himselfe Of the great Loue of our Lord in conueying the Blessed Sacrament to vs vnder the species of bread and wine Why it is neyther necessary nor conuenient nor scarce possible for all Christians to communicate of the Chalice Of diners kinds of Vnion And how liberall our Lord is to vs in letting vs all frequent these diuine Mysteries so often CHAP. 49. AS the loue of our Lord IESVS was full of inuention in disposing him to performe this worke so (a) The great loue of our Lord doth admirably appeare by diuers circumstances was it also in the manner of contriuing and dispensing it according to the capacity of man And first concerning the formes or species vnder which he is presented to vs what other could haue bene thought of either more agreable or more gustful to the nature of man thē they of bread wine If for the punishmēt of our sinnes or the mortification of our senses he had bene pleased to ordaine that we should haue receiued him in the formes of pitch or inke as himselfe would therby haue bene subiect to no indignity at all so yet still we must haue acknowledged that it had bene infinite mercy for vs to haue receiued such a pretious Iewell as that in how course or homely case soeuer it had come But bread and wine are the very stanes of corporall strength and comfort and he confined his body and bloud to the species of these two creatures that so this superscription as it were of the Loue-letter which he was writing to vs might prepare vs for an expectation of those sublime and sweet contēts which lay within Yet (b) The Bloud of our Lord is alwayes together with his body and for that reason it was necssary for lay people to receaue both the body and the bloud distinct Nay there are many other reasons which make it neyther conueniēt nor yet possible to receaue them so because there are some who haue a naturall auersion from the tast and euen from the very sent of vvine which no man euer had from bread Because there are some countries so remote both from the Sunne and from the Sea as that there wine is hardly to be found Because in the infinite multitudes of Christians it would be impossible for all to receaue of the sacred Chalice without indangering yea and committing much irreuerēce Because some would be so sicke of pestilent feauers as that euen a drop of wyne would doe them hurt Because persecutions would be sometymes so great as that it might be fit to leaue the blessed Sacrament in the custody of some particular men and women to be receiued by themselues for their comfort in some great exigent of distresse and danger as was often done in the primitiue Church by the testimony of Tertullian and others and which could not be done with the Chalice for any long tyme or euen almost at all in any hoat country For these reasons I say and for many others which by the wisedom and loue of our Lord IESVS were thought conuenient and especially because his body is a liuing body and consequently it cannot be without the bloud he was pleased that both the bloud the body should remaine vnder the species both of bread wine that so he who receaued one might be sure to receaue them both And (c) In the sacrifice of the Masse the reason is very different howsoeuer for as much as concernes the Sacrifice of the Masse both the bread and wine are seueraly to be offered consecrated and consummated by the Priest for in these three acts the substance of the holy Sacrifice doth confist and not in the prayers or Scriptures which doe either precede or follow or interlace them since these latter doe but serue as an addition for deuotion for a spirituall ornament to that high action For as much I say as this Sacrifice which is dayly offered vp vpon the Altar is to be a most liuely representation of the bloudy Sacrifice of our Lord vpon the Crosse a representation for as much as concernes the manner of it but no representation for as much as concernes the thinge because both the one and the other is but only one and the very selfe same Sacrifice yet when there is only questiō of receauing the blessed body and bloud of our Lord ' IESVS in the nature of a Sacrament the same Lord was pleased (d) The Church is to ordaine of many things according to that spirit of discretion which reigneth in it to leaue it to that spirit of discretion wherwith he would eminētly indue his Church to ordaine when it should be conuenient for necessary it could no way be to vse both the bread the wine distinct and when but the one of them alone It is also well obserued by spirituall writers that the very species of bread and wine doe inuite and bespeake our soules to a very intrinsecall vnion both with God and our neighbour In these species we may cōsider that there is an vnion of two sorts The one of them hauing bene setled by nature the other growing on by industry or art The naturall (e) Two kinds of vnion which are shewed by bread wine vnion consisteth in this That many graynes doe grow vpon one eare of corne and many grapes vpon one cluster of the vine with great resemblance to one another The artificiall vnion which is made betwene them doth defeate the former naturall vnion that so that former may become more perfect For first by plucking off or pressing the grapes or breaking and grinding the graynes of Corne and then by separating the chaff and husks and branne and skinnes stones it growes to be one paste or liquor which is perfected and purified afterward by heate the must by the naturall heate which it hath and the bread by the heate of fire And thē we can not know which graine of corne in particular was white and which was browne or which grape was great which was small These (f) How these two kinds of Vnion are found in men Vnions also there are and are to be in men The naturall as they are men of flesh and bloud and the other supernaturall as they are faithfull Christians regenerated by grace and animated therin by his diuine Sacraments In vertue of the former vnion we loue our kindred and friends And because this loue doth vse to carry imperfection with it through the influence of selfe loue and the mixture of temporall vayne respects Christ our Lord commeth to vs in this supernaturall Sacrament and doth take as it were our soules and the desires therof all in peeces casting away that which is inordinate vnmortified and any way vnfit concerning honour or estate or delight or any other earthly thing whatsoeuer and he doth so boyle and bake vs in the blessed Sacrament by the fire of his charity as that we may grow to be perfectly vnited both to him
grace to vvant this soueraigne meanes wherby to protest the faithfull and incommunicable homage vvhich she ovves to him For (c) The Oblation of Sacrifice is the highest act of religion a Sacrifice is a worship of Latria and the supreme act of religion wherby through the oblation and externall mutation of some corpor all thing according to the particular rites and sacred ceremonies which are perfourmed by persons who are peculiarly deputed for that purpose and are called Priests the excellency of the diuine Maiesty and the supreme Dominion which it hath ouer the life and death of all the creatures is acknowledged and protested Now therfore Christ our Lord vvould not depriue vs of this blessing But as vvith great aduātage to vs he had already changed the Circumcisiō of the old law into Baptisme so also was the diuine Goodnes pleased to make all those figuratiue Sacrifices of the same old lavv yeild vp their possession in the nevv and giue place to this one other most excellent Sacrifice of his ovvne most pretious body and bloud The Sacrifices of the old lavv vvere bloudy Num. 1. 3. and they vvere offred by that braunch of the Tribe of Leui which descended from Aron But yet Melchisedech also vvas a Priest and that long before Gen. 14. Psal 109. and he offred an vnbloudy Sacrifice and it consisted of bread wine Novv Christ our Lord vvho is our true high Priest did summe vp all the Sacrifices of both those kindes into his ovvne sacred selfe For as those former bloudy Sacrifices did prefigure the Sacrifice of his pretious life vpon the Crosse so that other of bread and vvine did prefigure the Sacrifice of the holy Masse And so truely and properly is this last a Sacrifice and so truly vvas he the Priest vvho offered it first in this last supper of his and so truly did he ordaine his Apostles to do the like by those vvords Hocfacite in meam commemorationem Doe this in commemoration of me Luc. 22. in their persons all those others also of succeding ages vvere appointed to doe it vvho should in like manner be ordayned by them that vnlesse this truth be sincerly and religiously granted vve shall neuer be able to verify those vvords of the holy Ghost vvherby it vvas prophesied thus by Dauid Psal 109. concerning Christ our Lord and so vnderstood by the holy Fathers of the Church as vve shall shortly see Tues sacerdos in aeternum secundum ordinem Melchisedech Thou art a Priest for euer after the order of Melchisedech But a true and lawfull Priest he is after the order of Melchisedech and a Priest he is to be till the end of the vvorld And although he be raigning still in heauen yet continually doth he exercise this office of his by his deputies vvho are true Catholicke Priests And principally it is he vvho offereth vp his ovvne body and bloud together vvith them he being the only true Originall Priest and these other though properly truly Priests yet being but partakers of his Povver Order by his grace Novv this body and bloud of our Lord IESVS vvho is the one only Sacrifice and vvho vvas offered vp in a bloudy māner vpon the Crosse is novv offered dayly in an vnbloudy manner vpon our Altars Conteyning (d) The sacrifice of the Masse is both Propitiatory Impetratory and of thanksgiuing doth benefit both the quick dead Mala. ◠in it selfe all sufficiency and aboundance of grace both for the liuing and dead for the propitiation of sinne and the paines vvhich follovv it the thanksgiuing for benefits already receiued the impetration of graces to be heereafter graunted by Almighty God And this is that Sacrifice wherof Malachy did so cleerly prophesy vvhen reprouing the Sacrifices of the old lavv he spake thus as in the tyme of the lavv of grace Ab ortu solis vsque ad occasum magnum est nomen meum in gentibus c. From the rysing of the sunne to the going downe therof great is my name among the gentiles And in euery place there is sacrificing and there is offered to my name a cleane oblation because my name is great among the Gentills sayth the Lord of Hosts Of the iudgemēt which the holy Fathers of the Church haue alwayes made of this holy Sacrifice and B. Sacrament and the great veneration which they had them in and the motiues whereby we may be induced to do the like CHAP. 47. VVELL might the Prophet say that this Sacrifice vvas pure and cleane since it is no lesse then God himselfe though not as God but man And the cheife Priest also is God vvho dayly offereth vp the same together vvith the subordinate Priest And although no Quire of Angells can speake as magnificently of it as the thing deserues yet the Fathers of the Church haue done theyr best to acknovvledge and admire it And for the comfort of my reader I vvill cite him a fevv of the many passages vvhich are found in them Who is more the Priest of God sayth (a) Cypr. l. 2. Ep. 3. S. Cyprian then our Lord Iesus Christ who offered a Sacrifice to God the Father he offered that which Melchisedech offered towit bread and wine that is to say his owne body and bloud When we offer this Sacrifice sayth (b) Cyril Hierosol one of the fathers of the first Councell of Nice in Catech. mist 5. Saint Cyrill we afterwards make mention of the dead We erect not Altars to Martyrs saith (c) August de ciuit Dei l. 22. c. 10. Idem Confes l. 9. c. 13. S. Augustine but we offer Sacrifice to him alone who is the God both of them and vs. This S. Augustine saith and he relateth els vvhere of his mother That when she was dying she desired him to remember her at the Altar where she was wont to be present euery day and from whence she knew that holy Sacrifice (d) The body of our Lord. to be dispensed wherby the hand wryting was blotted out which was contrary to vs. Our flesh sayth (e) Tertul. l. deresurrect carnit cap. 8. Tertullian doth secd vpon the body and bloud of Christ that the soule also may be made fat with God The bread which our Lord gaue to his Disciples as (f) Cypr. de coena Domini S. Cyprian saith of the Reall Presence being changed not in shew but in substance by the omnipotency of the word was made flesh That as in the person of Christ the humanity was seene and the diuinity lay hid so hath the diuine essence vnspeakeably powred it selfe into this inuisible Sacrament We doe rightly beleeue sayth (g) Gregor Nyssen in oratione catechistica cap. 37. S. Gregory of Nisse that bread being sanctified by the word of God is transmuted into the body of the word of God We know and haue it for most assured sayth (h) Cyril Ierosol cathe Myst. 4. S. Cyrill Bishop of
Hierusalem that this bread which is seene by vs is not bread although the tast esteeme it to be bread but that it is the body of Christ Many mothers saith (i) Chrysost hom 83. in Matt. S. Chrysostome put out their children when they are borne to be nurst by others but Christ our Lord would not doe soe but doth nourish vs with his owne body and so doth conioyne glew vs to himselfe O miracle (k) Chrysost l. 3. de Sacerde tio O benignity of God sayth the same S. Chrysostome He that sitteth aboue with the Father at the same instant is handled by the hands of all and he deliuers himselfe vp to such as will receaue and imbrace him And in (l) Chrysost hom 24 c. 10.1 Epist ad Corinth another place he sayth thus That which is in the Chalice flowed out of his side and of that doe we communicate This indeed as sayth S. (m) Saint Ephrem who was familiar with Saint Basil the great lib. de natura Dei non serutanda cap. 5. Ephrem exceedeth all admiration all speach and all conceipt which Christ our Sauiour the only begotten sonne of God hath done To vs who are clad with flesh he hath giuen fire and spirit to eate namely his body and his bloud My bread sayth (n) Ambros l. 4. de Sacra menâ—is S. Ambrose is vsuall bread but this bread is bread before the words of the Sacrament but wheÌ„ the coÌ„secration once doth come of bread it is made the flesh of Christ. Let vs therfore settle this point how that which is bread can be made the body of Christ By consecration This consecration of what speach and words doth it consist Of the words and speach of our Lord Iesus For all the rest which is said is either prayse giuen to God or there are particular prayers made for the people and for Kings and others But when he comes to the tyme of making the B. Sacrament the Priest doth no longer speake in his owne words but in the words of Christ The speach therfore of Christ is that which makes this Sacrament What speach of Christ Thevery same wherby al things were made Our Lord commaunded and the heauen was made Our Lord commaunded and the earth was made Our Lord commaunded and the sea was made Our Lord commaunded al the creatures were made Thou seest therfore how effectually the speach of Christ doth work If (o) Note this consequence then there be such power in the speach of our Lord Iesus as to make those things be which were not how much more effectually will it worke towards the making of them be which are and to make them be changed into other then what they were Therefore (p) Marke well the expresse authority of this Saint that I may answere thee I say That it was not the body of Christ before the consecration but after the consecration I say to thee that then it is the body of Christ. Christ was carried sayth (q) Aug. in Psal 33. Conc. 1. Ibid. S. Augustine in his owne hands when commending his body to his Apostles he said Hoc est corpus meum this is my body for then he carried his body in his hands And agayne Our Lord would place our saluation in his body and bloud But how did he commend his body and bloud to vs In his humility For vnlesse he were humble he would not be eaten and drunke The good Pastour sayth (r) Greg. in hom 14. in Euang. S. Gregory the great laid downe his life for his sheepe that he might turne his body and bloud into our Sacrament might feed the sheepe which he had redeemed by the nutriment of his flesh Vnder the species of bread sayth S. (s) Cyril Ierosol in Catech. Myst 4. Cyrillus Ierosolymitanus the body is giuen thee and vnder the species of bloud the wine that so thou maist become participant of his body bloud So shall we by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is Carryers of Christ when we shall haue receiued his body and bloud into our body and so as S. Peter saith we shall be made consorts of the diuine nature And according to that of S. (t) Cyril l. 10. in Iohn c. 11. Cyrill if any man shall mingle wax which is melted by fire with other wax which is also melted in such sort that they both doe seeme to be but one made of both so by the coniunction of the body and bloud of Christ our Lord he is in vs and we in him S. (u) Greg. l. 4. Dialog c. 58. Gregory doth surther say What faithfull soule can doubt but that in the very hower of the Sacrifice the heauens doe open at the voyce of the Priest and that in this mystery of Christ Iesus the Quires of the Angells doe assist the highest and the lowest things doe meete Terrestriall and Celestiall things are ioyned and there is made one thinge of things which are visible and inuisible Heere then we are taught by the holy Fathers of the Church whome I might haue cited to this purpose both more at large and more in number the inscrutable loue of our Lord IESVS to mankind expressed in these high mysteries of the blessed Sacrament and the holy Sacrifice of the Masse But how shall we be able to disingage our selues for being euen ouerwhelmed with the huge weight therof since the superexcellent Humanity of our (x) The incompable dignity of the person of Christ our Lord. Lord IESVS consisting of that pretious body which first was framed out of purest bloud of the all-immaculate Virgin by the only hand of the holy Ghost and of that glorious soule which in the first instaÌ„t of the creation therof was hypostatically vnited to God the sonne the second person of the most B. Trinity and the same person being indiuisible from the other two of God the Father and God the holy Ghost that this person I say of Christ our Lord should be communicated to all the Priests of the holy Catholike Church to be offred daily ouer all the world and to be receiued into the brest both of them and al the other faithfull children of that mother as often as theÌ„selues should desire What Cherubim is able to discouer the greatnes of this benefit and what Seraphim hath his hart hoat inough to breath out such ardent flames of loue as grow due to God vpoÌ„ this account How full of reason was the exclamation and admiration of holy Dauid when he said Psalm 34. 9. That there was none like to God in the cogitations which he interteyned for our Good No man no creature could euer haue aspired to such a happines or so much as to haue conceaued that euen the diuine nature it selfe had bene able to expresse such goodnes But God is God and God is loue and the loue euen of Creatures is full of (y) How full of Inuention great loue is inuention for
