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
septimus sine vesper a est nec habet occasum quia sanctificasti eum ad permansionem sempiternam That seauenth day of thine Conf. lib 13. cap. vlt. O God is without any euening nor doth that sunne euer set because thou hast sanctisied it to an eternall continuance This is that infinite benefit which is to be imparted to vs by this blessed Lord of ours and the meanes to conuey it is the office of his being our Sauiour which is declared in this Circumcision by his holy name of Iesus and wherof the next Chapter will tell vs more Of the name of Iesus the incomparable loue which our Lord doth shew to vs by that name CHAP. 14. FOR as much as there is no Name which can go neer to expresse the nature of God the holy (a) The reason of giuing so many seuerall names to God as God Scripture to make some kind of signification of the infinite Beinge the other infinite petfections of his diuinity of the benefits which he besto wes vpon vs doth giue him many attributes and many names which may in some small measure declare the effects of his diuine perfections the Offices which he performeth towards his Creatures as namely to be Almighty of infinite wisedome of infinite goodnes of infinite mercy of Creatour of Conseruour of Gouernour of Father of the beginning and end of all things and the like In the selfe same manner (b) The reason also of giuing so many seuerall names to Christ our Lord. to expresse that immense sea of perfections and graces which the whole blessed Trinity did impart to Christ our Lord as man that is to say to that most sacred humanity vnited to the person of the sonne of God the eternall word those incomparable and innumerable guifts and benefits which he communicated to vs by meanes therof the same holy Scripture doth giue him also many seuerall Names and Titles as of King of Priest of Pastour of Doctour of Law-giuer of Spouse of Mediatour of Aduocate of Redeemer of Sauâ—our diuers others wherby he may the better be conceaued since he cannot be sufficiently declared by any one Of all these names of al the rest which may be raunged and reduced to these there is none so excellent nor which doth so include the rest as doth the superexcellent name of Iesus which declareth our Losd to be the Sauiour of the world S. Bern. serm 2. de Circum Dom. serm 15. sup Can. This was that Name which the holy S. Bernard could by noe meanes be made coÌ„tent to want amoÌ„gst so many other most honorable appellations as the Euangelicall Prophet Esay applyed to him This Prophet being full of ioy vpon the fore seing of our Redeemer doth expresse himselfe thus as S. Bernard noteth Puer natus est nobis filius natus est nobis c. A child is borneto vs A sonne is giuen to vs his principality is placed vpon his shoulder his name is called Admirable CoÌ„scllour The stroÌ„ge God The Father of the future age The Prince of Peace Great saith S. Bernard are these names but where is (c) The name of Iesus is the most comfortable of al the names of Christ our Lord. that name which is aboue all names that name of Iesus in which euery knee shall bow The freinds and fauourites of Christ our Lord haue walked in a very different way froÌ„ that wherin such persons of our tymes as are disaffected to this sacred Name wil needs imploy theÌ„selues We see how that both Cherubim Seraphim of flesh bloud the beloued disciple of our Lord Iesus his Apostle and Euangelist S. Iohn who sucked in such a bundance from the diuine fountaine of that brest to which he vsed to lay his mouth did paint out no other word so often as that holy and diuine name of Iesus S. Paul (d) The great Deuotion of S. Paul to the Holy name of Iesus that full vessell of election being reprehended in that high vision of our B. Sauiour though in a most amourous and tender manner for persecuting him in the persoÌ„ of the ChristiaÌ„ Church was told by our Lord himselfe that he persecuted he saith not God nor Christ nor the Lord though he were all that but only Iesus And afterward he sayd moreouer to Ananias that this was the Name which Paule as a vessell of election was to carry ouer the earth among Gentiles and Kinges And so as I was saying it is admirable to consider how he was all taken with an vnspeakable delight to be euer in repetition of that sacred name in all his Epistles See also how the incomparable S. Augustine doth in his Confessions to our Lord relate that he was vehemently delighted in the reading of certaine bookes of Philosophy lib. 3. c. 4. which pointed him out to the search of wisedome But yet saith he in that so great delight this only cooled me tooke me off that I found not the name of thy Christ therin For this name O Lord through thy mercy this name of my (e) The name of Christ our Lord which S. Augustine had so greedily sucked vp in his infancy was the name of Sauyour of Iesus note how this Saynt esteemes the guift of deuotion to this holy name as a particular mercy Bern. ser 15. in Cant. Sauiour thy Some my yong and tender hart had euen in the very milke of my mother dronke vp deuoutly and carefully retayned and if any discourse whatsoeuer though neuer so learned so elegant and so true had wanted this name it did not carry me away entierely The same discourse concerning the holy Name of Iesus is further prosecuted CHAP. 15. THE day had need be long wherin I would pretend to make particular mention of the incredible deuotion and tender affection which the Saintes and holy seruants of God haue carried to this blessed name of Iesus S. Bernard whom I mentioned before shal therfore serue this turne insteed of many whose fifteenth Sermon vpon the Canticle I beseech my Reader euen in the name of Iesus that he will procure to read For there he may see how in this holy name it is that we meete with the remoue of al our cares He applyes to it that clause of the Canticles Oleum essusum nomen tuum Thy name (a) Note and loue this sweet contemplation of of S. Bernard vpoÌ„ the holy name of Iesus saith he is a pretious Oyle powred forth O blessed name O oyle which euery where is powred forth How farre froÌ„ heauen into Indea and from thence it runs ouer the whole earth We may well say it is powred forth since it hath not only distilled abundantly both in heauen and earth but it hath sprinkled euen them who are below the earth This Christ this Iesus being insused to the Angells and essused or powred out vpon men and those men who were growne rotten like beasts in their
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
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
to Cesar the vniust weake man was forced by his owne vicious feare to giue sentence against our Lord. Nor would he go one foote out of his pace nor put himselfe to the trouble of defending his owne innocency against the calumniations of the Iewes which yet with all ease he might haue done in case they should haue complayned against him But he rather chose to condēne innocency it self to that reward of wickednes and life to death and he permitted that charity should be tormented by the hāds of implacable malice and enuy Luc. 23. For the holy Scripture sayth That he deliuered him ouer to the will and appetite of the Iewes (e) He destroied his owne words by his deeds Matt. 27. washing first his hands and protesting by that ceremony that he was innocent from shedding the bloud of our Lord IESVS Wheras the ignorant hypocrite ought rather to haue cleansed his hart from so great impiety as it is for a Iudge to neglect his duty for humane respects What hope might then Christ our Lord conceaue that any other thing could befall him then the very quintessence of that worst which might be deuised Since they were to be his guides into what Labyrinths of torment would they not lead him How would they not incense the vulgar by telling certaine graue and well countenanced lyes wherof we haue some dregs remayning to these days of ours what bribes would they not fasten vpon those souldiers that so they might add the vttermost of any circumstance which might increase his shame and torment And our blessed Lord saw it all and if therin he had seene a million of tymes more thē that he had a hart prepared to beare it all vpon condition that it might doe vs good How our Lord did carry his Crosse and of the excessiue Loue he shewed in bearing the great affronts which were done to him in his iorney to Mount Caluary CHAP. 68. THEY did therfore then take of his purple Robe and put vpon his backe his owne former cloathes that so as he went the world might know for his greater scorne and shame euen by the first appearance that it was he And then they loaded his weake wounded shoulders with the Crosse wheron he was to be crucified which was a point of barbarous and vnwonted cruelty For wheras men are accustomed out of meere humanity to hide the instrument of the execution from other criminall persons they did not only not hide it in the case of Christ our Lord but they made him carry it as if he had double deserued death But the Crosse was so very heauy and he was growne both therby and otherwise so deadly weake that not being able to walke vnder it they constrayned another to assist him Luc. 23. Now when we see that Christ our Lord who was so enamoured of the Crosse was yet vnable to fetch strength inough out of his owne weakenes for the carrying it we may well imagine that the world went hard with him And (a) It is the pleasure of God that we helpe to beare the crosse of Christ our Lord. withall we must know once for all that since his Crosse was not wholy to be carryed by himselfe alone he will haue all his seruants assist him in it imbrace those Crosses which shall come for the exercise of our patience the testimony of our true loue in whatsoeuer forme the good will of God shall be pleased to send them Whether they be in that of sicknes or shame or banishment or losse of goods or spirituall desolation or corporall torments for the cause of Christ our Lord or in fine though it should be death it selfe The place to which they led our Lord and where they meant to crucifie him Luc. 23. was Mount Caluary without the citty of let usalem As he was going his misery seemed so great and he was so disfigured with durt and sweate and bloud and so weakned with the excesse of affliction he whome formerly the world had bene so much obliged to that the obiect wrought vpon many women who were lesse ill disposed And as they were following him in the midst of a mighty troope of men who went to see him put to death they did bitterly bewayle his misfortune But our Lord Ibid. though in his hart he accepted their compassion of him in gratefull part yet (b) Our Lord Iesus had no gust but in suffering for vs. through his loue to suffer and to suffer home for the loue of vs he refused to take complacence in that pitty of theirs And he aduised them to transferre their care of him to a consideration of themselues Letting them know the calamities which were comming towards them and their posterity and that if he who was innocency it selfe were so afflicted for the sinnes of others how grieuously should men be punished for their owne This was then the aduise which with perfect loue he gaue to them and in them to vs and all the world (c) Whet we are to looke for comfort in afflictions instructing vs how to seeke for the comfort of our afflictions not in the pittifull teares or moaning tongues or fawning entertaynements of others but in the Testimony of a good consciēce a strong hope in God and a faithfull obedience to his holy will Ibid. And by his asking If such things as those were executed in the greene wood wherby he insinuated himselfe what would be done to the dry wood wherby he aymed at them he doth with the oracle of his owne inuiolable truth stop vp the mouths of wicked and prophane persons For they say that the Greene wood which is Christ our Lord did suffer all vpon his owne person and that as for them who are dry wood they haue nothing to suffer for themselues but that it sufficeth to beleeue that he suffered all But heere our Lord is expresse in shewing that our sight of his miseries in the way of punishment must spurre vs vp to make vs bitterly lament our owne miseries in the way of sinne and that the seeing or beleeuing of those afflictions endured by him for vs would not serue our turne vnlesse we applyed them to oursoules by true contrition By these externall acts of loue and by thoughts when the occasions of acting fayled did our Lord goe wearing out that long way betweene Pilits house and Mount Caluary Hauing (d) Our Lord was cōpassed in on euery side by great affronts the perfidious Priests and Elders on the one side and the prophane scoffing souldiers on the other The executioners were close at his heeles the publique Cryer leading him the way and proclayming him for a seditious and a trayterous person in the eares of all that world The people would be running sometymes before him and sometymes behind as the manner is in such cases shouting out reproaching him euery one according to his owne fancy or rather phrensy And they who could not
