert disdayning with a holy kind of scorne that her eyes should feed vpon any other obiect then that which her memory would euer be sure to help her to of her most beloued and most beautifull Lord. His sacred presence had not any superficiall or glearing beauty belonging to it but (n) The Beauty of Christ our Lord was so aboundāt as to make a mā despise all temporall riches a beauty which conteined a Mine of plenty S. Mathew shall witnes this and he shall do it better then by words For instantly vpon our Lords commaundement and their mutuall sight of one another he followed him and that for euer and he discouered in our Lord Iesus another mannor of beautifull abundance then all the whole world could helpe him to And perhaps there is not a better proofe of the rich beauty and excellency of our Lord nor a stranger conuersion of any man recorded Luc. 54 then of this Apostle Who was as we may say in flagranti crimine in the very seate and chaire of sinne beseiged by the company of others who were likely to be as much depraued as himselfe He was in the exercise and occasions of new extorsions and yet (o) The Cōuersiō of S. Matthew was most heroicall he left all without taking so much as an howers tyme to cleere his bookes of account which could not choose but be intricate And all this vpon the single sight hearing the voyce of a meere man as Christ our Lord appeared to be And yet I say so rich was our Sauiours beauty and so attractiue was his manner of speach that instātly it was able to draw that Publicā though he were besotted by desire of gayne to follow him who through his pouerty seemed withall to be the owner of no earthly thing but only of his owne indiuiduall person But the Maies̄ty and splendour of the diuinity though it lay hid Cōment in Matth. c. 7. did yet shine so brightly in his face of flesh bloud as S. Hierome
changed their Lordes and formes of gouerment and not only the feilds haue bene bedevved but euen great Riuers haue beene dyed vvith bloud The (e) The great weakenesse of man euen besides his Wic kednes vveakenesse of man euen abstracting from expresse and malicious vvickednes is a lamentable thing to looke vpon Hovv often do vve erre in that vvherin vve procure least to faile vvho hath not desired and euen purchased many things vvhich he thought had beene a meanes to make him happy from vvhich yet he hath gathered nothing but the bitter fruit of misery No (f) The miserable incōstācy of man Cane is so vveake no vvinde is so inconstant and vvauering from the imoueable North as man is frō the Center of his rest by the variety of contrary dispositions which raigne in him Making him to be now merry and then melancholy now deuout then distracted Nay he sometymes who is valiant temperate wise happy within an hower after will be fearefull luxurious indiscreet and miserable and euen himselfe shall scarce know how that growes nor why So that not only euery Country and Citty family is vpon all warnings subiect to mutation towards the worse but there is no particular man who euen in his owne bosome hath not the woefull sense of such disorder confusion and restlesse variety of discourse that vnlesse our Lord God had vouchsafed and resolued vpon some remedy neither would our possessession haue beene free from desolation nor our bodies from destruction nor our soules from damnation S. Augustine exclaimeth thus by occasion of his owne particular and what then might he haue done vpon the general Tibi (g) How iustly my we all imitate that incōparable Saint in saying this Confes lib. 6. cap. 16. S. Leo ser 2. de Natiuit Dom. laus Tibi gloria fons misericordiarum ego fiebam miserior tu propinquior To thee be prayse to the be glory O thou fountaine of mercy I grew further of from thee by misery thou camest nearer me by mercy For when the world was at the worst and wickedest then did our Lord the God of heauen and earth whose very nature is goodnesse it selfe whose will is power and whose worke is mercy resolue vpon the remedy therof His (h) Nor should we content our selues in doing small seruices to such a Lord of loue as this pitty was not satisfied with contynuing the whole world to our assistance and seruice although by sinne we had forfeited the same It was not satisfied with mainteyning to vs the vse of our faculties and senses wherby we had yet procured to employ our selues wholly to his dishonor It was not satisfied with rayning downe sweet showers of other blessings blowing ouer many bitter stormes of vengeance which his iustice would faine haue powred vpon vs. In fine it was not satissied with such expressions as are wont to be made by the deerest partes of flesh and bloud nor would lesse serue his turne then to giue vs his owne only Sonne for our totall redresse And yet not only for the sauing vs from hell which is but the paine due to sinne but for the guilt also it selfe of sinne which is in comparably worse For so God loued the world that he gaue his only begotten Sonne to the end that (i) By Faith working with charity but Faith without workes is dead as sayth S. Iames. Prou. 22. whosoeuer should beleeue in him Ioan. 3. might not perish but haue euerlasting life And so that was verified which was said by the mouth of his holy Spirit Diues pauper obuiauerunt sibi Dominus autem operator vtriusque The rich man and the poore haue met one another and our Lord is the worker of both For who so rich as God he being the abundance and the very inexhaustednesse itselfe of all plenty and what is so poore a thing as man and such a man as was euen vpon the very brimme of dropping downe into the bottome of hell if our mercifull Lord had not put himselfe betwene him and home The Originall Roote and Motiue of the infinite Loue of Christ our Lord to the Saluation of man is discouered CHAP. 9. THE Loue which our Lord Iesus was pleased to shew mankind is found to be very different from that which the men of this world are wont to beare to one another For either we loue them who are rich that they may reward vs or who are vsefull that they may help vs or who are beautifull that they may delight vs and the best kind of loue which we are wont to beare is when we giue it by way of gratitude for some benefits or fauours which vve haue receiued But (a) The differēce of the loue which our Lord beares to vs in respect of that which we beare to one another man in relation to Christ our Lord was so poore and so deformed a thing and so vvholly disobliging him to loue as that there vvas nothing in man which might so much as speake of challenging any at his hands It may also seeme a greater vvonder hovv he could induce himselfe to loue vs since as there vvas no merit on our side so there vvas no passion or blinde capriciousnesse on his vvhich yet is the thing that cooples creatures together many tymes in the chaynes of loue vvithout all desert For (b) The former doubt is solued by considering the first motiue of the loue of our Lord to vs. the soluing of this doubt at the very roote therof we must resort to the motiue of the loue of Christ our Lord. Amor de Dios. Which was not as Doctour Auila doth excellently shew any perfection in vs but only that which was in himselfe and which by his contemplation of his eternall Fathers wil was put in motion towards mankind It depended vpon that solemne decree which with infinite mercy was made by the most blessed Trinity of imploying him vpon the Redemption and Saluation of the world When therfore he became Incarnate in the pure wombe of his all-immaculate mother in the very instant of the Creation of that most holy soule which was infused into his pretious body it was indued vvith all those incomparable blessings and graces vvherof vve haue already spoken and all vpon no other originall ground but onely because our Lord God vvas pleased to amplify extend his bountiful hand ouer that sovvle and so to exalt his ovvne goodnes both tovvards it and vs. Nor euen vvas that soule then in case to haue performed any one act vvhich might be meritorious in the sight of God out of vvhose pure and primitiue grace and mercy those vnspeakeable benefits vvere bestowed But vvhen in that happy instant vvherin it vvas created it did first open the eyes (c) What vnspeakeable affections would be raysed in that soule by that sight of her already deified vnderstanding and did see her selfe freely made that excellēt thing vvhich God is only able
were rebells and enemies to the Lord of life till that tyme obeying sense and bestiallity in all things and hating not onely Religion but euen very common sense and reason But he like a true sunne dispersed those clouds cleered vp the mist of ignorance and errour in our progenitours Who together with almost the whole world were so miserable as to worship stockes and stones insteed of God Nor were they more darke in the vnderstanding part then they were depraued in their will and if we be now in any better case we must onely impute such a diuine effect to an omnipotent cause which was the loue of our Lord who was wholly impatient to differ our conuersioÌ„ any longer and therfore vpon the very day of his Natiuity he directed and commaunded that Starre to prepare a way for the Epiphany The Prophet (h) This place deserues particular consideration Cap. 60. Esay in this mystery forseeing the beginning of the glorious state of the Church of Iesus Christ our Lord did thus by way of anticipation expresse himselfe Arise be illuminated Ierusalem because thy light is come and the glory of our Lord is risen vpon thee For behold darkenes shall couer the earth and a mist the people but vpon thee shall our Lord arise and his glory shall be seene vpon thee and the Gentills shall walke in thy light and Kings in the brightnes of thy rysing Lift vp thine eyes round about and se how all these are gathered together They are come to thee thy sonnes shall come from farre and thy daughters shall come from thy side Then shalt thou see and abound and thy hart shall meruaile and be enlarged when the multitude of the Sea shall be conuerted to thee the strength of the Gentills shall come to thee The inundation of Camells shall couer thee The Dromedaries of Madian and Epha All they of Saba shall come bringing gold and Frankenceuse and shewing forth payse to our Lord. The (i) How both the parts of this Prophesy are fulfilled latter part of this prophesy was most litterally fulfilled vpon this day of the Epiphany vpon these holy Magi as we clearly see by the sacred Euangelicall Text. And the former part which announceth the glory of the Christian Church hath bene as cuidently accomplished in the Communion of the holy Catholike Aposiolike Romane faith in the light wherof the Gentills were to walke And so many successions and Series of Kings when first they should be conuerted from Paganisme to this faith were to goe on in the brightnes of the rysing therof And such multitudes were then to come in to do her homage both from farre and neere as should amaze strike her through with ioy Nor was he able to expresse the plenty and abundance of that people otherwise then by the name of seas and inundations And (k) I dare make my reader my Iudge heere let any man who hath but the vse euen of coÌ„mon sense consider in what community of Christian people this prophesy hath bene fulfilled whether in the Catholike Romane which is spread farre and neere in all the fower quarters of the earth as Europe Affrique Asia and America or in any other present Sect of these parts of the world which neuer went further then to some Prouinces of Europe only Nor was euer euen heer such as now it is but onely since the tyme of Luther when also it is deuided into a world of sects Whether in the Catholike which conuerted all the Countries which euer were coÌ„uerted from Paganisme to the faith of our Lord or in any Sect at all which neuer conuerted any one but insteed therof hath peruerted as many as it could from the true faith to their owne carnall fancies Whether in the Catholike wherof such a world of Emperours and Kings and Queenes haue bene or els in any other now on foote which neuer had any one who was and did contynue of their coÌ„munion We (l) They are Catholiques only who adore our Lord Iesus as the Magi did Catholikes are they to whome our Lord did manifest himselfe according to the prediction of his holy Prophets We who finde him in the stable in the armes of his sacred and all-immaculate mother and We who adore him and present him not only with our hartes as his enemies do also pretend themselues to doe but with our Gold also by almes and all kind of Charity with our Incense by deuoâ—ion and piety and with our Mirrhe by mortification and pennance in vnion of that infinite loue of his wherby he hath made choice of vs to whome he would vouchsafe to be made knowne And therfore let vs follow S. Leo his counsell Ser. 2. de Epiphan who like a true supreme Pastour spake thus to the vniuersall flocke committed to his charge Let this most sacred day of the Epiphany be honoured by vs wheron the author of our saluation appeared and let vs adore him in heauen being so omnipotent to whome the Magi did expresse such veneration he being in his Cradle but an Infant It is shewed by the Presentation of our Lord Iesus in the Temple how infinite loue he bare to vs. CHAP. 17. THIS Omnipotent Lord Iesus hauing as it were emptied his fulnes or rather abridged the shew of his greatnes by growing into the narrow compasse of being a child in his Natiuity and hauing also submitted himselfe both to paine and shame in his Circumcision where he tooke to himselfe the sweet name of Iesus for our eternall good did proceed yet further shortly after in a most amourous obedience to that Law which we alone were subiect to Vnder the obligation heerof he was and vvould needs be presented in the Temple to Almighty God Luc. 2. as the first borne of all parents vvere bound to be in memory of that destruction Exod. 12. Exod. 13. Leuit. 12. vvhich God brought vpon the first borne of the Agyptians and so deliuering his ovvne people vvhich vvas the Children of Israell by meanes therof So punishing his enemies because they presecuted his friends or rather so punishing his enemies that they also might become his friends if they vvould not resolue to be their ovvne greatest enimies But yet vvitha I it vvas ordeyned in the old lavv that the first borne so offered by the parents vvhen once they had done that homage to the God of all things should not be so appropriated to his seruice as that the parents vvere vvholly to loose the comfort of them But (a) See heer the tender goodnes of almighty God towardes man Num. 8. all except they vvere of the Tribe of Leui vvho vvere to serue in Ecclesiasticall function might be redeemed recouered backe againe And that at so loe a rate as should not vndoe them hovv poore soeuer they might chance to be The beasts indeed and only they vvere to be sacrificed in Specie as they vvere offred to our Lord. This Oblation was therfore made by the people