to match with one another yet that rule had no place in these two but the Sacerdotall and the Royall often matched togeather her exteriour beauty was such as became the mother of that Sonne Psal 44. Ambr. de instit vir c. 7. S. Thom in 3. distinct 3. q. 1. art 2. quaestiuncula 1. ad 4. of whome it was said Speciosus forma prae filijs hominum Beautifull beyond the most beautifull of the Sonnes of men And yet a beauty it was of such an admirable holy kind as that according to the testimony of antiquity it had the property to quench all flames of lust in the behoulders Blessed be our Lord who hath prouided so sweet a remedy for our misery For knowing as Father Arias noteth in his booke of the Imitation of our B. Lady that one of our greatest enemies was the inordinate loue of women to men and men to women he hath for the redresse of this inconuenience giuen a man to the world who is his owne only begotten sonne and whome women might both loue and euen by that very louing they might become pure and chast And so also hath he bestowed a most beautifull womā vpon the world which is this glorious Virgin Mother by the loue of whome men might deliuer themselues from sensuality and become the Disciples of her high purity For by louing this man and this woman men are spiritually as it were conuerted into them and doe giue ouer after a sort to be themselues And from hence it hath proceeded that since God became man and was pleased to be borne of the blessed Virgin the feilds of the earth haue produced innumerable roses of virginity both in men women And the Church hath bene filled with this rare treasure wherewith the world in former tymes was not acquainted There (b) Diuers reasons of congruity which cōuince the B. Virgin to haue been free from all kind of spot Damase ser 1. de Natiuitat Virg. could be no such defect of power wisedom or goodnes in our Lord God but that since he was pleased to take his whole humanity from one Creature he would also be carefull of that excellent creature in strange proportion Since the diuinity it selfe would vouchsafe to be hypostatically and indissolubily vnited to the flesh which he would take of her body in her wombe that wombe of which is elegantly and most truely said that it was Officina miraculorum the very shop and mint-house of miraculous things how can it be that he should not preserue her from all those sinnes and shames which the rest of mākind was subiect to He would not liue so long in that holy Tabernacle of hers where she was euer imbracing him with her very bowells and then haue a hart so hard as to goe away as it were without paying her any house-rent out of his riches He came into the world to dissolue the workes of the diuell 1. Ioan. 3. euen in the greatest enemies and rebells to him that could be found and therfore he would be sure to preuent the soule of that body which was but the other halfe of his owne with such store of benedictiōs as wherby the very ayre and sent of any sinne whatsoeuer might be farre from breathing vpon her Christ our Lord descended from heauē to aduance the kingdome and glory of God and he could not then giue way that the hart which had conceaued him with such faith which had adored him with so much loue in her imaculate wombe which had so liberally fed him at the table of her sacred brest lodged him in the bed of her holy bosome and couered him with the robes of her pretious armes which had so diligently attended him in that Pilgrimage of Egipt Matt. 2. and had serued him so purely both with body and soule in all the rest of his life death that this hart I say should euer be in case to giue consent to sinne wherby she should of the spouse of god haue become according to her then present state a lymme of Sathan and be in fine the mother of Christ our Lord yet a Traytour to him and both at once Nay she was not only voyd of sinne but abounded (c) The sublime sanctity of our B. Lady Luc. 1. Cant. 7. in sactity whose sacred wombe was foreseene foretold to be Aceruus tritici vallatus lilijs A rich heape of corne compassed in with a faire and sweet inclosure of Lyllies And as those Lyllies of her purest body gaue him a body of such beauty so did that bread of heauen abundantly feed and euen feast her soule with his plenty The Prophet Ieremy was sanctified in his mothers wombe and she was therfore to be much more sanctified who was to apparaile Sanctity it selfe with a pretious body made by the holy Ghost of her purest bloud And being sanctified then farre and farre beyond that holy Prophet that priuilege must needs serue her afterward to so good purpose as that hauing bene holyer in her mothers wombe then he she grew afterward when she came into the world or rather whē she had brought the Sauiour therof into it to be incomparably much and much more holy S. Iohn (d) The great aduantage which our B. Lady had aboue all pure creatures Luc. 1. Baptist also was sanctified in his mothers wombe at the presence and vpon the very hearing of our B. Ladyes voyce as S. Elizabeth doth expresly say he was freed from his Originall sinne and indued with the vse of reason and he exulted and did exercise the operations of his soule which was the ground and foundation of all the admirable sanctity which florished in that Precursour afterward according to the high office to which he was called So as this mother of God himselfe who was the meanes of those benedictions to S. Elizabeths house by her presence must euer infallibly haue bene as farre beyond S. Iohn Baptist in sanctity Psalm 1. as she was in dignity For of him it is said that he was not worthy to vnty the latchet of our B. Sauiours shoo though yet he were the greatest Matt. 11. amongst the Sonnes of mē wheras she had ben made worthy to giue him all the flesh bloud he had It is a most certaine rule of what we are to belieue concerning the proceeding of Almighty God which S. Augustine giues vs in these words lib. 3. de lib. arb c. 5. Quicquid tibi vera ratione melius occurrerit id scias fecisse Deum whatsoeuer thou canst conceaue to be best according to the dictamen of rectified reason know that so it is done by Almighty God Now who sees not that it was fitter better that the mother of God should haue bene humble then proud discreet then rash beleeuing then incredulous and in fine a perfect Saint then a grieuous sinner Her glorious person is high inough out of reach assumed to heauen and
both extremely laborious withall very lickerish after all the delightfull obiects which it lookes vpon And for listening gazing it growes first to cheapning then to buying by the disorder distēpered heate therof it blowes with vehemet desire vpon them And so it rayseth a dust into the eye of the vnderstāding wherby it is made as blind almost as the blind will it selfe And wherby it growes persuaded that how deere soeùer that cōterfeit ware do cost it may proue a kind of sauing bargaine to vs in the end Now what a case are we therfore in if our Loue being so restles a thing as it is so resolued to be euer feeding vpon some obiect or other we suffer that to be such a one as besides the endles tormes of the next life can neuer bring vs to any true rest in this For the soule can neuer rest in the possession or fruition of any creature The reason heerof is playne because the rest of any thing consisteth in the attayning inioying of that last end to which it was ordayned in the creation therof And therfore the soule of man being made for the fruition of God whose glorious vision is only able to make vs say It is inough what meruaile is it that it can take no lasting true contentment in any thing which is lesse then God The holy S. Bernard sayth heervpon to this essect It is no meruaile that the soule of man can neuer be satisfied with the possessions honours pleasures of this world For the soule desires to feed vpon such a meat as may carry proportion to it selfe Now the entertaiments of this life carry no proportion at all to the soule in the way of giuing it entiere satisfactiō For the soule is spirituall immortall and all these obiects are either temporall or carnall And therfore as he who were ready to starue for lacke of meate would be ridiculous if he should thinke to kill his hungar by going to a window gaping there like some Camelion to take in the ayre which ayre is no cōpetent and proportionable food for a body of flesh bloud iust so a man who shal pretend to satisfy fulfill the desires of a spirituall immortal substāce as we know the soule to be by feeding fowly vpon the Carrion of Corporall thinges is at least as very a foole as the former And besides his folly his losse of labour in the meane time he wil heerafter grow to suffer by it so much more hē the otherr as the eternall dānation of a soule is a matter incōparably more considerable then the death of a mortall body No it is God alone who can quēch the infini e appetite of his reasonable creatures He alone made the whole world for vs vs for himself he only is our Center place of rest He only is that first Truth which our vnderstāding should aspire to know the only Good which our Will should be so inflamed to Loue. And because as hath bene said the question is but of the Meanes wherby we must tend to this most perfect End and for that by the treachery of our sēses we are induced to place our harts the affectiōs therof vpon dāgerous vicious obiects it is therfore shat I am procuring to set that one before vs which is the most strōg sweet perfect meanes which may not only inuite but assist vs also admirably otherwise towards the ariuing to our last End The line which leades to this faire full point the way which guides vs to this eternall habitation is that top of beauty and excellency Iesus Christ our Lord vpon whom if we can perswade our selues to fasten the rootes of allour Loue we shall not only be happy there but euē heere And to the end that we may consider the innumerable inualuable reasons which we haue to loue this Lord of ours I haue laboured first to shew the vnspeakeable dignity of his person then the infinite loue it selfe which he hath borne to vs. And this I haue deduced out of the principal misteries of his most sacred life bitter death as they haue bene deliuered to vs in holy Scripture And although whilst I treate of the Loue of our Lord to vs in euery one of the particular mysteries I do also shew the straite obligation into which we are cast of returning loue for loue to him yet I procure to do it more expresly towards the end of the book in the two last Chapters The holy ghost be he who by sweetly breathing vpō our soules may inable vs to do this duty well which hath bene so highly deserued of vs which only is able to make vs happy OF THE LOVE OF OVR LORD IESVS CHRIST declared by shewing his Greatnes as he is God CHAP. 1. THE Loue of our Lord Iesus Christ to this wretched and wicked creature Man is such a Sea without any bottome and such a Sunne without all Eclipse that not only no fadome can reach it must not so much as any eye behould it as indeed it is And whither soeuer we looke either vp or downe or towards any side we shall find our selues ouer wrought by the bulke and brightnes thereof Now (a) The quality of the persōs which loue each other giueth price and value to the loue it selfe because the loue of any one to any other doth take a tincture from the quality of the persons betweene whome it pasles therefore the loue of our Lord to vs is proued heereby to be infinite and incomprehensible because the dignity and Maiesty of his person is incomprehensible and infinite It will therefore be necessary to declare some part of the excellency of his person And for his sake who loued vs with so eternall loue I beg in this beginning an exact attention Because (b) The reason why exact attention is heere required what I am to say in this place being the ground whereon the rest of this discourse must rise will both giue it clearer light and greater weight and more certaine credit Nor can any thing which shall be deliuered in the progresse heerof be so high or deep or wide or hard to the beliefe whereof the soule wil not be able to flye at full ease and speed betweene the wings of faith and loue when it considers and ponders well who it is of whō we speake Our Lord Iesus Christ being perfect God and perfect Man as God is the only begotten eternall sonne of his Father and wholy equall to him And because (c) The generatiō of the Son of God he is begotten of him by an act of Vnderstanding proceeding out of that inexausted fountaine of his wisedom as if it were out of a wombe he is therefore called the Wisedome begotten the Word the Image and the Figure of his Father from whome togeather with the Sonne the Holy Ghost proceeds And for as much as the
diuine Soule of Christ our Lord through the high endowmentes wherewith it was enriched by the eternall Father Wherein no passion did euer once presume to lead the way to reason but was glad of so much honour as to follow it And though whatsoeuer concerned the vegetatiue and sensitiue powers of the soule may seeme little in respect of what is sayd concerning the reasonable which inuolueth both those others yet since nothing is little which is able to do seruice and homage to him who is so truly great it may deserue to be considered how those (k) The vegetatiue and sensitiue powers of the soule were wholly in the hand of the will of Christ our Lord. Vegetatiue and Sensitiue powers were wholy in the hand of his will And so he could haue chosen whether his body should grow or whether his meate should nourish or whether his flesh should feele or whether his bloud vpon the inflicting of a wound should follow or whether his person should send out any such images or species of it selfe as whereby it might become visible to the eyes of others And (l) The body of Christ our Lord though it were a true and naturall body yet was it wholly in his power to determine how far it should be subiect to the conditions of such a body more or lesse in fine in his choice it was whether he would let himselfe be lyable to any of those propertyes and conditions to which the rest of man is subiect And now because the graces and perfections of his sacred body doe contribute to the excellency of his diuine person I will also procure to describe the supereminent beauty and dignity of that sacred flesh and bloud For thus we shall grow to haue a perfect notion of his whole person which will conuey such an influēce of valew vpon euery act of loue which afterward he will be shewed to haue expressed as I hope will make vs wholly giue our hart to him by way of homage for his incomparable benefits The dignity of the pretious body of Christ our Lord is declared wherby the excellency of his loue is magnified CHAP. 4. THE Spirit of God in his holy Scripture doth prophetically delineate the beauty dignity of the sacred Humanity of our Lord Iesus I meane of his sacred flesh and bloud It speaketh of him thus Psalm 44. speciosus forma prae filijs hominum A (a) The beauty of the body of Christ our Lord. person indued with another manner of most excellent beauty then was euer to be seene in any other Creature And indeed euen abstracting from what is reuealed to vs by way of faith concerning his beauty in particular what kind of admirable thing must that Humanity needs be according to all discourse of reason On the one side let vs consider that this sacred body of his was compounded of no other matter but that purest bloud Royall of his al-immaculat virgin mother Royal (b) The dignity sanctity of his descēt it was by her discēt from so many kings Sacerdotall and Propheticall by her being also deriued from the Sanctity of Prophets of Preists Great prerogatiues were these but yet they are the least of them wherewith this holy body of our Lord was endued For it was much more dignified in that before it came to be his the body of the sacred virgin did cohabite with her owne most happy most accomplished soule Wherby (c) How sublimly spirituall the B. virgin was her very flesh was gowne after a sort to be euen Spirit as we see the very soules of sensuall persons to participate as it were the very nature of flesh Much more aduantage did it yet receiue in that the holy Ghost did frame this body of our B. Lord out of the bloud in the wombe of our B. Lady And most of all was it aduanced by this That in the instant when she conceaued his incomparable soule was infused and both his soule and body was Hypostatically vnited to the diuinity Of the happines of that soule already we haue spoken and euen by this little which heere is touched we may behould his body as the prime maister-peece of all visible beauty Amongst (d) Why the body of our B. Lord must needs be admirably beautiful the Children of this world we see indeed that euen they who are borne of handsome through the disorder which naturally accompanieth generation and besides it also growes sometymes through a disconformity which nurses haue to the mothers But his body was framed by the neuer erring hand of the holy Ghost heere the mother and the nurse were one and the same most holy Virgin Mary The excellency of Corporall Beauty doth consist (e) The conditiōs which are required for the making vp of perfect Beauty either in complexion for as much as concernes coulour or in feature or shape for as much as concernes proportion or in facility and grace for as much as concernes disposition and motion We see how any one of these partes of beauty if it be eminent doth affect the eye and hart of a beholder although such a person do either want the other two or haue them at the most but in some moderat degree And the perfection of any one part pleads the excuse of wanting any other And whether therfore shall we be so bold as to thinke that Christ our Lord was not endued with them all in all perfection or els so blinde as notwithstanding such vnspeakeable beauty as his was not to be enamoured of him It is not inough that a body haue only beauty for the perfection therof but (f) For the complemēt of Beauty there are requyred health strengh withall it must haue health and strength Now what want of health could the body of our B. Sauiour haue whose soule was not onely free but so infinitely farre from the curse both of Actuall and Originall sinne the true cause not only of sicknes but of death And what infirmity or weakenes could that Humanity be subiect to vnlesse he had would Isa 63. as indeed he would for our greater good which not onely was not obnoxious to any distemper of humours but withall it was made to be one person with allmighty God himselfe And now let him that can conceaue heerby the sublimity euen of his Corporall beauty Quis est iste saith the Prophet Esay Who is he that commeth out of Edom with his garments dyed from Bozra this beautifull one in his robe walking on in the multitude of his strength This S. Denis affirmes Decael Hierarch c. 7. to haue beene spoken in person of the (g) All the Angells in heauen were amazed to see the beauty of the body of Christ our Lord. Celestiall Spirits they being possessed with an admiration of the vnspeakable Beauty of Christ our Lord Whose diuinity was vested with our humanity as with a robe which once was white though it grew to be