the mother of God The B. (a) A iust consideration of the excellency of our B. Lady drawen from he◠her high Office Hebr. 1. Apostle inferred the supreme excellēcy of Christ our Lord from the name of Sonne which God had giuen him and that therfore he did infinitely excell the Angells For to which of them saith the Apostle was it sayd at any tyme Thou art my Sonne this day haue I begotten thee Now the same kind of discourse hath also place in honour of our B. Lady For since togeather with the name Office the God of power and wisedome is wont to giue all the abilities and ornaments which may concerne the same what thought can there be that there should be any thing in any meere creature yea or in all of them put togeather which might presume to compare with the superexcellent mother of the immortall God And therfore it is no speculation or streined conceite but a consequence which flowes apace or rather flyes as a man may say downe the hill That as the dignity of Gods mother is incomparably beyond the dignity of Patriarks Prophets Precursours Apostles and whatsoeuer is high or holy in the kingdome of God so also doth her sanctity exceed theirs as farre as a mountaine exceeds a moate or as the sea exceeds any shallow brooke And the meanest act of vertue which euer was practised by this B. Lady did in the intensenes of it farre and farre excell the greatest of that kind which euer was exercised by any other except her Sonne our only Lord Sauiour Farre be it from any Christian to conceaue by the reserued manner and speach which sometymes is held by Christ our Lord to our B. Lady in holy Scripture wherby he did but meane to teach the world certaine lessōs or els to deliuer some hidden mysteries that he could haue any intention to rebuke her as faulty in the least degree yea or euen to reprehend her as not being worthy of all honour But it is to be considered that our Lord IESVS was a Priest after the order of Melchisedeth Hebr. 5. 7. of whome it is recorded that he was without Father and mother As man our Lord was without a Father and though he had such an excellent mother as we know yet in the eye of the world he would giue little notice therof at some particular tymes any more then to that eye he would giue any knowledge of the dignity of his owne diuine persō Luc. 1. When our (b) Of the great honour which is done to our B. Lady by Saints by Angells and by our Lord God himselfe Luc. ibid. B. Lady and the Angell were in conference togeather we haue partly seene the honour and homage which was performed to her by that celestial Spirit a high Prince of Gods heauenly Court When our B. Lady was single with S. Elizabeth in the performance of her Office of humble charity we know how that Saint that Prophetesse that mother of the great Precursour of Christ that Kinswoman of our B. Lord was in confusion to receaue the honour of a visit from her And she was drawne to forget as a man may say euen the very rules of modesty by crying out with a lowd voyce in admiration of the blessed Virgins excellency and felicity When Christ our Lord was priuate not in the exercise of his publicke Office of Doctour of the world in which priuacy he continued for thirty of the three thirty yeares of his whole life who can doubt with how perfect profound reuerence that Sonne of God and very God would be sure to carry himselfe to his sacred mother The holy Scripture expresly saith that when he returned frō being found in the Temple he continued subiect Luc. ◠not only to our B. Lady who was his natural and most worthy mother but to S. Ioseph also who was but his putatiue Father It would (c) Note the force of his reason therfore be strange if when we are taught by so expresse euidence what honour was done to this sacred Virgin by Angells and Saints and euen by God himselfe in this mortall life during those thirty yeares of his subiection to his parents excepting that only instant tyme of his teaching in the Temple at twelue yeares of age we should argue any vnderualew to haue bin in the mind of such a Sonne towards such a mother or of any irreuerence or want of care and due respect in the mind of such a mother towards such a Sonne And all this but only vnder the colour of some words which our Lord might say to her in the hearing of others at such tymes as when he considered her not so much as he knew her to be the mother of himselfe whe was God but as she seemed in all appearāce to be which was a carpenters wife Angells in heauen but because as it was incomparably Superiour to it in proportion so yet it carried a kind of resemblance in the condition therof So that if any man should aske me what was the true name and as it were the very nature of Christ our Lord I would say God Incarnate and so also if he should aske me the same question concerning the Mother of God I would not doubt but to say that she were Vertue or Sāctity or the Angelicall nature incarnate and that the perfection of all created sanctity vnder that alone of Christ our Lord had taken vpon it the habit of her holy flesh and bloud therby to illuminate and inflame the world And that (f) Our Lord Iesus is the only mediatour of Redemption and our B. Lady is the most excellent mediatour of Intercession vnder him to God the father and between him self vs. as Christ our Lord was to be the Mediatour of Redemption betwene God the Father and man so was she vnder him to be the most excellent Mediatour of intercession betwene vs and him as the holy S. Bernard doth expresly affirme How the sanctity of our B. Lady doth much import to the honour of Christ our Lord. How notwithstanding all her excellency we anow her to be nothing in respect of Christ our Lord as God and by innumerable degrees inferiour to him as man and how much more honourably our Lord redeemed her then others CHAP. 83. IF a man who were full of want should need the helpe of a woman towards the obtayning accomplishing of some honorable and vsefull designe of his and if she should cheerfully concurre therin and so the end desired should be obtayned by him could that man be so wicked as not to acknowledge the merit of that other creature and not to inrich and honour her as far as her condition would beare especially if he were mighty and not to be made the poorer by it Or at least if the case should be so put as that his owne future honour were so interessed in the honour excellēcy of that other as that they two
of this sacred and precious Humanity this deerly sweet and yet most subtile and searching beame of diuine splēdour wherof the Sunne from which it flowed is no lesse then the Diuinity it selfe We make account to haue beheld many excellent beautyes of flesh and bloud But there (f) No other corporall beauty is so exact as not to haue some defect was neuer any yet since that of our our first parents which had no fault excepting this of our B. Lord and his sacred mother which did incomparably exceed that of Adam and Eue. Some pictures indeed and statues we haue seene which farre exceed any Naturall either of men or women And we haue discerned a countenance in some of them which doth as it were euen breath and speake the very soule and deliuer ouer into the hand of our minde whatsoeuer vertue or noble affection we will call for But now since all (g) There this no meanes of approaching to the expressiō of the excellēt beauty of Christ our Lord by any picture or gatue which this cannot be done pictures or statues grow either from the imitation of some originall life which hath exteriourly byn seene by the eye or els from the fancy of the painter or sculptour who conueys and ferries ouer his inuention into a picture or statue by the skill and maistery of his hand so miserably must euery such expression shrinke and fly out of sight if once it be compared to this deuine deere Lord of ours as there is an infinite distance on the one side betweene the paynter or sculptour who deuised that picture or statue and the Holy Ghost on the other who drew this sacred person out of the purest bloud of our B. Lady I allowe that painters who haue skill in drawing by seeing of a man may finde with ease if he be gracefull in the disposition of his person a (h) A true token more or lesse of grace in the disposition of a mans person ready signe therof is this If whilst he falleth into any posture without particular designe and as it were by chance it be decent and natural and fit to be put into a picture Wheras on the other side if a man be either rude or els affected howsoeuer you shall bid him place his body he will euer be as if he were a kind of forced imprisoned thing and the painter can neuer please himselfe in taking the posture of such a man The disposition and behauiour of our B. Sauiour was so easy and so naturall and withall so sweete and gracefull as infallibly there was neuer any motion or disposition so amiable as that And therfore vvhether he sate or vvalked or stood or kneeled or spake or only looked or vvhatsoeuer els in fine he did it vvas the topp of that vvhich could be done for grace and therfore it vvas no meruayle if vvhersoeuer he vvent he vvonne their harts and if therin they vvere glad to keepe his picture We dayly meete vvith some vvho are deformed both in feature and coulour and yet if they haue a svveet behauiour and especially if their mindes be perfectly vvell composed vvithin the very (i) The sāctity of the soule doth euen bestow vpon the body a kind of beauty sanctity of their soules breathes out such an influence vpon their bodyes as to make them pleasing This is certainly true and vve dayly meet vvith it by experience such povver hath vertue as to make an eye both forgiue and moreouer euen to like deformity in an obiect vvhere it desireth beauty or rather to procure that a persō vvho othervvise vvas deformed should not only not seeme but not so much as be so through the grace vvhich is communicated to it by the soule Then (k) By that account how incomparable was the beauty of our B. Lord from that Horison let vs take the height of this Starre of Beauty and contemplate the best vve can hovv much more Beautifull gracefull must that exteriour Beauty of our B. Sauiours most holy person haue bene vvhich yet of it selfe vvas so exact through the tincture vvhich still it vvould be receiuing from his most gracious and most glorious soule Hovv vvould it shine through euery action and motion of his body hovv povverfully vvould it inuite hovv streightly vvould it oblige and hovv ardently vvould it inflame the vvell disposed minde of man to admiration and loue The same discourse is prosecuted and concluded concerning the excellent Beauty of our Lord especially of the attractiuenesse of his sight CHAP. 7. IF their feete which carried newes of Peace were beautifull as by the testimony of our Lord himselfe they are hovv beautifull must those feete be Isa 52. vvhich carried not only nevves of Peace but that very Incarnate Peace it selfe which passeth all vnders̄tanding Phil. 4. Hovv (a) The liberality of the hands of our Lord Iesus Cantic 5. beautifull vvere his hands vvhich are described by the spouse vvho knovves them best and hath tasted oftnest of their bounty to be of gold full of pretious stomes for their riches and vvithall to be round and smoth to declare therby that those riches and graces are dayly and hovverly dropping dovvne on vs Hovv beautifull vvere those svveete and sacred lipps of his that treasure-house of diuine graces which locked vp let out that Ievvel of the vvords of eternall wisedome according to our capacities and occasions We (b) The wisedome power of his speech Matth. 21. Luc. 4. Ioan. 7. Mar. 7. perceaue in the Ghospell hovv they vvere amazed and yet vvith much delight to heare him speake how they auovved that neuer man had spoken like him how they acknowledge him to haue a kind (c) His inimitable grace of inimitable authority and power of language Which yet vvas so farre from incroaching vpon the possessions of his meekenes modesty which is a part of beauty that the Prophei long before he vvas borne foresaw hovv he vvas to be no clamorous or contentious person but that so softly he would (d) The admirable meeknes and modesty of his speach Isa 41. Matth. 12. Ibid. 2. Cor. 10. speake as to make no noyse in the streets And it is also said of him That he would not breake the bruised reed nor so much as quench the smoaking flaxe as if he would rather make his owne eyes water then offend the poorest creature vpon earth And the Apostle also not longe after his death being earnest with the Corinthians that they would be carefull to conserue their spirit coniures them to it by the meekenes and modesty of our Lord Iesus as by vertues which shined in him after an extraordinary manner How (e) The sweetnen of his diuine voyce Matth. 11. sweete was that voyce of his which inuited all the world to bring in their loades and to discharge them all vpon his shoulders and when through the compassion of our extreeme need to be refreshed he could not