of God for the perpetuating of the memory of so great a benefit Though yet no oblation was able to make that infinite Maiesty of the eternall God a Sauer for his hauing deliuered them by the death of the first borne of their enemies till he was pleased that his only sonne should come and offer himselfe in flesh and bloud for theyr deliuerance Coloss 1. he who was the first begotten of all Creatures and who performed that in deed and truth which all other oblations and Sacrifices did but only as figures in respect of him Now this Act of the Presentation of our Lord Iesus was made by our B. Lady Or rather he offered himselfe in those sacred and most pure hands of hers which he enabled for that excellent purpose with vnspeakeable and most ardent loue And as hereafter we shall see that he chiefely made oblation of himselfe in his sacred passion by way of propitiation for our sinnes and impetration of grace So the Presentation seems to carry a particular respect to worke by way of thanksgiuing for all the benefits which that open hand of God was by moments rayning downe vpon the Creatures And to the end that the goodnes of this Lord of ours may not be cast away vpō vs it will be necessary both now and very often heerafter to cast a carefull and well considering eye vpon the former (*) Cap. 2. discourse wherin we obserued the vnlimited knowledg of that diuine soule of Christ our Lord and wherby it is euident that all things concerning the Creatures for whome he would vouchsafe to be offered whether they were past or to come were as present to him as the very instant of tyme wherin then he liued In so much as there was not nor euer could be imparted the least benefit to mankind by Almighty God which was not present to his incomprehensible but all-comprehēding mind and for which our Lord Iesus did not offer himselfe then by way of thankes with most particular loue So that now we see our Lord surrendred vp into the hands of his eternall Father as if the world after a sort vvere dispossessed of him But so full of Charity vvas that Father as to ordayne the sonne to be sould backe againe (b) What soeuer is giuen to God is giuen vs backe againe with aduantage for the imparting of all those diuine sauours vvhich appeare to haue bene done to vs by him in the vvhole progresse of his holy life and death And vvheras he exercised vvith a perpetuity of burning loue those offices of a Lawgiuer a Maister a Father a Freind a Spouse and lastly of an omnipotēt Redeemer by his fiue sacred vvounds in this mistery vve find him to haue bene recouered and brought backe to vs vvith the payment of fiue Sicles vvhich according to the most probable opinion of computation doe not exceed tvvo shillings O omnipotent loue of our Lord IESVS who so would giue himselfe to vs as that indeed he choose rather not to giue himself but rather to innoble vs so farre as to enable vs to giue him somewhat for himselfe though the price fell infinitely short of the thing which was to be redeemed A price it was which fell short euen of being able to buy a very slaue and what proportion then could it carry with purchasing a God and King of glory sauing that his loue did make vp the rest His loue which was as pretious as God himselfe for God is loue and he being man is also God and so he was not only willing but euen able to pay as much as God was able to exact But we the while besides the contemplation of our owne obligation may doe wel to consider that course of prouidence loue which from the beginning of the world hath bene held with man in addressing him to an expectation and firme beleefe and loue of this diuine Redeemer Euen in the law of nature all was full of figures sacrifices were also offred then and (c) There is no truth of Religion where there is no visible Sacrifice wheresoeuer there is no visible Sacrifice there neither is nor cā there be any true Religion nor true worship of God and the mindes of many were indued with light according to the exigency of their state which ledd their inward eyes towards this marke In the tymes of the written Law another curtaine as a man may say was drawne and the faith of men grew more explicite then the Maiesty of the Church was increased the figures were both more and more significant and more euident and there was store of Prophets who expresly foretold the qualities of the Messias to come But now that he was indeed arriued no tyme was lost such loue as that could not be slacke and we haue seene how instantly the Sheepheards and in their persons such others as were neere at hand were inuited to that feast of ioy by the call of Angells After that the Magi and in their persons all the Gentills though neuer so farre off either in respect of tyme or place were drawne vnder the conduct of a Starre And now that such as were most particularly deputed for Gods seruice might be farre from not knowing their redeemer behould how he (d) Our Lord was declared by Saint Simeon to be come for the saluation both of Iewes and Gentils declares himselfe in the Temple to all the world by the mouth of holy Simeon Anna to be the Sauiour therof to be the glory of the Iewes and the light of the Gentills That so there might be none who should not tast of that fountaine of loue which was distilling into al those hartes which would receaue it It came not doubtles downe by drops into that of Simeon For instantly vpon the taking of that celestiall infant who was the Lord of life into his dying armes he fell into an extasis of ioy withall into a diuine deepe wearines of the world and was so deadly wounded by the loue of our Lord that he could not endure to looke vpon him but vpon the price of being willing to liue no longer How in the flight which our Lord Iesus made to Egypt he discouered his vnspeakeable Loue to man CHAP. 18. OVR Lord Iesus was no sooner brought backe into the power and designed to the vse of men but he was disposing himselfe by this incessant Charity to doe and suffer strange things for them For what stranger thing could there be then that he who created the whole world and who carries conducts it all by the word of his power in whose sight the Angells tremble the gates of heauen doe shiuer and in (a) What a poore Nothing the whole world is in comparison of God Matt. 2. comparison of whome all creatures are not so much as one poore single naked desolate grayne of dust that he I say should be content for loue of vs to feare and fly from such a thing as
fit to encounter with all the difficulties to which man is subiect and for that the charity of man as man is so very could as not to looke vpon the miseries and calamities of others with that compassion which becomes the fellow creatures of so good a God vnlesse first they haue tryed the variety of Temptations in their owne persons and because it is not possible for a man without a more extraordinary grace then can be expected to apply fit remedies to such soules as shall be subiect to Temptation vnlesse himselfe haue bene sicke of the same or the like disease our Lord is therfore (c) They are not good Physitiās of others in spirituall diseases who haue not been sicke thēselues wont to suffer euen his best seruants such as he meanes to imploy most in making warre against vice and sinne to be infested in this kind with the assaults of the enemy But yet so as that he enableth them withall by his grace if they will not be wanting to themselues to returne victorious out of the battaile And not only by these skirmishes to abate the fury of their foes but to eate out the rust which their soules had contracted by their owne former sinnes insteed therof to fill them full of merit in themselues to make them expert and safe guides of others and in fine by such knocks to hammer out and to build vp and most richly to furnish such a house in their hartes as wherin the God and King of glory may not only be cōrent but euen glad to dwell They are therfore deepely in errour who thinke it be a signe of Gods disfauour if he suffer a soule to be much tempted The argument is rather good on the other side to proue that it is a token of his loue For vve see how Christ our Lord himselfe would be vsed heerin to secure vs therby that it was a happy state since himselfe did choose to be possest therof Especially (d) The example of our Lord Iesus in this Temptation of his doth both sanctify Temptatiōs to vs strengthen vs agaynst them considering that by going so before through his Temptations he hath brokē the hart of such others as should afterward lay hold on vs besides that he instructs vs how we are to carry our selues therin euen whilst they last And infallibly the loue of our Lord to vs is so very tender and so pure that by the merit of this Temptation of his he would haue obteyned the destruction and death of all Temptations if he had not forseene that they should suruiue for our greater good in case that we would vse them wel And we may iustly beleeue that since God refused to graunt the suite of the holy Apostle when he had begged thrice that Sathan might no longer buffet him with the motions of sense 2. Cor. 12. it was only for the preseruing him in humility and way of prouision of greater glory and he made him a promise of sufficient grace wherby he should tryumph after victory Besides this assistance of the grace of God which yet alone ought to be anchor inough for the soule of man in any difficulty whatsoeuer so that the man for his part doe concurre therwith as his frailty will permit it is certaine that his diuine Maiesty is so indulgent a Father to his deere children and doth so thirst not only after their solid good in the next life but euen after their comfort and ioye in this that ordinarily when he permitteth them to vndergoe any grieuous Temptation of the enemy he either armeth them before hand with some extraordinary comfort by way of preparatiue or els he visiteth them afterward in some most gratious manner by way eyther of remedy or reward We see that it is iust so in this Temptation of Christ our Lord and that before it in his Baptisme the heauens were opened to him and the holy Ghost did visibly descend vpon him And after it the Angells did make court about him and doe him homage and did serue at his table when the fast was ended And we also as miserable as we seeme to be in this life haue a promise from truth it selfe in another part of the holy Ghospell Luc. 22. that they who shall haue remayned faithfull to him in his Temptations that is to say in such afflictions as God doth either send or suffer shall both eate and drinke at his table in his Kingdome of eternall glory And to the end that this might happen to vs more completely it was the gratious pleasure of our Lord to permit himselfe to be assalted (e) The seuerall kinds of Temptatiō which were offered to our Lord Iesus by three seuerall wayes wherein all kinds of Temptations might be lodged or to which at least they might be all reduced That so in them we might be instructed and enabled to ouercome in all by his example helpe as we shall see the Chapter following The Temptations which the Diuell did seeketo put vpon our Lord Iesus are declared and opened CHAP. 25. THE first (a) The 2. Temptation was delight or pleasure Matt. 4. Luc. 4. was a Temptation of delight or pleasure where the deuill moued our Lord by occasiō of that cause of h̄gar wherin he found him to turne stones into bread if it were true that indeed he was the sonne of God But our Lord who knew that the Feend of hell would reape no proffit by the manifestatiō of his diuinity for as much as he was confirmed for al eternity in malice vpon his first fall frō Grace vvould not worke that miracle to no purpose and especially at the discretion of the deuill Or rather he would not through his deare and tender loue to vs worke a miracle wherby he was to be freed from suffering the paine of hungar which he felt afterward for our sakes But whilst he (b) In what kind our Lord was feeding whilst he was fasting fasted in one kind he was feeding vpon a banquet in another For the food which gaue him exquisite delight was to be doing the will of his eternall Father suffering for the deliuerance and good of men And from corporall food he would abstaine in this first publique act of his if it were but to reuerse that misery which was come into the world by Adam when he fedde with inordinate appetite vpon the forbidden fruit of Paradise In the meane tyme his refusal to make bread wherby he might haue bene fed in that wildernes was liberally rewarded to our Lord by his eternal Father afterward euen in the same very kind in the selfe same or like place of his so great merit For in a wildernes as he would needs suffer hungar he had meanes afterward to multiply a few loaues and fishes to such a quantity as serued to seed and ouerseed thousands of men besides women and children To shew that as according to that diuine saying of S.