Apostle saith He who is circumcised is bound therby to fulfill the Law And lastly Gal. 5. when he who was the eternal spring the ouerflowing riuer and the bottomlesse sea of all sanctity would be contented for our good for the drawing vs by his example to loue paine and shame to be accounted by men for a creature as odious and abhominable in the sight of God as all sinners are But he thought not all this too much so that he might free vs from the curse of that law to which he would be subiect Aduising and enabling vs heerby to Circumcise (l) The corporall Circumcision of Christ our Lord must teach vs how to circumcise our affections the inordinate affections of our harts which are as so many veynes wherby the bloud of lise is drawne from that true loue which is only due to such a Lord as this who is all made of loue Now because this miserable race of men would not fully correspond with that incomparable Charity of Christ our Lord it was so much the more agreable to the iustice of God the Father to acknowledge and revvard this vnspeakable humility of his sonne And therfore then it vvas that he stampt vpō him the name of Iesus Luc. 2. Phillip 2. to which the knees of all Creatures should be obliged to bow Celestiall vvhose charity he had surpassed terrestriall vvhose life he had instructed and Infernall vvhose pride he had confounded And heerby vve further see hovv infinitely are vve bound to this Lord for this strange loue of his vvho vvhen there should be question of taking such aname as might be proper to him laid all such names aside as might expresse the Maiesty of himselfe and made only choyce of that name of Iesus vvhich might declare his Soueraigne mercy to vs. The Names vvhich grovve from God are farre vnlike to those which are imposed by men for these latter are meere extrinsecall denominations and the former are a most exact abridgement and mappe of those Conditions which grow within So that together vvith this name our Lord Iesus vvas sublimed to the office and dignity of a perfect Sauiour of mankind Not (m) What an yowor thy and weake Sauiour Christ our Lord is made by the Sectaries such a Sauiour as the Sectaries of our age are miserably vvont to make him vvho conceaue him to haue only saued our soules from Hell vvhich is but a punishment of sinne as vvas sayd before and vvhich punishment hovv great soeuer it be is incomparably of lesse deformity and true misery and vvere farre rather to be accepted and chosen then the least sinne it selfe vvhich can be committed but such a one as doth chiefly saue our soules from the guylt of sinne and that by sanctifiyng vs indeed vvith his inherent grace and not by a kind of Iustice vvhich only is imputed to vs vvhilst the vvhyle indeed it is none of ours Through the vvāt vvherof the leaprousy of our soules should not be cleansed and cured but only they should be couered and clad as those deceauedmen conceaue with the robe of his innocency Our Lord giue them light to see and knovv hovv deeply dangerously they deceaue themselues and dishonour him vnder the pretence of piety and peruerse and counterfaite humility vvhilst they make him but such a Sauiour as this Audi Piliacap 88. This errour as Doctour Auila saith proceedeth from the want of knowing the loue which Iesus Christ doth beare to such as are in the state of grace whome his bowells of mercy would not permit that whilst himselfe was iust full of all good things he should say to such as he instifyed Content your selues with this That I abound with these good things and esteeme them for your owne in regard that they are in me although in your selues you remaine vniust impure and naked There is no head which would hold such language as this to his liuing members nor one spouse to another if he should deerly loue her And much lesse will that Celestiall spouse say so who is giuen for a patterne to the spouses of this world that so after his resemblance they may treate and loue their fellow spouses You mensaith S. Paule loue your wiues as Christ loued his Church who gaue himselfe ouer for it to sanctify it and to clense it by baptisme and by the word of life If then he sanctify and wash and clense it and that with his owne bloud which is the thing that giueth power to the Sacramēts to cleanse soules by his grace which they impart how can that soule remaine vniust and silthy which is washed and cleansed by a thing which is of so extreme efficacy And in conformity of that which was affirmed before the same Doctour Auila doth also cleerly shew afterward that such opinions as that do no way serue (n) The doctrine of imputatiue Iustice is expresly impugned by holy scripture and doth impeach the honour of Christ our Lord. either towards the verifying of the Scriptures or for the doing of Iesus Christ sufficient honour For since the payne sayth he which is due to sinne is a lesse euill to any man then the guilt of the same sinne and the iniustice and deformity which is caused therby it cannot be said that Christ our Lord doth saue his people from their sinnes if by his merits he only obtaine that they may not be imputed to them for their punishment vnlesse first he should take the guilt away by the guift of grace Nor yet that he obtayneth purity and piety for men vnlesse by detesting sinne they may keepe the law of God This is the iugdement of Doctour Auila We (o) The catholik Doctrine concerning this poynt therfore according to that truth which is reuealed by Almighty God and propounded to vs to be beleeued by the holy Catholike Church his imaculate Spouse doe cōfesse to the ioy and triumph of our hartes with irreuocable vowes of the highest gratitude that we can conceaue for such an infinite benefit not only that he is the Sauiour of vs from hell which is but as an effect but from sinne also it selfe which is the iust cause therof And not only so but that he saues vs further also from the want of all those helpes graces of the holy Ghost which are conueniēt vt sine timore Luc. 1. de manibus inimicorum nostrorum liberati seruiamus illi in sanctitate institia coram ipso omnibus diebus vitae nostrae That being deliuered from the hands of our enemyes we may serue him without feare in holynes iustice before him all the dayes of our life At the end of which dayes we shall be admitted to see a day in heauen which hath no end and which admits no cloud This I say is to be the precious fruyte of this morning sacrifice of his Circumcision to put vs into a state which can admit no euening For as S. Augustine sayth dies
assured of any coÌ„dition he vvas quickly pleased to shevv the very bovvells of his mercy tovvards them They vvere opened before but then did he let them see hovv he had lodged them all therin For (c) The vnspeakeable fauour with our Lord lesus imparted to his Apostles in regard that they had left their little All for him he admitted them instantly into his ovvne diuine conuersation he instructed them by his heauenly doctrine He gaue them a dominion ouer deuills that they might expell them out of the bodies of men He made them knovv that he vvould leaue them Ambassadours in his place betvvene God and the vvorld That they should haue povver to offer consecrate and consummate his owne pretious body and bloud And to remit or retaine the sinnes of men according to that spirit of vvisedome and the authority vvhich he vvould impart to them for that purpose And that so they must grow to be Treasurers of eternall riches and administrators of all his diuine Sacraments Doctours of the vvhole vvorld And they being so fraile and imperfect men as vve haue shevved before he assumed them to a kind of participation of his ovvne Empire ouer heauen and earth and to a spirituall kind of principality aboue all the Monarks of the vvorld And that vvhich more importeth then all this he declared that they should sit together with himselfe vpon his throne and at the day of Iudgement giue sentence vpon the Twelue Tribes of Israell vvherby the vvhole vvorld is designed So (d) How infinitely we gayne by giuing al to God that heere vve haue meanes to see at hovv high a rate that mony is put out to vse vvhich vve present to God I meane vvhat infinite gaine is raysed by making a deed of guift of the miserable litle thing which vve haue and are to that immense goodnes of his By hearkning with a diligent faith full hart to his holy inspirations vvherby he vvoes vs to become his that in exchange he may be ours It is true that he desires to haue all or none and he hath reason For if this soule of ours with being so poore a thing as it is be yet of such capacity as that nothing which is lesse then God himselfe can content and fill it what a brutish thought would it be in vs to conceaue That our God himselfe could be contented to inioy but a part of vs who are things of nothing and who were all created by him and who are his and only his by so many tytles that hell it selfe is a punishment which comes not home to the crime of our diuiding the soule betwene him creatures He being the sole and supreme truth all (e) All that which concerneth creatures is a meer lye whensoeuer it disobeyeth God or drawes vs from him Confes lib. 10. cap. 22. creatures no better then a pure perfect lye in whatsoeuer they say they are or would seeme to be otherwise then as they yield obedience to the diuine Maiesty S. Augustine doth excellently expresse this particular when reuersing the wandring steps of his ill gouerned youth in the way of confession to almighty God he deliuereth himselfe in this manner Thou art supreme truth who presidest ouer all things Loath I was to loose thee but through my couetousnes I desired to possesse a Lye together with thee This was the reason why I lost thee because thou disdainst to be enioyed in the company of a lye The Apostles therfore when they were called did instantly and wholly giue themselues away with all they had And though the goods which they left were not a matter in themselues of any moment yet they were esteemed to haue giuen much because those happy men reserued nothing to themselues And with the same affection through which they had left that little they were as ready to haue left a thousand worlds for the loue of Christ our Lord. And S. Peter afterward was not affraid to put our Lord in mind therof by these words of his innoceÌ„t and confident Matt. 19. ardent tender loue Behould we haue left all things and followed thee what therfore wilt thou doe for vs He said not that he had left his netts or his house or his boate or this or that but absolutely that he had left all things And (f) The infinite liberality of our Lord Iesus our Lord made him this answere with no lesse then the bounty of a God Amen Amen c. which declareth a most serious affirmation or protestation You who haue followed me shall sit vpoÌ„ thrones at the resurrection of the iust you shall iudge the twelue tribes of Israell And whosoeuer shall haue left his Father or mother or brother or sister or house or land for my names sake shall haue a hundred fold in this world and afterward shall possesse eternall life Yea so liberall is our Lord IESVS as to reward with no lesse then heauen for euery instant of that tyme which we dispose our selues to imploy vpon his seruice And yet his excellency is such as that euen the very only doing him any little seruice is of so great happines to a faithfull soule as that it alone is an ouer-pay foral the paines that can be taken in this life But to shew that our Lord is scarce able to differre the recompence of such as follow him with a ready will we shall see in the next Chapter how he takes some of them as it were into the ioyes of heauen before their tyme. And he who (g) Note heer the excellent loue of Christ our Lord. would not haue them present when he was tempted solitary and in act of penance because perhaps they were not so able to feed so soone vpon such crosses or hard crusts as those did yet resolue that he would not haue some of them absent when he was to be Transfigured vpon the hill But that in recompence of their beginning to doe him seruice for the strengthning of their Faith and Hope and Loue in the processe of it they should tast a dropp of that glory wherwith they were to be inebriated in heauen Of the excessiue Loue which our Lord Iesus shewed to man in the mistery of the Transfiguration CHAP. 29. THE Temptation and Transfiguration of our Lord IESVS are liuely instances of hovv hard things he desired to suffer and how excellent things he desired to doe for vs which two â—â—e the most certayne tokens (a) True loue desires not only to do great thinges but to suffer hard thinges Matt. 17. of true loue We haue already considered of his Temptation and now this Mystery of his Transfiguration is thus related in the sacred text That our Lord tooke Saint Peter S. Iames S. Iohn into the top of a high and solitary mountaine to the end that he might pray That whilst he (b) The manner of the Transfiguration of our Lord Iesus was praying he grew to be
any one Matt. 8. the innumerable creatures who needed desired miraculous cure from Christ our Lord we heare not of any one who was finally frustrate of his suite Nay he reiected not the very deuills thēselues whom he suffred to enter into that heard of swyne His eyes were but as so many conduyts wherby he brought into his hart all the miseries that he saw and then by the same way he sent his mercies out for reliefe therof It is true that sometymes he seemed as if he would not graunt theyr suytes as in the case of the Cananean woman but it was but seeming For indeed Matt. 15. he meant not onely to cure the Daughter but to glorify the mother for that full cluster of vertues which shee had of humility patience perseuerance and such an eminency of Faith withall as that himselfe was not only pleased to commend her for it but being the true increated wisedome and knowledge of God he would yet be content to seeme obliged to be in admiration to make this exclamation in her honour O mulier magna est sides tua fiat tibi sicut vis O womā great is thy Faith be it vnto thee as thou wilt And this he did though himselfe was he who both gaue her grace to conceaue it by his inspiration and occasion to expresse it by the appearance which he made of her reprehension There was no tyme nor place nor seuerall disease of body nor disposition of mind to which this diuine Phisitian of the whole man did not accomodate himselfe with vnquencheable charity and incessant care Which was a million of tymes greater in him towards euery beggar then any Physitian of this world could euer tell how to carry towards the only Sonne of his soueraigne king whom he had in cure If (k) Our Lord did accōmodate himself to the cure of all men according to theyr seuerall dispositiōs and necessities Marc. 5. men had feeling of their infirmity and with all so much desire to be recouered as might serue to carry them to the places where he was to be he gaue them leaue by the increase of their labour to grow in merit If they cryed out as not being able to come quickly to him he would expect till they arriued and then would cure them as he did the ten leaprous persons all leaprous in their bodies but nyne of them more leaprous in their soules since they were vngrateful to such a goodnes If their miseries were great although their knowledge and beliefe in him were very small he would seeke such out without being sought Luc. 17. Ioan. 5. Marc. 9. Luc. 9. 4. 5. 8. Marc. 10. Matt. 9. Marc. 2. Matt. 20. as he did the man vvho lay at the Probatica piscina eight and thirty yeares If it vvere peraduenture a kind of a midle case he vvould meet them in the halfe vvay or he vvould require them to be brought to him or he vvould stay as if he stayd not for them till they came of themselues or he vvould cast to goe vvhere they vvere to come or els where he knevv them to be he vvould not fayle to goe And hovvsoeuer it vvere if he savv thē in need of helpe he vvould cure them sometymes though they did not so much as aske it of him Matt. 12. Luc. 14. 5. Ioan. 9. Luc. 9. Matt. 150 Marc. 6. Which was the case of the mā with the withered hand and the man vvho vvas Hydropicque and that other also vvho vvas borne blind And vvhen at seueral tymes he fed men women and children by thousands in the desert there vvas not one of them vvho opened his mouth to aske him meate but their distresse vvas the only Solicitour of his mercifull hart to shevv thē pitty If they deliuered him their ovvn petitiōs Marc. 1. 12. Luc. 7. they vvere sure to be gratiously hard if their case were exposed by the intercessiō of others they were also as sure not to be reiected To teach vs therby vvhat high cōfidēce we ought to haue in the prayers of saints since he heard such sinners for one another Novv the manner of his cures vvas vvithall so deerly svveet as that they seeme euen to exceed the mercy of the very cures themselues Hovv tenderly vvould he be carrying himselfe tovvards those poore creatures in all their necessities Sometymes he vvould performe the base Office of leading blind beggars by his ovvne hand he would conduct both blind and deafe and dumbe persons out of company Marc. 7. 8. that he might enioy them alone and so make thē knovv vvithall vs by thē that for the cure of al our spirituall diseases it is fit for vs sometymes to retyre our selues hand to hand vvith God Nay those hands of his vvould not disdaine to touch the loathsome and polluted flesh of leapers And though many make great dainty Matt. 8. to serue sicke persons who are subiect to lesse foule diseases wheras our Lord had sayd that in seruing them Matt. 25. we should be giuing comfort to himselfe yet to the eternall glory of his name and by the merit of his example and through the power of his grace we will acknowledge and be glad that in his holy Catholike Apostolicque Romaine Church the Spirit of this holy practice doth still liue And (1) The good custome of seruing in Hospitals that there are thousands and many thousands amongst vs of all conditions sexes and ages who in imitation of our Lords humility and charity are dayly visiting sicke persons Instructing comforting and feeding them both in body and soule procuring to ease them in their paines and making their beds and drying their sweats and wyping their sores It were a shame that the seruants of God should not imploy themselues in these good exercises when they consider how Christ our Lord did put those omnipotent fingars of his owne Mare 7. Ibid. into the eares of those poore creatures and into their mouthes Ioan. 9. Ioan. 11. and how himselfe made plaisters for their eyes and how he would sigh and groane to consider sinne in their soules the miserable effects therof in their very bodyes of flesh and bloud We see how he prayed and how he wept at the raysing of Lazarus and how through the excesse of loue wherwith he desired to restore him to life the Scripture saith Infremuit spiritu Ioan. 11. which betokned as it were a kind of tumult and tempest of his affections which were working and wrastling with God in the behalfe of that dead man In so much as the lookers on did wonder to see that so great a Prophet and the worker of so many and strange miracles should lament weep like another ordinary person And they easily inferred thereby that those teares other greater demonstrations of griefe must needs proceed from some puissant cause and so they said to one another in the way of wondring Behould