saith that vpon the very first (p) The soueraigne power which the aspect of Christ our Lord had ouer creatures aspect it was able to draw all such as lookt vpon it For if there be such vertue in a lodestone or a peece of amber as that it can draw to it rings of iron and straw how much more easely saith this Saint could the Lord of all the creatures draw to himselfe whom he was pleased to call So delighfull therfore and soe plentifull was this beauty and dignity of our Lord IESVS And if it appeared powerfull in their eyes at the first when they beheld it but by startes and glances much (q) The felicity of thē who might behold the person of Christ our Lord at pleasur Bernard serm 20. in Cant. more would it doe so afterward in the sight of his Apostles Disciples who had liberty and commodity to feed their senses at large vpon that sacred obiect In contemplation of this beauty in great part it was that they gaue themselues away to him without resuming themselues any more husbands forsaking theyr wiues and children their parents rich men their whole estates poore men the very instruments of their profession that they might haue the honour happines to follow him And to such excesse they grew therin that they did not endure Matth. 16. to heare so much as any speach euen of the Passion it selfe of our Lord though by it their redemption were to be wrought For till the Holy Ghost was sent to inhabite their soules after his Ascension they could (r) The vnspeakeable gust which the Apostles had to be euer looking vpō Christ our Lord. not content themselues to weane the outward man from the gust and ioy of looking on him But though our Lord were pleased to nourish their faith and withall to teach them how to find him reigning in their hartes by with drawing his corporall presence frō their eyes yet that loue was iust and due which they bore to him whome God had giuen to be Incarnate for a spouse to the Church and to all elected soules so to draw their hartes more powerfully by that sacred sight of his person then formerly they had beene withdrawne by vnlawfull pleasures Nay euen great part of our felicity in heauen is to consist in our behoulding the most sweete presence of the humanity of our blessed Sauiour and to enioy his embracemēts and yet the forme of his diuine face shall be the very same which in this life it was For (s) The figure of the persō of our Lord Iesus was so excellent as that neither doth glory now make it other thē it was neither did passibility mortality disgrace it Matth. 17.3 part q. 45. art 1. ad 1. so we find that after his Resurrection he continued to be knovvne by his former countenance and so he was also before that in his Transiguration as S. Hierome notes S. Thomas teacheth That his forme was not changed into another but onely that there was an addition of such splendour as belonged to a glorified body As on the other side the Passibility and Mortality which for our good he would haue it subiect to did no way depriue it both of perfect most powerfull beauty How this infinite God and super excellent Man our Lord Iesus Christ did with incomparable loue cast his eye of mercy vpon mankind CHAP. 8. VVE haue now beheld with the eye of our Consideration being illuminated by the light of Faith the incomparable excellēcy of the person of Christ our Lord and Sauiour consisting of his Diuinity as God and of his most holy soule and most beautifull and pretious flesh and bloud as Man And now this eternall God this second person of the euer Blessed Trinity the consubstantiall sonne of the eternall Father Colos 2. In whome the treasures of knowledge and wisedome were laid vp and in whome and by whome Ioan. 1. for whome were created all things and without him was made nothing that was made This God I say with being all that I haue already expressed being infinitely more then we know yea and more then we can explicitely beleeue did not onely cast the eye of his compassion vpon the misery of man but he resolued to reach out his helping hād towards the redresse therof He had created the world and made this man the Lord of it and (a) The indowments of Adam at his first creation indued him in the person of Adam with many precious guifts wherof some were supernaturall as Originall Iustice Grace and a kind of Immortallity with many others and some were incident as Connaturall to that condition wherof he was made namely an Vnderstanding freewill wherwith he was to know and loue Apoc. 2. first last the Creatour and Center of vs all A precept of Obedience was giuen to this forefather of ours to abstaine from tasting of the forbidden fruite which he contemning vpon his wiues pernicious counsell did (b) Vpon the first sinne of Adam his supernaturall guifts were destroyed his naturall guyfts decayed forfaite out right those supernaturall guiftes and deserued that those others which were but naturall should be so wounded and weakned as vve find them to be by sad experience This trying of conclusions cost him deere for instantly the vvhole state of his house vvas changed and his Passions vvhich vvere meant to be but inferiour officers became the Lords of that Reason vvhich vvas appointed to gouerne both them and him Novv then it is no meruaile if vvhen this vvas done he played the vnthrift and laid so many debtes and rent-charges vpon his land that in some sense a man may say The profits do scarce quitt the cost For (c) How soone the roote of sinne did beare aboundāce of bitter fruyte hence grevv that pride that enuy and malice vvhich being rooted in the hart did fructify so shortly after in the hand of the accursed Cain and in a vvord that consummation of all impiety grevv from thence vvhich did prouoke and dravv vvith a kind of violence a resolution from Almighty God to drovvne the vvhole vvorld except eight persons But euē those fevv vvere inough to make the rest of mankind the heires of their corrupted nature And so vve see vvhat a vvorld vve haue of this vvherin vve liue What a coyle doth this (d) The disorder of the Irascible Concupiscible is the ground out of which almost all our sinnes do grow Irascible and Concupiscible keepe in our bodies and soules vvhen either vve desire that for our selues through an inordinate loue of our selues vvhich lookes vpon vs vvith a face of ioy or pleasure or vvhen we vvould inflict matter of greefe or paine vpon others through an inordinate auersion from them The very schooles of sinne haue beene sett open in the vvorld and revvards haue bene propounded for such as haue excelled therin The Prouinces of the earth haue often
of God for the perpetuating of the memory of so great a benefit Though yet no oblation was able to make that infinite Maiesty of the eternall God a Sauer for his hauing deliuered them by the death of the first borne of their enemies till he was pleased that his only sonne should come and offer himselfe in flesh and bloud for theyr deliuerance Coloss 1. he who was the first begotten of all Creatures and who performed that in deed and truth which all other oblations and Sacrifices did but only as figures in respect of him Now this Act of the Presentation of our Lord Iesus was made by our B. Lady Or rather he offered himselfe in those sacred and most pure hands of hers which he enabled for that excellent purpose with vnspeakeable and most ardent loue And as hereafter we shall see that he chiefely made oblation of himselfe in his sacred passion by way of propitiation for our sinnes and impetration of grace So the Presentation seems to carry a particular respect to worke by way of thanksgiuing for all the benefits which that open hand of God was by moments rayning downe vpon the Creatures And to the end that the goodnes of this Lord of ours may not be cast away vpō vs it will be necessary both now and very often heerafter to cast a carefull and well considering eye vpon the former (*) Cap. 2. discourse wherin we obserued the vnlimited knowledg of that diuine soule of Christ our Lord and wherby it is euident that all things concerning the Creatures for whome he would vouchsafe to be offered whether they were past or to come were as present to him as the very instant of tyme wherin then he liued In so much as there was not nor euer could be imparted the least benefit to mankind by Almighty God which was not present to his incomprehensible but all-comprehēding mind and for which our Lord Iesus did not offer himselfe then by way of thankes with most particular loue So that now we see our Lord surrendred vp into the hands of his eternall Father as if the world after a sort vvere dispossessed of him But so full of Charity vvas that Father as to ordayne the sonne to be sould backe againe (b) What soeuer is giuen to God is giuen vs backe againe with aduantage for the imparting of all those diuine sauours vvhich appeare to haue bene done to vs by him in the vvhole progresse of his holy life and death And vvheras he exercised vvith a perpetuity of burning loue those offices of a Lawgiuer a Maister a Father a Freind a Spouse and lastly of an omnipotēt Redeemer by his fiue sacred vvounds in this mistery vve find him to haue bene recouered and brought backe to vs vvith the payment of fiue Sicles vvhich according to the most probable opinion of computation doe not exceed tvvo shillings O omnipotent loue of our Lord IESVS who so would giue himselfe to vs as that indeed he choose rather not to giue himself but rather to innoble vs so farre as to enable vs to giue him somewhat for himselfe though the price fell infinitely short of the thing which was to be redeemed A price it was which fell short euen of being able to buy a very slaue and what proportion then could it carry with purchasing a God and King of glory sauing that his loue did make vp the rest His loue which was as pretious as God himselfe for God is loue and he being man is also God and so he was not only willing but euen able to pay as much as God was able to exact But we the while besides the contemplation of our owne obligation may doe wel to consider that course of prouidence loue which from the beginning of the world hath bene held with man in addressing him to an expectation and firme beleefe and loue of this diuine Redeemer Euen in the law of nature all was full of figures sacrifices were also offred then and (c) There is no truth of Religion where there is no visible Sacrifice wheresoeuer there is no visible Sacrifice there neither is nor cā there be any true Religion nor true worship of God and the mindes of many were indued with light according to the exigency of their state which ledd their inward eyes towards this marke In the tymes of the written Law another curtaine as a man may say was drawne and the faith of men grew more explicite then the Maiesty of the Church was increased the figures were both more and more significant and more euident and there was store of Prophets who expresly foretold the qualities of the Messias to come But now that he was indeed arriued no tyme was lost such loue as that could not be slacke and we haue seene how instantly the Sheepheards and in their persons such others as were neere at hand were inuited to that feast of ioy by the call of Angells After that the Magi and in their persons all the Gentills though neuer so farre off either in respect of tyme or place were drawne vnder the conduct of a Starre And now that such as were most particularly deputed for Gods seruice might be farre from not knowing their redeemer behould how he (d) Our Lord was declared by Saint Simeon to be come for the saluation both of Iewes and Gentils declares himselfe in the Temple to all the world by the mouth of holy Simeon Anna to be the Sauiour therof to be the glory of the Iewes and the light of the Gentills That so there might be none who should not tast of that fountaine of loue which was distilling into al those hartes which would receaue it It came not doubtles downe by drops into that of Simeon For instantly vpon the taking of that celestiall infant who was the Lord of life into his dying armes he fell into an extasis of ioy withall into a diuine deepe wearines of the world and was so deadly wounded by the loue of our Lord that he could not endure to looke vpon him but vpon the price of being willing to liue no longer How in the flight which our Lord Iesus made to Egypt he discouered his vnspeakeable Loue to man CHAP. 18. OVR Lord Iesus was no sooner brought backe into the power and designed to the vse of men but he was disposing himselfe by this incessant Charity to doe and suffer strange things for them For what stranger thing could there be then that he who created the whole world and who carries conducts it all by the word of his power in whose sight the Angells tremble the gates of heauen doe shiuer and in (a) What a poore Nothing the whole world is in comparison of God Matt. 2. comparison of whome all creatures are not so much as one poore single naked desolate grayne of dust that he I say should be content for loue of vs to feare and fly from such a thing as
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
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
(c) The meanes of our Redemption was a more noble benesitt then the very Redemptiō it selfe meanes then by the guift of his owne only sonne as hath been said Though yet he might sufficiently haue done it either by the creating of some nevv man or by employing of Angells for that purpose or in fine by any one of so many millions of meanes as to his wisedome would neuer haue bene wanting if he had not bene pointed out to this by his loue to vs which did so abound But his Incarnation was the meanes wherby he would vouchsafe to accomplish the worke of our Redemption which may well be called a mystery as indeed it is for the many and diuine deepe secrets which are locked vp therin For by this the Pride of mā which sticks incomparably more close to his soule in our corrupted nature then any skinne doth to a body hath been shewed the way by an oueruling kind of reason how it might learne to (d) The Incarnation of Christ our Lord doth first reade vs a lesson of Humility and then of Glory become h̄ble By this the basenes of man was also taught how to clyme vp so farre as to grow to be a kind of God by a diminution as it were of the diuinity and an infusion and laying it as one may say to steep in the humility of the humanity of Christ our Lord that so by meanes of Grace we might swallow and sucke it vp as an infant would doe his nurses milke Hearken how diuinely S. Augustine doth expresse the altitude of Gods mercy and wisedome in particular and if euer you will admire the height and sanctity of that great man of God it may be now I (e) Obserue pōder the diuine discourse of this great Saynt D. Aug. Confes l. 7 cap. 18. was saith he in search of a way how to gett some strength which might be fit for the enioying of thee o God but I could meete with none till I imbraced the mediatour betwene God and man Christ Iesus who is also God aboue all things blessed for all eternities And who calleth vs and saith I am the way the truth and the lise And who is the food which yet I wanted strength to disgest till he mingled himselfe with our flesh that so thy (1) The second person of the B. Trinity wisdome by which thou didst create all things might frame it selse into the nature of (2) By his Humanity he did accommodate himself to our Capacity milke wherof we might sucke in this infancy of ours But I not being humble could not apprehend my Lord Iesus Christ who was so very humble Nor yet did I vnderstand what he meant to make vs learne (3) He meant to teach vs Humility thereby by that infirmity of his For thy (4) The sonne of God word which is the eternall truth being so highly exalted aboue the highest of thy Creatures doth rayse them vp vnto it selfe (5) The good Angells who were confirmed in grace for their humility who were obedient subiect to it And heere below among thy (6) The race of Adam inferiour creatures it built for it selfe (7) The precious body of Christ our Lord. a poore