endeauoured to procure and increase And if this haue appeared in the misteries of his holy Baptisme and Temptation it vvill doe so no lesse if not rather more in that vvhich novv shall present it selfe concerning the vocation of his Apostles Disciples to his seruice Of the great Loue which our Lord Iesus shewed to mankind in the Vocation of his Aposiles CHAP. 27. IT is not strāge that God should shew himselfe like God nor consequently that in all the actions of Christ our Lord who as man was Gods most excellent instrument his soueraigne power and wisedome and goodnes should much appeare This is true in them all especially is it so in this of the Vocatiō of his Apostles wherin he doth admirably declare quòd disponat omnia suauiter pertingat à fine vsque ad finē fortiter That he disposeth of all things sweetly yet reacheth from one end to the other with a hand of strength His (a) The end of the Incarnation and Passion of Christ our Lord. busines in this world was to redeeme it by his pretious bloud the merit wherof was to be applied to mens soules by faith and loue and that was to be rooted in them by the preaching of his doctrine the administration of such Sacraments as he came to institute in that Church which he meant to plant And because himselfe was to returne to his Father and the reconciliation of mankind to God was to contynue in acting till the end of the world he resolued vpon ordayning and sending Ambassadours into it for that purpose 2. Cor. 5. As Saint Paul affirmed afterward Pro Christo ergo legatione fungimur c. We Apostles and all Apostolicall men are Ambassadours sent into the world by Christ our Lord for the reconciliation of it to God The Hypostaticall Vnion wherby the Diuinity of the second person of the B. Trinity was vnited to the humanity of Christ our Lord gaue him power to doe what and when he would And he might haue called his Apostles either in his infancy or afterward by only inuisible inspirations or els as foone as he meant to appeare in the office of teaching But to giue vs example how to carry our selues in all our actions and especially in such as concerne the glory of God and the good of soules he would not enter vpon this busines till himselfe had visibly beene baptized and auowed by a voyce from heauen to be the welbeloued sonne of God in reward of that deepe humility which he exercised by such an act as that He also differred to call them instantly after he was baptized because at the first they would not haue been fit to accompany him in such austerity as he resolued to endure in the desert Whereby he also gaue vs a lesson both to vse prudence and charity when we haue cause to serue our selues of others He was neuer in any danger of being distracted from God in any one moment of his life neither yet was he in doubt but that he should call his Apostles in such sort as would be most agreable to the diuine will but yet before he would vndertake it Luc. 6. he retyred himselfe into a mountaine all alone And that blessed soule spent the whole night in prayer and (b) The soueraigne excellency and vse of prayer therby he gaue vs an example how in all things we were to haue recourse to God by that most holy exercise as the means wherby we might both get light for our vnderstanding and heate and strength towards the accōplishing of his most holy will by the obedience of ours The same Lord God who was the Creator of man would needs also be his Redeemer And for as much as he had made him did well discerne all the windings and turnings of his soule he was able with admirable facility felicity to guid him according to his nature With that skil he proceeded in the Vocatiō of his Apostles some of whom he called by himselfe and some were brought by others whome formerly himselfe had called Some he drew to him by the force of some short single speach and others by discourse or dialogue of greater length And of S. Peeter it is said in holy Scripture that when S. Andrew had brought him to our Lord he looked vpon him which is not said of any other Ioan. 2. Intuitus autem eum Iesus dixit Tu es Sinion filius Ionae tu vocaberis Caephas quod interpretatur Petrus Thou art Symon the sonne of Ionas thou shalt be called Caephas which is by interpretation Peter Ibid. Which word in Syriacke and that was the language with our Lord did speake and the only language with S. Peter vnderstood at that tyme doth signify aswel a Rocke as the name of a mā And the word Intuitus est doth implye that our Lord did enuisage and looke in earnest manner vpon his face Which I hope we shall not thinke but to haue bene both done and sayd vpon some reason of great mistery especially since we see that he bespeakes him for the office of being a Rocke wherupon next to himself he would build his Church In cōformity of which diuine purpose he affoarded him many most particular fauours he cured his mother (1) Luc. 4. in law in his house he (2) Luc. 5. would needs teach men out of his ship and to omit those passages of holy Scripture wherby (3) Matt. 16. Ioan. 21. he inuested him with that highest dignity in his Church in expresse termes he (4) Matt. 17. fetcht a miraculous tribute out of the fishes belly which he paid not only for himselfe but for S. Peter also as for the heire of his house It had bene easy for him to haue imployed Angells in that ministery to which he vouchsafed to depute S. Peter the rest of the Apostles but the (c) The sweet prouidence of our Lord. sweetnes of his prouidēce did exact that men should gouerne men The Angells who were impeccable would neuer haue bene so attractiue of sinners to pēnance for we should haue feared to approach to such humility purity as theirs with such frailty and pride as ours But our Lord was pleased to gouerne vs by men who were obnoxious to our infirmities That so by the experience of what had passed in their ovvne soules they might haue the more compassion of ours and so we might also vvith the more probability of successe aspire to their practise of vertue And they in the meane tyme were to absolue vs not only for once or for an hundred or a thousand tymes but for as often as we should sinne if we grew afterward to be indeed truly penitent But yet at least since he would needs dispatch the great busines of gayning soules by the meanes of mortall creatures a man would haue thought according to all dictamen of humain reason that he should haue chosen the most worthy and well qualified
assured of any coÌ„dition he vvas quickly pleased to shevv the very bovvells of his mercy tovvards them They vvere opened before but then did he let them see hovv he had lodged them all therin For (c) The vnspeakeable fauour with our Lord lesus imparted to his Apostles in regard that they had left their little All for him he admitted them instantly into his ovvne diuine conuersation he instructed them by his heauenly doctrine He gaue them a dominion ouer deuills that they might expell them out of the bodies of men He made them knovv that he vvould leaue them Ambassadours in his place betvvene God and the vvorld That they should haue povver to offer consecrate and consummate his owne pretious body and bloud And to remit or retaine the sinnes of men according to that spirit of vvisedome and the authority vvhich he vvould impart to them for that purpose And that so they must grow to be Treasurers of eternall riches and administrators of all his diuine Sacraments Doctours of the vvhole vvorld And they being so fraile and imperfect men as vve haue shevved before he assumed them to a kind of participation of his ovvne Empire ouer heauen and earth and to a spirituall kind of principality aboue all the Monarks of the vvorld And that vvhich more importeth then all this he declared that they should sit together with himselfe vpon his throne and at the day of Iudgement giue sentence vpon the Twelue Tribes of Israell vvherby the vvhole vvorld is designed So (d) How infinitely we gayne by giuing al to God that heere vve haue meanes to see at hovv high a rate that mony is put out to vse vvhich vve present to God I meane vvhat infinite gaine is raysed by making a deed of guift of the miserable litle thing which vve haue and are to that immense goodnes of his By hearkning with a diligent faith full hart to his holy inspirations vvherby he vvoes vs to become his that in exchange he may be ours It is true that he desires to haue all or none and he hath reason For if this soule of ours with being so poore a thing as it is be yet of such capacity as that nothing which is lesse then God himselfe can content and fill it what a brutish thought would it be in vs to conceaue That our God himselfe could be contented to inioy but a part of vs who are things of nothing and who were all created by him and who are his and only his by so many tytles that hell it selfe is a punishment which comes not home to the crime of our diuiding the soule betwene him creatures He being the sole and supreme truth all (e) All that which concerneth creatures is a meer lye whensoeuer it disobeyeth God or drawes vs from him Confes lib. 10. cap. 22. creatures no better then a pure perfect lye in whatsoeuer they say they are or would seeme to be otherwise then as they yield obedience to the diuine Maiesty S. Augustine doth excellently expresse this particular when reuersing the wandring steps of his ill gouerned youth in the way of confession to almighty God he deliuereth himselfe in this manner Thou art supreme truth who presidest ouer all things Loath I was to loose thee but through my couetousnes I desired to possesse a Lye together with thee This was the reason why I lost thee because thou disdainst to be enioyed in the company of a lye The Apostles therfore when they were called did instantly and wholly giue themselues away with all they had And though the goods which they left were not a matter in themselues of any moment yet they were esteemed to haue giuen much because those happy men reserued nothing to themselues And with the same affection through which they had left that little they were as ready to haue left a thousand worlds for the loue of Christ our Lord. And S. Peter afterward was not affraid to put our Lord in mind therof by these words of his innoceÌ„t and confident Matt. 19. ardent tender loue Behould we haue left all things and followed thee what therfore wilt thou doe for vs He said not that he had left his netts or his house or his boate or this or that but absolutely that he had left all things And (f) The infinite liberality of our Lord Iesus our Lord made him this answere with no lesse then the bounty of a God Amen Amen c. which declareth a most serious affirmation or protestation You who haue followed me shall sit vpoÌ„ thrones at the resurrection of the iust you shall iudge the twelue tribes of Israell And whosoeuer shall haue left his Father or mother or brother or sister or house or land for my names sake shall haue a hundred fold in this world and afterward shall possesse eternall life Yea so liberall is our Lord IESVS as to reward with no lesse then heauen for euery instant of that tyme which we dispose our selues to imploy vpon his seruice And yet his excellency is such as that euen the very only doing him any little seruice is of so great happines to a faithfull soule as that it alone is an ouer-pay foral the paines that can be taken in this life But to shew that our Lord is scarce able to differre the recompence of such as follow him with a ready will we shall see in the next Chapter how he takes some of them as it were into the ioyes of heauen before their tyme. And he who (g) Note heer the excellent loue of Christ our Lord. would not haue them present when he was tempted solitary and in act of penance because perhaps they were not so able to feed so soone vpon such crosses or hard crusts as those did yet resolue that he would not haue some of them absent when he was to be Transfigured vpon the hill But that in recompence of their beginning to doe him seruice for the strengthning of their Faith and Hope and Loue in the processe of it they should tast a dropp of that glory wherwith they were to be inebriated in heauen Of the excessiue Loue which our Lord Iesus shewed to man in the mistery of the Transfiguration CHAP. 29. THE Temptation and Transfiguration of our Lord IESVS are liuely instances of hovv hard things he desired to suffer and how excellent things he desired to doe for vs which two â—â—e the most certayne tokens (a) True loue desires not only to do great thinges but to suffer hard thinges Matt. 17. of true loue We haue already considered of his Temptation and now this Mystery of his Transfiguration is thus related in the sacred text That our Lord tooke Saint Peter S. Iames S. Iohn into the top of a high and solitary mountaine to the end that he might pray That whilst he (b) The manner of the Transfiguration of our Lord Iesus was praying he grew to be