goodnes immediatly vpon his hauing washed the Apostles feete And our Lord was pleased by that vnspeakeable humility of his to prepare and exalt them to a participation of so high mysteries as were to follow Ioan. 7. The holy Ghost was not then descended because the sonne of man was not ascēded vp to heauen And therfore it is no meruaile if S. Peter were at that tyme to seeke concerning the reasō why our Lord would vse such an excesse as that But he was told that he should vnderstand the mystery afterward Ioan. 13. and then he would easily know withal that (f) The great purity which is requisite to a Catholique Priest no purity in this world could be too great for the disposing of themselues to that which they went about which was to be ordeyned Priests and not only to partake but also to dispense the pretious body and bloud of our blessed Lord. Our Lord IESVS did therfore take bread into his hands he blessed it and gaue therof to his Disciples when first he had pronounced the words of Consecration ouer it Declaring and consequently making it to be that very body of his which was to be offred vpon the Crosse That being done he also tooke the Chalice and he consecrated that in like manner affirming and therby also making it to be that very bloud which was to be powred out afterward for the saluation of the world He authorized and commaunded them withall to doe the like in commemoration of what he should haue done and suffered for them Now incomparable was the loue which our Lord shewed heerin both in substance circumstance In (g) Most strong in substance most sweet in circumstance substance because he gaue himselfe for the food of his seruants and in the manner of it because he did it in such a sweet and tender fashion towards them at such a tyme when yet his owne hart was oppressed with sorrow through the foreknowledge and expectation of his bitter Passiō which was thē at hand Nay he was pleased as appeareth by the words of the sacred Text to be (h) In the very consecration he speake and thought of his Passion feeding his thoughts actually vpon how he was to giue his body vp by his bitter Passion and to shed his bloud by a violent and most dishonorable effusion euen whilst he was graunting that legacy and consecrating the same body and bloud of his for the comfort and ioy of mankind vnder the familiar and delightful formes of bread wine He was taking his leaue of them though yet he knew not how to leaue them But as he went from them in that visible manner according to which he had conuersed vvith thē til that tyme so yet he vvould bind himself to come in person to them for their comfort though in another forme vvhensoeuer they should haue a mind to call him How our Lord would not harken to those reasons which might haue disswaded him from shewing this great mercy to man Of the necessity of a visible Sacrifice and how our Lord himselfe doth still offer it CHAP. 46. IF reason might haue preuailed it seemes that he should haue taken heed vvhat he vvas about doe Matt. 7. That if Pearles were not to be cast to swyne much lesse vvas this inualuable ievvell to be mis-spent vpon so many vvho vvould continually be vvallovving in the filth of sinne That there vvould be a vvorld of Pagans Iewes Heretiques and vvho vvould not beleeue and would blaspheme the truth therof That millions of Catholikes though they did beleeue it would not yet frequent it but would rather for beare this bread of life this fountaine of heauenly water then the muddy miserable gust of some carnal pleasure or some base interest of the world which yet doth but lead them from a Purgatory in this life to a Hell in the next That some would do worse then to abstayne for notwithstanding that they resolued still to sinne they would yet presume with Sacrilegious mouth to prophane this Lord of heauen and earth to bring God into that house wherof the deuill had possession and dominion And in fine that they would be too few who would often resort to it with due reuerence of that Maiesty with hungar after true sanctity with loue of that immense beauty and with that purity of hart which might forbid them to lauish and wast themselues away in pursuite of creatures This might haue seemed to be the voyce of reason which was to haue diuerted our blessed Lord from submitting himselfe to such indignity as he seemed by his mercy to grow subiect to But (a) How the infinite loue of our Lord made answere in our behalfe to this infinite wisedome he on the other side would needs vnderstand it to be otherwise And that he being an infinite God it vvould become him well to be infinitely good That it should not be long of him if all the world were not inchayned to him by loue That if any man would either vnder-value the benefit and much more if he would abuse it otherwise a most rigorous account should be asked therof And that in the meane tyme it would be comfort inough for him if such as were resolued to serue him might be incorporated to him not only by supernaturall grace but by this supersubstantiall bread which should cause an vnspeakeable vnion betwene him them This was a principall reason why our Lord was pleased to institute both this diuine Sacrifice and Sacrament in this last supper of his but he did it besides for the fulfilling of Prophesies and the perfecting of the figures of the old Testament He was not come as himselfe had formerly affirmed To breake the law but to fulfill it And therfore as he was pleased to eate the Paschall lambe with all those Ceremonies which the law required and which till then were to be of force so (b) The Paschall lambe was a figure both of the death of Christ our Lord and of the B. Sacrament the same being partly a figure of the Passion and Death of our Lord IESVS and much more properly of the Blessed Sacrament and the holy Sacrifice of the Masse it became his Truth and Goodnes to ordaine and institute them at that tyme. For his Church in euery one of the states therof aswell vnder the law of nature as the written law was the Spouse of Christ our Lord and in vertue of that only coniunction it vvas acceptable and pleasing to the eternall Father But particularly it was to be so vnder the Law of Grace vvhen once it should come to be fed by his sacred body and inebriated by his pretious bloud And therfore as in those former tymes the Church of Christ our Lord had neuer bene without her Sacrifices neither is there indeed or can there be any true Religion without a reall and proper Sacrifice so much lesse vvould he permit that Spouse vnder the lavv of
the inioyning and if it were possible for the very exchanging themselues by loue into one another And now as God is infinite in all things so is he infinite after a particular manner in his loue and by consequence he is infinite in his inuention How inspeakeable honour had it bene for man to haue bene though but admitted to the sight alone of Christ our Lord in the blessed Sacrament Num. 88. For if the sight of that brasen serpēt with faith in Christ our Lord who was then but to come so long after were able to cure the Israelites of the stings of serpents how much more would the only sight of our blessed Sauiour with faith haue sufficiently serued to cure their soules of all their sicknesse How much happines had it bene for vs to touch the sacred host with our hāds the senfible part of the same host being a garment which sits so close vpon the body and soule of Christ our Lord. For we know that a woman was cured of a bloudy flux Matt. 9 14. Marc. 6. Luc. 8. by the only touch of the hemne of his looser garment Such honour and happines had bene much for vs to haue receaued but it was nothing in cōparisō of the excessiue charity of our Lord which would not be satisfied with doing lesse then all For what could euen his omnipotency haue added to the trace which heere he hath deuised not only of a coniunction but of an vnion and that such an one as is the most internall which can be imagined being in the way of food S. Augustine sheweth how God hath made as able to feed vpon him by a meer spirituall manner in the mistery of the Incarnation and we may fitly apply the same wordes to this Sacramētall kind of feeding as indeed these two misteries haue great affinity with one another God (z) A passage of S. Augustine which well deserueth to be consi dered Manual cap. 26. became man sayth this incomparable Saint for mans sake that so man might be redeemed by him by whome he was created And to the end that God might be beloued by man after a kind of more familiar manner he appeared in the likenes of man That so both the internall and the externall senses of man might be made happy in him and that the eye of our hart might be fedd by the consideration of his diuinity and the eye of our flesh and bloud by that of his humanity That so whether we should worke inward or outward this humane nature of ours which was created by him in him might be sure to find store of food This S. Augustine sayth and if this might be well affirmed in respect of the Incamation of our Lord IESVS how much more may it be sayd in respect of the mystery of the blessed Sacrament where we feed not only spiritually but besides after a sacramentall and yet reall māner How we doe both feed and are fedd vpon in the blessed Sacrament and of the admirable effects which it must necessarily cause in such as do worthily receaue it and of the reason why it must be so and of the Figures which forshewed the same CHAP. 48. VVE may wel perceaue that our Lord IESVS is a great freind of (a) God is a great friend of vnion Vnion His person is distinct from the other persons of the B. Trinity but the essence is one and very same of them all When he was resolued to become man he was also pleased to knit mans nature to the nature of God by the Hypostaticall vnion An infinite honour this was to man for it grew true heerby that man was God and that God was killed vpon a Crosse for the loue of men Yet though by that vnion in his Incarnation he brought vs all to be his allies he did not personally vnite himselfe to vs all But by this last (b) How our Lord vniteth vs to himself sacramentall vnion of him and vs when purely we take his pretious body bloud into our selues vnder the quality and condition of food he maketh euery one of vs much more one with him And then no meruaile if the honour he doth vs if the ioy he giues vs when the fault is not our owne be the greatest which we can receaue in this world For we inioye none of the other mysteries of the life and death of our Lord IESVS but onely by faith and memory wheras this is present to vs in very deed and present so as the food which we receaue is present to vs. And so in like manner when no impediment is at hand it breeds a great loue of his goodnes and a great delight in his sweetnes in fine an vnion of vs both in one Though with this difference from other food that as S. Augustine was taught by our Lord we change not him into vs Confes l. 7. cap. 10. as by eating other food we vse to chāge it but we are changed into it by it if we approach to it with a pure and hungry soule so feeding in this B. Sacrament vpon him he feedeth also vpon vs. Nor is it strange that we should both feed and yet be fed vpon when Almighty God is a party to the contract Omnia quaecumpue voluit fecit He can doe what he will and he is pleased to will Psalm 113. that he and we should feed vpon one another And to such as endeauour to be truly and entirely and purely his he contenteth not himselfe with lesse then thus to come to them in person with desire of vnion And he is (c) The vnspeakeable benefits which are reaped by worthy receauing the B. Sacrament Psal 147. washing away all the dregs of sinne by that fountaine of grace He is thawing all frozen hardnes of the hart by the sweet breath of his Spirit Flabit Spiritus eius fluent aquae and he is consuming the rust of their selfe loue by that burning fire of his charity comforting them in all afflictions and satisfying them in all their doubts and wants illuminating their vnderstanding and composing their will and fixing their imaginatiō and possessing and imprinting himselfe vpon their memory calling in and consecrating their senses and sealing vp their harts to himselfe And changing at length the whole tast of their soules he make them loue that which he loues and hate that which is any way offensiue to him To conclude of deuills which perhaps they were they become as so many Angells in flesh bloud are naturalized after a sort with God grow to be euen very Christs according to that of the blessed Apostle who said of himselfe Viuo (d) O happy holy state ego Galat. 2◠iam non ego viuit verò in me Christus I liue yet now not I but Christ is he who liueth in me by my liuely imitation of his diuine vertues and by a perfect conformity or rather transformity of my spirit
and within our selues and to one another And then wil that be fulfilled which the blessed Apostle sayth 1. Cor. 10. That we are all one bread and one body we who are partakers of that diuine bread and of his Chalice But though this may be truly said to some proportion of all such as doe carefully and deuoutly come to this blessed Sacrament yet most eminently is it true of them who are fed therby in the state of holy Religion Whose perfect (g) The vnion of religious persons is a kind of miroculous thing Vnion hath so very much of the miracle in it that it conuinceth euen the most malicious tookers on For euen they when they are in their wits cānot ascribe it to any other cause then the powerful presēce of the grace of God the powerfull grace of his presēce that such a world of persons of so different incompatible nations ages humours descent dispositions and talents should liue together in as perfect a mutuall consent of mind as if they were all the twynnes of one and the same naturall mother The (h) Of other circumstances which do greatly shew the loue of our Lord. ardent loue of our Lord IESVS doth also as liuely appeare in other circumstances of this diuine Sacrifice and Sacrament of the Altar It is true that such as receaue Christ our Lord with great purity of hart are content as it were to be at cost and care to adorne their soules when they to be sit at this celestiall Banquet are receiued by him with an vnspeakeable communicatiō of himselfe and he imbraceth them with armes of so great delight and ioy as is very different from what he ordinarily doth to such as approach Iesse deuoutly to him At this we are not to wonder for the loue of our Lord IESVS to vs is not like the loue of men which if it be very great it puts them as it were out of their wits But the (i) The loue of our Lord doth no way derogate from his infinite wisedom loue of our Lord God doth not take him one haires breadth from home nor doth it derogate at all from his high wisedome Nor are there in the world any weights either of gold or diamonds so precise or nice as the weights of the wisedome of our Lord God whereby he values euery thought of preparation which is made more or lesse when we approach to his presence And accordingly he receaues vs either like his seruants or like his Sonnes But yet still this is true that there is no person in state of grace who may not celebrate if he be a Priest nor no other man or woman but may communicate otherwise of the body and bloud of Christ our Lord with great profit This (k) Our Lords loue doth still more and more appeare by the cōsideration of other circumstances Lord might haue annexed this incomparable benefit to the only state of perfect Chastity or only to such persons as had performed certaine grieuous penances or at least to such alone as had neuer dishonored or profaned either this soueraigne Sacrifice or most venerable Sacrament by ill receiuing it But his Charity would not endure