house of the same clay wherof we were made By (8) Humanity of Christ our Lord. which they were to be depressed frō their high concert of themselues (9) No mā who is not humble can be a true mēber of Christ our Lord. who would become subiect thervnto and so it might sucke draw them vnto it curing the tumour of their Pride and nourishing their loue (10) Christ our Lord became Incarnate to destroy our Pride To the end that they might not goe further on in vanity through any confidence in themselues but might rather acknowledge their owne infirmity when they should see the Diuinity it selfe lying as it were (11) By the participation of our fraile nature infirme before their feete by being content to weare the garment of our slesh and bloud And (12) Our Lord disdaines vs not though we come not to him till we be weary of the tyranny of sinne so being weary they might deiect and prostrate themselues vpon this (13) The way of ascending by the diuinity of Christ our Lord is first to prostrate our selues vpon his humanity humanity of Christ our Lord and it ascending vp might rayse them also vp together with it To such excesse grew the loue of Christ our Lord to vs degrading himselfe that he might exalt vs afflicting himselfe that he might ease vs and imptying himselfe of hiselfe that he might make vs full of him which first was made apparant euen to these eyes thē selues of our flesh and blood by the admirarable mystery of his Natiuity Of the immense Loue of Christ our Lord expressed to Man in his holy Natiuity CHAP. 11. VVE haue no reason to find it strāge that our Lord should be more taken by the circumstances of that seruice which he expecteth and exacteth of vs thē by the very seruice it selfe The whole world is his and he needs not any thing which we can giue He (a) The reason why God is more pleased with the manner and mind wherwith we do him any seruice then with the thing it selfe is the plenitude of all things and can receaue no substantiall increase at all but he is only capable of honour and glory at our hands and that doth only accrew to him on our part by the affection wherwith it is procured by vs. Now this truth of his regarding more the minde manner wherwith and wherin things are done then the very things themselues is declared to vs many wayes but (b) Our Lord did practise that in his owne person which he expecteth of vs. especially by the soueraigne example it selfe of Christ our Lord. For as if his pleasure to redeeme vs from the torments of hell and the slauery of sinne had been nothing as if his Incarnation which was an ineffable descent for the Diuinity to make had bene no great matter he letts vs further see by the manner of it what a meaning he had to binde vs yet faster to him by the chaynes of loue It would haue cost him nothing since he would needs become man for vs to haue vested his soule with the body of a perfect man all at once and as fully complete in all the functions and actions therof as afterward his owne sacred body was At ease he might also since there was no remedy but that he would needs become a Creature haue taken so much of the greatnes of the world to himselfe as would haue made him incomparably more glorious more triumphāt and more abundantly happy by a floud of temporall felicity then Salomon and all the Caesars did enioy But not the substance of our Redemptiō not the substance of his owne Incarnation could satisfy and quench the ardent desire which reigned in
his sacred hart to shew his loue to vs (c) Our Lord God would not be satisfied with lesse then becomming a poore naked child for vs. Lue. 2. vnlesse for our sakes he had withall bene borne a child and had become therby obnoxious to all the impotencies miseries of that age in sucking crying and swathing with a thousand other incommodities This King of glory was also pleased to commend his loue as much by pouerty as he had done already by infirmity and instantly (d) The excessiue pouerty of our Lord. to put himselfe insteed of a Pallace into a stable at the townes end of Bethleē all abandoned and open such as are vsed in hoat countries And there the B. Virgin-mother did stay and suffer many dayes which any vagabond Gypsy would haue found difficulty to do Our Lord was layd in a Maunger insteed of a Cradle of gold vnder a Rocke insteed of a rich Cloth of State He was wrapped in cloutes insteed of being adorned with Imperall robes He was attended by the Oxe and the Asse insteed of Counsellours of his State Officers of his Crowne and magistrates of his kingdome And all that at such a tyme of the yeare then which a harder and colder could not be found and euen in the very first hower after midnight to shew that his loue would not giue him leaue to stay till the second This mistery of the holy Natiuity of our B. Lord was meant by him as all those others also were of his life and death not only as a meanes of our redemption (e) Our Lord Iesus bacame man that he might redeeme vs and that we might imitate him but as a most iust motiue also of our Imitation of those vertues which shine therin and especially of Humility Patience Charity and Pouerty The originall sinne which descendeth to vs by our fore-Fathers being accompanied by our owne actuall sinnes had greatly dissigured the Image of God which was made in vs and for the enabling vs to repayre and reforme the same it concerned vs much to haue some such excellent true patterne as this according to which we might mend our selues It concerned vs also much as is excellently pondered by Father (*) Titulo de Dios. Arias that on the one side this Guyde or patterne should be visible (f) It was wholly necessary that our Guide to heauen should be both vifible Infallible and perceptible by our other senses For besides that it is a most cōnatural thing and carryeth great proportion to man who is compounded both of body and soule that he should ascend by visible and corporeall things to such as are spirituall and inuisible man became by his sinne extremely vncapable and blynd towards the knowledge of those inuisible things and therfore it imported much that the example which he was to follow should be visible And on the other side it was wholy fit that this Guide should be infallible and knowne to be vnable to erre for otherwise men could not follow him without much daunger or at least without much feare of errour Now God of himselfe was not visible and so he could not be this Guide according to that former condition and man as man could not be securely free from errour and so he could not be a Guide according to the latter The (g) The diuiue inuentiō of loue wher by our Lord was pleased to negotiate our saluation In serm de Natiuit Dom. apud Ariam loto citato remedy therfore was resolued vpon by Almighty God That for our good he would become and be borne a man that so being man God might be visible and man being God might be infallible And this is briefly declared by the incomparable S. Augustine saying Man who might be seene was not to be imitated by men because he might erre and God who might securely be imitated could not be seene And therfore to the end that man might haue a Guide who might both be imitated and be seene God vouchsafed to become man Iustly therfore doth Father Arias expresse himselfe Titulo de Dios c. 1. in this admiring manner O how great was the mercy of God! O how deepe a Sea was it full of mercies that he would so accomodate himselfe to our weakenes and condescend to our basenes For as much as because man was not able to see any other thē the workes of flesh and bloud he who was the Creator of the Angelicall spirits would make himselfe man And for as much as he who holdeth his Imperiall seate and throne in the highest heauens and who conuersed only in heauen and was there beheld by the Angells would grow to be visible in this inferior world and conuerse and treat with mortall men that so by his example he might teach them the way to eternall blisse All this is deliuered by the holy and learned Father Arias How by the Pouerty of our Lord Iesus in his Natiuity poore men are comforted and the rich are kept from being proud CHAP. 12. BY the pouerty which our Lord Iesus was pleased both to feele in himselfe and to declare to vs in this sweet mistery of his Natiuity he shewed euen in other respects particular loue to all the world For (a) It ought to be of much comfort to poore people to consider that Christ our Lord would be borne so poore he gaue comfort therby to all such as should be borne of parents who vvere poore that so that accident might no lōger be summed vp in the account of mens great misfortunes according to the custome of the vvorld vvhen they should see that the true king of glory would vouchsafe to keepe them cōpany therin And as for such others as doe or shal descend of rich progenitours our Lord with ardent Charity did giue them also now alesson of humility by his owne being borne in so great pouerty For (b) By this so poore Natiuity rich men are obliged not to vaunt thē selues vpon that occasion who is he that can be excused in such a vanity as to take much pleasure and glory in that which Christ Iesus would not countenance by his example This pouerty is counted to vs by another circumstance which is very considerable For his sacred and imaculate Mother was as highly noble euen according to the extraction of bloud as a creature could be she being lineally as hath byn said descended from so many Prophets Kings Preists Now for our Lord to permit that so high nobility should be left in the hands of such necessity as euen with ours we may feele him to haue bene subiect to as it heapes the more contēpt vpō him so it doth more proclaime his loue to vs. I omit to shew how that although that purest wombe of the B. Virgin were in some respects a more glorious Pallace then heauen it selfe could haue holpen his humanity vnto yet in others it might goe for a kind of prison to his body as
to any ambition of riches or strength or knowledge or any other such aduantage whatsoeuer so the infamy of impiety of sinne is that which of all other woundeth most This infamy is therfore the very thinge to which our Lord with strange contempt of himselfe did submit his diuine excellency And notwithstanding the perfect hatred which indeed he carryed to all that which looked like sinne he was yet content to lay that thought aside through the infinite loue which he bare to vs and he pinned that badge vpon his owne sleeue which was only to haue been worne by the traytours Rebells of Almighty God and he resolued to weare it being God himselfe By taking (c) Our Lord by the payne shame of his circumcision did satisfy for our sinnes he did purchase grace and fortify vs by his example this badge of sinne which was payne and shame to his owne person he did not only satisfy for the sensuality pride of man but he deliuered vs also from being subiect any longer to those tyrants both by the grace which he obtayned therby at the hands of his eternall Father and by the example which he gaue in this his Circumcision of a most profound contempt of himselfe And who is therfore that man who by way of retribution for the loue of this Lord will not now procure to follow his example and at least by little and little to weane himselfe frō estimation of honour and delight in pleasure since the king of glory did contēt himself for the loue of vs to be thought a sinner and to vndergoe the obligatiōs due to such a one Doctour Auila Cap. 76. in his Audi Filia vseth this excellent comparison If (d) Consider and ponder this comparison a King should goe vpon his bare feete and should be weary and should sweat through the length and sharpnes of the way hauing his back loaden with sackcloath and his face with teares as king Dauid did and had by occasion of the reuolte of his sonne Absalom what seruant or Courtier could there be of his who either for loue or shame would not also goe on foote and vnshodd and as like his king as he could be And so the holy Scripture affirmeth that all the seruants of Dauid did and all the people which accompanied him at that tyme. And the same authour saith afterward That the altitude of the state of perfect Christians is so great and that Christ our Lord hath wrought such a change in things by his holy example as that the bitter and the base of this world is growne to be honorable and delightfull And (e) Let worldlinges thinke as lightly as they will of this the perfect seruāts of God do find the truth of it at theyr very harts that he enableth his true seruants to cast the gorge when they are but to rast of that in the pursuite wherof worldly men are vpon the pointe of cutting the throates of one another Thus sayth Doctour Auila Fa. Arias doth serue himselfe of another comparison to this effect If a King sitting in his chayre of State should by a * Titulo de Redemtor Ca. 4. law command that the Caualleroes of his Court should weare their garments of plame stusse for the enriching of his kingdome or that for the defence therof they should accustome themselues to carry such or such a kind of weapō it is cleere that they would take themselues to be in obligation of obseruing that law But if the king himselfe at the very gate of his Royall Pallace should proclaime the same with his owne princely mouth for the example of others would gird such a weapon to his owne side put such a garmēt vpō his own back without doubt his Courtiers would take thēselues to be more straitly bound to keepe this law And as they should be honored who would obserne it so the breach therof would instly intytle the infringers of it to more grieuous punishmēt Now (f) Obserue this application and it will mooue thee God being in his Thron of glory did commaund both by the naturall written lawe that men should liue according to vertue and be caresull to imbrace those meanes which might conduce to their saluation This lawe he published by meanes of his Angells and other Creatures and the world was bound to obserue the same and the breach of it was both threatned and reuenged with