assembly of Bishops while expecting his coming and suddenly he appeared not accompanied with any Guard or souldiers but with a small number of friends Eusebius who was there present saith in his History that never was any thing seen more admirable than the person of this Monarch at the meeting of this Councel For besides that he was of a most gallant stature and a singular presence he was delighted to hold it as it were enchased in rich attire The purple wherewith he then was clothed mingling the lustre thereof with the rays of precious stones which sparkled on his head made reflections of grace and majesty arise in the eyes of all the beholders He passed through the middle of the Assembly and all the Prelates rose up to do him reverence Then being come unto his place he stood upright expecting from the Bishops a sign given him to sit which being done and prayer ended he sat down upon a golden chair very low which was placed in the middle to the end he might be encompassed with so great a number of Saints as a Palm with a row of Cedars The others also being seated near him Eustatius selected out to open the Councel stood up and made an Oration whereof we find some pieces in Gregorie a Priest of Caesarea which import thus much We have very much obligation O sacred Majestie to Oration of Eustatius at â—he opening of the Councel render immortal thanks to the living God in that he hath made choice of your person to put the Empire of the world into your hands and that by your means destroying idolatrie he hath exalted the glorie of his Altars and established Christianitie in that tranquilitie which we presently enjoy It is an act from the right hand of the Omnipotent which we durst not hope for in our days if God had not made you to be born for the good of the universal world It is a prodigie to have seen you in a short time to calm so many tempests disperse so many smoaks of sacrifices to devils extirpate so many horrible superstitions and enlighten such cloudie darkness with the rays of the knowledge of the true God The world which was before polluted with ordures is purified the name of Saviour is known to Nations the most barbarous The Father is glorified the Son adored the Holy Ghost declared a Trinitie consubstantial that is to say one same Divinitie in three Persons is acknowledged by all the faithfull That is it O sacred Majestie which supporteth the greatness of your Empire with those three fingers of power wherewith it holdeth the mass of the earth poized as it were to serve as a basis As your felicitie is inseparably tyed to its honour so ought you to reverence defend and invincibly protect all that which concerneth the glorie thereof Behold a strange accident and which is to us more sensible than the persecution of Diocletian They go about to dis-member the Trinitie and thrust the knife of division into its throne One Arius who hath taken his name from furie a wolf bred among us in a sheeps skin a Priest of Alexandria an enemie of the doctrine of Apostles and Prophets hath proclaimed war against the Son of God endeavouring to deprive him of the essence honour and power which he holdeth equal from all eternitie with his heavenly Father This is it which hath assembled us here to condemn his errour and most humbly to beseech your Majestie that when you have heard the opinions of all these great men here present you will hold a steadie hand upon the preservation of Apostolical doctrine and command all those to be cut from our body who will persever in their damnable opinions to the end we may breath the Christian air in all liberty which the world beginneth already so sweetly to taste under the happiness of your reign Then was the time saith S. Hierom when the first trumpet began to sound against Arius After the good Bishop of Antioch had ended the Emperour beholding all the assembly with a very gracious aspect spake in Latin to retain the majesty of the Roman Empire and in a moderate tone those words which are couched in Eusebius the sense whereof we render Venerable Fathers I must needs affirm that I never Oâ—ation of Constantine desired any thing more passionately than to enjoy your sweet presences and infinitely am I bound to God that he hath accomplished my desires granting me a blessing that I prefer before all the happiness in the world which is to see you all here assembled and united in will for the glory of God and peace of the Church I pray you suffer not the storm to surprize us in the haven thereby to snatch from us the comfort which we already have in our hands and if God hath given us victorie against Tyrants let us not turn our arms against our selves to tear out our proper entrails It is most certain these domestick troubles are much more to be feared than all the hostilities in the world The sword of persecution can dissever nothing but members but these divisions tend to the subversion of souls which maketh them so much the more dangerous beyond common wars as the spirit is above the body God having afforded me so many victories and so many prosperities I proposed to my self there remained nothing from me to ask of him but an humble acknowledgement of his benefits and leisure to rejoyce with those whom I saw through his favour in repose sheltered under the good success of mine arms and the authority of my Laws It hath been a grief very sensible unto me to understand of those revolutions which have passed in our Citie of Alexandria and which have afterward dispersed themselves through the rest of Christendom I have done all that possibly I might in the beginning to stop them but seeing the evil increased with so much danger I have called you hither to apply the last remedy I beseech you O venerable Priests of the living God to preserve among your selves that concord which I think I may read in your countenances and not to suffer your selves to be deprived of the benefit of peace since the Divine providence hath selected you to establish it upon Altars by your prayers for all the rest of the world Cut off speedily the root of evil and sweetly pacifie these troubles of the Church you shall do a thing most acceptable to God and as for my self who am your fellow servant I shall hold me obliged as for a singular benefit The Interpreter explicated the Oration of the Emperour in the Greek tongue Then the propositions of Arius were read At the reading whereof the most part of the Bishops stopped their ears for horrour as afterward S. Athanasius observed From thence they proceeded to opinions where the disputation was enkindled on both sides Constantine afforded a singular attention to all that was said peaceably entertained sentences encouraged all the world sweetened acerbities
rally their troups he in the mean time fighting in his own person and withal performing the duty both of a great Captain and valiant souldier But notwithstanding all his endeavours terrour had so seized on these flying men that the affair grew desperate And as remedies are sought from Heaven when those of the earth are of no effect Aurelianus the great favourite of the King approching near to his Master perswadeth him to make a vow unto God to fulfil the promise he had made to the Queen his wife which was to be baptized if he returned victorious from this battel which he did calling aloud upon the God of his wife and promising an absolute conversion to the Catholick faith The word was no sooner spoken but that his troups rallied themselves up made head against their enemies pursued them ran through and routed them with so great a massacre that the fields were all covered with dead bodies The discomfiture so terrified them on the other side of the Rhein that the Almans which survived fearing least the King puffed up with his victories might pass the river dispatched a speedy Embassadour unto him to yield themselves tributaries to his Majesty Clotilda hearing the news of this battel and of the holy resolution of her husband was transported with so great joy that she went out to meet him as far as Champaigne accompanied with the great Archbishop S. Remigius a man whom God was pleased to make use of to crown this great work of the salvation of Clodovaeus For besides his admirable sanctity acknowledged throughout all France he had the reputation to be one of the most able and eloquent men of his time witness Sidonius Apollinaris who speaketh Sidon Apollinar ep 7. c. 9 Flumen in verbis lumen in clausulis of his eloquence with admiration saying He thought there was not a man living upon the face of the earth whom S. Remigius surpasseth not without any elaborate study at all through the experience he had acquired of well speaking His conceptions were inimitable his language so sweet and polite that it resembled a piece of ice very smooth whereon nothing might be seen unequal His sentences were full of weight his arguments of force and his words glided along like a river and ever bare in them some flashes of lightening at the end of his periods So soon as the King who was still replenished with sweet idaeaes of his victory saw the Queen his wife It is now Madame saith he that you have gained Clodovaeus triumpheth over the Almans and you triumph over Clodovaeus The deed is done my Baptism must no longer be deferred The Queen infinitely comforted with this word answereth Sir To the great God of Hosts is due the glorie of these two triumphs and your Majestie doth most wisely to render him with the first opportunitie what you have vowed That man giveth doubly who affordeth readily Behold one of the greatest Prelats of your Kingdom whom I have brought along to serve your Majestie in an affair of such importance Thereupon Saint Remigius was presented whom the King most honourably entertained and signified he much desired to be rectified by his good instructions whereat the holy man exceedingly rejoycing for the good which he hoped to derive from thence made him on the day assigned a Sermon of the knowledge of God and of the glory of Christianity against the vanity of Idols so ravishing that it transported the King and all his Court who ceased not afterward to confine himself to the lips of Saint Remigius as to a stream of living waters It is true that S. Vedaestus who was afterward Bishop Anno Christi 499. Clodovaei 15. of Arras had already begun to catechize Clodovaeus but as these holy men pretended nothing but the interests of God not having regard to any thing which touched their own persons he most willingly gave way to the dignity of an Arch-bishop and to the great ability of a man accounted as an Oracle contenting himself to assist S. Remigius and to contribute in this action all which his ministery and service might afford This King going to Rhemes disposed himself religiously to receive Baptism under the direction of this Prelate daily hearkening with singular attention unto the instructions of faith and informing himself with much judgement in all that which was necessary for his salvation It is written among other Chronicâ—â— manuscription things that when S. Remigius came to explicate the mystery of the passion unto him he was much moved thereat so that transported with a generous impatience he put his hand to his sword and spake aloud in anger That had he with his French been present in the place where this act was committed against his Master he would have revenged it with the utmost ability of his forces The holy Prelate sweetened his warlike humours and made him capable of every mystery using therein much endeavour and great perspicuity of discourse After these instructions they proceeded to Confession and ordinary penances wherein the King shewed so much devotion that laying aside the purple robe and Crown he covered himself with ashes imploring the mercy of God in his most fervent prayers When the day of Baptism came which was the Eye of Easter Saint Remigius caused the Church of Rhemes to be excellently adorned as the custom of those times would permit commanding it to be hanged with the richest pieces of tapestry he could find to be perfumed with sweet odours and lightened with a great quantity of wax lights composed of certain perfumes which rendered a delicate splendour in such manner that Saint Gregorie of Tours saith this place resembled a little terrestrial Paradise Some while before the Baptism the King and Queen sitting with S. Remigius in the Oratory of S. Peter attended by few persons of note behold there came on a sudden a most resplendent light which appeared unto the eyes of all the world with rays so sparkling that scarcely it might be endured and at the same instant was heard from Heaven a voice which said Peace be with you fear nothing persevere in my love This was the time when the new Constantine set forward towards holy Baptism where being arrived in the presence of all the world S. Remigius spake to him these words Mitis depone colla Sicamber Adora quod incendisti incende quod adorâsti Bow thy neck O French man under the yoke of God Adore that which you have burned and burn what you adored Thereupon pronouncing his profession of faith Omnipotentem Deum in Trinitate confessus Gregor Turon and especially that which concerned the mystery of the holy Trinitie he was baptized In the Name of the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost The hand of God that is not shortened and which being the Work-master of nature operateth when it pleaseth him above nature useth to honour with some great miracles the foundations of Religion in certain places where it is planted Here he
world the benefits that God hath conferred upon their families is it not most fitting that we endeavour to acknowledge in some manner the liberality of the Divine Majesty This act consisteth in three things First in the Memory which represents to the Understanding the benefit received and this Understanding considers the hand that gives them and to whom and how and wherefore and by what ways and in what measure Thereupon an affectionate acknowledgement is framed in the Will which not able to continue idle spreads it self into outward acts to witness the fervour of its affection To practise this well it is requisite to make a catalogue of the benefits of God which are contained in three kinds of goodness and mercy The first is that whereby he drew this great Universe out of the Chaos and darkness of nothing to the light of being and life for our sakes creating a world of such greatness beauty profit measure order vicissitude continuance and preserving it as it wereby the continual breathing of his spirit affording to every thing its rank form propriety appetite inclination scituation limits and accomplishment But above all making man as a little miracle of Nature with the adornments of so many pieces so well set to bear in his aspect the beams of his own Majestie The second bounty is that whereby he hath decreed to raise in man all that is natural to a supernatural estate The third that whereby he hath raised the nature of man being fallen into sin into miserie into the shadow of death to innocence bliss light and eternal life This is the incomprehensible mystery of the Incarnation of the Word which comprehends six other benefits that is the benefit of the doctrine and wisdom of Heaven conferred on us the benefit of our Saviors good examples the benefit of Redemption the benefit of Adoption into the number of Gods children the benefit of the treasure of the merits of Jesus Christ the benefit of the blessed Eucharist Besides those benefits which are in the generality of Christianity we are to represent in all humility often to our selves the particular favours received from God in our birth nourishment education instruction in gifts of soul and body in means and conveniences in friends allies kinred in vocation estate and profession of life in continued protection in deliverance out of so many dangers in vicissitude of adversities and prospeâ—ity in guidance through the degrees of age wherein every one in his own particular may acknowledge infinite passages of the Divine Providence All this pouring it self upon the soul with consideration of the circumstances of each benefit at last draws from the Will this act of acknowledgement which maketh it to say with the Prophet David Who am I O Lord God and what is my house that thou hast brought me bitherto 2 Sam 7. 18. The seventh SECTION A Pattern of Thanksgiving HEreupon you shall give thanks for all benefits in general and particularly for those you have received at present which at that time you are to set before you that may season this action with some new relish The Church furnisheth us with an excellent form of Thanksgiving to God in the hymn Te Deum or else say with the blessed spirits O God power and riches and wisdom and strength and honour and blessing be unto thee for ever and ever O God glory be to thee on high and on earth peace good will towards men I bless thee I worship thee I give thanks to thee for thy great glory and thy benefits O Lord God heavenly King God the Father Almighty and thou also O Lord Jesus Christ my Saviour onely Son of the Heavenly Father perfect God and perfect man Thou that takest away the sins of the world and sittest at the right hand of God the Father And thou O Holy Gbost consubstantial with the Father and the Son most blessed Trinitie receive my prayers in giving thanks The eighth SECTION Of Offering or Oblation The third Act of Devotion REligion and Sacrifice had their beginning in the worlds infancy and ever since have been linked together by an indissoluble tie God who giveth all will have us give to him meaning we should take out of his store that which our Nothing cannot afford Observe here a thing remarkeable That as in the Law of Moses there were three kinds of Sacrifice that is Immolations Libations and Victims Immolations which were made of the fruits of the earth Libations of liquours as oyl and wine Victims of living creatures so likewise God requires that we give him our actions for fruits our affections for liquours and our selves for victims This is done by the act of Oblation or Offering which is a way of sacrifice by which we offer our selves and all that belongeth to us at the Altar of the Divine Majesty To perform this act well we must have first a pure apprehension of the power and dominion which God hath over us secondly an intimate knowledge of our own dependence upon him considering that we not onely have received being and all things annexed to being from his goodness but that we are also sustained perpetually by his hand as a stone in the air and that if he should let go never so little we should be dissolved into that Nothing out of which we are extracted From thence will arise an act of Justice in the will ready to give to God that which is his and as the Holocaust where the hoast was quite consumed in honour to the Divine Majestie was heretofore the noblest of all Sacrifices so will we imitate this excellent act of Religion by consecrating not onely our actions and affections but all that we are unto God wishing to be dissolved and annihilated for his sake if it might be for the glory of his Divine Majestie But if this annihilation cannot be real we must at the least form it to our mind in an extraordinary manner acquiring to our selves as much as is possible twelve dis-engagements wherein the perfection of the Holocaust consisteth The first is a divesting our selves of all affection to temporal things so that we no longer love any thing but for God of God and to God The second a dis-entangling from our own interest in all our actions The third an absolute mortifying of sensuality The fourth a separation from friendships sensual tural and acquired that they have no longer hold on our heart to the prejudice of virtue The fifth a banishing of worldly imaginations in such a manner that the meer representation of them may beget aversion and horrour in us The sixth a discharge from worldly cares not necessary to salvation The seventh a deliverance from bitterness of heart and discontents which ordinarily arise from eâ—cessive love to creatures The eighth a valiant flight from all kind of vanity of spirit The ninth a contempt of sensible consolations when God would have us to be weaned from them The tenth a renouncing of scruples of mind
the Roman People contrary to the command of Laws and honesty I declare him from this time forward unworthy both of the Common-wealth and my house The unfortunate son was so overwhelmed with melancholy upon this judgement given by his father that the next night he killed himself and the father esteeming him degenerate would not so much as honour his funerals with his presence Good God what severity what thunders what lightnings against the disobedience of sons among Pagans And you wicked sons in Christianity where the Law of love should oblige you to the duty which I prove unto you with an adamantine knot do you think all is permitted you And you fathers are not you most worthy of your unhappiness when you cherish by a negligent and soft indulgence the disobediences of your children which you should root up from their infancy and not suffer them to grow to the prejudice of your houses with so many bloudy tragedies as are daily seen in the mournful theater of the worlds Fili suscipe senium tam patris tui non contristes eum in vitâ illius si defecerint sensus veniam da non spernas eum in tuâ virtute Eccles 3. Qui timeâ— Deum honorat pareâ—tes quasi Dominis serviet iis qui segenuerunt miseries Let us conclude upon the fourth duty of children which is succour Son receive the old age of thy father and mother in thy bosom Take heed thou do not contristate them in any kind Beware thou scornest them not if they chance to fall into any debility of spirit Assist them with all thy might It followeth The child which feareth God never fails either in the honour or ayd he should yield to his parents nay more be shall serve them as a servant his Master We need not here seek out examples in holy Scripture or where the Law of nature is handled the more our proofs are taken from Infidels who had nothing at all but the light of reason so much the more clour and weight they have I will not make mention here of a Roman daughter (a) (a) (a) Fulgos l. 5. c. 3. who fed her father from her own breasts condemned to dye of hunger between four wals you may sufficiently see that often recorded in writing Yea under Peter of Castle there lived a man that never ceased weeping until he were put to death instead of his father who was to be executed I speak nothing now at all of that but cannot omit an example recounted in Bibliotheck of the great with Photius who telleth on a time there happened in Sicily as it hath often been seen an eruption of Aetna now called mount Gibel It is a hydeous thing and the very image of hell to behold a mountain which murmurs burns belches up flames and throws out its fiery entrails making all the world fly from it It happened then that in this horrible and violent breach of flames every one flying and carrying away all they had most precious with them two sons the one called Anapias the other Amphinomus carefull of the wealth and goods in their houses reflected on their father and mother both very old who could not save themselves from the fire by flight and where shall we said they find a more precious treasure than those who begat us The one took his father on his shoulder the other his mother and so made passage through the flames It is an admirable thing that God in consideration of this piety though Pagan did a miracle for the monuments of all antiquity witness the devouring flames stayd at this spectacle and the fire roasting and broyling all round about them the way onely through which these two good sons passed was tapistred with fresh verdure and called afterward by posterity the holy field in memory of this accident What may we answer to this what can we say when the virtues eâ—en of Pagans dart lightening-flashes of honesty and duty into our eyes What brasen or adamantine brow can covetous and caytive sons have who being rich and abounding in means deny necessary things to those who brought them into the world yea have the heart to see them struggle with extream misery whilst they offer a sacrifice of abomination to their burning avarice Wicked son wreched daughter know you what you do when you commit such a crime You hold the soul bloud and life of your progenitours in your coffers you burn them with a soft fire you consume them with a lingring and shameful death you are accountable before God for what they suffer And for whom is remorse of conscience For whom infamy For whom necessity For whom punishments in the other life but for such as in this manner abuse a treasure so recommended by God Take heed O children take heed of breaking this triple cord of the Law divine natural and civil which indissolubly tie you to the exercise of that piety which you have abjured Take heed of irreverence disobedience and ingratitude towards your parents expect not onely in the other life the unavoydable punishments of Gods Justice against such contumacy but in this present life know you shall be measured with the same measure you afforded others You know the history of the miserable father dragged by the hair with the hand of his son unto the threshold of his door where seeing himself unworthily used Hold son saith he it is enough the justice of God hath given me my due I committed the like outrage heretofore against my father thy Grand-father which thou at this instant actest upon me I dragged him hither and behold me hither haled Go no further O Justice O terrour O dreadful spectacle Great eye of God which never sleepest over the crimes of mortals O divine hand which ever bearest arms of vengeance hanging over the heads of rebellious children How terrible thou art who can but fear thee who will not heareafter tremble at the apprehension of thy judgements Children be pious live in the duty you have vowed and resigned to your progenitours and to all your superiours Live full of honour and glory in this world live in expectation of palms and crowns which you shall enjoy in the other world And you likewise fathers and mothers embrace charity towards your good children with all affection and if any forget their duty and afterward stretch out hands humbly to your obedience receive them into favour exercise mercy towards them as you desire should be done to you by God our common father But if you still groan under the ingratitude of wicked children and the fear of future evils wipe away your tears sweeten your acerbities season your bitterness with the comfort of a good conscience When you have done all you can and all you ought to do leave the success to God and say unto him My God who hast seen the cause of my afflictions to proceed from my self accept my good desires for the works of this evil child
motto which said Haereticum hominem devita that is to say we must avoid an Heretick alluding to his father Levigildus Disputation which concerneth the estate of Princes is a ticklish piece where the most part of those who speak of it use their own interest for text and their passion for Commentary Silence and peace which are the two mansions of a good conscience are of much more worth than all the questions which enkindle divisions I think the best doctrine is that which best knoweth how to cement up concord among Miters Diadems and Crowns entertain the obedience of people towards their Sovereigns and if there be verities which are the daughters of the abyss and silence as those Ancients said to leave them in the house of their father and mother where though they nought avail they shall ever be better lodged than in publick It is not vice but the times which divideth Saints and every one thinketh an affair probable which he hath taken upon the byass of his own understanding S. Leander approved the separation of Hermingildus in Spain S. Gregorie of Towers blamed it in France I enter not into all the considerations of them both but I think this Prince took ways too violent in his beginnings levying arms against his father which were not according to the counsel of his wife and I will have no other Authour but himself since he condemned his own design so soon as he began to become holy The thirteenth SECTION The reciprocal Letters of the father and the son upon their separation HErmingildus extreamly incensed at the affront which he received in the person most dear unto him in the world and who wanted not a Nobility round about him that enkindled the fire of choller burst forth in the beginning with violence The father an old suspitious man felt himself much displeased with this alteration and the step-mother ceased not to throw flames through her throat and crie al-arm as loud as she could to transport affairs instantly unto the utmost point of severity Levigildus notwithstanding before he would proceed to extremities sought to do something by letters which are found couched in the History wherein this Prince flattereth his son with fair words to surprize him Behold here the copy of them SON I would willingly say that unto you present which I cannot sufficiently express in my Letters If you have as much confidence in me as I yet have love towards you I verily think were you with me and alienated from the evil counsels of those who abuse the facilitie of your excellent nature I might do much upon your spirit both as a father and as a King so that at the least if you fear my Scepter you would love my charitie which still openeth its arms to your obedience I have bred you up from your tender infancie to make you heir of my Crown and since you arrived to full age I have conferred so many benefits on you that they have surmounted your hopes and as it were drained my liberalities I have put a Scepter into your hand to serve your father with the more authoritie and not to deliver it over to mine enemy I have caused you to be stiled a King to become a support to my Crown and not a Lord over mine Empire I have given you all to repose my old age upon the hope of your dutie and not to afflict me And yet notwithstanding after I have done all this beyond custom beyond your age and above your merit you pay me with impietie and ingratitude Expect yet a little and the law of nature will give you that which you seek by ambition Alledge not Religion unto me to justifie your arms it hath been a crime in you to take a Religion contrary to my commands and an impietie in your Religion to separate your self from my obedience I counsel you as a friend and command you as a father to render your self as soon as possibly you may at my Court and set your self in the way of dutie otherwise I fear you may implore mercie when there will be no other Kingdom found for you but that of justice Hermingildus deliberated upon the answer he was to make to these Letters but his Councel too fervent shewed him it was now no time to retire back that he had to do with a man imperious and turbulent a mother-in-law irreconciliable who had no other aim but to ruin him and that if he took not arms to defend his own life he would be chased away like a beast and should not find safety even in deserts Behold the cause why he wrote back in this manner Sir I give thanks to my Religion which hath already afforded me patience enough to bear the sharpness of your words and which is more resolution also not to be shaken with the severitie of your menaces I have ever freely protested that I am tied unto you with immortal obligations and am besides ready prest to acknowledge them even to my last breath were it not that some now endeavour with you to render all my duties unjust and my thoughts criminal Your Majestie should quickly see me by your sides if she who will not behold me at your feet but in the quality of a Delinquent had not pre-occupated your heart and ears to stop up the one to charitie the other to justice What assurance can I have of my life in a place where she for whom I live hath been dragged by the hair and trampled under foot The wound sticketh so sensibly upon me that time can neither find a lenitive nor reason a remedie As for the change of Religion made by me I go along with the main current of wisdom and sanctitie of the whole world and where I find my salvation most assured I cannot live with more authoritie nor die with more hope and if you condemn me for it your Majestie shall know that a father requireth obedience out of the limits of nature when he exacteth it beyond conscience Sir I beseech you to adde to so many benefits by you afforded me the liberty of an honest repose lest our arms may be as shamefull for the Conquerour as miserable to the vanquished Levigildus was more exasperated upon these Letters and the wicked Step-mother ceased not to rub the sore as much as she might All designs tended to war the father upon the one side maketh great levies of souldiers the son fortifieth Sevil and Cordova and draweth to his party some Forces of the Empire having sent an honourable Embassy to the Emperour of Constantinople which was at that time Tyberius to intreat great succours Acts of hostility were practised both by the one and other part and in the end Hermingildus is besieged in Sevil where he made his abode the space of two or three years after his departure from the Court King Levigildus who was an old fox endeavoured then to entertain the Catholicks with much sweetness to divert them from his sons
it not these poor miserable creatures desire nothing more than to give me my last Farewel and I am confident my Sister Elizabeth would not have refused me so small a courtesie seeing the Honour of my Sex demandeth that my Servants should be present I am her near kinswoman Grandchild to Henry the eight and Queen Dowager of France besides I have received the Unction of Queen of Scotland if you will not grant this courtesie to one of my quality let me have it at least for the tenderness of the heart of men On this consideration five or six of her ordinary Servants were permitted to accompany her to the place of Execution to which she now was going This Divine Queen whom France had seen to walk in such state and Triumph at the pomp of her marriage when she was followed with all the glory of that Kingdom doth now alas go with this poor train to render her neck unto the Hangman She came into the Hall hung round about with blacks and ascended the Scaffold which was covered with the same livery to accomplish this last Act of her long Tragedy What eyes of furies were not struck blind at the aspect of this face in which the dying Graces did shoot for the last light of their shining Glories As soon as she was sate in a chair prepared for that purpose one Beal did read the Command and the outragious Sentence of her death which she heard very peaceably suppressing all the strugglings of Nature to abandon her self to Grace in the imitation of her Saviour At last Fletcher the Dean of Peterborough one of her evil Counsellours did present himself before her and made a Pedantical Discourse on the condition of the life passed the life present and the life to come undertaking according to his power to pervert her in this her last conflict This was the most sensible to her of all her afflictions at the last minute of her life to hear the studied speech of an impertinent and audacious Minister wherefore she oftentimes interrupted him and besought him not to importune her assuring him that she was confirmed in the saith of the ancient Catholick and Roman Church and was ready to shed her last bloud for it Nevertheless this infamous Doctour did not cease to persecute her with his Remonstrances unto the shades of Death She looked round about the Hall if she could discover her Confessor to demand of him the absolution of her sins but he was so busie that he could not be found A poor Maid belonging to her having thrust her self with all her force into the Croud as soon as she was got through them and beheld her Mistress between two Hang-men did break forth into a loud crie which troubled those who were about the Queen to assist her But the Queen who had a spirit present on all occasions made a sign unto her with her hand that she should hold her peace if she had not a mind to be forced thence The Lords then made a semblance as if they would pray for her but she thanked them heartily for their good will saying that it would be taken as a crime to communicate in prayers with them Then turning to the multitude who were about three hundred persons she thus expressed her self It is a new spectacle to behold a Queen brought to die upon a Scaffold I have not learned to undress to unveil my self and to put off the Royal Ornaments in so great a Companie and to have two Hang-men in the place of the Grooms of my Chamber But we must submit to what Heaven is pleased to have done and obey the Decrees of the Divine Providence I protest before the face of the living God that I never attempted against the Life or Estate of my Cousin neither have I committed any thing worthie of this usage If it be imputed to my Religion I esteem my self most happie to shed even the last drop of my life for it I put all my confidence in him whom I see represented in this Cross which I hold in my hand and I promise and assure my self that this temporal Death suffered for his Name shall be a beginning to me of eternal Life with the Angels and most happie Souls who shall receive my bloud and represent it before the face of God in the Remission of all my Offences There was now a floud in every eye and amongst all her Enemies there were not above four who were able to contain their tears The Hang-man clothed in black velvet fell down on his knees and did demand her pardon which she most willingly granted and not to him onely but to all her persecutours After these words she kneeled down her self praying aloud in Latin and invoked the most holy Mother of God and the triumphant Company of Saints to assist her She repeated her most servent prayers for the Church for her Kingdom for France for her Son for her cruel murtherers for England for her Judges and for her Executioner recommending into the hands of the Saviour of the world her spirit purified as well by love as by affliction The last words of her Pravers were these As thy arms Lord Jesus were stretched forth on the Cross so receive me into the stretched forth arms of thy mercie She uncessantly kissed a Crucifix which she had in her hand whereat one that stood by being offended at the honour which she gave unto the Cross told her That she should carry it in her heart to whom she suddenly made answer Both in my heart and in my hand After this she disposed her self to the Block The Executioner would have taken off her Gown but she repelled him and desired that that office might be performed for her by her own maids who approched to her to prepare her for the stroke of Death And she her self did accommodate them in it as diligently as she could and laid open her neck and throat more white than Alabaster and too much alas discovered for so lamentable a Subject This being done she signed her own Attendants with the sign of the Cross kissing them and with a short smile did bid them farewel to shew that she died as comfortably as constantly making no more resistance than the flower doth against the hand that doth gather it Those poor creatures did weep most bitterly and with their sighs and sobs could have cleaved the rocks when the Queen reproved them saying Nay What do you mean Have I answered for your constancie and that your grief should not be importunate and do you suffer your selves to be thus transported with lamentation when I am going to exchange a temporal Kingdom full of miserie for an everlasting Empire filled with fellcitie It was discovered that she had a Cross about her of great value which she intended to have bestowed on one of her nearest friends promising the Executioner to recompence him some other way but this enemy of the Cross did force it from her to satisfie
THE HOLY COURT IN FIVE TOMES The FIRST Treating of MOTIVES Which should excite men of Qualitie to CHRISTIAN PERFECTION The SECOND Of the PRELATE SOULDIER STATES-MAN and LADIE The THIRD Of MAXIMS of CHRISTIANITIE AGAINST PROPHANESSE Divided into Three Parts viz. DIVINITIE GOVERNMENT OF THIS LIFE STATE OF THE OTHER WORLD The FOURTH Containing the Command of REASON over the PASSIONS The FIFTH Now first published in English and much augmented according to the last Edition of the AUTHOUR Containing the LIVES of the most Famous and Illustrious COURTIERS taken both out of the OLD and NEW TESTAMENT and other Modern Authours Written in French by NICHOLAS CAUSSIN S. J. Translated into English by Sr. T. H. and others LONDON Printed by WILLIAM BENTLEY and are to be sold by JOHN WILLIAMS in Pauls Church-yard MDCL THE HOLY COURT DEUS EST NOBIS SOL ET SCUTUM Caeca Cupido ruit caecusque Cupido Via Regia 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 THE HOLY COVRT dixi Dij estis et filij excelsi omnes 〈…〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈…〉 Solomon ex ad perfectum Vsque perduxit Reg. 3. G. G. sculp To the MOST EXCELLENT MAJESTY OF HENRIETTE-MARIA QUEEN OF GREAT BRITTAIN A COURT adorned with virtue and sanctified with pietie is here most EXCELLENT QUEEN to your view presented which having once already in pure and Native colours received light and life from the bright eye of your Royal BROTHER would gladly at this time in a harsher language and ruder garment adventure your gracious acceptance The subject is serious the discourse usefull and proper for those who in Court so serve Princes that they neglect not an humble acknowledgement to a more transcendent Greatness It hath pleased GOD as a singular favour to this Kingdom to affoard us in your MAjESTIE a pious Queen who exemplarly maketh good what diffusedly is here handled Let then lesser lights borrow beams of radiance from your greater Orbs and persist You Glorious Example of virtue to illuminate and heat our Northern Clime with celestiall ardours Adde to earthly Crowns heavenly Diadems of Piety Here shall a HOLY COURT be found fairly delineated nor can I see how it will be in the power of persons of best eminence to plead ignorance and pretend inability they having such a Book to direct them and such a Queen to follow Lead then with alacritie most Sacred MAJESTIE and may propitious Heaven so prosper your holy desires that the Greatest may have matter to imitate and the whole Nation to admire TO THE KING OF FRANCE SIR THis Treatise of the Holiness of Courts before it be published comes forth to behold the great and divine lights wherewith God hath environed your Majestie whom he hath chosen out to sanctifie the COURT by means of two reflections which are the Example of your virtues and the Authority of your Laws As for example You supply as much as in a Prince may be desired who hath brought innocency into the Throne of Majestie as an earnest-pennie of Royaltie and whitened the very Flower-de-luces by the puritie of your heart and hands This argument in my opinion should powerfully operate in the hearts of French-men For it would be a disorder in Nature to see bad subjects under a good Prince to plant vice in the Kingdom of Virtue and to have a bodie of morter and feet of clay affixed to a head of Gold It is fit impudence should be extreamly shameless not to blush when the sparkling lustre of a Crown casteth into the eyes the glimmering flashes of so great a Pietie Where example cannot reach Kings have Laws which are given them from Heaven as hands of gold and iron to recompence merits and chastise crimes And as your Majestie SIR from your most tender years hath shewed a singular propension to the detestation of Impietie and maintenance of Justice that causeth me to say Your Majestie hath great means to make the COURT essentially holy which the disabilitie of my pen cannot express but on paper It is a work worthy of a Christian King who standeth in the midst of Kings and Nations as heretofore the statue of the Sun in the midst of publick passages Royal hands cannot be better employed than to erect the Tropheys of Sanctity That is it which all the first have done CONSTANTINE in the Roman Empire CLODOVAEUS in France RICAREDUS in Spain ETHELBERT in England CANUTUS in Denmark WENCESLAUS in Poland All those who have taken that way have been glorious in the memory of men whilest others that have prepared Altars and Tables to Fortune as saith the Prophet Isaiah erecting Monarchie on humane Maxims have built on the quick-sands of imaginary greatness which hath served them to no other purpose but to measure their fall Vice and Voluptuousness cannot immortalize men since they have nothing lasting in them but the sorrow of their infancie and the infamie of their name All the greatness and happiness of a Prince is to make in his virtues a visible image of invisible Divinitie then to imprint the same on his subjects as the Sun doth his brightness on the Rain bowe SIR Your Majestie knoweth it by proper experience God hath made you to read the decrees of good success written as it were with the rayes of your pietie By how much the more you are affected to the service of the great Master so much the more the good success of affairs hath followed your desires You have seen your battels end in bays and the thorns of your travels to grow all up into Crowns And as we are ever in this world to merit so we ought to hope that so many worthy acts will also with time take their just increase and that you shall sow new virtues on earth to reap felicities in Heaven Lastly that he who hath given you the enterance of Solomon into the Kingdom will grant you the exit of David This is the vow which offereth to God SIR Of Your MAJESTY The most humble most faithfull and obedient Subject N. CAUSSIN TO THF NOBILITIE OF FRANCE SIRS THis Work as it is composed for your sakes offereth it self to your hands without bearing any other ornament on the brow but the reflection of Truth any other recommendation than the worth of the subject It is not the abundant store of sanctity in the Courts of our Age which maketh this stiled the HOLY COURT but this Frontis-piece onely carrieth the name because this Book beareth the model which verily with more ease is moulded on paper than printed on the manners of men Yet we may affirm that God who draweth the sons of Abraham from the midst of flints and rocks doth in all places reserve Saints for himself and he that will consider it well shall find that in all times the Courts of zealous Princes have had their Martyrs their Confessours their Virgins and Hermits I have a purpose when my leisure will permit to divulge the lives of Kings Princes Lords men of state and likewise also of
Queens Princesses and Ladies who in the course of the world have flourished in much sanctity beginning from the Court of David and then concluding in our Age to the end the multitude of examples may place the Sun in full splendour before their eyes who take the greatness of their condition for pretext of their remisness For the present because Reason should carry the torch before History I will satisfie my self with publishing this Christian Institution which treateth of the MOTIVES and OBSTACLES men of Qualitie have to Perfection with the practise of virtues most suitable to their condition the whole attended by two books of Histories that very amply contain the good and evil of Courts I consecrate this small labour at the feet of the Church among so many worthy Writers which make her wholly radiant in gold not unlike that Bird which as the Kings of Asia contributed great treasure to the building of a Temple she having no other wealth went thither to present her Feathers It remaineth SIRS that you make the COURT holy and you shall sanctifie the world your examples may do much therein when you shall advance the standard of piety a plentifull Train will follow Behold how all those that have framed their fortune upon vice have built on abysses they have sowed wind as saith the Prophet to reap tempests their hopes are crackt as clouds swoln with the vapours of the earth and their felicity like a golden statue hanged in the Air on a rotten cable hath melted upon their head Never any man hath had good fortune in impiety He that looseth his conscience hath nothing else to gain nor loose Nothing to gain for that nothing remaineth for him but unhappiness and nothing to loose because he hath lost himself So many crimes and impieties daily float on the face of this Age that you must stretch out your arms against iniquity If you have your hearts fixed where God planted them you shall place the confidence of well doing in the life of the most timorous and shame of ill doing upon the brow of the most impudent Your hands shall always be in a readiness to overthrow vice and your feet shall not walk but on Palms of victory The Church extendeth her hands out to you and imploreth the aid of your authoritie and good examples You are in the house of God as Joseph in that of the Lord of Egypt The Master hath put all into your hands defile not the honour of his bed since with his finger he hath imprinted the lustre of his glory on your fronts If you be among men as Mountains over valleys be Mountains of perfume of which Solomon speaketh in the Canticles and not those hills of the Prophet Osee which have nothing but snares and gins to serve for stumbling-blocks to those whom they should enlighten If you be elevated in the world as cliffs above the Sea be watch-towers not rocks If you be Stars be Suns to be the Chariots of light and life and not comets to pour malignity on the four quarters of the world Be ye assured that how much the more you are united to God so much the greater shall you be the more conformable you are to the will of the Sovereign Master so much shall you behold the earth in contempt under your feet and Heaven in Crowns over your heads The DESIGN and ORDER of the Book TO speak properly we have but two great Books the Heaven and the Bible which never perish The others have an Air and a certain continuance amongst men and at the last arrive unto their period But the most part of those who at this day do write do come into the world as drops of rain into the Sea of which the Ocean takes no notice neither of their coming in or their going out In so great a croud of Writers I have put forth my first Tome of the HOLY COURT as under that consideration esteeming that I brought but a little dew into a great River and having spoken some Truths by the way I should bury my self from my birth in the Tomb of so many Books which is excusable by the law of necessity and honourable by the multitude and the qualities of those that write Howsoever I see that GOD who governeth our lives and our pens hath been pleased that this Work should be had in some respect and having exceeded the merit of the Authour it should also exceed his hope producing some fruit and withal some comfort to my travels which I cannot now judge to be ill employed This hath again put my pen into my hand to follow the continuation of it to which so many personages of Honour have brought so many reasons to induce me that having but little leisure to undertake this second Work I have had the less boldness to refuse it Those who complain that my pen hath not swiftly enough followed their desires are to remember that though Slowness be a mother a little to be blamed yet her Children are not deformed The bringing forth of good Books ought not to resemble that of Birds concerning which an Ancient writeth that they come out of the Belly of their mother before they are born we ought to give them form and a long time to foster them in the Mind before they appear in publick For in precipitation it is a poor attempt to be able onely to hope for nothing but to erre hastily to repent at leisure I do more fear the Reproches of precipitation than deliberation for in this mortal condition wherein we live our most perfect Actions are but heavy assays and the most gross proofs of perfection This may be said without any diminution to the merit of some celestial Spirits who make promptitude and goodness to march together with an equal pace it being not expedient that those who cannot follow them should glory in the infirmities contrary to so great abilities For me I content my self with the approvement and admiration of other mens works reserving nothing but industry for my own And though for all my pains I cannot of my self find in my own work satisfaction enough to content the Readers whom I acknowledge so favourable to me yet so it is that I find I have brought something which bears some correspondence with their desires This I can assure them that the contraction of the precepts which I have drawn into so few words being able to stretch them into Volumes are not without their profit and that Histories are made most choice of in that nature where besides their majesty which lays forth the most specious affairs of the Estate of Empires since the beginning of their Christianism they have a certain sweetness with them which sound spirits will find to be so much advanced above all Fables and Romances as the pleasures of Truth do surpass all illusions of Sorcerers You shall here perpetually observe a great Theater of the Divine Providence where God knows I have no other Design than
first practice and most ordinary to hear Mass for those who understand the words there spoken is to follow them with application of spirit and to accompany the silence of the Priest with some meditations or vocal prayers The second is to stay ones self upon the signification of all the parts of the Mass As at the Confiteor to represent to your self man banished from Paradise miserable suppliant confessing deploring his sin At the Introite the enflamed desires of all mankind expecting the Messias At the Hymn of Angels Glory be to God on high the Nativity At the Prayers thanksgiving for such a benefit At the Epistle the preaching of the Praecursour S. John At the Gospel truth preached by the Saviour of the world and so of the rest The third is to divide the Mass into certain parcels and behold a very considerable manner Represent to your self five great things in the mystery of the Mass from whence you ought to draw so many fruits These five things are representation praise Sacrifice instruction nourishment Representation because the Mass is a perfect image Five notable things in the mystery of the Mass Radicati superaedificati in ipso Col. 2. c. of the life and passion of our Saviour and therefore the first fruit you ought to gather from thence is daily to imprint more lively in your heart the actions and passions of the Son of God to conform your self thereunto Praise So many words as are in the Mass aim at this purpose to give praise unto God for this ineffable mystery of our redemption and to conform your self to this action you ought to bend all the endeavour of your heart to praise God whether it be by vocal or mental prayer Sacrifice It is a most singular act of Religion by which we reverence and adore God for the infinite glory of his souereign Being And the Mass is a Mass a Sacrifice true Sacrifice by eminency where the life and bloud of beasts is not offered but the life of a Saviour which is more worth than the life of all Angels and men Cedrenus recounteth that the Emperour Justinian Cedren in Compen hist Wonder of Justinian caused an Altar to be made in the Church of Saint Sophia wherein he used all sorts of mettal of precious stones of the richest materials which might be chosen out amongst all the magazins of nature to incorporate all the beauties of the world in onesole master-piece And verily this Sacrifice is the prime work of God in which he hath as it were locked up all that which is great or holy in all the mysteries of our Religion It was the custom daily to proportion the Sacrifices to the benefits of God When in the old law he gave the fat of the earth they offered the first-fruits to him But now that he hath granted to us the dew of Heaven so long expected his onely Son we must render to him his Son again which is done in the Sacrifice of the Mass And the fruit you should derive from this consideration is at the elevation of the host to offer Jesus Christ to God his Father by the ministery of the Priest and to offer it First for a supream and incomparable honour of the Divine Majesty Secondly for thanksgiving for all benefits received and to be received Thirdly to obtain protection direction and prosperity in all your works Besides offer up all your powers faculties functions actions in the union of the merits of Jesus Instruction Those who understand the words of Instruction 4. of Mass the Mass may draw goodly instructions from reading the Epistle the Gospel the Collects All in general teach us the virtues of honour and reverence towards the Divine Majesty seeing this Sacrifice is celebrated with so many holy sacred and profoundly dutiful ceremonies Of gratitude since God being once offered in the bloudy Sacrifice of the Cross will also be daily presented to God his Father in the title of gratitude And that ought to awaken in us the memory of observing every benefit of God with some remarkable act of devotion Of Charity towards our common Saviour and towards our neighbour since we see a life of God spent for our redemption and all faithful people Nourishment The eye liveth by light and colours Nourishment 5. the Bee by dew the Phenix by the most thin and subtile vapours and the soul of the faithful by the nourishment which it receiveth in the Blessed Sacrament which is purely spiritual This nourishment is not onely derived from the Sacramental Communion Spiritual Communion by the real presence of the body of our Saviour but also by the spiritual Communion which is made when in the Sacrifice of the Mass at the time of the Priest his communicating the same dispositions apprehensions and affections are entertained as if really and actually one did receive For this purpose it is fit to do three things First to excite anew in your self the acts of self-dislike and contrition for your wretchedness and imperfections The second to take spiritually the carbuncle of the Altar not with the pincers of the Seraphin but with acts of a most lively faith a most resolved hope and a charitie most ardent to open boldly the mouth of your heart and pray our Saviour to enter in as truly by the communication of his graces and favours which are the rays of this Sun as by the real imparting of his body and bloud he gives himself to those that communicate The third to conclude all your actions with a most hearty thanksgiving The fourteenth SECTION Practice of Meditation OF four worlds which are the Architype Intelligible Celestial and Elementary prayer imitateth the most perfect being a true image of the oeconomy of the holy Trinitie which according to the maxims of Divines cannot pray to any having no Superiour yet affordeth a model for all prayers For prayer as saith Tertullian is composed of reason words and spirit Of reason as we may interpret by the relation it hath to the Father of words as it is referred to the Word of spirit by the the direction it hath to the third Person Now this principally agreeth with meditation For it is that divine silence delicious ravishment of the soul which uniteth man to God and finite essence to Infinite It is that plenitude and that tear spoken of in Exodus according to an ancient translation Plenitude Exod. 22. 29. because it replenisheth the soul with the splendour of consolations and sources which distil from the Paradise of God Tear yea tear of myrrhe because it distilleth under the eyes of God as doth the tree which beareth myrrhe under the rays of the Sun It is a wonderful thing to behold this little shrub which doth not perpetually expect to be cut with iron that it may drop forth its pleasing liquor but the Sun reflecting on the branches thereof becomes as it were a mid-wife and maketh it bring forth what is sought
as never being without a woman but since experience daily teacheth there are of them excellently governed we must not impute to the condition of sex that which proceeds from the vice of depraved nature Though the Scripture condemn evil women yet it bestoweth so great elogies on the virtuous that they are able to dazle calumny and enlighten virtue One while woman is called A Lamp which shineth on a holy candlestick Lucerna splendens super candelabrum sanctum Eccles 26. Erat lucerna ardens lucens Joan. 5. 55. a title onely given to persons eminent as it was said of Saint John Baptist He was a burning and resplendent lamp The body of this Lamp is the rib created by the hand of a great Work-man the soul is the fire of it virtue the light grace the oyl devotion the match and nourishment and marriage the holy candlestick whereinto it is put Another while she is called a Sun As a Sun said the Wise-man rising in the world from the palace of God Whereby he Sicut sol oriens mundo in altissimis Dei would have us to understand that a Mary should so near approch to the Divinity that she was to possess the highest place above Angels Thrones Virtues and all Intelligences Sometime the same Scripture to declare the rank a virtuous woman holds in the world presenteth unto us a ballance in one scale a woman and in the other all the riches of the world and woman is the weightiest A chaste woman is a Gratia super gratiam omnis penderatio non est digna continentis animae grace above all graces admitting no comparison And besides holy Writ replenished with the virtues and remarkable acts of famous women the Wise-man seems also to have undertaken as a task the praise of women in the panegerick of the one and thirtieth chapter of the Proverbs There he compareth woman to a ship carrying victual from a far distant countrey desirous to signifie that she is laden as much with virtues as a ship with merchandize Do you seek for devotion in her a most estimable ornament of souls Behold how the great Saint Augustine by singularity calleth this sex the devout sex Their first mother as I told you was created in terrestrial Paradise and they are perpetually at the gates of celestial Paradise either praying or hearkening to the word of God Were there not women who accompanied our Saviour with his holy Mother in so many painful pilgrimages succouring his necessities according to their abilities And is it not a prodigie that on the day of that bloudy and dolorous passion which shook the pillars of Heaven and made the Apostles flie women were found who followed the Son of God with heart affection presence tears sighs even to the foot of the Cross terrours of arms fury of souldiers earth rent in sunder with sorrow and Heaven wholly covered with darkness unable to force affrightment into these souls to stop the current of their holy undertakings Besides they have done so many services to the Church yea so many wonders that not onely Cities but whole Kingdoms have many times been converted and brought to the knowledge of God by the means of women Desire you prudence in them Behold a poor Thecuite who treateth with King David of Absaloms reconciliation with such dexterity that she obtained whatsoever she asked See in the History of Esther how by the treachery of Aman swords were drawn out of scabbards to be thrust into the throats of an infinite number of poor innocents throughout all the Provinces of the Kingdom at which time God raised a young captive an Esther who so well knew how to temper the spirit of this harsh and haughty King that she made him open his eare to innocency and shut them up from flattery and cruelty withhold the wings of thunder already shot over the heads of those poor Citizens and turn them against the guilty If you among them seek for justice the history of the ancient Gauls will shew you that anciently they decided differences among people and often staid arms ready to encounter planting the Temple of peace in the midst of furies and liberty of arms Yea God himself for the government of his people was pleased to make use of a Debora whom Erat Deboâ—a pro Prophetis Jud. 4. the Hebrews called by the name of a Bee for her wisdom valour and industrie You will perhaps think strength is wanting in this Tugloria Hierusalem tu â—â—titia Iâ—rael â—u honorisicentia populi nostri quia fecisâ—i virilièr Judith 15. sex Behold Judith who consecrated her victorious hand to the defence of her countrey and slaying Holofernes defeated a whole Armie spread over Judea and surging on every side like a furious deluge And if you will thereunto adde the histories of later times see a shepheardess a simple maid commonly called Ieanne la Pucille who opposed herself as a wall for the defence of this Kingdom against English arms with such military prowess that she seemed to bear fire bloud war and victory in her hands Let us then no longer say that woman is the seminary of evils happening in marriage but rather that they are vices which proceed from both when the husband and wife take the liberty of doing ill The first disorder is that such matches are almost never made but for covetousness We do not well to call this an iron Age it is all composed of gold and silver Heretofore marriages were made Si uxorari oportel sit amor in causâ Hieron in ep ad Ruffin for love which caused them to be of a lasting condition and to be indissoluble but now adays avarice alone predominateth We thought love was the most powerfull Archer of the world to transfix a heart but avarice is found to confront him Had a maid now all that which fools use to couch in their writings the brows of Juno the eyes of Venus the hands of Miuerva and feet of Thetis if she be Oculos suo â—statuerunt declinare in terram not rich were she Pandora her self if she bring not where withal to guild the hand of her husband it is no match for him And from hence it comes that marriage is not as it were marriage but a mercenary traffick a fare a market where reasonable creatures are sold like bruit beasts Ancient laws testifie that heretofore nothing was given with maids in marriage but their apparrel mean enough I warrant you It was for men who sought them to endow them This is practised still in the new world to wit in China It is a treasure there to have many daughters men buy them with large sums of money which they give to the parents that breed them now they purchase men and with huge portions buy their bondage This makes their parents hair to wax grisly and impoverisheth families which fear to be over-burdened with daughters because one cannot be rid of them nor drive them