that any one should be excluded from such a benefit if at last he would be content to loue him He might haue abridged vs to one only tyme of cōmunion in all our life or at least that we should not communicate aboue once a yeare But so farre he was from giuing any such restraint as this that he desires nothing more then that we should often repaire to this food of life Yea and he hath inspired his holy Church by his holy Spirit to counsaile her children to frequent it and to driue them out of her company by (l) They are excōmunicated who doe not communicate once in the yeare excommunication if at certayne tymes they doe not satisfye the longing which he hath to become therby one with them There is no necessity or important occasion in the world either corporall or spirituall either publicke or priuate for which this holy Sacrifice may not be offered And not only brings it profit to liuing men but to such as haue led vs the way to Purgatory where the paines are much discounted heereby as S. Augustine De cura pro mortuis possim and many other of the Fathers doe aboundantly shew So also in our receiuing the blessed Sacrament we of the layty are put to no stint heerin but euery Christian may communicate as often as his owne ghostly Father shall thinke fit And as when (m) The King of Glory vouchsafes to come and visit in person euery beggar we haue health of body we may in euery Church goe to him so when we are sicke we neede take no care in this for he wil be sure to come to vs. And if it were an incomparable mercy as we haue seene it to be in the last discourse of the miracles for our Lord IESVS to visit and cure the sicke of corporall diseases whilst himselfe was mortall how much more is he to be magnified by all the powers of our soules since he cōsines himselfe as a man may say to our Altars and bindes himselfe to be there at all the howers both of day and night and to be ready in all weathers and vpon all warnings and sometimes with small attendance to transport himselfe to the death-bed of euery beggar yea and of euery sinner who may perhaps haue profaned him in the same Sacrament to cure and comfort their afflicted soules And all this he doth now that he is glorious in heauen and sitting at the right hand of God Sometymes (n) He is pleased to be exposed for our cōfort opon our Altars for many howres together he is pleased that we shall not only receaue him which action is begun and ended as it were at an instant but moreouer vpon great solemnities as also vpō other particular occasions of the Church we may haue the cōfort to see the blessed Sacramēt with our corporal eyes for some good tyme together And sometymes it is exposed for the space of forty howers vpon our Altars And because he reapes much honor and vve much good by the meeting of many pious affections in one and for that the multitude of the faithfull is so great in euery good towne that no one Church can hould them for that purpose this mercifull Lord of ours is content to be carried in procession through the streets and publicke places and so to take homage from whole Cittyes at once whereby they (o) How we reuerse the dishonour which was done to our Lord in tyme of the Passion doe the best they can to reuerse the ignominies and affronts which he receiued in the many most paynfull and most shameful processions which he made to the house of Aunas of Cayphas of Pylate of Herod and of Mount Caluary in that night and morning of his bitter Passion for
our Redemption The misery is shewed and the errour is partly conuinced of such as doe not imbrace the beliefe of those diuine Mysteries CHAP. 50. VVHo shall therfore be euer able inough to admire this Soueraigne Lord of loue for the mercy which he hath shewed vs in this blessed Sacramēt of his most pretious body and bloud and for the care he hath taken of the cōpletenes of our comfort heerin Psalm 105. Quis loquetur potentias Domini auditas faciet omnes landes eius Who I say shall be able to declare Gods power and to proclaime his prayses And how much reason therfore is it that there should not be in the world any Priest or other faithfull Christian who will not set vp the rest of all his comfort in this life in frequenting this bread of heauen and in spending some part of his dayes and nights in preparing to receaue this diuine food with due deuotion If our Lord IESVS Lue. 14. tooke it ill in the Ghospell that they would not resort to that supper of his which was indeed a type of heauen it selfe and yet withall of this heauenly mystery how heauily wil he lay it to our charge if we be negligent in comming to this Table whē himselfe is both he who inuites to the banquet the very bāquet it self But O (a) The lamentable ingratitude of such as are not Catholiques misery to be eternally deplored euen with teares of bloud that in these woefull dayes of ours there should be any found with the name of Christians vpon their forehead who yet renounce the benefit yea and expresly blaspheme the inuiolable truth of this mystery Miserable creatures they are a thousand tymes miserable who do by this meanes eyther ignorantly or maliciously degrade and depose themselues from the most soueraigne point of Christian dignity which the infinite wisedome and loue of God himselfe was euen able with all his omnipotency to impart to the meanenes and weakenes of sinfull men Yet some of them being pressed as it were to death by the euident words of Hoc est corpus meum so often iterated by so many of the holy Euangelists haue begun of late yeares to affirme that they beleeue the reall presence of our Lord in the blessed Sacrament as well as wee but only that they dare not pronounce de modo But (b) Theyr speach de modo is a false and foolish stift our Lord doth know that they speake not as they meane but only to abuse the people Neither can they beleeue it as we doe according to their other particular declarations concerning this doctrine And yet in truth if they did beleeue the thing it selfe and did only differ de modo as they say they doe amongst which modo's or wayes they vnderstād our doctrine of Transubstantiation to be one how could they dare so wickedly blaspheme this our Doctrine cōcerning the modus yet professe that they are ignorant of the modus or way how the reall presence comes to be in the B. Sacrament But this (c) The scope of this book is not to teach faith but loue Treatise is not intended for the setling of the truth of the Catholike faith and to conuince them of errour who inpugne it but only to inflame the hart of the true Christian to heate of loue vpon those reasons and motiues which are already ministred by the light of faith to our soules That other taske hath bene performed by multitudes of our learned Authors wherof the world is ful I will only beseech them for the loue of our Lord IESVS that they will procure to purify their hartes from sensuality and other sinne which blindes that soule wherin it raignes till then we will wonder the lesse that men of so bestiall life as the founders of their religion were had no sight wherwith to pierce into so pure mysteries The carnall man cannot discerne of things belonging to God 1. Cor. ◠and if not of things which are but belonging to him how much lesse of the substance of this blessed Sacrament which is God himselfe as truly God as he is God who made heauen and earth In the meane tyme these people deserue much pitty at our hands who whet the teeth not only of infidelity against God but euen of Enuy against themselues For what doth it looke like but enuy since they refuse to beleeue and to imbrace so great a good vpon this cheife reason because they thinke it is too good to be true And (d) The counterfeyt sanctity and preposterous pretence of the humility of Sectaries this peruerse and preposterous humility togeather with a seeming to take such a counterfayte care of the dignity and Maiesty God is one of those bucklers vnder which they hide themselues from the darts of loue which he would faine be shooting at their soules For they say it is an indignity and what if a rat or a dogge should eate the blessed Sacrament and I know not what vnsauoury stuff of the kind But they consider not the while that God receaues farre more dishonour in being prophaned by a Iudas or any other obstinate sinner then if the body of our Lord should be eaten by as many rats as there are blaspheming Heretikes in the world That Sunne true Sunne of Iustice can well inough tell how to keep his beames from being defyled vpon any filthy dunghill And if he could not it would goe hard with him For the diuinity of Christ our Lord IESVS is actually intrinsecally in all the parts of all the creatures of the whole world both by essence presēce and power yea and in all the deuills of hell as truly as in any Angell of heauen or els that thing would instantly giue ouer to be And now if the (e) Note this most certay ne and apparant consequēce diuinity of Christ our Lord be in all vile places without any indignity the humanity how noble soeuer it be will be farre from disdayning to keep it company Little doe these deceaued creatures consider how low our mercifull Lord could be content to descend for the loue of man towards the receauing if there should be cause of dishonour by the meanes either of beasts or other men And I should thinke that the Temptation of Christ our Lord by the Prince of darkenes in the wildernes Matt. 4. might read them a lowd lesson vpon this subiect For there our B. Lord was not only tempted by the deuill but that diuine goodnes did suffer that sacred Sonne of the blessed Virgin to be taken as hath been said posted vp downe in those armes or hands which the infernall Spirit had assumed to himselfe for that purpose Or if they had rather looke vpon the Sonnes and slaues of the deuill then vpon himselfe Let them (f) Note also this consequēce behould how that holy humanity being so knit to God as that it made the selfe same person with him was
soule being vnited to the diuinity would haue bene farre from feeling any thing but vnspeakeable ioy But leauing eight of his Disciples not farre of he tooke to himselfe the three whom he fauoured most Marc. 14. S. Peter S. Iames and S. Iohn as the fittest to be eye witnesses of his afflictiō because they had beene fortified by hauing bene present at his Transfiguration Matt. 17. Marc. 14. Luc. 22. He bad them watch and pray least else they might enter into Temptation But the lead of their sad harts drew downe and closd ' the doores of their heauy eyes making them sleep after a sort whether they would or no. Our Lord had by that tyme retyred himselfe a little euen from them into perfect (a) Solitude is fit for such as pray solicitude Not that he had need therof who knew not what be longed to a distraction but to teach vs in such cases what we are to doe Yea and to make euen men of the highest prayer and contemplation not to contemne the preparations and helpes which weaker persons are wont vse When he had prayed a while he went to visit his Apostles And so he did agayne at two seueral tymes afterward for no paine of his owne was able to make him forget them And although in all reason they were to haue been sharply reprehended for such a dulnes yet he would not open his mouth towards the holding of any such language But (b) The wōderfull meeknes of our B. Lord. he pittied them rather and bad them at the last sleepe on and to the extreme confusion of such as for tryflles are cholerickly transported against their seruants he excuseth and defendeth and euen comendeth them for the promptitude and good desire of their minde although their body of flesh bloud were fraile Returning therfore againe to pray his soule was ouer wrought with griefe in such excesse that his valiant hart which knew not what belonged to feare and his silent tongue which vsed not to vent it selfe by speach were not ashamed to professe that he was all seized with terrour that he was oppressed with a kind of wearines that he was surcharged with so profound sorrow as made him say That his soule was sad euen to the death What a blessed goodnes was this in him to plucke vp those stakes dikes which formerly had made it impossible for such thought as those to breake in and ouerflow him and now to giue way to such (c) The weakenes of our Lord hath obtayned strength for his seruants in their sufferāce weakenes in himselfe that by the merit therof so much grace might be applied to men and not only to men but euen to tender and delicate Virgins as that in vertue therof they might be able with patience and euen with ioy to endure as cruell Martyrdomes as euer the rage of the most barbarous Tyrants could inuent For as we grew to haue perfect life by the obediēce of his death and true honour by his humility and shame so by this weakenes of his we haue gayned strength by his wearines alacrity and by his griefe his faithfull seruants haue obteyned ioy in their greatest misery From hence we may also gather an other fruite of cōfort that since our Lord himselfe went so farre in the expression of his distresse his seruants must not thinke when thēselues should be much deiected by their crosses in the inferiour part of their soule that therfore God is angry with them if still in the superiour they will imitate this Lord of ours Who notstanding he desired that the Chalice might haue passed from him did yet resigne himselfe with intire abnegatiō of his owne wil accepting thus Luc. 22. imbracing the wil of God Pater si est possibile transeat à me Calix iste attamen non mea voluntas sed tua siat Father if it be possible let this Chalice passe frō me yet not my will but thine be done Now as the charity was vnspeakeable which our Lord IESVS was pleased to expresse both in bearing such a vveight as this for our Redemption in letting vs heare the groanes which it cost him for our instructiō consolation so who shall be able to sound into that bottomlesse pit of his profound humility which drew the God of glory to submit himselfe to such indignity and to make him content to need the comfort of a creature though he were an Angell which Angell must come downe from heauen like a prince of glory whilst the creatour of all the Angells was planted there so full of misery And that he would find himselfe in such necessity of (d) How he persisted in prayer persisting in his prayer sometymes (1) Luc. 22. vpon his knees sometymes (2) Marc. 14. prostrate vpon the ground often repeating the same Prayer and that in the selfe same words as if it had bene like to proue a kind of doubtfull case what would become of him at last But of that there was no doubt at all for besides his Hypostaticall vnion with the diuinity his happy soule was fully in God And both by the straytes into which he was content that the inferiour part therof should be cast for as much as concerned any sense of cōfort as also by the course which he tooke to become victorious in the end he went recording wayes and rules for vs wherby we might also conquer all our enemies Our blessed Lord in the meane tyme was labouring as it were for life to such plunges was he brought as to find himselfe in expresse agony Luc. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for so the holy Euangelist declares Now this is the state of dying persons in the last moments of their life when the eyes being already dymme the teeth being knit the hart strings being straynd and all the noble partes being in commotion as this Globe of the lower world vvould be in a generall earth quake the diuorce of the body and soule seemeth neere at hand And it is to be noted that this grevv in him vvithout any torment then inflicted vpon his body and only from the (e) The excessiue anguish of mind which our Lord Iesus felt anguish of his minde Hovv exquisite therfore and hovv insufferable must that anguish be But the more closely he vvas to be set vpon by that Sea of sorrovv vvhich seemed as if instantly it vvould svvallovv him vp the more firme vvas his hope in God and so also must ours be in such occasions And after the rate of our discomforts so is our Prayer to be increased Forvve see it is affirmed of our blessed Sauiour that vvhē he vvas grovvne to be in Agony he produced his prayer into great length Ibid. Et factus in agonia prolixius orabat Prayer is therfore that vvhich still he recommends to vs heerby and vve see vvith hovv profound reuerence it must be made and vvhat high estimation vve are to make