though euery one will not reach so high That we must be perfect as our heauenly Father is perfect And that whoso euer will be so must sell all that he hath and giue it to the poore and follow our Lord and that such a one shall haue his treasure in heauen That if any man would come after our Lord he must deny himselfe and take vp his Crosse and follow him For he that would saue his life should loose it and he that would loose his life should saue it That his disciples must goe in Mission for the conuersion of soules without depending vpon the hauing of any viaticum or the wearing so much as shooes or carrying a wallet with them for any prouision That they must looke persecution and euen death it selfe in the face and not so much as premeditate what they are to say for themselues in those occasions These are the most fragrant flowers wherof that rich garment is wouen or rather these are the most choyce Iewells wherof that pretious Crowne is composed which Christ our Lord brought downe from heauen With intention to put it vpon the heads of all such persons as meant to be disciples of his Doctrine and to become Graduates in his schoole of Perfection And (c) The faithfull practise of the Doctrine of Christ our Lord makes men happy euen in this life verily euen in this life the study and practice of this Doctrine of Christ our Lord doth make men happy after a sort and put them heere into a kind of tast of that felicity wherof they are to take the whole daughts heerafter in the kingdome of heauen For so great is the purity power thereof as to lodge a man out of the reach of humane things by making him place his felicity euen in Crosses both of paine and shame wherof in such a world as this he shal be sure to haue no want And to make him see that his misery cōsists in nothing but in swaruing frō this way to his felicity Happy is he who feeles the truth of this in his soule and most miserable is he who although he feele it not will not yet beleeue that the thing is true For he who beleeues not this truth will neuer seeke it and he that seeks it not will neuer find it It cannot (d) Considerations which facilitate the practise of this Doctrine be denyed but that this Doctrine requires hard things at a mans hands But so it must be considered that he who teacheth it doth withall giue much grace wherwith to learne it A burthen is more or lesse grieuous according to the strength more or lesse which he hath who is to beare it And it is no heard matter for one who is of infinite power to giue vs strength to carry according to the weight of that which is to be imposed and especially if that power be accōpanied with a goodnes which is as infinite Indeed it we consider the Doctrine as it is in it selfe we may say it is not only hard but impossible and especially it will seeme so then when we accompany that thought with a deepe consideration of the miserable frailty of our nature the strength of our passions and the importunity of sensible obiects which solicite and haunt vs euen to death in euery corner But yet on the other side we shall beleeue it to be both possible and easy if we remember as I was saying the omnipotēt wise loue of Christ our Lord the aboundant grace which is deriued to vs from the merits of his holy life and death the exāple of many Saints who hauing bene made of the same metall with vs haue by the fauour of God and their good endeauours translated as it were their soules out of this wildernes of beasts into the paradise of Angells euen before they parted from their mortall bodies And not only hath this bene performed by Sains deceased but we doe most certainly know and conuerse with so good seruants of God as that in great measure they ariue to it also in this life So that we haue all reason to be full of hope that by the same meanes we may follow whither (e) Wear left without excuse it we do not follow where so many are gone before they haue gone before Or at least we are to confesse that the fault is no bodies but our owne if we doe it not For if it be a burthen Christ our Lord will make it light and if it be a yoke he will make it sweet And he who thirsteth after comfort is inuiced by the lowd cry of Christ our Lord to goe drinke therof at that liuing fountaine of his grace And a promise is made to all the world Ioan. 7. that whatsoeuer shall be asked of God in the name of Christ our Lord shal be graunted Matt. 11. And whosoeuer is either loaden with sinne or doth labour vnder those punishments which as the reliques of sinne doe hange vpon him is allured by the voyce of Christ our Lord himself to repaire to him that he may be refreshed And indeed what refreshing or comfort is there to be had in this life till selfeloue be laid downe and the pure and perfect loue of Christ our Lord be taken vp in the practise of his diuine Doctrine selfeloue and selfewill it is which puts vs to such paine in this pilgrimage For these are the rootes of all our inordinate affections which place vs as vpon a beacon where we are subiect to all the windes of perturbation and passion which can blow either of desires or hopes or feares or any other care whatsoeuer Yea and if we watch our selues well we shall find sometymes that euen concerning the same persōs or things we are in effect at the (f) This is most true how strág soeuer it may seem selfe same tyme both in hope and feare in loue and yet in hate in a burning kind of little enuy against them and yet vpon the mayne with an ardēt desire of their good And in fine we know not sometymes what our selues would haue nor what we ayle What meruaile is it then if we be often vnlike to what we had resolued to be that we are so extremely vnequall so mutable and so miserable How can we choose but be perfect slaues if thus we tye our selues to selfe loue which giues the plague death it selfe to al true liberty of spirit professed and imparted by the practice of the Doctrine of Christ our Lord which is only able to make men free This is not that prophane supposed liberty to (g) The levvd liberty of the Ghospell of sectaries which the sectaries of this age do intytle their Ghospel and which is indeed but expresse subiection to sinne and true slauery But true Christian liberty doth consist in vntying the soule from all imperfection sin in subduing mortifying our inordinate inclinations and passions acoording to the pure and perfect law of Christ
the ceremonies which were sanctified by his miracles not a motion of his hand with relation to the cure of any man wherin some mistery was not wrapped vp or els some ceremony sanctified and recommended to the vse of the holy Church And so we see how in the administration of Baptisme those very ceremonies are imbraced by vs which Christ our Lord did vse to sicke persons of seuerall kindes all whose spirituall diseases doe meet in the person of an infant till he be baptized For he is spiritually deafe and therefore doth the Priest put his fingars into the childs eares and cryeth Ephata He is spiritually dumbe and therfore his tongue is touched with spittle And he is yet in the power of the deuill and a child of wrath and therfore is he exorcized as we see to haue bene done vpon possessed persons by our B. Lord. Oftentymes he cured both the bodies of sicknes and the soules of sinnes though the Patients desired but to be corporally cured And when he did not cure their soules it was only because they were not nor would not be well disposed to receiue that blessing But otherwise what he wrought vpō their bodies was ordayned by that diuine goodnes to the helpe of their foules if they hearkned to his inspirations they did instantly recouer both in the outward and inward man Many also of the miracles of Christour Lord (c) Many miracles were ordayned by our Lord to facilitate the beliefe of Christian Religion Ioan. 11. Matt. 14. Matt. 15. Marc. 8. did sweetly prepare a way for the beliefe of other nobler miracles which did also concerne the highest misteries of the Catholike faith As namely the raysing vp of Lazarus disposed men to beleeue the resurrection of the dead at the last day And those two miracles of the walking of our Lord vpon the sea and the stupendious multiplying of the loaues of bread in the desert doe both together open a faire and ready passage towards a beliefe of the Catholicke Doctrine concerning the reall presence of our blessed Lord in the most venerable Sacrament of the Altar For his walking on the sea shewed that his body was no way subiect to the ordinary conditions of a naturall body whensoeuer he should be pleased to exempt it from them although of it selfe it were a perfect naturall body And his multiplying of the loaues did deliuer in plaine language to the world the soueraigne power which he had and hath to multiply what and how much he would Which two points being accorded there remaines no difficulty in belieuing our doctrine of the reall presence of our Lord in the blessed Sacrament So (d) The cōclusion of this discourse of the miracles of Christ our Lord. that to cōclude the loue of our Lord IESVS in the working of his miracles was extraordinarily great Both because the things themselues were so greatly great and because they were wrought with such a perfect and pure intention of Gods greatest glory and our greatest good They tended not only as we haue seen to the cure of bodyes but also of soules And not only of soules to be conuerted at that tyme but through all ages also afterward by the discouery of our spirituall infirmities and by the institution of most holy ceremonies and by facilitating a beliefe of the highest misteries Making one miracle to be a step and introduction for another as I haue shewed in the particular of the blessed Sacrament And (e) Consider all these circumstāces with attention if for euery one of them alone a loyall and gratefull hart would find it selfe obliged to loue him withall the power it hath what effect ought such an aboundant cause as they all together doe make vp to worke in vs and how ought they to induce vs to honour and adore such an incessāt goodnes For if it would goe for a great fauour that a Principall man should once vouchsafe to visite a sicke beggar or leprous slaue the more principall the one of them were and the more base the other so much the greater fanour it would be And if to that visit he should be pleased to add the tendernes of some compassionate speach and almes and euen of corporall seruice about that creature and not only once but often and not only to one but to all the world how iustly would such a charity exact all admiration at our hands Let vs therfore loue and eternally adore our blessed Lord who being the God of heauen and earth vouchsafed to looke vpon such miserable creatures as we are with such eyes of pitty And (f) How those auncient miracles oblige vs to the loue of our Lord. although those former cures were not wrought for the recouery of our indiuiduall bodyes yet there is no single circumstance belonging to any one of them which giueth not a copious supply of instruction and comfort to our soules and especially that last and greatest miracle of all miracles of the institution of the most blessed Sacrament of the Altar So that to omit all other moderne miracles which yet are innumerable Christ our Lord doth still vvorke miracle vpon miracle in this blessed Sacrament For this is consecrated in thousands of places daily and hourely and it is imparted as easily and liberally to the worst and wickedest of vs all if euen now at last we haue a resolution to mend as it was to his own most blessed mother and his Apostles And this is not only a lasting miracle of instruction and direction and consolation both of body and soule as those others were but it is a miracle of high communication and perfect vnion Wherby the omnipotent Maiesty of God Matt. 26. Marc. 14. Luc. 22. Ioan. 13. is content after a sort to make sinfull man become one thing with himselfe That diuine goodnes vouchsafing to leaue it to his Church by way of Legacy in the night precedent to his passion as euen now I am endeauouring to shew Of the infinite Loue which our Lord Iesus shewed to vs in the institution of the blessed Sacrament and the holy Sacrifice of the Masse CHAP. 45. OVR Lord God of his goodnes giue vs grace that in vs it may be verified which hath bene vttered by his owne sacred mouth Habenti dabitur Matt. 13. To him who hath shall be giuen And that since he hath indued vs with Faith in the beliefe of the misteries of his pretious life and death we may still haue Faith more and more wherwith to giue a firme feeling inflamed kind of assent to all the testimonies of his infinite loue which haue bene made to vs his miserable creatures For (a) What loades of mercy our Lord doth lay vpon our soules verily in this kind he layes such loade vpon vs and doth as it were so presse vs euen to death with his deare mercies that if the eyes of our mindes were not eleuated by his supernaturall grace and fixed therby vpon an
goodnes immediatly vpon his hauing washed the Apostles feete And our Lord was pleased by that vnspeakeable humility of his to prepare and exalt them to a participation of so high mysteries as were to follow Ioan. 7. The holy Ghost was not then descended because the sonne of man was not ascēded vp to heauen And therfore it is no meruaile if S. Peter were at that tyme to seeke concerning the reasō why our Lord would vse such an excesse as that But he was told that he should vnderstand the mystery afterward Ioan. 13. and then he would easily know withal that (f) The great purity which is requisite to a Catholique Priest no purity in this world could be too great for the disposing of themselues to that which they went about which was to be ordeyned Priests and not only to partake but also to dispense the pretious body and bloud of our blessed Lord. Our Lord IESVS did therfore take bread into his hands he blessed it and gaue therof to his Disciples when first he had pronounced the words of Consecration ouer it Declaring and consequently making it to be that very body of his which was to be offred vpon the Crosse That being done he also tooke the Chalice and he consecrated that in like manner affirming and therby also making it to be that very bloud which was to be powred out afterward for the saluation of the world He authorized and commaunded them withall to doe the like in commemoration of what he should haue done and suffered for them Now incomparable was the loue which our Lord shewed heerin both in substance circumstance In (g) Most strong in substance most sweet in circumstance substance because he gaue himselfe for the food of his seruants and in the manner of it because he did it in such a sweet and tender fashion towards them at such a tyme when yet his owne hart was oppressed with sorrow through the foreknowledge and expectation of his bitter Passiō which was thē at hand Nay he was pleased as appeareth by the words of the sacred Text to be (h) In the very consecration he speake and thought of his Passion feeding his thoughts actually vpon how he was to giue his body vp by his bitter Passion and to shed his bloud by a violent and most dishonorable effusion euen whilst he was graunting that legacy and consecrating the same body and bloud of his for the comfort and ioy of mankind vnder the familiar and delightful formes of bread wine He was taking his leaue of them though yet he knew not how to leaue them But as he went from them in that visible manner according to which he had conuersed vvith thē til that tyme so yet he vvould bind himself to come in person to them for their comfort though in another forme vvhensoeuer they should haue a mind to call him How our Lord would not harken to those reasons which might haue disswaded him from shewing this great mercy to man Of the necessity of a visible Sacrifice and how our Lord himselfe doth still offer it CHAP. 46. IF reason might haue preuailed it seemes that he should haue taken heed vvhat he vvas about doe Matt. 7. That if Pearles were not to be cast to swyne much lesse vvas this inualuable ievvell to be mis-spent vpon so many vvho vvould continually be vvallovving in the filth of sinne That there vvould be a vvorld of Pagans Iewes Heretiques and vvho vvould not beleeue and would blaspheme the truth therof That millions of Catholikes though they did beleeue it would not yet frequent it but would rather for beare this bread of life this fountaine of heauenly water then the muddy miserable gust of some carnal pleasure or some base interest of the world which yet doth but lead them from a Purgatory in this life to a Hell in the next That some would do worse then to abstayne for notwithstanding that they resolued still to sinne they would yet presume with Sacrilegious mouth to prophane this Lord of heauen and earth to bring God into that house wherof the deuill had possession and dominion And in fine that they would be too few who would often resort to it with due reuerence of that Maiesty with hungar after true sanctity with loue of that immense beauty and with that purity of hart which might forbid