the eternall fire of Hell But in the tyme of the law of grace God himselfe descended from his Imperiall throne came downe into the world apparailing himselfe with the garment of our flesh and bloud And with his owne sacred mouth be did proclaime his Euangelicall Law And in his owne sacred person he (g) The perfectiō of Christ our Lord complyed with all that vertue and sanctity in supreme perfection which he exacted at the hands of men And (h) His mortification he imbraced all the meanes of paine and shame wherby sincere and solid vertue is obtained So that there can be no doubt but that our obligation to keepe his law is much the greater since it is auowed by his owne example and consequently the fault in breaking it would be more inexcusable and the punishment due to it more intollerable And (i) Giue great attention to this circumstāce if when Christ our Lord was yet on earth and did commaund his Disciples to preach his will to the people of Israel and to moone men also by their example he commaunded that they should goe on foote and not only without money but euen without shoes that otherwise also they should be poorely cladd and did then protest that the people who would not heare their Doctrine should find themselues in worse case at the day of Iudgment then they of Sodome Gomorra how incomparably much more will it increase our damnation who haue bene taught by the very mouth and haue bene conuinced by the example not only of the Disciples but of Christ our Lord himselfe the king of glory if we imita e not his vertues and if we imbrace not his mortifications This is the summe and substance of that excellent discourse of Fa. Arias where he treates of Christ our Lord vnder the quality of his being our Redeemer And although he doe in generall propound it there as inducing vs to pennance and vertue vpon the consideration of the doctrine and example of Christ our Lord at large yet (k) That the consideration brought by Fa. Arrias doth very particularly belong to the Cu c̄cision of our Lord. it seemes very naturall that heer I should apply it in particular manner by occasion of this mistery of the Circumcision Wherein the first of that most pretious bloud was shedd wherby the world was to be redeemed and when he who was the true and supreme Law-giuer did diminish himselfe so much as to become obnoxious to that penalty of his owne Law since as his holy
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
in the Temple With how vnspeable loue both to God and man did our Lord IESVS dispossesse himselfe for a while of the greatest ioy and comfort that he could receaue in this world which was the sweet society of his sacred mother wherein although through the eminency of grace which had beene communicated to her happy soule in the very first instant of her Immaculate Conception he could neuer haue found the least distraction from the immediate and most perfect seruice of Almighty God yet because the parents of his disciples and seruants would not all be such but would often be diuerting and diswading vs from corresponding with his inspirations and our obligations he was pleased not only to giue vs an example at large but euen to impart the very expresse words themselues wherby we might ouercome their intreaties And rather then we should not be instructed to forsake all flesh and bloud when once there should be question of Gods seruice and rather then we should not be armed well agaynst those temptatioÌ„s which might grow to vs from our Parents he was content to exemplify the case in his owne sacred person with a seeming diminution to his B. Mother For this it was that when the all-immaculate virgin spake to him in these tender words Sonne why hast thou so done to vs Lâ—â— 2. behold thy Father and I sorrowing did seeke thee Our B. Sauiour answered thus not in the way of reprehension as certayne course-harted people will needs conceaue but (e) In what sense our Lord Iesus spake to his B. mother out of compassion to them and out of instruction to vs Why is it that you sought me did you not knowe that I must be about those things which are my Father And to show that his meaning was but to benefit vs by that expression of himselfe and not to cast the least aspersion of imperfection vpon his most holy mother and S. Ioseph he caused his holy spirit to record it instantly after in holy Scripture that he departed from the Temple with them and came to Nazareth was subiect to them And heere let him that can consider and admire the vnspeakeable dignity and excellency of our B. Lady to whom the God of heauen earth would become a subiect And let him much more adore God for the infinite humility and Charity of our Lord IESVS (e) The incomparable loue of Lord in being so subiect to our B. Lady and S. Ioseph who vouchsafed by this stronge example of his to procure the quenching of our pride and the kindling of our loue by making himselfe a subiect to flesh and bloud for our sake he who was the superiour and soueraigne Lord of all the creatures both in heauen earth He shewed well what he was whilst yet he sate in the Temple amongst the Doctours Of whome he heard what they could say and he asked them to see what they would answere And many other things he also did at the same tyme though holy Scripture by wrapping them vp in silence doe rather leaue matter for our soules then for our senses to worke vpon For he did both pray his eternall Father for their conuersion to his diuine Maiesty and for the manifestation of his glory not only in their hartes vvho vvere present then but in as many as by their meanes should aftervvard come to knovv vvhat had passed there The sacred Text affirmes How all that heard him were aslonished at his wisedome and answeres and that seeing him they wondred And vve may vvell assure our selues that theyr admiring his diuine presence theyr being astonished at his vvisedome vvas to that holy soule of our Lord Iesus an occasion of much mortisication which nothing but ardent Charity could haue made him so willingly imbrace For he was then but twelue yeares old and he had bene bred in a poore and plaine appearance and he dwelt in the very depth of profound hamility And humility when indeed it is profound doth make a soule much more abhorre admiration and prayse then any hart which is vayne can appreh end and hate to be despised The vvhile if all they were so amazed by hearing him vvho vvere the Doctours of the law and vvho vvere likely to despise all the world in comparison of themselues and if the very sight of him made them wonder vvhose eyes vvere euen almost put out by the dust of Enuy and Hypocrysy vvhich the mind of pride had raysed into them which our Lord IESVS by the dropps of his diuine grace vvas procuring them to lay in a farre higher manner must (f) We are particularly bound to admire the wisedome and grace of our Lord Iesus we vvho are Christian and vvhome our Lord instructs not only at some certaine tymes as he did that people in the Temple but to vvhose harts he is euer preaching in a most particular manner happy are they who apply the eares therof to his sacred mouth adore the Maiesty of his wisedome and power and admire the dignity and beauty of his humanity and be inflamed and euen consumed with the sense of his eternall prouidence and ardent loue But yet withall we must consider that howsoeuer it be said and that most truely Thâ—it he proceeded in wisedome and age and grace with God and men this is only to be vnderstood of that kind of wisedome which might grow through experimentall knowledge by way of the senses which he had like vs though yet with this difference as (*) Cap. â—â— hath bene shewed that euen therin he was free from all possibility of errour which we are not For his wisedome otherwise was so great as not to be capable of any increase as nether was his grace wherof in the instant of his Conception that diuine soule of his had receiued all absolute fulnes But he may be truely said to haue increased dayly with God and men in Grace that is in Fauour because euery day more more his soule was beautified by new acts in the sight of God and daylie he made more and more discouery of himselfe to men according to the rates of their Capacity and they would not haue bene men but beasts and blockes if they had not bene taken by such an obiect We are taught withall by his growing thus in grace before God and men to performe our actions in such sort as that we must nether procure to please God alone by not caring for the edification of men nor yet men alone through Hipocrisy or want of purity in the intention but they both must goe together hand in hand as daily our Lord when he grew afterward to mans estate did effectually teach vs more and more Of the excessiue loue which our Lord Iesus shewed to vs in that he would vouchsafe to be Baptized CHAP. 21. VVHAT thought of man or Angell can reach to that humility which Christ our Lord being longe since growne to be a man and now vpon the poynt of
to all the (e) The abnegatiō of ones self which is required by the doctrine of Christ our Lord. Luc. 14. Ioan. 12. Ioan. 6. vvorld as instantly I shall touch againe that If any man would come after him he must deny himselfe take vp his Crosse follow him For he that would saue his life should loose it and he that would loose his life for him should saue it If a sectary or libertine shal heare this Doctrine he vvil be sure to say that it is Durus sermo A bit vvhich hath a bone in it so bigge as that he knovves not hovv either to chavv or svvallovv and much lesse digest it And yet this very bit this bitter pilwhich is so vnsauoury to the man vvho is all made of flesh and bloud being vvrapped vp in the golden vvords of our Lord doth in the taking it dovvne grovv so full of delight and gust through the puissance vvhich it hath ouer the soules of such as doe seriously sincerely loue him that no pennance in this life could be so grieuous to them as if they should be boüd from doing pennance And see now by this whether the Doctrine of Christ our Lord be not of strange power and strength and whether his diuine Maiesty haue not infinitely loued vs who hath made weake men so able and so willing to imbrace it for the loue of him This (f) This doctrine as it is on the one side effica cious and strong so on the other it is smooth sweet strength wherwith the Doctrine of Christ our Lord abounds is no rude or course kind of strength but rather it is like some one of those most excellēt Minerall Phisicks which is exactly well prepared For together with the discharging of peccant humours which vseth to carry with it a kind of paine it is a cordiall withall and it comforts the very substance of the soule incompably more excellently then that other Phisicke can the nature of the body Besides there is not heere any one receipt alone for the cure of soules as there be Empericks inough in the world who withall their bragges haue but some one medicine or two for the corporall cure of as many patients as they may chance to haue But heere are fully as many helpes as there can be motions in the minde this Doctrine is fit to worke vpon them al. For who sees (g) The seuerall wayes wherby the hart of man is holpen by that Doctrine of Christ our Lord. not how it abounds with exact commandements expresse prohibitions high and holy counsailes heroicall examples a clear notice of benefits already receiued and faithful promises of more sweet admonitions seuere reprehensions and terrible threats To the end that no man may be able to defend or euen excuse his disobedience with any appearance of reason but that euery one may as he ought submit himselfe What misery can that be whereof heere he may not find a remedy what doubt wherof he may not find a solution What pious affection wherof he may not find an inflamation What vertue would he obtaine or what vice would he auoyd wherin he shall not find a world of counsaile addresse And in a word what thought of God or of himselfe can he haue with any relation to his comfort either for this life or the next which being a good student of this Doctrine of Christ our Lord he may not easily apparaile in that rich and choyce wardrobe of his with iaculatory prayers and aspirations I say not only significant but which haue withall so much of the ardent of the great and of the noble as it will become the eares of God to heare will not become his mercifull hart not to harken to The incompar able purity of the Doctrine of Christ our Lord and with how great loue he helpeth vs towards the practise therof CHAP. 35. THIS diuine Doctrine of our Lord IESVS doth no way abrogate the morall law or ten commaundements but it doth auow and ratify the same Though for as much as concernes the Iudiciall and Ceremoniall lawes vnder which the people of God did liue before the coming of our Messias it perpetuated only the reall verities which were conteyned therin and it did destroy and bury though yet with honour those partes therof which were but figures of the comming of Christ our Lord. We say therfore most properly that to be the Doctrine of this diuine Doctour wherby either some Truthes were reuiued which through the wickednes of men were neglected and laid to sleepe before his comming or els wherby some others were published to the world which in perfection did exceed the former and many of them were not so properly inioyned in the nature of a comaundement as they were taught vs by the counsailes of Christ our Lord. This (a) Wher and how the body of the Doctrine of Christ our Lord is deliuered Doctrine of Christ our Lord is partly deliuered to vs by the Tradition of the holy Catholike Church as we shall see afterward and partly in holy Scripture And in this holy Scripture most of those particulars are conteyned and expressed which shew the perfection and purity of his heauenly Doctrine This is done after a most particular manner in that diuine sermon wherby his Disciples and we in them if we also will be his Disciples Cap. 5.6 and elsewhere in all the parts of the ghospell were instructed vpon that hill and S. Matthew deliuereth it by the words of our Lords owne sacred mouth He proclaimeth the eight Beatitudes where he annexeth not felicity to the comodities and pleasures of this life But to pouerty of spirit meekenes mornefulnes hungar and thirst after Iustice mercifulnes purity of hart Peace making and to the being persecuted and reuiled for the cause of Christ our Lord. He lets men know withall that for no respect they must breake the least tittle of the law of God That men must not be angry nor giue any iniurious word to others That we must not consent to so much as the least dishonest thought That no man or woman must be diuorced vpon the committing of lesse then Fornication and that neither of thē shall marry againe till the other dye That we must not sineare at all That we must not so much as resist oppression That we must loue euen our very enemies That we must giue Almes and fast and pray without ostemation That in all things we must haue a most pure intention That we must cast away all sollicitude concerning our selues and leaue all to the good prouidence of God That we must reforme our selues but not so much as iudge any other man That we must cut of and cast away all occasions causes of scandall and sinne how neere or how deare so euer they may be to vs. That we must striue to enter into he auen by the (b) Of mortification and penance narrow gate That we must aspire to chastity