therof as shortly vvill be shevved more at large And since our blessed Lord vvas content to repeate the selfe same prayer thrice vve are to pitty the poore men vvho vvill needs be our aduersaries vvhilst they laugh and scoffe at vs for our often repetition of the same (f) That Repetitiō of the same prayers is commended by the example of Christ our Lord. Prayers Indeed if vve did but say them vvith the lips and tongue alone as they impose vpon vs tooke not care to accompany them vvith the application and attention of our minde they might still laugh on and the deuill vvould keepe them company therin But othervvise vve see by this mystery of the Garden that Repetition of Prayers is no ill custome if vve vse it as vve ought And then if still they vvill needs be laughing at as for the vse therof they vvill be faine to doe it alone for the deuill is not such a foole as to doe so too since he knovves he looses by the bargaine A heauy Agony to our Lord IESVS that vvas but a happy one for vs since he offred it to the eternall Father for the obtayning of comfort and strength not (g) That Agony of our Lord got cōfort for vs both in our afflictions of mind and diseases of body only in all the distresses of minde as vvas said before but in all the deadly diseases of body also vvhich might come to carry vs out of this life And it is in vertue of this Agony that vve see the seruants of God so full of patience and courage and sometymes euen of ioy vvhen they are vpō that bed euē as it were in the very iavves of death Nor vvhen they are abandoned by the help of the vvhole vvorld and vvhē their corporal strength is entirely gone can yet all the proud deuills in hell vvho are then imploying all the force and fraude they haue to their perdition disquiet their conscience or disturbe their peace What griefe it must needs cause to our blessed Lord to be estranged from feeling comfort in God CHAP. 55. BVT vvhat might that be the very apprehension vvherof vvrought so impetuously vpon our blessed Lord vvhome nothing had bene obserued to distemper in the least degree through all the course of his holy life vvhat kind of thing I say must that be vvhich durst assault his hart vvith sorrovv Or of vvhat had he bene ignorant till then the knowledge wherof at that tyme might be able to put the powers of his mind into that appearance of disorder His knowledge was still the same but his loue in some sort was not the same for it seemes as if euery minute of his life he had bene adding new feathers to those wings wherby his hart was flying towards the comfort of ours And knowing of how great aduantage to vs his humility and patience would be in the sight of God (a) Our Lord was pleased to suffer much for vs whom he loued so much it was only his pleasure at that tyme as hath been sayd to hide the comfort of his diuinity from the inferiour part of his soule wherby those apprehensions and reasons of griefe and desolation were of vnspeakeable torment to his minde Which so long as it was feeding vpon the cleere and sensible vision of God could not so much as once distract it from incessant ioy Whereas novv he vvas so very farre from ioy that vve see him as if he had been halfe ouercome with griefe To let vs knowe by the way that as all our burthens are light when they are carryed vpō our backs by the help of God so when he retyreth his holy hand there is not the least of thē which may not trouble the strongest Saint that liues But the obiect which caused such excessiue anguish to our Lord IESVS which wrought so farre euen vpon his sacred body as to make it vtter a prodigious svveat of very bloud and that not by drops but as it vvere by streames and flood Luc. 22. vvhich did not trickle but run downe a maine from the heauenly earth of his body to the terrestriall earth wheron he kneeled which was made a kind of heauen by drinking vp that quintessēce of life was (b) The dishonour of God and the perdition of man was the two edged sword which cut our B. Sauiours hart in funder the glory of God which he saw prophaned by the sinne of man and the soules of all mankind wherof he loued euery one a million of times more then his owne pretious life addicted to the eternall torments of hell fire For this was that sword with a double edge which did as it were cut his soule in sunder Who is also able to imagine what a sad affliction it must be to him to be depriued for one moment of the feeling of that soueraigne delight ioy wherewith he did so abound from the very instant of his Conception by the sensible shining of his diuinity vpon his whole soule which now in part was abridged thereof The want of any communication of Almighty God to a hart which hath seen light in light is of so great moment how little soeuer it be that it wōds that hart with much griefe which doth well discerne that nothing of that kind is little To know any thing of God by way of sensible experience doth kindle in the spirit a very furnace of desire to enioy the rest And how much sorrow then must it feele to be depriued euen of what it had The liues of Saintes are full of the sweet and sad complaints which they haue made to God vpon such occasions and in particular you may see store of this in the life of that great woman Blessed Mother Teresa of Iesus which was written by her selfe vpon the commaundement of her ghostly Father And not only did this holy Passion raigne among such soules departed as the Church esteemeth to be Saints but by the goodnes of God we haue met with some amongst the creatures who are yet in flesh and bloud who seruing God in great purity in conformity therof hauing bene admitted to some deere imbracemēts of that heauēly spouse of their soules haue gone lamētably mourning and that for a long tyme together like so many Turtles for the absence of their beloued through the wāt of that infinite Good wherof before they had beene admitted to take a taste They (c) The great sorrow which is felt by the spouse of Christ vpon any hiding of himselfe from a soule or euen by liuing in this Pilgrimage are so deeply wounded with loue that to be hindred from inioying him is wont to giue them excessiue griefe They feele it so much as they know not how they shall endure that want since the only remedy of all their other paines is the certaine (d) By often thinking vpō God meanes to increase this one paine of theirs For as a sore is most felt when it
man would exhibite a spectacle wherby the lookers on were to be moued to loue that man would take care to giue it all those aduantages of grace and beauty which were any way to be attractiue of loue If he were to present an obiect wherby the spectators were to be strocken with feare he would not faile to accompany it with such instruments and demonstrations of terrour as might affect and afflict their mindes with feare And so heere since Pilates care and study was how to winne those implacable Harpies from that hungar and thirst after the destruction and death of Christ our Lord no doubt can be made but that he would adorne and dresse him in the most lamentable attyre of torments which he could deuise that so by the sight of that excessiue misery he might conuert their perfect malice into some little mercy This designe of his he was obliged to communicate with the Executioners who were to be his souldlers for els he had not bene true to his owne end And then I will leaue it to the reasonable imagination of any creature if such an insolent race of people as that vseth many tymes to be hauing receaued an expresse direction from their Commaunder for the execution of such a cruelty vpon a prisoner who was so persecuted by all the principall men and Magistrates of his owne profession were not likely to shew cruelty inough vpon that pretious body of our blessed Lord. Of the cruell Scourging of Christ our Lord and how with incomparable patience and charity the endured the same CHAP. 64. THEY strip thim therfore into the same nakednes wherin he was borne wherin he had neuer bene seene but in his infancy nor then but by the sight of the Angells and those farre purer eyes of the All-immaculate virgin mother They stripped him I say who in all the daies of his blessed life had neuer seene so much as any part of himselfe discouered naked but only those hands which were still imployed in shewing mercies There are millions of men and women in the holy Catholike Church who in their high loue of purity do neuer so much as looke euen vpon their owne face in a glasse and much lesse vpon any naked part of their body excepting only in the occasions of meere necessity when they shift their cloathes yea and then they do it very sparingly and with a kind of horrour euen to see themselues But from those necessities Christ our Lord was still exempt who in all his life did neuer shift or change his cloathes And that * Euthym. in cap. 27. Match Maldonat in cundem loium omnes recentiores cōmuniter Garment which was wouen without any seame at all by those pure hands of his sacred Mother did miraculously grow togeather with the body it selfe Now in the loue of mortification and purity all the Saints of the Church must not compare with him wherin he exceeded them all more then heauen doth excell the earth If therfore there be amongst vs so many thousands of sacred virgins who would rather giue vp their liues then they would once expose their naked bodies to open view Let vs beg of our Lord by his owne supreme purity that he will giue vs to vnderstand make vs sensible at the very rootes of our hartes of how (a) The excessiue affliction which it must giue to our B. Lord to be striped naked great a torment it was to him in the way of shame to be stript stark naked before those Pagan souldiers and to let that pretious banquet of his pure humanity be fed vpon deuoured by those petulant prophane eyes of theirs How great a torment was it to thee O Lord in the way of shame and yet withall how meekely didst thou endure it and how much ioy did it giue thee to be sacrificing the merit therof to the eternall Father for the impetratiō of all that Angelical purity which hath florished since that tyme in so many mortall bodies of flesh and bloud They tyed him then to a piller as naked as I haue heere bescribed as if there had beene danger that either like some slaue he would haue run away or els like a child he would be shrinking declining the strokes wherwith they had resolued to load him But he was inwardly bōd so fast Ose 12. with such cords of Adam which were chaines of loue as that in comparison therof those outward cords were but as threds of a spiders webbe which would haue bene farre from holding him to that piller against his will him who makes the foundations of the earth tremble the pillars of the world shake with the least breath of his Nostrills whensoeuer he thinks fit to worke vpon the world by way of terrour They began then to scourge our Lord Ioan. 1◠with excessiue cruelty And as a violent tempestof hayle would destroy a fruit tree which were in flower so did those cruell men not only blast that diuine sweet beauty of our Lord by breathing vpō it with the filthy ayre of their lasciuious and scornefull tongues but they brake through it with those scourges They clasped and circled him in with euery blow as so many snakes would doe some pretious and odoriferous plant which yet were so medicinall withall as to be able to cure a whole world of men of a whole world of diseases It is able to grieue any ciuill noble hart to see in Italy and especially at Rome how the barbarous Goths and Vandals when like an inundation they ouerflowed those florishing fields of the world did leaue the markes of their long nayles behind them in the ruines of so many sumptuous buildings and curious statues But what hath any sumptuous building or any curious statue to doe by way of comparison with that pretious humanity of our Lord. That Temple of the holy Ghost which the fulnes of the diuinity did substantially inhabite Colos 2. and that superexcellent Image that double Image of the eternall Father For an image he was of God euen as he was but man but then againe as God he was an Image begotten not made by the increated vnderstanding of the eternall God And what comparison thē cā there be betwene the barbarousnes of those Goths and Vandalls with these men of bloud who drew this holy house into such decay They did not only (b) How the house of Gods humanity was handled vnfurnish it but they procured to beate downe the walls and they made so many wide windowes in it with their rude hands as by which the soule would infallibly haue flowne out and forsaken it if it had not bene held fast perforce by the tye of loue that so it might liue to endure the rest of torment which was prouided for it A strange kind of ornament it was for that garment of his pretious humanity being hypostatically vnited to the diuinity to be so thicke ouercast and imbrodered with stripes insteed
of stitches as that it could now no more be knowe but only by the eyes of Faith of what stuffe it was made Which caused the Prophet Esay who foresaw him in this woefull traunce to declare that he was not to be discerned for who he was but mistaken for some base leprous person The bloud ran flowing out of his body through the force of their fury as formerly it had done in the gardē by the reflectiō which he made vpon the worlds impiety But not a word was heard to fal out of his sacred mouth wherwith he did euen kisse those very rodds since by their afflicting him whome he contemned he made a bath of delight and ease for vs. A bath of bloud that was which being vnited to the diuine person of the Sonne of God was adored by all the Angells as the bloud of God and (c) The infinite valew of the least drop of the bloud of Christ our Lord. whereof the least drop was able to haue redeemed milliōs of worlds And yet on the other side it was drawne out of that pretious body by cruell contumelious scourges it was spilt vpon the ground and troden vpon by those base vnbeleuers And this infinite Lord was content to accept this tormēt of the flagellation with excessiue loue and in particular manner he accepted it in satisfaction of the sinnes of sensuality which had bene and would be committed in that kind throughout the world We may therfore see whether our carnall pleasures the delights of sense be not wicked things since the pardon therof was to cost the Sonne of God so deere But as it will worke our pardon if we apply it to our soules by tymely pennance so if we shall continue to please our selues by those transitory and impure delights which did put our Lord to so deadly paine what kind of vengeāce shall we thinke that is which will be sure to seize vs both in body and soule How our blessed Lord was crowned with thornes and blasphemed and tormented further with strange inuention of malice And how he endured it all with incomparable Loue. CHAP. 65. YET this was not all for the souldiers who had receiued cōmission to scourge him in so bloudy manner to the end that by that cruelty the pitty of the Iewes might be awaked tooke the bouldnes out of their owne Capriccio to put the most ignominious withall most bitter torment vpon him which euer in the world had bene conceaued When therfore they had wearied thēselues in scourging him and there was now no more place for new wounds since all his sacred body was growne to be as it were one continued wound or rather a kind of Cake of bloud they vntyed him from the pillar they gaue him leaue to cloath himselfe though they had almost taken away the strength wherwith he might be able to doe it and they lent him for the present a little rest till they had resolued what they were to doe And because the Priests and Elders had charged him with procuring by fauour of the people to be made a King whome they had found by experience to be so subiect to themselues they (a) Why they resolued to crowne him with thornes thought it would carry a good proportion to the supposed cryme of his ambitiō if they could find some meanes to make him a conunterfeit kind of King and to afflict him in point both of ease and honor by the appearance of all those ornaments and demonstrations of respect seruice which are indeed of honour to true kings when they are truly meant but to him they were of excessiue affront and paine They made him then with his hands fast tyed sit downe all naked in most seruile manner for now they had stripped him the second tyme. And calling their whole troope of Guard togeather they clapt in imitation of the Princely robes of a King a purple mantle Matt. 27. Marc. 15. Ioau 19. about his backe which could not choose but sticke to his sacred flesh for there was no skinne betwene to part thē They put a Reed into his hands insteed of a Scepter and a plat of thornes vpon his head insteed of a Crowne They did then with incredible ioy of hart to see his misery salute him and say All haile O King of the Iewes Then would they be taking the Reed out of his hands and they would beate the Crowne more deeply into his head and then spitting in his face they kneeled downe and adored him in shew as they would their King All this did Christ our Lord endure for vs and he did it with a kind of infinite meekenes and loue not complayning therat nor declaring the least mistike therof either by pittying himselfe or blaming them But he confounded therby and that after a most puissant manner the arrogant pride of earth and hell offring vp (b) The Coronation of our Lord had a special ayme at the pardon cure of the sinnes of Pride his owne humiliation in propitiation for all the sinnes of the whole world especially for such as were committed in the way of pride and for the obteyning such grace at the hands of God by meanes heereof as might enable his true seruants to imitate his humility It ought to fill our soules with extreme confusion to find that we who professe to be the seruants of our Lord are yet so dull in deuising meanes how to expresse our reuerēce and loue towards him Our wits lye cleane another way And euen in Prayer we haue sometymes inough to doe to entertaine this spouse of our soules with aboundance of so much as mentall acts of loue and much more difficulty we find to performe them afterward by way of practise Yet heere these enemies of God man are teaching vs by their lewd example whose wits did serue them but too well to increase the torment of our Lord at an easy rate vnto themselues For when they had stript him naked in the sight of so many impure eyes and scourged him so cruelly as that it might seeme almost impossible to giue any increase ether of shame or torment behould how full they are of strange inuention and their malice findes meanes to deuise such exquisite waies to augment them both in such a measure as makes all that seeme little which was done before It is true (c) A comparison of his presēt scornes with the former that before he had most blasphemously bene spit vpon but it was at midnight and in Cayphas his house and but only by his keepers But heere it is done almost at noon day in the Vice-Royes Court and by a whole troope of Pagan souldiers He was then already come from being most cruelly scourged ouer all his most beautifull and most sacred body which gaue him paine beyond all expression but now behould they haue recourse to his diuine head which seemed as if till then it had escaped their rage And so that