them to lauish and wast themselues away in pursuite of creatures This might haue seemed to be the voyce of reason which was to haue diuerted our blessed Lord from submitting himselfe to such indignity as he seemed by his mercy to grow subiect to But (a) How the infinite loue of our Lord made answere in our behalfe to this infinite wisedome he on the other side would needs vnderstand it to be otherwise And that he being an infinite God it vvould become him well to be infinitely good That it should not be long of him if all the world were not inchayned to him by loue That if any man would either vnder-value the benefit and much more if he would abuse it otherwise a most rigorous account should be asked therof And that in the meane tyme it would be comfort inough for him if such as were resolued to serue him might be incorporated to him not only by supernaturall grace but by this supersubstantiall bread which should cause an vnspeakeable vnion betwene him them This was a principall reason why our Lord was pleased to institute both this diuine Sacrifice and Sacrament in this last supper of his but he did it besides for the fulfilling of Prophesies and the perfecting of the figures of the old Testament He was not come as himselfe had formerly affirmed To breake the law but to fulfill it And therfore as he was pleased to eate the Paschall lambe with all those Ceremonies which the law required and which till then were to be of force so (b) The Paschall lambe was a figure both of the death of Christ our Lord and of the B. Sacrament the same being partly a figure of the Passion and Death of our Lord IESVS and much more properly of the Blessed Sacrament and the holy Sacrifice of the Masse it became his Truth and Goodnes to ordaine and institute them at that tyme. For his Church in euery one of the states therof aswell vnder the law of nature as the written law was the Spouse of Christ our Lord and in vertue of that only coniunction it vvas acceptable and pleasing to the eternall Father But particularly it was to be so vnder the Law of Grace vvhen once it should come to be fed by his sacred body and inebriated by his pretious bloud And therfore as in those former tymes the Church of Christ our Lord had neuer bene without her Sacrifices neither is there indeed or can there be any true Religion without a reall and proper Sacrifice so much lesse vvould he permit that Spouse vnder the lavv of
to tyme He shewed them what a glory it would be for them to resemble their Maister in his Crosse and he made them knovv vvithall that they should not carry it alone but that in the place of his owne corporall presence which then was the obiect of their senses he would send them a comforter the Holy Ghost from heauen who should inhabit and sanctify their soules He promised them his Peace which should shew them a safe and quiet port wherin to ride in the very midst of all the difficulties and greatest daungers of this world He told thē in plaine tearmes that he loued them and he besought thē that as they loued him they would keepe his commaundements and that if they would doe so both he and his Father would come and visit and dwell with them He told them moreouer that euen his eternall Father loued them and that whatsoeuer they would akse they should be sure to haue whether they should aske it of himselfe or of his Father in his name yea and he desired them to aske somewhat of him that so their ioy might be full as if he had bid them try and be euen iudged by themselues whether he had said true or no. It serueth also to shew the very passionatenes as I may say of his loue (d) Agreat proofe of the tendernes the loue of our Lord Iesus that he was content to repeate the selfe same expressions of it many tymes To declare that he could not say that inough which he thought he could neuer doe too much We see how tenderly he called them his seruants his Disciples his friends and that he would tell them all his secrets his Sonnes and euen his little Sonnes whome yet he would not leaue as Orphans without a Father And now we shall heare him pray the eternall Father for them in most efficacious and obliging words That he would sanctify them in his Truth He presseth him by the highest points of diuine Rethoricke which could be though of He puts him in mind Of the eternall loue he bare the Sonne and of the faithfull seruice which he the Sonne had performed to the Father He also representeth the Fathers Mission of the Sonne and he avoweth That as the Father had sent him so had he seent them He begs the vnion of all his children with one another and of all those children with himselfe that so he being in God and they being in him they all might also come to be one in God In this (e) How earnest our Lord Iesus was for vs in his suyte to his eternall Father suite of his he is so importunate and proceeds so farre to vrge the same that in effect he tells the eternall Father that he will not be denyed therin Nor was he content that this should be an vnion of inferiour degree but an vnion with perfection and consummation Iust so as in a broath which is made of diuers meats there is an vnion of those meates in that broath and if they boyle in it till they euen boyle away there is not only an vnion of the meates but a consummation thereof into that broath And although in most places of holy Scripture when our Lord spake to his Apostles or Disciples he meant not that his words should be for them alone but that all the world should be comprehended in their persons to whome then he spake Yet his loue at that tyme was not content to intend vs only by way of inference but that dying flame would needs be sending out certaine flashes which yet extend themselues so farre as euen to lay expresse hold vpon euery one of our indiuiduall persons who haue the happines to be members of the holy Catholike Church Which they only are who beleeue the Doctrine of Christ our Lord by the preaching of the Apostles or of those Apostolicall men who haue a lawfull and direct mission from them And therfore he said for now I cite his owne very words I pray not only for them that is to say for his Apostles but for those others also who will beleeue in mee by their preaching that they be one as thou O Father art in mee and I in thee so they also may be one in vs and the world may beleeue that thou hast sent me And that glory which thou hast giuen me I haue giuen to them that they may be one thing as we are one thing In thee and thou in mee that they may be (f) A strāg desire for Christ our Lord to make to God in our behalfe consummated in one and the world may know that thou hast sent me and that thou hast loued them euen as thou hast loued me I will O Father that they whome thou hast giuen mee may be with me there where I shall be That they may see the glory which thou hast giuen mee because thou louedst me before the framing of the world O thou iust Father the world hath not known thee but I haue knowne thee and these haue knowne that thou hast sent me And I haue made my name known to thē and I will make it knowne that the same very loue wherwith thou hast loued me may be in thē I in thē These amongst many others were the words of our bleffed Lord in that last diuine sermon of his Wherby we may see the amourous and restlesse desire which tooke possession of his hart wherwith he sollicited his eternall Father that we might behold the glory which he had giuen to him and placing as it were his whole (g) Our Lord Iesus did place his honour in beeing Lord by his eternal Father for vs. credit vpon the obteyning of these fauours for vs when he begs it to the end that so the world might come to know that the Father had sent him As if he should haue said that in the face of the world he had giuen his word both for our Redemption and Sanctification Vnion and for our right to raigne in heauen with himselfe and that if the eternall Father should not make good that word the world might haue reason not to beleeue that he was as he had said the Sonne of God The horrour and terrour and sorrow of Christ our Lord togeather with his Prayer in the Garden CHAP. 54. NO sooner had he ended that speach but instantly he went out with his Disciples ouer the Torrent of Cedron Ioan. 18◠He did perhaps passe ouer that Torrent without once tasting any droppe therof but the whole world was a kind of Torrent of affliction to him his whole life was that way wherin he did not only tast but take deepe draughts therof before he exalted his head Psalm 109. by ascending vp to heauen Already did the sensible or inferiour part of his soule begin to be obscure and sad with care He was pleased to leaue it after a sort to it selfe for the increase of that paine which he desired to suffer For els his
our selues to beare towards this Lord of loue since ours is so full of frailty misery and vnfaithfull dealing What a kind of nothing will it proue if it be all compared with one only spark of this pure pretious loue qui attingit à sine vsque ad sinem fortiter disponit omnia suauiter Sap. 8. Wheras ours doth nether reach home nor last long nor is it of any intense degree but so very luke warme that vnlesse the heate of hart and the thirst of our Lord were very great he would cast vs out of his mouth not sucke vs in as he doth that so we may be incorporated into himselfe The Iewes preferre Barabbas before Christ our Lorde and Pilate through base feare gaue sentence of death against our Lord and with incessant Loue he endured all CHAP. 67. OExcessiue cruelty of those enuious hypocriticall Iewes for the appeasing wherof the mercy of Pilate was euen cōstrayned after a sort to be thus cruell He shewed him to them being scourged and crowned after this bloudy manner with hope that hauing drawn from him such a streame of bloud and tormenting him still with that crowne of thornes it might haue satisfied the thirst of their rage Togeather with that spectacle of pitty he made a protestation of our Lords innocency but it would not serue For they as if already they had bene confirmed in malice in hell it selfe did stil demaund with a cōstant and generall clamour that he might be crucified Matt. 27. So (a) All turned to the disaduantage of Christ our Lord. as this designe of Pilats came to faile nothing had been gayned therby but the shedding of almost al the bloud of Christ our Lord one drop wherof was a milliō of tymes more worth in true accōt thē as many creatures worlds as God himselfe can make the piercing of that head where lay the wisedome of the wisedome of God We may yet see by the way that though Pilate had a great desire to free him in regard of his innocency yet euen that desire was accompanied with an extremely-base conceite of Christ our Lord Since he resolued not to maintaine his cause but thought him a fit man vpon whom conclusions might be tryed and to put him at a venter to the sufferance of that intollerable scorne and paine rather thē he would speake one resolute word in his behalfe Our Lord all the while had the wisedome wherwith to weigh euery one of those thoughts of his to the very vttermost that it could beare and he had patience to endure it and aboue al he had the loue wherwith to offer it to his eternall Father for our discharge Yet Pilate still went on with a velleity or coole kind of appetite to saue his life and he set another Proiect on foote which he thought might peraduenture take effect and that was grounded vpon this custome The Iewes Matt. 27. Marc. 17. Luc. 23. were wont in honour and reuerence of their great Passeouer to free some prisoner who was lyable to death by the hand of Iustice There was at that tyme a seditious murtherer in prison and he was called Barabbas Now Pilate was of opinion that putting the question betwene Christ our Lord and that wicked man they would neuer haue bene able to let that murtherer weigh downe our Lord IESVS in the ballance of their pitty But he was deceaued and they demaunded the sauing of Barabbas and cryed out amaine whē there was speach of who should be dismissed Non hunc sed Barabbam not him but Barabbas whē there was speach of what should be done with IESVS they sayd Tolle Tolle crucifige eum Away with him Away with him let him be crucified If then our (b) A deep wound inflicted vpon the tēder hart of Christ our Lord. blessed Lord were not wounded with griefe he neuer was nor could be wounded That he should liue to see the day wherin that people which was his owne flesh and bloud which had particularly bene chosen of God which he instructed with so much care which he had cured of all diseases with so much power that people which so lately before vpon that day which now hath the name of Palme-sunday had exhibited to him the greatest triumph in tokē of homage which perhaps had bene seene in the whole world Matt. 21. Marc. 11. Ioan. 12. That now I say it should so abase him below a Barabbas a seditious and bloudy thiefe notwithstanding that Pilate who was a Pagan and in other respects a most wicked man did let them see that yet he was a Saint in respect of them by intreating them rather to dismisse the King of the Iewes (c) Note this contrapositiō then him on the other side that Christ our Lord should with so profōd meekenes endure such a height of scorne without shewing that he misliked it without oncce reproaching the wicked life of that malefactour by so much as setting out the innocency of his owne without vpbrayding the ingratitude of that lewd natiō by so much as saying that he had neuer murthered any of them as the other had done but to let them do their worst by way of offence and he the while to do his best by way of patience and loue and euen then to giue vp to God that very act of his acceptation both for Barabbas and for them who were much more faulty then that wretched man what shall we say heere but that the hart of our Lord was grown a whole world of griefe loue and that we are miserable who cānot euen consume with the very thought therof But woe be to vs for we are so far frō this as that euen we our selues are the body wherof that wicked race of Iewes was a figure For so often doe we also prefer Barabbas before Christ our Lord as we choose the forsaking of God for the committing of a mortall sinne of whatsoeuer kind it be Nay therin we doe preferre euen the very diuell before God himselfe And yet so infinite is his loue as that still he beares it at our hands as then he bare it at theirs But shall we now lend an eye to our Lord IESVS as he was procuring to pay the debt of Pilats curtesy to him or rather of that lesse malice then was vttered against him by those Iewes As God he did cast into the hart of Pilats wife a vehement desire that her husband would not cooperate to his destruction as he was mā yet the frozen hart of that miserable creature would not kindle it selfe by such a sparke But the Iewes pressing hard and pretending Luc. 13. Ioan. 19. that Christ our Lord had made himselfe a King and protesting that they would haue no King but Cesar and withall that (d) The same argument preuayls too must in these dayes if Pilate should dismisse Christ our Lord they would proue him to be no saithfull subiect and friend