our Lord and in a word in re-acquiring for so much as can be done in this life that state of innocency and that perfect subordination of sense to reason and of reason to God which by Adam was lost in Paradise And if still it shall appeare to vs that euen supposing but ordinary grace this enterprise doe carry difficulty in the bosome of it yet consider at least that no great thing can be done without some difficulty Consider how (h) The infinite paynes vvhich is taken by vvorldly men for trash the souldier labours for a little pay The Courtier for a miserable suite the scholler for a smacke of vayne knowledge The Merchant for increase of gaine The husbandman for the hope of a good haruest The Sheepheard for the thriuing of his flocke Cōsider the torments which sicke and wounded men indure for the recouery of a little corporall health and the sensuall person for the obteyning of his bestiall pleasure And be thou sure to beleeue this most certaine truth that the perfect seruice of God deserues in no sort to be accounted painefull in respect of that deadly affliction and torment which the tyranny of our inordinate affections worldly pretences doth dayly and hourely put vs to And know this withall that still the strōger those passions grow the more vn worthy seruitude doe they also grow euery moment to hold thee in besides the mortall wounds which they oftē inflict vpon the soule wherin if it dye it is damned withall Wheras a true (i) The happines of a true seruant of God Disciple of this Doctrine of Christ out Lord hath the happines to study vnder the care and in the eye of an omnipotent Doctour He walkes perpetually secure because he is euer in conformity to the holy and wise wil of God He is dayly gayning vpon himselfe He is fed now and then with particular cōforts of Gods holy spirit in comparison wherof all the lying pleasures of flesh and bloud are no better then a smoky chimney to a tēder sight He findes himselfe generally to grow stated in a kind of quiet ioy and an immoueable peace of mind though this indeed admits of great variety of degrees more or lesse according to his indeauour and concourse with the diuine grace And although (k) The very desire of perfection is ◠good step towards it a man should neuer arriue to the very top of perfection yet that proportion wherof he cānot misse if he faithfully endeauour to procure it will be a liberall reward of greater paines then he can take For besides the contentment of being still in strife towards God he will find it seated in his very soule as a most certaine truth That the very meere desire of perfection if it be a sound one indeed giues such a sauoury kind of comfort as puts all the base contentment of this world to silence By this endeauour he shall also be defended not only from mortall but euen from willfull veniall sinnes And he is already possessed of as great security as can be had in this mortall life of ours that he is ordeyned for heauen in reward of that reuerence and obedience which heere he hath performed in learning and practising the diuine Doctrine of Christ our Lord which he came to teach vs with so infinite loue But yet further we ought to be his euerlasting slaues in that he was pleased that so principall a part of this very doctrine should not only be deliuered but should remaine recorded and written in holy Scripture for our instruction and comfort as partly we haue seen already and will yet appeare more particularly in the Chapter following Of the vnspeakeable Loue of our Lord Iesus in ordeyning that the greatest part of his diuine Doctrine should remaine in wryting and of the great benefit which growes to vs by the holy Scripture CHAP. 36. HOw clearly is our mercifull God as good as his word in fulfilling the promise which he was pleased to make to vs by the mouth of the Prophet Esay Isa 30. Non faciet auohere à te vltra Doctorem tuum erunt oculi tui videntes praeceptorem tuum c. and againe by the Prophet Ioel Filij Sion exultate laetamini in Domino Deo vestro quia dedit vobis Doctorem Iustitiae Our Lord will not make thy Doctour fly away any more and thine eyes shall see thy (a) A most tender expression of the loue of God in the teaching of man Teacher And thine eares shall heare the word of him who admonisheth thee behinde thy backe This is the way walke you in it and decline you neither to the right hand nor to the left Reioyce yee children of Sion and be ioyful in the Lord your God because he hath giuen you a Doctour of Iustice That God did giue vs this Doctour for the instruction of our soules we know by faith and we feele by grace and the Church his Spouse is dayly recomending it to our memory But (b) The holy Scripture doth most liuely represent Christ our Lord as it were to our very eyes that yet he was so to be heere as neuer to remoue euen as it were his visible instructing presence from vs this blessing is chiefly affoarded to vs by the holy Scripture For therby we are dayly and howerly told so many particulars of his sacred person how he lookt how he walkt how he spake how he groād how he wept how he prayed and how he preached so that besides his reall presence in the B. Sacrament for vpon that I shall reflect heereafter we esteeme our selues to haue him still euen personall after a sort amongst vs and to be as it were chayned with our eyes to that diuine countenance of his and vvith our eares to those heauenly vvords and vvith our harts to those immense benefits vvhich vve find him to haue povvred vpon our fore fathers and by them on vs. Our Lord forbid Psalm 32. that vve should be like that horse or mule which hath no vnderstanding but vvhen the Maister hath fed him full and fat doth abuse his care and giue him perhaps a kicke insteed of doing him painefull seruice yea and that for nothing else but because he had bene so liberally fed For euen such shall we be if the riches of Gods mercy towards vs should incline vs rather to a fastidious kind of contempt then to an obsequious reuerence respect If our (c) Consider well of this truth Lord IESVS had not bene so gratious as to inspire his seruants to write his story or to enable his Church to preserue it from the consumption of tyme and the Canker of Heresy and the inundation of Infidelity how willingly would we haue sould our selues into our shirts to haue obtayned so great a fauour at his hands If we should only haue knowne that when our Lord liued on earth he had conuersed with men had expressed himselfe to thē at large
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
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
griefe and who did euen possesse the knowledge of infirmity His face was as if it were hiddden and despised and we had him in no estimation It was he indeed who bare our infirmities and who suffered our paines and we esteemed of him as of some Leaprous person and as one who had bene strucken by the hand of God and so deiected How truly were these things performed in the persō of Christ our Lord throughout the course and current of his Passion wil instantly be represented heere when first you (b) In the consideration of the Passion of Christ our Lord it is necessary to ponder his infinite Maiesty as he is God shall haue bene desired to looke a little backe with the eye of your consideration vpon the first Chapters of this whole discourse wherin the dignity of the person of Christ our Lord is touched For so when we shall haue coupled that former excellēcy with this present infamy shall withal haue weighed how the only reason that moued him to dispoyle himselfe of the one and to vest himselfe with the other was a desire of the glory of God which might redound to him by our good And that he emptyed himselfe out of his owne felicity to the end that we might partake therof in heauen And did euen as it were inebriate himselfe with the Chalice of affliction affronts and desolation that so in the strength of that he might secure vs from the eternall chaines of fire in hell I (c) The vse of these consideratiōs thinke we shal not be so blindly bold nor so wickedly vngratefull as not to detest our sins which were the cause of all his sorrow and continually to lament and serue loue that Lord who was pleased to vndergoe such penance for them Consider therfore I say that he whose Passion you are to read was the only Sonne of the sacred Virgin Mary that most excellēt and perfect pure Creature that euer was Cōsider that his humanity was framed by the hād and skill of the holy Ghost out of her Royall and all-immaculate bloud Consider that he was beautifull aboue all the Sonnes of men for cōplexion for constitution Psalm 44. and for grace and motion Consider the complete sanctity of his holy soule which animated that body so full of beauty The high purity the wide charity the profound humility the entyre conformity and transformity of his will into the will of God with al other vertues in the highest degree which God could communicate to a creature Consider the other incomparable guifts and graces which were imparted to him or rather ingulfed in him beyond all measure proportion That guift of Prophesy and Miracles That treasure of incorruptible wisedome That euer flowing riuer of his infallible Knowledge Experimentall Infused Beatificall Cōsider that this body and soule were knit by the indissoluble bond of Hypostaticall vnion to the second person of the most blessed Trinity who according to the words of the Creed of the Councell of Nice is God of God light of light true God of true God begottens not made consubstantiall with the Father by whom all things were made Consider if thou canst the infinite eternall simple vnchangeable independant essence and wisedome and power goodnes of this diuinity It being the fountaine of Immortality Purity Liberty Verity Clarity Peace Plenty Grace Glory Swauity Excellency Beauty Maiesty Felicity Prouidence Preseruation Protection Iustice Mercy Pitty Longanimity and Loue. Consider that to euery of these Attributes there belongs an addition of being infinite and that in a word he is the substāce and the summe the circumference and the Center of all Originall created perfection Of the most tender and diuine Loue and care which our Lord Iesus shewed at his entrance into the Passion in his last sermon and long prayer to his eternall Father CHAP. 53. THIS man this God this God and man did abandon himselfe so farre as to suffer hideous things for the loue of vs. And we are bound with our whole harts not onely to carry great compassion towardes him but to fly a mayne from all that which is any way offensiue to him who did voluntarily and with a kind of infinite charity cast himselfe into such a bed of Thornes for our sakes For as soone as our Lord had instituted the blessed Sacrament of the Altar and the holy Sacrifice of the Masse and had therby (a) The Apostles ordayned Priests with authority to ordayne others to the end of the world ordayned his Apostles Priests who in the person of their successours and such as should lawfully be sent by them might perpetuate the celebratiō of those diuine misteries till the end of the world he went disposing himselse to that Passion which Iudas was already gone to bring vpon him And notwithstanding that he knew how vast things they were to be yet desired he with excessiue appetite to imbrace them This is plainely insinuated by that expression of the holy Prophet who saith of Christ (b) Our Lord did long for his fill of suffering for our sakes Ierem. Thren 30. our Lord Saturabitur opprobrijs which implyes a being hungry after the enduring of reproach and scorne for vs as a man might be after some curious and costly banquetting dish and that at the tyme of his Passion he should be sure to haue his longing satisfied But before he went forth to the place where he knew he should be betrayed and apprehended he resolued to take a kind of leaue of his Apostles he had intertayned thē with a large and amourous and most mysterious discourse And although as a man may say one of his feete were already in the graue and that he was soone to find the whole rage and fury of hell vpon him for the sending of the other after it he (c) Out Lord was tenderly carefull to comfort his Apostles in the middst of his owne greatest sorrowes applyed himselfe yet to comfort them and to forget himselfe as was sayd before with such a courage as might well become that man who was the naturall Sonne of God and with such a loue as might well declare the diuine pitty which he carried to the Sonnes of men For from hence it came that he tooke such tender care to arme them against all future feares He told them to this effect and almost in these very wordes That indeed he was to goe away but withall Ioan. 14.15.16.17 that he went to prouide a place for them He assured them that their afflictions whensoeuer they might happen should not last but quickly be conuerted into ioy and such a ioy as neuer should be taken from them He insinuated himselfe to their rude capacities by sweet and tender comparisons He made the eternall Father to be a husbandman that so himselfe might be the vine wherof they were to be the braunches He told them what care the Father himselfe would take to purge and purify their soules from tyme