negotiate vpō the crosse did he as it were shut himselfe vp for the Redēption of mankind making dispatches which he sent by moments to the mercy and Iustice seate of God and speeding of all his memorialls concerning the erection and propagation of his Church the illuminating of Pagans the mollifying of lewes the reducing of Heretikes the instruction of all soules the propitiation of sinnes the satisfaction of all paynes the impetration of all graces and the retribution of thankes for all benefits There did he adore God in highest contemplation there did he prostrate himself with profound humiliation There did one of the extended armes of his soule reach to the Angells in heauen and the other to Lymbus below the earth his hart the while betwene them both was imbracing the whole race of mortall men with desire to make them all one with him in that kingdome of glory vpon the purchase wherof he was then disbursing his hart bloud He had nothing but deadly sorrow by him but he saw that ioy before him which he was eternally to take in the glory of God and good of man Hebr. 2. And therfore Proposito sibi gaudio sustinuit crucem confusione contempta If euer his hart did appeare to be an infinite kind of thing it was in those three howers of torments desolations and silence He was at that tyme withall the world or rather with as many little worlds as there had bene were were to be reasonable creatures in it but there was not any one of thē with him in the way of giuing him the least sensible comfort So that we may conclude that his Father and Sonne and seruant Dauid did most truly litterally prophesy of him when he said Psalm 10◠Vigilaui (c) The sad solitude of Christ our Lord. factus sum sicut passer solitarius in tecto He was kept well awake like a solitary sparrow vpon the roofe of a house which knowes not whither to retyre it selfe being strocken by the voyce of thunder and frighted on euery side by the flashes of lighning and battered euen to the very braines by an impetuous storne of rayne and hayle O thou innocent lambe of God which takest away the sinnes of the world Thou Lambe of God who art also God and becamst a Lābe that so thou mighest not only haue wooll wherof to be fleeced for the couering of vs but bloud also which thou wert glad to shed for the giuing of life to vs. And how deeply are the soules of vs thy seruants wounded to see this multiplication of thy miseries How cordially are we afflicted that we can but be astonished at this solitude and silence and those vast torments of thine Or rather how much are we ashamed that we scarce say true euen when we say that we are sory for them since we are so wicked withall as that we giue them not leaue to worke those effects vpon our soules for which they were suffered vpon thy pretious body How long shall we be the slaues of sinne since thou hast fought so hard for our liberty How long shall we care for the contentments of this life since thou who art more to vs then millions of liues didst for the loue and example of vs wretches contract and tye thy selfe to such an endlesse shame of reproach torment How come we to be so miserable as that we are able so much as to liue when we see that thou who art the King of glory and the God of life art thus going to dye Would not lesse deere Lord haue serued the turne for the accomplishment of our redemptiō but that thou must needs be thus obnoxious to such a vastity of anguish as now we see thee in Lesse would haue serued to satisfy the iustice of God since by reason of the Hypostaticall vnion any one act or sigh of thine would haue ouerbought many millions of worlds from hell But nothing could satisfy that vnquencheable heat of thy hart vnlesse thou hadst endured all this Chaos of confusion torment Because therby not only our saluation but our sanctification also was to be more nobly wrought more sweetly and more honorably for vs more gloriously for God and therfore more gustfully and delightfully for thee in the superiour part of thy soule howsoeuer in the inferiour it cost thee deere Of the vnspeakeable thirst of our Lord which he did indure and declare with incomparable Loue to man CHAP. 74. THERE remayned now a Prophesy to be fulfilled cōcerning the thirst of our Lord vpō the Crosse The torment of extreme h̄gar is sometymes so great as that we read of straite and long sieges of townes where the inhabitants haue bene driuen by the rage therof not only to eate vncleane beasts but euen mothers haue deuoured the very childrē of their owne body yea and euen the flesh of their owne Lymms And yet most certain it is and we take a kind of tast therof by our owne dayly experience that euery one of vs who haue at any tyme found our selues in extremity both of hungar and thirst haue felt the thirst incomparably more troublesome thē the hungar (a) The great torment of great thirst beyond that of hungar Such againe as haue trauelled sundry dayes in some dry and barren deserts as it hapneth to many in the Southern and Eastern parts of the world such as haue felt the malignity of burning feuers doe well vnderstād what I say Nor is there almost any treasure vpon earth which some such man would not be glad to giue for a glasse of water Now thirst is otherwise also caused by excesse of labour by heate by griefe of minde by payne of body and especially by the spending of much bloud And we seldome let bloud whē we are taking Phisicke though it be but in iest but it serues to giue vs increase of thirst How ardent then must the thirst of Christ our Lord needs haue beene in whome alone al the causes of extreme thirst did meet For during all that day and the whole precedent night he had bene perpetually in tormēt And besides his Agony and bloudy sweat in the garden he had bene dragged and buffeted and all inflamed by those cruell scourges thornes And lastly he had byn bored through with nayles vpō which he had now hunge almost three houres with streames of bloud continually flowing from him and his spirits were exhausted by a world of deadly sorrow at his hart to increase his thirst This torment he endured all that while without once so much as saying that he endured it Nether did he expresse himselfe now at last in this kind through the delight he meant to take or paine he meāt to driue away by drinking for already he was euen vpon the very pitch and brimme of death And he who in all that tyme had bene swallowing vp the want of drinke in silence could easily haue extended his patience to those next minutes which were to
way of conformity and obedience then without once harkening to the inferiour part of the soule to range the Superiour to the will of God not only with solid patience but with supreme ioy What more perfect in the way of Charity then to endure the extremity of affront paine for his mortall enemies And at the very tyme when those enemies were tormenting him for him to be protecting them and negotiating their cause with bitter sighes in the cares of almighty God What more (b) The incomparable perfection of the worke of the passion of our Lord. perfect in the way of contemplation then in such distresse to be looking at ease so many wayes at once from the death and contumely of a Crosse as if it had bin from some tower of recreation and delight To haue God himselfe and all the world so perfectly and cleerly in his eye and all at once To be offering euery graine of all the Passion in forgiuenes of all the sinnes of the whole world wherof then he saw euery one more distinctly and cleerly thē any man did euer see any one of his own What more perfect in the way of diligence in giuing vs direction how to carry our selues then that when himself was so deeply wounded by those incomparable torments and affronts he would furnish vs with such diuine documents and examples drawne from his owne sacred person Wherby we may become victorious in all our combats find the edge of our afflictions so abated as that they should neuer cast vs vpon despaire What thing is more perfect in the way of corporall sufferance then so to suffer as that there may be nothing which suffers not There is nothing higher then the head and we haue seene how the head of Christ our Lord did suffer by that hideous crowne of thornes There is nothing lower then the feete and we haue seen how the feete haue suffered by cruel nayles There is nothing of a man more wide or large then his hands spread abroad at the armes end and we haue also seene how he suffered by nayles driuen through his hands Those hands wherin he said that he (1) Isa 49. had written vs and (2) Ioan. 12. wherby he would draw vs towards himselfe with diuine pitty when once he should be exalted vpon the Crosse In fine there is nothing more then all and we haue seene how he hath bene scourged all ouer pierc't and fettered and spit vpon and boxt and buffeted and bored and beathen through with Iron for the pure loue of vs. And euen whilst he was hanging vpon the Crosse in expectation of death he vouchsafed still to be affronted and blasphemed beyond all morall beliefe and he the while euen when vinegar was giuen him to drinke in that torment of thirst which he endured did regorge in the deernes of his loue to vs. He perfected (c) How our Lord Iesus did perfect the figures and sacrifices of the old law vpon the Crosse wherof he also fulfilled the prophesies Luc. 22. 1. Cor. 11. the imperfection of the old law in the law of grace which he did promulgate heere He perfected all the Sacrifices of the old Testament in this Sacrifice of himselfe vpon the Crosse the memory wherof he had already commaunded his Priests to perpetuate by the dayly oblation of his owne pretious body and bloud vpon their Altars He perfected all the Prophesies which were made concerning his owne life and death He perfected all those figures which had bene deliuered of him in the old Testament for the disposing of the mindes of the faithfull towards the beliefe of their Messias who was thē to come We haue heere the history of Noe. For as he was made drunke Genes 9. by the vine which he planted and had his nakednes discouered by his children so was our Lord stript naked more then once as we haue seene and that by his children of whome his Prophet in his person said Isa 1. Filios enutriui exaltaui ipsi autem spreuerunt me I tooke care to breed and bring vp my children and they tooke pleasure to despise and dishonor me He was also inebriated by the loue which he bare to his people which like a vine he planted with miracles and pruned with Doctrine and watered with bloud And that vine inebriated him also with another kind of wine the wine of torments and reproach wherwith he was stuft and cloyd By which kind of liquor although he were not because he would not be disgusted yet we haue heard him by his Prophet thus complaine of this vine after a most deere and killing manner Isa 5. Expectauit vt faceret vuas fecit autem labruscas I expected that my vine should haue yielded me wine for the comfort of my hart but it yielded me nothing but veriuyce which hath set my teeth on edge We haue heere a better then that (1) Num. 21. Brasen serpent the sight of whome will cure the bytings of all those serpents which are our sinnes We haue heere the true Dauid who kild that Gyant (2) 1. Reg. 17. Golyas being a figure of the Prince of darkenes with the fiue stones of his fiue sacred wounds and he cut of the Gyants head with the Gyants sword conquering the Deuill by death which was his weapon drawne by sinne The same might be shewed in al the other figures which were deliuered of our Lord in the old Testament which were perfected and fulfilled vpon the Crosse So that our Lord might iustly say Consummatum est The worke of my Passion the worke of mans redemption both in regard of the thing it selfe and of the manner how it hath bene wrought and borne is perfect consummate and complete Of our Lords last prayer to his eternall Father of his excessiue griefe and loue expressed in the separation of his soule from his body and of the grace beauty of the Crucifix CHAP. 76. THERE did now remaine no more but that our Lord IESVS hauing taken care of the whole world and hauing particulerly powred forth those seuerall benedictions vpō it frō that treasure-house of the Crosse should also commend himselfe into the hands of the eternall Father A te principium tibi desinit might the soule of Christ our Lord say to God He began his Passion with the inuocation of his Father Luc. 22. in the Garden he cōtinued it by praying to him whē the Crosse was erected with himselfe vpon it and now he concluded it by recommending himselfe into his hands still vnder the sweet and gracious tytle of his Father Instructing vs therby in all our actions especially in such as are of moment most of all when we are either endeauouring or enduring any thing which doth immediatly concerne the glory of God and the true good of men as this mistery of our redēption highly did to prepare our selues by Prayer before we beginne to eleuate our mindes often to
God whilst we are in working and to presse with instance Ibid. when we are concluding Father saith he into thy hands I commend my spirit 1. Cor. 6. And if we will procure to be one spirit with him as S. Paul exhorts vs all to be already (a) How we assure our selues to be cōmended by Christ our Lord. Hebr. 5. we may perceaue that Christ our Lord did no lesse pray for vs then for himselfe He prayed as the same Apostle sayd els where Cum clamore valido lacrymis with a lowd cry and with teares and therfore it is no meruaile if he were heard by the Eternall Father both for himselfe and vs. But yet so as that we must concurre with him and suffer pray cry out and weepe for our selues and for our sinnes since he hath traced out the way of doing it for the sinnes of others But the misery is many tymes that whilst we doe so often vsurpe this holy Prayer of our blessed Sauiour wherby we protest our selues to commend our spirit into the hands of God we doe but cōmend it only in word or at the most we doe but giue it with one hand and take it backe againe with the other and indeed we deliuer it ouer to his enemies by sinne or at least to strangers by fulfilling vaine and lesse good desires Wheras if we would doe it as Christ our Lord was found to doe we should no sooner bequeth our selues to the seruice of our Lord but that instantly we would take a lōg euerlasting leaue of a wretched world Our Lord when he had giuen his spirit to God expired Luc. 23. And we if we expire not if we dye not to the sinnes and vanities of this life the spirit will be still where it was and we doe but say we giue him that which indeed we reserue for others or at least for our selues But that other kind of alienation b There will be no true life and liberty vnlesse there be a true death to imperfection passion is the only way to haue a true possession of our soules Seruire Deo regnare est This bondage doth only bring perfect liberty This kind of expiring by death doth only inspire vs with true life Christ our Lord for loue of vs did leaue as we haue seene his life of nature that we might be animated by the life of grace And woe be to that wretched man who shall rather choose death then life and such a life as hath been bought to our hād by parting with such a iewell as was the life of Christ our Lord. He had vnspeakeable cause to loue his life but we haue no cause at all to be in loue with ours The reason why we may punish euen hate as one may say our bodyes with a iust and holy kind of hate is because otherwise they will be giuing ill counsell to the soule The (c) In what case we desire a separation betweene the body and the soule 2. Pet. ◠reason why in some cases we may wish so farre as may stand with the good will of God to haue this Tabernacle of our flesh and bloud dissolued by death may be because we doe highly apprehēd a feare of sinne and so we may be glad to dye the first death when we hope our selues to be in good state least afterward we may dye the second And besides we haue reason to long for the sight of God from which we are exiled in this Pilgrimage But Christ our Lord did euer see the face of God and the Superiour part of his soule was as glorious as closely vnited to the Diunity in the bitterest torments of the Crosse as now is it at the right hand of his Father And besides there could be no daunger that euer that impeccable soule could sinne As therfore there was no cause why Christ our Lord should of himselfe desire or euen admit of any separation of his soule from his body so whatsoeuer motiue it were that should induce him to it that must necessarily be acknowledged for a great one For neuer did nor neuer could any creature in any reason so deerly and delightfully loue the cōiunction betwene his soule and his body as Christ our Lord loued his Nor consequently could any or all the creatures so much apprehend and abhorre any separation of the body from the soule as Christ our Lord would haue apprehended and abhorred that of his if some mighty reason had not moued him to it Because (d) The reason why Christ our Lord must needs loue the coniunction of his body and soule after a most eminent māner no creature nor all the creatures put togeather had euer found any body so sweetly so continually and so perfectly obedient to all the dictamens of a holy soule as our Lord IESVS had sound his body and this is the only or at least the principall reason why any man should loue his body So that for Christ our Lord to indure that the coniunction of such a body and soule should be broken for how short a tyme soeuer was the Crosse beyond all the corporall Crosses which he endured in his Passion concerning himselfe Yet of this he admitted as we see And since there was no power which could oblige him to it in the way of force it doth cleerly appeare that he performed it vpon a commandement of loue For loue is the King of all affections and disposeth of them all at pleasure And amongst seuerall loues the Superiour loue is still the King to whom all inferiour loues giue place If then Christ our Lord did so deerly and so iustly loue his owne pretious life incomparably more then any of vs can by any possibility loue ours and if yet that loue were content to yield to his loue of vs and that indeed he dyed of pure and perfect loue which is yet declared further to vs by that sweet declyning of his head when he gaue vp the ghost let vs endeauour to conceaue what an infinite kind of loue this was And let vs beg of him by his owne pretious wounds that he will make vs in all things as like himselfe as he desires And that as a meanes therunto he will print himselfe thus crucified vpon our harts and that the eye of our mind may be euer looking at ease vpon this sweet figure the (e) The grace and beauty of the Crucifix sweetest that hath bene seene or can be conceaued the fittest to moue all the affections of a Christian hart whether they be of compassion or admiration And verily I thinke that it is not only faith which brings vs to be of this beliefe but that euen abstracting from the quality of the diuine persō of Christ our Lord the cause for which he suffered which yet indeed are the things that subdue vs most the very figure it selfe of an excellent man so exposed to publique view vpon a Crosse is the loueliest and the