way of conformity and obedience then without once harkening to the inferiour part of the soule to range the Superiour to the will of God not only with solid patience but with supreme ioy What more perfect in the way of Charity then to endure the extremity of affront paine for his mortall enemies And at the very tyme when those enemies were tormenting him for him to be protecting them and negotiating their cause with bitter sighes in the cares of almighty God What more (b) The incomparable perfection of the worke of the passion of our Lord. perfect in the way of contemplation then in such distresse to be looking at ease so many wayes at once from the death and contumely of a Crosse as if it had bin from some tower of recreation and delight To haue God himselfe and all the world so perfectly and cleerly in his eye and all at once To be offering euery graine of all the Passion in forgiuenes of all the sinnes of the whole world wherof then he saw euery one more distinctly and cleerly thē any man did euer see any one of his own What more perfect in the way of diligence in giuing vs direction how to carry our selues then that when himself was so deeply wounded by those incomparable torments and affronts he would furnish vs with such diuine documents and examples drawne from his owne sacred person Wherby we may become victorious in all our combats find the edge of our afflictions so abated as that they should neuer cast vs vpon despaire What thing is more perfect in the way of corporall sufferance then so to suffer as that there may be nothing which suffers not There is nothing higher then the head and we haue seene how the head of Christ our Lord did suffer by that hideous crowne of thornes There is nothing lower then the feete and we haue seen how the feete haue suffered by cruel nayles There is nothing of a man more wide or large then his hands spread abroad at the armes end and we haue also seene how he suffered by nayles driuen through his hands Those hands wherin he said that he (1) Isa 49. had written vs and (2) Ioan. 12. wherby he would draw vs towards himselfe with diuine pitty when once he should be exalted vpon the Crosse In fine there is nothing more then all and we haue seene how he hath bene scourged all ouer pierc't and fettered and spit vpon and boxt and buffeted and bored and beathen through with Iron for the pure loue of vs. And euen whilst he was hanging vpon the Crosse in expectation of death he vouchsafed still to be affronted and blasphemed beyond all morall beliefe and he the while euen when vinegar was giuen him to drinke in that torment of thirst which he endured did regorge in the deernes of his loue to vs. He perfected (c) How our Lord Iesus did perfect the figures and sacrifices of the old law vpon the Crosse wherof he also fulfilled the prophesies Luc. 22. 1. Cor. 11. the imperfection of the old law in the law of grace which he did promulgate heere He perfected all the Sacrifices of the old Testament in this Sacrifice of himselfe vpon the Crosse the memory wherof he had already commaunded his Priests to perpetuate by the dayly oblation of his owne pretious body and bloud vpon their Altars He perfected all the Prophesies which were made concerning his owne life and death He perfected all those figures which had bene deliuered of him in the old Testament for the disposing of the mindes of the faithfull towards the beliefe of their Messias who was thē to come We haue heere the history of Noe. For as he was made drunke Genes 9. by the vine which he planted and had his nakednes discouered by his children so was our Lord stript naked more then once as we haue seene and that by his children of whome his Prophet in his person said Isa 1. Filios enutriui exaltaui ipsi autem spreuerunt me I tooke care to breed and bring vp my children and they tooke pleasure to despise and dishonor me He was also inebriated by the loue which he bare to his people which like a vine he planted with miracles and pruned with Doctrine and watered with bloud And that vine inebriated him also with another kind of wine the wine of torments and reproach wherwith he was stuft and cloyd By which kind of liquor although he were not because he would not be disgusted yet we haue heard him by his Prophet thus complaine of this vine after a most deere and killing manner Isa 5. Expectauit vt faceret vuas fecit autem labruscas I expected that my vine should haue yielded me wine for the comfort of my hart but it yielded me nothing but veriuyce which hath set my teeth on edge We haue heere a better then that (1) Num. 21. Brasen serpent the sight of whome will cure the bytings of all those serpents which are our sinnes We haue heere the true Dauid who kild that Gyant (2) 1. Reg. 17. Golyas being a figure of the Prince of darkenes with the fiue stones of his fiue sacred wounds and he cut of the Gyants head with the Gyants sword conquering the Deuill by death which was his weapon drawne by sinne The same might be shewed in al the other figures which were deliuered of our Lord in the old Testament which were perfected and fulfilled vpon the Crosse So that our Lord might iustly say Consummatum est The worke of my Passion the worke of mans redemption both in regard of the thing it selfe and of the manner how it hath bene wrought and borne is perfect consummate and complete Of our Lords last prayer to his eternall Father of his excessiue griefe and loue expressed in the separation of his soule from his body and of the grace beauty of the Crucifix CHAP. 76. THERE did now remaine no more but that our Lord IESVS hauing taken care of the whole world and hauing particulerly powred forth those seuerall benedictions vpō it frō that treasure-house of the Crosse should also commend himselfe into the hands of the eternall Father A te principium tibi desinit might the soule of Christ our Lord say to God He began his Passion with the inuocation of his Father Luc. 22. in the Garden he cōtinued it by praying to him whē the Crosse was erected with himselfe vpon it and now he concluded it by recommending himselfe into his hands still vnder the sweet and gracious tytle of his Father Instructing vs therby in all our actions especially in such as are of moment most of all when we are either endeauouring or enduring any thing which doth immediatly concerne the glory of God and the true good of men as this mistery of our redēption highly did to prepare our selues by Prayer before we beginne to eleuate our mindes often to
and the world In the former three he aymed at our only good and in the latter to his owne which yet withall was also ours In the first of those three which was the prayer to his Father Pater dimitte illis non enim sciunt quid faciunt Father forgiue them for they know not what they doe those persecut ours of Christ our Lord were principally intēded by that diuine goodnes but yet withall those men were a kind of figure and represented after a sort all the sinners of the whole world in their persons and so he prayed for the forgiuenes of them all Luc. Ibid. In the second which was his speach to the good Thiefe Amen dico libi hodie mecum eris in Paradiso I tell thee that for certaine thou shalt be with me in Paradise this very day the same good thiefe was assured of his saluation after a most eminent manner but yet withall he was a Type and his person did expresse the character of all sinners truly penitent whome our Lord doth instantly restore to his grace fauour Ioan. 19. vpon their humble and constant desire thereof In the third which was the speach to his B. Virgin-Mother and his most beloued disciple Mulier ecce filius tuus and then Ecce mater tua woman behould thy sonne then to him behold thy mother as this sacred Virgin and this Disciple were in most particular manner designed to be the Mother and Sonne of one mother so yet S. Iohn therin did carry the person of all mankind by being made the Sonne of that most excellent Mother Such was the stile which our Lord held in his death and such it had euer bene throughout the whole course of his life to speake (c) How the speaches of Christ our Lord were many of thē meant chiefly to such as were then present to him and yet expresly also to such as were to succeed in the world afterward chiefly to thē who were present and yet expresly also to those others who were absēt thē vnborne And this truth doth abundantly appeare by the Euangelicall history and to doubt heerof were to say the sunne is darke Since God was content to be made man for the loue of men we are brought more easily to belieue that man shall be made a kind of God in heauen And so when we know and consider that through Christ our Lord who is the naturall Sonne of God we may all become the adopted Sonnes of God yea and so we are if we dispose our selues to be like God our Father and consequently to Christ IESVS our elder brother for that the Father and Sonne are so very like that one of thē is well knowne by the other it (d) How we are made the brothers of our Lord Iesus both by the fathers the Mothers side will seeme lesse strange and nothing disagreable to the infinite mercy of our Redeemer that as he had vouchsafed to make vs his brethren by the Fathers side who is God he would also be pleased to make vs his brethren by the mothers side as he was man adopting vs in the person of S. Iohn to be all the Sonnes of the sacred Virgin Nor did that deernes of his loue shine lesse in that he would cōmunicate his mother to vs thē in that he was pleased that al his other blessings should be common betwene him and vs. And as Ioseph the Patriarke loued his brother Gen. 41. by the mothers side with most tendernes so it seemes as if our Lord would euen oblige himselfe to affect vs with a greater tēdernes of loue now that he had receaued vs as it were into the same very bowells of purity which had borne himselfe As our Lord IESVS is our brother for many reasons especially because we are made his coheyres of eternall glory in the kingdom of heauen so in regard that we are made so by the benefit and purchase of his redemption consequently that he begot vs by so excellent a meanes to that rich inheritance he (e) How Christ our Lord is not only our brother but our father also Isa 9. Ephes 2. is also in holy Scripture called not only our brother but our Father And so the holy Euangelicall Prophet Esay speaking of the glorious Tytle of Christ our Lord setteth this downe among the rest that he is Pater futuri saeculi The Father of the future age that is of Christians whome by his faith and Sacraments he would beget to God This Tytle of Father cost him very deere for was there any Mother who by the way of naturall birth did bring forth any child with such excesse of torment to her selfe as this Father of ours IESVS Christ our Lord did with excesse of anguish and affliction beget euery one of them who of the children of wrath were to be made by his meanes the Sonnes of God And therefore as in course of naturall descent Christ our Lord was the Sonne of the sacred Virgin so if we consider him as the Father and regeneratour of vs all to grace then our Lord and the blessed Virgin may in some sort be accompted rather as the spouses then as the Sonne and Mother of one another This way of cōsidering Christ our Lord our B. Lady ought not seeme strange to vs since partly holy Scripture and partly the cōsēt of the holy Fathers of the primitiue Church do so expresly set it forth to our sight 1. ad Cor. 15. For frō hence it is that Christ our Lord is so often called the (f) How our Lord Iesus is called the second Adam our B Lady the second Eue. second Adam who was to repaire the ruines which the former had drawne downe about the head and eares of mankind And hence also it is that we see it manifestly insinuated in holy Scripture and cleerly and euidently expresled by the holy Fathers that as Christ our Lord came to supply the place of the former adam so our B. Lady was to vs a second a better Eue then the former that she wrought both for her selfe vs as a most eleuated instrument and partly as a cause of our restitution to that inheritance which had bene forfeited by the former But yet with this great difference that as betwene the former Adam and Eue the Originall prime poyson of the first sinne came chiefly and primitiuely from the serpent to Eue and then in a second kind of degree from her to Adam and frō him to vs So betwene this latter Adam and Eue which is Christ our Lord our B. Lady the roote ground of that grace wherby the redemption of the world was wrought came originally and fundamentally from God to Christ our Lord and after a secondary instrumentall manner through her Sonne our Lord to our B. Lady It is shewed how our Blessed Lady and Eue doe resemble one another and how they differ and our Blessed Lady is