is most toucht so is their paine augmented by speaking or thinking of things which concerne Almighty God whose breath they smell but vpon whose substance they are not suffered now to seed and yet all things els are a torment to them They thirst and pine they euen consume and melt and they cry out to our Lord and there is none but only himselfe who can comfort that swelling and gasping soule of theirs And though they seeme to be neere him yea and so they are in very deed yet they find themselues to be as in a prison out of which they know not how to breake Such affects as these doe raigne in the harts of some choyce seruants of God vpon the consideration which they haue of wanting certayne feeling communications of his diuine Maiesty in this woefull pilgrimage wherin they liue Yea it is not many yeares since one who was sicke of this sweetly sad disease was so happy as to dy of a flux of teares and another whose hart strings brake and he instantly dyed in exercising some acts of the loue of God and so it was found when he was opened Measure (e) The incomparable griefe of our Lord Iesus then by this what depth of sorrow it must cause in the hart of our B. Lord to be absented so from the feeling fruition of God whome he knew so well whom he loued so much and whome so perfectly he had inioyed before In comparison of whose knowledge and loue and ioy in God the knowledge and loue and ioy of all the other creatures put together is not so much as one single moate compared to the whole body of the earth And yet wheras they with all this griefe of theirs for wanting God haue yet through his goodnes some such kind of feeling of him still as makes it to be in the midst of paines a kind of most ioyfull sufferance our Lord was pleased to take the bitter without the sweet for himselfe and only to feele and penetrate the want vvherin he vvas of that good vvithout enabling the inferiour part to reflect vpon that same very good in the vvay of conceauing any Comfort by it The incomparable sorrow of Christ our Lord through his consideration of the dishonour of God and the sinne and misery of man togeather with the sight of what himselfe was to suffer CHAP. 56. NOVV if it vvould be of such vnsufferable paine for Christ our Lord to be only absented or estranged from Almighty God vvhich abseÌ„ce is no sinne but only a punishment and vvhich is not many tymes ' of any offence at all to the diuine Maiesty but serueth only for a probation of vertue and for a preparation to an increase of grace hovv may vve thinke that it vvould pierce his hart from side to side to see as hath been sayd that God prophaned his glory disgraced his lavv transgressed and all those creatures vvhom he had created after his ovvne Image to enioy heauen vvith eternall felicity to staÌ„d novv so neere vpon the tearmes of being damned to euerlasting misery He savv vvhat Adams happy state had beene and vvhat a miserable a state it vvas grovvne to be He savv that reason vvhich vvas a Queene vvas novv become the drudge of PassioÌ„ The sinnes of the vvhole world were to passe vpon his account nor was the least of them to be pardoned by the Iustice of God but in vertue of the sacred Passion which then he was about to vndergoe They were (a) The true cause of our Lords excessiue sorrow all represented to his dolorous afflicted mind as distinctly as they were distinct in their being coÌ„mitted and a million of tymes more cleerly then the men who coÌ„mitted them did euer see them Let a man but thinke how many sinnes he alone may haue committed in some one day of his life and then how many daies he hath liued how many of his sinnes he hath forgotten how many of his actions words thoughts are accounted sinfull in the sight of God which yet did not seeme so to him Let him thinke how many men there are in the towne where he may chance to be how many in the Prouince how many in the kingdome how many in all Europe how many in all the world at this tyme. Let him thinke how many there haue bene in the whole world throughout all the ages therof since the begining and how many there may be before the end And who shall now be able once to conceaue of the innumerable sinnes which haue bene are are to be coÌ„mitted by all this race of maÌ„kind Prouer. 14. since the iust man sinneth seauen tymes a day by veniall sinnes and many who goe for Saints with vs will be found to haue committed many and many Mortall What shall we therfore say of such wicked men as drinke iniquity vp like water Iob. 15. whether they be vicious Catholicks or blasphemous Heretiques or disobedient Schismatiques or perfidious Ievves or Prophane Pagans or bestiall Turkes and Mores What Legions what millioÌ„s what worlds of sinnes must there haue been presented to the soule of Christ our Lord to suffer for since for as much as concerned him he accepted the punishment of them all and that by so exact scales of diuine Iustice as that if any one of all those sinnes had not be committed the Passion of Christ our Lord had bene so much the lesse grieuous And it was to be their fault vvho vvould not by Faith Penance apply that Passion to their soules if they were not saued therby and not any defect of the Passion it selfe of Christ our Lord who savv knevv and counted and accepted euery one of their particular sinnes and made for as much as coÌ„cerned him oblation of an inestimable paymeÌ„t in discharge of the same particular sinne Not (b) Our Lord Iesus suffered not only for all the sinnes which were coÌ„mitted but for all those others also which would haue been committed without his grace only did he see and suffer for all finnes which already are and are heâ—reafter to be coÌ„mitted but also for all those other which vvould haue bene committed by them all if they had not bene preuented by the Grace vvhich grevv from God in contemplation of the Passion of Christ our Lord. For no lesse vvas his pretious bloud to be the Antidote preseruatiue against all sinnes vvhich might haue byn coÌ„mitted then it vvas to be the remedy and cure of such as vvould be committed indeed So that euery man did add somevvhat to this sorrovv of our Lord both good and bad past and present and to come vvithall their sinnes vvhether they vvere great or small of thought vvord or deed vvhether the vvere mortall or veniall of omission or commission vvhether actually they vvere or would haue been committed if they had not bene preuented by this costly meanes And if (c) Other considerations which do open the sight of the soule to discerne the loue and
you looke for some Traytour or seditious enemy of God and man your leuell is ill layed Though yet for the glory of God for the exercise of all vertue and for the recouery of the world from hell and sinne I am content to be mistaken for such a one Yet nothing could induce them to relent But as the manner is with men who when they are desperately resolued to doe a thing which their conscience telleth them that reason requires them to forbeare the greater the force of that reason is which is prest against them the more eagarly are they inflamed euen blinded with rage to worke their will As soone therfore as they had apprehēded bound him with far greater cruelty then any Christian hart knowes how to imagine it cannot be chosen but that they would dragge him more like a dogge then a man Not (g) What soeuer incommodity they indured was reuéged by the vpō our Lord. that he went vnwillingly but because the presse must needs be great and they were also in bloud against him and would all so desire to be the executioners of some particular affliction and affront vpon him that they could not but hinder one another And then if any of them were iustled if any chanced to st̄ble or fall vpon whom would they reuenge themselue but vpon him who with patience which was indeed diuine permitted himselfe to be carried in that painefull iourney to the howse of Annas vnder that cruell cudody which the accursed Iudas had aduised them to keep him in Of the blow which was giuen vpon the face of our B. Lord in the high Priests howse of the fall of S. Peter How our Lord was taxed first of Blasphemy and of the excessiue Loue of our Lord in dll these particulars CHAP. 60. SHALL I need to say that it shewed an infinite kind of loue in our Lord that he vvould vouchsafe to be presented before Annas and then before Cayphas at their seuerall hovvses Matt. 26. Luc. 22. Ioan. 18. and before all that race of persidious Ievves vvho thē very thē cōspired his death That he being the fountaine of vvisedom knovvledge and the King of glory vvould for our sakes be arraigned and be contented to passe vnder the censure of those slaues of the deuill vvho vvas his slaue And he in their prosecuting of that suite against him to maintaine that inuincible patience and profund silence notvvithstanding all their clamours and so seldome to haue opened that blessed mouth of his He referred himselfe that first tyme when he vvas examined about his Doctrine to the iudgment of themselues Ioan. 18. vvho had heard him teaching in the Temple And vvhen for saying but so in the vvay of anvvere to the high Priest a barbarous vvretch Ibid. vvho vvas attending in that Court knevv that he should please his betters by it stroocke that face vvith his polluted hand vvhich the Angells doe so reuere and reioyce to see he did not damne him nor strike him dead 1. Pet. 1. vvhich yet most easily most iustly he might haue done nor so much as sharpely rebuke or reprehend him for it though it vvere so levvd an affront as is neuer vvont to be put vpon any slaue in the vievv of Iustice But he asked him only vvith great meeknes why he strooke him if he had spoken well and if he had spoken ill Ibid. why did he not informe the Court against him By vvhich kind of plea our Lord though he vvere the Creatour of all things did not assume to himselfe the least aduantage aboue the vvickedest and basest thing aliue That so by suffering he might shevv hovv much he loued vs. For the more he suffered the more rich the Church vvas to be of merits so the more copious our Redemption Whilst these things vvere acting Psalm 120. in the house of Cayphas S. Peter who at the apprehension of Christ our Lord vvas fled avvay vvith the other Apostles for (a) Our Lord was euer in care to giue vs comfort our Lord IESVS vvas content to be vvholly abandoned euen by his dearest friends that it might serue for our comfort vvhen vve are forsaken by ours could find no resting place for his thoughts till together vvith S. Iohn he came after our Lord to the hovvse of Cayphas But vvhether it vvere that his countenance complayned of some perplexity or that the manner of his speach or habit made it be thought that he vvas a Disciple of Christ our Lord he vvas questioned by diuers and he denied his Maister to them all and said vvith oathes and protestations Marc. 14. that he did not so much as know the man A great offence in it self a iust punishmēt of a former fault which he had made in presuming vpon his ovvne strength For that vnspeakeable loue vvhich he bare to our blessed Lord vvhich vvas not only as of a friend to a friēd or as of a Disciple to his Doctour but of any indulgēt father who might halfe doate vpon a Sonne did seeme novv to him to be so cōnatural to his very soule as that he thought he could not loose it but vvith his life Wheras in very deed it vvas the meere guift of God and for such he ought to haue acknovvledged it and so distrusting himselfe he should haue confided in our Lord. It vvas therfore pleasing to our deere Redeemer to permit that denyall out of infinite loue both to S. Peter and to vs though it could not but goe the vvhile very deeply to his ovvne tender hart that S. Peter who was not only one of his friends but of his fauourities should forsweare that he did not so much as know him He (b) How our Lord did loue S. Peter euen in suffering him thus to full Ibid. loued S. Peter in suffering him thus to fall for therby he taught him how to stand more firmely afterward which is neuer to be done by any soule but vpon the ground of humility He loued him also most deerly in making him rise againe so soone both by the shew of his corporall presence to the others eyes of flesh and bloud and by the sweet pure light of his grace which was imparted to the eyes of his soule And that light had so much heat also with it as to draw vp the vapours which powred themselues down afterward at full speed through his cloudy eyes Our Lord be euer blessed for his owne infinite goodnes who in the bitterest of those sorrowes shewed such mercy and had such memory both of him and vs. For thus the world is filled with Sea-markes which instruct vs how to saile through the Tempest of this life towards the safe port of heauen That when we passe by a Iudas we may take heed of auarice and enuy because it ends in desperation And when we passe by a S. Peter we may forbeare to fall vpon selfe conceipt which will put vs vpon many sinnes and