sought her adding Behold what you love He seized with horrour hastened to hide himself in a Monastery where he remained the rest of his days to expiate his loves O incomparable patience I would go further but she stays me For what can I speak more having said this Is it not enough to shew chastity can do little of it self but that it dissolveth as incense on the burning coals of charity To give away the light of the day the sweetest of all creatures to give up her bloud drop after drop to give her torn eyes so to avoid a sin which faithless souls account but a sport Infinite many pusillanimous people justly chastised for their sins cannot endure the least sting but with complaint and murmur against God they burn but it is as lawrels crackling in the flames but this virgin in the sharpest rigours of a most sensible torment burnt sweetly couragiously silently O what a perfume of the living God is virginity If the smoke of the bodies of the damned and despairing Babylon perpetually mount to Heaven in a sacrifice of vengeance may we not affirm this delicious perfume of virginity will on the other side ascend as a sacrifice of honour whilest there is Religion and Altars men and Angels O women prodigal of a good irrecoverable Ah wretched maids Ah young witless women that give for a momentary delight a treasure for which the Church hath shed so much bloud Ah inexcusable treachery to give to a bold libertine what is taken from Jesus Christ Ah pusillanimity to yield at the first shock by delivering up a gift of God for which so many virgins have persisted under the teeth and paws of Lions under the sharp irons of tyrannical wheels in cauldrons of scalding hot oyl in the tearing out their eye-strings in dislocation of their bones and massacring their bodies yea even to the last breath of life Unhappy victim made a prey to dishonour what wilt thou answer to an Agnes a Tecla a Katharine a Lucie when they shall shew thee their palms their bloud and wounds more bright and radiant than the stars in the skie And what will they say behold what we have suffered for a virtue which thou hast so sleightly valued as to trample it under foot and through a strange prostitution hast thrown into their eyes who required it not O mothers breed your daughters piously and preserve them as pledges charily recommended unto you by Almighty God What a shame what an ignominie nay what a fury to behold maids now adays ill taught bold amongst men as souldiers wanton as leaping kids and impudent as Syrens who hath ever sequestred shamefac'dness from the soul that did not separate modesty from the bodie How can you account a gadding house-wife a dancing reveller an idle wanton to be modest since the strongest chastities have now adays much adoe to defend themselves from calumnie Snares are laid on every side as well upon the mountain as the valley There is not a stone whereon some scorpion sleepeth not Never was the lust of impudent men so enflamed and yet you dally without fear or danger Hearken to the advise of S. Hierom concerning the instruction of maids with which I will conclude this discourse Let a maid who ought to be the Temple of God be so Hierom. ad Laetam instructed that she neither hear nor speak any thing which tendeth not to the fear of God Let not impure speeches approch her ears Let her be ignorant of worldly pleasures Let her tongue in her tender years be seasoned with the praises of Jesus Christ Let her banish young men from her company who have any loose fashion in their behaviour and let the maids themselves who come amongst them be alienated from worldly commerce least having been ill disciples of sensuality they thereby become the worse Mistresses If she also learn to read let her letters be made of box or ivory and be all called by their names that so they may be a recreation for her eyes to serve as instruments for her instruction Let her in good time practice to write and let her tender hand be guided on the paper to trace the letters which are shewed her Let her have some reward for doing well for in this her minority these sleight ornaments prove to be an allurement to virtue Let her have companions for emulation and entertain a generous envie against their praise Let her not be chidden if she be of a heavie spirit but encouraged by the help of commendation Let her take delight to overcome and be as loth to be vanquished Heed must be taken she hate not studie and travel lest the bitterness she may conceive in her infancy spread beyond her most innocent years Let the first letters she begins to call compose some holy names to prepare her memory to piety Let her have a governess grave and modest Let her entertain her companions with serenity of countenance Let her become affable and amiable to all the world Accustom her not to wear pendants in her ears to paint to load her neck and head with pearls Change not the colour of her hair by art nor frizle or crisp her with fire and irons lest it prove a prediction of infernal flames Take heed she be not touched with the hammer which now adays strikes all the world to wit Vanity Let her not drink in the cup of Babylon which is Impurity beware she go not forth with Dinah to see how the maids of the countrey are attired Let her not be a dancer nor gawdy in apparel Poyson is not given but by rubbing the goblet with honey nor doth vice deceive us but under colour and pretext of virtue Above all let her see nothing either in father or mother the imitation whereof may make her guilty Let her be disposed to the reading of good books and never appear in publick without the advise of her mother Let her not entertain some spruce young Amourist to cast wanton glances nor let her bear particular affection towards any of her servants who may whisper in her ear but cause them to speak aloud that all the rest may hear Let her orderly every day offer her devotion to God be very sober in her deportement and delighted with works worthy of her condition Let her be most obedient nor ever so hardy as to see any or undertake ought without their leave who govern her Doing this she shall save her soul and edifie all the world To Fathers and Mothers The thirty ninth SECTION Concerning the education and instruction of their children O What a goodly chain of gold is Charitie which with its many lincks enchaineth the world The more closely it shutteth the more strength it affordeth The more it tieth our hearts the more it fasteneth our felicities The first liberty of a reasonable creature is the thraldom of an honest love wherein fathers and mothers have a great part for their union floweth from the bowels of
he passed in continual apprehensions thornie affairs perilous voyages sinister distrusts frosty fears of death barbarous cruelties remorses of conscience the forerunners of hell leaving besides a short and unfortunate posterity Behold his Picture and Elogie HERODES ASCALONITA HERODES ASCALONITA VULTU FERUS ANIMO BARBARUS LUTO ET SANGUINE MACERATUS A QUO NIHIL AD SUMMAM CRUDELITATEM PRAETER DEICIDIUM ABFUIT DEICIDIO VOLUNTAS NON DEFUIT VULPINA FRAUDE REGNUM JUDEAE INVASIT AN. MUNDI TER MILLESSIMO NONGENTESSIMO SEXAGESSIMO QUINTO REGNAVIT IRAE SERVUS JURIS DOMINUS FORTUNA FOELIX CYCLOPAEA VITA INFOELICISSIMUS DESIIT CAELESTI PLAGA FERALIS MORBI ANNO REGNI TRICESSIMO SEPTIMO VITAE FERME SEPTUAGESSIMO CHRISTI OCTAVO Vpon the Picture of HEROD A man no whit with civil grace indu'd Of visage hydeous of manners rude A monster made of massacres and bloud That boldly God Heav'n Natures laws withstood Ill words within no certain limits fall But who once mentions Herod speaketh all BY the carriage of this Court one may see whither vice transporteth great fortunes In the person of Aristobulus and Hircanus you behold that the canker is to a body less dangerous than the discord of brothers to a state In the person of Antipater a friend for advantage who seeketh to fish in a troubled water in the end fisheth his fill but is drowned in the act to teach you there is no policie so great as to be an honest man and that he who prepareth snares for another diggeth his own grave In the person of Pompey an Aribitratour who worketh his own ends under the colour of justice who buildeth his ambition on the ruins of state in the end the earth which faileth him for his conquests denieth him a sepulchre He found no more Countries to conquer and scarcely had he six foot of earth to make him a tomb In that of Hircanus too much credulity too much facility to please others humours too much pusillanimity in the government of Justice which head-long threw him into a life as miserable as his death was cruel and bloudy In that of Anthonie a passionate Judge who turneth with all winds and suffereth himself to be carried along by the stronger without consideration of Justice In that of Joseph and Sohemus that it is perilous to treat with women though free from ill purpose and much more dangerous to reveal a secret which who will safely keep must make his heart a sepulchre for it In that of young Aristobulus how the most beautifull hopes are storm-beaten in the bud and that you must walk upon the prosperitie of the world as on ice that it must be handled like glass fearing always they break not in the lustre of their brightness In that of Alexandra a boundless ambition designs without effect afflictions devoid of consolations torments without patience and a death without deserts and all this because she gave not a good temper of virtue to her soul In that of the sons of Mariamne innocency perfecuted and a little vanity of tongue desperately revenged In that of yong Antipater policy deceived the cloud of humane hopes cracked punishment and revenge ever attending an offender In the person of Herod an enraged ambition which giveth motion to all his crimes a double soul crafty cautelous politick mischievous bloudy barbarous savage and withal in the best of his tricks benummed doltish dall thinking to make a fortune to the prejudice of religion and conscience A goodly fortune to make himself great and live in the hatred of all the world in the remorses of a Cyclopean conscience a thousand times aday to call upon death not being able to die and in the end to die in a body leaprous stinking louzey and death to tear his soul from him with scabs stench and lice to make it survive its torments in an eternity of flames See you not here fair fruits of humane wisdom impiety and atheism In that of Mariamne a soul raised above the highest sphere of true greatness a soul truly royal holy religious courteous mercifull wise affable and endowed with an incomparable patience who as an Eagle strong of wing and courage soaring above the storms of the world maketh her self Mistress of tempests and thunders which for that they had served as an exercise of her constancy and perpetual battels for her life shall through all Ages attend the immortality of her glory THE FIFTH BOOK Fortunate Pietie WE have hitherto beheld a Court which rather resembleth Polyphemus cave than a Kings Palace to teach Great-ones there is no bruitishness so savage wherinto ingratitude towards God and vice doth not precipitate a forsaken soul Let us now see that as unbridled passions are of power to make a hell of a Princes Court so the practice of piety and other virtues make it a true Paradise Behold the Court of Theodosius the Younger a Prince who seemed to be born for nothing else but to allye the scepter to virtues and manifest what royal greatness can do guided by the rules of pietie It is no small miracle to behold a holy King If Ring of God God affected the curiositie of wearing a ring as well in effect as the Scripture attributeth it to him in allegorie the most agreeable characters he would engrave therein were the names of good Kings who are his most lively representations as those who wed together power and goodness two inseparable pieces of God but very incompatible in the life of man such are the corruptions of this Age. Some live in Four sorts of life the world transported with the torrents thereof and that is weakness Others flie the world and in flying oft-times carry it along with them and this is an illusion Others separate themselves as well in body as affection and this is prudence But few are found who bearing the world on their shoulders through necessity do tread it under-foot by contempt of vanities That is it which this great Prince hath done whose Court we here describe for being seated among people he built a desert in his heart and in a vast Ocean of affairs he lived as fishes which keep silence within the loud noise of waves and preserve their plump substance fresh in the brackish waters I go not about to place Theodosius the Younger in the rank of the bravest and most heroick spirits you hereafter shall see others more couragious and warlick but I purposely have selected this history drawn from the Chronicle of Alexandria Zonaras Zozomen Raderius and others to teach certain vain-glorious people who make no account but of those trifling spirits fierce mutinous and unquiet stampt with the coyn of impiety how much they miss of their reckoning seeing this Emperour with the sole arms of piety and modesty carried himself in a very long and most prosperous reign amidst horrible tempests which seemed ready to rend the world and other rash Princes who made shew to swallow earth and seas were drowned in a glass
Nations the ebbe and floud of great affairs a profound peace an absolute power to satisfie all sorts of desires with attractive objects and delights ever ready to be reaped and in the mean time what a life led the new couple what a life Pulcheria and her sister what monasterie more regular than the Court of this Emperour what virtue what chastity what sanctity what devotion was ever found in Cloysters which hath not here been seen with so much the more lustre as it is more difficult to have all vices a power and all virtues in will If in religion the first account be made of devotion which is the master-wheel of all great actions this Court was as the Tabernacle of the ancient law which born amongst armies environed with hosts of men bristled round about with pikes and javelins ever retained a sweet silence a chaste religion a sacred veneration and perpetually had holy fire in centinel victims and prayers in sacrifice So the Palace of Theodosius amongst all the clamours of affairs all the rumours tumults and accidents which upon one side and other occur in a large Empire never so much slackened as to loose the sweetness of prayer which was as the Manna these Royal souls daily gathered in the desert which they had planted in the midst of their hearts Pulcheria as the Abbess governed the devotion of all the rest by her counsel and example As soon as break of Note here O Noblemen a Holy Court day drew the curtain of Heaven to discover the works of God they adored the work-man and assembling in their houshold Chappel sung the praises of God following therein the course of the Church-prayers The whole time was there circumvolved in compass The divine office had the first fruits affairs and recreations had likewise their turn nothing was exorbitant where all was done by weight and measure If in religious life so much esteem be had of poverty as of walls and rampires of the Citie of God where shall you find a more admirable poverty than in this Court Is it not a prodigious thing to be spoken that this good Emperour for whom seas and rivers ran for whom the earth opened her bosom with so much prodigality for whom she kept so many Magazins of gold and silver within her entrails beholding himself among the revenues of a great Empire so husbanded them for the entertainment of things necessary wherein he was ever magnificent that he suffered no excess in his own person He used all his blessings as things borrowed and sometimes in his own particular would not permit the expence of his diet exceed the value of the work of his own hands He painted very well and took pleasure so much as affairs would give leave to delineate the holy Scripture in most noble characters saying to his familiars it was reason since all the world took pains in his Kingdom himself should have a trade and that as others he should learn to dip his bread in the sweat of his brow and his body being of the same composition which others are it was fit to exercise the same labours Such innocency was very far from the profusions which are made in Princes Courts with the expence of the peoples bloud a matter that beyond all other burdens would surcharge them at the Judgement-seat of God The Emperours sisters to imitate him had always their works in their hands that they might leave no passage open to idleness If in religion Excellent chastity and modesty chastity be esteemed here the conjugal supereminently flourished between Theodosius and Eudoxia virginity in Pulcheria and her sisters Marina Flaccilla Arcadia was as redolent balm which ascended to Heaven in a perpetual sacrifice The very name onely of dishonesty was not so much as known in this Palace yet all things were therein learned but vice and idleness Glances of the eye were simple and dove-like words pondered ordinary discourses of the imitation of Jesus Christ and virtues of Saints carriages full of respect honour and majesty This chastitie abode among the chief in Court and was spread over all the rest by the odour of good example as do the rays of the Sun which involve the whole world without ever parting from the original fountain of light If in religion obedience be esteemed this Court was the very model of well obeying and commanding Those holy souls had made a law to themselves most exactly to observe all the Commandments of God and the Church to reverence the Prelates of the same to cherish assist comfort the religious and all Ecclesiastical Orders with most cordial affection tempted with holy reverence in such sort that the most austere Monks could not be more punctual in religious obedience than all of this Court were in the government of their consciences God for reward imprinted on the Emperours forehead the rays of his Majesty which made him so much the more awfull as he less of purpose sought to make himself such If in religious Orders they live in perpetual exercise Mortification of mortification what life more mortified than to behold so much humility in sovereign greatness so much chastity in vigorous youth in an absolute power to do all so much retention In so much science so much conscience so much temperance among so many occasions of delights Besides the fasts of the Church which were there exactly kept abstinence was observed on the wednesday and friday in every week The Emperour gave the example his wife and sisters imitated it their table was rather a perpetual list of temperance than a provision of dainties It was observed the good Prince travelling one A worthy act day through the heats of summer full of dust and sweat his Court being in great scarcity of water behold a peasant cometh who presenteth him with a draught of cool water in a fair christal glass he was in his passions so mortified that as an other David after he magnificently had recompenced the good mans present he gave it back again to bestow where he pleased without once touching it thinking it unreasonable he should flatter his own tast during the thirst of his followers He sometimes stole away in hunting and went to dine with some Hermit where he fed on a little slice of mouldy bread and drank the clear water of the fountain protesting afterward it was one of the best repasts he had made for commonly it was seasoned with sacred discourse and wholefom counsel In his apparel although he appeared full of majesty according to his quality yet he oftentimes hid under his royal purple the old frock or hair-shirt of some holy Anchoret In publick shews he also abstained from gazing that seeing one would have thought him blind His virtues were so much the more as they had the less of affectation He was in conversation among men as a man and yet therein preserved himself pure as an Angel If religion be the hive wherein the honey of good
her the news thereof The Empress saluted him very courteously and disposed her heart to speak to him touching a certain sum of money she desired to give for the entertainment of his Monks but the good man divining the thoughts of her heart saith to her Madame trouble not your self for this money there are other affairs which more concern you know you very shortly must depart out of this world and now you ought to have but one care which is to entertain your soul in that state you desire it should part out of this life Eudoxia at the first was amazed at this discourse It seemeth souls as Plato saith go not but with grief out of fair bodies but this was too much disengaged to do in the end of those days any unresigned act After she had a long time talked to Euthymius as one would with Angels she gave him the last adieu full of hope to see him at the Rendez-vous of all good men Returning into Ierusalem she had no other care but to set a seal upon all her good works then distributing whatsoever she had to the poor she expected the stroke of death freely and resignedly her soul was taken out of her body throughly ripened for Heaven as fruit which onely expects the hand of the Master to gather it She was about threescore years of age having survived Theodosius her husband and Pulcheria Flaccilla Marina Arcadia for all of them went before her into the other world she was married at twenty years of age she spent twenty nine in Court and as it were eleven in Jerusalem she deceased in the year of our Lord 459. the 21. year of Pope Leo and the 4. of the Emperour Leo Successour of Martianus A woman very miraculous among women who seemeth so much to have transcended the ordinary of her sex as men surpass beasts More than an Age is required ere nature can produce such creatures They are born as the Phenix from five hundred to five hundred yeare yea much more rare A great beauty great wit great fortune a great virtue great combats great victories to be born in a poor cottage as a snail in his shell and issue out to shew it self upon the throne of an Empire and die in an hermitage all is great all is admirable in this Princess But nothing more great nothing more admirable than to behold a golden vessel with sails of linnen and cordage of silk counterbuffed by so many storms over whelmed and even accounted as lost in the end happily to arrive at the haven Behold her Potraicture and Elogie AVGVSTA EVDOXIA EUDOXIA AUGUSTA THEODOSII JUNIORIS CONJUX EX HUMILI FORTUNA IN MAGNUM IMPERIUM TRANSCRIPTA SCEPTRUM VIRTUTIBUS SUPERAVIT CELESTIS INSTAR PRODIGII FOEMINA INGENIO FORMA VITA SCRIPTIS ET RELIGIONE CLARISSIMA CUM VICENIS NUPTA ANNOS XXIX EGISSET IN IMPERIO ET UNDECIM FERME IN PALESTINA HIEROSOLIMIS RELIGIOSISSIMO EXITU VITAM CLAUSIT ANNO CHRISTI CDLX AETATIS LIX Upon the picture of EUDOXIA Fortune unparallel'd beauty her own A spirit that admits no Paragon Divine immense although it seem to be 'T was but the Temple of the Deitie HEr example drew an infinite number of great Ladies to contempt of pleasures and vanities of Court to seek the Temple of repose in the deserts of the holy Land Among others Queen Eudoxia her Grand-child who as we have said was married into Africk treading the world under foot with a generous resolution came with her Crown to do homage at the tomb of her Grand-mother kissed her ashes as of a holy Empress and was so ravished with the many monuments of virtue she had erected in the holy Land that there she would pass the residue of her days and choose her tomb at the foot of that from whence she derived her bloud and name It is a great loss to us that the learned books written by this Royal hand have been scattered for those varieties of Homer which are extant are not Eudoxia's Photius much more subtile than Zonaras to judge of the works of antiquity maketh no mention thereof in the recital of the writings of this divine spirit but of her Octoteuch which he witnesseth to be a worthy heroick and admirable piece Behold that which is most remarkeable in the Court of Theodosius And verily for as much as concerneth the person of the Emperour he did enough to make himself a Saint by living so mortified in his passions in the delights of a flourishing Court It is a meer bruitishness a very plague of mans soul to make no account of Princes but of certain braggards vain brain-sick and turbulent spirits who fill histories with vain-glorious bravadoes whoredoms murders and treacheries these are they of whom the spirit of flesh an enemy of God proclaimeth false praises and such an one seemeth to himself sufficiently great when there appeareth a power in him to do ill A calm spirit united docible temperate though he have not so many gifts of nature is a thousand times to be preferred before these vain-glorious and audacious who are onely wise in their own opinion valiant in rashness happy in vice and great in the imagination of fools It is good to have the piety of Theodosius and to let over-much facility work in praying and pray in working to have the beak and plumage of an Eagle and the mildness of a Dove to lay the hide of a Lion at the feet of the Stature of piety As for Pulcheria she was the mirrour of perfection among the great Princesses of the earth yet not without her spots but still giving water to wash them away And for Eudoxia you find in her what to take what to leave many things to imitate few to reject but an infinite number to admire Behold in the end the Fortunate Pietie which I have set before your eyes as a golden statue not onely to behold it in passing by but to guild your manners with the rays and adorn your greatness with the glory thereof Who will not admire the prosperity of the Empire of Constantinople in the manage of Theodosius of Pulcheria of Martianus under the rule of piety and not say Behold the world which trembleth in all the parts thereof under the prodigious armies of Barbarians who seem desirous to rend the earth and wholly carry it away in fire and bloud from the center Behold the Roman Empire which hath trodden under foot all Scepters and Crowns of the earth ruined dis-membred torn in a thousand pieces in the hands of a vitious Emperour who buried it under the shivers of his Scepter and behold on the other side God who preserveth his Theodosius his Pulcheria his Martianus among these formidable inundations which cast all the world into a deluge as heretofore he did Noe in the revengefull waters which poured down from Heaven to drown the impurities of the earth What nurse was ever so carefull to drive a flie from the face of her little infant while
protest if it were to do again I had rather die in The life of Hugo a Monastery covered with leaprousie than with the scarlet robe of a Cardinal Yet notwithstanding this man had been so little idle that besides the Concordances of the Bible which he composed and the Commentaries he made upon the whole Corps of holy Scripture he so couragiously employed himself in the exercise of good works that being drawn out of the excellent Order of S. Dominick he retained all his former virtues which found no change in him but that they added to their native beauty the lustre of authority I speak this not to inform Prelates from whom I should receive instruction but to represent to so many of the young Nobility as we now daily behold advanced to Ecclesiastical charges the peril there is in Prelacies which are not guided by the paths of a good conscience It is a monstrous thing said holy S. Bernard to hold the highest place and have the lowest courage Bern. de consid lib. 1. cap. 7 the first Chair and the last life a tongue magnificent and a hand slothfull much noise about you and little fruit the countenance grave and actions light great authority and no more constancy than a weather-cock It were a better sight to behold an Ape on the house top and smoke in a candlestick than a man dignified without merit On the contrary part when science and virtue agree with Nobility to make up a good Church-man it is so glorious a spectacle that it may be said God to produce it on earth hath taken a pattern from himself in Heaven I wish no more faithfull witnesses than this Prelate which I shall present unto you in this first Treatise after I have made a brief Summary of precepts which I have purposely comprised in very few pages to render them the readier for the understanding well knowing there are store of books largely enough dilating on this subject the length of which I have avoided to attend the matter I wish it may have an effect in your hearts worthy of your courage that honouring your dignity for virtue virtue may enoble you with titles of true glorie THE HOLY COURT SECOND TOME THE PRELATE The first SECTION That it is convenient the Nobilitie should govern the Church I Begin by the Altar to measure the Aeternitas mundi ex obedientiâ ad intelligentiam motricem Apudi Matthiam de Viennâ qui liber impressus anno 1482. Temple of the Holy Court and set a Prelate before your eyes who bare Nobility into the house of God and there furnished himself with all the virtues which made him speak like an Oracle and live as a true image of the Divinity The Platonists say the whole order of the world dependeth on Intelligences which bear sway in the motion of the first Heaven and we in imitation of them may say all the good of Christendom proceeds from the examples of Ecclesiastical men to whom the Son of God hath consigned his authority on their brows his word in their mouths his bloud and Church into their hands For if bees engendred of the body of a bull carry in their entrails the very form of that bull from whence they are derived by a much more just title the people Vlysses Aldobran de apibus will bear the marks of those whom God hath given them for Doctours and Fathers whether it be by correspendence of nature through custom or by imitation which ever hold a very great predominance over spirits disposed to receive their impressions Behold the cause why a Prelate who liveth conform to his profession imprinteth the seal of the Son of God on all those souls he governeth and produceth himself in as many objects as he hath imitatours of his virtues As on the contrary part he who liveth ill in great Nobility and dignity is a Seraphin in appearance but a Seraphin without eyes without heart without hands which hath wings of a profane fire able to burn the Propitiatory if God afford not his helping hand And forasmuch as we at this day see the Nobility aspire to Ecclesiastical charges and many fathers to dispose their children thereunto sometimes with more fervour than consideration it hath caused me to undertake this Treatise for the Nobility which dedicate themselves to the Church as well to shew the purity of intention they ought to exercise therein as to give them a fair discovery of the goodly and glorious actions they ought to pursue in the practice thereof I here will first offer you a simple draught which I afterward intend to adorn with the greatness of S. Ambrose as with more lively colours Plato rejoyced to behold Princes and Governours of Common-wealths to become Philosophers and we have cause to praise God when we see the children of Noble houses to dispose themselves to Priesthood not by oblique and sinister ways but with all the conditions which their bloud requireth and sacred dignity exacteth in so noble a subject Why should we deny them Myters Crosiers and eminency in the Church So far is their birth from ministering any occasions of the contrary that it rather affordeth them favour both to undertake such charges with courage and discharge their conscience with all fidelity The reasons hereof are evident For first we must aver that by how much the more honourable the charges are so much the rather they are proper for such as make profession of honour provided always on the other side they have qualities suitable to those ministeries they pretend to exercise And are there any in the world more ambitious of honour than Noblemen Ostentation is the last shirt they put off and where can you find a more solid and eminent honour than that which is derived from the lawfull administration of Ecclesiastical functions Aristotle saith Truths which transmit themselves Arist lib. 1. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Xenophon l. 4. de factis dictis Socratis tribuit etiam Socrati Strabo Geograph l. 14. Aelian l. 14. c. 34. Var. Eus in Chrō Agathias histor l. 2 c. through the common sense of every man get into credit as it were by the decree of nature Now such hath been the esteem of all Nations that Kingdoms and Common-wealths being established upon Religion and temporal jurisdiction as on two columns Religion so much the more excelleth politick government as things divine transcendently surmount humane And for this cause favours priviledges and preheminences have ever been given to Priests in the greatest and most flourishing Monarchies and Common-wealths of the world as we may see in Histories and in the policie of the Aegyptians Assyrians Chaldeans Medes Persians Grecians Romans Gauls and other Nations The honour of Priesthood gained so much on the hearts of all people that the Monarchs of the earth seemed not to rule but with one arm if they made not in one and the same person the alliance of Priesthood and Royalty so that oftentimes
tractable with ease to dispose it self to inclinations of honesty Behold these two principal heads whereon this excellent nature of an inestimable price is established And first forasmuch as concerneth the tranquility of passions it is undoubted that every man being composed of four elements by consequence draweth along four roots of all the motions thereof which are Love Fear Pleasure Sorrow There is not a man which feeleth not some touch But as every sea hath his winds though Mariners observe that some are more tossed than others so though every soul have its passions we must confess there be some of them are mildly disposed and others more roughly distempered You see men who from their most tender age tast of strange extravagancies choller harshness rage despight which maketh them to be of a spirit fantastical uncivil and obstinate against which you must ever fight with an armed hand Others from their cradles are endued with a peaceable soul as a sea in the time that Halcyons build their nests on the trembling agitation of waters they have inclinations to virtue wholly Angelical in such sort that they seem to be as it were conveyed therein as fishes in their element From this repose from passions ariseth the second condition of good nature that is docibleness of spirit the beginning of education and happiness of life For as Divines require in those who receive faith a certain Religious affection to divine things discharged and purified from all spirit of contradiction so in matter of moral virtue and piety we stand in need of a tractable soul which fixeth it self on good instructions as the ivie cleaveth to trees and pillars Go not then about when you make choice of an Ecclesiastical man to tender some Esau some spirit of the field who is onely pleased with arms and slaughter of beasts Take rather a Jacob under the pavilions a sweet and temperate spirit that is wholly disposed to the sound of virtues But you Noble Spirits who have met with this excellent Ezech. 28. Omnis lapis pretiosus operimentum tuum foramina in die quâ conditus es preparata sunt nature I may speak the words of the Prophet unto you God hath given you a soul wholly covered with precious stones enriched with gifts and admirable talents he hath enchased it in a body endowed with a singular temperature as a diamond set in the head of a ring Much hath he given you and therefore much requireth at your hands The seventh SECTION Of Virtues requisite in the carriage of a Prelate The first is Wisdom DO you demand what God requireth from you I answer five principal virtues which were very wel represented in the ephod of the High-Priest of the old law as S. Gregorie the great (a) (a) (a) Greg. de Pastor p. 2. cap. 3. hath well observed This ephod was a certain mantle that covered the shoulders composed of four colours of hyacinth purple white and scarlet the whole wrought all over with threeds of gold enterlaced with curious work-manship Why this dressing why these colours To teach you seasonably to bear on your shoulders the conditions requisite to your profession The hyacinth or skie-colour signifieth the first thing you ought to do is to flie as the plague of virtues from these travantly and unworthy spirits who have no other object in the possession of the goods of the Church but flesh-pots and play you are to frame for your selves a soul totally noble wholly elate meerly celestial which conceiveth strong resolutions one day to dedicate it self to God not in a mercinary manner but with the utmost endeavour of its power Think not (b) (b) (b) Mediocre nè putes quod tibi commissum est Primùm ut alta Dei videas quod est sapientiae Deinde ut excubias pro populo Dei deferas quod est justitiae castra defendas tabernacula tucaris quod est fortitudinis Teipsum continentem ac sobrium praestes quod est temperantiae Amb. de Oâ—â—ic lib. 1. saith S. Ambrose that being called to an Ecclesiastical state you have a slight commission from God Wisdom requireth you consider the mysteries of Heaven and that you be highly raised above the ordinary strain Justice willeth you to stand centinel for the people who expect aid from your prayers Strength desireth you to defend the Tabernacle and Camp of the God of Hosts Temperance ordaineth you live with singular sobriety and continency You are said Saint Isidore of Damieta (c) (c) (c) Isido Polusiota lib. 3. ep 2 placed between divine and humane nature to honour the one with your sacrifices and edifie the other by your examples A Priest (d) (d) (d) Sacerdos debet esse Christi alumnus à peccatis segregatusrector non raptor speculator non spiculator dispensator non dissipator pius in judicio justus in consilio devotus in Choro stabilis in Ecclesiâ sobrius in mensâ prudens in letitiâ purus in conscientiâ assiduus in oratione patiens in adversitate lenis in prosperitate dives in virtutibus expeditus in actibus sapiens in sermone verax in predicatione Alphons Torrez ought to be as a young child issued out of the school and bosom of the son of God even as an Angel to govern the Church not to despoil it to treat with God in prayer not to handle a sword He should be entire in his judgements just in his resolutions devout in the Quire firm in the Church sober at table prudent in recreations pure in conscience serious in prayer patient in adversity affable in prosperitie rich in virtues sage in words upright in preaching and free in all good actions Great S. Denis the dreopagite (e) (e) (e) S. Dionys ep 3. ad Demophilum addeth a notable sentence saying That he who most especially seeketh to transcend others in holy Orders ought most nearly approach to God in all sorts of virtue For which cause your education should not be in the ordinary way If you have brothers that are to be bred for the world let them live in the practice and fashions of the world O how unworthy are you of the hopes to which God calleth you if you envie them the favour of the house and of those I know not what kind of petty trifles of their own profession Your condition is much other if you follow that spirit which guideth you (f) (f) (f) Bern. l. 4. de consid c. 6. Vbi de comitatu Episcopi inter mitratos discurrere calamistratos non decet Heretofore Monasteries were the chief schools of Kings and the Great-ones of the earth to cause them to suck in virtue with the milk your abode should be in places where you have engaged your heart and your faith which best can prepare and manure you for the life you have chosen It is truly a scandal to your profession if you be ashamed to wear a habit proper for an Ecclesiastical man and blush at the
that being sent into the Territory of Milan in the quality of a Governour Probus who substituted him merily said Go Vade age non ut Judex sed ut Episcopus rule like a Bishop rather than a President recommending mildness unto him that he might apply a lenitive to the great rigours that were used in matter of justice This fell out much otherwise than Probus and Ambrose had projected for as the history telleth Auxentius an Arrian Bishop who had much longer lived than was fit for a man so wicked some little time before deceased at Milan the Metropolitan place of his Diocess and when there was question to proceed to election there were many difficulties between the Catholicks and Arrians every one coveting to create a Bishop of his own party The emulation which was much enkindled threatned to draw bloud from the veins of both sides before it could be quenched Ambrose as a Magistrate went thither to redress it And behold at the same instant a little child as if it had been an Angel descended from Heaven cried out in the midst of the assembly Ambrose must The election of S. Ambrose be created Bishop This loud voice was seconded by all men as a voice sent from the mouth of God The fire of dissention was quenched in an instant the most outragious courages forsook their arms and thought on nothing but to raise Ambrose who was not as yet baptized to bear him by ordinary degrees to the Episcopal chair There were some obstacles herein on every side Concil Nicenum Can. 1. Miserum est eum fieri â—â—gistrum qui necdum dificit esse discipulus Innocentius primus ep 12. ad Aurelium Hieron Ne milesantequm Tyre ne prâ—â—s magister sis quà m discipâ—lus For first it was against the laws of the Church to choose a Bishop since the Councel of Nice condemneth those Prelates who give Orders to Priests presently after baptism Secondly there was an Edict of the Emperour which forbade the advancement of his Officers and civil Magistrates without his express consent In the third place Ambrose who was wholly dedicated to a secular life had neither vein nor artery which enclined to election But who can resist the spirit of God when he is pleased to strike a stroke with his own hand beyond the imagination and judgements of men All difficulties one after another were taken away and this election was approved not onely by the holy See but of all the Eastern and Western Bishops who much rejoyced and congratulated with S. Ambrose by their letters The Emperour Valentinian gave his assent thereunto boasting he had sent such good Governours to Provinces that they were thought capable of Bishopricks There was no body but Ambrose to subdue who used all sort of engines and practises to divert this purpose He who ever of his own nature was exceeding mild feigned himself bloudy causing racks and tortures to bepublickly exercised on offenders yet needs would they have him for Bishop He who was most chaste made men and women of ill life haunt his house and descended even to the shadow of sin to flee the light of glory yet ceased they not to pursue him He fled and after he had for a whole night travelled hard thinking he was far off found himself at the gates of Milan from whence he departed In the end he was forced to yield to the spirit of Almighty God who gave him such evident tokens of his calling Needs must he undergo the charge he so constantly had refused and where humane prudence looseth its sight we must suffer it to attend the direction of Eternal Providence The second SECTION A short Elogie of the life and manners of S. Ambrose I Will do as Geographers who put the whole world into a little map I intend to comprize in few words that which deserveth a volume and give you a brief table of the life and manners of this great Saint S. Ambrose was a man in whom it seemed virtue Rare endowments of a Prelate was incorporated to make it self visible to mortal eyes Goodness which cometh to others by studie seemed his by nature since he had consecrated his infancy by the ignorance of vice and whiteness of innocency Others think it ill to commit a sin and with him it was a great vice to omit a virtue When he lived in the house of his father with his good sister Marcellina he attended to the practice of virtuous actions they both were as flint-stones which by proximity make the sparkles flie so the holy emulation they used in the pursuit of good enkindled the sensible apprehension of God in their hearts by a mutual reverberation He went from this school as Samuel from the Tabernacle to bear innocency to the Episcopal Throne and there to receive dignity His life served as a rule his example as a torch his learning as an ornament and his very silence as an admonition If you regard the virtues which ordinarily lay the foundations of spiritual building such as are sobriety and continency Ambrose undertook fasts for delight commonly eating but once aday and that with moderation he tyed himself to the one for the love of the Cross and admitted the other by way of necessity This exercise much served him to conserve his purity which most inviolably he kept even in the very course of secular life as it was found in his private papers where he very ardently begged of Almighty God that he would give him grace to maintain in his Episcopal dignity the gift of chastity which he had afforded him in a secular life He daily rose from his bed as the Phenix from her nest having no other flames but those of that great Sun which scorcheth Angels in Heaven and the most Angelical hearts on earth From this temperance proceeded his admirable conversation which gained all hearts and who so well knew how to joyn the wisdom of the serpent with the simplicity of the dove He was prudent with good men sharp against the practises of the wicked yet crafty never His discourse came from him with such an Oeconomy that the ignorant found instruction therein the curious light the learned solidity the eloquent grace the vitious terrour the virtuous edification the timorous confidence the afflicted consolation and the whole world admiration There was nothing idle in this man all spake in him all tended to praise-worthy actions his study was holy letters his care to express in his manners what he had read in books he was prompt in all which he did and had but one hinderance in the world and that was prayer which he would never have left if discretion had not taught him to forsake God to find God His intentions were most sincere his negotiations honourable his silence discreet his words ever profitable his heart full of compassion and although the eminency of his life raised him above all men yet the sweetness of his nature made him familiar
though too too late You that have made me so many times become red with bloud suffer me once to be ruddie with shame that I so lightly have been deceived to the end I may not blush to see my self converted with all the world And tell me not I pray that I am old Decrepitness is not in years but in manners It is never too late to learn ones salvation and it is ever seasonable to do good Shame is but for those who have neither power nor will to correct their vices Come learn a new warfare of Christians with me which Notable answers to the libertie of Symmachus in earth beareth arms and in Heaven its conquests From whom should I learn the mysteries of Heaven but from him that made it and not from man who doth not so much as know all that passeth in his own house Whom would you have me confide in the matter of belief we ought to have of God but God himself How shall I take you for a Master since in the seeking to teach me you confess your own ignorance You say God is a great secret and must be sought by many ways but he who once hath hit on the readie way why should he amuse himself with crooked turnings You seek him blindfold and we find him in the light You enquire him with suspicions and minds disturbance and we find him in the revelation of the wisdom and veritie of God himself It is a malicious stupiditie to think we can serve this sovereign Master in all sorts of Sects As there is but one sun in the world so is there but one truth It is a streight line which is to be made but one way All other superstitions are crooked lines that have as many semblances as defects How can we reconcile our Religions you adoring the works of your hands and we accounting it an injurie done to God to worship the works of men How shall we have one and the same God if you adore stocks and stones which our God instructeth us to trample under foot To whom shall we entrust this veritie in such a great diversitie of opinions but to a Man-God whose words were no other than prophesies wisdoms and verities his life innocencie sanctitie and virtue his actions power wonders miracles in all parts of the world What secret spirit set the Cross on the top of your Capitol You demand proofs of the Divinitie and I shew you the conquest of a world under the feet of one crucified the less this action hath of man the more you behold therein the work of God Then Symmachus you redemand the Altars of Idols of Grave words for the Emperour whom Of a Christian Emperour whose heart is in the hand of God arms are for the protection of faith Would you have him employ his chast and innocent hands which he never lifted up but to the living God to repair the monuments of a false Deitie In what Historie find you that the Pagan Emperours have built Chappels and Temples for us And think you our great Prince hath less zeal for truth than his Predecessours for falshood They have made all the parts of the world ruddie with our bloud for defence of their Idols but God hath blasted their purposes and overthrown by his power what they would have raised by their injustice Would you that a Christian Emperour should from the ruins of your Gods restore for you in contempt of his own Religion objects of sin on the Altars But let us a little further see the sequel hereof They demand A pertinent reply to the act of Vestals revenews for the Vestals for they cannot otherwise serve their God Behold how couragious the Gentiles are We have imbraced and maintained our faith in povertie injuries and persecutions and they crie out their ceremonies cannot subsist without their own interest It is a shamefull thing to sell virginitie and to fix themselves on profit through the despair of virtues What armies have these maids to maintain who have such care of their revenews Their number exceedeth not seven which they have chosen amongst so many thousands to guard a mercenary virginity that still reserves a night to make experience of marriage Is it for this they must be mytred for this scarletted for this endowed with a thousand priviledges and entertained in magnificent Caroches with a train of Princesses to brave it through the streets of a Citie Behold the holy virgins and poor maidens of Symmachus By my consent let him reflect the eye of his understanding and bodie on the state of our Religious women he shall see companies replenished with honour integritie shame-facedness who know how to use the gift of virginitie as it ought to be They wear no atyres nor pompeous myters on their heads but a poor veil which borroweth its worth from the lustre of their chastitie They know not what belongs to attractives of beautie for they have renounced all curiosities of the world Purple and superfluitie never dwels in their house but rather fasts and austerities It is not their custom to flatter or sell at the price of honour and priviledges the puritie of their bodies but much otherwise they do all as if their sufferings were to be the recompence of their virtues Never will they learn the trade of setting their flesh to sale to the best bidder sell the abstinence from pleasures to them that offer most well knowing the first victory of chastitie is to triumph over greediness of riches which are the most dangerous baits of sin If we should give great revenews to all the maids which are now readie to receive the veil what treasures would furnish out such an expence And if they dare affirm that none is due but to Vestals is it not an impudence to be desirous to deprive Christian virgins from goods given in favour of virginitie as if to be Christians were to be the less chast or as if the Religion they profess were on their foreheads a mark of infamie Who can endure under the reign of most Christian Emperours customs which are onely tollerable in the Empire of Nero's Symmachus demandeth moneys of the Common-wealth for entertainment of his Vestals we by certain modern laws have been bereft the successions which we might expect from particulars without making complaints so temperate we are in our proceedings Some Ecclesiasticks likewise have been made to renounce their patrimony to be freed from Court-obligations and enjoy the priviledges of the Church Were this done to the Pagans they would cast flames from their mouthes for how could it be but very troublesome to purchase the vacancy of a holy ministery with the prejudice of his means in consecrating himself to the safety of the whole world to have necessitie for recompence in his house Wils are valid in favour of the ministers of Idols Be they never so profane in superstition so abject in condition so prodigal of their honour they
there is no infancie but is replenished with God if it render it self not unworthy thereof Little Infants heretofore have confronted executioners and born away the crown of martyrdom and will you betray our altars What will you answer to your good brother the Emperour Gratian of holy and glorious memorie when he shall say My brother I never thought my self vanquished by mine enemies whilest I left the Diadem on your head It hath not grieved me to die since my place was replenished with so good a Successour I freely have forsaken the Empire being perswaded the ordinances I made in favour of Religion would remain inviolable to posteritie Brother these are the spoils I gained over divels these are my titles and tropheys these the pledges of my pietie and monuments of my faith which you have since taken away from me by your Edicts What may an enemie do more You have violated what I so piously ordained for the glory of Altars It is a thing which he who so unworthily bare arms against me never did The sword which transfixed my bodie did me less hurt than your Edicts more sensible am I of the wound you impressed on my cinders than that which the Tyrant fixed on my members The one took from me the life of bodie but this bereaves me the life of memorie and virtues On this day it is that I loose an Empire since I see my self deprived of that I always preferred before Empires and that it is taken from me after my death yea by the hand of a man whom I infinitly loved Brother If you have done this of your own accord you have condemned my faith and if by constraint you have betrayed your own and being wholly dead as I am you make me die in you who are of my self the better part On the other side think you not but that the Emperour Valentinian your father whose name you bear will say unto you Son you have done me much injury so to condemn my conscience and to believe I ever had any purpose to tolerate superstitions so prejudicial to Christianitie I punished all crimes that came to my knowledge But never have I heard of an Altar of Victorie nor profane sacrifices to be made in a Sovereign Court before the eyes of all Christendom Dear son you greatly dishonour the respect which is due to the memorie of your father if you think he oweth his Empire to superstition and not to his Religion I heartily beseech God most Sacred Majestie if this affair be so important as you see to your conscience to the memorie of your father the ashes of your brother your own reputation to the judgement which posteritie shall give upon you and that which transcendeth all other considerations to the universal Church you now do what you will one day wish to have done when we shall appear before the eyes of the whole Church Triumphant to the end your actions may be free from reproof as my counsels are of Repentance Who could resist these thunder-bolts Symmachus reputed at that time as we have said the prime States-man in the Roman Empire both for eloquence and authoritie was ashamed of his superstition and in pleading for Victorie lost it well shewing it was nothing since it had so little countenanced a man who ascribed so much unto it which made Ennodius Dicendi palmam Victoria tollit amico Transit ad Ambrosium plâ—s favet ira Deae Ennodius say Symmachus in pleading for Victorie hath lost the victorie left by him in the hands of S. Ambrose plainly discovering the Goddess was very unreasonable to forsake those that served her and gratifie such as offended her The triumph of S. AMBROSE in the conversion of S. Augustine The sixth SECTION Of the Nature and Condition of this great Man I Come to one of the most remarkable actions of The greatnes of S. Ambrose in this conversion S. Ambrose resplendent in the conversion of great S. Augustine the benefit whereof heaven and earth have divided since this incomparable man serves as a support for the Church Militant in the revolution of so many Ages and an ornament to the Church Triumphant through all eternitie It is none of the least gifts from Heaven that our Ambrose was selected for an affair of so great importance that the whole world might find its interests therein and for a victorie so eminent that were the Angels as capable of envie as they are repleat with charitie as they have loved the Conquest they would envie the glory thereof Happie voice of thunder which made this hind to bring forth her young after the throws and agitations of twelve years Happie the Beseleel who so well hath laboured in the Exod. 31. Tabernacle of the living God Happy the David who hath subdued this Rabbath so many times shaken 2. Kings 12. by the arms of great Captains Happy the Alexander who with the sword of the word hath cut so many Gordian knots as held this great Spirit in disturbance I here defie all the Amphitheaters which have been in the world and so often mixed the bloud of men with that of Lyons and Elephants I call those spectacles which so many times have attracted the eyes of Cesars I desire the jousts turneys races chariots triumphs and those magnificences may be proposed which have drawn bloud from all the veins of the world to establish superfluitie and that it may be considered whether there were ever combat comparable to this which I present where a holy Bishop entred into the list against the prime Spirit of the world where God sits enthroned where the Angels ranged before the gates of Heaven contemplate where three parts of the world expect the issue of this duel where Heaven applaudeth the earth trembleth where hell frowneth the divels houl to see themselves deceived of their prey Where the victorious Ambrose triumpheth where the unvanquishable Augustine yieldeth to be confirmed by his fall to be raised by his abasing fortified by his weakness Gentle Reader I intreat you as my purpose is no other but to enchase in this historie of S. Ambrose the acts of Ecclesiasticks who to him are so particularly tied that you think it not strange if I more at large distend my self upon a narration so proper for the subject which I treat of I doubt not but the manner wherein I shall unfold it will render it wholly new as the greatness thereof made it honourable and the utilitie still seasoneth it with some particular delight That we may here well observe the ways of the Impediments in the conversion of S. Augustine Divine providence in the direction of mans salvation and the strength of S. Ambrose quickened with the Spirit of God it is necessarie to consider the powerfull oppositions that so long time hindered this conversion which I reduce to three principal heads Curiositie Presumption and Carnal Love It is a dangerous pestilence in matter of Religion to take the wind