to match with one another yet that rule had no place in these two but the Sacerdotall and the Royall often matched togeather her exteriour beauty was such as became the mother of that Sonne Psal 44. Ambr. de instit vir c. 7. S. Thom in 3. distinct 3. q. 1. art 2. quaestiuncula 1. ad 4. of whome it was said Speciosus forma prae filijs hominum Beautifull beyond the most beautifull of the Sonnes of men And yet a beauty it was of such an admirable holy kind as that according to the testimony of antiquity it had the property to quench all flames of lust in the behoulders Blessed be our Lord who hath prouided so sweet a remedy for our misery For knowing as Father Arias noteth in his booke of the Imitation of our B. Lady that one of our greatest enemies was the inordinate loue of women to men and men to women he hath for the redresse of this inconuenience giuen a man to the world who is his owne only begotten sonne and whome women might both loue and euen by that very louing they might become pure and chast And so also hath he bestowed a most beautifull womā vpon the world which is this glorious Virgin Mother by the loue of whome men might deliuer themselues from sensuality and become the Disciples of her high purity For by louing this man and this woman men are spiritually as it were conuerted into them and doe giue ouer after a sort to be themselues And from hence it hath proceeded that since God became man and was pleased to be borne of the blessed Virgin the feilds of the earth haue produced innumerable roses of virginity both in men women And the Church hath bene filled with this rare treasure wherewith the world in former tymes was not acquainted There (b) Diuers reasons of congruity which cōuince the B. Virgin to haue been free from all kind of spot Damase ser 1. de Natiuitat Virg. could be no such defect of power wisedom or goodnes in our Lord God but that since he was pleased to take his whole humanity from one Creature he would also be carefull of that excellent creature in strange proportion Since the diuinity it selfe would vouchsafe to be hypostatically and indissolubily vnited to the flesh which he would take of her body in her wombe that wombe of which is elegantly and most truely said that it was Officina miraculorum the very shop and mint-house of miraculous things how can it be that he should not preserue her from all those sinnes and shames which the rest of mākind was subiect to He would not liue so long in that holy Tabernacle of hers where she was euer imbracing him with her very bowells and then haue a hart so hard as to goe away as it were without paying her any house-rent out of his riches He came into the world to dissolue the workes of the diuell 1. Ioan. 3. euen in the greatest enemies and rebells to him that could be found and therfore he would be sure to preuent the soule of that body which was but the other halfe of his owne with such store of benedictiōs as wherby the very ayre and sent of any sinne whatsoeuer might be farre from breathing vpon her Christ our Lord descended from heauē to aduance the kingdome and glory of God and he could not then giue way that the hart which had conceaued him with such faith which had adored him with so much loue in her imaculate wombe which had so liberally fed him at the table of her sacred brest lodged him in the bed of her holy bosome and couered him with the robes of her pretious armes which had so diligently attended him in that Pilgrimage of Egipt Matt. 2. and had serued him so purely both with body and soule in all the rest of his life death that this hart I say should euer be in case to giue consent to sinne wherby she should of the spouse of god haue become according to her then present state a lymme of Sathan and be in fine the mother of Christ our Lord yet a Traytour to him and both at once Nay she was not only voyd of sinne but abounded (c) The sublime sanctity of our B. Lady Luc. 1. Cant. 7. in sactity whose sacred wombe was foreseene foretold to be Aceruus tritici vallatus lilijs A rich heape of corne compassed in with a faire and sweet inclosure of Lyllies And as those Lyllies of her purest body gaue him a body of such beauty so did that bread of heauen abundantly feed and euen feast her soule with his plenty The Prophet Ieremy was sanctified in his mothers wombe and she was therfore to be much more sanctified who was to apparaile Sanctity it selfe with a pretious body made by the holy Ghost of her purest bloud And being sanctified then farre and farre beyond that holy Prophet that priuilege must needs serue her afterward to so good purpose as that hauing bene holyer in her mothers wombe then he she grew afterward when she came into the world or rather whē she had brought the Sauiour therof into it to be incomparably much and much more holy S. Iohn (d) The great aduantage which our B. Lady had aboue all pure creatures Luc. 1. Baptist also was sanctified in his mothers wombe at the presence and vpon the very hearing of our B. Ladyes voyce as S. Elizabeth doth expresly say he was freed from his Originall sinne and indued with the vse of reason and he exulted and did exercise the operations of his soule which was the ground and foundation of all the admirable sanctity which florished in that Precursour afterward according to the high office to which he was called So as this mother of God himselfe who was the meanes of those benedictions to S. Elizabeths house by her presence must euer infallibly haue bene as farre beyond S. Iohn Baptist in sanctity Psalm 1. as she was in dignity For of him it is said that he was not worthy to vnty the latchet of our B. Sauiours shoo though yet he were the greatest Matt. 11. amongst the Sonnes of mē wheras she had ben made worthy to giue him all the flesh bloud he had It is a most certaine rule of what we are to belieue concerning the proceeding of Almighty God which S. Augustine giues vs in these words lib. 3. de lib. arb c. 5. Quicquid tibi vera ratione melius occurrerit id scias fecisse Deum whatsoeuer thou canst conceaue to be best according to the dictamen of rectified reason know that so it is done by Almighty God Now who sees not that it was fitter better that the mother of God should haue bene humble then proud discreet then rash beleeuing then incredulous and in fine a perfect Saint then a grieuous sinner Her glorious person is high inough out of reach assumed to heauen and
the mother of God The B. (a) A iust consideration of the excellency of our B. Lady drawen from he◠her high Office Hebr. 1. Apostle inferred the supreme excellēcy of Christ our Lord from the name of Sonne which God had giuen him and that therfore he did infinitely excell the Angells For to which of them saith the Apostle was it sayd at any tyme Thou art my Sonne this day haue I begotten thee Now the same kind of discourse hath also place in honour of our B. Lady For since togeather with the name Office the God of power and wisedome is wont to giue all the abilities and ornaments which may concerne the same what thought can there be that there should be any thing in any meere creature yea or in all of them put togeather which might presume to compare with the superexcellent mother of the immortall God And therfore it is no speculation or streined conceite but a consequence which flowes apace or rather flyes as a man may say downe the hill That as the dignity of Gods mother is incomparably beyond the dignity of Patriarks Prophets Precursours Apostles and whatsoeuer is high or holy in the kingdome of God so also doth her sanctity exceed theirs as farre as a mountaine exceeds a moate or as the sea exceeds any shallow brooke And the meanest act of vertue which euer was practised by this B. Lady did in the intensenes of it farre and farre excell the greatest of that kind which euer was exercised by any other except her Sonne our only Lord Sauiour Farre be it from any Christian to conceaue by the reserued manner and speach which sometymes is held by Christ our Lord to our B. Lady in holy Scripture wherby he did but meane to teach the world certaine lessōs or els to deliuer some hidden mysteries that he could haue any intention to rebuke her as faulty in the least degree yea or euen to reprehend her as not being worthy of all honour But it is to be considered that our Lord IESVS was a Priest after the order of Melchisedeth Hebr. 5. 7. of whome it is recorded that he was without Father and mother As man our Lord was without a Father and though he had such an excellent mother as we know yet in the eye of the world he would giue little notice therof at some particular tymes any more then to that eye he would giue any knowledge of the dignity of his owne diuine persō Luc. 1. When our (b) Of the great honour which is done to our B. Lady by Saints by Angells and by our Lord God himselfe Luc. ibid. B. Lady and the Angell were in conference togeather we haue partly seene the honour and homage which was performed to her by that celestial Spirit a high Prince of Gods heauenly Court When our B. Lady was single with S. Elizabeth in the performance of her Office of humble charity we know how that Saint that Prophetesse that mother of the great Precursour of Christ that Kinswoman of our B. Lord was in confusion to receaue the honour of a visit from her And she was drawne to forget as a man may say euen the very rules of modesty by crying out with a lowd voyce in admiration of the blessed Virgins excellency and felicity When Christ our Lord was priuate not in the exercise of his publicke Office of Doctour of the world in which priuacy he continued for thirty of the three thirty yeares of his whole life who can doubt with how perfect profound reuerence that Sonne of God and very God would be sure to carry himselfe to his sacred mother The holy Scripture expresly saith that when he returned frō being found in the Temple he continued subiect Luc. ◠not only to our B. Lady who was his natural and most worthy mother but to S. Ioseph also who was but his putatiue Father It would (c) Note the force of his reason therfore be strange if when we are taught by so expresse euidence what honour was done to this sacred Virgin by Angells and Saints and euen by God himselfe in this mortall life during those thirty yeares of his subiection to his parents excepting that only instant tyme of his teaching in the Temple at twelue yeares of age we should argue any vnderualew to haue bin in the mind of such a Sonne towards such a mother or of any irreuerence or want of care and due respect in the mind of such a mother towards such a Sonne And all this but only vnder the colour of some words which our Lord might say to her in the hearing of others at such tymes as when he considered her not so much as he knew her to be the mother of himselfe whe was God but as she seemed in all appearāce to be which was a carpenters wife Angells in heauen but because as it was incomparably Superiour to it in proportion so yet it carried a kind of resemblance in the condition therof So that if any man should aske me what was the true name and as it were the very nature of Christ our Lord I would say God Incarnate and so also if he should aske me the same question concerning the Mother of God I would not doubt but to say that she were Vertue or Sāctity or the Angelicall nature incarnate and that the perfection of all created sanctity vnder that alone of Christ our Lord had taken vpon it the habit of her holy flesh and bloud therby to illuminate and inflame the world And that (f) Our Lord Iesus is the only mediatour of Redemption and our B. Lady is the most excellent mediatour of Intercession vnder him to God the father and between him self vs. as Christ our Lord was to be the Mediatour of Redemption betwene God the Father and man so was she vnder him to be the most excellent Mediatour of intercession betwene vs and him as the holy S. Bernard doth expresly affirme How the sanctity of our B. Lady doth much import to the honour of Christ our Lord. How notwithstanding all her excellency we anow her to be nothing in respect of Christ our Lord as God and by innumerable degrees inferiour to him as man and how much more honourably our Lord redeemed her then others CHAP. 83. IF a man who were full of want should need the helpe of a woman towards the obtayning accomplishing of some honorable and vsefull designe of his and if she should cheerfully concurre therin and so the end desired should be obtayned by him could that man be so wicked as not to acknowledge the merit of that other creature and not to inrich and honour her as far as her condition would beare especially if he were mighty and not to be made the poorer by it Or at least if the case should be so put as that his owne future honour were so interessed in the honour excellēcy of that other as that they two
very soule yet neither in so many yeares was that Mare pacificum that profound Sea of her sweet soule once troubled at it nor at the foote of the crosse did she vtter any one word of lesse Cōformity nor expresse otherwise any little shew of womanish weake cōplaint Nay S. Ambrose who considers her in this most dolorous but yet most glorious state dares not affirme the she did so much as weep Stantem lego flentem non lego Ambr. de obitu Valent prope sinem I read saith he that she was standing at the foote of the Crosse but I doe not read that she was weeping for the Crucifix And to increase the wonder let it be further considered as it is most true though she had such griefe as hath bene said for the torment and death of Christ our Lord which was the effect yet incomparably she had more griefe for the dishonour of God and the sinne of man which was the cause therof But still howsoeuer she was all resigned and so in conformity of the most excellent will of God as still to stand like an immoueable marble tower in the midst of such a world of waues To conclude therfore concerning her vertues she had not in her whole life one thought wherby she did not exercise some vertue or other in all perfection Nay if we be so miserable as by one and the same act of ours to offend sometymes against many vertues at once (f) Our B. Lady did exercise at once many vertues in the top of perfectiō how much more sure was her diuine soule to be like a huge rich Carbuncle cut full of faces or squares to cōply by euery act of hers with the obligation perfection of many vertues at once And those vertues had the very properties which her own excellent person had for they were not only most purely faire for as much as cōcerned thēselues but most chastly attractiue and actually fruitfull in the mind of others And God alone is able to n̄ber vp those innumerable millions of vertuous acts of all kindes which haue bene wrought by Christians in imitation contemplation of her vertues And not only haue men produced them by her example but when that was done they haue refined perfected them in a high degree And yet still withall they conceaue and consider and feele themselues in their very harts to be but as vnprofitable seruants as Christ our Lord cōmaundeth all the world to thinke they are when they should haue done all they could Wherin no soule hath reasō to find difficulty whē it remembers this holy mother of God who would know her self by no better name then of his slaue The entiere Conformity of the B. Virgins will to the will of God is prosecuted And it is shewed how a world of priuiledges and perfections which seeme incompatible were assembled in her CHAP. 92. VERILY we Christian Catholikes are much bound to God for infinite (a) Out Lord doth seeke to draw vs to him by obiects of incomparable strength sweetnes fauours it deserueth to go amongst the greatest of them that he sets before vs such puissant yet delightfull obiects as these A God incarnate dying vpon a Crosse and an Angell incarnate and more then a whole Quire of Angells in the person of his B. Virgin Mother at the foote therof They draw vs vp towards them by depressing vs downe below our selues For euen what Saint will not run out of cōntenance as farre as the feete of shame can carry him and shrinke into a feeling knowledge that he is indeed a kind of nothing if he be cōpared I say not only to Christ our Lord but to our B. Lady When the body is tormented the mind will help to hold it vp but when the Martyrdome is indured by a sword of such sorrow in the soule what is able to stay it but such a perfect obedience and patience and loue as hers which tyed it after an immoueable manner to the pillar of Gods will and which (b) The house of our B Ladies hart was immoueable planted that house of her hart vpon a rocke so firme as could not once be shaken by all the waues of earth and hell The visible Sunne did hide it selfe at that tyme as in the discourse of the Passion was declared so also did the inuisible Sonne which was the the Sonne of this sacred Virgin hide himselfe in her For where did he shine and burne but there Cant. 2. Dilectus meus mihi ego illi was then the word of them both hand to hand and she might well affirme in a much more eminent manner Coloss 3. then S. Paul that her life was hidden vp with Christ in God What (c) Our B. Lady did abound with thinges which seem incompatible with one another a world of things which seeme incompatible with one another do we see encounter and imbrace themselues in this sacred Virgin In her we see affliction and ioy Nobility and pouerty A cleere knowledge that she was the Cedar of Excellency with a perfect contempt and making herselfe the shrubb of hysop by humility The fire of Charity and the snow of Purity Her person vpon earth her conuersatiō in heauen A child of Adam in nature and his mother in Grace and a child of Christ our Lord in grace his mother in nature So that shee is both mother and daughter nay she is both Virgin Mother In her sacred wombe she coupled God and man Eecl 42. Et qui creauit me requieuit in tabernaculo meo and he sayth she who created me hath reposed in this (d) Her sacred wombe Tabernacle of mine She gaue a new and that an Eternall being to him who gaue the totall being which is inioyed both by her and all other creatures She was Grauida as S. Bernard saith but not Grauata great with child but it was a burthen without any weight For she carried him in her wōbe who carried and conducted both him and the world in his three fingars S. Bern. hom 3. super Missus est post med She was turbata non perturbata troubled at the salutation of the Angell but not disturbed by it as is also affirmed by the same S. Bernard She is a faire full riuer which could neuer fall but did ouer flow so far as to be a Sea but subiect to no tempest and alwayes if we will we may glasse our selues in her smooth shining waters A Sea she is to saile in and a port to rest in She is also a well sealed vp Fons signatus Cant. 4. but yet we may all draw that from thēce which will quench our thirst for she is not only well but water She is also a garden shut vp but yet we all may gather of those excellent Hortus cōclusus Cant. 4. and odoriferous flowers Nay though she be a garden herselfe is also a flower and the