to be amiable and easy to be endured And thus was the whole life which Christ our Lord did lead in this world an example and a liuing Doctrine of the actions which we were to performe and of the vertues which we were to practise This is said by S. Augustine Therfore to conclude this discourse of the Passion of our B. Lord we haue (i) The summe of this whole discourse of the Passion of our B. Lord. seene how painefull it was with how great loue he endured it and with how heroicall vertue it was performed We haue seene the end and ayme he had therin which was not only the redeeming of vs from hell but the recouery of vs from sinne the inducing vs to fly from all inordinate desire of honour estate and vaine delights to imbrace after his exaÌ„ple for his loue the exercise of all vertue the mortification both of the inward and outward man Let vs take heed that we contemne not the treasures of his mercies least we be consumed by the fiery torrent of his Iustice Let vs not pretend to make him loose his labour for auoyding of a little labour of our owne He is the wisedome it selfe of God and can tell how to value to a haire such a huge indignity as that would be And of this truth we must be well assured for it is not only reuealed to vs by way of Faith but it is written in our harts by the law it selfe of nature and reason That (k) The more good God is to men the more bitterly will they be punished for the contempt of such goodnesse if a mercy be offered abused a vengeance will belong to that offence If the mercy be great the vengeance will not faile to be great and if the mercy be infinite the vengeance also will be infinite And though Christ our Lord be a Lyon and the roaring of a Lyon is a frighfull thing yet he is also a Lambe we haue seene how he hath bene shorne and slaine and this LaÌ„be is not willingly alienated from his loue to vs. But if he be then laesa patientia vertitur in furorem The more inuincibly patient he was the more implacably furious he will be And for my part I doe not heare in the whole booke of God any word which strickes with greater terrour then when it speakes of the wrath of the Lambe Apoc. 6. The holy Ghospell describing Christ our Lord vpoÌ„ the Crosse saith that they blasphemed him as they were passing by Many blaspheme him by their deeds who doe not so by their words Matt. 27. but hauing an Aue Rex in their mouthes they strike him with the Reed in their hands If we desire insteed of blaspheming to doe him seruice and so to be happy both in heauen and euen heere our way will be not to passe so lightly by his Crosse but there to behould contemplate him at good leasure For how miserably shall we be out of countenance at the hower of our death if our conscience may iustly then accuse vs that we could not so much as find in our harts now then to thinke of those bitter things which the Sonne of God God did find in his hart to endure and that with infinite loue for our saluation Our Lord (l) Our great ingratitude to God will make vs see how very wicked we are otherwise IESVS giue vs grace to know how very wicked things we are And this knowledge being once well grounded in vs and our Lord being desired that for the loue of his bitter Passion he will make vs see the loue he bare vs in it we shall grow to take delight in looking often vpon that book with the eyes of our soule and so they will be happily shut vp from the sight and loue of other obiects We shall then quickly find that the Crosse is no such cruell thing as we haue coÌ„ceaued but that it is short and light and the reward therof remaines for euer Besides that the memory of her friends is honorable afterward euen with the enemies therof Wheras those persecuting Iewes with Cayphas and Pilate Herod al the libertines of the world who indeed are the enemies of Christ our Lord Philip. 3. and of his Crosse as S. Paul affirmeth howsoeuer they triumphed for a tyme were soone either beate downe by disgrace like so many bladders or blsters or els blowne vp by a little tyme out of the estimation of God and man like so many squibbs And now they haue found their place in hel where they shall remaine as long as God is God and so will their successors in sinne succeed them also in their punishment from which our Lord deliuer both them and vs. Of the vnspeakeable Loue of our Lord Iesus in bequeathing to vs vpon the Crosse his All-immaculate Virgin Mother to be the Mother of vs all CHAP. 79. OVR Lord IESVS hauing made his last Will and Testament in that night precedent to his death at which tyme he gaue vs his owne pretious body and bloud not only for the food of our soules in the blessed Sacrament but for a Sacrifice to God in the way of homage as to a Soueraigne Creatour by the institution of the Masse and being that night and the next day arriued so farre in the course of his bloudy and bitter Passion as after innumerable other affronts and torments to see himselfe both naked nayled through hands and feete vpon a Crosse the (a) The loue of our Lord Iesus did after asort increase with the torment which he â—â—dured â—â—â—our 〈◊〉 bowells of his mercy were so farre from being changed or cooled toward vs that the neerer they were to breake for griefe the faster he made them beate for loue And therfore as some tender-harted husband would haue done in fauour of his most faithfull and beloued wife who hauing setled his affaires in tyme of health by way of Testament wherby he had honorably prouided for her estate and comfort would yet wheÌ„ he drew neere to death in further proofe of his affection increase her ioynture by some Lordships and plucke of his ringe of greatest price from his owne fingar that he might put it vpon hers iust so was our Lord IESVS pleased to proceed with the holy Church his Spouse To whome notwithstanding the legacy of his owne pretious body which he had giuen vs already by Testament he did also now when he drew close vpon the confines of death with incomparable Charity (b) Our Lord Iesus bequeathed his B. mother to be also ours as it were by way of Codicill annexed to his last will Luc. 23. bequeath his sacred Mother to vs as it were by way of Codicille which he annexed to that former Will of his It hath bene seene already how our Lord vpon the death-bed of the Crosse did vtter seauen Words or rather declare himselfe by seauen seuerall speaches both to God
Virgin But this which I haue already said will suffice to shew how the one was a type and figure of the other and that the holy Fathers of the Church declare that howsoeuer they are both our Mothers in seuerall respects yet that the East and West are not so farre off from one another as this latter holy humble Eue doth in sanctity excell the former And now to the point of her being the Mother of vs all see further how * De sanct Virgin c. 6. Ambr. apud Bonau in spec Virg. c. 8◠Cyrillus Alex. hom con tra Nestorium S. Augustine saith she is the spirituall Mother of the members of the Church for as much as she cooperated to the end that the faithfull might be borne in the same Church S. Ambrose also saith If Christ be the brother of all beleeuers how can she choose but be the mother of Christ And so doth S. Bonauenture deliuer the blessed Virgin to be not only the particular Mother of Christ our Lord but the vniuersall mother of all the faithfull And S. Cyrill giues a massy reason heerof when speaking as to the blessed Virgin he professeth himselfe in these words By thee all those creatures who are retayned in the errour of Idolatry are conuerted to the knowledge of truth But the (b) An excellent cōsideration of S. Bernard vpō the sweet prouidēce of our Lord God concerning the B. Vir. cited by Pa. Arias Bern. ser sup missus est holy S. Bernard shall conclude this point when he saith to this effect Christ our Sauiour did suffice for the reparation of mankind because all our sufficiency doth come to vs by him and all that also wherof we haue need for our saluation Yet was it most conuenient for our good and comfort that he should be associated in this reparation of ours by such a companion as might be a mother and such a mother as that she being the mother of God might be also ours This holy Saint in the same place doth giue many reasons heerof full of conueniency and consolation which heere I shall not need to represent In his booke de imitat B. Virg. But it appeares clearly inough that as Father Arias notes for the multiplication of mankind in the course of nature God framed our first Father Adam And notwithstanding that he might haue giuen sufficiency of power to him alone for the multiplication of mankind if he had bene so pleased yet he would not doe it but he resolued to giue him a companion and helper which was our Grandmother Eue according to the sweet disposition of his diuine prouidence In the selfe same name Arias l. de imitat B. Virg. when the world was lost by sinne our Lord God hauing resolued to beget and multiply iust men who might be heires to the kingdome of heauen he gaue his only begotten Sonne to be Incarnate who by his life and death might beget and breed vs to saluation And although it be most true that this Father of ours is all sufficient by himselfe alone to performe this worke of our Regeneration because he is of infinite vertue and who according to the rigour of Iustice doth merit grace and glory for his children and doth obtaine pretious fauours and satisfy for all kind of sinne yet neuerthelesse God was pleased according to the designe of his owne excellent wisedome to giue to Christ our Lord the most sacred and most holy of all meere creatures his All-immaculate Virgin Mother Mary to be a companion to himselfe in the spirituall generation of the world as the mother therof who might assist and serue him in so great a worke Not by way of praying for vs or of iustifying vs or of giuing vs grace or glory as of her owne guift for al that is proper to the redeemer and Sauiour of the world but to the end that she might concurre to the reducing of sinners by the way of sweetnes and loue interceding and praying for them and offering vp for their good all those excellent operations seruices which she performed in this life to her blessed Sonne our Lord and so obtayning celestiall fauours for them and facilitating their way to heauen by discouering the infinite mercy and suauity of Almighty God to the eyes of their mind And if (c) A cleer consequence 1. Cor. 4. S. Paul might say in the word of truth I haue begotten you to the Ghospell how much more might this blessed Lady say it in a most eminent manner who did beare and bring forth our Lord IESVS and did both therby and otherwise so admirably and immediatly cooperate towards the saluation of the whole world Not only do many particular Fathers ascribe the title of Mother to our blessed Lady but the holy Catholike Church doth ioyntly glory in calling her by that sweet name and esteemes her selfe happy that she may haue recourse to her as such Nor giues she only way to all her faithfull children to acknowledge this maternity of hers in priuate manner but in that publike Office In the Office of the Church wherin she celebrates the prayse and memory of her Spouse at all the howers both of euery day and night as one who well vnderstands by that spirit of sanctity and truth in which she is guided that no honour doth more delightfully redound to our Lord IESVS then that which magnifyeth the happy creature who gaue him a body of her owne all-immaculate flesh and bloud The externall Excellencies and attractiuenesse of our Blessed Lady The reasons of congruity which prooue her innocency and purity and the innumerable motiues which oblige the world to admire loue her CHAP. 81. TO the end that we may be inuited and incouraged to gratitude towards Almighty God for giuing his glorions mother to be also ours and that we may both conceaue of her dignity comply with our own duty as is fit I wil procure to shew both what kind of excellent creature she is in her selfe of how admirable vse and aduantage to vs. Touching the (a) The glorious and holy extraction of our B. Lady Nobility of her descent it wil suffice to heere what S. Bernard saith There is somewhat of the celestiall Ber. ser super Signum magnum Apoc. 12. which shineth in the progeny of Mary That euidently she is descended of Kings that she is of the seed of Abraham that she is sponge from the stocke of Dauid And if this be little let it be further added that by a speciall priuiledge of sanctity she was knowne to haue bene granted to the world from heauen That long before she was pointed at from aboue to our forefathers That she was prefigured by misticall miracles and fore tould by propheticall Oracles For as much as may further concerne the sanctity of her extraction we must know that it came frō the tribe of Leui as wel as from that of Iuda For howsoeuer seuerall tribes were not generally
otherwise in the mystery of his appreheÌ„sion pag. 344 Chap. 60. Of the blow which was giuen vpon the face of our B. Lord in the high â—â—iests house of the fall of S. Peter How our Lord was taxed first of Blasphemy of the excessiue Loue of our Lord in all these particulars pag. 350 Chap. 61. The abundant must bitter scornes which our B. Lord indured with excessiue loue in that night precedent to his death pag. 358 Chap. 62. How our Lord was solemnly adiuged worthy of death for Blasphemy of the death of Iudas and how they send our Lord to Pilate pag. 366 Chap. 63. How Pilate examined our B. Lord sent him to Herod How Herod scorned him sent him backe to Pilate who resolued to scourge him pag. 372 Chap. 64. Of the cruell Scourging of Christ our Lord and how with incomparable patience and charity he endured the same pag. 377 Chap. 65. How our B. Lord was crowned with thornes blasphemed tormented with strang inuention of malice And how he endured all with incoÌ„parable loue pag. 382 Chap. 66. How we ought to carry our selues in consideration of the Ecce Homo And how our B. Sauiour did carry himselfe at that tyme with contempt of all humane comfort for loue of vs. pag. 388 Chap. 67. How the Iewes prefer Barabbas before Christ our Lord And how Pilate gaue sentence of death against him And with what incessant loue he endured all pag. 394 Chap. 68. How our Lord did carry his Crosse of the excessiue loue he shewed in bearing the great affronts which were done to him in his iorney to Mount Caluary pag. 399 Chap. 69. The Crucifixion of our B. Lord his quicke sense seuerall paynes distinctly felt of his vnspeakeable patience and loue to vs therin pag 404 Chap. 70. Of the excessiue torments of our Lord how he was blasphemed by all sortes of persons and of the diuine patience and loue wherwith he bare it all pag. 411 Chap. 71. How our Lord did exercise the Offices of Redeemer and Instructor vpon the Crosse and of the three first words he vttered from thence pag. 419 Chap. 72. Of the darkenes ouer the world the desolation which our Lord endured with incoÌ„parable loue whilst he said to his eternall Father Deus Deus meus vt quid dereliquisti me pag. 425 Chap. 73. Of the excessiue loue which our Lord expressed by his silence in the torments of the Crosse And how the while he was negotiating our cause with God pag. 432 Chap. 74. Of the vnspeakeable thirst of our Lord which he did endure and declare with incomparable loue to man pag. 437 Chap. 75. Of the entyere consummation of our RedemptioÌ„ wrought by Christ our Lord vpon the Crosse pag. 442 Chap. 76. Of our Lords last prayer of the separation of his soule from his body and of the grace and beauty of the Crucifixe pag. 447 Chap. 77. Of the great loue of God expressed in those prodigious things which appeared vpon the death of our B. Lord. And of the bloud and water which slowed out of his side c. pag. 453 Chap. 78. The Conclusson of this discourse of the Passion of our B. Lord the vse which we are bound to make therof pag. 460 Chap. 79. Of the vnspeakeable loue of our Lord Iesus in bequeathing to vs vpon the Crosse his All-immaculate Virgin Mother to be the Mother of vs all pag. 472 Chap. 80. How our B. Lady and Eue doe resemble one another and how they â—iffer And our B. Lady is proued to be the spirituall mother of all mankind pag. 478 Chap. 81. The externall Excellencies attractiuenesse of our B. Lady The reasons of congruity which proue her innocency purity and the innumerable motiues which oblige the world to admire loue her pag. 485 Chap. 82. Of the incoÌ„parable sanctity which is implyed to haue beene in our B. Lady by the consideration of the high dignity of her calling how that maÌ„ner of speach is to be vnderstood in holy Scripture wherby our B. Lady doth seeme in the eye of some to be disaduantaged pag. 424 Chap. 83. How the sanctity of our B. Lady doth much import to the honour of Christ our Lord. How notwithstanding all her excellency we auow her to be nothing in respect of Christ our Lord as God by innumerable degrees inferiour to him as man how much more honorably our Lord redeemed her theÌ„ others pag. 500 Chap. 84. Of the great eminency of our B. Lady beyond all others with an authority cited out of S. Augustine and that the way for vs to iudge rightly of her is to purify our soules pag. 506 Chap. 85. Of great Excellency of our B. Lady set out by the Figures Appellations and Allusions of the old Testament pag. 509 Chap. 86. The wonderfull excelleÌ„cies of our B. Lady which are declared in the new Testament be heere set forth pag. 514 Chap. 87. That our B. Lady was saluted full of Grace of seuerall kindes of Fulnes of Grace pag. 520 Chap. 88. The prayses of the B. Virgin are prosecuted by a testimony of S. Gregory And consideration is made of her diuine Vertues first of her admirable Faith and Hope pag. 527 Chap. 89. Of the most ardent Charity both to God man which raigned in the hart of the B. Virgin pag. 533 Chap. 90. The profound Humility and perfect Purity of our B. Ladyes both body soule And wherin the height thereof consisteth pag. 545 Chap. 91. Of the inexplicable Conformity of the will of the B. Virgin to the holy will of God in all thinges how deere soeuer it might cost her pag. 545 Chap. 92. Of the entyere Conformity of the B. Virgins will to the will of God and how many priuiledges and perfections were assembled in her pag. 551 Chap. 93. Of the seuerall deuotions that we are to carry to our Blessed Lady pag. 555 Chap. 94. Of the piety of our B. Lady towards vs now in heauen far more then when she liued on earth with a prayer to her pag. 580 Chap. 95. A RecapitulatioÌ„ of diuers Motiues which ought to draw vs close to the loue of our Lord. pag. 567 Chap. 96. Of the seuerall kinds of loue which our soules may exercise to our Lord Iesus with the Conclusion of the whole Treatise pag. 574. FINIS