satisfaction of my mind but the establishment of my fortune Notwithstanding I have wholly left it through a most undoubted knowledge that we cannot resolve on any thing solid therein Judge you what you please but ever a well rectified spirit will be ashamed to profess a science not supported by reason and which knows almost no other trade but to deceive This at that time somewhat startled him but stayed not his purpose so much he loved to deceive himself and so much he resolved to find out this secret in the end But ever as he waded further not discovering firm land he found trouble in a barren labour and much vanitie where he to himself proposed some soliditie Nothing confirmed him so much in contempt of this folly as the discourse he had with Firminus a young man of eminent qualitie sick of the same disease that he was for the curiositie of Astrologie ceased not to incite him as being born of a father an Astrologer a man of honour but so curious that he calculated the very horoscope of cats and dogs that were whelped in his house yet so little had he profited therein that at the same time his son came into the world a servant of his neighbours being delivered of a male-child he foretold according to the rules of his art that both of them being born under one same constellation should run the like fortune which was so false that this Firminus his son being born of a rich family progressed far into the honour of the times whilest the son of the servant notwithstanding the favours of his goodly horoscope waxed old in servitude This young man who made this narration though convinced by his own experience still suffered himself to be beguiled with his proper errour so difficult it is to take away this charm by force of reasons Our Augustine by little and little dispersed those vapours both by the vivacitie of his own excellent judgement and the consideration of others folly He was likewise solicited to attempt a kind of magick much in request among the heathen Philosophers of that Age which was to seek predictions from the shop of the devil by means of the effusion of the bloud of beasts and sometiemes of children But God who as yet held a bridle on this uncollected soul and would not suffer it to be defiled with those black furies gave him in the beginning so much horrour upon all these proceedings that a Negromancer promising him one day to bear away the prize of Poesie in a publick meeting of Poets if he would assure him of a reasonable reward he answered that were the Crown to be given in those games of profit of gold wholly celestial he would not buy it by such kind of ways at the rate of the bloud of a flie Which he partly spake through some sence of pietie partly also by the knowledge he had of the illusion and barrenness of such sciences He was much more troubled about the Articles His Religion of Faith for though from his childhood he was educated in Christian Religion under the wings of his good mother S. Monica yet suffering his mind to mount up unto so many curiosities he had greatly weakened the sence of pietie And being desirous to penetrate all by the help of humane reasons when he began to think on the Christian maxims of Faith he therein beheld much terrour and abyss He came to this condition that not content with the God of his forefathers who taught him holy counsels and the universal voice of the Church he put himself upon masterie now wholly ready to shape a Divinitie on the weak idaeas of his own brain The Manichees at that time swayed in Africk who having found this spirit and seeing he might one day prove a support to their Sect they spared nothing to gain him and he being upon change it was not very hard to bring him into the snare This Sect sprang from one named Manes a Persian by birth and a servant by condition who having inherited the goods of a Mistress whom he served from a good slave which he had been had he remained in that siate became by studie an ill Philosopher and a worse Divine for mingling some old dotages of the magick of Persians with other maxims of Christianitie partly by the help of his purse partly also by an infinitie of impostures derived from his giddy spirit he made himself head of a faction protesting he was the holy Ghost His principal folly consisted in placing two Gods in the world the one good the other bad who had many strange battels The bodie as he said was the creature of the evil God and the soul a portion of the substance of the good enthraled in matter And following these principals he gave a phantastical bodie to the Saviour of the world esteeming it a thing unworthy of the Word to be personally united to the flesh which he held in the number of of things execrable Behold the cause why those who were ingulfed in this Sect made shew to abstain from meat and wine which they termed the dragons gall I do not think that ever Augustine fully consented to all the chymeraes of Manes which were innumerable but at the least he relished this Sect in the opinion it had of the original and nature of the bodie and soul and in many other articles even to the believing as himself witnesseth fables most ridiculous Great God! who thunderest upon the pride of humane spirits and draggest into the dust of the earth those that would go equal with Angels What Eclypse of understanding What abasing of courage in miserable Augustine To say that a man whose eye was so piercing doctrine so eminent and eloquence so divine after he had forsaken the helm of faith and reason became so abandoned as to make himself a partie of the Sect of a barbarous and phantastical slave who in the end for his misdeeds was flayed by the command of the King of Persia as if the skin of this man could no longer cover a soul so wicked Behold whither curiositie transporteth an exorbitant spirit Behold into what so many goodly gifts of grace and nature are dissolved Behold now the Eternal Wisdom besotteth those who forsake him to court the lying fantasies of their imagination A second obstacle went along with this extravagant A second impediment Presumption curiositie to settle him fixedly in errour which was the presumption of his own abilities an inseparable companion of heresie He that once in his brain hath deified crocodiles and dragons not onely adoreth them but will perswade others that he hath reason to set candles before them and burn incense for them It is a terrible blow when one is wounded in the head by his proper judgement whose ill never rests in the mean We come to the end of all by the strength of industrie Stones are pulled forth from the entrails of men the head is opened to make smoak issue
Sects making his arrows of every wood so to hit the white of honour Verily if there be any vice deserving the execration Detestable hypocrisie of all mankind it is that which distendeth snares over Altars and which under colour of piety and zeal entrappeth men Cities and Provinces with a kind of theft which seeketh to make it self honourable under pretence of piety and Religion This was very familiar with this bad man for seeing many Pagans of quality who bit the bridle expecting the re-establishment of Idols he under-hand entertained them with very fair hopes On the other side he favoured the Synagogue of Jews in secret supposing these men being lost in Religion and conscience might one day serve his turn though but to fill up ditches But then beholding the Catholick Church in an eminent height he openly courted it and that with demonstrations of respect and service which might seem to proceed from none but the most zealous Letters also of his were found written to the Emperour Valentinian the Second where he made many declarations of the duty he owed to the Catholick Church so compleat that they seem much fitter for the mouth of a Bishop than of a Tyrant He speaketh of God like a Saint saying (a) (a) (a) Periâ—â—â—â— mihi crede divina teâ—tanâ—â—r Insanuâ— ubi error exâ—fabilis non est ibi velle peccare Baron an 387. 35. Great hecd must be taken not to contend with ones Master and that sins committed against Religion admit no excuse He talks of Rome (b) (b) (b) Româ— Veâ—â—rabilis enjus hac parte Principitatâ—s est Epist ad Siricium eod anno sect 65. as a Pope calling it in full voice The most Venerable and Princess of Religion He seemed to sweat bloud and water in defence of S. Ambrose whose virtue he infinitely feared it being joyned to a liberty which never accustomed to bow under tyranny In another Epistle where he writeth to Pope Siricius he tells how going from the Font of Baptism he had been transported to the Imperial Throne which being ignorant of the life of the children of God he esteemeth an incomparable favour from Heaven and in recompence thereof promiseth all service to the Church of Rome satisfying himself onely to execute that which should be commanded him without any desire to enter into the knowledge of the cause Moreover if he saw any forlorn Hereticks who were feeble in faction and much out of favour he ran upon them with all manner of violence and then shewing spiders webs of one side filled with little flies and on the other side all broken by creatures of a larger size he raiseth mightie tropheyes thinking so to piece out his fortune by the effusion of contemptible bloud In this manner he caused Priscillian and many other of his Sect to be put to death who were Hereticks possessed with a black and melancholy devil and such as in truth according to the laws both divine and humane well deserved punishment but not according to the proceedings were observed in their process much blamed by S. Martin and other wise Bishops who took notice of passions over-bloudy even in the Ecclesiasticks that sought after spoil O God! it is verily one of the greatest unhappinesses Virtutibus vitia 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Aristot Origen Basil Albertus in Paradiso animz Prolog of humane life to say that vices keep shop near to virtues and often deceive the best experienced merchants with their artifices That is most true which is spoken by Albertus the Great Master of Saint Thomas Severitie counterfeiteth justice melancholy calleth it self gravitie babble stealeth into the name of affabilitie as doth dissolution pass under colour of free mirth The prodigal saith he is an honest man the covetous provident the self-conceited constant the craftie prudent curiosity borroweth the title of circumspection vain-glory of generosity presumption of hope carnal love of charity dissimulation of patience pusillanimity of mildness indiscreet zeal of fervour in matter of Religion and the worst of all is hypocrisie puts on the mask of sanctity Yet if with these Pretext of devotion daÌ„gerous semblances and borrowed faces they onely deceived vulgar souls it were somewhat tollerable but it is a thing most deplorable that the subtile who have no other God but their own interests by slight complacences and petty affectations of devotion ensnare noble and Religious souls who measuring all by their own innocency daily afford more support to credulity A little outward shew handsomly exprest ravisheth men with admiration and causeth Altars to be raised to them for whom God hath prepared gibbets There are also many silly A parable of the fowler birds who seeing the fowler with blear and running eyes role a huge pair of beads in his hands say this is a holy man and full of compassion but the more judicious answer We must not regard his eyes nor beads but the bloud and rapine which is in his hands Had Maximus been beheld upon this side he had never deceived the world but his plaistered devotions served his turn to amuze easie natures whilest his ambitions cleft mountains to climb to the Throne of Caesars Pope Siricius beguiled with the mask of this false piety gave demonstration of much affection to him and when he was declared Emperour many Bishops used with him at Trier sundry complements which too near approched to servitude There was none at that time but our Saint Martin who held a strong power over this spirit and the wily Maximus who well foresaw there was no resistance to be used against a stroke of thunder submitted with all pliantness and postures to draw this great Prelate to his amity He who heretofore made himself to be petitioned unto by the Bishops received the commandments of S. Martin as decrees and endeavoured to yield him all satisfaction One desire onely he fixed in his heart which was some one time to invite this holy man to his table to wipe away all the ill reputation of which the most judicious could not be ignorant but S. Martin constantly refused it until Maximus upon a time having made a thousand protestations of the sincerity of his intentions in that point which concerned the usurpation of the Empire the man of God whether perswaded by reasons or mollified by so many prayers went thither and used there passages of generosity which you shall know In this banquet were present the false Emperour Sulpitius in vita S. Martini cap. 23. Maximus with his brother and his uncle a Consul and two Counts S. Martin for his honour was placed in the middle near the person of Maximus and when about the midst of dinner the cup-bearer presented a goblet to his Master he for a singular testimony of his affection put it into the hands of the good Bishop seeming to have a holy ambition to drink therein after it was consecrated by the touch of his lips but S. Martin not using any other complement
more than an ordinary souldier This seemed commendable in him but he was so desperately proud and cholerick that he would have all things carried according to his own counsels much offended with the least contradiction and accounting himself so necessary that nothing could be done without him On the other side the young Emperour who was jealous of his authority seeing that through his presumption he took too much upon him he in all occasion sought to depress him which the other ill digested but he continuing in this arrogant and harsh disposition Valentinian violently moved did resolve to be rid of him Behold why one day as Arbogastus approched to his Throne to do him reverence he looked awry on him and gave him a ticket by which he declared him a man disgraced and deprived of his charge He furious as a dog who byteth the stone thrown at him after he had read the ticket tore it in pieces in the presence of the Emperour through extream impudency and cried out aloud You gave me not the charge which I hold nor is it in your power to take it from me This he spake presuming of support from the souldiers whom he had ever esteemed From this day forward he ceased not to make his distasts appear and to bend his spirit to a mischievous revenge There was by misfortune at that time in the Court one named Eugenius who was accounted a wittie man but cold and timorous that heretofore had professed Rhetorick and acquired a good talent in speaking Arbogastus supposed his own boldness would make an excellent temper with the coldness of this man and having along time much confided in him he made him an overture to seize on the Empire which he at first refused But the other having promised him the death of Valentinian and his sword for defence gave consent to a most enormous assassinate All men were amazed that the poor Emperour in a fatal morning was found strangled by the conspiracy of Eugenius and Arbogastus aided by the Gentils who desired nothing but the liberty of Paganism This news brought a most sensible affliction upon Saint Ambrose for the Emperour was assured that the Bishop came to Vienna expresly to entreat his return into Italie which having understood he reckoned up the days and expected his arrival with unspeakable impatience But S. Ambrose who would not by importunity thrust himself into unnecessary affairs as he through charity was unwilling to be wanting in necessary having understood that the Emperour was daily upon his return deferred this voyage which had been most requisite to hinder Arbogastus over whom he had a great power Valentinian advertised of this delay wrote to him and earnestly pressed him to come adding he meant to receive Baptism at his hands for he was as yet but a Catechumen The good Prelate having received the Emperours letters speedily undertook the journey using all expedition when at his coming to the Alps he heard the deplorable death of the poor Prince which made him return back again and wash as he saith his own steps in his proper tears most bitterly every moment bemoaning the death of his dearest pupil The Providence of God was very manifest in his Manners of Valentinian Ambrosius de obitu Valent. death for Valentinian was drawn from Empires of the world in a time when he seemed now fully ripe for Heaven It is an admirable thing how the direction of S. Ambrose whom in his latter days he onely affected had metamorphosed him into another man In the beginning he was thought to be over-much delighted in tourneys and horse-races he so took away this opinion of him that he would hardly permit these sports in the great festival entertainments of the Empire The Gentiles who made observations on all his life had nothing to reproach in him but that he excessively delighted in the slaughter of savage beasts whom he caused to be taken and fed for his pleasure saying it diverted him from cares of the Empire He to satisfie all the world caused instantly all those creatures to be killed and disposed himself to attend the affairs of his Councel with so good judgement and so great resolution that he seemed a Daniel in the midst of the Assembly of Elders These envious people having watched him so far as to observe him at the table objected he anticipated the hour of his repast yet he so addicted himself to abstinence that he was seen in feasts rather seemingly than effectually to eat for sometimes in entertaining others he fasted tempering devotion and charity with a singular discretion Finally to give testimony of his infinite chastity it was told him there was in Rome a female Comedian endowed with a singular beauty having attractives which ravished all the Nobilitie This understood he deputeth one expresly to bring her to the Court but they being passionately in love with her corrupted the messenger so that he returned without doing any thing The Emperour rechargeth and commandeth that she with all expedition should be brought It was so done but she coming to the Court the most chaste Emperour would not so much as onely see her but instantly sent her back again saying That if he being in a condition which gave him the means to satisfie all his pleasures and in an Age which ordinarily useth to be very slippery in matter of vice and which is more not married abstained from unlawfull loves his subjects might well do somewhat by his example Never servant saith S. Ambrose was more in the power of his Master than the body of this Prince was under command of the soul nor ever Censor more diligently examined the actions of others than he his own Though all these dispositions infinitely much comforted the holy Prelate and namely the desire he expressed to receive Baptism two days before his death asking every instant if Bishop Ambrose were come notwithstanding his heart was transfixed to see him taken away in a time when he went about to make himself most necessary for all the world His death was generally bemoaned by all men and there was not any nay not his enemies which for him poured not out their tears It is said that Galla his sister wife of the Emperour Theodosius at the news of his death filled the Court with inconsolable lamentations and died in child-bed which came by excess of grief for which Theodosius was pitifully afflicted The other sisters of the Prince who were at Milan ceased not to dissolve into tears before the eyes of S. Ambrose who had no word more effectual to comfort them than the assurance that his faith and zeal had purified him and the demand he made of Baptism had consecrated him to the end they should no longer be in pain with the ease of his soul The good Bishop took a most particular care of his obsequies and burial where he made a Funeral Oration found yet among his Works In the end remembering his two pupils Go saith he O you most
from Alexandria for that he would not sign this proposition this drew compassion from her The spirit of Constantia tainted with this doctrine began already to cast an evil odour upon the Emperour her brother and Eusebius coming thereupon to make recital of that which passed in Alexandria between Alexander and Arius set such a face upon the whole business that he made as it is said the Sun with a cole figuring out the good Prelate Alexander as a passionate man who could not endure an excel-cellent spirit in his Bishoprick 'T is a pitifull thing that great men see not the truth but through the passions of those that serve them This poor Alexander who was a holy old man and grown white in the exercises of Religion was then presented to the Emperour by the information of Eusebius as a fool who under a grizled head had extravagancies of youth in such sort that Constantine Constantine deceived vouchsafing to write unto him taxed him as the authour of this tumult in that he put a frivolous question into consultation and gave occasion of dispute which could never have proceeded but from abundance of idleness And as for Arius he said of him that he gave too much scope to his spirit upon a subject which might much better have been concealed And for the rest they should be both reconciled mutually pardoning each other and hereafter hindering all manner of disputations upon the like occasion Alexander who had done nothing but by the Councel of an hundred Bishops seeing himself treated in a worse condition than Arius was in the Emperours letters and considering the blasphemy which this Heretick had vomited against the Divinity of the Word was reputed as a trifle thought verily they had endeavoured to envenom the spirit of Constantine to the prejudice of the truth For this cause he informed the other Bishops and namely Pope Sylvester of the justice of his cause answering very pertinently to the calumnies objected against him On Eusebius a true patron of hereticks the other side Eusebius who beheld the integrity of this holy Bishop with an ill eye and who had very far engaged himself to maintain Arius embroiled the affairs at Court as much as his credit might permit In the end the disputation was so enkindled through the Christian world that needs must a general Councel be held to determine it Three hundred and eighteen Bishops are assembled Councel of Nice at Nice a Citie of Bithynia by the approbation of Pope Sylvester at the request of the Emperour Constantine who invited the most eminent by express letters and gave very singular direction as wel for their journey as their reception Never was there seen a goodlier company It was a Crown not of pearls nor diamonds but of the rarest men of the world who came from all parts like bees bearing as saith S. Augustine honey in their mouths and wax in their hands There you might behold Venetians Arahians Aegyptians Scythians Thracians Africans Persians not speaking of Western Bishops who were there already in no small number It was a most magnificent spectacle to behold on one side venerable old men white as swans who still bare upon their bodies the scars of iron and persecution which were invincible testimonies of their constancy on the other men who had the gift of miracles so much as to force the power of death and tear from him the dead out of their tombs on the other part men accomplished in Theologie and eloquence who in opening their mouthes seemed to unfold the gate of a Temple full of wonders and beauties There was to be found that great S. James of Nisibis Paphnutius and Potamion There was Hosius S. Nicholas the first Gregorie the father of our Nazianzen Spiridion and so many other worthymen The good Pope S. Sylvester could not be present therat by reason of the decrepitness of his age but sent thither three Legats Hosius Vitus and Vincentius The Emperour received them all most lovingly kissing the scars of some and admiring the sanctity of others never satisfying himself with the modesty and good discourse of all both in particular and general Among these children of God were likewise some Satans adherents to Arius who discovered in their eyes and countenances the passions of their hearts These turbulent spirits fearing the aspect of this awfull assembly softly suggested divers calumnies to surprize the spirit of the Emperour which very naturally retained much goodness And for this purpose they presented to him many requests and many papers charged with complaints and accusations upon pretended domages Verily these proceedings were sufficient to divert this Prince from the love he bare to our Religion were it not that through the grace of God he had already taken very deep root in the faith In the end to do an act worthy of his Majesty beholding himself to be daily burdened with writings wherein these passionate Bishops spake of nothing but their own interests he advised them to set down all their grievances and all the satisfactions which they pretended to draw from those who had offended them and present them on a day designed They failed not to confound him with libels and supplications but this grave Monarch putting them into his bosom said openly Behold a large Zozom l. 1. cap. 16. proportion of Accusations all which must be transferred to the judgement of God who will judge them in the latter day As for my self I am a man nor is it my profession to take notice of such causes where those that accuse and such as be accused are Bishops Let us I pray you for this time leave these affairs and treat we the points for which this Councel is here assembled onely let every one following therein the Divine clemencie pardon all that is past and make an absolute reconciliation for the time to come When he had spoken this he took all the civil requests presented unto him and caused them to be cast into the fire which was much applauded by all those who had their judgements discharged from partialities In the mean space the Bishops before they entered into the Councel took time to examine the propositions that were to be handled and leisurably to inform themselves of the pretensions of Arius who was there present and who already felt the vehemency of the vigour of S. Athanasius though he was yet but a Deacon in the Church of Alexandria The day of the Councel being come the Bishops assembled in the great Hall of the Palace where many benches were set both on the one side and other Every one taketh his place according to his rank Baronius thinketh the Legats of the Pope were seated on the left hand as in the most honourable seats which he very pertinently proveth In the first place on the right hand sat the venerable Bishop Eustatius who was to begin the prayer and carry relations to the Emperour The Bishops remained silent for a Constantius in the
affairs of Christianitie in this flourishing Monarchy with prowesses and successes incomparable so likewise are we tied to her in an immortal obligation to have cast the first seeds of piety into the Court of our Kings that it might with the more authoritie enter into the souls of all their subjects The good Princess like to a pearl which cometh from the salt sea beheld her self involved almost from her birth in great acerbities and horrible confusions from whence she arose with so much lustre as she made of adversities the steps to the temple of glory She was daughter of Chilperick who contending for the scepter against Gombaut his elder brother King of Burgundy with more temeritie than reason sunk down to the ground and was forsaken by the people whom he had excited against this his brother who verily was a bad King But God who giveth Sovereigns leave to reign favouring a just cause even in the person of an evill man gave victorie to the elder He most truly made use of his fortune for having surprized his younger brother at the siege of a City he caused him to loose his head on a scaffold and not content with this murther extended his vengeance against the wife of the deceased by an act most unworthy For causing a stone to be tied to her neck she was thrown into the river and it was a great chance he had not inflicted the like upon two other virgins the lamentable remainders of this unfortunate marriage But beholding them as yet so young and innocent he thought their life could not be prejudicial to his estate and their death might be ignominious to his reputation Behold the reason why he contented himself to shut the one of them up in a Monastery and retained the other which was our Clotilda with himself that she might be bred in his Court. The holy maid entereth into the Palace of her Uncle as a sheep into a Lions den having no reason to repose much assurance in a man who still had the bloud of her father and mother in his hands Notwithstanding great is the power of virtue when it is enchaced in beautie For this cruel Basilisk who had an eye of bloud and poyson no sooner considered the praise-worthy parts of this Princess but that feeling himself dazeled with her aspect and his heart softened with the innocency of this poor orphan he instantly took compassion upon her who never inclined to it before He began to behold her with a pleasing countenance to endear her to wish and promise her much good But the good creature who could not think after so strange an affliction she was any more to pretend to greatness and pleasures of the world threw her self between the arms of the Cross that there she might find those of God and though in publick she stifeled the resentments of her sorrow with a discreet patience not resisting the storm nor striking her head against the rocks yet in the secrecy of her retirement she daily dissolved her self into tears and found no comfort but in the wounds of the worlds Saviour My God said she to him I adore your holy providence which drencheth me with gall and wormwood in an age wherein maidens of my qualitie accustom not to walk but on roses perhaps you know my pride hath need of such a counterpoise and you in all equitie have done that which your wisdom thought good Behold I have my eyes still all moistened with the bloud of my father and the bodie of my poor mother which being covered with so many waves cannot have over it one silly tear from the eyes of her daughter which fail not every night to pour forth streaming rivers My God Your name be blessed eternally I require nought else of you but the participation of your sufferings It is no reason I here should live without some light hurt seeing you wounded on all sides for my example Some have been pleased to wish me I should receive and take contentments in the hope of a better fortune where would they have me gather those pleasures I am yet upon the weeping shores of the river of Babylon I fix all my consolations and songs at the feet of your Cross promising to desire nothing more in the world but the performance of your holy will There is I know not what kind of charm in holy sadness which cannot be sufficiently expressed but such it is that a soul contristated for God when it is fallen into abysses wherein all the world reputes it lost findeth in the bottom of its heart lights and sweetnesses so great that there is not any comfort in the world to be compared with them Clotilda was already come to these terms and if for obedience she had not learned to leave God for God she had been softened with those tears by suffering her self voluntarily to slide into a lazy sorrow but considering that whilest she was in the house of this uncle an Arian heretick she was bound by God to instruct with her example all those who were to be spectatours of her actions she set her hand couragiously to the work and shewed her self so able of judgement in her carriage and so regular in all her deportments that her life became a picture of virtue which spake to all the world Although she were derived from the bloud of Kings she shewed to have no other nobility but that which springs from worthy Actions As her face was free from adulterate beauty so her soul was exempt from those affected authorities and disdains which ordinarily grow with great fortunes Her aspects were simple and dove-like her words discreet her actions sober her gestures measured her carriage honest her access affable her conversation full of sweetness and profit She was a virgin in mind and body living in marvellous purity of affections and amities which she fomented by the virtue of humility which the Ancients esteemed to be as the wall of the garden of charity God oftentimes suffering impurity of body to chastise the rebellion of the soul She was so humble of heart that she accounted her self as the meanest servant of the house not scorning at all to apply her self to inferiour offices which she notwithstanding performed with so much majesty that even in spinning with a distaff she seemed a Queen She was marvellously wise in her counsels prompt and agil in execution moderate in all good successes constant in bad ever equal to her self She spake little never slandered envied none did good to all the world not pretending her own interests expecting from God alone the character of her merit and the recompence of her charities She had no worldly thing in her person and as little regarded her attyres as the dust of the earth She knew almost but one street in the City where she dwelt which was the same that lead to the Church Sports and feasts were punishments to her and she was seldom found in the company of men unless it were
in the list of combat Clodovaeus quickly alighted from his horse to rid him of life and being about to mend some defect in his cuirass he was treacherously assaulted by two Goths but he having dispatched his adversary defended himself from both these and mounted up again on his horse whom he made to curvet in a martial manner demeaning himself so bravely in all that he seemed to be as it were a flash of lightening sent from the hand of God rather than a man This defeat ruined the hopes of the Goths and cut off all the designs of heresie which subsisted not but by their favour From thence Clodovaeus marched all covered over with laurels into the Countreys of his conquests with so much good success that being before the Citie of Angoulesm which made shew of resistance the walls miraculously fell down as did heretofore those of Jericho he having by the advise of Apronius his Chaplain caused some holy reliques to be lifted up whereunto he dedicated a singular devotion What need we here make mention of the adventures which he had with the Kings Chararic and Ragvachairus whom he defeated as it were without blows This man went every where as confidently as one who seemed to have a Guard of celestial Virtues by his side his hands were fatal to purge the earth from many infidel Princes that infected it with heresie tyrannies and sacriledges Who can but wonder that in so short a time he extended his Empire from Rheine to Seine from the river of Loyre to Rosne and from the Pyrenei to the Ocean Who can but admire that he was so feared by all the Monarchs of his Age as the Grecians who have written Suidas 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 after that time under the title of King intended for the more excellency to speak onely of the King of France Who will not highly esteem his great authority in that he first of all stampt golden coyn which the Emperours had always forborn through extream jealousie causing the marks of his faith to be impressed on this money And who can sufficiently marvel that having at his death left four sons to succeed him he hath besides been followed by seven and fifty Kings who constantly rendering themselves imitatours of his belief have likewise shared with him in his felicity I demand of you whether one must not become blind deaf and dumb not to see understand nor declare that all the happiness and prosperity of France is inseparably tied to the piety of our Ancestours since the hand of God thundering and lightening at the same time upon so great a number of Diadems of heretical Kings as of Gombaut Godemar Chilperic Godegisilus Alaricus and in the end on Theodorick himself led Clodovaeus by the hand through so many smoking ruins so many swords and such flames to establish him with all his posterity in a Throne whereunto the great Saint Remegius hath promised an eternity of years so long as it should remain cemented with the same faith and religion which first of all consecrated the Lilies to the service of the Divine Majesty The holy Clotilda amongst all these conquests of her husband lifted her innocent hands up to Heaven to apply the forces of the Saviour of the world to his Royal banners In the end having drawn him to Paris after so many bloudy wars and sweetened the extravagancies of his nature a little too violent propending to excesses of cruelty she caused him to tast in his repose devotion and justice in such sort that having closed up his eyes in the exercises of piety she enterred him with a most honourable reputation V. Kal. Dec. Depositio magni Regis Clodovaei Du Pleix There is yet to be found an old Calendar of the Church of S. Genovefue which maketh mention of the day of his death on the seven and twentieth of November The ninth SECTION The life of Clotilda in her widow-hood her afflictions and glorious death CLotilda vehemently desired to bring forth male children for the establishment of her State and though this affection seemed to be most just notwithstanding God who purgeth all the elect in the furnace of afflictions found a rough Purgatory for this good soul in the enjoying her desires She had sons as she wished whom she endeavoured with all her power to breed in the fear of God whilest she might bow them but these children who tasted too much of the warlike humours of the father and had not enough of the piety of the mother being arrived to an age wherein it was not possible any longer to restrain them they fell into many terrible extravagancies which transfixed the heart of the mother with a thousand swords of sorrow It happened that Sigismund the cousin-germain of Clotilda for whom she had procured the Kingdom of Burgundie after the death of his wife by whom he had a son named Sigeritus suffered himself to be surprized with the love of a Ladie waiting in Court whom he afterward married to the great heart-burning of the son who could not endure to see her clothed with the spoils of his mother This step-dame being drawn from servitude and wantonness to enter into the bed of a King beholding her self crossed in her loves by this Heir of the house conceived so much gall and rage against him that she prepared a most fatal calumnie for his ruin accusing him to have a plot upon the life of his father Sigismund who was of an easie nature stirred up with love and ambition quickly believed this shameless creature and after he had called this poor young man to dinner under colour of affection he commanded him in his sleep to be strangled by the hands of his servants But the miserable man delivered out of the gulf of his passion and seeing himself defiled with an act so black and wicked publickly confessed his sin and for it performed a most austere penance but God who ordinarily blotteth out the crime not forgiving the pains and satisfactions due to his justice deprived him of Scepter and life by the hands of his allies raising up a sharp revenge to give to such like an eternal horrour of his iniquitie The children of Clodovaeus who had already shared the Kingdom of their father were not yet satisfied but desired to advance the limits of their division as far as the point of their launce might extend Behold the cause why Clodomer who was the eldest of the legitimate seeing the Kingdom of Burgundie in this danger entereth thereinto with great forces and found little resistance Sigismond being formerly convinced by his crime Having possessed himself of the places most important he took the miserable King and led him away prisoner to Orleans to dispose of him according to his pleasure But Godimer the brother of Sigismund who had retired to the mountains while the French made all this notable havock returned with a great power and having slain the French Garrisons made himself Master of the Kingdom Clodomer
mirrour what perfection My eyes dazle in beholding her actions and my pen fails in writing her praises What a courage that a young maid not above fifteen or sixteen years of age entereth into a Kingdom with intention to conquer it for God much otherwise than the Caesars who so many times have devoured it by ambition What a prudence to tolerate the conversation of a step-mother whilest she medled not with her Religion What liberty of spirit and what strength of words to defend her faith so soon as she saw her self assailed in this virtue which was more dear unto her than the apple of her eye What patience to endure to be dragged along upon the pavement by the hair to be beaten even to bloud to be thrown into the river to be used like the dust of the earth for the honour of Jâ—sus Christ not challenging any one not complaining not seeming offended nay not telling her husband into whose bosom she poured forth her most secret thoughts the affront she had received for fear to break peace with a creature who deserved the hatred of all the world What wisdom what grace what eloquence used she in the conversion of her husband What love for his soul what zeal for his salvation what care for his direction What authority to stop with a word the armies of the father and son instantly ready to encounter What resignation of her own will in this separation from her husband And what a heart of diamond against a thousand strokes of dolours to take thankfully a death so bloudy so tragical so pitifull To see her self at an instant bereaved of a son and a husband and of all things in the world offering up unto God in all her afflictions the obedience of her heart prayers of her lips and victims of all the parts of her body What triumph when after her death her brother-in-law who had participated of her good instructions in rememberance of her and her husband was absolutely converted to the Catholick faith and changing the whole face of the Kingdom repealed the banished restored the Bishops to their Sees Religion into force Laws into authority and the whole Province into peace What miracle to see sage Indegondis on the top of all her tropheys whereof she tendereth homage to God in the glory of Saints How ought we here to render to her the offerings of our most humble services Behold here the limits which I proposed to my self so to give an end at last to these Histories having thought it more fit and suitable to my employments to abbreviate my self in these four Models than unboundedly enlarge them yet it hath been somewhat difficult with me to make a resolution to put forth this second Volume among so many duties of our ordinary functions being thereunto sollicited by entreaties which held as it were the place of commands And I may well say I were stupid and ungratefull if I should not confess to have been much excited to prosecute this labour by the honourable invitations which my Lord Bishop of Bellay hath used towards me in his Works I cannot set too high a price upon his recommendation in such a subject For he is verily one of the most able and flourishing wits that ever handled a pen. To see the number of his books one might say he began to write so soon as to live and to consider their worth it is a wonder how so many graces and beauties which other attain not but with much labour encreased with him as in a soil natural for eloquence If there be any slight discourses who amuse themselves to argue upon some words of his writings it is not a matter unusual seeing we are now in an Age where there are some who revive the example of those corrupted Grecians that preferred a sauce made by the Cook Mithecus before the divine Works of Phidias If this piece have given you any contentment take the pains to read it over again sometimes at your leisure tasting the Maxims therein with an utilitie worthy of its subject For believe me the precipitation now adays used in slightly running over all sorts of books causeth a certain indigestion in the mind wherewith it is rather choaked than nourished Reading is never good if the understanding take not occasion thereby to negotiate by meditation and industrie that which concerneth the health and ornament thereof 1 TIM 1. To the King of Ages Immortal and Invisible to GOD alone be honour and glorie given for ever and evermore THE HOLY COURT MAXIMS OF CHRISTIANITIE AGAINST THE PROPHANE COVRT Divided into three Parts WHEREOF The I. Treateth of the Divinitie The II. Treateth of the Government of this life The III. Treateth of the State of the other World THE THIRD TOME Written in French by NICHOLAS CAUSSIN of the S. of JESUS and translated into English by Sr. T. H. DEUS EST NOBIS SOL ET SCUTUM LONDON Printed by William Bentley and are to be sold by JOHN WILLIAMS at the Crown in St. Pauls Church-yard 1650. TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE LADIE FRANCES Countess of PORTLAND and Baroness WESTON RIGHT HONOURABLE THe excellent endowments of your soul acknowledged even by envie and admired by truth together with your known propension to the reading of pious Books invites me to this Dedication as proper for your sweet retirements and consonant to my intentions which onely aim in some measure to express my humblest respects to your Honour The matters herein handled are Instructions apt to inform the mind by way of Maxims learned discourses made familiar to less able understandings and choise Histories exemplifying both that so all sorts of Readers though of different capacitie disproportionable judgement may find somewhat to entertain their curiositie My scope Excellent LADIE in this Translation is through your Honours hand and under so noble a Patronage to convey the third Part of the HOLY COURT into English light which as the first breathed air under the benign aspect of her sacred Majestie may also hope in this latter piece with like happiness to be crowned with your Honors chearful acceptation The height of my ambition is by this poor way to serve you since more ample demonstrations are wanting to my weak abilities as likewise not to doubt your noble disposition will be satisfied with such my humble acknowledgements The advancement of virtue and depression of vice is my Authour's scope throughout the whole Work which he elegantly pursues and victoriously atchieveth Triumphs of that kind best become his grave and serious pen whilest my task is faithfully in our language to imitate his living figures though in dead and discoloured forms and confidently to tell your Honour that I will ever be The most Obsequious Servant of Your Commands T. H. TO MONSIEUR MONSIEUR THE PRINCE SIR THe excellency of the subject I handle in these discourses makes me reflect on that of your Greatness to offer you a Work which being conceived by your authority must needs seek for
favoured by those to whom he hath given full power over me submitted the slenderness of my wit to the power of their wills perswading myself a silly nothing may become a matter important in their hands You know how having a purpose to frame a Christian Institution in the HOLY COVRT for men of qualitie I began with their obligation to Pietie and consequently shewed the Obstacles must be vanquished to arrive thither Then I gave precepts of the principal virtues most concern them which were waited on with the Histories of Courts abbreviated into four Models In this that the good Court may triumph I represent a combat of two Courts the Holy and Counterfeit the Religious and Prophane wherein I unsold the victories of the chief Maxims of Christianitie divided into three Parts whereof the one treateth of the Diviuitie the other of the Government of this present life and the third of the State of the other world You may behold how divine the subject is and that the other Books were onely to prepare you to these great lights the rays whereof I diffused I must needs tell you that being surpassed by so many excellent men who have worthily handled a pen I have in this seriously sought to go beyond my self I have contracted large subjects into little Tracts which hath been no small labour there being not a Maxim whereof I could not have compiled an ample Volume But imagining conceptions are like hairs which more easily may be filletted up than dissheveled I have endeavoured to give you more substance in this Book than words and amplifications And seeing all the subjects are very serious I have sweetened them with excellent Examples to afford fit nourishment both to Eagles and Doves All which I now offer you in this is more than my promise thinking it better to give without promise than to promise and not give Your affection sets an edge upon my industrie and if labour waste the bodie for your avail and reserve works of the wit for posteritie it shall be as a Cedar which causing the death of the living seems to give life to the dead This Tome being replenished with important considerations cannot be for him who cursorily reads it with those delicious loyterings which sleightly furnish out the titles of Books and thence derive nothing but wind Give me Gentle Reader the contentment that God may be glorified in your manners by reading this as I here seek to honour him in his works MAXIMS OF THE HOLY COURT AGAINST THE PROPHANE COVERT First Part touching the DIVINITIE The first MAXIM Of Religion PROPHANE COURT HOLY COURT That matters of faith being invisible and uncertain we must tie our selves to the world which is visible and certain That matters of faith being most certain and very excellent we should fix the whole order of our life unto it 1. THere is nothing so reasonable in nature as to desire good nothing so eminent as to know much nothing so absolute as to have the power of all but there is not any thing so profitable as to proceed to true wisdom by a mysterious ignorance and to be in in created light by blindness The soul becometh another world by the means of knowledge or rather as God createth a world in essence that frameth another in Idaea But if truth and love do not co-operate therein man tormenteth himself in his knowledges and createth evils without end from which he cannot free himself no not by issuing out of life The Prophane Court say you leads you into a visible world but it is to behold miseries in it To a world certain but it is to teach you that happiness being therein un certain loss is undoubted All we have in The happines to be born a Christian the world is base caityf and difficult without knowledge of the true God It is but a laboursom turmoyl of affairs an amazement of transitory pleasures an illusion of deceitfull blessings which trouble us and starve us in stead of satisfying our desires or nourishing our hopes But the knowledge of God is the root Scire justitiam virtutem tuam radix est immortalitatis Sap. c. 15. 3. of immortalitie I then require of you O Reader that in the beginning of this discourse you adore the wisdom of God over you who hath selected you out of the Mass of so many Infidels to inrole you in the number of his children and hath drawn you from the confusions of so great darkness to call you into the light of Christianity Behold so many people covered under the veil of shadie night born in errour to live in bruitishness and die in despair of eternal salvation and you are enlightened by the rays of God illuminated by his wisdom guided by his direction covered with his protection nourished with his bloud animated with his life are made participant of his felicity If you be desirous in some measure to observe the Three tokens of the perfection of a thing S. Thomas 1. p. q. 6. excellency of your Faith and Religion consider the perfection of any thing is known by three principal notes Essence Operation and Repose All which you have visible in the wisdom of Heaven you profess His Essence is of an infallible verity his Operations miraculous and his Repose an unchangeable happiness For what assurance more solid than to have a God Solidity of our religion Incarnate for Authour who is come to cast the seeds of a golden Age and adopt a new world in the bloud of an eternal Testament Who can better teach us the secrets of God than God himself I cannot account Varro apud Vincen. tom 2. Illum quidem eruditorem elige quem magis mireris in suis nihil magnisicum docebit qui à se nihil didicerit him said Varro a skilfull Master who learns nothing of himself And he hath understood all in the bosom of his Eternal Father and from his own wisdom which is no other than his Essence He was promised from the beginning of the world preached through all Ages given as a pledge to the memory of all mankind so long before his coming was appointed his time birth life and death He came at his prefixed time all environed with prodigies and miracles all composed of virtues making greatness to proceed out of the lowliness of his humble and painfull life as lightening-flashes break through the obscurity of night 2. What foundations think you hath he laid of The foundations of faith your faith Men believe men upon a little piece of paper yea very often upon the breath of a silly word And Jesus would not be believed but by writing his Law with the rays of an infinite number of Prophesies which were verified in his Person with the bloud of more than ten millions of Martyrs who suffered for his doctrine with miracles so visible and irreprochable that they changed even executioners into Confessours and Tyrants into Martyrs To speak plainly he
making use of a riding-rod which he had in his hand drew a circle about Antiochus and enclosed him within it saying There is but one word to be used Before you come out from thence you must necessarily resilve either on peace with your sister or wars against the Senate and people of Rome He seeing himself so strongly charged gave way to their demands and wrote to the Senate That he esteemed the Masked complement Peace which came from their motion more glorious than all his victories and heard their Embassadours as if the Gods had spoken out of heaven to him Therein imitating the most supple Courtiers who in stead of shewing their discontent against power give thanks for a beating Howsoever becoming enraged with rancour Horrible persecution of the Hebrews to see so rich a prey escaped out of his hands he discharged all his choller upon the Jews as those who make their servants suffer for the losses they had in game He had a spleen against this religious Nation both through the motive of his own impiety and reason of State suspecting them more to encline to King Ptolemee's faction Behold why he entered into Jerusalem Anno Antiochi 7. like an enraged Lion with huge troups in the beginning pillaging the Citie and Temple sparing neither the prophane nor sacred swallowed excessive riches and plunged the fiery flames of his anger in the bloud and tears of four-score thousand people some killed divers sold and many fettered unable to satisfie his cruelty For presently after came out those wicked and Anno ejus 9. bloudy Edicts which made God a party with a violent hatred and let loose the rains of impiety even to the desire of utter defacing the marks of Religion The streets of Sion mourned Priests were banished or massacred the Altars demollished Temples polluted with ordures and uncleanness by abominable monsters who renewed sacrifices to Bâ—elphegor and Bacchus in the Sanctuary heretofore impenetrable to mortal eyes The abomination of desolation foretold by the Prophet Daniel which was a statue of olympick Jupiter was seen to be raised in the holy place in sight of all the world The books of the law were sought out through all the houses and committed to flames the festivals changed into Bacchanals all exercise of piety interdicted with whips wheels fires so far that two poor mothers being found administering Circumcision to two little in fants were drawn through the Citie having their lamentable offipring hanged about their necks and in that posture thrown into a ditch The whole Citie was nought else but a spectacle of gibbets and slaughters the Pagans by some false brothers conspiring with much fervour to put the Kings Edicts in execution Then was the time Eleazars combat with the seven young Machabees appeared Combat of Eleazar which is excellently described in the Scripture in Josephus and the Fathers of the Church that it were a thing superfluous to endeavour enlargement upon it with a more ample discourse I onely say that if God permitted upon one side to be seen the unbridled soul of a man professed an enemy of all piety on the other an admirable spectacle was beheld of fear and reverence rendered to his Name by the faithfull What a prodigie to see an aged man four-score and ten years old of one of the prime families of his Nation learned in the Law of an Angelical aspect to go smiling to punishment And he cracking even their hearts with compassion who sate as Magistrates upon his execution some perswaded him onely but to make a shew to eat hogs flesh for the Kings satisfaction But he reflecting on the true point of honour The hoariness saith he of this venerable hair wherewith my head is covered having waxed old in the exercises of Religion sufficiently teacheth me my dutie It is not fit for Eleazar to counterfeit impietie but profess virtue God forbid I should forget the law of my God dishonour the school and doctrine in which I was bred or become a scandal to these young men to whom God is now pleased to make a Theater of my Constancie The honour of my passed life shall enter into the ashes of my Tomb and my soul shall flie out of this bodie truly innocent and not bear infidelitie into the bosom of my Ancestours Then they tormenting him under the lashes of whips and fervour of flames he added My All-knowing God thou art not ignorant that it being in my power to free my self from death not to fail in thy fear I faint in my life I make thee the depositorie of my soul which issueth out of these torn members choosing rather to die tortured on all sides than to live one silly moment unfaithfull After Eleazar went the glorious mother of the The mother of the Macchabees Machabees along having the spirit of a man in a feminine body She entered first of all into the combat although she were the last that arrived to the crown bringing seven sons with her to death as to the true source of immortality This blessed creature stood between two flames the one of natural love the other of charity towards God Both combatted but there was but one prevailed that she might transcend all things under God As she lived in seven souls so she was sacrificed in seven bodies She saw the tongue torn out from one the toes and fingers of feet and hands cut off from another the skin pulled away all bloudy from the head of this that thrown into a boyling cauldron finally she beheld them all equal in punishment as she parallel'd them in love Some while she delivered one to the executioners another while she received the bloud upon her garments presently the mangled members in her arms she fought in all and for all having no other fear but of their deliverance But she infinitely fearfull for the youngest of her sons shewed him Heaven then her breasts the one to have bred him the other to glorifie him When she saw him dead then was the time she thought him born and then with most courage she waited on his execution O incomparable mother saith S. Augustine who August serm 109. c. 6. knew what it was to possess children since she feared not to loose them Mother of Martyrs and eight times a Martyr who equailed her triumphs to her childrens and her glory to eternitie In the end Antiochus after all this butchery retiring Punishment of the wicked Antiochus the living God who pursued the tracks of this impious man and who in his eyes bare the lightenings of his justice raised Mattathias and his children who with a silly handfull of men restored sanctification to the Temple and liberty to the Citizens having in four encounters defeated four Royal Armies This wretched creature and who had no religion in him though in apparence he made shew of that of the Grecians went to Elymas to invade a Temple of Diana where great treasures were kept but was
of the world Some hold all is done by Chance and that nothing but Fortune predominateth in the actions and affairs of the world others will subject all to the laws of fatal necessity the third put their whole confidence in carnal prudence which not unlike reeds takes away their support and leaves them remorse Happy he who amongst so many straights shelves and ship-wracks can hold the right way ever casting his eye towards Providence as his Pole-star and never loosing sight of it that he may never loose himself Let us now endeavour to ruin these three Companies of Chaldaeans by the arms of Scripture holy Fathers and Reason It is a pitiful thing to see a giddy soul which The misery of impiety seeketh God and will not find him making so many errours as paces so many stumbles as steps and as many sacriledges as there are creatures in the whole world The Prophet Esay complained in his time Esay 65. Qui â—onitis Fortunae mensam libatis super eam of those who dressed up Altars to Fortune and made Sacrifices to her But this Sect took with time so great encrease that it filled the whole earth For blind Gentilism beholding so many sundry accidents in the life of man the cause whereof they could not penetrate imagined there was a certain Deity blind unequal and furious which distributed all conditions and held good and bad luck as day and night in its hands This Idolatrie of Fortune Adorers of Fortune Plin. l. 2. c. 6. Toto mundo locis omnibus omnibusque horis omnium vocibus fortuna sola invocatur una nominatur una accusatur una agitur rea una cogitatuâ— huic omnia expensa huic omnia feruntur accepta in totâ ratione mortalium sola utramque paginam facit Fantasies of Ancients upon the names of Fortune was so general that Plinie durst say Fortune alone is invoked throughout the world in all places at all times in all languages none talk but of her she onely is praised she onely accused she gives all presents makes all expences and if you well weigh the great book of the accounts of our life you shall find Fortune filleth all the leaves of it The Romans who in arms overcame all other Nations do go beyond them in superstition not contenting themselves with one sole Fortune made many which had no other foundations of their Deities but Chymaeraes of brains bereaved of reason as S. Augustine sheweth us in his fourth book of the City of God One was called Fortune the first born because they held it was the beginning of all things the other was all covered over with duggs and was termed Mammosa in testimony of its fruitfulness One was called Fortune the strong the other feminine the other a virgin the other inconstant the other stable One was for certain days another for all times One for Emperours all of gold which they kept in their chambers as a relick and another for the people of wood or earth Lastly not so much as young men but adored a Aug. l. 4. de civit Dei c. 2. barbed Fortune that their first beard might grow in good fashion Good God! what ignorance what a cloud See we not how gross these superstitions are since the bloud of Jesus washed away the stain Notwithstanding the world is filled with slaves of Fortune who cease not to impute all prosperities and adversities of life to the hazard of chance 2. Now to decide this point we must know Fortune That Fortune is in the power of Providence is nought else but man himself when without thinking upon it he makes himself the accidental cause of an effect not pretended A man through despaire sought for a halter to Arist de causis Fortuna est causa per accidens in his quae per electionem alicujus gratiae fiunt hang himself and stirring the earth in an unusual place met with a treasure it was said to be fortune yet is this fortune nothing else but man who in searching gave occasion to this effect which followed though never by him intended In respect of man this chance is obsolutely casual in respect of the prime cause which is God it is a Providence Behold a man crushed under the ruins of a tree he expected not this tree should fall and therefore it is his fortune But God without whose dispose one sole leaf of a tree droppeth not off had foreseen this fall from all eternity which enforceth us to affirm that all fortunes of men are enclosed within the power of Providence It is a notable doctrine of a great Bishop of Paris A notable doctrine of who saith God Father of all essences begetteth and eternally speaketh his Son or his Eternall Word and William of Paris Gulielm Paris 1. part de univer part 3. c. 24. that in this Word he once said all he would do and all which should happen in such sort that there is not any accident order or mean in this great connexion of Ages enchained one within another can escape the vivacity of his eye and the extent of his Providence There it is he hath ordained all the blessings of nature grace and glory There it is he hath seen all the evils of offence yet willeth he not nor can he will they should be of him or by him as being unworthy his sanctity his glory and goodness But as for the fortunes and misfortunes of men banishments bands prisons maladies afflictions prosperities riches honours treasures glories and crowns he hath appointed them according to his divine pleasures to be instruments of good desires and glorious actions Wherefore let us never say good and ill haps of the world come by chance without Gods dispose To me saith the Great God in the holy Scriptures Meae sunt omnes ferae silosrum pulchritudo agri mecum est Mecum sunt divitiae gloria opes superbae justicia Per me Reges regnant legâ—â— conditores justâ— decernunt Si clanget tubs in civitate populus non expavescet si eriâ— malum in civitate quod Dominus non ficerit Psal 49. 10. Prov. 8. 18. Amos. 3. 9. belong all the beasts in the forrest and I behold the beauty of the fields disclosed from my bosome With me are riches glory pomps wealth which rest in the protection of my Justice It is by me Kings hold the rains of Empire in their hands and Law-makers open their lipâ—â—o pronounce Oracles The trumpet sounds in the midâ—â—â—f the City and the people tremble not knowing the cause of their misery But there is no evil of punishment in the City which I have not caused for most just reasons (a) (a) (a) Second squadron The second squadron of our Chaldaeans takeing a quite contrary way to this will bruitishly maintain all things are done by a fatal necessity which some attribute to stars others to divine prescience For as much as concerneth stars