hands of our hart Most happy are those soules to whom our Lord imparts a cordiall and filiall deuotion to this Queene-mother of heaueÌ„ for they read that truth written in their owne harts which others do but read in bookes Namely that it is a great signe of Predestination to be particularly deuoted to her And if I were disposed to proue that an auersion of the hart from doing her honour and seruice were an euident signe of Reprobation in punishment of that and other sinnes I (e) The filthy life and fearful end of such as haue opposed to the honour of B. Lady Vide Canis l. 5. c. 20. should need but to make a Catalogue of such as haue maligned her For the proofe of this latter truth let Nestorius Iouinianus Heluidius with the impure Apostata's of this last age be looked vpon and let their wicked life otherwise be coÌ„sidered togeather with the fearfull end to which many of them did arriue And so also let them looke backe with their memory vpon Copronymus that most flagitious Emperour that bloudy laciuious Sorcerer who by lawes solemnely made did depriue our B. Lady both of her due estimation and inuocation Apoc. 13. Et aperuit os suum in blasphemias ad Deum blasphemare nomen eius Tabernaculum eius and he opened his mouth in the way of blasphemy against God and his holy Tabernacle And afterward he dyed blaspheming God himselfe through the torments of most loathsome diseases which carried him from hence to hell On the (f) Compare the persons who haue beene deuoted much to our B. Lady with those others other side let it be weighed what excellent Princes they were who from tyme to tyme haue done right to this Queene of heauen by erecting Temples in her honour As Constantine the great S. Helene S. Pulcheria and Charlemaine to omit innumerable others And what worthy holy persons they also were who haue written in her prayses and commended themselues with humble deuotion to their intercession and who withall haue filled the world with the odour of their exemplar and holy liues as namely S. Athanasius S. Basil S. Chrysostome S. Gregory Nazienzen Petrus Chrisologus S. Iohn Damascene with troupes of other Fathers of the Greeke Church and of the Latine S. Ambrose S. Augustine S. Hierome S. Gregory Venerable Bede S. Anselme S. Bernard and worlds of others whose bookes are full besides the testimonies of prayers to Saints and sometymes to such as had then lately liued with themselues and how much more to this Blessed mother of God this Saint Superiour to all Saints vnder Christ our Lord whose honour they haue defended from all Heretikes Some of whome had taken pleasure and pride either to degrade her body from integrity or her soule froÌ„ SaÌ„ctity and who haue withal discouraged disswaded the world from procuring by their prayers to her to obtaine the effects of Gods mercy towards her children And when it shall be found what a difference there is betwene these two troopes of men both her aduersaries I hope by so liuely examples will be reduced and her humble sernants and obedient Sonnes will be animated to the increase and doubling of their deuotion towards her Which the Saints of all ages haue delighted in and which supposing that she is the mother of God the very light of reason doth inforce and which God himself hath approued by innumerable most vndoubted both corporall and spirituall miracles in all the corners of the Christian world The pitty of our B. Lady towards vs now that shee is in heauen is set out and shewed to be farre beyond what it was when she liued on earth And this discourse is concluded with a Prayer to her CHAP. 94. IF whilst (a) A particular poÌ„deration of our B. Ladyes vnqueÌ„chable charity whilst she liued on â—â—â—th 〈◊〉 1. she was heere in this mortall life she would vouchsafe being the mother of God to expresse such an act of Humility and Charity as cost her pure feete so many painefull steps ouer that hilly Country to S. Elizabeth If she put herselfe vpon that labour immediatly after she was announced the mother of God If it was not any visit of complement but that by her presence she was the meanes of enriching the body and soule and Sonne of that Saint with celestiall graces And that she went not to come quickly away againe but staid assisting seruing her for the space of three moneths in all which time S. Ambrose excellently poÌ„ders Luc. 2. l. 1. CoÌ„ S. Luc. c. â— how much S. Elizabeth must needs be sanctified by the diuine conuersation of the sacred Virgin since the first shew of her presence wrought such wonders in her If the sanctification of S. Iohn were the first spirituall increase which our Lord incarnate wrought in harts and it was done by meanes of this B. Virgin and the first corporall miracle was also wrought by her meanes at the Marriage of Cana when she would descend so low as to assist at the dynner of people who were so very poore as that they were not able to haue wine inough for their most solemne Feast If of herselfe without being desired she had an eye vpon their wants and a hart which wrought towards the reliefe therof If she had compassion of them not only concerning some such thing as bread which had bene of meere necessity but for the obtayning of wine which is a creature chiefely ordayned for our delight and comfort If to procure it she solicited her Sonne our Lord to worke a miracle in their fauour which till that tyme he had neuer done and yet he would not faile to graunt her suite If as soone as by her prayers for them she had induced Christ our Lord to giue them wine she did instantly turne her praying to him into a kinde of preaching to them aduising them to doe whatsoeuer he should require at their hands through the deere solicitude and feare she had least otherwise they might haue fayled of due obedience especially when she knew in what manner he went to worke the miracle which was first to haue the vessells filled with water which might haue seemed to be a very contrary meanes to the desired end which was to helpe theÌ„ to a supply of wine If these things I say were done by her when her Charity was far lesse (b) A coÌ„parison of what our B. Lady was on earth to what shee is now in heanen her state incomparably inferiour to that which now it is what persoÌ„ is that so vnworthy whome this Queene of heaueÌ„ wil not auow own froÌ„ heauen What wound of any soule is that so grieuous which she will disdayne to dresse what waÌ„t of coÌ„fort can that be so extreme which she wil not imploy herself to remoue by interceding to her Sonne our Lord Now that those Lillyes of Purity and those Violets of her Humility those red Roses of her burning
Charity Patience at the Crosse are trāsplanted out of the desert of this world into that gardē of God in heauen For thither is she assumed both in soule body to the fruition of more glory then is possessed by all the Angells and Saints There is she ingulfed in the bright vision of God where she sees and in whome she loues all the soules which haue recourse to her with incomparable Charity and care And if S. Augustine could truly say of his deceased friend Nebridius who was gone to God Confes l. ◠c. ◠I am non ponit aurem ad os mē c. He doth not now lay his eare to my mouth but he applyes that spirituall mouth to that spring of thine and he drinketh wisedome after the vttermost rate of his owne greedy thirst being happy for all eternity Neither yet doe I thinke that he is so inebriated with thee as that he can forget me since thou O Lord whome he is drinking art mindfull of vs. If S. Augustine I say could thus reflect vpon Nebribius who shall be euer able to expresse the perpetuall memory or rather the euer presēt sight and care of vs which the mother of our Lord God now raigning in such glory as becometh such greatnes hath incē parably more tēderly more liuely of vs then S. Augustines Nebridius could haue of him So much more as she was made our mother heere so much more as now that she is there she drinkes whole seas of God for any one drop which Nebridius could drink consequētly as she is more perfectly happy trāsformed into that Abisse of charity God himself whose loue desire care of our eternall good is infinite Proceed therfore O thou glorious Queen in being glorious raigne thou for euer vnder God alone ouer all his creatures Proceed in being gracious to vs thou who wert so ful of Grace euen before thou wert made the mother of God Thy soule did magnify our Lord at the visit which thou gauest to S. Elizabeth with (c) The princely gratitude of our B. Lady expressed in the Magnificat to our Lord God more delight ioy thē euer had bene cōceaued by any creature And thou didst thē most diuinely expresse his goodnes to thee in a māner of Court so choice noble as might wel declare that thou wert born a Queen thou didst singe Magnificat to our Lord for hauing respected as it were cast an eye of fauour towards thee And how truly indeed wert thou as good as thy word therin when thou saidst that thou didst Magnify or make great our Lord. For whilst he was bestowing those great fauours vpon thee according to those other words of thine Fecit mihi magna qui potēs est sanctū nomē eius Our Lord hath done great things to me and his name is holy thou wert euen very then returning those great things againe to him with the additiō of thine owne most humble thāks So that the greater he made thee the more great and glorious he was also made by thee And besides how couldst thou mak him shew more glorious and more great then in saying that with the cast as it were but of an eye he had made such a mother for himself as thou This Magnificat of thyne is celebrated with diligent and dayly deuotion by the holy Catholike Church in memory of that high ioy which thou hadst in thy Angelicall hart when the holy Ghost expressed it selfe by that well tuned Organ of thy tongue But now O soueraigne Lady that thou art all transformed in God thou art singing it out in a far higher straine Thou canst not say any more that he but casts an eye of fauour towards thee for now he lookes vpō thee with a full face and thou art able to see him as thou art scene 1. Cor. 13. And since the more thou seest of him the more dost thou also see of vs. Vouchsafe to implore his mercy towards the reliefe of our misery which thou canst not but find to be extreme Behould vs who are children of thy soule since by Faith thou becamst the mother of all such as were to liue by Grace And intercede thou for vs with that Sonne of thy sacred wombe whose lawes though we haue transgressed and whose Passion though we haue renewed and whose grace though we haue quenched by our innumerable sinnes yet for as much as frō our soules we are sory for thē that there was mercy in store for his very Crucifiers let it not be wāting to vs who are procuring as thou knowest to be his seruants Since we fly to the sanctuary of thy feete for succour since with the most reuerend of our thoughts we take hold of that Altar of thy purest wombe wherin the Iudge of the quicke and dead did make the first Sacrifice of himselfe to his eternall Father for the redemption of the world defend vs by thy prayers O Queene of pitty from that sword of Iustice which is ready to fall vpon our heads Thou saidst that all Generations should call thee Blessed and we are a part of them withall the powers of our soules we blesse both thee and God for thee and we vow our selues to belieue whatsoeuer excellency may be ascribed to a meere creature And we make this protestation withall that so farre we are frō derogating therby from the worship of Latria which is only due to God as that we know not in this world how to do him more high honour and seruice then by offering him first to himselfe and next by honoring and praysing thee For the greater thou art the greater do we acknowlege him to be who made thee what thou art or nothing Obtaine of that holy Spirit who ouer-shadowed thee heere which doth as it were ouerwhelme thee there in that region of eternall blisse that we also may be quickned inspired by it so may be walking on towards heauē by those paces which thy pure feete haue traced out I cannot beseech thee to obtaine wine for vs as thou didst for them of Cana for we want no wine since we are nourished by the milke of thy maternall loue which is better thē the best most pretious wine And we may also be inebriated as oftē as we shall wel dispose our selues by that Vinum germinaus virgines Lach. 9. that pretious bloud in the body of thy Sonne our Lord in the venerable Sacrament of the Altar But the misery is that our soules want mouths wherwith to tast it or rather they are all crammed with the corrupted food of delight in creatures and our blindnes is such through the mist of passiō which ouergrowes vs that we see not what we eate and much lesse can we discerne the sad effects which it works within and amongst them this one that it depriues vs of gust in heauenly things It is therfore O Queene of heauen that we cast our selues humbly