longer deferred their execution Procopius having once again been tormented before he was brought back to prison recommended these first victims to Heaven by his prayers whose example was quickly waited on by twelve Ladies full of honour who made open profession of faith Justus thinking it was a feminine heat which would be quenched when torments were applied to their bodies caused them cruelly to be tortured commanded their sides and arm-holes to be burnt yet they persevered singing and praising God in the ardour of the most exquisite torments Theodosia mother of our Martyr being present at this spectacle felt her self touched to the quick for the spirit of God entered powerfully into her It suddenly took off the film which in her had clouded the light of reason making her see into the bottom of her soul at which she conceived much horrour Alas then said she within her self who ever Change of Theodosia lodged a heart so barbarous as thine in the body of a woman All the bloud thou seest shed distilleth now to satisfie a revenge thou conceivedst against thine own bloud Thy son is in prison all rent and torn and if he yet have not rendered up his soul he keeps it on his lips expecting perhaps thy last words If thou art not yet satisfied go bathe thy self in his wounds and pull away that little life nature gave him by thy means and which cruelty taketh from him by thy practises Ah Theodosia the most rigorous of women and the most unfortunate of Mothers though thou hast abjured nature renounce not the God of nature Hear the voice which speaketh in thy heart and render thee to that Jesus who begins to resign thee up to thy self Why wilt thou not do what they act before thine eyes They have neither hearts of steel nor bodies of brass more than thou but more resolution because far greater faith And why shouldst not thou be faithfull by imitating their example If thou hast provoked Gods mercy thou hast not wasted it Let us go to Heaven by the purple way since the Providence of Heaven presenteth it unto thee The bloud of thy poor son yet speaks to thee in so many tongues as there are drops of it shed in the streets Let us follow him and never think that done too late which soon shall work thy eternal salvation She feeling the combat of these cogitations in her heart suddenly cried out as in an extasie I am a Christian The Judge who feared this act gave semblance to hear nothing of it but she redoubled her voice so loudly and made so solemn a profession that it was impossible for him to dissemble it So that seeing she would not desist from this resolution he was enforced to send her into the prison where her son remained Procopius beholding her to come fettered with other Ladies was infinitely joyed at this spectacle and cried out aloud Madam my dear mother who brings you To whom she answered Loving son the cause which put you here brought me hither to be the companion of your death since I am the murderess of your life I have betrayed bloud and nature and delivered His imprisonment and martyrdom my bowels to executioners to satisfie passion Virtue and honour being lost nought else remains for me but the happiness to die with you for Jesus Christ It is Son at this instant I must accomplish the words you spake to me at your return that I should take example from you as you birth from me O God most honoured Mother behold here a great touch from Heaven said Procopius I have nothing more to wish in the world since I this day behold you the precious conquest of Jesus Christ It is at this time when being a mother by nature you shall likewise be a mother to me by the example of your piety You are come to the point whither God would have you and all that is past was but to augment the glory of your conversion Let us go by the way of bloud to the place where the soul of your good husband and my dearest father expecteth us These two hearts wholly dissolved into the love of God spake in thought having not language enough to express their affection Theodosia being in a short time after baptized by Leontius was led to execution with the twelve Ladies where she appeared as the singular ornament of this holy Quire leaving her head in the place where she had first confessed Jesus Christ with a constancy so heroick that she drew tears from all the world Procopius having been tumbled up and down at divers Sessions before the Tribunals whipped roasted broyled salted torn in all his body the strength of his courage no whit shaken stretched out his neck to the executioner and yielded up his fair soul to God learning in the conversion of his mother and his own the divine power of this great Praedestination VII MAXIM Of the Divinitie of JESUS THE PROPHANE COURT THE HOLY COURT That God will be served in any kind and that every sect hath reason in its Religion That none but Jesus is Authour of truth and salvation to whom all creatures bear witness of his Divinitie THis Maxim of the Prophane Court is an old dotage of obsequious spirits who having no zeal for faith and likewise less courage against impiety do in apparence approve all Religions and follow none That is it which made Symmachus say God was a great secret and that it was no wonder every one sought after it and spake according to his weak endeavour of it some in one fashion and some in another That is it also which made Maximus Madaurensis write He was too great to enter whole and entire into the understanding of man but must be taken piece-meal every one contenting himself to adore some Symbol of God which seemed most convenient unto him Behold the shortest way can be taken to arrive at gross impiety for it is to make a Roman Pantheon of Religion where you shall have a thousand imaginary Divinities without one least glimmer of the knowledge of the true God Lies for some space accord together although they spare not to oppose one another but true Religion hath this property to tend wholly to Monarchy and if you speak to it of tolerating other sects as if they were reasonable it is to thrust thorns into the feet and put straws into the eyes of it Jesus hath nothing to do with Belial the faithfull 2 Cor. 6. with the unfaithfull nor the Temple of God with the synagogue of devils All religions which wander from the ray of Christian and Catholick verity are but chymaeraes of piety spectres of wisdom and flames which lead these souls into an abyss of fire and darkness There is but one Redeemer to whom are due all services and adorations And it is my desire for your comfort to shew you that the Authours of all Sects having in the end appeared so monstrous it onely appertained to the Eternal
not be possible to God he being Omnipotent Immense Infinite How according to the confession of ancient Philosophers can he replenish all the world with his Divnity and is not able to accommodate himself with enough of it to divinize his holy Humanity Is it because we say it is united to the Word in this mystery in a quite other fashion than the Spirit of God is with the world I admit it For the union of it is truely personal But must it not be confessed the Word in this divine Essence as under title of efficient cause it hath an influence infinite over all the effects of the world and as under title of final cause it hath a capacity to limit and measure all the inclinations of creatures so under title of substantial bound it may confine and accomplish by its personality all possible Essence Why shall we tie the hands of Divine bounty in its communications since it binds not our understanding in its conceptions Is it not a shamefull thing that man will estimate and set a value upon the Divine Essence If God please not man he shall not be God Should we say man is incapable of this communication And how is it that the holy Humanity resisted the Omnipotency of God to the prejudice of his own exaltation since it is found as soon in the union of the Word as in the possession of Essence See we not in nature that the rays of the Sun draw up vapours from the earth and incorporated with them do create Meteors in the air not any one making resistance to his exaltation What contradiction can there be in our understanding against such a maxim seeing it appears the most famous Philosopher said This union of God with man might be very fit and Plutarch also Plutarch in Numa 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 speaking of the communication of the Creatour with the creature pronounced these words That God was not a lover of birds nor other living creatures but a lover of men and that it is a very reasonable matter that be communicate himself to his loves and delights But this would seem to abase the Divinity Hear what Volusianus said I wonder that he to whom this whole Volusianus Miror si intra corpus vagientis infantiae latetâ— cui parva putatur universilas c. universe is so small can be shut up within the bodie of a little child having a mouth open to crie as others What uncomeliness is there if God be united to a little body Have not Plinie (a) (a) (a) Plin. Natura nusquam magis quà m in minimis tota est and Seneca (b) (b) (b) Servitus magnitudinis non posse fieri minorem Senec. Homo quippe ad Deum accessit Deus à se non decessit August said That nature was ever so admirable as in little bodies and that it was a slavery in Great-ones to be unable to be little I wonder the Sovereign Lord of all things is so long absent from Heaven and that all the government of the world is transferred to so little a creature From whence proceedeth this amazement but from the baseness of our thoughts If we said God being made man ceased to be God and were despoiled of his Empire Greatness Essence there would be somewhat wherewith to question this Mystery but when we say God came to Man by inclination of a Sovereign bounty and mercy not leaving himself when we say humane nature is received into the Word as a small source into a huge river and not loosing its Essence is fixed upon the personality of the Word it self is it not to honour the power majesty and wisdom of God 5. In what were the Divinity abased Can it be in doing a work so noble so singular so divine that it deserveth to entertain the thoughts of men and Angels through times and eternity What is more specious and more sweet than to represent to ones self the Person of our Saviour who in himself makes an alliance of all was most eminent in spiritual and corporal nature to wit of God and man verily say I one composed of an unheard-of composition to render the majesty of his father palbable and visible to the hands and eyes of mortals What dignity to behold in the world a Man-God become a part of the world to possess the Spirit of God from all eternity who proposed this person as the end of his communications the bound of his power the first-born of all creatures who held all Ages in breath for him all hearts in desires all minds in expectation all creatures in prophesies The Book of God hath written me In copite libri scriptum est de me Psal 39. 8. in the beginning of its first page said the Word with the Psalmist All creatures of this great universe all predictions and conceptions of these two great books the world and the Bible tended to the accomplishment and revelation of this God-Man who should set a golden head upon all nature intelligent sensitive and vegetative All creatures were but leaves and flowers that promised the great fruit which the Prophet calleth The fruit of earth sublime Isaiah 4. 20. We must religiously speak what deserveth to be heard Religiose dicendum reverentér audiendum est quis propter hunc hominon gloris honâ—re coronandum Deus omnis creavit Rupert l. 13. de glor Trinit proces Spi. Sancti with reverence It is for this incomparable man that God created the world and all creatures are but as silly rays from the Diadem of glory which covereth his head What a spectacle to see them all wound up as the strings of a harp to praise and declare unto men the Name of God to behold the nine Quires of Angels enter into this consort and every one of them to honour this first Essence by so many distinct perfections notwithstanding all to confess their ability cannot reach that degree which the Divine greatness meriteth And thereupon behold here the Word Incarnate which passing through all the spheres of nature grace and glory enter into the new sphere of the hypostatical union where it appears as a rainbow imprinted with all the beauties of the father he manifesteth them to men and making himself an adoring God a loving God an honouring God he adoreth he loveth he honoureth God so much as he is adorable amiable and honourable through all Ages for evermore Let us unfold our hearts in the knowledge and love of the Word revealed Let us adore this great sign this eternal character of the living God for whom all signs are Let us make a firm purpose not to pass over a day of our life wherein we afford him not three things due to him by titles so lawfull Homage Love Imitation Homage by adoring him and offering him some small service directed according to times in acknowledgement of the dependence we have of him by an entire comformity of our wils to his Love
honour conferred protesting to be nothing the less pliant to his commands and that the period of his obedience should be the end of his life Constantius fell into such a fury upon this news that he deigned not so much as to see his Embassadour but sent him presently a letter of disclaim which he desired might be read to the Army commanding forthwith to lay down the title of Augustus unless he would leave his life Julian who already had passed the Rubicon hazardeth the business and advanced towards Italie with his troups wherewith the Emperour infinitely irritated made an Oration in the midst of his Army shewing to the souldiers the treason and wickedness of Julian in terms very pressing and saying He went to require a speedy satisfaction well knowing God condemneth the ungrateful Numen perenni suffragio damnat ingratos Death of Constantius with an everlasting judgement Hereupon every one cried out he must needs march on to fight with the traitour and rebel and verily the Emperour hastened thither by great journeys at which time he felt himself seized by a feaver so ardent that he burnt like an oven and was besides so troubled all night with dreams and horrible visions which told him his good Angel had forsaken him and that it was time to leave life and Empire which he did being chastised by God for his cruelty towards Catholicks and by his death left Julian in full possession of all He instantly pulled off the mask and caused the Temples of the gods to be opened persecuting Christians not so much by the bruitishness of Diocletian as with subtile wiles of a wise Politician But behold the invincible force of our Religion Punishment◠of Julian remarkable and how unhappiness is necessarily tied to all their designs who forsake the true God He was resolved to shut up the name of Christian within a narrow nook of the earth calling us by the name of Galileans But God limiting the enterprizes of this impious man and not confining his own name hath covered with the beams of his own glory and knowledge all the parts of the habitable world and contrariwise the name of this deplorable Prince is ignominious For although Emperours the most bloudy against our religion are named without addition never almost is Julian pronounced but that for a note of eternal infamy the Apostate is added He set out an Edict by which he deprived Christians of the knowledge of letters Yet God hath permitted millions of Writers to spring up in Christianity whilest other superstitions as Judaism Gentilism and Mahometism being now fallen into extream ignorance there is none but Christianism the mother of sciences and mistress of mankind He resolved to re-edifie the temple of Jerusalem and having given the commission thereof to Alipius bals of fire were seen to issue from the foundations as fast as they laid them which made the design as frivolous as the place was inaccessible He extreamly affected honour yet change of religion made him so contemptible that the most abject people mocked at him saying he must shave his beard to make halters and that he spent so much in sacrifices that he would unfurnish the world of sheep and oxen He sought to give himself authority yet were his laws spiders webs continually broken by his subjects In the end to imitate Alexander he would undertake a war against the Persians but after infinite many toils he was there strucken by a blow from Heaven which quickly concluded his life and shut up his mouth by the blasphemy we have heard when filling his hand with bloud which distilled from his body he threw it against heaven and said Thou O Galilean hast vanquished This miserable Prince who thought by the help of his false Gods to command the waves of the sea and to walk upon Stars being pulled from the Empire at the age of thirty and one year and the first of his reign was carried on a beer as a sad spectacle for all those who adored his fortune His death was waited on by the bone fires of Persians and joy of Christians whose chains this day were dissolved his memory was buried in execrations and horrours nor were there any yea of pens the most sacred who had not gall for him so true it proves that a man who hath defiled his sanctification and sets Jesus aside findeth hell every where as in all things he sought to oppose the Divinity VIII MAXIM Of the Perfections of JESUS which make him amiable THE PROPHANE COURT THE HOLY COURT That we should love things visible not troubling our selves with invisible That all love is due to Jesus Christ by reason of his incomparable excellencies ALl the greatest evils in the world do ordinarily proceed from the ill manage of love which exceeding the limits prescribed by God causeth every where a deluge to occasion afterward disasters Sensual men perswade themselves one cannot love but by the eyes And verily they are those who according to the saying of Clemens Alexandrinus begin the skirmish in all the battels of worldly love And if 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Clem. Alex. Nutibus oculorum ibant Isaiah 3. 16. Baseness of worldly loves Astomorum Gens vestita frondium lanugine halitu tantum vivens we follow the opinion of the Prophet Isaiah we shall term them The feet of the heart since by them it goeth to objects of bodies to which it inclines But O good God how wretched are these loves of things visible since they idolatrize a little skin and resemble the people called Astomes who are clothed with leaves and live on smoke The carnal man who daily crucifieth himself upon so many crosses as he entertaineth thoughts for the creature he loveth is taken by the eye with a little exteriour skin called by the Physitians Epidermis Pull that a way from this body which gives him so many martyrdoms he would think that a monster he now adoreth for a Goddess Is not this a strange weakness of judgement and must we not confess the eyes so enflamed in their pursuits are very scanty in their fruition reserving to themselves no other object than thin colours which put upon them so many illusions to occasion so many flames I hold every judicious man will be enforced Love of invisible things most penetrating through the sole consideration of nature to affirm the most noble loves yea the greatest are employed on things invisible For behold a woman who with a most lively and fervent affection loved her husband be he taken away and carried to a tomb in the flower of his age and greatest splendour of his fortune she presently becomes passionate at it more through necessity than election It is not to speak truly the body she loveth for should that be left to her discretion it would in a short time become insupportable What is it then she esteemed most in this person The spirit which imprinted the character of its beauty and vigour upon this
in him and by him all things were made and it pleased the heavenly father that in his Person alone a plenitude of all perfections should inhabit The Valentinians said God the Father of the universe is in his Paradise as in the midst of a garden ennamelled with flowers and that these flowers were the Intelligencies whom he enlightened with his lights sanctified with his virtues animated with his aspects and quickened with his own life That he beheld himself in all and saw therein some draughts of his beauty very well expressed yet notwithstanding they being most insufficient in comparison of the first Essence it pleased the Eternal Father to make a Man-God to be the King of all these Intelligencies which they termed Aeons and for this purpose they added That having taken the most exquisite beauties from all the flowers of this divine garden he fitted and enchased them in the great work of the Word Incarnate It were too prophane Theologie to take it outwardly by the letter and it is no wonder if Tertullian mocked at it objecting to them they made Aesop's Jay or Hesiodus his Pandora of the Redeemer But if we speak according to true Divinity Vt sit in omnibus primatum tenens Colos 1. 19. we say this God-man containeth in eminency all the virtues and beauties of Angels to the end he may in and through all hold the primacie But to give at this time some limits to a discourse which of its nature Three excellencies of Jesus wherein all other are concluded runneth as it were into an infinity we say that as the first Adam falling was infected with sin darkened with ignorance ruined in power so the second Adam bearing himself as the restorer of humane nature took three eminent qualities upon him wherein all his excellencies conclude which are sanctity wisdom and power And to begin with sanctity we find the word Holy His sanctity was heretofore properly given to three sorts of people First to those who were purified by the bloud of the Hoast wherewith they were sprinkled for so were the expiations of the old Law performed to figure the effusion of the bloud of Jesus Christ Saints Exod. 24. 8. Ille verò sumptum sanguinem respersit in populum Hic est sanguis foederis quod pepigit Dominus nobiscum Sancti quasi sanguinetincti were anciently those who were chafed and sprinkled with bloud of the victim immolated in the Sacrifice say school Divines 2. This name was appropriated to those who alienated themselves from secular life and affairs to serve God 3. Such as in this separated life lived much purified from the dregs and contagion of sensuality This being so who seeth not the excellent title of sanctity wholly appertaineth to Jesus Christ because he purgeth all the Mass of mankind not onely by the sacred effusion of his bloud but likewise being sequestered and separated from his mothers womb to the honour of his Heavenly Father he led a life in the most eminent height might ever be imagined His sanctity hath three incomparable Prerogatives First it is a sanctity not of participation but of essence to wit of necessity and independencie sanctity being asintimate to God as his Divinity That is it S. Dyonisius Alexandrinus would say in the disputation against Paulus Samosetanus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that the sanctity of S. John Baptist and all other Saints was the work of God but this in Jesus was the nature of God himself Secondly that it is the original and exemplar cause of all all sanctities in the world which borrow all lustre of lights from the first sanctity Thirdly that it hath been through all times in freedom from sin as well because the created sanctity of Jesus Christ was governed by the increated sanctity as for that it was moistened with sources of capital Graces and inseparably tied to the beatified vision O Eternal Word how worthy art thou to be called by thy Prophet Daniel The Holy Vngetur Sanctus Sanctorum Dan. 6. 24. of Holies worthy the Seraphins should sing for thee eternally the Trisagion Holy Holy Holy worthy to bear the seal of Sanctity and to imprint thy characters upon all the Saints I will establish thee saith Ponam te quasi signaculum quia te elegi Agg. 2. 2. the Scripture as the true seal of the world because I have chosen thee 4. The great and eminent wisdom is united to sanctity for as very well saith S. Bonaventure As His wisdom Sicut in Christo fuit omnis plenitudo gratiae ita omnis plenitudo sapientiae S. Bonavent Theol. verit c. 15. l. 4. all plenitude of Grace was in Jesus Christ so there was a plenitude of wisdom by a necessary association It was a wisdom increated on the part of the Divinity a wisdom beatifying capital infused experimental in the holy Humanity acquired unto it from treasures of infinite sciences in such sort that it had knowledge of all things created past present future possible impossible discovering the most small Atomes from the highest Heaven to the lowest depths The Word of the celestial Father God of God light of Verbum Dei Patris Deus de Deo lumend â—â—ine sapientis de sapientiâ novit omnia quae novit Pater sed einoss de Patre est sicut esse Aug. l. 15. de civit c. 14. light wisdom of wisdom knoweth all the Father knows but knowledge cometh to him from the Father as well as Essence It is the river Tygris whereof the Scripture (a) (a) (a) Eccl. 24. Tygris in diebus nowrum fluâ—ius Dioryx Amari abundaviâ— cogitatio ejus c. speaketh which overfloweth in the beginning of seasons the river which spreadeth it self into divers channels to moisten all the wise which are the plants of his garden His thoughts are of larger extent than the sea and his counsels far deeper than abysses The two Testaments as well Old as New behold Jesus Christ as the Cherubins did the Propitiatory but there is as much difference between the Old and New as between the grain of corn and the ear according to the saying of Job the Monk in Photius The doctrine of Jesus Christ surpasseth all other doctrines because it hath its force and root in the Cross as S. Hierom speaketh (b) (b) (b) Omnem doctrinam suam petibulo roborabat Hier. ad Aglasiam Jesus fortified all his doctrine by the merit of his Passion Adde that as wisdom is observed in the order and oeconomie of great affairs when they are well proportioned to their ends so there cannot be a matter either more important than that of the eternal salvation of men or which hath been mannaged with more choice order and success or which hath succeeded by means more distant from the tracks of humane wisdom The science of Jesus Christ hath enlightened the most ignorant with the knowledge of secrets unknown to Philosophers and his word hath been as the
retro criminâ—â—â— venia c. in the Book he composed of games and sportive entertainments sheweth by lively and urgent reasons there is no game nor recreation in all the world can be compared to the soul of a Christian whose conscience is a portative Theater where incessantly are presented many admirable shews All which is powerfull and energetical to glad a well-composed soul and to entertain it in eternal delights is eminently found in the exercises of piety If the chief source of peace and alacrity be to be throughly reconciled to God is it not in this Angelical Devotion is it not in piety that an entire reconciliation is made with our Master that the stool the ring and shoes of hyacinth are put on to walk in the paths of his commandments If there be nothing so majestical so delicious so pleasing as the contemplation of truth whereon our soul liveth as the eye on colours the Bee on dew and the Phenix as it is said on the thinnest vapours of the air is it not here where after so many errours so many fantasies so many illusions which turmoyled our minde in the disturbances of the world we enjoy in purity and plenitude the consideration of the most noble Maxims of spiritual life If it be a sweet and sensible repose having obtained remission of sins of the life past to return into the peaceful harbour of a good conscience is not here the rock where so many waves are broken where so many little curs which cease not to bark in the bottom of a troubled conscience are appeased and where the soul becomes a calm sea beautified and curled with the rays of an enamoured and smiling Sun Finally if there be no greater pleasure in the world than to despise temporal pleasures and to temple under foot the vanities which Monarchs themselves have set over their heads where are they despised but in this school of virtue where mortification of passions is learned and the exercise of goodly and heroick actions which give the soul an antipast of Heaven in this mortal life and an enfranchisement from fear of death How can a devout soul which lives amongst so many helps so many remedies so many comforts give the least advantage to one black and cloudy thought of the world What can we find out able to contristrate us amongst such succours and lights O a thousand times happy soul which having chased away all these illusions of vanity beholdest with a clear serene eye the ever to be adored rays of this verity The ninth EXAMPLE upon the ninth MAXIM Of Solid Devotion SOlid Devotions resemble those rivers which run under the earth they steal from the eyes of the world to seek for the eyes of God they study solitudes and retirements they are wholly shut up within themselves and it often happens that those of whom we speak least on earth are the best known in Heaven I verily think among all the great examples which may be produced of piety in Courts there will not any one be found more sincere or more strong than that of S. Lewis as it appeareth by all the acts of his S. Lewis the true Table of the most solid Devotion life namely that which was written by his Confessour It is an easie matter to judge his was a most holy life because the most dis-interessed he having no other aim but to dissolve his person his Kingdom his wife and children into the will of God to make the world no longer to be ought else but a Temple of the Divinity The Divine providence drew him out of his Kingdom with an Abraham's faith gave him among so many lands and seas the conduct of a Moses and to set a seal on him of all his greatness caused him to end his life with the patience of Job We find many Princes who embraced piety one after one fashion another after another and who have covered great vices with great virtues but it is a very hard matter to find one either more universal in all actions of virtue or more free from blame in the point of innocencie than our S. Lewis David ows all he is more to pennance than to innocency Constantine the Great before he was a Christian saw himself most unhappily stained with the bloud of his allies Theodosius the elder was enflamed with choller which cost many people of Thessalonica their lives Arcadius persecuted S. Chrysostom at the solicitation of the Emperess his wife Honorius his brother who was very pious and innocent had nothing warlike in him and ever better knew what the white cock named Rama did in whom he took pleasure than the capital Citie of the world whereof he was Emperour Theodosius the younger entertained love or hatred according as his Eunuchs and women dictated Belisarius one of the bravest Captains which the earth ever bare had a very commendable souldier-like piety but did all at the will of Theodora the Emperess observing her passions even to the taking the Pope and putting him into prison by her command Narses who succeeded him did wonders and subdued Totila the most valorous King which ever reigned among the Goths he was very devout to the Blessed Virgin to whom he attributed all his victories but withal so insolent that to be revenged for a word of disdain which his Mistress the Emperess of Constantinople spake he gave Italie over as a prey to the Lombards Finally to conclude this Relation and to speak of that which more nearly concerneth us Charlemaigne was the greatest Emperour of the world in matter of religion valour policy liberalitie sweetness and affability but the love of women though expiated by sharp pennance set blemishes on this Sun which the memory of ensuing Ages hath much ado to wash off It is a strange thing that God chastised the sins of the father in his own daughters who had very little care of their honour through too free an education and indulgence of the Emperour who spared the punishment of his own sins in another There hath not been almost in all the Monarchies but one S. Lewis who was so like to virtue that if it upon one side appeared incarnate to mortal eyes and on the other shewed this great King there would have been much ado to know which were the copie and which the principal He had three things very recommendable in him religious wisdom in the brightest lustre of the world humility planted even upon the rubies and diamonds of the Royal Crown courage and valour invincible in a devotion incomparable Who would see a manifest token of his wisdom let him behold how his spirit in the greatest concussions of worldly accidents stood ever in the same posture without any whit forgoing the ordinary exercise of his piety One sole action of his life which was his taking in Aegypt made what I say well to appear This good King having lost a great battel which ruined all his affairs saw the wide fields covered with the
the power of God in his Saints caused a fair Church to be built to this most blessed woman and a Cross to be erected in the place where she left him which was called the Cross of the place Thus was God pleased to ratifie by so great miracles the pardon Constantia had given to Prince Charls I will shut up this discourse with a passage of so rare clemency of a Monarch offended in the honour of a daughter of his by a mean vassal as it seems could never have fallen but into the heart of a Charlemaigne It is to this purpose recounted that one Eginardus Curio l. 2. rerum Chronologicarum who was Secretary to the Prince having placed his affections much higher than his condition admitted made love to one of his daughters which was in mine opinion natural who seeing this man of a brave spirit and a grace suitable thought not him too low for her whom merit had so eminently raised above his birth She affected him and gave him too free access Goodness and in dulgence of Charlemaigne to her person so far as to suffer him to have recourse unto her to laugh and sport in her chamber on evenings which ought to have been kept as a sanctuary wherein relicks are preserved It happened upon a winters night these two amorous hearts having inwardly so much fire that they scarcely could think upon the cold Eginardus ever hastening his approches and being very negligent in his returns had somewhat too much slackened his departure The snow mean while raised a rampart which troubled them both when he thought to go out Time pressed him to leave her and heaven had stopped up the way of his passage It was not tolerable for him to go forward Eginardus feared to be known by his feet and the Lady thought it not any matter at all to see the prints of such steps about her door They being much perplexed love which taketh the diadem of majesty from Queens so soon as they submit to its tyranny made her do an act for a lover which had she done for a poor man it would have been the means to place her among the great Saints of her time She tooke this Gentleman upon her shoulders and carried him all the length of the Court to his chamber he never setting foot to the ground that so the next day no impression might be seen of his footing It is true which a holy Father saith that if hell lay on the shoulders of love love would find courage enough to bear it But it hath more facilitie to undertake than prudence to hide it self the eye of God not permitting these follies should either be concealed or unpunished Charlemaign who had not so much affection in store for women that he spent not some nights in studie watched this night and hearing a noise opened the window and perceived this prettie prank at which he could not tell whether he were best to be angrie or to laugh The next day in a great assembly of Lords and in the presence of his daughter and Eginardus he proposed the matter past in covert tearms asking what punishment might a servant seem worthie of who made use of a Kings daughter as of a Mule and caused himself to be carried on her shoulders in the midst of winter through night snow and all sharpness of the season Every one gave hereupon his opinion and there was not any who condemned not this insolent man to death The Princess and Secretarie changed colour thinking nothing remained for them but to be flayed alive But the Emperour looking on his Secretarie with a smooth brow said Eginardus hadst thou loved the Princess my daughter thou oughtest to have come freely to her father who should dispose of her libertie and not to play these pranks which have made thee worthy of death were not my clemency much greater than the respect thou hast born to my person I now at this present give thee two lives the one in preserving thine the other in delivering her to thee in whom thy soul more survives than in the body it animateth Take thy fair portress in marriage and both of you learn to fear God and to play the good husbands These lovers thought they were in an instant drawn out of the depth of Hell to ascend to heaven and all the Court stood infinitly in admiration of this judgement It appears by the narration what was the mild temper of Charlemaign in this point and that he followed the counsel of S. Ambrose who advised a Father named Epist l. 8. ep 64. Si bonam duxit acquisioit tibi gratiam Si erravit accipiendo meliores facies refutando deteriores Sisinnius to receive his son with a wife he had taken for love For receiving them both said he you will make them better rejecting them render them worse The goodness of these great hearts for all that justifieth not the errours of youth which grievously offendeth when it undertaketh resolutions in this kind not consulting with those to whom it oweth life XIII MAXIM Of the Epicurean life THE PROPHANE COURT THE HOLY COURT That the flesh must be daintily used and all possible contentment given to the mind That life without crosses and flesh void of mortification is the sepulcher of a living man EXperience teacheth us there is in the World a sect of reformed Epicures who do not openly profess the bruitishness of those infamous spirits which are drenched in gourmandize and lust but take Maxims more refined that have as they say no other aim but to make a man truly contented For which purpose they promise themselves to drive all objects from their minds which may bring the least disgust and to afford the bodie all pleasures which may preserve it in a flourishing health accompanied with grace vigour and vivacity of senses Here may the judicious observe that such was the The Philosophie of Epicurus swayeth in the world doctrine of ancient Epicurus For although many make a monster of him all drowned in ordure and prodigious pleasure yet it is very easie to prove that he never went about to countenance those bruitish ones who through exorbitance of lusts ruin all the contentments of the mind and bodie But he wholly inclined to find out all the pleasures of nature and to banish any impediments which might make impression on the soul or bodie For which cause I think Thedor l. 2. Therap Nicet 2. Thesau c. 1. Tertul. apol c. 38. Hieron 2. in Jovin Laertius lib. 10. Senec. l. de vitâ beatâ Theodoret mistook him when he made him so gluttonous as to contend with Jupiter about a sop and that Nicetas who representeth him so licourish after honied tarts well understood him not For Tertullian S. Hierom Laertius and Seneca who better noted his doctrine assure us he was a very sober man and speaketh not in his writings but of pulse and fruits not for the honour he bare to
all the fair riches of the earth The ambitious perish as spiders who present wretched threeds and some little flies in them such are also the snares pursuits and businesses of the world But the Just forsake us like the silk-worm For this little creature had it understanding would be well pleased issuing forth of her prison to become a butterflie to see the goodly halle of great men Churches and Altars to smile under her works What a contentment to the conscience of a just man in death to consider the Churches adorned Altars covered poor fed sins resisted virtues crowned like so many pieces of tapistry by the work of his hands Hath he not cause to say I entered into the list I valiantly 1 Tim. 4. Bonum certamen certavâ— cursum consummavi in reliquo reposita est mihi corona justitiae Exhortation to such nice people as fear death fought I have well ended my race there remains nothing more for me but to wear the Crown of Justice which God keeps for me as a pledge 6. I yet come again to thee worldly man who so much fearest this last hour Learn from this discourse to fortifie thy self against these vain apprehensions of death which have more disturbance for thee than the Sea surges Is it not a goodly thing to see thee tremble at thy enterance into so beaten a path wherein so many millions have passed along before thee and the most timorous of the earth have finished their course as well as the rest without any contradiction All that which seemeth most uneasie in this passage is much sweetened by two considerations the first whereof is That God made it so common that there is no living creature exempt and the other That to dispose us to a great death we every night find in our sleep a little death Wilt thou then still doubt to set thy foot-steps firmly in the paths which the worlds Saviour with his holy Mother imprinted with their tracks After thou hast slept so many years and so long passed through the pettie miseries of death shalt thou never come to the great Why art thou so apprehensive of death Sickness and miseries of the world will one day perhaps make thee desire that which thou now most fearest Were it not better to do by election what must be suffered by necessity Hast thou so little profited in the world that thou hast not yet some friend some one dearly beloved who passed into the other life Needs must thou have very little affection in store for him if thou fearest the day which should draw thee near to his company What is it maketh all these apprehensions arise in thy mind Is it so ill with thee to forsake a world so treacherous so miserable so corrupt If thou hast been therin perpetually happy which is very rare couragiously set a seal upon thy felicity and be not weary of thy good hap which may easily be changed into a great misfortune Many have lived too long by one year others by one day which made them see what they feared more than death But if thou be afflicted and persecuted in this life why art thou not ashamed when God calleth thee to go out faintly from a place where thou canst not stay without calamitie Deplorest thou thy gold silver costly attire houses and riches Thou goest into a Countrey where thou no longer shalt need any of that They were remedies given thee for the necessities of life now that thy wounds shall be cured wouldest thou still wear the plaisters Bewailest thou loss of friends There are some who expect thee above which are better than the worldly more wise more assured and who will never afford thee ought but comfort Thou perhaps laments the habit of body and pangs of this passage It is not death then which makes thee wax pale but life thou so dearly lovedst It hath been told thee in the last agonies of death the body feeleth great disturbances that it turns here and there that one rubs the bed-cloths with his hands hath convulsions shuts fast the teeth choaketh words hath a trembling lower lip pale visage sharp nose troubled memory speech fumbling cold sweat the white of the eye sunk and the aspect totally changed What need we fear all that which perhaps will never happen to us How many are there who die very sweetly and almost not thinking of it You would say they are not there when it happens Caesar the Pretour died putting on his shoes Lucius Lepidius striking with his foot against a gate the Rhodian Embassadour having made an Oration before the Senate of Rome Anacreon drinking Torquatus eating a cake Cardinal Colonna tasting figs Xeuxes the Painter laughing at the Picture of an old woman he was to finish and lastly Augustus the Monarch performing a complement But if something must be endured think you the hand of God is stretched out to torment you above your force or shortened to comfort you He will give you a winter according to your wool as it is said sufferings according to the strength of your body and a crown for your patience You fear nothing say you of all that I mention but you dread Judgement Who can better order that than your self Had you been the most desperate sinner in the world if you take a strong resolution to make hereafter an exact and effectual conversion the arms of God are open to receive you He will provide for your passage doubt it not as he took care for your birth He will accompany you with his Angels he will hold you under the veil of his face under the shadow of his protection if he must purge you by justice he will crown you by his mercy The fifteenth EXAMPLE upon the fifteenth MAXIM The manner of dying well drawn from the Model of our LADIE ONe of the most important mysteries in the world is to die well It is never done but once and if one fail to perform it well he is lost without recovery It is the last lineament of the table of our life the last blaze of the torch extinguished the last lustre of the setting Sun the end of the race which gives a period to the course the great seal which signeth all our actions One may in death correct all the defects of an ill life and all the virtues of a good are defaced and polluted by an evil death The art of dying well being of so great consequence it seems God permitted the death of his Mother to teach us what ours ought to be The death of the Virgin Mary is the death of a Phenix which hath three conditions resolution disengagement and union I begin with resolution of conformity to the will 1. Quality of good death is the indifferency of time and manner of God which is the first quality should be had to die well That is to hold life in your hands as a loan borrowed from Heaven ever ready to restore it at the least
summons you shall have from the will of God It is not perfection not to care for life through impatience nor to have an ear not deaf to death through faintness of courage This resignation was most excellent and very admirable in our Ladie for two reasons First the great knowledge she had of beatitude Secondly the ineffable love she bare to her Son For I leave you to think if our desires follow the first rays of our knowledges and if we be so much the more earnest after a good as we are the better informed of its merit what impatience Patience of our Lady to endure life must our Ladie needs have of life since she received a science of beatitude strong powerful and resplendent above all other creatures God giving her leave to see in Calvarie the abyss of his glories in the depth of his dolours It is no wonder we so very easily affect life seeing we are as the little children of a King bred in the house of a shepheard as the gloss upon Daniel reporteth touching the education of Nebuchadnezzar We know not what a scepter Kingdom or crown is in this great meaness of a life base and terrestrial But had we talked onely one quarter of an hour with a blessed soul and discoursed of the state of the other life our hearts would wholly dissolve into desires Which makes me say It was an act of a most heroical resolution in the blessed Virgin in those great knowledges she had of Paradise to have continued so many years in this life and if you consider the most ardent love she bare her Son who was the adamant of all loves you shall find the holy Virgin who had born all the glory of Paradise in her womb more merited in this resignation she made to see her self separated the space of thirty years both from Paradise and her Son than all the Martyrs did in resigning themselves to deaths strange bloudy and hydeous There is nothing comparable to the martyrdom of Martyrdom of love love It is an exhalation in a cloud It is a fire in a myne a torrent shut up in ditches a night of separation lasteth Ages and all waxeth old for it but its desires Now this holy Mother to be thirty years upon the cross of love without repining without complaint or disturbance peaceably expecting the stroke of her hour what virtue and how far are we from it So now adays throughout the world you see nothing Worldly irresolutions of death Boet. Carm. 1. Eheu cur dura miseros averteris aure Et stentes oculos claudere saeva negos but mourners who are loth to live or faint-hearted that would never die Some crie out Come to me O sluggish death thou hast forgotten me what do I here I am but a living death and an unprofitable burden to the earth Ah death hast thou ears of brass and diamond for me alone Canst thou not shut up mine eyes which I daily drown in my tears Much otherwise when we see one die young fresh flourishing in honour wealth health prosperity we crie out upon death as if it were cruel and malicious To take saith one this young betrothed this poor maid this husband intended this excellent man who so well played the Rhodomont to lay hold of one so necessarie for the publick in the flower of his age Why took it not away this cripple this beggar who hath not wherewith to live Why took it not away this other who daily dies yet cannot die once O our manners O dainty conceits O fit language Were it not some little humane respect we would take Gods Providence by the throat Whom do we contend withal The indifferency we daily see in the death of men where as soon the young is taken as the old the happie as the miserable the Emperour as the porter is one of the greatest signs of Gods Providence to be admired Why then complain we that God maketh us to leave life when he pleaseth It is not a punishment but a wholesom doctrine by which we learn the power of the Divine Wisdom First when we entered into life our advise was not required whether we would be born in such or such an Age such a day such a year such an hour so when we must be gone from hence there is no reason to ask our counsel Let us onely yield up this last loan and not murmure against the father of the family Let us not say this man should go before and this after Who knows them better than God You complain this miserable creature lives so long how know you whether he accomplish the years of his purgatory How know you whether God suffers him to become a spectacle unto you of his patience Why gnash you your teeth for anger that this man rich that man fortunate and that other so qualified is taken hence in his flourishing youth How know you the misadventures and shipwracks which attended him had he still continued in the world You say he was necessary why God will shew there is not any thing necessary in the world but himself Vnâ— aâ—ulso non deficit alter aureus Poor eyes of a bat which see nothing but darkness you would give eyes to Argus and light to the Sun If you desire to take part in the prudence of the just handle the matter so that for the first sign of a good death you be ever indifferent to live or die accordding to our Ladies example Daily expect death stand perpetually on your guard Do as the brave bird the Grecians call Onocratalus which is so well practised Instinct of the Onocratalus Constancy of faith to expect the Hawk to grapple with her that even when sleep shuts up her eyes she sleepeth with her beak exalted as if she would contend with her adversary Know we are continually among rocks and dangers that there needs but one hour to get all or loose all that the day of Judgement comes with the pace of a thief and that we must be ready to receive it and resolute to combat with death to gain immortalitie Hold this concluding sentence of Tertul. Idol c. 2. Hos inter scopulos velisicata spiritu Dei fides navigat tuta si cauta secura si attonita Caeterúm ineluctabile excussis profundum inexplicabile impactis naufragium irrespirabile â— devoratis hypocriphium Second quality of good death Philo l. 3. de vita Mosis in fine Notable speech of Philo of Moses his state 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Tertullian as an Oracle Amongst the rocks and shelves of this sea called life Christian faith passeth on breaking the waves filling the sails with Gods spirit ever assured yet ever distrustful and perpetually fearless yet still carefull of the future As for the rest it sees under its feet an abyss not to be passed by swimming and inexplicable ship wrack for those who are drenched a gulf which suffocates all such as it once swalloweth The second
quality of a good death is the ready and constant adieu given to the world as did the Blessed Virgin who was so disengaged from it towards death that she touched not earth at all but with the soles of her feet Philo saith God gave Moses leave to live very long perpetually in glorious actions in contemplations in lights so that his body was worn wasted and almost wholly vapoured out into the substance of his spirit By a much stronger reason may one say the like of the Mother of God For it is certain her life was nothing else but a divorce from the world But as Physitians observe that the breath of storks is purified and made sweet in the proportion as they increase in age in such sort that becoming old they yield forth most odoriferous exhalations So the life of this holy Mother which was ever hanging about the heart of her Son ever in the contemplation of the great mysteries of our salvation perpetually in the furnace of love wholly transformed it self into her well-beloved as one wax melted into another as a drop of water poured into a great vessel of wine as incense wasted into flames O what sweetness of breath what odour of virtues in her old age Her body seemed to be exhaled and to vapour out Harph. c. 49. libri de mystic Theol. all in soul the soul which is the knot of life and which possesseth in us the most inferiour part of spirituality dissolved wholly into spirit which is in the middle and the spirit melted entirely into the understanding which hath the highest rank in the soul and which bears the image of the most holy Trinitie Her memory in a silent repose was freed from all rememberances of the world her will resided in languishing fervours and her understanding was wholly engulfed in great abysses of lights there was not one small threed of imagination which tied her to earth O what an adieu to the world It is very well declared in the Canticles by these Cantic 1. 6. Quae est ista quae ascendit per desertum sicut virgula fumi ex aromatibus myrrhae thuris universâ— pulveris pigmentarii The three ties of the world Genes 12. Egredere de terra tua de cognationetua de domo patris tui words Who is it that ascendeth through the desert like a thin vapour composed of odours myrrb incense and all the most curious perfumes Which saith in a word the holy Virgin was wholly spiritualized wholly vapour all perfume all spirit and had as it were nothing of body massiness or earth O how many unreasonably fail in this second condition When death comes to sound his trumpet in our ears and saith to us Let us go thou must dislodge from thy lands inheritances never to return again from thy kinred from the house thy father gave thee to wit thy bodie how harsh that is to ill mortified spirits and which hold of the world by roots as deep as hell and as big as arms Go out of thy land O how hard is this first step to go out of the land to forsake the land not at all to pretend to the land to the gold to the silver to those jewels that inheritance to all that glorious glitter of fortune See the first torment of worldly spirits Such there have been who Desperate desire of worldly goods Joannes Nider seeing themselves in the last approaches of inevitable death have swallowed their gold like pills other to eternize themselves on earth have caused formidable sepulchers to be built wherein they put all their wealths as the Aegyptian King Cheopes who prostituted even his own daughter to raise unto himself a Pyramid for burial so enormous that it seemed the earth was too weak to bear it and Heaven too low to be freed from its importunity Besides he caused to be engraven upon it that the manufactures alone of this sepulcher had cost six millions of gold in coleworts and turneps Others caused to be buried with them dogs horses slaves apparrel dishes to serve them in the other world Yea it is not long ago since there was found in Anno 1544. Belforest Goodly monument of the Emperess Marie Rome a coffin of marble eight foot long and in it a robe embroidered with Gold-smiths work which yielded six and thirty pounds of gold besides fourty rings a cluster of emeralds a little mouse made of another precious stone and amongst all these precious magnificencies two leg-bones of a dead corps known by the inscription of the tomb to be the bones of the Emperess Marie daughter of Stilicon and wife of the Emperour Honorius who died before consummation of marriage About twelve hundred years were passed after she was buried with all these goodly toys which no doubt gave much ease to her soul My God how are we tied to earth Tell me not the like is not done now adays for it is worse since they were buried after death with their riches and you O mortals alive as you are build your sepulchers thereon We see men who having already one foot in the grave if you speak to them of the affairs of their consciences all the spirit yet remaining is perhaps for two or three hours besieged by an infinite number of thoughts of worldly wealth Death crieth out aloud in their ears saying Go from thy land and you pull it to you as with iron hooks After that cometh kinred allies table-frends friends for game buffons amourists and all the delights of former companies Some weep others make shew of tears the rest under a veil of sorrow make bones-fires in their hearts they seem all to appear about the bed and to sing this sad song of S. Augustine Aug. Confes 6. 11. Dimittis ne nos a momento illo non erimus tecum ultra in aeternum Et a momento isto non licebit hoc illud ultra in aeternum Alas do you leave us and shall we hereafter meet no more together Farewel pleasing amities Adieu feasts adieu sports adieu loves This nor that will any longer be permitted from this moment for ever Behold another very slipperie and dangerous step notwithstanding you must leave it Death hasteneth and says Go from thy kinred In the last the body and flesh is presented which seems to say Ah my soul whither goest thou My dear hostess whither goest thou Thou hast hitherto so tenderly pampered me so pompously clothed me so wantonly cherished me I was thy Idol thy Paradise thy little Goddess and where will you put me into a grave with serpents and worms what shall I do there and what will become of me Behold a hard task principally for such of both sexes as have dearly loved their bodies like the Dutchess of Venice Damian opusc in instit ad Blanch. c. 11. The prodigality of a Venetian Ladie and her punishnent of whom Cardinal Petrus Damianus speaketh who was plunged into sensuality
whereof the poor have too much been frustrated to establish thy vanities and fatten thee in pleasures Where is thy liberality Where are thy alms toward miserable creatures who die in affliction in the streets Observe justice and take example by my disasters Husband it is thy wife so beloved that speaks to thee saying Ah my dearest friends where is the faith plighted in the face of the Church Where are the faithful loves which should have no limit but eternity Death no sooner absented me from thy eyes but forgetfulness drew me out of thy heart I complain not thou livest happy and fortunate in thy new affections for I am in a condition wherein I can neither envy nor malice any but I complain that not onely after my death the children which are pledges of our love were distastful to thee but thou hast wholly lost the memory of one who was so precious to thee and whom thou as a Christian oughrest to love beyond a tomb Open yet once unto her the bowels of thy charity and comfort by thy alms and good works a soul which must expect that help from thee or some other The seventeenth EXAMPLE upon the seventeenth MAXIM Apparition of Souls in Purgatorie HIstories tell us the apparation of souls in Purgatory are so frequent that he who would keep an account may as soon number the stars in the sky or leaves on the trees But as it is not fit to be too credulous in all may be said thereupon so a man must be very impudent to deny all is spoken of it and to oppose as well the authority of so many great personages as the memory of all Ages He who believes nothing above nature will not believe a God of nature How many extraordinary things are there the experience whereof teacheth us the effects and of which God hideth the reasons from us The Philosopher Democritus disputing with Solinus Polyhistor the Sages of his time concerning the secret power of nature held commonly in his hand the stone called cathocita which insensibly sticketh to such as touch it and they being unable to give a reason of it he inferred there were many secrets which are rather to humble our spirits than to satisfie our curiosity Who Jul. Scal. A Porta Caâ—eraâ— can tell why the theamede which is a kind of adamant draweth iron on one side and repelleth it on the other Why do the forked branches of the nut-tree turn towards mines of gold and silver Why do bees often die in the hives after the death of the Master of the family unless they be else-where transported Why doth a dead body cast forth bloud in the presence of the murderer Why do certain fountains in the current of their waters and in their colour carry presages of seasons as that of Blomuza which waxeth red when the countrey is menaced with war Why have so many noble families Diâ—â—arus Petrus Albinus certain signs which never fail to happen when some one of the family is to die The commerce of the living with spirits of the dead is a matter very extraordinarie but not impossible to the Father of spirits who holdeth total nature between his hands Peter of Clugny surnamed the Venerable and esteemed in his time as the oracle of France was a man who proceeded in these affairs with much consideration not countenancing any thing either frivolous or light Behold the cause wherefore I willingly make use of his authority He telleth that in a village of Spain named the Star there was a man of quality called Peter of Engelbert much esteemed in the world for his excellent parts and abundant riches Notwithstanding the spirit of God having made him understand the vanity of all humane things being now far stepped into years he went into a Monastery of the Order of Clugny there the more piously to pass the remnant of his dayes as it is said the best incense cometh from old trees He often spake amongst the holy Fryers of a vision which he saw when he as yet was in the world and which he acknowledged to be no small motive to work his conversion This bruit came to the ears of Venerable Peter who was his General and who for the affairs of his Order was then gone into Spain Behold the cause why he never admitting any discourses to be entertained if they were not well verified took the pains to go into a little Monastery of Nazare where Engelbert was to question him upon it in the presence of the Bishops of Oleron and Osma conjuring him in the virtue of holy obedience to tell him punctually the truth touching the vision he had seen whilest he led a secular life This man being very grave and very circumspect in all he said spake the words which the Authour of the historie hath couched in his proper terms In the time that Alphonsus the younger heir of the great Alphonsus warred in Castile against certain factious dis-united from his obedience he made an Edict that every family in his Kingdom should be bound to furnish him with a souldier which was the cause that for obedience to the Kings commands I sent into his army one of my houshold-servants named Sancius The wars being ended and the troups discharged he returned to my house where having some time so journed he was seized by a sickness which in few dayes took him away into the other world We performed the obsequies usually observed towards the dead and four moneths were already past we hearing nought at all of the state of his soul when behold upon a winters night being in my bed throughly awake I perceived a man who stirring up the ashes of my hearth opened the burning coals which made him the more easily to be seen Although I found my self much terrified with the sight of this ghost God gave me courage to ask him who he was and for what purpose he came thither to lay my hearth abroad But he in a very low voice answered Master fear nothing I am your poor servant Sancius I go into Castile in the company of many souldiers to expiate my sins in the same place where I committed them I stoutly replied If the commandment of God call you thither to what purpose come you hither Sir saith he take it not amiss for it is not without the Divine permission I am in a state not desperate and wherein I may be helped by you if you bear any good will towards me Hereupon I required what his necessity was and what succour he expected from me You know Master said he that a little before my death you sent me into a place where ordinarily men are not sanctified Liberty ill example youth and temerity all conspire against the soul of a poor souldier who hath no government I committed many out-rages during the late war robbing and pillaging even to the goods of the Church for which I am at this present grievously tormented But good Master if you loved me
rebellion of Core Dathan and Abiram this earth which is the foundation and basis of the universe changed its nature shook with frightful tremblings opened its wide and gaping bosom to swallow these disastrous creatures Where shall we lodge this sin On the waters Behold the waters could not endure one sole disobedience of Jonas All the air is on fire all the winds in blusters all the sea in rage and fury whilest it is under the weight of this poor sinner He must be cast into the belly of a whale although unable to digest shevomit him up God himself Laboravi sustinens Job 1. God Omnipotent in whose hands all this great world is but a drop of dew complains he cannot endure sin Where shall we place it then but in the pit of hell But if at least this pain had some end And see you not sin hath neither end nor limits in its eternity Alas he who would understand this who would Ducunt in bonis dies suos in puncto ad inferna descendunt Job 21. 13. open his eyes to behold what I am about to say and what I conceal had rather put himself into the arms of hell being in innocency than among imaginary felicities in crime and sin If you know it not O Christians it is an infinite evil because it striketh at the head of an infinite divinity and it is an horrible thing to think on for that as much as is possible it annihilateth God and the whole fountain of essences felicities and mercies Do you not consider a transgression Enormity of a sinner increaseth according as the person interessed is of great and eminent quality It is one thing to offend a peasant another thing a Merchant another thing a Judge another a King But he who offends all Kings and all Judges of the earth or should thrust a knife into the throat of a million of men would he not seem very criminal Nay were all the greatness grace and majesty of a hundred thousand worlds poured and quintessenced in one body what would it be in comparison of God but one grain of sand And then to invade God in his will to infringe and annul the Divinity O abyss of confusion To say unto God Omnipotent all good and all holy You will give me a law and I will play the unbridled colt I will take it of my self I will admit no Law-maker you created me for your Irritam quis faciens legem Mosi sine ulla miseratione moritur quanto magis putatis deteriora mereri supplicia qui Filium Dei conculcaverit sanguinem Testamenti pollutâ—m dunerit Heb. 10 self and I will live for my self and be the sovereign good of my self you created a world for my use and I will people it with monsters which shall be my sins You redeemed and reconciled me by the bloud of your Son and I will contemn and trample it under-foot I should not presume to use these words had not S. Paul prevented me You will be a Judge to chastise me and I make as much account of all your thunder-stroaks as of broken rushes To despise God as a Law-maker as a Creatour as a Father as a Redeemer as a Judge as God as all and then say God did you wrong in making a hell 5. Behold there his justice purged now see its effect in the quality and condition of pains of the damned What is Hell It is called Silence to shew we cannot speak of it but by silence All is said of hell is less than hell The holy history of Aegyptian Quality and condition of the pains of the damned Anchorites written by Palladius recounteth an accident very prodigious happened to the great Macharius which is that one day this admirable man Strange narration of Palladius commonly called the God of Monks for his speech was an oracle and his life a perpetual miracle this excellent man I say travelling through the hideous and savage desarts of Aegypt alwaies fixed and bent both with eye heart upon the contemplation of a future life met with the head of a dead man by the way and ere he was aware set a palmers staff which he had in his hand upright upon it and behold at the same instant as it happened in other occasions he heard to come from the head of this dead man a sad and frightful voice able to have astonished the most couragious But the holy Saint being wholly made for these apparitions of spirits and armed to the proof against all illusions of Sathan stood still and asked Whose art thou It answered I am the head of one damned He replied What threw thee head-long into this wretched miserie Two things said the dead misbelief and vice Then being demanded concerning the torments he endured he replied The soul makes hell the soul suffers hell and the soul cannot well comprehend what hell is What have you on the earth more odious than horrible darkness and not to speak of our coals nor of any of the rest of our greatest calamities behold our greatest ease The unhappy spirit cutting off his words held his peace and the holy man lifting the head up from the ground took it in his hand then deeply sighing with fobs of lively and penetrating grief he said O what ease O what ease what eternal darkness blind world prostituted world desperate world oh wouldest thou know wouldest thou know but thine unhappiness hath put a scarf before thine eyes I would here conclude this discourse and substitute in my place this blessed old man the eye and honour of these desarts holding this dead mans head between his hands I would intreat him to ask of it again what have availed the damned their honours reputation riches riots pleasures delights those wretched lime-twigs which entangled the wings of the soul and plunged it into an abyss of infelicities I would intreat it to tell us what a monster mortal sin is since to punish it such dreadful dungeons must be built such racks and tortures It would tell this with a voice of thunder accompanied with flouds of tears and you would be appalled tremble and weep at it with all the just who never think of hell but with terrour and tears O bruitish and sensual men who live in a continual Definition of hell contempt of Gods anger Ask the great Tertullian what hell is And he will answer hell is a treasury of fire enkindled by the breath of God for punishment of the damned hell is an ugly and deep sink Arcani ignis subterrâ—nâ—â— ad panam thesaurâ— Abstrusa in visceribâ— terrae profunditâ—â— c. Tertul. deanimâ— and a sewer wherein all the ordures of Ages are thrown Ask of Hugo of S. Victor (a) (a) (a) Profundum sine fundo whi nulla spes boni nulla desperatio mali Hugo victorius l. de anima what hell is and he wil reply a bottom without bottom which shutteth the
the General in this siege that she disposed his heart to what she pleased In such sort that going forth in the fear and confusion of all the people she returned with peace and assurance of quiet which made them all to come out to receive her at the Citie gates with loud acclamations some throwing flowers other Crowns and all rendering thanks to her as their Sovereign Preserveress She apprehended so much joy therewith that in the very instant she expired in her honours at the Citie gate and in stead of being carried to the throne was brought to her tomb with the infinite sorrow of all her countrey I leave you to think if humane comforts have such force what will the great joy of God be for these unheard-of spectacles these continual triumphs and inexhaustible sources Must we not say we should there every moment leave our souls in the height of pleasure were not the happiness of it conjoyned to immortality XX. MAXIM Of RESURRECTION THE PROPHANE COURT THE HOLY COURT That we must not deny our bodies the benefit of time since they must perish That we must use our bodies as the Temples of God since they must rise again WE may truly say there is not any mysterie The resurrection proved more than any other mysterie in all our faith which God hath pleased to teach and prove unto us more effectually than the resurrection For it being sufficiently averred that our salvation consisteth in the knowledge of three principal Articles which are that of the Trinity of the incarnation with its extension made to the Sacrament of the Altar and of the Resurrection although they be all of like necessity yet it seems God disposing himself more to our ends than his own hath more abundantly explaned himself in this last mysterie which most concerneth our peculiar profit It is very true that for the doctrine of the Trinity the Incarnation and the Sacrament of the Altar he was contented to give us some figures of them in the old Testament not fully shewing the effects but for the Resurrection he was pleased to establish it even before his coming into the world really and actually by raising many dead by the merits of Elias and Elizeus as we learn in the history of Kings It is well enough known that having afforded to the Ancients very obscure knowledges of the Trinity and Incarnation for the Resurrection alone he made the law of nature the Mosaical the order of the world the form of Common-wealths and the Evangelical law to speak so intelligibly that he could speak nothing more perspicuously In the law of nature I understand the chief Secretary Scio quod Redemptor meus vivit in novissimâ— die de terra resurrecturus sum c. Job 19. of the world Job who crieth out on the dunghil I know my Redeemer liveth and that at the last day of the world I must rise again from the earth and shall see God in mine own flesh that I shall see my self in person and that my eyes shall behold him and no other this hope I keep as a pledge in my bosom A man who lived about three thousand years ago before all books all Doctours and all schools to speak in so clear terms so pressing so peremptory is it not a prodigie In the Mosaical law besides formal passages in the Ecce ego aperiam tumulos vestros educam vos de sepulchris vestris Ezech. 33. Macch. 2. Math. 22. D. Tho. art 1. ad 2. supplem q. 75. prophet Ezechiel I will open your tombs and will take you from your sepulchers besides the generous confession of the Macchabees we have in the Pentateuch a passage alledged for proof of the resurrection by the Son of God himself which for this purpose ought to be held as an argument necessary and invincible It is so many times said The God of Abraham Isaac and Jacob Now he is not the God of the dead but of the living and therefore needs must these Patriarchs beliving not onely in the immortality of their souls for the soul makes not a man entire but in future resurrection In the order of the world we have the new birth Tertul. l. de Resur c. 12. and 13. Greg. Mag. 14. mor. c. 10. Cyril Catech. 18. Macar hom 5. de Resur Nil Ora. 2. de Pasca Theod. serm de Provid of stars dayes seasons planets of birds who make a perpetual image of the Resurrection in the world on which the holy Fathers enlarge with much eloquence In the form of Common-wealths and policie of the universe we observe the great care all Nations the most barbarous have had of the burial of bodies not to have been but through an instinct and estimation of the resurrection Which the chiefmen in Gentilism have publickly and notably professed And although they had very weak knowledge of other mysteries of our faith and spake of it with much obscurity in the point of resurrection they unfolded themselves most distinctly and expresly Mercurius Trismegistus in the first chapter of Pymander assureth us of the resurrection of bodies as a thing infallible The great Athenagoras sheweth it was the doctrine of Pythagoras and Plato the two first lights of Philosophy And verily we have also the writings of Plato which witness the wicked shall be judged and condemned to hell in bodie and soul a passage alledged by S. Justine in the tenth of his Common-wealth and which is more this singular man to win us to this belief hath couched a very notable axiom in his Phedon where he saith that all 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Plato in Phaedon Plin. l. 7. c. 55. which is living in the world comes from some thing dead Democritus who was as Hippocrates affirmeth one of the wisest men in the world wished the bodies of the dead should be honourably used in respect of resurrection which Pliny could not dissemble Phocyllides said the same in verses written as with the rayes of the Sun Nay if we would consult with the tombs of the dead we shall find there hath not been any but some wicked and irregular spirits who have renounced the blessings of the other life as by publick profession causing it to be engraven on their tombs So did Sardanapalus the most infamous of men whose epitaph Aristotle having read said It was more fit for a hog than a King So did that wretched woman of Bress whose monument is yet to be seen in antiquities causing to be set over her ashes That after the death of her husband Vixi ultra â—â—tam nihil credidi Nihil unquam pâ—ccavit nisi quod mortua â—st Brisson formul she had been neither widdow nor wife and that her house served onely for a snare to loves Otherwise that during life she never believed any thing but life So did one Julia who caused also to be inscribed over her bones That she had lived seven and twenty years without committing any
of ours If we desire to sweeten the a cerbities of life and to replenish our hearts with the antipast of our immortality let us make a perpetual Pasch in our souls and reflect on our Jesus our Phenix who goeth out of his sepulcher on the day of his triumphs That the resurrection of Jesus Christ is the foundation of ours and we must behold his sweetness and glories as the sources of our eternity NAture which is an expression of Divine understanding Nature delighteth in contrarieties Discordant accords of the world is never so great and admirable as in contrarieties and it seems she takes delight to derive the goodliest harmonies of the world from certain disagreeing accords We admire contrarie motions in the heavens which compose an eternal peace In the air a bird which takes life from death and the beauty of her plumage from a tomb of ashes On earth bees bred in the throat of a dead Lion that find life in a savour able to kill them In the sea a fish named the holy fish which as histories say taking its original in the Kingdom of tempests fails not to create a calm by Ael l. 8. de animal its presence And among fountains we cannot sufficiently wonder at the water of Dodone into which a torch falling is put out and coming forth is lighted S. Isodo de fonte Epiri and Solinus Jesus Authour of nature beareth all these miracles in his own Person to make a miracle in our hearts and to draw them out of the dust and darkness from which he freed our bodies He is the great heaven which by motions of his life holily contrary unanimously divers and harmoniously disagreeing Miracles of the person of Jesus Isa 46. 11. hath made the accords of the Church militant and triumphant He is the bird of the East whereof Isaiah speaketh which glorifieth his tomb and quickneth his death to slay ours He is the Bee of the Celestial Father which from all Eternity having his hive in the heart of his Father soareth into the region of death to sit upon dying flowers which took away his life and put him into the throat of a lionness of a death which devouring all is devoured it self as saith the Apostle and from this gulf which yielded nothing issueth a life to be the seed of all lives It is the Divine fish of the Sybilles sacred by so 1. Cor. 15. many titles to consecrate all intelligent nature which after the rage of so turbulent a passion makes a great calm in the world which he establisheth by his fall quickeneth by his death washeth by his bloud and glorifieth by his torments He is the torch which entered dead into the river of Cocytus whereof holy Job Job 21. 53. speaketh and came out lighted and all environed with flames of a triumphant glorie Let us then say that God who by his providence Jesus entereth into his glory by his merit and by a singular predestination governeth the state of intellectual creatures in all perfect height and accomplishment of beatitude hath so tied glory to merit and merit to glory that he would not glorifie the Angels without giving them some moment of a wayfaring life and some exercise of meritorious actions to obtain the crown and consummation of felicity And consequently to the same purpose it is very true the most holy humanity of the worlds Saviour from the first instant of his beginning was inseparably united to the Divinity but not to be the lights Suspension of actual glory in the body of our Saviour and actual splendours which were incessantly to spring from this ineffable union of the Word to the flesh The Father ordained and the Son for our love received and freely accepted a suspension of the light of glory for the space of three and thirty years And although he had the foundation and root in himself the exercise of it was staid and proposed to him in the end of his race as the recompence of his painful life and unspeakable dolours of his death He naturally desired the glory of his body as our soul sticking in flesh and bloud vehemently covets a full liberty of its intellectual functions and behold here in this mysterie his desire is accomplished and this humanity darkened by the space of a long night of life hidden and buried in the obscurity of an ignominious death cometh from it as the Sun out of a cloud and makes a transfusion of himself into the bosom of ineffable lights which issue from the Sanctuary of the most holy Trinity In such sort that it is as a second birth of the most sacred humanity which being born to the communication of divine subsistence is here born to glory 5. Now observe if you please that as the lightening-flash Three properties of splendour in the resurrection of our Saviour which appeared in the face of the Angel messenger of the resurrection hath three properties the first is that it is a subtile part of enflamed elements the second that it is endowed with a splendour and sparkling which dazeleth humane eyes the third that it goes from one pole to another with an extream vivacity a shril sound So three things are observable in the glory which our Saviour entertained in his Resurrection first that this body taken from the clay of Adam and matter of elements became in an instant wholly invested in sweet and honourable flames of divinity secondly that he appeared with an Fles delectationum amoenitâ—s deliciarum veri amoris initium August homil in exurg Mariae A Remarkeable Psalm Psalmus David quando ei terra restituta est Alij quando fundata est terra Dominus regnavit decorem indutus est c. The triumphant glory of the Resurrection Emiss hom 1. in diem Paschae admirable beauty which made that S. dugustine gave him this title The flower of pleasures and the most purified pleasure of all delights the root of holy loves the third consisteth in the lustre of this great name which went from the East to the West from the South to the North filling the world with his wonders It seems this was divinely prophesied in the 29. Psalm which beareth a title very remarkeabe It is a Psalm sung by David to the Messias on the day when his land was restored to him to wit his body was rejoyned to his soul in the possession of glory and therefore he saith according to the paraphrase It is verily on this day our Saviour beginneth an eternal Empire and a supream Monarchy in his militant and triumphant Church It is on this day be cloathed himself with a body endowed with a flourishing beauty with beauty be took an invincible force which hath penetrated even into hell as divinely saith (a) (a) (a) Aeterna nox inferorum Christo descendente resplenduit silüit stridor ille lugentium catenarum disrupta acciderunt vincula damnatorum c. Eusebius
be therein sufficiently informed The Jews were heretofore the chosen people and are become the reprobate God for them drave back the waves of the read sea and suffered them to walk drie-foot between two waters as between two chrystal vaults and afterward why did he drown them so many times in rivers of their bloud with so horrible slaughters that in the whole siege of Jerusalem under Titus and Vespasian were reckoned according to Josephus his calculation eleven hundred thousand Vide Iosephum Hegesippum Thraenos dead God opened to them the sides of rocks to quench their thirst and afterward why dried he up the dugs of women who saw their little ones die between their arms they unable to give them one drop of milk God for them made Manna and clouds of Quails to showt and why afterward did he so afflict them with such cruel and enraged a famine that the hands of mercifull mothers slew and roasted on coals their own proper children and eat them to satisfie their hunger God carried them through deserts as upon eagles wings and wherefore afterward did he abandon them to eagles and vultures which so many times made carrion of the bodies of his children God had given them a land so fat and fruitful that it streamed altogether milk and honey and wherefore afterward had it entrails of iron denying food to the living yea burial to the dead God gave them strength as a devouring fire before which all Nations were but as straw and why afterwards became it the shuttle-cock of the arms of Infidels God gave them liberty for an inheritance and why afterward obtained they not so much as an honourable servitude Why at the siege of Jerusalem among so many thousand prisoners did they so much disdain to make use of a Jew that there being never a a Cross to crucifie them they were reserved for beasts to devour them rather than derive any service from them God gave them knowledge and wherefore afterwards became they blockish idle and stupid in all learning God ordained for them the assistance and protection of Angels and why afterward forsook they their Temple crying out aloud Let us depart let us depart from hence God destined to them Royalty and Empire over neighbouring Nations and why afterward had they not one inch of land at their own dispose and especially of land where formerly Jerusalem was built unless they purchased it with money onely to enjoy it one hour or two in the year and weep over it and bedew it with the water of their eyes after they had so often moistened it with their bloud God established priest-hood to them and afterwards what became of Jerusalem the Holy What became of Solomon's Temple the miracle of the world Where is the Propitiatory the Table of Proposition-bread the Rational which was before the peoples oracle Where is the majesty of High-priests the comeliness of Prelates the perpetuity of Sacrifices From whence comes it that it is above fifteen hundred years ago since this miserable Nation goes wandering through the Regions of the earth as abandoned into an eternal exile without Priests without Temple without Sacrifice without Prince King or government O eternal God how hast thou thrown down thy foot-stool O God of justice how hast thou made desolate thy royal Priesthood O God of vengeance how hast thou suffered thy Sanctuary to be profaned Who hath ever heard speech of such a punishment There have been adulteries rapines concussions gluttonies yea and idolatries which God hath not revenged in this manner A captivity of three-score and ten years expiated all these sins but this after fifteen hundred years to what sin may we attribute it but to the neglect of the essence of the Word Incarnate After the time that the Son of God shut his eyes steeped in tears and bloud over the miserable Jerusalem he never hath opened them to afford them mercy A Lord so sweet so mild so clement as that he raised thieves almost from bloud and robbery in an instant to thrones of glory for having acknowledged and confessed his name so roughly to chastise the neglect of his authority for the space of so many Ages what meaneth this but to prove the opposing of the divine Essence of God is a crime of all the most hydeous and unspeakable Run over the Histories of antiquity as long as you Tragical events of the wicked please revolve in your memory all the experiences which your Age may afford and if you see the impious come to a good end say There is no cause of fear Cain their Patriarch banished from the sight of God lived long like a melancholy spirit among forrests with a perpetual affrightment until Lamech took away his life The Cainists were all drenched in the waters of the deluge Pharaoh drowned in the Red-sea Nebuchadnezzar turned into a beast Holofernes slain in his bed by the hand of a woman Senacherib lost one hundred four-score and five thousand men for a blasphemy Antiochus strucken with a horrible maladie Birds did eat the tongue of Nicanor and his hand was hanged up over against the Temple Heliodorus was visibly chastised by Angels Herodes Agrippa born from the Theater to the bed of death The President Saturninus strucken blind Hermianus eaten by worms in his Pretourship Leo the fourth all covered over with botches and carbuncles Bamba crowned with a diadem of pitch after his eyes were pulled out Julian the Apostate strucken with a dart from Heaven Michael the Emperour who had in his train a heap of young scoffers that in scorn counterfeited the ceremonies of the Church was torn in pieces as a victim by his own servants Olympius strucken with thunder in a bath And if we observe times more near Rogero dragged to a laystall Vanin burnt at Tholouse Alsan Calefat divided between fire and water and slain by his own hand Great eye of God which art ever open upon the sins of the earth who can steal himself from the lightning-flashes Great hand of God who thunderest and lightenest perpetually over rebellious heads who is able to resist thy justice Advice to Youth and such as too easily give way to impietie O Unfortunate youth who having received the first tincture of good instruction after thou wert bred with so much care and honour by those to whom thou owedst thy birth betrayest the tears of thy parents the travels of thy teachers and the whole hopes of the publick How canst thou embark thy self among these treacherous and ignominious associates How canst thou walk among so many shelves and precipices not so much as once opening thy eyes to behold the abyss thou hast under thy feet So many heads crushed in pieces under the Divine vengeance are as broken masts and shivers of a shipwrack advanced on the promontory of rocks to give notice of the deplorable events they have found whose examples thou still pursuest yet thou lookest on them with arms across and dallyest in
stept far into age bear the torch before youth Let women endeavour to establish piety which is the ornament of their sex Let children be well bred and trained within the laws of modesty Let the doctrine of Jesus Christ be sealed with the seal of good manners there is no Libertine but will be daunted at the sight of a life led according to the laws of Christianity For it is a mirrour which killeth basilisks by reverberation of their proper poison But if blasphemers continue still so impudent as to vomit forth unclean and injurious words against the Religion we profess have not laws which are in the power of the Sovereign Princes on earth and of their Ministers of State iron hands able to stay their most daring impudencies I call you hither O holy Prelates O Monarchs To the great-ones of all Christendom Princes and Potentates who are in the world as the great Intelligences who make the Heavens move and who by diversity of your aspects cause calms and storms in this inferiour region wherein we live I pray tell me where do you think hath glory which you naturally love placed its throne and state if not in the bosom of true piety By what degrees are those immortal spirits of your Ancestours mounted up to the joys and delights of God having replenished the earth with the veneration of their memory if it were not by making the honour of the Sovereign Master march in the front of all their designs and thinking nought their own but what was acquired for God Remember you are not altogether like the Angel Apo. 10. of the Apocalyps which beareth the Sun and Rainbows and all the garnishments of glory on feet of brass you enjoy dignities and supereminencies that draw the Great-ones into admiration astonish inferiours attract people evict honour and wonder from all the world But consider if so you please that all this is onely supported on feet of clay and morter Time changeth you cares consume you maladies assail you death takes and despoileth you They who adored you in thrones may one day trample on you in sepulchers Alas if it happen you carry all your own interests with violence of passion to the height of your pretensions and that you hold Religion and the glory of Jesus in a perpetual contempt what will your soul one day answer when it leaves the body unto the thundering voice of a living God saying to you as he did to Cyrus in Isaiah Assimilavi te non cognovisti Isaiah 45. me I called thee by thy name I created thee like unto my self I made thee a little God on earth and thou hast forgotten me I so many times marched before thy standards many times have I humbled the most glorious of the earth for thee I brake brazen gates pulled down iron bars to afford thee hiden treasures and the wealth of Ages which nature for thee preserved in her bosom The Sun seemed not to shine in the world but to enlighten thy greatness the seas surged for thee and for thee the earth was wholly bent to honour and obedience Admirer of thy self and ignorant of Gods works thou hast so ill husbanded my goods that thou hast changed them all into evils I gave thee rays and thou hast made arrows of them to shoot against me Did I seat thee on thrones that there thy passions might sway Did I imprint on thy forehead the character of my greatness that thou mightest authorize crimes Thou hadst a feeble pretext of Religion and hast neglected the effects Thy interests reigned and my honour suffered in thy house At what aimed thy ambition so strong of wing and so weak of brain which onely thought how to envy what was above the more to oppress any thing below it What did that burning avarice that profuse riot that spirit of bloud and flesh employed in the advancement of thine own house to the contempt of mine For an inch of land a wretched matter of profit the fantasie of an affront jealousie onely subsisting in a body of smoke all the elements must be troubled men and swords drawn forth for revenge and bloud of so many mortals shed but for my Name which is blasphemed it is sufficient to wag the finger to shew onely a cold countenance a slight touch of that great authority whilst I was neglected having done no other fault but to have paid ingratitudes with benefits O you Great-ones who sit at the stern of Churches and temporal Estates how far will you become accountable to Gods justice if you place not his honour in the first rank of all your intentions Alas Ought not you to entertain an ardent zeal towards the Religion which our Ancestours consigned unto us with so many examples of piety that Heaven hath not more stars than we lights before our eyes Can we well endure that the verities and maxims of God which the Prophets foretold us the Apostles pronounced the Confessours professed the Martyrs defended in the piece-meal mangling of their bodies amidst combs and iron hooks burning cauldrons wheels armed with keen razours should now adays be the sport of certain giddy spirits and the aim of profane lips who void of wit or shame dare invade holy things Is it not for this O France the beloved of God and orient pearl of the world thou hast seen in thy bosom so many hostilities such contagions famines monsters and devastations that had not the arm of God supported thee thou wouldst have been long since drenched in irrecoverable confusions O you who bear the sword of justice and have authority in your hands will you not one day say All Omnis qui zelum habet legis statuens testamentum suum exeat post me they who have the zeal of the law and the pietie of our Ancestours follow us couragiously for behold we are readie to revenge the quarrels of God and to account his glorie on earth in the same degree the Angels hold it in Heaven This was the conceit of the valiant Machabee the Prince of Gods people who having seen an Apostate of his Nation offer incense to an Idol slew him with his own hand on the very same Altar saying aloud He who hath the zeal of the law let him Vae mihi quis natus sum videre contritionem populi mei Sancts in manu extrantcrum facts sunt c. Nunc ergo silii aemulatores estote legis date animas vestras protestamento Patrum Moriamur in virtule propter fratres nostros non inferamus crimen gloriae nostre follow me Wo to me since I am born to behold the desolation of my people Holy things are in the hands of strangers The Temple hath been handled as the most wicked man on earth Our mysteries our beauties our glories are desolated To what purpose do I still lead a miserable life Fathers of families will you not say to your children what he did to his Children be ye emulatours
on thy part what ingratitudes on mine Preserve me in what is thine and wash away with the precious bloud of thy Son what is mine Shelter me under the wings of thy protection from so many shadows apparitions and snares of the father of darkness and grant that though sleep close my eys yet my heart may never be shut to thy love Lastly fall asleep upon some good thought that your night as the Prophet saith may be enlightened with the delights of God and if you chance to have any interruption of sleep supply it with ejaculatory prayers and elevations of heart as the just did of old called for this reason The crickets of the night Thus shall you lead a life full of honour quiet and satisfaction to your self and shall make every day a step to Eternity The marks which may amongst others give you good hope of your predestination are eleven principall 1. Faith lively simple and firm 2. Purity of life exempt ordinarily from grievous sins 3. Tribulation 4. Clemency and mercy 5. Poverty of spirit disengaged from the earth 6. Humility 7. Charity to your neighbour 8. Frequentation of the blessed Sacrament 9. Affection to the word of God 10. Resignation of your own mind to the will of your Sovereign Lord. 11. Some remarkable act of virtue which you have upon occasion exercised You will find this Diary little in volume but great in virtue if relishing it well you begin to put it in practice It contains many things worthy to be meditated at leisure for they are grave and wise precepts choisely extracted out of the moral doctrine of the Fathers Though they seem short they cost not the less pains Remember that famous Artist Myrmecides employed more time to make a Bee than an unskilfull workman to build a house EJACULATIONS FOR THE DIARY In the Morning MY voice shalt thou hear in the morning O Lord In the morning will I direct my prayer unto thee and will look up Psal 5. 3. Thou shalt make thy face to shine upon me and all the beasts of the forest shall gather themselves together and lay them down in their dens Psal 184. 22. My dayes are like the dayes of an hireling Untill the day break and the shadows flie away Job 7. 1. Cant. 4. 6. Beginning a good work In the volume of the book it is written of me I delight to do thy will O my God yea thy Law is within my heart Psal 40. 7. 8. In good Inspirations The Lord God hath opened mine ear and I was not rebellious neither turned away back Isaiah 50. 5. At Church How amiable are thy Tabernacles O Lord of hosts Psal 84. 1. Before reading Speak Lord for thy servant heareth 1 Samuel 3. 9. Speaking My heart is inditing a good matter I speak of the things which I have made touching the King Psal 45. 1. Eating Thou openest thine hand and satisfiest the desire of every living thing Psal 145. In Prosperity If I do not remember thee let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth If I prefer not thee above my chief joy Psal 137. 6. Adversity The Lord killeth and maketh alive 1 Sam. 2. 6. Shall we receive good at the hand of God and shall we not receive evil Job 2. 10. Ought not Christ to have suffered these things and to enter into his glorie Luke 24. 26. Troubles Surely man walketh in a vain shew surely they are disquieted in vain Psal 39. 6. Calumnies If I pleased men I should not be the servant of Christ Gal. 1. 10. Praises Not unto us O Lord not unto us but unto thy Name give glorie Psal 115. 1. Against vain hope As a dream when one awaketh so O Lord when thou awakest thou shalt despise their image Psalm 73. 20. Pride Whosoever exalteth himself shall be abased Luke 14. 11. Covetousness It is more blessed to give than to receive Acts 20. 35. Luxury Know ye not that your bodies are the members of Christ 1. Cor. 6. 15. Envy He that loveth not his brother abideth in death 1 John 3. 14. Gluttony The Kingdom of God is not meat and drink Rom. 14. 17. Anger Learn of me for I am meek and lowly in heart Matth. 11. 29. Sloth Cursed be he that doth the work of the Lord negligently Jer. 48. 10. Rules of Faith God cannot be known but by himself What is to be understood of God is to be learned by God Hilar lib. 5. de Trin. God doth not call us to the blessed life by hard questions In simplicity must we seek him in piety profess him Idem lib. 10. Remove not the ancient bounds which thy fathers have set Prov. 22. 28. Many are the reasons which justly hold me in the bosom of the Catholick Church Consent of people and nations Authority begun by miracles nourished by hope encreased by charity confirmed by antiquity August lib. De utilitate credendi To dispute against that which the universal Church doth maintenance is insolent madness Idem Epist 118. Let us follow universality antiquity consent Let us hold that which is believed every where always by all Vincentius Lyrinensis De profanis vocum novitatibus Acts of Faith Lord I believe help thou mine unbelief Marc. 9. 24. I know that my Redeemer liveth c. Job 19. 25. Hope Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death I will fear no evil for thou art with me Psal 24. 4. I will be with him in trouble I will deliver him and honour him Psal 90. 15. Charity Whom have I in heaven but thee and there is none upon earth that I desire besides thee My flesh and my heart faileth but God is the strength of my heart and my portion for ever Psal 73. 25 26. Feed me O Lord thy suppliant with the continual influence of thy Divinity This I request this I desire that vehement love may throughly pierce me fill me and change me into it self Blosius PRAYERS for all Persons and occasions For the Church WE beseech thee O Lord graciously to accept the prayers of thy Church that she being delivered from all adversitie and errour may serve thee in safety and freedom through Jesus Christ our Lord. For the King WE beseech thee O Lord that thy servant CHARLS by thy gracious appointment our King and Governour may be enriched with all encrease of virtue whereby he may be able to eschew evil and to follow Thee the Way the Truth and the Life through Jesus Christ our Lord. For a Friend ALmighty and ever-living Lord God have mercy upon thy servant N. and direct him by thy goodness into the way of eternall salvation that through thy grace he may desire those things which please thee and with his whole endeavour perform the same through Jesus Christ our Lord. For Peace O God from whom all holy desires all good counsels and all just works do proceed give unto us thy servants that peace which the world cannot give that both our hearts may be set
to obey thy Commandments and also that by thee we being defended from the fear of our enemies may pass our time in rest and quietness through the merits of Jesus Christ our Saviour In the time of Plague LEt thy anger cease O Lod and be appeased for the iniquity of thy people as thou hast sworn by thy self O holy God holy and strong holy and immortal have mercy upon us For the Clergy ALmighty and everlasting God who by thy Spirit dost sanctifie and govern the whole body of the Church graciously hear our prayers for all those whom thou hast ordained and called to the publick service of thy Sanctuary that by the help of thy grace they may faithfully serve thee in their several degrees through Jesus Christ our Lord. For a Citie COmpass this Citie O Lord with thy protection and let thy holy Angels guard the walls thereof O Lord mercifully hear thy people For the sick O God the onely refuge of our infirmities by thy mighty power relieve thy sick servants that they with thy gracious assistance may be able to give thanks unto thee in thy holy Church through Jesus Christ For grace LOrd from whom all good things do come grant unto us thy humble servants that by thy holy inspiration we may think those things that be good and by thy merciful guiding may perform the same through our Lord Jesus Christ For the afflicted O Almighty God the afflicted soul the troubled spirit crieth unto thee Hear O Lord and have mercy for thou art a merciful God For friends I Beseech thee O Lord for all those to whom I am indebted for my birth education instruction promotion their necessities are known unto thee thou art rich in all things reward them for these benefits with blessings both temporal and eternal For enemies O God the lover and preserver of peace and charity give unto all our enemies thy true peace and love and remission of sins and mightily deliver us from their snares through Jesus Christ our Lord. For travellers ASsist us mercifully O Lord in our supplications and prayers and dispose the way of thy servants towards the attainment of everlasting salvation that among all the changes and chances of this mortal life they may ever be defended by thy most gracious and ready help through Christ our Lord. For a Family ALmighty and everlasting God send down thy holy Angel from heaven to visit protect and defend all that dwell in this house through Jesus Christ our Lord. For the dying FAther of spirits and God of all flesh receive the souls which thou hast redeemed with thy bloud returning unto thee For the fruits of the earth O God in whom we live and move and have our being open thy treasure in the due season and give a blessing to the works of thy hands For women in travel O Lord of thy goodness help thy servants who are in pains of child-birth that being delivered out of their present danger they may glorifie thy holy name blessed for ever Against temptation ALmighty God which dost see that we have no power of our selves to help our selves keep thou us both outwardly in our bodies and inwardly in our souls that we may be defended from all adversities which may happen to the body and from all evil thoughts which may assault and hurt the soul through Jesus Christ For misbelievers and sinners ALmighty and everliving God who desirest not the death of a sinner mercifully look upon all that are deceived by the subtility of Satan that all evil prejudice laid aside they may return to the unity of thy truth and love For Prisoners O God who didst deliver S. Peter from his chains and restoredst him to liberty have pitie upon thy servants in captivity release their bonds and grant them freedom and safety for his merits who liveth and reigneth with thee and the holy Ghost ever one God world without end For temporal necessaries REplenish those O Lord we beseech thee with temporal nourishment whom thou hast refreshed with thy blessed Sacraments Against tempests DRive spiritual wickedness from thy house O Lord and preserve it from the malignity of tempestuous weather A Prayer of Thomas Aquinas before study O Unspeakable Creatour who out of the treasure of thy wisdom hast ordained Hierarchies of Angels and hast placed them above the highest heaven in a wonderfull order and disposed them sweetly for all parts of the world Thou the true fountain and incomprehensible principle of light and wisdom vouchsafe to illuminate the darkness of my understanding with a beam of thy light remove the darkness wherein I was born sin and ignorance Thou who makest the tongues of infants eloquent loosen my tongue and pour forth the grace of thy spirit upon my lips give me acuteness to apprehend capacity to retain subtility to interpret aptness to learn readiness to speak direct my beginning further my progression and perfect my conclusion THE PENITENT OR ENTERTAINMENTS for LENT And for the first day upon the Consideration of Ashes THou art Dust and to Dust thou shalt return Genes 3. 1. It is an excellent way to begin Lent with the consideration of Dust whereby Nature gives us beginning and by the same Death shall put an end to all our worldly vanities There is no better way to abate and humble the proudest of all Creatures than to represent his beginning and his end The middle part of our life like a kind of Proteus takes upon it several shapes not understood by others but the first and last part of it deceive no man for they do both begin and end in Dust It is a strange thing that Man knowing well what he hath been and what he must be is not confounded in himself by observing the pride of his own life and the great disorder of his passions The end of all other creatures is less deformed than that of man Plants in their death retain some pleasing smell of their bodies The little rose buries it self in her natural sweetness and carnation colour Many Creatures at their death leave us their teeth horns feathers skins of which we make great use Others after death are served up in silver and golden dishes to feed the greatest persons of the world Onely mans dead carcase is good for nothing but to feed worms and yet he often retains the presumptuous pride of a Giant by the exorbitancie of his heart and the cruel nature of a murderer by the furious rage of his revenge Surely that man must either be stupid by nature or most wicked by his own election who will not correct and amend himself having still before his eyes Ashes for his Glass and Death for his Mistress 2. This consideration of Dust is an excellent remedy to cure vices and an assured Rampire against all temptations S. Paulinus saith excellently well That holy Job was free from all temptations when he was placed upon the smoke and dust of his humility He that lies upon the ground can
Death 24 Its Attendants 66 Meditation of Death 67 Death of the Just is sweet 415 Quality of a good Death is the indifferency of time and manner 416 Worldly irresolutions of Death 417 The way how to be well provided for Death 418 A good Death must have Union with God 419 A notable Aenigma of Death 436 Devotion defined 467 That the great number of Devout men should settle men in Devotion 82 The adhering to creatures doth marre all in Devotion ib. Pretext of Devotion dangerous illustrated by the Fowler 203 Devotion subject to many illusions and the reason why 381 Gross and afflicting Devotion 382 Three blemishes of anxious Devotion ibid. Quaint Devotion 383 The pomp and practises of this Devotion ibid. Reasons of the nullity of this Devotion 284 Transcendent Devotion ibid. Illusions of this Transcendent Devotion 385 S. Lewis the true Table of Solid Devotion 387 State of the Church under Diocletian 234 His conditions ibid. He forsaketh the Empire 235 Dissimulation reigneth every where 394 Dissimulation doth ruin humane faith 395 Dissimulation shamefull to the Authour of it ibid. Dissimulation doth debase a man ibid. The horrours and hatred of Dissimulation 396 The troubles and miseries of Dissimulation ibid. The dreadfull Events of Dissemblers ibid. The power of the Divinity over Infidels 346 Different opinion of the Divinity 348 It is a sacriledge to make Divinity of proper Interest 390 How abominable vicious Domesticks are 17 Duels unlawfull 14 A Duel is no act of Courage ibid. Who anciently entered into Duels ibid. There is want of Generosity in Duels ibid. Authors of Duels 224 Courage of Duellers like to that of the possessed 22â— Dydimus his bold attempt 86 E EDucation its force 15 Defects of Education ibid. Moses educated in the Court. 16 Education of Children recommended by excellent passages of the holy Fathers 17 Eleazar his Combat 347 The Isle of Amber the felicity of Epicurus 40â— The Philosophie of Epicurus doth bear sway in the world 404 The foundation of Episcopal life 180 Eponina a rare example of Conjugal Piety 306 Errours of the Time 341 Eternity of nothing first humilation of man 349 Eucharist the foundation of Paradise 72 Greatness of the Eucharist ibid. Eusebius the Patron of Hereticks 252 Eustatius his Oration at the opening of the Councel 253 Evils generally proceed from ignorance and from the want of the knowledge of God 62 Evil alwayes beareth sorrow behind it but not true pennance 66 Eudoxia mother of Theodosius 138 Her humour ibid Bishops treat with her ibid. Her Zeal ibid. She goeth into Palestine 147 Her return is laboured by Chrysaphius ibid. She lived in the Holy Land in the Eutychian heresie 153 Her Conversion 155 Her worthy life and glorious death ibid. Remedies and reasons against Excess 52 Indignity of Excess in apparel ibid. Necessity of Examen 71 Six things in the Examen to employ the most perfect ibid. Ill Example the work of Antichrist 22 Exemplar crimes deserve Exemplar punishments 23 An Observation upon the Chariot of Ezechiel 451 F FAith what it is and the dignity thereof 62 Its Object and the manner of its working ibid. Touch-stone to know whether we have Faith 63 Heroick acts of Faith ibid. How acts of Faith may be made easie 64 What ought to be the Faith of good Communicants 72 To be Faithfull to the King one must be loyal to God 236 To be Faithfull is to be conformable to reason 340 The great Providence of God in the establishment of Faith ibid. The repose which our Faith promiseth 341 Constancy of Faith 417 Fathers and Mothers compared to Ostriches 16 Fantasies to gain honours 25 Conclusions against Fatalitie 36 Maxims of Fatalitie 365 Favorinus his excellent Observations 10 Excellency of Fidelity 395 Flattery punished 349 Flattery inebriateth Great-men from the Cradle 46 Great Spirits enemies to the Flesh 405 Immoderate love of health doth make a man become suppliant and servile to the Flesh 406 Plotinus a great enemy to his own Flesh 405 Instance upon the weakness and miserie of the Flesh ibid. Hierom his Observation upon the Flower of Box. 406 A notable Fable of the Flie and Silk-worm 43 Fortitude defined 486 Fantasies of Ancients upon the Names of Fortune 360 Fortune is in the power of Providence ibid. A Conclusion against those who curse Fortune 362 Manners are changed with Fortune 364 G GAramant the Fountain 301 GOd's hands a golden bowl full of the Sea 9 God named Obliging in the beginning of the World 19 God a great Thesis 22 God is better known to us than our selves 344 God most easie to be known ibid. All things contribute to the knowledge of God 345 God in this life handleth the wicked as the damned 348 God is who he is 349 Excellency of the Simplicity and Universality of God in comparison of the World 350 Perfections of God 351 God his Goodness 355 367 An excellent similitude of God with the Ocean 351 The God of Hosts besiegeth a Citie 217 Diversity of Gods 349 Gods pastime what it is 42 Why God admitted not the Ostrich and Swan into the number of Victims ibid. Knowledge of the Goodness Justice and Power of God 356 357 God governeth the world with two hands 430 God will replenish us with himself 437 Desperate desire of worldly Goods 418 Gratian the son of Valentinian 200 His excellent qualities 201 Affectionate words of S. Ambrose unto him ibid. His zeal and virtue by the direction of S. Ambrose ibid. His admirable Charity 202 Maximus rebellâ—th against him ibid. His pitifull death 204 Gratitude in the Law of God 20 Excellent proofs of natural Gratitude 19 Gratitude defined 488 The acts of Gratitude 90 Gratitude of the Hebrews ibid. Practise of S. Augustine to encourage himself to Gratitude 20 Greatness of God 437 Greatness of an honest man 48 Lives of Great-ones enlightened 6 The great virtue of Great-ones 7 Authority of Great-ones to strengthen Devotion 8 Great-ones heretofore have perverted the world 21 Great-ones that are vicious draw on themselves horrible execrations of God 23 Great-ones strangely punished 24 Three sorts of Great ones do make Fortune 25 True Devotion in Great-ones 60 Humility of Great-ones 92 A good Document for Great-ones 139 Plague of Great-ones 140 Great-ones are the flatterers of Gods 349 H HEart of man what it is 69 HEbrews horribly persecuted 347 Heliogabalus his wheel 57 Hell defined 432 How the fire of Hell burneth 430 Helena the Beauty and grace of her time 236 She is married to Constantius ibid. Her exceeding virtue ibid. Exceeding love of Constantius and Helena ibid. Effects of Heresie 35 Herod depresseth the Royal Stock 117 His deep Hypocrisie and Dissimulation 120 He is accused for the death of Aristobulus ibid. His Apologie for himself full of craft 121 His Oration against his Wife 125 His fury after the death of Mariamne 127 He advanceth Antipater his son whom he had by Doris 128 His horrible condition in his latter days 134 Herod's
for pretexts to cover their passions some saying It is a touch from heaven and an effect of their Horoscope which cannot be diverted Others Casus in culpam transit Velleius Pater culus complain they are bewitched and that they feel the power of magick Others cast all the blame upon devils who notwithstanding think not so much of them as they may imagine for love comes easily enough from naturall causes without going about to seek for it in the bottome of the Abysse I here remember what Pliny recounteth of one Cresin who manured a piece of ground which yielded him fruit in abundance while Plin. l. 18. c. 16. his neighbours lands were extreamly poor and barren for which cause he was accused to have enchanted them Otherwise said his accuser his inheritance could not raise such a revenue while others stand in so wretched a Condition But he pleading his cause did nothing else but bring forth a lusty daughter of his well Filiam validam bene curatam fed and well bred who took pains in his garden with strong carts and stout oxen vvhich ploughed his land and the vvhole equipage of his Tillage in very good order He then cryed out aloud before the Judges Behold the art magick and charms of Cresin vvilling to shew that we must not seek for hidden and extraordinary causes where ordinary are so evident So in the like case we may say it is a thing most ridiculous Haec sunt veneficia mea Quirites to see a body composed according to nature found and very strong which hath fire in the spirits and bloud in the veins which continually feeds high lies soft and perpetually converseth among women the most handsome to complain of celestiall influences or the sorseries of Venus Totall Nature especially since Interiour causes of love the corruption of sin conspireth to make love It sets Reason to sale if it carefully take not heed and insensibly draweth it to its side There is not almost a stone whereunder some scorpion lyeth not there is not a place where concupiscence spreadeth not out some net for us It fighteth against our selves makes use of our members as of the Instruments of its battels and the Organs of its wiles There is sedition within and warre without and never any repose but by the singular grace of God Tertullian writes the chastity Tertull. de Velandis Continentia majoris ardoris laboratior of men is the more painfull the fervour of concupiscence being the more fiery in their sex and one may justly say that such as persist all their life time in great resistances and notable victories are Martyrs of purity who having passed through fire and water hasten to a place of refreshment We have all one domestick enemy which is our own body that perpetually Rebellion of the flesh S. Climach de castita te grad 15. in fine Quomodo illum vinciam quam ut amem a natura suscepimus Est cooperator hostis adjutator atque adversarias auxiliator simul infidiator c. almost opposeth the dispositions of the spirit If I go about to fetter it saith S. John Climachus it gets out of my hands If I will judge it it grows into favour with me If I intend to punish it it flatters me If I will hate it Nature commandeth me to love it If I will fly from it it saith it is tyed to my soul for the whole time of my life If I will destroy it with one hand I repair it with another Is it too much cherished it the more violently assaults me Is it too much mortified it cannot almost creep watching withers it sleep on the other side fatteneth it whips torment it and dandlings corrupt it By treating it ill I endanger my life by pampering it I incurre death This sheweth how Saints fortified themselves with much precaution diligently observing the condition of Nature the causes of temptations and the maladies of the soul thereby the more successefully to practise the cure They who are most retired said the fore-alledged Authour fail not to feel domestick warres but such as indifferently expose themselves to objects are violently both within and without assaulted The beauty and handsomnesse of one sex is a sweet Beauty imperious Nomen 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Psal 49. Alii reddunt fetam alii pulchâ—it udinem ut sept naginta Interpretes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 poison to the other which entreth in by the eyes and maketh strange havock And I wonder not at all that the Scripture compares it to a Panther a savage and cruel beast which with teeth teareth those she hath amuzed with the mirrour-like spots of her skin drawn to her by the sweet exhalation of her body It is more to be feared said an Ancient then the horns of the Bull the teeth of the Lion the gall of the Aspick yea then fire or flames and the holy Abbot of mount Sinai saith that had not God given woman shamefac'tnesse which is the scabbard wherein this sword is Climach de castreate kept there would be no salvation in the world The love of women caused Sampson's David's and Salomon's shipwracks It hath besotted Sages conquered the strong deceived the prudent corrupted saints humbled the mighty It hath walked on Sceptres The love of women dangerous parched the lawrels of victours thrown trouble into states schisme into Churches corruption among judges fury into arms It hath entered into places which seemed inaccessible but to spirits and lightnings And if beauty be so much to be dreaded when it hath no other companions how dangerous think we is it when it causeth to walk along with it pomp apparell attractives dalliances cunning wires liberty of conversation merriment Good chear Courting Idlenesse Night sollitude familiarity Need we to require any other charms then those to work the ruine of a soul Yet besides these open causes there are other secret ones to be found in the love of humour and fantasie which insensibly fetter a mind and suffer it not to find its chains A modern Authour hath of late written a treatise of the love of inclination wherein he speaks very pertinently of its originall and doth according to his saying Monsiur de la Chambre seem to draw it a second time out of its Chaos To understand his opinion we must presuppose that which S. Thomas saith That totall Nature loveth to present it self in the objects proposed unto it And as they continually proceed from all things coloured images S. Thom. l. 4. contra gentes c 11. The secret attractives of love and figures as it were wholly spirituall which make themselves to be seen as in looking-glasses and are received into the eies to contribute to the effect of sight so every body hath its projections and unperceivable influences as we find in the power of Amber and the Adamant which attract Iron and straw by the expiration they
eyes and saw not ears and heard not senses and felt not she was not where she was for she was wholly where her Master was although she knew not where he was She knew no other art but that of love she had unlearnt to fear to hope to rejoyce to be sad all in her turned to love by reason of him whom she loved above all The Angels who descended from heaven to comfort her were to her troublesome nor could she endure them she stood upright near the sepulchre where in the place of death she found her heaven Now as in efficacious plyantnesses are flowers of Liberality love which never bring forth any fruit so it takes a second quality which is to be liberall and much obliging For this cause the hands of the bridegroome according to the Canticles are all of gold and round to shew there is not any thing crooked or rough to stay Cant. 5. 14 Manus ejus tornatiles aureae plenae Hyacinthis alia versio Globi aurei pleni mari his gifts besides they are all filled with pretious stones to figure his benefits unto us Jacinths and Diamonds which he scattereth and bestoweth as liberally as the sand of the sea The Hebrew saith that the same hands are vessels of gold replenished with the sea because love is an Ocean of liberalities which is never exhausted There remains nothing but to be patient which it Patience Pennas habet non pondus Ailredus doth with so much grace that one may say its yoke hath wings not weight The heart of it oft-times is invironed with thorns and it sweareth they are roses It swims in a sea of worm-wood and faith it is sweet water It is covered all over with wounds and protesteth they are Pearls and Rubies It is overwhelmed with affairs and maintains they are recreations It is surcharged with maladies and they are sports with calumnies and they are blessings with death and that is life These three qualities cause twelve very notable effects Twelve effects of love in love which are To love God above all and in comparison of him to despise all To account ones self unhappy if but a very moment diverted from his sweet Ideas To do all that may be and to endure all things impossible to come near him To embellish and adorn our soul to please him To be alwayes corporally present with him as in the Sacrament or spiritually as in prayer To love all which is for him and to hate all which is not for him To desire that he may be declared confessed praised and adored by all the world To entertein all the most sublime thoughts that is possible of his dear person To passe over with sweetnesse all the acerbities suffered in his service To accommodate ones self to all his motions and to receive both sad and joyfull things with his countenance To languish perpetually with the desires to behold him face to face and lastly To serve him without anxiety or expectation of reward These things being so sublime we must not presume to arrive thither at the first dash It is very fit to file and continually to polish our soul by long services and goodly actions to arrive in the end at the happy accomplishment of love For this cause there are reckoned certain degrees by which the soul is led to the pallace of this triumphant Monarch There is a love as yet but young which doth onely begin and hath five degrees within the compasse whereof it dilates it self to passe to a much greater perfection It beginneth first by the taste of the word of God and the sweetnesse it feels by the reading of good books which is a sign that a soul already hath an arrow of true love in the heart This taste maketh a man take good resolutions for the amendment of his manners and order of his life this resolution is followed by a happy penance which bewaileth all the imperfections of the life past with a bitter distaste and a fit satisfaction By this way we proceed to the love of a neighbour and a beginning is made by a tender compassion of his afflictions and a rejoycing at his prosperities Lastly or addicts himself much to many very laudable good works and to the holy exercises of mercy Behold here a most sincere condition and to be wished in many men of honour who may therein persist with great constancy The second order comprehendeth those which are Three orders of true lovers of the World yet more strong and it conteineth five other degrees First they are very assiduous in prayer wherein they are much enlightned with the knowledge of verities and celestiall maximes Secondly they obtain an excellent purity of conscience which they cleanse and polish by an enquiry into their interiour holily curious and perfectly disposed Thirdly they feel the exteriour man much weakned by a generous mortification wherewith concupiscence is quailed Fourthly followeth the vigour of the inward man who finds him self happily enabled to all the functions of the spirit with a certain facility which becometh as it were naturall to him Fifthly appeareth a great observance of the law of God which maketh him apprehend the least atomes of sin through a notable fidelity with which he desires to serve his master In this rank are many good religious who lead a life most accomplished in devotion and in the continuall mortification of senses Lastly in the third order of perfect lovers are the great effects of perfect charity as is not to have any humane and naturall considerations in all ones actions but to tread under foot all respect of flesh and bloud to defend truth Not to stick to earth by any root but to account all things worse then a dunghill to gain Jesus Christ to run before the Crosse and to bear the greatest adversities with a generous patience to love ones enemies to do good to persecutours and in conclusion freely to expose ones life for the salvation of a neighbour To say truly they had need to be persons most heroick to go so far and there is no doubt but this is the full accomplishment of love Notwithstanding nine degrees also are added of Seraphick love which concern Contemplatives which are Nine degrees of Seraphicall love for the contemplative The solitude of a heart throughly purified from all the forms of Creatures Silence in a sublime tranquillity of passions Suspension which is a mean degree between Angell and man Inseparability which adhereth to its welbeloved for an eternity not admitting the least disunion Insatiability which never is satiated with love Indefatigability which endureth all labours without wearinesse Languour which causeth the soul to dissolve and melt on the heart of its beloved Extasie which causeth a destitution of the vegetative and sensitive soul totally to actuate the intellectuall Deiformity which is a degree approching near to beatifick love Then is there made in the soul a deluge of mysterious and adorable
love which drowneth all humane thoughts which swalloweth all earthly affections which flieth to the superiour region of man which hideth all that is eminent in sciences transcendent in virtue great in imagination and which causeth the spirit to forget it self and to look on nothing but heaven § 12. The Practise of Divine Love THe love of God is a science inspired not studied where the infusion of the Holy Ghost is more eloquent then all Tongues and more learned then all Pens That which comes to us by art oft-times begins very late and quickly endeth That which is given us by the favour of heaven comes very readily and never is dost Those who think to learn the love of God by precepts onely croak like Ravens 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Pindarus and have nothing solid such as have it by grace are Angels who are raised into the highest region and poize themselves on their wings Grave discourses and good books fail not to contribute much to this purpose as we lately may have tried by the treatise which the R. F. Stephen Binet hath published fully replenished with the holy ardours of extraordinary devotion and which seem to have been dictated by love it self and conceived in that fire which Jesus came to enkindle on earth to enflame the whole world If then you desire to profit in this love let your endeavour The means to acquire the love of God be continually to beg it of God with the most fervent prayers which the holy Ghost shall suggest to esteem it above all worldly things and to apply all your actions to this happy conquest Be ye very carefull to cut off from your heart all impediments which may give it any obstacle for if you should imagine to entertain it in a soul sullied with terrestriall affections it were to ask a most precious Quot vitia habemus tot recentes habemus Deos Hieron Balm to put it in an unclean vessel We have as many Idolls in our heart as passions opposite to the law of God Be not satisfied with taking away vices but stifle the remembrance of worldly things which may in you occasion any exorbitancy Withdraw your mind as much as you can from a thousand imaginations which fly as aiery spirits about your heart when it begins to take wings to its repose Perplex not your self likewise more then is reason with affairs both spirituall and temporall which cause a thousand cares to arise and onely serve to quench the vigour of devotion and to draw out the juice of piety Fly acerbities of heart apprehensions and servitudes accustoming your self to do all with a spirit of sweetnesse and holy liberty Consequently make a practise of the love of God The practise of the love of God undertaking it with a resolute purpose a great application of mind and employing all possible industries to profit therein as one would in affecting some great bargain some very considerable office or affair most important For it is a very unworthy thing to behold all despicable Trades full of artisans who kill themselves How we may earn to love God above the love of the world Jnhonestos amatores ostendite si quis amore foeminae lasciviens vestit se aliter quà m amatae placet Aug. ler. 19. de verbis Apost to find out inventions that may set forth the profession and that onely the occupation of the love of God should have workmen so lazy and unnaturall After all following the counsel of S. Augustine consider what the children of darknesse often do to prosper in worldly loves and amities They strive to insinuate themselves by some good office they consider on every side the person of him of whom they would be beloved they study his nature his inclinations his desires his affairs and they oblige him ere he is aware in what he desireth most Are they entred into his amity they persist in the practise of great assiduities they have entertainments and admirable correspondencies they delight they serve they mingle the recreative with the serious They apply all they see all they think upon all they invent all they hope all they possesse all they say all they write to the contentment of this creature They draw tribute out of all for it and if it be possible will give it its hearts-wish in all things They transform themselves into its humours and likings They espouse its loves enmities quarrels and revenges They publish its virtues with discretion conceal its favours they have tricks to pacifie its anger to stir up its languours to open its heart to hold their possession and if it be needfull will passe through ten purgatories of fire ice tears bloud torrents seas enflamed serpents gnawing vultures to arrive at one of its pretentions O reproch that all this is done for a frivolous worldly love which oftentimes is the Hangman of life the gulf of Reason the Hell of souls and that there is none but Jesus for whom they will not so much ss stir a finger Make a resolution to insinuate your self into his friendship by some notable Act which you know to be acceptable to him and which he already hath required of you by so many inspirations Enter into his house and into his bosome render him assiduity in your prayers your meditations your communions and in all your exercises of devotion Learn to speak to him every hour by jaculatory prayers as one would to some friend tenderly loved and vehemently affected Referre all creatures to his love and love nothing but him but in him but for him publish his greatnesse every where make a thousand instruments of his glory but conceal his favours by a profound humility Behold men your like as his images Engrave all his words all his actions all his wounds in the bottome of your heart make your selves like him as much as you may bear him on your flesh suffering for him not onely with patience but alacrity through a desire of conformity Behold the principall means by which one may come to the love of God and to the unitive way Observe there withall the three Conditions which S. Bernard prescribeth to wit to love sweetly prudently strongly sweetly without violence prudently without illusion strongly without separation But there being nothing which more forcibly moveth That we learn to love God himself and by the character of his substance which is Jesus In medio animalium splendor ignis de igne fulgur egrediens Ezekiel 1. the soul then Example I advise you often to present unto your self the love of God and Jesus Christ which should be the source of ours and to make a sacred posy to your self of all the lovers who were most vehement in Divine Love Reflect O Christian soul upon the chariot of Cherubins in Ezechiel and thou shalt learn what God would have of thee I see saith the Prophet a clear and bright fire in the midst of these living Creatures and from
he fell into an extasie of holy comfort to have found a man so conform to his humour and both of them wept so much out of love over this fountain that they seemed to go about to raise those streams by their tears If he wrote a letter he imagined love gave him the pen and that he dipped it in his tears and that the paper was all over filled with instruments of the passion and that he sent his thoughts and sighs as Courtiers to seek out the well-beloved of his heart When he saw an Epistle or a letter wherein the name of Jesus was not premised it sensibly tormented him saying Sarazins had more devotion for Mahomet a man of sin setting his name in the front of all their letters then Christians had for their Redeemer A holy occasion one day drew him to a Church to hear excellent musick but he perceiving the words were of God and the tune according to the world he could not forbear to cry out aloud Cease profane men Cease to cast pearls into mire Impure airs are not fit for the King of virgins Some took delight to ask him many questions and he answered them nothing but the word love which he had perpetually in his mouth To whom belongest thou To love whence comest thou from love whither goest thou To love who begat thee Love Of what dost thou live upon love where dwellest thou In love He accounted them unworthy to live who died of any other death then of love and beholding a sick-man in an agony who shewed no feeling of joy to go unto God but onely complained of his pain he lamented him as a man most miserable At his entrance into a great Citie he asked who were the friends of God and a poor man being shewed him who continually wept for the love of heaven and heavenly things he instantly ranne to him and embracing him they mingled their tears together with unspeakable joy God often visited him by many lights and most sweet consolations as it happened at that time when he thought he saw a huge cloud between his Beloved and him which hindred and much troubled him but presently it seemed to him that love put it self between them both and gilded the cloud with great and admirable splendours in such sort that through this radiant beauty he saw a ray of the face of his well-beloved and for a long space spake to him with profusions of heart and admirations not to be expressed From this obsequious love he passed to obliging love and made a strong resolution to become profitable to all the world For which purpose feeling every moment to be replenished with sublime and divine thoughts which God had communicated to him and that he had no insight in Grammer nor other slight school-notions he resolved to learn the Latine tongue being now full fourty years old He hit upon a teacher one Master Thomas who taught him words conjugations and concords but he rendred him back again elate conceptions unheard of discourses and harmonies wholly celestiall so much honouring his Master that he dedicated the most part of his books to him wherein for the dead letter he offered unto him the spirit of life Not satisfied with this he added the Arabick tongue of purpose to convert the Mahumetans and for this end he bought a slave for whom having no other employment but to teach him it and he having therein already well profited and endeavouring to convert this wretched servant who had been his teacher the other found him so knowing and eloquent that he had an apprehension that through this industry he was able to confound the Mahumetan-law which was the cause that the Traitour espying his opportunity took a knife and sought to kill his Master but he stopt the blow and onely received a wound which proved not mortall All the house ran at the noise and there was not any one who would not have knocked down the ungratefull creature but he hindered it with all his might and heartily pardoned him in the greatest sharpnesse of his dolours Instantly the officers seized on this compassion and put him into prison where he was strangled repenting himself of nothing but that he had not finished his mischief which caused extreme sorrow in Raymond who bewailed him with many tender tears of compassion After this he undertook divers journies into France Spain Italy Greece and Africk wandring continually over the world and not ceasing to preach write and teach to advance the salvation of his neighbours Paris many times received him with all courtesie in such sort that the Chancellour Bertand who was infinitely affected to knowledges permitted him to reade them publickly in his hall The reverend Charter-house Monks whose houses have so often been sanctuaries for Learning and Devotion were his hoasts and so much he confided in their integrtty and sincerity that he with them deposed all which he had most precious The love of God which is as lightning in a cloud still striving to break forth suffered him not to rest but disposed him to undertake somewhat for the glory of God It is true he had first of all that purpose which afterwards our father S. Ignatius so gloriously accomplished for he was desirous to make Seminaries of learned and courageous spirits who should spread themselves throughout the world to preach the Gospel and to sacrifice themselves for the propagation of Faith For this cause he multiplied his voyages to Rome to Lions to Paris to Avignon incessantly solliciting Popes and Kings to so excellent a work without successe He used fervour and zeal therein but our father thereunto contributed more order and prudence The one undertook it in a crosse time during the passage of the holy See from Rome to Avignon where the Popes more thought upon their own preservation then tha conquests of Christianity The other knew how to take occasion by the fore-lock and he interessed Rome and the Popes thereof in his design The one made his first triall under Pope Boniface the Eighth who having dispossessed a Hermite of S. Peters Chair held those for suspected who were of the same profession fearing they a second time might make a head of the Church The other happened upon Paul the Third who was a benign Pope and he gained his good opinion by his ready services and submissions which tended to nothing but the humility of Jesus Christ The one embroiled himself too much in Sciences even unto curiosity and made them walk like Ladies and Mistresses the other held them as faithfull servants of the Crosse subjected to holy Humility The one stood too much upon his own wit and needs would beat out wayes not hitherto printed with any foot-steps nor conferred enough with the Doctours of his times in matters of Opinion and Concord the other passed through the surges of Universities and followed an ordinary trackt in the progression of his studies The one was of a humour very haughty the other of a spirit
at once when it is born with us and Utility of melancholy proportioned to the functions of our mind and motions of our body It is a land which seemeth somewhat dry but it hideth great treasures What would become Saturnus fuerit opti mè constitutus largitur scientiae profunditatem of subtilty of wit weight of judgement in conceits invention in sciences indefatigable labour in affairs constancy in resolutions a corrective for light humours beseemlinesse in modesty perseverance in devotion strength in meditation constancy in serious life patience in contempt exercise of humility if the Melancholick temperature and Saturnian influence did not thereto contribute solidity It 's that which maketh great Captains sage Counsellours of State divine Philosophers and the most famous Religious From whence it cometh that the Antiens called it the passion of Demy-gods Onely heed must be taken it run not into some excesse and render not nature sharp criticall Abditas 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Gellius l. 18 cap. 7. presumptuous inflexible and odious For by that means certain spirits too much do sooth their own humour using therein not any correction make themselves among company that which Aconite is among plants They are insupportable in conversation and Sad spirits oft-times mingling vanity with sharpnesse there is not any thing wherein they will not find somewhat to reprehend in words in sciences in affairs in sport in recreation in voyce in garb in habits and because nothing pleaseth them they many times displease all the world It is a great prudence in such as feel themselves naturally disposed to Melancholy to cultivate their mind and to take from it all which may make it harsh by a perpetuall countrepoise of sweetnesse and mildnesse The wicked Rutilius thought all the Anachorets Rutilius in Itinerat and Religious were sick of Bellerophon's disease which is a furious sadnesse but he is grosly deceived For it is undoubted there are great Religious persons who drawing nought out of Melancholy but solidity and constancy do associate unto it out of virtue a singular serenity of life so that it is a hard matter to find any of a humour more pliant and pleasing Palladius Pallad in hist Laufia in his Lausiac History maketh mention of a famous Abbot named Apolon who was the father and master of about five hundred Monks whom he maintained in so perfect alacrity that their countenances seemed to bear the characters of Celestiall tranquillity There were none sad and if any one seemed to be touched with heavinesse the good Abbot drove it away by his discourse as swiftly as the Northern wind dispelleth the clouds saying unto them It was for Jews for Gentiles and for sinnes to be contristated but good religious men ought to entertain an eternall commerce with Joy S. Athanasius saith of S. Anthony that his face S. Athan. c. 40. in vita S. Anton. was a looking-glasse wherein God caused the sanctity of his mind to be resplendent and that he alwayes seemed chearfull as if the bloomings of his heart had Dionyfius exiguus in vita S. Pachomii put his venerable face all into blossome So much saith Denis surnamed the little S. Pachomius a man very eminent who in body altogether dissolved with austerities and maladies did in conversation retain the vigour of holy alacrity It is an imitation of the Saviour of the world who according to the Prophet Esay was to be neither sad nor tempestuous And as pious Anna of whom is spoken in the first book of Non erit tristis neque turbulenrus Isa 42. 4. 1 Regum Vultus ejus non sunt amplius in diversa mutad Kings forsook all the countenances and crabbed looks which sadnesse caused in her so soon as she had conceived the little Samuel so we must inferre that a soul which is honoured with the spirituall conception of Jesus formed in his heart is able to drive away all the disturbances of dolour Otherwise if this evill humour of Sadnesse be cherished without breaking it upon all occasions by convenient diversions and the direction of reason it encreaseth with age and being aided by evil dispositions of body it often degenerateth into shamefull follies and hideous frenzies From thence are come those Melancholicks of whom Gallen speaketh Gal. c. 6. l. 3 de locis affectis whereof one thought himself to be an earthen-pot the other imagined he was a cock and ceased not to crow and clap his wings the other feared that Atlas would let the heavens fall And Trallianus assureth Trallian l. 1 cap 16. there was a woman who continually kept her hand very closely shut fearing lest the world which in her opinion was held between her fingers might escape her Such Melancholies saith S. Jerome stand more in need of Hippocrates his remedies then the discourses of Philosophers But laying aside these Sadnesses of naturall Melancholy it is fit to know that which proceedeth from a tedious anxiety of heart is very hurtfull to the practice of virtue and may be cured by the resolution and courage of a well-disposed will It is the malady which the Grecian calls Acedia against which Cassian wrote Cassian lib. de spiritu Acediae a whole book shewing it fastneth very easily upon persons who make profession of Devotion if they use not labour and study to divert it And verily there are people in no sort fit for Religion nor the exercises of Meditation who neverthelesse are therein embarked through levity or ignorance never having well weighed the greatnesse of that vocation But if they meet some spirituall Directours either indiscreetly Zealous or little experienced they will raise them from earth and instantly apply them to the highest contemplations drawing them from handy labours and employments of civil life I would willingly ask what can they else do but fall into the passion of slothfulnesse into anxieties and languors which make life unprofitable to them In the mean time they who have undertaken the charge to guide them in their Labyrinth make them many times believe these drynesse and disrelishes are the visitations of God who will try them and that they must go on and not faint nor suffer the honour of their crown to wither And there are who living as beasts in a meer lazinesse of spirit imagine it is an Inaction which causeth a cessation from all the functions of their soul to let the Spirit of God to work in them Hereupon we see some Devoters so well practised in this mystery that they abandon all the correspondencies due to a husband all the care of their children all the providence they ought to have for their family and houshold affairs to satisfie the fancies of their mind It is not Devotion which teacheth them this nor is it fit that Libertines hereby take occasion to condemn the exercise of piety It is an errour must be corrected and speedily such spirits must be reduced to labour and
for us we shall soon see one another and re-enter into the possession of those whose absence we a while lament It is not absence say you which most afflicteth me but to see my self destitute of a support which I expected that is it vexeth me Enter into thy heart lay thy hand on thy thoughts and they will teach thee that all thy unhappinesse cometh from being still too much tied to honours ambitions and worldly commodities I would divert thee as much as I might possibly from despair but I at this present find that the remedy of thy evils will never be but in a holy Despair of all the frivolous fair semblances of the world O how wisely said Vegetius That Despair is in many a necessity of virtue But more wisely S. John Climachus Veg. l 4. c. 5. Necessitas quaedam virtutis est desperatio Clym gr 3. peregrinatio vera est omnium protsus rerum desperatio who defining the life of a perfect Christian which he calleth the Pilgrimage did let these words fall True and perfect Religion is a generall Despair of all things O what a happy science is it to know how to Despair of all to put all our hope in God alone Let us take away those deceitfull and treacherous props which besiege our credulous minds and cease not to enter into our heart by heaps Let us bid adieu to all the charming promises of a barren and lying world and turning our eyes towards this celestiall Jerusalem our true countrey let us sing with the Prophet All the greatest comfort I have in this miserable life is that I often lift Levavi oculos meos in montes unde veniet auxilium mihi Auxilium meum à Domino qui fecit coelum terram Psal 120. up mine eyes to the mountains and towards heaven to see if any necessary succour comes to me from any place From whence can I hope more help or consolation then from the great God omnipotent who of nothing created this Vniverse and hath for my sake made an infinity of so many goodly creatures Should I see armed squadrons of thunders and lightnings to fall on me I would have a spirit as confident as if there were no danger Were I Si consistant adversùm me castra non timebit cor meum Psal 263. c. to passe through the horrours of death being in thy company I would fear no danger Moreover I hold it for a singular favour and it shall be no small comfort to me when thou takest pain lovingly to chastise me for my misdeeds and to favour me with thy visits Happy he who hath raised his gain from his losses his assurance out of his uncertainties his strength out of his infirmities his hopes out of his proper Despairs and who hopes not any thing but what is promised by God nor is contented but with God who satisfieth all desires and crowneth all felicities The ninth Treatise Of FEAR § 1. The Definition the Description the Causes and Effects thereof FEar is the daughter of self-love and opinion a Passion truly horrid which causeth The nature of Fear and the bad effects of it all things to be feared yea those which are not as yet in being and by making all to be feared hath nothing so terrible as it self It falleth on a poor heart on a miserable man as would a tempest not fore-seen or like a ravenous beast practised in slaughter and confiscateth a body which it suddenly interdicteth the functions of nature and the use of forces It doth at first that with us which the Sparrow-hawk doth with the Quail It laies hold on the heart which is the fountain of heat and source of life it seizeth on it it gripes it it tortureth it in such sort that all the members of the body extremely afflicted with the accident befaln their poor Prince send him some small tributes of bloud and heat to comfort him in his sufferings whereby the body becomes much weakned The vermillion of cheeks instantly fadeth and palenesse spreads over all the face destitute of the bloud wherewith it was formerly coloured the hair hard strained at the root with cold stares and stands on end the flames which sweetly blaze in the eyes fall into eclipse the voyce is interrupted words are imperfectly spoken all the organs and bands are loosened and untyed quaking spreads it self over all especially the knees which are the Basis of this building of Nature and over the hands which are frontier-places most distant from the direction of the Prince who is then toiled with the confusion of his state This evill passion is not content to seize on our body but it flieth to the superior region of our soul to cause disorder robbing us almost in a moment of memory understanding judgement will courage and rendring us benumm'd dull and stupid in our actions This notwithstanding is not to be understood but of an inordinate fear And that we may see day-light through this dark passion to know it in all The sorts of Fear Clavus animae fluctuantis Amb. de Paradis Tertul. de cultufoemin O necessarius timor qui tim et arte non casu voluntate non necessitate religione non culpa S. Zeno. the parts thereof I say first in generall that there are two sorts of Fear Morall and Naturall Morall which comprehending filiall and servile is not properly a Passion but a Virtue which S. Barnaby according to the report of Clemens Alexandrinus called the Coadjutrix of Faith S. Ambrose the rudder of the soul And Tertullian the foundation of Salvation Of this very same it was S. Zeno spake so eloquently O necessary fear which art to be procured by care and study and not to be met by chance voluntarily not out of necessity and rather by overmuch piety and tendernesse then by the occasion of sin which brings a guilty soul vexation enough Naturall fear is properly an apprehension of a near approaching evil framed in the soul whether it be reall or seeming to which one cannot easily make resistance It is divided into six parts according to the Doctrine of S. John Damascen to wit Pusillanimity Bashfulnesse Six sorts of naturall Fear Shame Amazement Stupidity and Agony Pusillanimity feareth a labour burthensome and offensive to nature Bashfulnesse flyeth a foul act not yet committed Shame dreadeth disgrace which ordinarily followeth the sinne when it is committed Amazement which we otherwise call admiration is caused by an object we have of some evill which is great new and not expected the progressions and events whereof we cannot fore-see Stupidity proceedeth from a great superabundance of fear which oppresseth all the faculties of the soul And Agony is the last degree which totally swalloweth up the spirit in the extreme nearnesse of great evils and greatly remedilesse Forasmuch as concerneth the causes of this passion The causes of fear if we will reason upon it we shall find that the chief and most
non fert infirmirates curare nescit Chrysol serm 150. punishments and glory He descended from heaven like a rich Merchant laden with great treasures he came to lodge in a wretched cottage among mortals whom he held for his brethren He was charmed with a love so powerfull and entranced in a manner so prodigious that he made a change admirable to all the world taking upon him our infirmities to give us strength our affronts to conferre his dignity upon us our wounds to bestow his health on us When I here below behold a man well may I have some small impression of his example but I thereby become not enriched with his merit Now Jesus hath this property that besides the benefit of the celestiall Doctrine which he communicateth to us besides that of example which is infinitely ravishing he maketh in us under the title of Adoption a powerfull infusion of his Graces He continually poureth his virtue on Tanquam caput in membra tanquam vitis in palmites in ipsos justificatos jugiter virtutem influit Concil Trid. sess 6. c. 16. Eccli 45. 9. souls who are in the possession of Justifying Grace as the head on the rest of the members and as the root of the vine sendeth nourishment to all the branches which depend upon it He is our Aaron who as it is said in the Book of Wisdome is crowned with vessels of virtue since the treasure of his merits are so many vessels of sanctity which flow over the whole masse of mankind Note that he communicateth to us three Pledges Three powerfull succours of our Saviour to animate our constancy of his inestimable Love to give us confidence that is to say his Name his Crosse and the Sacrament of his Body and his Bloud Good God! What dastardlinesse would not be animated and what courage not raised in the presence of three so much to be adored assistances The Name of Jesus is the Name of names The power of the name of Jesus which we should grave on our fore-heads as the Character of our Christianity and the assurance of our salvation against all hostilities This is the Name Facies laminam de auro purissimo in qua sculpes opere caelatoris saâ—ctum Domino Exod. 28. Oratio Manassis Conclusisti Abyssum signastieam terribili laudabili nomine tuo which the high Priest of the Jews bare on his Mytre It is the name in sight of which Alexander when he went out to besiege Jerusalem became a lamb of an enraged lion breaking all his choler at the feet of a Priest as waves are dashed against the rocks It is that Name which made Daniel to take his refection whilst he was in the paws of lions with all tranquillity That Name which the flames of the Babylonian fornace acknowledged That Name which God maketh use of to seal up the Abysses And what shall I say of the Crosse and of this Royall Standard of the Monarch of monarchs said The admirable effects of the Cross of Jesus Christ the voyce of heaven to Constantine It is he under whom so many brave Colonels of Christian souldiery have flown from one Pole to another as Eagles faln like tempests upon the armies of Sarazens cut like keen razours consumed as with coles all Powers opposed against Christianity How often hath this sign lifted up dejected Courages How often hath it thrown terrour among legions of Infidels How often hath it driven away Devils On this wood God established Dominus regnavit à ligno Aug. in Psal 91. Pugnavit Cruce sua Christus vicit Reges subjugatis eis ipsam Crucem in fronte fixit his Throne Jesus Chiist as saith S. Augustine fought with his Crosse He by it defeated the Kings and Monarchs of the earth and having gloriously overthrown them hath made them to carry the Crosse on their fore-heads O how unhappy be we if we resemble vipers who bear the Crosse but hidden under their jaws It is to do like the brood of vipers to blush at the Crosse and to be ashamed at the venerable scorns of the Passion of our Saviour But it is our work to bear it in the sight of all the world and to Raymund in Autechristo regard it as the sign of our Redemption and the harnesse of our Protection What shall we not do with it and with this adorable The courage we may derive from the help of the holy Sacrament of the Altar Sacrament of the Altar which maketh us present with God and God so present to us Is it not from thence that so many Saints have gone forth as lions casting fire and flames out of their mouths as saith S. John Chrysostome The learned S. Gregory of Tours teacheth us that antiently the holy Eucharist was kept An excellent observation of S. Gregory in Churches in a little tower of silver In my opinion to signifie that this pledge of the love of God is a fortresse inexpugnable against the assaults of our enemies That is it which at all times fortified Virgins against the ardours of Concupiscence and the importunities of carnall lovers who would have bereaved them of their honour That which made Martyrs run to flames and wheels as others to delights That which made them to look with alacrity upon their streaming bloud and to hold it more precious then orientall pearls The Scripture telleth us that the Children of Israel Numb 35. being departed from Marah as much as to say a place of Bitternesse arrived at Elim where they found twelve Fountains and seventy Palms And I must tell you that when after the Mortification of the flesh the afflictions of the world the fears of so many acccidents which menace us we come to this divine Sacrament there we meet with fountains which stream from the wounds of our Saviour there we gather palms and victories numberlesse Who then would not learn holy Boldnesse in the school of Jesus Christ But alas it often happens that instead of profiting in so good a school and in the Doctrine of so great a Master we are bold for the world and timorous in the affairs of God What a prodigy is it to see now-a-dayes so many who are onely bold to do ill If a falshood be to be averred if a wretched maid to be debauched if a revenge to be put forward even to the effusion of humane bloud if lawfull Powers to be resisted if laws both Divine and Humane to be spoken against there Boldnesse and Confidence appeareth But what say I Confidence yea Impudency fomented by the mildnesse of laws and impunity of so many crimes But in undertakings made for God we have hearts of wax and souls trembling like leaves under the breath of winds O detestable Boldnesse which art not born but to serve as an instrument to mischief dost thou not know there is no assured Power against God who in the twinkling of an eye overthroweth the children and race of
Forrests with bloud and massacres perpetually under their paws by naturall instinct quake at the thundering voyce of God Fishes in the bottome of seas and abysses with horrour hear it enraged tempests which seem ready to tear the world in pieces become silent at the command of the Highest and draw in their O maxime O summe invisibilium procreator opifex invise nullis unquam comprehense naturis dâ—gnus eâ— verè si modò te dignum mortali dicendum est cre cui spirans omnis intelligénsque natura habere agere nunquam gratias desinat cui totâ conveniat vitâ genu nixo procumbere continuatis precibus suppiicà te Arnob. contra gentes wings under his throne waves and floods which make a shew not to regard this great All no more then a single Element dissolve their fury upon the sight of one silly grain of sand which imposeth a law on them by virtue of Gods ordinance The very divels all on Fire in the flames of their punishment which infinite misery seems to have exempted from fear can not free themselves from this sting O most mighty O most sovereign Lord of things visible and invisible O great Eye who seest all and art not seen by any here below Thou art truly worthy If we with mortall lips may call thee worthy yea worthy to whom all intelligent and reasonable Nature should give continuall thanks for thy inexplicable benefits worthy before whom we on our bended knees should all our life-time remain prostrate worthy that for thee we should have praises and prayers everlastingly on our lips And where is that brazen brow which dares to offend thee in the midst of thy Temple of this universe from whence thou on all sides beholdest us O what a monster is impudency if it persist insensible to such considerations § 5. Of the reverence which the holy Humanity of our Lord bare to his Eternall Father LEt us look on the other Modell and consider how The reverence Jesus bare to that divine Majesty Jesus Christ uncapable properly either of fear or Shamefac'dnesse caused by any defect observed all the dayes of his mortall conversation so lowly a reverence towards the divine Majesty that it serves for matter of admiration to all Angels and of example for all ages To understand this well I beseech you to take into your consideration two reasons that I will set before you which me thinks are well worthy of your ponderation First that the greatnesse of actions ought ever to be measured by the end for which God hath instituted them as if one prove that the actions of understanding are given us to raise us to the knowledge of God we by the same means infer that those actions are very noble since they are directed to an end so eminent Now wherefore think you was the eternall Word Incarnate in the womb of a holy Virgin I say that besides consideration of humane Redemption and the instruction of all mortals God covered himself with the flesh of man that there might by that means be a person in the world able to praise and honour God asmuch as he is praise-worthy and honourable by a nature create hypostatically joyned to the divine nature Philo in Philo de plantatione Noemi the Book of Noahs plantation saith that search was made through the world for a voyce suteable to the divine Majesty to speak and recount his praises and there was none found For although the sovereign Creatour hath been praised from the beginning of Ages by the morning starrs which are the Angels as saith Job Cum me laudarent astra matutina jubiâ— larent omnes filii Dei Job 38. 5. yet we must say that all the praises which the highest Seraphims may give to the Divinity if we compare them to the merits of its incomparable greatnesse are like a Candle in comparison of the Sun a small drop of water parallell'd with the sea and an infant-like stutterer who should undertake to declare the prowesses of the most illustrious Cesars There needeth a lauding God a reverencing God and an adoring God to praise reverence and adore God worthily otherwise there were nothing sutable to his Divine Majesty there being no proportion between the finite and the Infinite And that which seemed to be impossible is accomplished in the person of Jesus Christ All reverences of Angels and men are dissolved into him as if one should melt many small Bells to make a great one And verily all creatures being dumb in his presence he made himself as a huge Bell of the great clock of the word which striketh the hours and resoundeth thanks to his heavenly Father All our reverences our homages our adorations have neither force dignity nor value if they be not united and incorporated with the homage submission and adoration which this glorious Humanity rendereth to his Celestiall Father even above the vaults of the Empereall Heaven This is the great Angel of Counsel of whom we may pronounce these words of the Apocalypse That he came to present himself Apoc. 8. 3. before the Altar having in his hand a golden Incensorie and much incense was given him that he might offer the prayers of holy Saints on this golden Altar The second reason is that the reverence and honour we do to one is justly augmented according as we more clearly know his great and worthy parts whereupon we may inferr that as our Saviour had knowledges and incomparable lights of the Majestie of his heavenly Father not onely in respect of science increate but of science beatifick and infused so had he proportionably resentments of honour so profoundly reverent that he perpetually lived absorpt in this reverence as a drop of water in the sea or a hot Iron in the fornace There was neither vein nor artery which was not every moment penetrated and overflowed with the veneration he yeilded to God his Father Men who naturally are dull and sensuall stand in need of exteriour signs to raise them to the reverence of God For which cause the sages of the world in the falshood of pretended religions have always affected some tokens of terrour to affright perjured and Philostr l. 1. c. 16 de vit Apollonii A notable custome of the Babylonians in doing Justice wicked men So the Babylonians when they sat on matters of Justice went into a Hall of the Palace made in the form of the heavens where were hanged the figures of their Gods all resplentent in gold and where were to be seen on the roof certain forms of birds which they thought to be sent from on high as messengers of The custom of Bochyris a Judge of Egypt the Sun So Bochyris a most famous Judge of Egypt ordinarily named as the Father and protectour of Equitie that he might powerfully imprint an apprehension of God avenger of Injustices when he fate on his throne of Judicature always had the image of a serpent in embossed
work hanging over his head as in a readiness to sting him if he pronounced an unjust sentence This is partly tolerable partly also praise-worthy among mortal men but as for the person of our Saviour he had not any need of exteriour signs having always a perspicuous vision of the Divinitie And tell me not this continuall sight of God this so exprest familiaritie might lessen the reverence which ordinarily is preserved in things lesse accustomed This verily hath some truth if we speak of men their perpetual presence many times diminisheth the reverence of those who familiarly converse with them because being men their perfections are finite and imperfections almost infinite which is the cause they are exhausted like roses which with their odour cast forth part of their substance They waste like Torches which annihilate themselves before the eyes of beholders leaving most times nought behind them but stink and smoke They are to be looked on afar off and in the dark as painted women and adulterate merchandize but in God whom S. Denis calleth the Hearth and House of Essences we must not apprehend Dionys de divin nominibus c. 1. these limitations these defects and these disrelishes since he being of his own nature infinite is never lessened The most blessed soul of Jesus Christ entred into the consideration of his greatnesses as into a most spacious Labyrinth all replenished with lights perfections and virtues which never satiate but on the contrary give as in an eternall Theatre spectacles delicious immortall and inexplicable For there it is where all the blessed draw their felicitie always greedie and ever full always in possession and ever desiring their satiety is without loathing and their hunger free from torment still they eat the bread of life and never waste it As S. Augustine hath most divinely observed Hymn Dam de gloria Para. in the Hymn which Cardinall Damian hath framed out of his words Thence I leave you to consider with what reverence our Lord walked on the earth as a man suspended in heaven drenched in God as a spunge would be in a vast sea a man who held not of the earth but by roots of compassion and mercy Still he had his eyes lifted up towards heaven in doing miracles still his hands raised towards heaven in prayer still his heart contracted with sadnesse for the irreverencies committed against the irreverencies of his father Conversation drinking eating sleeping desolved not the sweet conversation he had with God Sometimes even in company being overwhelmed with the impetuous approch of this holy Majestie he brake forth into words of reverence of love of thanksgiving as it were saying I laud Matt. 21. 25 thee my Father Lord of heaven and earth that thou hast hidden those goodly lights from men who make account of the wisdom and prudence of the world and hast made them known to the most simple and little ones yea dear Father for such hath been thy most holy will In honour of the lowly reverence which Jesus Christ bare to his heavenly Father Let us resolve to preserve in our selves three sorts of shamefac'tnesse of pietie of chastitie of discretion Shamefac'tnesse of pietie by observing a holy and religious modestie in Churches and all those actions which do appertein to the service and honour of God Shamefac'tnesse of chastitie by abstaining from all words and actions which render conversation too free and exorbitant not without some prejudice to chastitie And therefore O Virgins engrave in your hearts this document of Tertullian who saith That it is fit a virgin should blush even at virtue Lastly let us have shamefac'nesse of discretion in demeaning our selves very circumspectly in all the duties we ought to yield to persons worthy of honour and namely to those to whom we are tied by some obligations Alas who can endure those that have lost not onely reverence of a God invisible but even the shame of men visible Shamefac'tnesse is the last shirt of virtue which one never putteth off but when he is readie to clothe himself with an infinitie of vices It is a strange thing that Adam and Eve who bare as it were in one vessel all the riches of Mankind after they had made that miserable ship-wrack the losses whereof we yet deplore after they had lost all that which a wretch might lose and all that which a happie man might desire they yet still in the midst of this great breach preserved shamefac'tnesse as the last plank of this lamentable ship-wrack They yet were ashamed to see themselves naked and by this spectacle of their nakednesse were perswaded to penance And thou wretched and depraved soul over head and ears thou fearest neither God nor man father nor mother neighbour nor kinsman friend nor magistrate force mildnesse admonition menace nor reputation either good or bad Ah Caitife It is to run to a downfall with veiled eyes to live in this manner It is to lift up an armed hand against heaven Thy conscience justifies thee sayst thou and thou carest not at all for men what conscience if thou neglectest reputation which is the bridle wherewith God useth to represse all sorts of vice Thou hast no conscience which notwithstanding never forsakes any man enlightening and stinging thieves in wild caves and in the massacres of men to expose to light vices which could never endure the rayes of the Sun which were confined to darknesse and Gomorrhian night to establish them in the conversation of men to publish them to practise them openly before the eyes of heaven and earth and to say we should give nature free libertie Ah! wicked Zimri Hast thou not read the Historie in the book of Numbers hast thou not in this picture observed the effects and disasters of impudency As that of Zimri a Prince of Gods people 〈◊〉 35. â—he miserable end of an unhappy impudent man who hastening to make love to a Madianite a Cozbi at mid-day in sight of all the people of Israel cast under foot the laws of God the shame of men the honour of Reputation the reverence of all posteritie Wretch whither goest thou said one to him Knowst thou not the law of God forbiddeth alliance with strangers what hast thou to do with this Madianite she will ruine thee It importeth thee not to say I will go But dost thou consider thy qualitie and the rank thou holdest being a Prince of People Thou well seest the bad example thou wilt give to all the world cannot but be pernicious It importeth not I will go Behold thy Parents and nearest of kin stretch forth their hands to thee and say Son Do not our family this dishonour Bring not such a crime into our house which will make us incurre the malediction of God and will overwhelm thee first of all under some notable disaster It importeth not I will go Alas seest thou not poor Moses who weeps with all the people prostrated before the Tabernacle of God that he
anxious wayward and irksome to our selves The onely means to amend and correct your self is to represent the hurt this passion bringeth by depriving you of wisdome of justice civility concord virtue and of the splendour of the spirit of God The way to lessen the opinion you have of being despised is not lightly to believe tale-tellers and to find reasons to excuse him who hath erred not to be curious to know that which may displease you to fortifie your self in that side you find to be most feeble in you avoiding objects which most ordinarily provoke you to live with peaceable people to shun cares and troublesome affairs to afford your self convenient solaces to extirpate petty Curiosities and false opinions which you have of your sufficiency in such sort that you imagine within your self that you ought to be used with great respect and that you should not suffer any disgrace either by word or deed but that men and elements must contribute to your likings Behold from whence your feaver proceedeth and how you may handsomely remedy it O soul infinitely nice It seems you were bred in a box in perfumed Cotton and that you must endure nothing Broth overmuch salted a garment too straight a mustachio ill turned up the creaking of a door the wind of a window the least indiscretion of a servant puts you out of your self What do you take your self to be You believe those flatterers who say Do you suffer this you measure not your self by your quality And yet Kings and Queens and the Monarchs of the earth have endured and daily do endure many slight oppositions with great tranquillity and you silly worm of the earth turn against God when he permitteth any thing to happen contrary to your liking Frame unto your self a life simple and free from affectations take away your wantonnesse your pleasures and petty peevishnesse Choler is engendred by overmuch curiosities Seneca de Ira. Ira voluptatibuâ— generatur volu ptatum suppressionâ— sopitur Seneca de Ira l. 2. c. 14. Ira perturbat artes Agrippinus Epictetus Stobâ—us of spirit stifle them and you immediately extinguish it Know that to quarrell with an equall is hazardous with an inferiour is contemptuous and with a superiour it is foolish Set before you the Maxime of Pirrhus that great Master of Fence who said this passion was a Trouble-Trade and that whilst you continue the same humour you shall be unable for all good employments Do as the brave Philosopher Agrippinus of whom Epictetus makes mention who perceiving that when any misfortune befell him he thereby became hasty and chollerick What is this saith he I play the slave where I should play the Monarch O misfortunes I will deceive you Thereupon he wrote the praises of every evil which might happen against his will If a calumny the praise of the profit calumny brought If an Exile the praise of exile If a quartane Ague the praise of the Quartane Ague And by this means he came to such a height of Tranquillity that so soon as a fresh mischief assailed him he met it with a smiling countenance and said God be praised behold the way of my exercise And you who are a child of light fed with the body and bloud of your master for Heaven and the company of Angels you cannot say when some little inconvenience befalleth you praised be Jesus behold here how the good purpose I have made of patience is exercised And then if you feel any rebellion Take heed you shew it not either by words or outward signs but get you and lodge at the signe of silence where the haven of Tranquility is Do as those that are ill of the falling sicknesse who retire at the approch of their fits that they may not let any things uncomely appear Renedictus Dominus Deus meus qui docet manus meas ad praelium digitos meos ad bellum Psal 143. Benedictus Dominus rupes mea Stabilisque manens dâ—t cuncta moveri say Blessed be our Lord God who teacheth my hands to fight and frameth my fingers to warre The Hebrew hath it Blessed be our Lord who is my rock To shew you that God if you endeavour to vanquish your passions will place you upon the holy rock of Tranquility from whence he in his immutability beholdeth the motion of all ages Take a good friend a faithfull companion who may divert your passion in its first fit who may admonish you and play on Davids harp to drive away this devil of mad Saul and take you from the occasions of hurt The second remedy for such as long chew on their choler and entertain aversions irreconcileable is that It The second remedy Cogitemus nequaquam licere nobis orare nec iratas fundere preces ad Deum quotidie crèdamus nos è corpore migraturos nihilque nobis continentiâ castitatis nihil abre nuntiatione facultatum nihil divitiarum contemptu nihil jejuniorum vigiliarum laboribus conserendum quibus propter iracundiam solam odium ab universitatis judice supplicia promittuntur aeterna Cassian l. 8. c. 21. de Institutis Renunt Vade priuÌ„s reconciliare â—â—atri tuo tunc veniens offeres munus tusi Matth. 5. 24 were good to ponder and consider the words of Cassian Let us perswade our selves that whilst we are angry It is not permitted us to pray unto God and to present him our prayers Let us take each day to be our last and let us not think that for being chast and continent for having forsaken the pleasures of the world and despised riches for macerating our bodies with fastings watchings and labours much is due to us if at the end of the reckoning it be found we carry hatred and anger in our hearts That alone is sufficient to condemn us to eternall punishments by the sentence of him who shall judge the whole world Take not this as my saying but take it as an oracle which that great man hath collected from many holy men of his age When you keep in your heart some hatred against your neighour you do a notable wrong to your soul For first what have we more sweet more mercifull then altars There we should seek for mercy if God had banished it from all parts of the world and yet whilst you deferre reconciliation with your enemy you deprive your self of the right of altars and if you still have some spark of Christianity as often as you approch to them you hear the voice of the son of God who speaketh to you in the bottome of your heart and saith these words of the Gospel Go first of all and reconcile your self to your brother and then you shall come to offer your sacrifice of the altar By despising these words of our Saviour and going on you commit a new sacriledge by recoyling back and avoiding the altar and sacrifice you fly from pardon and life And then in what a state are you
causeth heaven and beatitude Thus doth S. Augustine assure us that the science of God is the cause of all things which draweth Being from the Abysse of nothing and brings the shades of death into light The world is known by us because it is but it is insomuch as it is known by God so efficacious this knowledge is O what a goodly thing it had been to see this great world how it displayed it self in all its pieces and smiled in all its mansions under the eye of God! The Heavens were stretched forth like a Courtain the stars were inchased in the Heavens as Diamonds the clouds suspended in the air as floating bodies that air was diversified in meteors the eternal veins of fountains began to stream the earth to cover its bosome and liberally to afford us out of its entrails infinite many blessings from the benignity of his aspects Tell me not that which the naturall History mentioneth that the Ostrich hatcheth her little ones by the rayes of her eyes yet never shall she bring forth eggs by looking on the earth but the Eye that is to say the knowledge of God hath such virtue that it is the maker of all creatures O beauty O greatnesse O goodnesse Beauty to inhabit in the Idea of God as in a Paradise of Glory Greatnesse to have a capacitie infinite Goodnesse to rest in the bowels of the mercy of the Creatour See a little the difference that is between our knowledges The differencies of our knowledges from those of God and that of God you think it a goodly matter to know a man and to wish him well yet he thereby becomes neither white nor black hot nor cold good rich nor learned for our knowledges are small in their capacities limited in their effects and inefficacious in their operations How many brave Captains and learned Authours are there who are still well thought of in the opinion of men but whether they beliving or whether they be dead if their souls be in an ill state this knowledge and this love nothing contributeth to their felicities But so is it not with the knowledge of God I speak of an amourous knowledge It gives Being and Grace Being because all things known by God are in God in a more noble manner then in themselves Here we behold dying creatures who fade wither and shrink insensibly into nothing were they not supported by the divine hand but in the house of God in the palace of Essences the Summers are of Cypresse saith the holy Canticle insomuch as all therein Cant. 1. 17. is immortall vigorous perfect and incorruptible and there it is where the blessed who have not here seen the world but by two eyes of flesh and have seen it tottering Bearis pervium est omniforme illud divinitatis speculum in quo quicquid eorum interest illucescat Concil Sen nonse and altogether imperfect behold it in God fully stable equall and absolute in all its dimensions The Saints perpetually have before their eyes the incomprehensible mirrour of the Divinity in which they at case behold all that which concerneth them and may conduce to their greater contentment I add that this knowledge causeth Grace For what makes predestination but that preparation of Grace and Glory which God hath conceived from all Eternity in his understanding to communicate it to his elect See what God doth seeing and God seen what doth he else but actually make heaven and Beatitude which consisteth in the clear vision of God So soon as a soul predestinated to enjoy without delay the glory of heaven is gone from out the bands of its body it hath for guide this divine splendour which Divines call the light of Glory which is a quality infused into the understanding that so elevates and fortifies it beyond its condition that it is able to endure the lightning flash eternall Beatitude Is it not of this light holy Job spake when he said he hideth light in his hands Job 36. and faith to his friend it is his inheritance possession Then God all-good communicateth himself to this soul ennobled with such a qualitie not by some image or representation but by its very essence intimately united to the glorified understanding and from thence what followeth but an admirable transformation The soul is wholly absorpt in felicity and as a small drop of water poured into the sea instantly takes the colour and taste of the sea so the souls taste is fully inebriated and coloured with the Divinity It is almost no longer in its self but becometh wholly like to God not by nature but by participation We know saith S. John when we shall see him we shall be like him And S. Gregory Nazianzen dareth to call it God Joan. ep 1. and as we have two principall parts of the soul to content Greg. Naz. Hymn the understanding and the will so God all benigne abundantly satisfieth them making thither to stream as by two dugs of glory all the delights and contentments proportioned to their condition For the understanding which naturally desireth to know is illuminated by a most excellent knowledge of things the most hidden which it seeth in God as in an incomprehensible Mirrour and seeth them not in the manner of the wise men of the world who flutter round about sciences as little flies about lamps that findge their wings and make their tomb in the flames but it seeth them with a vision sublime calm and delicious which giveth to the will that is made to love amorous eagrenesse Avidi semper pleni quod habent desiderant Pet. Damis in Hymn de gloria Paradis ever desiring and ever having what it desireth O what miracles doth the eye of God enkindling with one sole aspect of many Divinities when maketh so many blessed ones like unto it self as if the sun rising should in the heavens createa million of little suns and on earth an infinitie of Diamonds all which should bear the image of this bright star All those blessed ones illustrated by this aspect albeit The blessed although unequall iâ— glory are not enviouâ— they shine diversly according to each ones merit are so far from envie receiving the flames of eternall Goodnesse that every one accounteth the felicity of his companion for the accomplishment of his own Non erit tibi aliqua invidia disparis claritatis ubi regnat unitas charitatis Aug. There you shall hear no speech of envie occasioned by inequalitie of felicity where the union of charity shall eternally reign Go to then O thou Envious O thou malign Man God hath made thee to his likenesse to carry as he in proportion raies of love and compassion in thy eyes towards men and thou there bearest gall bloud and poyson Nay so far art thou otherwise that if it were in thy power to make benefits to grow from thy aspects thou wouldest rather desire the eye of a Basilisk to poyson burn and
A Detestation of Envie VVIll we not then enter into the joy of God by participation of the joyes and prosperities of men whence we shall take a holy and magnificent possession Multis abundat virturibus quialienas amat Plin. Jun. in epist ad Cornel. in the quiet we shall find in our hearts perswading our selves that that saying is most true That he who loveth virtues in another hath them abundantly in himself There is not any way more short or honourable to felicity then to arrive thither by a contentment taken in the happinesse of our likes In wishing their hurt we resemble the Thunderbolt which to strike a rock breaks the cloud that bred it we ruine our selves by our proper labours and profit not but by the Justice of our punishment But by loving in another that which others envie we shall become absolutely rich and totally powerfull in the kingdome of perfect love Let us not satisfie our selves with not envying any and to take pleasure in the good successe of good men but let us have an eye of affections a liberall hand and a heart wide open to the exercise of charity alwayes remembring two rare documents given by two great Apostles S. Peter and S. Bartholomew The first teacheth us that the virginity of the soul consisteth in brotherly love Rendring saith he your souls chaste in the obedience of charity in the brotherly 1 Pet. 1. love which you ought mutually to preserve The other hath in S. Denis left us in writing this royall sentence Dion c. 1. de Myst Theo. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which saith Love is the greatest and least Theology because all is abbreviated in this great word Who is it then would enter into the Hell of Jealousie to rob himself of all the joyes of chaste marriage and to live like Ixion on the wheel of an eternall torment Were it not much better to tear away this frantick love this troublesome curiosity this easinesse to believe tales this rashnesse of judgement and all that which fomenteth passion then to raise matter of Laughter of Comedies and Tragedies to defile your conscience betray your bed dishonour your children and ruine your house Thou envious and jealous creature what dost thou answer to this eye of our celestiall Father which causeth by seeing Essence and Grace and by being seen produceth heaven What dost thou answer to this eye of Jesus waking sparkling and weeping for thee Wilt thou yet have an eye of the Basilisk to scorch plants break stones and kill men Ah thou pusillanimous thing to be envious against thy neighbour for a good which thou hast not and which thou with excessive passion desirest Thou dost envie profit thou enviest credit honour riches and the talent of nature and all which thy jealous heart beholdeth Thou wilt not saist thou bereave others but dost onely complain of the want thou findest in thy self And how knowest thou whether these blessings thou seekest for with desires as ardent as fire would not be great evils unto thee How knowest thou whether in prosperity and abundance thou mightest not lose thy self with ingratitude forgetfulnesse of God arrogance and sinne How knowest thou whether the Saviour of the world hath not expresly deprived thee of these temporall favours to assure thy predestination Cease to envie that which God will not give thee Ah! Thou on the other side to be perpetually arguing with God about the prosperity of sinners and out of petty infidelities to waver in the belief of his holy Providence Ignorant of celestiall blessings and stupid admirer of the bread of dags who seest not that all these favours are rough obligations and rich punishments which will rather increase the misery of the wicked then lessen their pain God promiseth thee a Kingdome if thou be faithfull and thou longest for the dishes which sinners feed on at the table of the world even tearing one another with a thousand torments and as many disturbancies And thou on the other side wicked as thou art not onely to envie the good of thy neighbour but to desire and work his hurt with impatient madnesse one while biting his reputation another while hindering his good one while deliberately wishing his death another while having direfull enterprises upon his life what canst thou expect from this infernall passion but an eternall damnation Wouldest thou know whom thou art like Behold I pray in histories the mount Etna which rends and throweth forth its all-inflamed entrails as if it would scorch and consume the flowers which in the mean time flourish upon its top Thou ceasest not to cry out to storm to thunder against this man Thou castest forth fire and flames from thy throat with which it seems thou art resolved to vomit up thy heart infected with poyson What gettest thou with this brutish fury This man whom thou wouldest swallow alive by the permission of God shall flourish over thy head Let us go let us go to seek in Judea for the cruell Joseph triumphant mangers the enraged envie or his brothers brothers of Joseph and let us shew them the innocent not any longer groaning under the weight of fetters but born on the wings of glory and mounted upon the chariot of Pharaoh in a habit full of Majesty and in a pomp which dazleth the eyes of those who have now no other word in their mouthes but Abrech Abrech which was an acclamation of joy by which the people acknowledged him as the Father and Protectour of all Egypt Abrech Abrech O wretches know you this man This is he of whom you said Behold our Lord come let us kill Gen. 37. 9. him Look well upon him this is he whom you inhumanely did despoil of his garments to embrew them in the bloud of beasts and represent them to your deplorable Father to give him the stroke of death Acknowledge your own bloud this is he whom you threw into the bottome of an old Cistern and banqueted over his head Detest your fury This is he whom you did sell to the Amalekites Behold what your envie hath brought him to Bend your knee with all the people who adore him and say O caitif Envie the Hang-man of the envious mayst thou never find any habitation but in hell whence thou first camest to trouble the peace of men Heavenly Father I beseech thee by that Eye which createth heaven and thou world Incarnate by that Eie which hath wept so many tears of compassion and love over us banish this fury from our hearts and make thy holy charities there to flourish which shall by us for ever be as much adored as they have been to mankind profitable who hath no subsistence but in thy mercies The fourteenth Treatise of MILDNESSE and COMPASSION § 1. The great Miseries of Manmake Compassion necessary in the world HEaven is replenished with Sanctities and Felicities with sanctities without blemishes with Felicities without disasters and hell is filled with ordures and miseries
many remedilesse calamities and that this onely sonne disdaineth not to become its ransome delivered himself for it to torments so enormous and confusions so hideous The earth saith S. Augustine expecteth light and rain from heaven and we from a Messias expect truth and mercy He came after so long expectations and hath replenished the earth with his knowledge and the effects of his benignity What shall we now admire in the ineffable mystery of the Incarnation If we cast our eyes on the heavenly Father we there see a work of the power of his arm wherein he seems to have exhausted all his strength The heavens and the starres saith Saint Gregory Nyssen were but the works of the fingers of this divine Majesty But in the Incarnation he proccedeth with all the extent of his might with all the engines of his power and all the miracles of his Greatnesse It is a Maxime among Politicians that a man to appear very great should not waste all his force at an instant but still to reserve to himself somewhat to do wherein he may make his ability to be seen as it were by degrees by daily surpassing himself From whence it came that Seneca said to Nero Plutarch de Ira. who had caused a certain Pavillion infinitely precious to be made that he therein had shewed his weaknesse for if it should chance to perish he could not recover it and were it preserved it would be an everlasting reproch to him to have done to the uttermost of his power Behold the proceedings of humane prudence But our celestiall Father setting aside all other considerations and forgetting his greatnesse to be mindfull of his mercy did a work in our behalf which hath so limited his power that we may truly say that God cannot in the world in all Eternity make any thing greater then a Man-God And if we on the other part do reflect on the holy Ghost it seems that this third person which in the sphere of the Trinity had a mysterious barrennesse springing from the incomparability of a new production in the divine emanations would make recompense in this mystery pouring out at once heats lights and beauties in the blessed Virgin there to form the body of Jesus Christ and to raise his holy Humanity to the union of the Word Increate But what piece meriteth more admiration then to see the person of a God-man then to see a Jesus Christ who in himself uniteth Divine and Humane Nature who carries in himself the last lines of the love and power of his Father who beareth the consummation of all his designes for the government of man who includeth all possible communications to an inferiour nature in one inimitable communication who makes himself the source of Grace and Glory in Angelicall and humane nature as he is the source of life and love in the Trinity O what a goodly spectacle is it To behold how he blesseth by his presence how he replenisheth by his greatnesse how he governeth by his power how he sanctifieth by his influences both heaven and Earth If we yet doubt of his love and fatherly goodnesse let us look on his hands and we shall see that he hath written our name with his nails Let us see his heart which was opened for us by that lance which at the latter end of his dayes digg'd from out his entrails the remainder of his life and we shall observe how we therein live how we therein breathe and how we therein honourably burn as in a great fornace common to all intelligible Nature If you would know what you have cost and happily do not believe your Creatour Quà m preâ—iosus siâ— si factori forte non credâ—s interroga redemâ—torem Euseb Gal. Homil. 2. de Symbol ask your Redeemer and he will tell you Let us also behold the effects which have succeeded from the alliance of the Divine nature with the Humane and let us reverence the divine Goodnesse which hath raised up all the great Masse of men in a supernaturall Being to innocency to felicity to light and to life eternall Who was more destitute then Man more brutish and more ignorant in so great a night and in so horrible confusions of Idolatry and Jesus by his Incarnation hath revealed unto us the secrets and wisdome of heaven Who was more unfurnished of wise direction and he affordeth us his examples Who was more forlorn he adopteth us for his children Who was more needy and he gives us the treasure of his merits Who was more hungry and he nourisheth us with his flesh and bloud Who was more unhappy and he divideth his Beatitude among us If after so many benefits we remain still faithlesse to his fidelity he expecteth us with a singular long forbearance if we delay he stirreth us up if we fly he followeth us if we return he stretcheth forth his arm He washeth us in his bloud He regenerateth us in his love He makes it his trophey to have conquered us as if he entred afresh into the possession of an Empire causeth our proper sinnes to contribute to our glory If we endure somewhat for him he endureth with us he weepeth over us he prepareth eternall sources of consolations and as it is said that there is a certain fish which sweetens the water of the salt sea in its mouth so Jesus mingleth all our acerbities in the inexplicable Fasten apud Maiolum sweetnesses of his benignity And yet thou O Man wilt in presence of this Modell The source of charity still remain a little Tiger as irreconcileable to amities as streight-handed to works of liberality Believe me among all the Ensignes of Greatnesse which thou canst have there is not any more sensible then the charitable communication of one man to another by waies of liberality and alms which God receiveth in the nature Plin l. 2. c. 7 Deus est mortali benefacere mortalem haec ad aeternam gloriam via of victimes It is a Divinity for one man by his benefits to oblige another and this is properly the way of eternall glory Who are they in your opinion that first of all deserved the title of Cardinall which is now-a-dayes accounted among the great dignities of the Church Do From whence the Title of Cardinals cometh you think that nobility of extraction favour of great ones Eminency of wisdome prudence in the government of Empires gave these Titles to the primitive Church I say all these qualities are very considerable Fabianus Vide Concil Rom. sub Sylvestro Lacerdam adversar c. 35. Cardinales á Cardinibus seu vicis Rome yet neverthelesse it is true that the first fourteen Cardinals who were called by this name were fourteen personages of honour and merit who under Pope Sylvester were ranged in as many streets of the City of Rome to take care of the poor So true it is that they who begat us to Christianity placed the magnificence of men not
in garments which are the food of moths not in precious stones which are the excrements of the sea and land not in Coaches and horses which are the notes of our poverty and dependence not in titles which are Errat qui Deo proximam conscientiam credit commodis invitari sola putatis lucra quae vobis de liberalirate â—aseuntur qui divitias cum tributis accipitis Euod l. 1. Ep. ad Symmachum Papam Imaginary felicities but in the relief of persons necessitous who are the Images of God A learned Bishop said to a Pope He deceives himself who thinks that a conscience so near to the Divinity is tyed to its Interests For my part I imagine you do not believe there is any other gain for you but that which takes birth from your liberality and that you think you receive good as oftentimes as you do it But if there be no spurre of honour which inciteth you to proceed confidently and liberally to open your hands to men to enter into the communication of the virtue and glory of so many Saints at the least soften your bowels from the necessity of times and the calamities of so many poor people who seem to be the dregs of the earth or froth of an inraged sea Inform your self a little of the wants of Cities and Towns and you shall find many abandoned of all consolation and destitute of all necessaries who yet are your flesh your brethren and your coheirs in Jesus Christ and now whilst all smileth in your houses and all is resplendent with a lustre of fair accommodation in your own persons there are poor old men couched on straw among copwebs there are women afflicted with long and irksome maladies environed with very many children whom they see dying before their eyes not having any means to give them a bit of bread They are forsaken by kindred friends and all manner of assistance as if they were some monsters of nature thrown on the shore by the seas anger There are Virgins for whom daily snares are laid that they may fall into sin under colour of poverty There are some who have been heretofore very fortunate according to the world who are faln into great wants and at this present when they have so many tears to bewail their misery under the covert of some poor cottage have not a tongue to complain for having lost all they yet retain shame which tieth the hands of their poverty and hindereth them from stretching them out to the cruel rich from whom they expect nothing but deniall Know we not how in certain places men many times have run up and down the streets armed with fury and rage for bread and have snatched as it were out of bloud and flames a nourishment worse then death Know we not there are many who have been divers dayes without bread And how often have others eaten such as they were fain to shut their eyes when they put it in their mouths Are we ignorant that certain mothers have prostituted their daughters out of a cursed and vitious constraint to help their miseries Their hands peradventure had been more mercifull if they had hewed them in pieces before they sacrificed them to dishonour but behold whither the tyranny of Avarice and Prodigality have transported the affairs of Christendome What rock would not be mollified among so many direfull objects What eye of ice would not melt amidst such spectacles of disastres Will you not then in your houses establish the sacrifice of Mercy which God would have to be perpetuall Will you not consider what you may do without much prejudicing your revenues Will you expect death to do good and to make your torch to be carried after you They who have renounced Faith Truth and light I mean Hereticks have not renounced mercy they exhaust themselves for their faction and many times do acts of liberality to ours who help the poor But what say I Hereticks The Turks in their salvage life give the Tenth part of their goods to the poor There are some who build fountains and pay men wages to give drink to passengers and some thereto add camels to carry their fardels Will it not be a great honour to you at the day of judgement if persisting in this inhumanity you see your self worse then the Infidels and that the Character of Christianity hath served you for no other purpose but to reproch you in the eternity of your pains with the exorbitance of your Infamy Good God divert this misery from thy servants and since thou so freely hast opened thy heart unto them Let them never shut up the bowels of their Compassion against thy brethren who are the poor FINIS HISTORICALL OBSERVATIONS Upon the Four Principall PASSIONS VVhich are as Four DEVILS Disturbers OF THE HOLY COURT Printed M.DC.L To the READER Dear Reader I Here find that which Job the first Writer of the world saith that our thoughts are as the Branches of our soul which multiply and extend as farre as their Root giveth them vigour and nutriment You see the affection you have shewed to these Books of the Holy Court hath served for vitall humours to my wit to produce many discourses and with much labour to undertake that which I supposed to be profitable and satisfactory for you which I have ever more esteemed then my own repose When I thought I was at the end of my design you have caused me to set forth a fourth Tome wherein I conceive I have comprized all the secrets of humane life in the moderation of Passions It would here have been fit for me to end were it not that some Lords and Ladies who make up a part of this innocent Court by the good example of their lives are not fully satisfied unlesse I afford them Histories This then hath moved me to crown these Treatises with most select Historicall Observations to expose to view the disorder which ill rectified Passions introduce and the profits they bring when they are ranged under the laws of discretion I meant expresly to have drawn them almost all out of our own History for two reasons whereof the one is That the Passions of Infidels of Antiquity and even those of many other Christian Nations have passages too full of horrour and brutishnesse But ours albeit they have extravagancies inconsiderate enough are more within limits ordinary to nature corrupted by sinne The second is that writing this to the Court of France I propose to my self I should more efficaciously perswade by domestick Examples which are partly already known to our Countrey-men then by forreign and unheard of Histories Now all Passions of the Court relate to four Principall which are Love Desire of Honours and Pleasures of the world Anger alwayes animated to Revenge and Envy which draggeth along with it the black Passions of Jealousie Sadnesse and Despair I will content my self to pursue these Tracts scoring out unto you the disastres of such as have yielded to
of Flanders with him He being very subtil sought to prevent the Virgin and to accommodate her to his likings wherein he could not prevail according to his wicked purpose and it is likewise thought she let him see presumptions pregnant enough against La Brosse his kinsman But he surprizing her by way of conscience enjoyned her silence saying It was not fit for her to speak since her speech might peradventure be the cause of the death of a man whom she could not expose to this danger without mortall sin The Abbot being come to acquit himself of his Commission found her wholly reserved and could get nothing out of her which made him to suspect some deceit Both of them returned to the Court where the Bishop being questioned by the King concerning his proceedings saith the religious woman had told him things under the secret of Confession which was not fit for him to reveal To which Philip readily replied that he sent him not to hear her Confession but to know the revelations she had from God in the discharge of Innocents The Abbot said aloud he well perceived there was jugling in the Bishops proceeding and that he went not sincerely to work which was the cause that a second Embassage was appointed to this religious creature whereof Theobald Bishop of Dol and Arnulph a Knight of the Templers had the Commission and they so well understood how to handle the matter that she spake in these terms Tell the King If any one hath spoken to him in an ill sense of the Queen his wife let him not believe it for she is truly and sincerely good and cordially faithfull towards him and his her virtue cannot be obscured by the darknesse of Calumny This answer cured Philips mind in the matter of suspicion against Mary and turned it upon his bad servants although the want of proof permitted him not to hazard the punishment was due to them But God who draweth brightnesse out of the bosome of darknesse discovered the mischief of La Brosse by a notable accident One of his trusty friends passing by the Abbey of S. Peter at Melun is surprized by a sharp sicknesse which made him think upon his last passage by the assistance of good Religious men of that Monastery and finding himself touched to the quick with remorse of conscience he declared his crime and gave a little Casket to a Religious man who heard his Confession charging him to give it to the King with his own hands and to no other which he very faithfully did and when they had opened this box of Pandora there were discovered all the mischiefs and practices of La Brosse and his hopes to be dissolved For he was presently put in prison and brought to his triall which was followed by a Sentence that condemned him to be hanged and strangled on a gallows of Felons Here it was where the ambitious desires of this disloyall soul were to determine who found that worldly fortunes in which God is not are grosse smokes that produce nought but tempests 6. To conclude we find in the last order bloudy The French revengers of ambition and furious ambitions which cause revolutions of Empire and shake the pillars of the earth Nicetas observeth one very terrible wherein the French were witnesses arbitratours and revengers During the expedition they made in the Land under Philip Gods-guift there appeared a strange accident and a horrible confusion in the state of the Eastern Empire Isaac Comnenus who held the reins of the Empire is menaced much misery by his nearest allies and those whom he had advanced to the greatest dignities He thereupon consulteth with a South-sayer who among popular spirits was in great reputation but who according to the opinion of Nicetas was a cheating Imposter that sought to passe for a Prophet although his words consisted of a thousand falshoods The Emperour with much courtesie having saluted him he disposed himself to leap and to expresse postures which savoured more of a man possessed and frantick then of a prophet notwithstanding without saying any thing else he threw his staffe at the Emperours Image and for an ill presage put out the eyes of it Isaac Comnenus making no account here of contemneth the Southsayer and in few dayes is deprived of the Empire and of his eyes by a horrible conspiracy of Alexius his nearest kinsman and in this condition confined to a loathsome prison all the rest of his life The tyrant who had put out his eyes takes his bloudy spoil and finding no resistance possesseth himself of the throne of Constantinople Alexis son of the Emperour made blind escaped The furious ambition of Alexius the Tyrant of Greece punished by the valour and Justice of the French out of the chains and hand of the parricide his uncle and goes to the French Camp where he made a lamentable narration of his disasters He prayes he beseecheth he conjureth these brave Conquerours by all things the most sacred to take pity upon a miserable Emperour and to succour his father against the most execrable treachery that ever was practised in the world saying It onely belonged to them to trample dragons and monsters under-foot Besides the glory of this action he promiseth them wonders arms ships munition to advance the design they had for the conquest of the holy Land The French were divided in opinion upon this businesse some desiring to pursue their journey others judging this occasion well deserved to stay them there being not any actions in the world more glorious then to do Justice to the afflicted dispossesse bloudy usurpers of Empires and to restore true Kings into that rank which nature and the consent of people had given them This Faction carried it and ours using the advantage which their first fervours afforded them put themselves presently in a readinesse to take Constantinople One who should well weigh the exploits of arms they did in six dayes would think their army had consisted of Giants who bare Mountains and piled them one upon another to over-look the strongest Citadels in the world What they did exceedeth ordinary prodigies and will scarcely find credit with posterity Two thousand foot separated from the rest of the army aided onely by five hundred horse entred into a city wherein there were threescore thousand horse and four hundred thousand souls able to bear arms This so filled minds with terrour that the tyrant as timorous in warre as he had been violent in peace leaves his place without resistance and putting his richest treasures into covert he goes to sea in an instant to change a great Empire into Banishment He went out at one gate and young Alexis entred in by the other causing his troups to march in good order and was with applause received by the chief Citizens who had used much compassion in the afflictions of his Father There was then seen a strange alteration when they went to take this poor blind Emperour out of prison to
torments no whit shaken blessing God for all these things and incessantly praying and forming some stuttering inarticulate sounds to instruct and exhort those who visited him A while after he is called again before this Tyrant who made a sport of his pains and sought to make him end his life by despair to kill the soul with the body But when he perceived his heart was of so strong a temper and that the dreadfull horrour of a poor body carried up and down among so many tortures made nothing for his reputation he gave order to Chrodobert to put him to death and instantly he was delivered to four executioners who led him forth into a forrest which retaineth the name of S. Leger The blessed blind man perceiving his hour approached said to them I see what you go about to do Trouble not your selves I am more ready to die then you to execute me Thereupon three of the murderers relenting prostrated themselves at his feet and craved pardon which he very freely granted and putting himself upon his knees prayed for his persecutours recommending his soul to the Father of souls at which time one of these four executioners persisting in his obduratenesse cut off his head The wife of Chrodobert took the body and interred it in a little Chappel where it did great miracles which have deserved the veneration of people Some time after the detestable Ebroin continuing the wickednesse of his bloudy life was slain in his bed like another Holophernes and suddenly taken out of the world not shewing any sign of repentance to be reserved for an eternall torment Behold all which Envy Jealousie and the Rage of a man abandoned by God can do which letteth us manifestly see that there are not any men in the world worse then those who degenerating from a religious profession return to the vices of the world And on the other side we may behold in the person of S. Leger that there is not any Passion which may not be overcome nor honour which may not be trodden underfoot nor torments which a man is not able to set at naught when he with strong confidence throws himself between the arms of the Crosse there to find those of Jesus Christ LAUS DEO FINIS THE HOLY COURT VVritten in French by N. CAUSSIN S. J. The Fifth Tome Containing the Lives and Elogies of Persons of the COURT most Illustrious both of the Old and New Testament c. divided into five ORDERS Monarchs and Princes Queens and Ladies Souldiers States-men Religious men Printed M.DC.L To the READER HAving employed my first Volumn in pious and profitable discourses I have purposed to set forth in this fifth Tome a sufficient large Court to serve for example Which I have done by uniting to the Histories which I have already published these which I have here added a new which are almost all taken out of the holy Scriptures and handled in a style more solid and contract then specious and enlarged If this Work hath somewhat delayed its coming forth into the light it hath been businesses other wayes coming upon me that hath staid it We have had adversaries to deal with very well known that have by their Requests and by their Libels exceedingly troubled themselves to molest us I have answered them in two Books after a long silence for that the necessity did seem so to require and Authority therein did expresly command my obedience I have done it with the greatest modesty and sincerity that I was able and I may with confidence say that it hath been to the satisfaction of people of quality and desert Since as I understand they have continued their Replies where they largely witnesse their sharpnesse against me But what offence have I committed if in a Cause so good and by order from my Superiours I have undertaken the Defence in generall of a Society in which I have lived near these fourty years and have never learned any thing therein but Wisdome and Virtue They have so little matter that they are compelled to use old News-books against me which have spoken nothing but what hath been interpreted to my honour I have served God the King the Queen and all France without ever offending any person they might be ashamed to reproach me with that which hath been so much for my credit and to imitate those people that threw their Gods at the heads of their enemies for want of arrows God keep me from losing so much time as to reade their Writings or any desire to answer them I should seem to have lost my understanding if I should busie my self in fighting against Shadows and Lies put into Rhetorick so fully refuted by our Justifications and so manifestly condemned by the judgement of the Queen Regent and the rest of the. Powers that have acknowledged and maintained the Innocency of this Society against all Accusations These Books of evil Language are intolerable to all honest people and even odious to those that are rationâ—ll of their own party in so much that I pity their Authours to whom the pains of so great a Volumn with so little successe hath already served for a large punishment Instead of Replies to all those slanders I do sincerely offer up Prayers to God for our Persecutours that he may please to kindle in their hearts his holy Love which may purge out this gall of bitternesse this carnall wisdome and cause them to bring forth the fruits of Truth Justice and Charity The which I have endeavoured to do in this Work wherein I conceive that I have acquitted my self of the promises that I made to the Publick by treating on the true Histories of great Personages and especially those whom the holy Scripture hath honoured by its style for the edification of all the world It is in these illustrious Representations that the mind contents it self it is here that it contemplates the Virtues of famous Persons like the beams of the first Magnitude it is here that it quickens it self to the imitation of their glorious deeds and that it fore-stalls the delights of its own immortality It is here that it learns to endure adversities without departing from the duties of its Calling and firmly to keep its Constancy like the shadow in the Quadrants that remains immoveable under the blasts of the most furious winds not forsaking the measures of the Sunne Receive therefore courteous Reader the fruits of this my labour sprung up in the midst of a tempest that is may find calmnesse in thy favourable acceptance THE MONARCHS THe wisest of Monarchs speaking in the holy Scripture unto the Princes of his age and proceeding at large to give a full warning to all those that should bear part in their honour and imitate their lives delivereth these words by way of Oracle Hearken O Kings not onely The words of the wiseman directed to the Kings of his time Sap. 6. with an ear of flesh but attend with that of the understanding and
Ceremonies and infinite merriments The King not contenting himself with having broken the chains of the capitall city of the world made great presents to her Church and after he had been crowned King of Lombardy by the hands of that great Pope who offered him also the dignity of a Senatour the fore-runner of the Imperiall He returned to France leaving to all Italy an approbation of his deeds and a great desire of his Domination On the other side the Christians of Spain that suffered an Age since insupportable outrages under the Tyranny of the Sarazens had also recourse to this invincible Monarch who as one alwayes ready to exalt the Standard of the Faith and to succour the afflicted passes happily over the Pyrenean mountains takes the city of Pampelona crosses the river Ebro seizes himself of Sarragossa and afterwards of Barcelona plucks the Mahumetans out of the fortresses that they possessed and re-established the Christian Faith in all the places from whence the fury of that Barbarian had banished it His zeal alwayes burning carried him by the same means to the Conversion of the Infidels of which he caused innumerable multitudes to be baptized so true it is that every thing gave way to the Arms and to the perswasions of that incomparable Prince whom God seemed to lead by the hand to the Possession of the Roman Empire Here is the great work of the Providence of God upon his well-beloved Charles that he did him this favour to wear the first of all the Diadem of the Cesars in the house of France and to have transmitted it to a sufficient long posterity I pray you Reader to observe here the sacred traces of that wise governesse of Empires and to consider how she insensibly collected all dispositions necessary to set this great King upon the Throne of the Emperours The conquest of Kingdomes resemble often that golden bough of Virgil which one could not pluck off from its tree by main force but might easily be taken off by an hand that had good fortune on his side There are many Princes that to take Cities and Provinces by violence have covered the earth with Arms and the sea with Vessels with a noise that astonished the whole world without ever compassing their designs whereas others have come to Crowns with as much haste as easinesse without troubling themselves and almost without stirring because the hand of God was in the mingling of their affairs This is the proceeding which we visibly discover in the advancement of our Charles whilst he dream'd of nothing but on the means of exalting the Glory of God and succouring afflicted Nations Heaven labours for him in the East in the West and raises him occasions which without his thinking of it set the Diadem upon his head It was already a long time since the Eagle of the Roman Emperours clapt but with one wing Italy having been so many times pillaged by the Gothes the Huns the Vandals and the Lombards The courageous wisdome of Justinian that thought he had freed it from oppression did but change not break its chains The East had enough to do to defend it self against the incursions of the Barbarians and could no more contribute any thing to the West but unprofitable compassions and griess to lose that which it could no longer keep It happened that to aggravate the evils of the successours of Constantine there sprang up an Heresie of the Iconoclasts or Image-breakers which was worse then a plague of Egypt and which being fomented even by those that were upon the Throne caused innumerable disastres and shook the Pillars of the State The beginning of this unhappinesse came from Leo the Isauric who being of a very base extraction took in hand the Sceptre of Constantinople which he soil'd much more by his furious deportments then by his shamefull originiall He had in his Privy Councel a pernicious Jew that perswaded him to abolish the holy Images promising him the Empire when he was yet but a private man as the recompence of that Sacriledge and for this reason he afterward employed himself about it with fury and cast out the roarings of a Lion which were heard from East to West The Patriarch S. Germain opposed his Edicts who was for that businesse deprived of his Dignity and many great personages horribly persecuted for the same cause sealed with their bloud the Belief of the Church Gregory the Second thundred from S. Peters Chair against that Lion although he was under the captivity of the Lombards and declared him not onely Excommunicated but had also forfeited his Imperial Dignity and all the Demesnes he pretended to in Italy The rage of his Revenge caused a Fleet to be prepared to go down to Italy and to put this generous Pope in chains but it was cast away and death strangled his designs so that he could never root out of the hearts of men the worshipping of Images Constantine Copronymus his sonne that defiled in the day of his Baptisme the waters that purifie all the world continued Leo's furies and made himself the most abominable of all men a professed enemy of the most holy Virgin the mother of God and of all the Saints till such time as he was consumed by the leprosie He left an heir of his Sceptre and Impiety which was called by his Grandfathers name Leo a profane and unhappy Prince who being much in love with pearls and precious stones took away from the treasures of the Church a magnificent Crown that the Emperour Maurice had dedicated to God but his crime was followed suddenly with vengeance for scarce had he set it upon his head but it was covered with impostems and sores accompanied with a violent fever that took him away in few dayes after a reign of four years and a half He had a sonne named Constantine who began his Reign at the age of ten years under the protection of his mother Irene who was declared Regent of the Empire by her condition and because she was a woman of great discretion and courage the daughter of a King skilfull in holy learning end owed with a perfect beauty and accomplished in many graces and virtues that rendred her Government pleasing to all world She gave the direction of her affairs to Stauratius a man of a sublime capacity and an equall reputation that seconded all her good intentions so that she governed ten years with her sonne in great peace and in the approbation of all honest men Her Regency was greatly remarkable for the Zeal which she testified to the Catholick Faith following the good counsels of Pope Adrian and of Tarasus Patriarch of Constantinople who perswaded her to cause a generall Councel to be held at Nice where the memory of the preceding Emperours that had authorised the Heresie of the Iconoclasts was condemned the Images re-established and the Devotions of the people enflamed to their veneration This Councel gave a thousand benedictions to the Empresse even so farre
tender age in this voyage conceiving that he ought not to spare any thing which the service of God might require The ardent love caused him to expose his Royall person not onely to wearinesse but to the most dangerous blows of battels There is a certain jealous strictnesse of judgement in the understanding of men which would not that any one person should be excellent in the degree of Sovereignty in two illustrious qualities The reputation of Arms took away the high title of eloquence from Julius Cesar and we may see that S. Lewis contented himself with his rare devotion without taking that high part that he deserved in valour But this is the truth that he was courageous heroicall and valiant above all those brave ones whom the opinion of men do often deifie without very much desert Together with all his devotion he seemed to have obliged himself to take up Arms against his enemies even from his tenderest infancy He made wars both by sea and land in Europe Asia and Africa He was set upon in his minority by the neighbouring Princes and by the greatest Lords of his State from which he freed himself both by wisedome and valour marching forth into the field with the assistance of God and good counsell of his Mother He disarmed Philip his Uncle by courtesie the English by force he vanquished the inconstancy of Theohald by his stedfastnesse and the self-conceitednesse of Peter de Drues by his patience After he had pacified his kingdome he undertook the Holy War by a pious generousnesse of heart in the which he shewed marvellous valiantnesse of his person Joinville that was present saith that he stoutly ventured himself into the hottest conflicts of the battalions and fought fiercely with his own hand scattering and overthrowing the Sarazens that opposed his enterprises They speak much of the valour of Attila that visiting a certain place was set upon by two souldiers that had a purpose to kill him and escaped both the one and the other by his valour and mention But S. Lowis on a day having gone aside from the Army was set upon by six whom he put to flight by a victorious resistance When they were in some doubt about going a shore in his first voyage to Africa he was the first that threw himself upon the Coast of the Enemies with his sword in his hand without any amazement although he was up to the neck in water When he was seen at the beginning of the battel arrayed in his Royall arms he appeared like a Sun to the whole Army but as soon as he began to enter into the fight he was like a lightning that made a wonderfull flashing upon the Infidels together with all the misfortune of the time wherewith he was overborn he took the great and famous City of Damiata in his first voyage he discomfited the Sarazens in two battels he fortified four great places in Syria he compell'd the Emmiers of Egypt to restore him his prisoners he provided for the safety of all the Christians that were remaining in Palestine In his second voyage he vanquished at the first onset the Africans which had antiently made Italy Greece and Spain to tremble and had so long time disputed for the Empire of the world with the Romans and if he had not been hindred by sicknesse he had forthwith made himself master of Thunis and Carthage Behold what this ardent love did by his hands But the love indefatigable the true and faithfull character of a great stoutnesse of courage caused him not to be amazed at any thing and that he continued with an invincible magnanimity under the most burthensome accidents that contraried his enterprises This love caused him to make tryall of another voyage after the sad accidents of the first this love caused that the seas filled with terrours the Lands with Ant-heaps of Sarazens formed into Batalions the air that seemed from every part to let fly arrows of pestilence the wayes which were full of toyles the wars of terrours and maslacres the encounters of evil successe and the champions of a million of divers kinds of death never altered the constancy of his invincible heart The very day of his captivity after he had lost a great battel which overthrew all his affairs when as he saw the wayes covered with the dead bodies of his servants when he saw the river Nilus smoaking and bubling up the French blood when as the arrows of the Sarazens did fly round about his head like the hail on a winters day when as he was taken and carried to the Aunt of the Sultan and that he heard the clamours of those outrageous mouths that he saw so many infernall faces that might shake a soul of the stoutest temper he remained still in a great tranquility of mind and asked his page for his book of prayers which being ready he began to perform the duty of his Orazons which he presented every day to God with as quiet a spirit as if he had been returned from taking a walk in his gardens The very day that he was seased upon by the pestilence he beheld death coming upon him with a settled countenance he disposed of the affairs of his kingdome and of his house with a great judgment gave very excellent instructions to the princes children comforted all his good servants strengthened himself with the Sacraments entred into extasies of divine love which drove out of his heart all the cares of this present life The poor Prince sooner failed of his life then he could fail of his constancy and faithfulnesse to his high virtue It is here O Providence that you cover with a canopy of the night and darknesse the great events of the affairs of the world it is here that we acknowledge your government This Prince so wise so humble so holy which deserved that the world should bend under his laws and to have constrained good fortune to fly no where but about his colours in the mean while was handled by you as it seems to many not like to an indulgent mother but as by a step-mother severe and rigorous Alas the Lands have often undertaken the yoke and the seas have spread their back with coverlids by a pleasing calmnesse under the arms and vessels of Pirates Was there none but this Monarch to whom all creatures ought to have served as a defence that could deserve to be so evil handled at your hands In the first of his expeditions he lost his liberty and in the second his life What is the meaning of this O Providence draw the courtain a little uncover your secrets and unceil our eyes to behold them She answereth that the generall truth hath revealed to us in the Gospel his judgements on this point when he said to the Jewes which were come to take him behold your hour and the power of darknesse It is true that by a certain order of God and for causes very reasonable well known to his Providence
Bethulia said to her You are this day blessed my daughter and glorious above all women that are in the habitable world Praised be the Creatour of heaven and earth who hath so well guided your victorious hand to the ruine of the capitall of our enemies and who by the same means hath so glorified your name that he hath rendred your praise immortall in the mouth of men that shall have any sense of the wonderfull works of God Every one will remember how you have not spared your life to draw your people out of the ruines wherein they were almost buried Thereupon Achior was called and Judith shewing him the head of Holophernes sayes to him You have lost nothing by the testimonies you give to the power of our God for behold the head of the Collonel of the Unbelievers which God hath cut off this night by this hand of mine Behold him that threatned to make you die when he had taken Bethulia but sure now he will let you live in great quiet This man was in such an extasie at this news that he fell down in a swoon and when he was come to himself again he cast himself at the feet of Judith and gave her a reverence that was near to adoration And by her means was converted to the true Religion and rendred all glory to the God of Jerusalem Judith pursuing this her conquest counselled her people to make a shew of sallying out of the city in arms at the break of day as if they would give battel which would make the Assyrians hasten to the Pavilion of Holophernes to awake him and so seeing what had passed would be seized with so great a fear that they would sell their lives at a cheap rate This was executed and the Captains failed not to repair unto the Generall to receive orders It was already forward dayes and he was yet asleep with the sleep of death from whence there is no waking unlesse by an extraordinary power Every one was astonished that he appeared not but no body durst take the boldnesse to awake him so greatly was he feared They presse Vagoa to enter into the chamber who refuses at first to trouble the pleasures of his Master but when the time was drawn out in length he entred and made a noise not as by design but accident and seeing that no body stirred he went neer the bed thinking that he was yet with Judith At last when one told him that the enemy appeared in arms he drew the curtain very gently and saw the body of his Master weltering in his own bloud He therefore became so furious that he rent suddenly his clothes and ran to Judith's chamber to make her suffer a thousand deaths but when he could not find her he sent out frightfull cryes and spake aloud that that stranger-woman had filled the house of Nebuchadonozor with confusion and that she had assassinated their Generall who was now nothing but a trunk without an head plung'd in his own bloud All ran to this spectacle and the whole Camp was filled with astonishment with fears with despair with tears and with howlings At the same time appeared the head of Holophernes hanged up upon the walls of Bethulia and all the army of the Assyrians surpriz'd with a panick fear and as it were struck with a scourge from heaven began to scatter themselves every one seeking his safety in his flight The Israelites pursued them making a great noise as if they had drawn forth numerous troops and as if their squadrons had marched compacted and in good order It was easie for them to vanquish run-awayes who had already delivered up to fear all the hope of their life and fortune All the neighbouring cities came out to take a share of this glory and cast themselves into the fields on all parts to entrap their routed enemies of whom they made most horrible massacre All the Camp of Holophernes was pillaged where was found so great a quantity of booty that it was a thing prodigious The noise of this victory was spread unto Jerusalem the high Priest came to Bethulia with his other Priests to see Judith to whom every one gave a thousand blessings One could hear nothing but shouts of joy and acclamations that published her The Glory of Jerusalem the Joy of Israel the Honour of her People the gallant Woman the Chaste and Valiant Princesse the incomparable Lady whose Reputation should live as long as Eternity it self A moneth passed wherein there was nothing heard but joyes but consorts of musick but trophies amongst the people They gathered every day some new spoils whereof the most precious in gold in silver in purple in pearls and jewels were presented to the victorious Judith She composed a song of Triumph which was sung solemnly with the admiration of the whole world After all they went as it behoved them to Jerusalem to render to God the Vows of the whole people and to make great Offerings where three moneths more were spent in an incomparable chearfulnesse There was not a day that was not Festivall nor a face that did not wear the lineaments of the joyes of Paradise Judith offered in the Temple the Pavilion of Holophernes that the memory of it might never be defaced by oblivion At last all returned home to their own houses and the holy woman remained in her little city of Bethulia alwayes in her widow-hood honoured of all the world as the most glorious soul on earth She made her servant free and lived even to the age of 105 years amongst her people in a profound peace She appeared abroad the Festivall dayes in a magnificent glory spending the other dayes in her solitude and living with great examples of Virtues and Devotion The day of that happinesse was marked with white and reckoned in the number of the greatest Feasts of the Jews to all posterity God who is the worker of so many wonders hath taken a care also of this History It is an eternall monument of the virtue of his arm that shakes the mountains that cleaves the rocks and overthrows in a moment those sons of the Titans who make warre against heaven it self and would walk upon the wings of the winds A Generall of an Army that vaunted himself in the midst of an hundred thousand souldiers environed all about with steel with fires and lightnings who said I will go I will do I will level with the ground who held a fatall councel where he decreed the firing of Cities the sacking of Provinces where so many dragons drank up the tears of Nations without being touched with any sense of pity A Giant that heaped mountain upon mountain to ascend through fire and sword even to the throne of the most High behold now conquered slain massacred tumbled in his bloud by a woman that makes a play-game of his head and an army that cut their passage through the Rocks that drank up Rivers that shadowed the Sun by the multitude
say shall come to passe under thy Reign Behold a strange Prophecy and some body may wonder that Elisha did not cause that wicked man to be strangled that was to make all those tragedies for how many mothers are there that would have choaked their own children at their breast if they had foreseen that after they had sucked their milk they would one day assume the spirit of an hangmand to tyrannize over mankind Yet Elisha rejects not that Hazael but consecrates him King by his speech because that he knew that it was a disposition of God who would make use of him as of the rod of his fury to chastise the Idolatries of his Kings and the sins of his People All men of God have this property to submit themselves exceedingly to Gods will although it seems to will and permit things strangely lamentable In conclusion as Predictions are very ticklish and flatter the intention of those that promise themselves Empires and wonders they animate also the heart of those that have wicked undertakings and one ought never to permit any one to take consulations with Astrologers and Southsayers about the life and fortune of great men This Embassadour returning to the Court deceived his King giving him all hopes of a life and when he doubted least of death strangled him with a wet napkin paying himself with a Kingdome for a recompence of his wickednesse And although it was a disposition of God that Benhadad should be deprived of his Sceptre yet it failed not to be a crime in Hazael The last rancounter that Elisha had at Court was with King Joash who went to see him a little before his death and this Prince foreseeing that he would quickly depart out of this world said to him weeping that he was the Father the Chariot and the Conductour of his Kingdome and of all his People expressing that he was afflicted with the regret of his losse above all the things of the world But Elisha to comfort him made him take his bow and arrows and put his hand upon the Kings hand as to guide it after that he commanded the window to be set open towards Syria and caused the King to let flie an arrow which he accompanied with Propheticall words saying That it was the arrow of salvation whose feathers God himself did guide and that it was a messenger that prophesied to him that he should combate and destroy the Syrians enemies of his people After that he bad Joash again strike the ground with the point of a dart that he had in his hand which he did three times and the Prophet told him that he should carry away as many victories over the King of Syria but if he had stricken till seven times he should have ruined him even to the utmost consummation A little while after Elisha dyed with an high reputation of sanctity and an extreme regret of all the orders of the kingdome and was interred in a place where he raised afterward a dead man by the touching of his bones God rendring every thing wonderfull in him even to his very ashes It appears by all this discourse that this personage had not a Piety idle and fearfull amorous of its own small preservation without caring for the publick good but he had an heart filled with generous flames for the protection of his people and an incomparable security to shew to Princes the estate of their conscience He supported all the Realm by his prayers by his exhortations by his heroick actions and the losse of one such man was the overthrow of the prime Pillar of the State ISAIAH JEREMIAH ISAIAH THE PROPHET IEREMIAH THE PROPHET THe Prophet Isaiah hath engraved his spirit in his Book and cannot be commended more advantageously then by his works He that would make him great Elogies after so sublime a Prophecy would seem to intend to shew the Sun with a torch The things that are most excellent make themselves known by themselves as God and the Light and I may say all the words that this divine Personage hath left us are as many characters of his Immortality It is with a very just title that we put him amongst the holy Courtiers for he was born at the Court of Judea and some hold that he was the nephew of King Amasiah This birth so elevated and so many fair hopes which might flatter him to make him follow the course of the great ambitions of the world did no way shake the force of his spirit It was a soul consecrated to things Divine that sacrificed the first fires of his youth by the most pure flames of Angels Never did Prophet enter into that Ministery with more authority and disposition of heaven He had a sublime vision in which he saw the Majesty of God seated upon a Throne of Glory environ'd with Seraphims that were transported through the admiration of his greatnesse God in person created him his Prophet the Seraphim a messenger of the sovereign power purified his lips with a Carbuncle from whence proceeded a celestiall fire that if he had got any pollutions at the Court where tongues are so free they might be taken away by that sacred touch He offered himself to God with an heart full of chearfulnesse to carry his word before Kings and Subjects without fearing their menaces or their furies And he acquitted himself all his life time worthily of that duty and prophesied more then fourscore and ten years not ceasing to exhort to counsel to rebuke to instruct to comfort and to perform all the exercises of his charge His Eloquence is as elevated as his birth he speaks every where like a King with a speech firm lofty and thundering that passes all the inventions of man When he threatens and fore-tells the calamities of Nations it is so much lightning kindled by the breath of Seraphims that proceeds out of this Divine mouth that pierces the rocks that shakes the mountains that crushes the highest cedars into dust the nations into fear and the Kings into respect When he comforts they are rivers of milk and honey that flow from his tongue and spread themselves with incomparable sweetnesses into afflicted hearts When he describes the perfections and the reign of the Messias they are the amorous extasies of a spirit melted by the heats of Jesus that strikes burns and penetrates him more then seven hundred years before his Birth The holinesse of his Life marched alwayes hand in hand with his Doctrine He was a man dead to all worldly things that lived but by the raptures of his deified spirit He loved singularly the poor and comforted them in all their necessities He spake to Kings and reproved their sins with an heroick constancy worthy of his Bloud and Ministery At the same time as Romulus began the Court of Rome Isaiah saw that of Judea where he experimented great changes and strange diversities according to the revolutions of humane things He passed his youth under his uncle Amasiah who
with a prodigious army against which there was no humane resistance He sent a certain man named Rabshakeh in an Embassage to King Hezekiah who vomited out blasphemies and proposed to him conditions shamefull to his reputation and impossible to all his powers All the people were in an affright expecting nothing but fire and sword The King covered with sackcloth implores the heavenly assistance and sends the chief Counsellours of his State to the Prophet Isaiah to turn away this scourge by his prayers The holy man in that confusion of affairs wherein one could not see one onely spark of light encourages him animates him and promises him unexpected effects of the mercy of God The Prophecy was not vain for in one onely night the Angel of God killed an hundred fourscore and five thousand men in the Army of the Assyrians by a stroke from heaven and a devouring fire which reduced them to dust in their guilded arms This proud King was constrained to make an ignominious retreat and being returned to Niniveh the capitall city of his Empire he was slain by his own children This is a manifest example of the amiable protection of God over the Holy Court who defended his dear Hezekiah by the intercession of the Prophet as the apple of his eyes He expressed yet another singular favour to him in a great sicknesse caused by a malignant ulcer of which according to the course of nature he should have died and therefore Isaiah went to see him and without flattering him brought him word of his last day exhorting him to put the affairs of his State in order This good King had a tender affection to life and being astonished at that news prayed God fervently with a great profusion of tears that he would have regard to the sincerity of his heart and to the good services that he had done him in his Temple and not to tear away his life by a violent death in the middle of its course The heart of the everlasting Father melted at the tears of that Prince and he advertised Isaiah who was not yet gone out of the Palace to retread his steps and carry him the news of his recovery He told him from God that he should rise again from that sicknesse and within three dayes should go up to the Temple ro render his Thanks-giving Further he promised him that his dayes should be augmented fifteen years and that he should see himself totally delivered from the fury of the Assyrians to serve the living God in a perfect tranquility The King was ravished at this happy news and desired some sign of the Divine will to make him believe an happinesse so unhoped for Isaiah for this purpose did a miracle which since Joshua had not been seen nor heard which was to make the Sun turn back so that the shadow of the Diall which was in the palace appeared ten degrees retired to the admiration and ravishment of all the world And to shew that the Prophet was not ignorant of Physick he caused a Cataplasme composed of a lump of figs to be applyed to the wound of the sick man whereby he was healed and in three dayes rendred to the Temple This miracle was not unknown to the Babylonians who perceived the immense length of the day in which it was done and their Prince having heard the news of it sent Embassadours to King Hezekiah to congratulate his health and to offer him great presents whereat this Monarch that was of an easie nature suffered himself to be a little too much transported with joy and out of a little kind of vanity made a shew of his treasures and of his great riches to those strangers which served much to kindle their covetousnesse And therefore the Prophet who was never sparing of his remonstrances to the King rebuked him for that action and fore-told him that he made Infidels see the great wealth that God had given him through a vain glory which would cost him dear and that having been spectatours of his treasures they had a mind to be the masters of them and that at length they should compasse their design but that it should not be in his time This Prince received the correction with patience and took courage hearing that the hail should not fall upon his head passing over his to his childrens Manasses his son succeeded him a Prince truly abominable who wiped out all the marks of the piety of his father and placed Idols even in the very Temple of the living God All that Idolatry had shown in sacriledges cruelty in murders impudence in all sort of wickednesses was renewed by the perfidiousnesse of this man abandoned of God Poor Isaiah that had governed the father with so much authority had no credit with the son this tygre was incensed at the harmonious consorts of the divine Wisdomes that spake by his mouth and could no more endure the truth then serpents the odour of the vine Yet he desisted not to reprehend him and to advertise him of the punishments that God prepared for his crimes whereat this barbarous man was so much moved and kindled with fury that he commanded that this holy old man that had passed the hundreth year should be sawn alive by an horrible and extraordinary punishment O Manasses cruell Manasses the most infamous of tyrants and the most bloudy of hang-men this was the onely crime that the furies themselves even the most enraged should never have permitted to thy salvagenesse This venerable Master of so many Kings this King of Prophets this prime Intelligence of the State this Seraphim this instrument of the God of Hosts to be used so barbarously at the Court by his own bloud after so many good counsels so many glorious labours so many Oracles pronounced so many Divine actions so worthily accomplished All the Militia of heaven wept over this companion of the Angels and the earth caused fountains to leap up to bedew her lips in the midst of her ardent pains His Wisdome hath rendred him admirable to the Learned his Life inimitable to the most Perfect his Zeal adorable to the most Courageous his Age venerable to Nature and his Death deplorable to all Ages JEREMIAH BEhold the most afflicted of Holy Courtiers a Prophet weeping a Man of sorrows an heart alwayes bleeding and eyes that are never dry He haunted not great men but to see great evils and was not found at Court but to sing its Funerals and to set it up a tomb Yet was he a very great and most holy person that had been sanctified in his mothers womb that began to prophecy at the age of fifteen years a spirit separated from the vanities and the pretensions of the world that was intire to God that lived by the purest flames of his holy love and quenched his thirst with his tears He drank the mud of bad times and found himself in a piteous Government in which there was little to gain and much to suffer After that the
Princes ears with such like words and to breed a distrust in him of Saint John in such a manner as that he consented that he should be apprehended and put in prison under colour as Josephus saith that he went about to change the peoples minds and to embroil the State This detaining of a man so holy and so renowned made a great noyse through all Judea but the wicked woman had this maxime That one ought to take ones pleasure to content nature and little to trouble ones self at the opinions of the world below nor at the complaints of honest men judging that all mouthes ought to be stopped by the rigour of punishments and that she should be innocent when no body durst any more find fault with her actions She slept not one good sleep with her Herod as long as Saint John was yet alive but fearing alwayes either that her pretended husband whom she thought light enough might be softned with compassion to release him or that the people that held him for a Saint might break open the prisons to take him thence she resolved to see the end of him to give all liberty to her unbridled passions She watches the opportunity of Herods birth-day on which he was accustomed to make feasts and to intertein the principall Officers of his Kingdome This crafty woman tampered with all the wills of those that had any power over his spirit for this design and seeing that her daughter was a powerfull instrument to move that effeminate Prince and that he was extraordinarily pleased to see her dance conjured her to employ all her genius and all her industry all the baits allurements and gentilesses that she had in dancing to gain the Kings heart and that if she saw him very freely merry and on terms to gratifie her with some great advantage she should take heed of asking any thing but the head of John and that he was necessarily to fall if she would not see her mother perish and all her fortunes overthrown The daughter obeyed and fits her self even to perfection to please the Princes eyes she enters into the banqueting house richly deck'd and makes use of a dance not vulgar whereat he was ravished and all the Guests that were perhaps hired by Herodias to commend her made a wonderfull recitall of her perfections There was nothing now remaining but to give her the recompence of her pains This daughter of iniquity and not of nature sayes Chrysologus seeing that every one applauded her and that the King that was no longer his own man would honour her with some great present which he would remit to her own choyse even as far as to give her the moity of his Kingdome if she would have desired it made a bloudy request following the instructions of her wicked mother and required that instantly S. Johns head should be given her in a plate Herod felt his heart pricked with a repentance piercing enough but because he had sworn in presence of the Nobles of his Kingdomes to deny nothing that she should ask would not discontent her but gives command to the Master of his House to go to the prison and to cut off S. Johns head to put it in the hands of this wanton wench As soon as the word was pronounced her mother was not quiet till she saw the execution of it to Prison they run every one thought that it had been for some grace since that it was upon the nick of the feast of the Nativity of the King but they quickly saw an effect quite contrary to that thought when S. John was called for and told that he must resolve to dye What think we did this divine forerunner do at this last moment that remained to him of so innocent a life but render thanks to God that made him dye a Martyr for the truth after he had inlightned his eyes with the visible presence of the Incarnate Word which permitted him not to have any thing left in this world to be desired He exhorted his disciples to range themselves about our Saviour who was the Way the Life and the Truth He prayed for his persecutours and for the easing of the miseries of his poor people afterward having a relish of the first contentments of his felicity by the tranquility of his spirit he yielded his neck to the hangman His body was honourably buried by his disciples and his head brought in a plate to that cruell feast put into the hands of that danceresse who presented it to her mother and the mother according to S. Jerome made a play-game of it pricking the tongue with the needle of her hair All that one can speak is below the horrour of its spectacle sayes S. Ambrose The head of S. John of the Prime man of the world that had shut up the Law that had opened the Gospel the head of a Prophet of an Angell is outrageously taken off and delivered for the salary of a danceresse The soberest of men is massacreed in a feast of drunkards and the chastest by the artifice of a prostitute He is condemned on an occasion and on a time in which he would not even have been absolved as abhorring all that proceeded from intemperance O how dangerous is it then to offend a woman that hath renounced her honour Herod gave her an homicide for a kisse The hangmen wash their hands when they are ready to sit down at table but these unhappy women pollute theirs in the banquet with a Prophets bloud The righteous slain by adulterers the innocent by the guilty the true judge by criminall souls This banquet that should have been the source of life brings an edict of death Cruelty is mingled with delights and pleasure with funerals This horrible plate is carried through all the table for the satiating of those unhumane eyes and the bloud that drops yet from his veins falls upon the pavement to be licked up with the ordures of that infamous supper Look upon it Herod look upon a deed that was worthy of none but thy Cruelty stretch out thine hand put thy fingers in the wound that thou hast made that they may be again bedewed with a bloud so sacred Drink cruell man drink that river which thou seest glide to quench thy thirst Look upon those dead eyes that accuse thy wickednesse and which thou dost wound again with the aspect of thy filthy pleasures Alas they are shut not so much by the necessity of death as by the horrour of thy luxury The vengeance of God delayed not long to fall upon those perverse souls that had committed so enourmous a crime Arethas King of the Arabians resenting the affront that had been given to his daughter by those Adulterers enters in arms upon the lands of Herod who bestirrs himself but weakly to resist him Pleasures held him so fast chained that he had not the boldnesse to go to his frontiers in person to oppose his adversary but contented himself with sending a
by our glorious Father S. Gregory the Great it is that which our Fathers have embraced it is that which they have defended by their Words their Arms and their Bloud which they have shed for the Honour of it Nothing is left for those to hope for who are separated from it but the tempests of darkness and the everlasting chains of hell It is well known that the change of Faith proceeds from an infectious passion which having possessed the heart of a poor Prince hath caused these reprocheable furies and the inundations of bloud which hath covered the face of England He hath at his death condemned that which before he approved He by his last Testament destroyed that which before he had chosen wherefore those who have followed him in his Errour may also follow him in his Repentance The Peace the Safety the Abundance the Felicity of the Kingdom are ready to re-enter with the true Faith which if you refuse I see the choller of God and a thousand calamities that do threaten you Return therefore O Shunamite Return O fair Island to thy first beginning feign not to thy self imaginary penalties terrours and punishments which are not prepared but for the obstinate The Sovereign Father of Christendom doth continually stretch forth his arms to thy obedience and hath delegated me as the Dove out of the Ark to bring unto thee the Olive Bough to pronounce Peace and Reconciliation to thee This is the acceptable Hour this is the Day of thy salvation The Night which hitherto hath covered thee is at the end of her Course and the Sun of Justice is risen to bring light unto thee It is time to lay down the works of darkness and to take up the Armour of Light to the end that all the earth inhabited may take notice that thou abborrest what is past embracest what is present and dost totally put thy self into the hands of God for the time to come This Oration was attended with a wonderful approbation of all the assembly and the Cardinal being departed from the Councel the King and Queen commanded that they should debate on this Proposition which was presently taken into consideration and it was resolved That the ancient religion should be established The Chancellour made this resolution known unto the people and did powerfully exhort them to follow the examples which were conformable to the advice of the King and Queen and the most eminent personages in the Kingdom This discourse was revived with a general applause for the advancement of the Catholick faith In the end he demanded that they would testifie their resolution in a Petition to the King and Queen and mediate for a reconciliation to the Cardinal Legate of the holy See which incontenently was done the paper was presented and openly read their Majesties did confirm it both by their authorities and their prayers and humbled themselves on their knees with their Grandees and all the people demanding mercy whereupon an authentick absolution was given by the Legate the bels did ring in all the Churches Te Deum was sung All places were filled with the cries of joyes as people infranchised and coming out of the gates of hell After this King Philip was obliged to go into Flanders by reason of the retreat of the Emperour his father Pool was left chief of the Councellours with Queen Mary who did wonders for the good of Religion of the State It is true that Cranmer and other turbulent and seditious spirits were punished but so great a moderation was used that the Benefices and the Reveneues of the Church did continue in the hands of those who did hold them of the King without disturbing them on that innovation all things were continued that might any way be suffered not so much as changing any thing in marriages because they would not ensnare their spirits The heart of the Queen and of her ministers did think on nothing more than to establish Religion to entertain the holy See to render justice to comfort the people to procure peace and rest to multiply the abundance of the Kingdom They did begin again the golden age when after the reign of five years and odde moneths they were both in one day taken out of the world by sickness which did oppress with grief all honest men and did bury with them in one Tomb the happiness and safety of that Kingdom O providencelnot to be dived into by humane reason what vail hast thou cast on our Councels and our works What might we have not hoped from such beginnings What wisdom would not have concluded That felicity had crowned for ever the enterprizes of this Cardinal An affair so well conducted a negotiation so happy a business of State and the greatest that was ever in any Kingdom whatsoever ought it not to carry his progress unto eternity Where are the fine plots of policy Where are the Arms that in so small a time have ever wrought so great an effect The Chariots of the Romans which covered with Lawrels did march on the heads of Kings did not make their wayes remarkable but by stormings of Towns by Flames and Massacres But behold here many millions of men struck down and raised again with one onely speech so many legions of souls converted with a soft sweetness the face of a kingdom totally changed in one Moment and made the happiest that any Ages have seen And after all this to find the inexoarble Trenchant of Death to sap in one day the two great pillars of Estate and ruinate the house of God which should have reached to the imperial heaven O how true is it that there are the strokes of Fate that is to say an order of the secret purpose of God which is as concealed as inevitable nothing can divert nothing can delay it The counsels of the wise are here blinded their addresses are lost their activity troubled their patience tried and all their reasons confounded Poor Brittain God gave thee these two Great Lights not to enjoy them but as they passed by to behold them Thou art soiled with sacriledges and impieties thou art red with the bloud of the Martyrs The sins of Henrie are not yet expiated and the ignominious passions of his life are punished by the permission of the Errour The Powers of darkness have their times determined by God they will abate nothing of their periods if the invincible hand of the Sovereign Judge doth not stop their courses by his absolute Authority It pertaineth to God onely to know and appoint the times of punishment and Mercy and there is nothing more expedient for man than to submit to his Laws to obey his Decrees to reverence his Chastisements and to adore the Hand that strikes him FINIS THE ANGEL OF PEACE TO ALL CHRISTIAN PRINCES Written in French by N. CAUSSIN S. J. And now translated into English Printed in the Year of our Lord MDCL The Angel of Peace to all Christian Princes IF it be
when the Sun obtained the middle part of Virgo or Astraea for he was to govern the world with the moderation of Laws He ascended with Lyra being to make a harmony and consort of publick tranquillity And if Scorpio did at the same time shew forth his sting he threatned the Sarazens and promised the Idumean Palms to him that should be born so often dignified by the Valour of his Ancestours The heavenly habitations rejoyced at his birth and the whole world welcomed the new-born Babe with joy Now no man thought himself miserable at this happy birth now no man thought himself happy whom that birth did not make so Upon that day France wiped away all the foot of Warre and shined clearly with refulgent ensignes of Peace We had that day as many prosperities as bone-fires and as many bone-fires as there are starres O Lewis beloved of God whom he seemeth to have regenerated in his sonne that very moneth wherein he was born O Anne late indeed the mother of a sonne yet alwayes a fortunate mother in bringing forth a sonne not onely to her self nor so much to her self as to all France He hath much of his Father and much of his Mother and by this very confusion he maketh the image of them both more gratefull and more amiable This new Isaac will make thee laugh O France and whom thou canst scarce hear speaking hereafter thou shalt see comforting How many chains will those tender hands burst asunder How many prisons will they open How many obscurities will those little eyes enlighten How many monsters will the feet of this Infant subdue and trample on Be silent ye waves be silent ye tempests and rages of the sea at the beck of such a gentle Prince and restore unto the world that serenrty whereof you have deprived it Ye heavenly Powers lend him long unto the earth and whom you have made so healthfull to the Nation make him also lasting Ye Fates keep off your hands and touch not this child but to assist him Let him transcend the years and actions of his Ancestours and being born mortall may he apprehend nothing but what is immortall May he love and desire to be beloved ever fearing to be feared Let the oppressed find him a deliverer may the unjust feel him an avenger may his enemies know him to be of a warlike spirit and may his Subjects attest him to be of a peaceable mind This Nativity ravisheth all my senses which I foretell shall be the beginning of an eternall Peace unto us Look down from above O Lewis upon such a sonne Look upon him all ye Christian Kings as your little Nephew give rest to wearied things let arms be silent at the command of so great a Prince so potent an Oratour nor let the tumults of Warre rock this royall cradle To you again Great Princes I wholly turn my self by whatsoever is dear I ask by whatsoever is holy I beseech you give peace to them that beg it or must beg without it give tranquillity to the world sighing under so many feverish miseries Make it appear unto us that you chose rather to be the Pacificatours of the world then the Subverters of your own Kingdomes There is a story how in that fatall War between the English and the French continued with lasting contentions and horrible slaughters a pious Anachoret instigated thereunto by God came unto the Courts of the two Princes that he might compose these ferall discords between them But being slighted in the English Court and negligently repulsed this despised but not despicable Augur pronounced many direfull accidents that should befall that Nation But travelling to Charles of France and finding him to be a prince of a gentle wit and inclined to conditions of Peace he foretold that the Kingdome being recovered he should have the Dolphin to be his successour who as he was the child of many hearty desires so he should prove the instrument of many joyfull enterprises The prophecy is inpartpart fulfilled with a prosperous event so tenderly God loves the sons of Peace accumulated with affluence of all good things Whoe're he be let him beware that shall resist and strive against the peaceable wishes of all men some grievous hand will fall upon him and his from heaven he shall meet with unhappy events in all his undertakings his life shall be cer-tainly troublesome his death doubtfull Best and greatest Princes consider and think with your selves that what losse soever can be pretended to happen by this league of Peace whatsoever can detract from your Honour or your Empire is recompenced unto you in the most fortunate advantages of the whole Chri-stian world This is rich indeed this is magnificent this truly Royal and to be propagated to the memory of all Ages Remember that you are Christians and govern Christians be you propitious like Gods unto men if you desire that God should be propitious unto you Whatsoever you enjoy of life is slippery and uncertain and your Dignities are full of frailty it is your Justice that hath reference to your Felicity and it is your Virtue that links you to Eternity There is a great and conspicuous Tribunall that expects you there sits a Judge cloathed with purestlight to summon you unto whom the most secret things are revealed whom the most involved and disguised actions cannot deceive no can he be overcome by perversities Before him must appear the souls of Kings devested of body fortunes Empires and be they just or unjust they must be examined by a most clear light There you shall hear the Edicts of the supreme Deity and the King of kings thundering in your ears the groans of the oppressed shall cry against you the tears of the poor shall speak against you the tutelary Gods will plead for their Altars which you have broken down and all the heavenly Militia will rise together against the contumacious Endeavour ye pious and alwayes invincible Princes that those things which have been committed in prejudice of your wills by the uncontroulable licence of War may be corrected by your Equity that they may leave no aspersion upon your Reignes no stain upon Reputations no blot upon your Persons Bring to passe that Justice and Peace may meet in mutuall embracements let them be carried with triumphall pomp thorow your Kingdomes and thorow your Cities let them be born upon the shoulders of the whole world unto fixed and eternall seat that it perpetually may be lawfull for us to worship and reverence them at the monuments of your goodnesse and the pledges of our felicity Pax super Israel Dei. FINIS AN ALPHABETICALL TABLE Setting down the most observable Matters contained in the two last TOMES of the HOLY COURT ABiathar the high Priest deprived of his dignities by a violent action 152 The wisdome of Abigail 142 The insolence of Abner 144 He treateth with David 145 His death ibid. Absolon out of favour 147 His reconciliation by means of Joab ibid. Absolons
which said these words as it were singing Take and read often repeating them Admiration stopped the floud of tears and he began to examine in himself whether such a voice could come from any neighbour-place by some ordinary means All which well weighed he found it could not be humane but that God by this voice instructed him what he was to do He went from this place thither where he left S. Pauls Epistles with his friend Alipius imagining that as S. Anthonie had been converted by the reading of one word in the Gospel on which he casually happened God might likewise work somewhat in his soul by the words of his Apostle He openeth the book with a holy horrour and the first sentence he encountered was that which said It was time to live no longer in good cheer feasts and the Rom. 13. Non in commessationibus ebriâ—tatibus non in cubilibus imjudicitiis non in contentione aemulatione sed induimini Dominum Jesum Christum carnis providentiam ne â—â—ceritis in concupiscentiis vestris drunkenness of the world That it was time to live no longer in unchast beds quarrels vanities and emulations but that we must be clothed with Jesus Christ as with a robe of glory no more obeying the flesh nor the concupiscence of the heart There was no need to read any further Behold in an instant the ray of God which did directly beat upon his heart and opened to him a delicious serenitie Behold him throughly resolved He sheweth this passage to his faithfull Alipius as the decisive sentence of a long process which he had with sensuality And Alipius casting his eyes upon the subsequent words found (a) (a) (a) Rom. 14. Infirmum autem â—n â—â—ae reâ—ipite Receive him who is weak in faith Behold me said he If you determine to forsake the world take me for your companion They rose and went both to the good S. Monica Mother saith Augustine you shall not need to take the pains to find me out a wife Behold me a Catholick and which is more resolved to leave the world to live in continency The resolution is made and concluded with God there is no means at all to retire Had not God withheld the soul of this holy widdow of Naim it was already upon her lips to flie out for joy beholding this dead son this son of so many tears to come unexpectedly out of his tomb and present himself before her eyes with a splendour of incomparable light She made bon-fires of joy in her heart and triumphed with celestial alacritie blessing God who had stretched out the power of his arm on this conversion and who by the bounty of a true father had surmounted the vows of an afflicted mother Augustine in the mean while thought sweetly to begin his retreat from the Rhetorick Lectures wherein he was engaged There yet remained but twenty days to the time of vacation which had the continuance of twenty years to a man who then entertained far other affections notwithstanding through great wisdom and modesty he would not break with exteriour pomp by publishing a change of life in the Citie of Milan but suffered the time to steal away with little noise When the term expired he quietly discharged himself thereof and likewise freed himself from the importunity of fathers who passionately sought him to be Tutour to their children for his great capacity he alledging for his excuse that the exercise of the School had brought a difficulty of breathing and an indisposition of the breast upon him which threatened him with a ptysick if he desisted not This was very true but yet not the principal point of his resolution Behold how this great man avoided the occasions of ostentation and the divers interpretations he might make to himself for a gloss of actions and although God as he said had put into his heart flaming darts and juniper-coals against slanderous tongues he chose rather to take away occasion of calumny than to see himself put upon the necessity of defending himself very far different therein from the nature of those who make great flourishes to end them in nothing After he was discharged from his professon of Rhetorick he retired himself into the Grange of Verecundus where he stayed a long time as yet a Catachumen leading a most Angelical life spent wholly in prayer and the study of holy letters From thence he wrote to S. Ambrose of the errours of his passed life and the estate wherein he presently was by the grace of God as also of the aid he had contributed to his conversion demanding besides what book he should read the better to prepare himself for the grace of Baptism S. Ambrose certified him of the contentment he took in this so particular visitation of God and advised him to read the Prophet Isaiah but he seeing he could not yet understand it did defer it till another time wherein he might be better practised in holy Scriptures In the end the day so many times desired being S. Ambrose baptized S. Augustine come wherein he was to be born anew by Baptism it being in the thirty fourth year of his age as Cardinal Baronius accounteth it he went from the Grange of Verecundus to the Citie of Milan where he was christened by the hand of Saint Ambrose and had for companion of his Baptisin his faithful friend Alipius and his onely son Adeodatus at that time about fifteen years of age so prodigious a wit that his father could not think upon it without astonishment I had nothing Horrori â—â—ibi erat istud ingenium therein saith he my God but sin the rest is from you who so well know how to reform our deformities But all was there admirable for at the age between fifteen and sixteen years he already surpassed many great and learned men He also verified the saying of Sages affirming these such sparkling wits are not for any long continuance upon earth for he died some years after his return into Africk leaving a repose in the father who already apprehended the course of this Ingenium nimis mature magnum non est vitale youth and although he grieved to see him taken away in the flower of his age yet on the other side he was much comforted in the innocency of his life hope of his immortality knowing it was the will of the gardener who had gathered the fruit according to his good pleasure to lay it up in store After this baptism there were nothing but hymns songs lights of eternal verities thanksgiving and tears of joy This done he must take the way of Africa and they The death of S. Monica were now arrived to the port of Ostia expecting the opportunity of navigation when the holy and venerable mother Monica of fifty six years of age and worn with many labours rendered to nature her tribute and soul to its Creatour This admirable woman resembleth the Ark in
the deluge which after it had born the whole world in the bowels thereof amongst so many storms and fatal convulsions of universal nature reposed on the mountains of Armenia So S. Monica when she so long time had carried in her entrails and heart a spirit as great as this universe among so many tears and dolours so soon as she was delivered of this painful burden went to take her rest on the mountains of Sion A little before her death beholding Heaven from a high window which opened on a garden she seemed there already to mark out her lodging so much she witnessed resentment and extasie towards her son Augustine who at that time made this admirable colloquie with her couched by him afterward in his Confessions The conclusion was that she said unto him My son I have now no more obligations to the world you have discharged all the promises of Heaven to me and I have consummated all the hopes I might have on earth seeing you a Catholick and which is more resolved to perfection of the life you have embraced When it shall please God to call me I am like fruit ripe and falling that holdeth on nothing Soon after she betook her to her bed being surprized with a feaver which she presently felt to be the messenger of her last hour Behold the cause why she being fortified with arms and assistances necessary for this combat took leave of Augustine and his brother there present affectionately entreating them to remember her soul at the Altar onely meditating on Heaven and neglecting the thought of the land of Africa which she had seemed at other times to desire for the sepulcher of her body And as her other son said unto her Madame my mother we as yet are not there we hope to close your eyes in our own countrey and burie you in the tomb of your husband this holy woman seeing this man would still tie her to the present life and divert her from cogitation of death which to her was most sweet beheld him with a severe eye and then turning her self towards her son Augustine Hearken saith she what he saith as if we absent from Africa must needs be further from God She often cast her dying eyes towards this son who was her precious conquest and who in her sickness served her with most particular assistances affirming that Augustine had ever been a good son towards her and though he had cost her many sorrows he never had forgotten the respect due to a mother Verily there was a great sympathie between the soul of such a mother and such a son which was infinitely augmented after this happy conversion and therefore we must give to nature that which belongs to it The child Adeodatus seeing his Grand-mother in the last agony as possessing the affections of his father threw out pitifull out-cries in which he could not be pacified And S. Augustine who endeavoured to comfort them all upon so happy a death withheld his tears for a time by violence but needs must he in the end give passage to plaints so reasonable The Saint died as a Phenix among Palms and they having rendered the last duties to her pursued the way begun directly for Africk Behold how the conversion of S. Augustine passed and though many cooperated therein yet next unto God S. Ambrose hath ever been reputed the principal Agent and for that cause his great disciple said of him (b) (b) (b) Aug. contra Julianum Pelagianum l. 1. c. 6. Excellens Dei dispensator quâ—m veneror ut patrem in Christo enim Jesu per Evangelium ipse me genuit eo Christi ministerio lavacrum Regenerationis accepi Ambrose is the excellent steward of the great father of the family whom I reverence as my true father for he hath begotten me in Jesus Christ by the virtue of the Gospel and God hath been pleased to make use of his service to regenerate me by Baptism Whilest stars and elements shall continue it will be an immortal glory to the Bishop Ambrose to have given the Church a S. Augustine of whom Volusianus spake one word worth a thousand (c) (c) (c) Volusian Epist 2. Vir est totius gloriae capax Augustinus In aliis sacerdotibus absque detrimento cultus divini toleratur inscitia at cum ad Antistitem Augustinum venitur Legi deest quicquid ab eo contigerit ignorari Augustine is a man capable of all the glorie of the world There is much difference between him and other Bishops The ignorance of one Church-man alone prejudiceth not Religion but when we come to Bishop Augustine if he be ignorant of any thing it is not he but the law which is defective because this man is as knowing as the law it self The eleventh SECTION The affairs of S. Ambrose with the Empeperours Valentinian the father and Gratian the son LEt us leave the particulars of the life of S. Ambrose to pursue our principal design which is to represent it in the great and couragious actions he enterprized with the Monarchs of the world Let us not behold this Eagle beating his wings in the lower region of the ayr but consider him among lightenings tempests and whirl-winds how he plays with thunder-claps and ever hath his eye where the day breaketh The state of Christianitie stood then in need of a The state of Christendom brave Prelate to establish it in the Court of Great-ones The memory of Jâ—lian the Apostata who endeavoured with all his power to restore Idols was yet very fresh it being not above ten years past since he died and yet lived in the minds of many Pagans of eminent quality who had strong desires to pursue his purpose On the other side the Arians who saw themselves so mightily supported by the Emperour Constans made a great party and incessantly embroyled the affairs of Religion Jovinian a most Catholick Emperour who succeeded Julian passed away as a lightening in a reign of seven moneths After him Valentinian swayed the Empire who had in truth good relishes of Religion but withal a warlick spirit and who to entertain himself in so great a diversitie of humours and sects whereon he saw this Empire to be built much propended to petty accommodations which for some time appeased the evil but took not away the root He made associate of the Empire his brother Valens who being a very good Catholick in the beginning of his reign suffered himself to be deceived by an Arian woman and did afterward exercise black cruelties against the faithfull till such time as defeated by the Goths and wounded in an encounter he was burnt alive by his enemies in a shepherds cottage whereunto he was retired so rendering up his soul in the bloud and flames where with he had filled the Church of God The association of this wicked brother caused much disorder in the affairs of Christendom and often slackened the good resolutions of Valentinian by coldness and
who gave him life by his death as he had afforded him birth by his life Who did this but the Master of Life and Death Besides I read in the relations of Muscovia set Demetrius Legatus out by the Embassadour Demetrius that a countrey Boor being by chance clammed in the hollow body of a great tree full of honey and finding no means to come forth of his licorish captivity behold a Bear hasteneth to the same tree to eat of the honey whereof these beasts are very greedy which observed the poor forlorn creature not discerning what this might be but catching hold as one almost drowned of any thing which good luck offered him grasped the Bear who feeling himself taken laboured hard to flie through fear conceived and draweth out the peasant by an admirable accident wherein it was no easie matter to say which of the two was most affrighted Who directed this but the eye of Providence I admire also in the earth-quake of Apulia that happened the year 1627 the last day of Jâ—ly where one writeth that in the Citie of S. Severin alone ten thousand souls were taken out of the world how in the horrour of such infinite ruins and sepulcher of so many mortals a great bell fell so fitly over a child that it inclosed him and doing no hurt made a bulwark for him against any other danger who ballanced the motion of this metal but the fingers which distended heaven Will you pass to particulars of Empires You will Providence over Empires be rapt with admiration when you come to consider the beginnings progressions and events of every one You shall see them spring like small veins of water unknown and with time to take such encrease as to become huge rivers large enough to overflow the fields Sometimes it will seem to you they are onely set upon a needles point and are ready to ruin in the mean space there is an invisible hand which supporteth and re-establisheth them by their proper falls You admire how God so long suffers ungrateful and perfidious Nations to draw them unto him and afterwards the measure of their sins filled up if they must be destroyed it is but to cause others to rise out of their ruins The Assyrians after the reign of thirty eight Kings changed into Medes and Chaldaeans the Medes after the sway of nine Kings and three hundred and twenty two years ended in Astyages The Chaldaeans after two hundred and nine years in Darius the Mede But they like two rivers united in the person of Cyrus to make great the Monarchy of the Persians The Persians after two hundred thirty years and fourteen Kings dissolve into the Grecians The Grecians are multiplied to Ptolomeyes and Sâ—â—ucides All are finally swallowed in the Roman Empire Rome lost it self after one thousand two hundred twenty nine years accounted from the foundation to the Emperour Augustulus who is observed as the last Monarch before the great wrack which made the Empire a prey to so many Nations that had fed it with their bloud From the division of the Roman Empire sprang our French Spaniards English Goths Vandals Lombards Polacks Otomans and such other Powers If from thence you advance your thoughts to Providence over the Church the government of the Church which is the principal work of God and reflect upon it from its cradle to the present Age entertaining in your memory its infancy encrease travels persecution glories and crowns you will stand amazed at the bottomless depth of the counsels of the Divine Providence What mother ever had so much care and tender affection over her little infant sleeping in the cradle as this Providence for the Church and Christianity It is a remarkeable thing that at the same time when Nebuchadnezzar ruined the Temple of Jerusalem Diarium Historicum in the East the Capitol was built in the West to plant there one day the Cross and that Rome in the space of one hundred forty two years having been six times taken and ransacked by Alaricus Gensericus Odoacer the Heruli Theodoricus Belisarius and Totylas when one would have thought it were brought to nothing was ever preserved by God to be the source of lights and the mother of all Churches How many times hath God tied secret virtues to the standards of Christians How many times made winds and tempests to fight under their Ensigns How often hath he opened for them lands inaccessible calmed stormy seas for them changed deserts into Paradises of delight Petty handfuls of souldiers to discomfit huge Armies take Towns impregnable cleave rocks and hew through mountaines to do the work of Giants and find facility in all which humane reason conceived impossible Read Paulus Aemilius and Gulielmus Tyrius upon Paul Aemil. l. 4. the conquest of the holy land and you shall see that birds of the air seemed in pay with Godfrey of Bovillon For who can be but astonished to hear it told how when he besieged Jerusalem the Sultan having Serange accident taught pigeons to carry messages dispatched one of them with a letter which she bare under her wings to give advise to the besieged But good hap would have it that a Hawk seazing one her just over the Christian army took her and made her to let fall what she carried to inform ours of the enemies design How many such like accidents shew us the care God hath of his and that he never suffered them to be overthrown but to vanquish their vices and to humble their pride by the counterpoise of forraign Powers What may we say of Councels What may we likewise think of great bodies of Justice How many times have we seen counsels discovered and resolutions of which it seemed no creature had a thought God governed the hearts and tongues of those who sought to abuse them against him a great Spirit swayed all those members assembled and secretly did its work to the admiration of the whole world One same motion guided within compass all those stars as in Archimedes his sphere and accorded them by their proper contrarieties Great Vis illum veras poenas dare Sentiat quà m bono patri injuriam fecerit Senec. contro l. 1. God have we not cause to say what he did in Seneca Throughly to punish the wicked man who woundeth the Divine Providence I ordain nothing but that he understand the wrong he hath done to a good father V. MAXIM Of Accidents THE PROPHANE COURT THE HOLY COURT That all is done by chance by necessity or humane providence That all is done by the will of God except sin THe enemies of Providence use all kind of engins to oppose their own happiness Three squadrons against Providence and crack their own eye-strings that they may not behold the great eye which pursues the wicked even into the shades of death I find the Chaldaeans made three squadrons that we may speak with holy Job wherewith to assail this great Mistress
wisdom and authority of S. Boniface the Martyr who converted Germany sent thither by Gregory the second and who flourished about nine hundred years ago This great Apostle of the Northern parts left goodly writings to posterity being most learned and we have to this day some Epistles of his taken out of good libraries In the one and twentieth of his letters written to S. Bonifacius ep 21. Aldeburgus he makes mention of a man who was raised again to life in his time the miracle much known and verified before all the world for to prove he proceeded very fair into knowledges of the other life he advertised many men of note of most secret sins never opened to any living man and exhorted them for Gods sake to true pennance He likewise foretold the death of Ceelredus King of Mercia who reigned with much tyranny and rapine whereof he received the reward This great Prelate S. Boniface then in Germany sought to inform himself particularly of this wonder and afterward couched in the forementioned Epistle the discourse he had with this late raised man How he asked many questions concerning events happened to him in this so dangerous passage he tels the storie and relates it with tears in his eyes Alas how much other are our knowledges at the separation of the soul from the bodie than they are in this present life We here onely see through two little holes which are our two eyes the bark of objects a very little distance but the instant of death discovers unto us much other truths Represent unto your self said he a blind man who never saw any thing if some one come and take away the film giving him sight he would then behold things spoken of in a much other manner than he imagined The like happened to me for my soul leaving my body about midnight I instantly saw the whole world with the extension of its lands and seas that water it as if it had been abbreviated in a table although to say truth it was not the universe which was abbridged but the sight of the spirit dilated by disengagement from the bodie The world was all encompassed with fire which seemed to me of an excessive greatness and ready to swallow all the elements if its impetuous course had not been stayed by the measures of Gods hand At the same time I perceived our Saviour in the quality of a Judge environed with an infinite number of Angels indued with marvellous brightness and excellent beautie on the other side devils in dreadfull shapes which I cannot now well describe since my soul is returned to my body At the same instant souls newly unloosened from all parts in so prodigious numbers that I could never believe there had been so many creatures in the world Then was a rigorous examen made of crimes committed in the life past And I saw very few souls who had holily lived whilest they were as yet in this mortal flesh to fly unto heaven with palms and Crowns Others were reserved to be purged as gold in the furnace and to follow the steps of those happie warriours who had gone before them As for those who went from this life out of the state of grace and were in mortal sin it was a horrible thing to see the tyrannie with which the devils used them For I perceived in places under the earth pits which vomited fire and flames on the brinks whereof I saw those souls in such manner as we shall see some fatal birds who bewailed lamented their disasters with dreadful complaints able to rent rocks and marbles asunder Then they were thrown into precipices of fire bidding a long adieu to all pleasures without hope ever to behold the face of God nor pleasing light of the Sun or to have fruition of any other reflection but the flames of their torments I who saw these strange passages leave you to think with what terrour I expected the last sentence of my judge The evil spirits began to accuse me with all violence you would have said they had reckoned all the steps of my life so rigorously they mustered up all the slightest actions But nothing at that time was so insupportable to me as mine own conscience For the sins which I heretofore imagined to be light were presented unto me in spirit as horrid phantasms which seemed to reproch me with mine ingratitude towards God and to say I am the pleasure thou hast obeyed I am the ambition whose slave thou wast I am the avarice which was the aim of all thy actions Behold so many sins which are thy children Thou begatest them Thou so much didst love them as to prefer them before thy Saviour It is an admirable thing that I likewise saw the specter of a man whom I had heretofore wounded though yet alive He seemed to be present at this Judgement and to require of me an account of his bloud All these horrours had already engulphed me into an inconsolable sadness expecting nought at all but the stroke of thunder and sentence of my Judge at which time my good Angel disposed himself to produce some good works I had heretofore done One cannot say nor believe the comfort a soul then feels in the rememberance of virtues it exercised in the bodie Happy a thousand-fold the hands which sow alms on earth to reap them in heaven It seemed to me I saw so many stars of a favourable influence when I beheld this little good I had done with Gods grace Lastly sentence was pronounced that for instruction of many I should again return into life I must confess unto you that amongst so many troubles of mind so many fears and frights which I suffered before the decision of my affairs except devils and hell nothing so much struck me with horrour as to see my bodie for which a burial was prepared Is it possible said I to my self that to serve this carrion I so often have forsaken my God! Is it possible that to fatten this dunghil I dispised my soul That I so adored my prison and fetters as to ballance them with the Cross and nails of my Saviour Jesus For this cause I had some repugnance to reenter into this bodie which seemed to me a little hell But my soul coming back into it I remained the space of seven dayes quite stupid and so lastly strove with my self till bloud gushed from mine eyes as not having tears sufficient to bemoan my sins Behold me ready to declare and witness to all mortals by an authentike example the words of the Wiseman who saith MEMORARE NOVISSIMA TUA ET IN Eccl. 3. AETERNUM NON PECCABIS REMEMBER ALL VVILL PASSE AT THE LAST HOUR AND THOU SHALT NEVER OFFEND I beseech the Reader who peruseth these lines to put the affairs of his conscience in order and if he love any thing in the world to love it for life eternal XIX MAXIM Of Sovereign Happiness THE PROPHANE COURT THE HOLY COURT It is a
simplicity to forsake certain pleasures for an uncertain beatitude That the glorie of Paradise is most certain to good men WE live here among the groans of creatures Opinion concerning beatitude every one well understands he is not in his right situation and all the world turns from one side to another like a sick man in a bed and if any one lie still it is rather through the impotencie of motion than the happiness of repose Our soul well knows it is the daughter of a good house that there is another place which expecteth it another life which inviteth it It seeth some glimmers of felicity in the mass of this bodie but hath much ado to follow them so many illusions deceive it upon one side and so many obstacles oppose it on the other The great floud and ebbe of perpetual disturbances Disturbances of life August l. 2. de Trinit c. 12. Amor magis sentitur cum prodit indigentia shew us we are made for some great matter since among so many objects there is none which either fully or long contenteth us We understand our happiness by the continual change of our miseries and our strong appetite by distast of all things Love which according to Plato is the son of indigence never is so ill as with its own mother from whom it learns nothing but its poverty which addeth a sharp spur to direct it to riches When I read S. Gregory Nazianzen in the great Naz. de itineribus vitae The divers wayes of humane life according to S. Gregory That the choice of conditions of life is hazardous work he compiled of sundry courses of life it seems to me I behold a man in the enterance of a labyrinth much distracted who will and will not who desires waxeth drouthy is intranced and become pale yea in the height of his delights It seems to me nature leadeth him through all the corners of her Kingdom and sayes unto him O man what wouldest thou do to become happie Behold I conduct thee through all the parts of my jurisdiction of purpose to afford thee felicitie which thou seekest Wilt thou then marrie fy no saith he for there is too much hazard in the adventure single life it is painfull would you have children they cloy with too much care barreness it hath no support riches they are treacherous to their Master and many have been in danger to loose life for having too much wherewith to live charges and honours they cost overmuch and are indeed dead trees whereinto ostriches flie as well as eagles would you have favour it is a squib which cracks in the air and leaves nothing behind it but burnt paper and smoak but if the Courts of Great-ones afford good fruit there is store many times of evil birds which devour it Thou wouldest then live in subjection saith nature since thou canst not command He replieth he could not obey I will make thee poor saith she to teach thee humilitie you were as good quoth he to put me on the wheel Thou shalt have beautie it is the snare of lust youth it is the bubling of time strength it shall be inferiour to bulls nobility it is too full of libertie eloquence it is too vain skill in pleading it is nought but wrangling Wouldest thou wear a sword by thy side it is to live either an homicide or to become a victime of death retire into some wilderness it is to languish Will you have title it is to become captive traffick it hath too much hazard and pains travel it hath too much toil sail on the sea there are too many storms stay on the land it is repleat with miseries learn some trade all is full of craft and I find none good manure the earth I am not able live idlely that is to rot alive One knoweth not on what side to turn him in the Obtiruntur humilitate depressa nutant celsa fastigio S. Eucherius Miseries of this present life world poor states are overwhelmed under their miseries great totter born down with the weight of their own greatness We find by experience that we here lead a painfull bitter and corruptible life which is fruitfull in miseries knowing in all whereof it should be ignorant and many times impotent but to do ill A life over which elements predominate which heats burn cold congeals humours swell maladies torment the very air and viands wherewith it lives cease not to corrupt A life which loves tyrannize hopes flatter cares devour anxieties oppress joyes make profusely dissolute A life which ignorance blindfolds flesh tempteth the world deceives sin poisoneth the devil beguiles inconstancy turmoileth time takes away and death despoileth Now what spirit is so bruitish and unnatural Necessary consequence which considering upon one side how God accommodateth all creatures even the least flies to the full latitude of that felicitie their nature admitteth and on the other side seeing this great abyss of miseries Bonum omnes conjectant maxime vero principalissimum Aristot politic lib. 1. cap. 1. wherein we role in this life doth not judge that God who in his nature is most wise and benign hath not so given the King of creatures over as prey to injuries and calamities as not to have reserved a life of spirits for him since he is spirit to please him by an intellectual felicitie 2. The Sages of Gentilism have looked this verity Opinion of the wise Summum hominis bonum est perfectio per sua intellectiva in the face by the sole ray of natural light For if we consult with Alpharabius the Arabian he will tell us that the Sovereign felicitie of man consisteth in a perfect dispose of the functions of his soul as well those which concern the understanding as such as depend on the will If we ask of the Philosopher Heraclitus what wiped his eyes so many times drenched in his tears He will tell you that it was the contemplation of a good not imaginable which expected souls in the other life If we desire to understand the apprehensions of Metrodorus we shall learn the soul must ascend until it behold time in its source and the infinity of the first Being If we cover to hear Plato upon it doth not he discourse in his Phedon that the soul recollected within it self mounteth to the Divinity Ascende donec saeculum rerum videas infinitatem Plato in Phaedone Mercur Trismeg Pymander cap. 1. Plotinus Ennead 1. l. 6. Ennead 5. l. 8. whose image it carrieth and that in the fruition thereof it satisfieth all desires It it not likewise the doctrine of Trismegistus in his Pymander Doth not he teach us the soul after death of the bodie returns to its nature as a troubled water which purifieth when it is setled And doth not Plotinus triumph on this subject in publishing that blessed souls at their passage out of bodies go to the first beautie which hath power to make
terminate their Law-suits by his Verdict His principal care was to commit Justice unto innocent hands but the horrour of his thoughts was perpetually against the unjust and against the violent thinking that his Authority and his Arms could have no better employment then in the destruction of tyrants But on the contrary he had goodnesses of heart inexhaustible for honest men and a wonderful care of the quiet and commodity of his people his access was easie his words gracious his caresses full of attractions his command sweet his answers judicious his orders so just that they seemed all consorted in heaven He denyed with sweetnesse and gave with measure although his hands were seas of Liberality and Magnificence that were never dry He had all his life time the possession of his soul by a singular moderation that retained his mouth his tongue and his anger but it could not pluck back Love by the wings which caused some spots to be seen in this Sun although they were afterward washed away again by a strong Repentance That which was most resplendent in all the parts of his life was an high generosity that never forsook his heart and that found exercise continually in all his actions He contented not himself with middle Virtues but he carried them all even up to the altitude of their Glory He had a spirit incessantly bent to great designs and a soul alwayes filled with a strong confidence which he had seated totally in God of whom he thought himself to be beloved He never was kept back by any obstacles from generous enterprises he exposed himself to all dangers even to the most terrible for the glory of his sovereign Master Prosperity had no charms upon him and adversity found not any darts that were able to abate his resolution All these virtues marched in him under the conduct of a great Reason and failed not to be followed with an happinesse that had no equal but his Prudence God having ennobled him with so eminent qualities ceased not to furnish him with Objects to put them in practise as well by the condition of his Birth as by the divers occurrences of Affairs It seems that Providence made him be born on purpose at Ingeheim upon the river of Rhine and on the Borders of France and Germany as the man that should unite those two Estates under one Sceptre He found a Monarchy at his birth which his Grandfather touched upon and which his father openly possessed that had much need of being settled by his power and husbanded by his cares He enterprised for this purpose divers warres but he never waged any one that he was not led to by strong reasons of Piety and Justice His first Arms were employed against the Saxons who were at that time Infidels and Pagans and who besides rebelled against the lawfull Power that ruled them One may say truly that that Nation was the Hydra of our Hercules whose heads continually weâ—e born again and whose bloud so often shed was but the seed of a new Warre even to infinite Never did the Arms of the Romans dare to attempt any thing upon this people which they desired rather not to know then fight with Their Standards had never resolution enough to see that which Charlemagne had power enough to beat They were warlike even to a wonder and obstinate even to all extremity The businesse was not onely to conquer the Lands and to gain the men but to overcome their Superstition and to disarm the furies of despair This is that which our Charles performed in nine Warres as cruel as possible and in the space of three and thirty years so much Constancy had he against stubbornnesse and so much Power against madnesse He defeated them in many battels he subdued their cities and took their principall fortresses he demolished the Altars of the pernicious Irminsul so many times besprinkled with humane bloud he plucked all the other Idols also out of their demolished Temples and at last constrained the brave Vitiguinde their King to yield to the happinesse of France which made him find the kingdome of God in Baptisme by the losse of that of the Barbarians But it is true that this magnificent Conquerour found not any where a Theatre of his deeds more famous then that of Italy whither the Church groaning under the chains of the Lombards called for him incessantly Above all Pope Adrian the first whom Charlemagne loved afterwards as his brother conjured him to help him speedily and to recover the Patrimony of Jesus out of the hands of so many unjust usurpers He transported over into Italy with an Eagles wings and a lions strength marching upon his fathers steps that exhaled yet the odour of his generous piety He took at first the city of Verona then that of Pavia after a long tedious siege and appeared victorious with an Army of fire in the champains of his enemies Didiâ—â— King of the Lombards that was more ready to do an injury to a disarmed power then to ward the blows of an adversary was seen conquered and taken prisoner rendering the Church her liberty by his captivity It was a sight fill'd with Magnificence and Piety to see him arrive at Rome where the heavens seemed to be all in Blessings over his head and the earth all in respect under his feet He would have marched with a little noise and prevented the Pope not desiring to make his entrance with great pomp But Adrian that watched over his march perceived it and sent out very farre to meet him abundance of the Nobility and Officers for a Convoy and when he was near enough to Rome the Souldiery with all the Citizens appeared in Anns but that which was most delightfull was a Procession of little Children well chosen out that carried boughs and sang Benedictus qui venit in nomine Domini Blessed be he that comes in the name of God The Pope desiring to honour the lively image of the saviour by some kind of honours that had been heretofore rendred to the originall When the King saw the Crosses of the Senatours and that came also out to meet him he alighted off his horse and walked afoot as farre as S. Peters Church where the holy Father was at the door to receive him with his Cardinalls and all his Chair Charlemagne by a Ceremonious devotion and great respect that he bare to S. Peter and his successour would kisse every stair of the ascent of the Portall before he would close with Adrian that received and embraced him with extasies of joyes and the King kissed his hand amongst a thousand acclamations of cheerfulnesse and happinesse which the people ceased not to redouble They went both of them into the Church to render thanks for the favours that God had done them on that great day which was an holy Saturday and which gave not place for that time to the triumphs of the Resurrection The Feasts of the Passeover were spent amidst powerfull Devotions pretty