which afterward will cost and can be only cured by penance It was also an act of excessiue charity in Christ our Lord to let him feed vpon the experience of his owne frailty that so hauing a resolution to make him the supreme Pastour of his Church and to giue him the keyes of pardoning Matt. 16. and reteyning sinnes he might easily pitty others since he had fallen into so deepe a pit himselfe and all others also might be kept very farre from presuming to confide in their owne vertue since euen S. Peter was not able to secure himselfe from growing worse But as for those (c) A defence of S. Peter from the reproach which sectaries would lay vpnn him Luc. 22. wicked people who in the hatred they haue to the Catholike Church would impute to the head therof that in this denyall of his he had lost his faith they are not so much as to be heard For the holy Scripture insinuates no such things but the very contrary since Christ our Lord himselfe declared how he had prayed already to his eternall Father that S. Peters faith might neuer faile and moreouer the voyce of reason and the streame of all the holy * Aug. de correp gra c. 8. Chryshom 81. in Matth. Theophilact in c. 22. Lucaeâ— alij passim Fathers doth condemne that errour And we see how soone he returned to bitter penance for his fault And it was farre from the loue of our Lord to suffer that this most excellent Apostle should fall out-right into infidelity who had neuer offended him before but venially and only out of too free a hart Nor euen now but by the meere mistaking of the confines of Grace and nature which were not so well set out till afterward by the comming of the holy Ghost And of this we are certaine that before he had loued our Lord most vnspeakably tenderly and at a clap he had left all the world (1) Matt. 9. for him and had cast himselfe into the very (2) Matt. 14 Sea to approach him and at the apprehension of our Lord he had drawne his (3) Ioan. 18. poore single sword in his defence against so many hundreds of Armed men and he had woÌ„ded one of the hoaâ—est of them it was nothing but euen (4) Mare 14. the very passion of loue to our Lord that seized his hart which could carry him so instantly into so apparaÌ„t danger as it must be for him to put himselfe in the high Priests howse when he was but then newly come from wounding his seruaÌ„t Malchus And though this sinne of denying our Lord IESVS were a very great one yet all the deuills of hell cannot make it more then of meere frailty and his pennance for it began almost at the very instant when it was committed and that continued till the last moment of his life At which tyme he gaue insteed of teares his bloud vpon a Crosse as our Lord had done for him but with his head turned downeward through humility And the holy Scripture sheweth Luc. 24. how our Lord appeared to him alone after his Resurrection we heare not that he once rebuked him for that former sinne And before his Ascension vve are very sure since the holy Ghost it selfe hath said so that our Lord making S. Peter declare the loue which he bare him at three seuerall tymes before the Apostles he gaue him the charge both of them and all the rest who would be either lambes or sheepe of his flocke Ioan. 15. Now since our Lord himselfe vvho vvas offended and vvho best can tell hovv deepely did so svveetly and so magnificently forgiue and forget S. Peters sinne it is but a signe of a cankered and malicious minde to be exagerating the same vpon al occasions And let them vvho are so insolent in taxing this Prince of the Apostles for his sinne of frailty in denying Christ our Lord vvho is the head Note at that tyme vvhen truth could be discerned but as by the light of a candle Let them I say take heed that dayly themselues be not committing farre greater sinnes against the same truth vvhilst they are not only denying but blaspheming and afflicting it in the body of Christ our Lord which is his Church vvhich truth Isalm 19. they yet may see as by the light of the Sunne For in she sunne God hath placed his Tabernacle vvhich S. Augustine vnderstandeth of his Church The vvicked Priests suborned false vvitnesses against our Lord but he vvould not so much as reproach them for it much lesse conuince them of levvd practice nor enen open his mouth vvhen it might any vvay haue bene in his ovvne discharge Only vvheÌ„ Cayphas coniured him in the name (d) The high seuerence which our Lord did carry to the name of God Matt 26. of God to say whether he were the Sonne of God or no both because he had the place of high Priest at that tyme and yet further for the high reuerence vvhich he carryed to the holy name of God his ansvvere vvas expresse and cleere though short and meeke That he was the sonne of God And heerpon they declared him to be vvorthy of death as a blasphemer O false painted face of the world how vayne and deceiptfull are thy iudgments and how many are there now a dayes who if they should see a Cayphas sit with great solemnity authority and attendance vpon the cause of Christ our Lord who were coÌ„temptibly staÌ„ding at a barre and should heere a Cayphas affirme that he were an ennemy to the word of thé Lord or the State would infallibly ioyne with him against our Lord be drawne by those vayne appearances to beleeue for the tyme that they said true But whatsoeuer the thought of the people was of Christ our Lord his enamoured hart did so deadly thirst after their good and ours vpon any termes as that he being God did not abhorro to be accounted a blasphemer of God so that by the applicatioÌ„ of that pretious merit to vs we might of slaues become the Sonnes of his eternall Father And (e) The loue of our Lord Iesus to vs made him easily ouercomâ— all difficulties Ibid. howsoeuer it was an vnspeakeable detestation of that thing which raigned in his most reuerent soule yet was his loue to the name and imputation therof in effect as vnspeakeable since the more deeply he had cause to be auerted from it the more aboundantly he deserued by it for vs. But the Priest cried our Blasphemy what need haue we now of any witnesses Those hypocryticall eyes were cast vp to heauen the garments were rent and our Lord without his answering any one word was esteemed and decreed by them all to be worthy of death We haue read of Saints who haue bene armed with patience against all other affronts but when they haue bene called Heretiques they could not chuse but breake their pace and declare
grauest and greatest of them who would needs goe with him to testify the excesse of their malice though it be not the vse of men of rancke to cheapen themselues by accompanying criminall persons in the publique streets would not fayle to hold most hypocritical discourses As protesting in their zeale to the lavv of God hovv much it grieued them that the Pagan Iudge to vvhome they vvere going should be forced to knovv that amongst the men of their Religion vvhich the prisoner vvas there should be a creature so impious so blasphemous as most vvickedly they accused him to be Our Lord IESVS in the meane tyme vvas not to seeke for patience in the bearing of vvhatsoeuer affront they could put vpon him nor vvould he vvho had endured the greater refuse the lesse Novv a (b) The sinne of the Iewes was greater against our Lord then that of the Gentiles lesse offence it vvas in them for him to be presented before a Pagan and prophane person vvho had no knowledge at all of the true God or of his law then before a congregation of men who had the custody of his auncient Testament for whose saluation and perfection they being his owne chosen people he was particularly come into the would And so the more fauoured they had bene the more faulty they were in persecuting Christ our Lord that euen for no other cause but only for the very zeale which he had of their good They might haue considered how earnestly they had cōcurred to the sinne of Iudas and therfore they should haue feared his punishment which was the falling into a greater sinne For when he saw that they were then going actually to procure the death of Christ our Lord and when he began to looke in vpon himselfe and vpon what he had done then discerning cleerly the deformity of his sinne which the deuill had before procured to hide he hunge (c) The lamentable of death of Iudas Matt. 27. himselfe by the necke his body brake in the middle and his bowells fell about his feete and instantly his soule sirnke downe into the lowest place of hell How would that accident strike the hart of Christ our Lord with sorrovv For as our Lord is incomparably more sory for our sinns then for his own paines so vvas this a greater thē that fin For to finish in despaire of Gods omnipotent mercy is the most grieuous sinne vvhich man is able to commit It strooke I say our Lords hart vvith griefe yet those vvretches vvere not touched by it tovvards remorse But notwithstanding that Iudas restored to them the price wherby he had bene wrought to act that treason and did declare himselfe to haue sinned in betraying that innocent bloud they neither relented in themselues nor tooke compassion of him but seornefully made answere that it was not a thing which belonged to them and that all was to run vpon his account A memorable example of how truly and miserably they are deceaued who serue the world the flesh or the deuill For (d) Consider seriously of this truth whatsoeuer may be promised before hand yet in fine when the turne is serued no care is taken of their comfort but they may with Iudas goe hange themselues And so they doe many tymes and more I beleeue in our only country of England then in all the rest of Europe put togeather Matt. 29. But the thirty peeces which Iudas restored to the Priests were not cast into the Treasury but imployed vpō the Purchase of a place to a pious vse And S. Augustine noteth how it was by a most particular prouidence of God Serm. 128. de coena Dom apud Ariam that the price of the bloud of Christ our Lord should not serue for the expence of liuing sinners but for the buriall of deceased Pilgrimes that so with the price of his bloud he might both redeeme the liuing and be a retraite for the dead The hate of those malicious Priests Elders to Christ our Lord and consequently his loue to them and vs since for their particular and our generall good he was content to endure so much at their hands appears yet more plainely by other circumstances For the tyme when they persecuted our Lord was the day of the greatest solemnity and deuotiō of the whole yeare It was the feast of the Paschal when all the Iewish world was come to Ierusalem Luc. 22. to assist at those sacrifices and ceremonies of the the law in the Temple And as the affronts were so much greater then if they had bene done at a more priuate tyme the malice of the high Priests so much the more eager since they could not be perswaded to put it of to a lesse busy day so was the loue of our Lord excessiue euen heerin who was contented with the publicity of his shame at that tyme because by meanes therof the notice of his Passion togeather with the miracles succeding it would the more speedily be spred and more readily beleeued shortly after throughout the world The circumstance of Pilates person doth plainely also shew the particular rancour of their hart since they hated Christ our Lord so much as that it made them earnest glad to shew themselues subiect to that Romane Iustice They detested the subiection which they were in to Rome They loued not Cesar whome they tooke to be a Tyrant and Vsurper ouer them they loued not Pilate whome they knew to be a most corrupt and wicked Iudge they loued not the exercise of his Iudicature which serued but to refresh the memory of their owne misfortune in their hauing lost the vse of that power But their predominat malice to Christ our Lord made them content to gnaw and swallow all such bones as those When Pilate was come sorth they began to make their charge against the prisoner accusing him in bitter termes of most odious crimes but still as the manner of such persons is only in generall termes Which yet out of the (e) The base conceit which the lewes had of Christ our Lord. base cōceit they had of Christ our Lord and the pride which they tooke in themselues they thought would haue sufficiently induced Pilate to proceed against him And so indeed they did as good as say when afterward being pressed to produce their proofe they insinuated that it was more then needed For if the man had not bene wicked they would not Ioan. 18. said they haue brought him thither And withall they did not so much as vouchsafe to giue our Lord any particular name but they only sayd Inuenimus hunc c. We haue sound this fellow disturbing the peace of our people Luc. 23. and forbidding that Tribute should be paid to Cesar and declaring himselfe to be a King Yet Pilate being moued by the sight of the person of Christ our Lord did beyond his custome forbeare to make such hast as at the instant to
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
might grow partakers of the diuine nature Isa 53.2 Pet. 1. We will behould that man to adore him with all the powers of our soule to lament the sad case into which our sinnes and his loue to vs haue cast him We will behould him and we wil wish withall that vpō the price of all our liues we were able to doe him any one faithfull seruice We will behould him as our soueraigne King though heere he vouchsafed to become a subiect to the basest slaues We will behould him as our law-giuer and yet our law our sacrifice and yet our Priest our Redeemer yet our Price We will behould him with profound reuerence that so we may reuerse al the acts of shame and paine which he accepted for our benefit By the (a) What we are to contemplate by the eyes of Faith in this mistery of the Flagellation of our B. Lord. eyes of faith and loue we wil behould his glory through that Crowne of thornes His stole of immortality through that purple robe His scepter of omnipotency through that Reed of scorne His incomparable beauty through the spittle which desiled his diuine countenance And insteed of those counterfait acts of homage which those Idolatrous souldiers did performe we will cast our selues all before him with entire humility and trembling loue Esteeming our selues worthy of a thousand Hells for (b) A costly remedy of a great disease hauing needed such a costly remedy of our miseries by the innumerable sinnes which we haue committed And wheras those wretches procured euen to breake his hart with the foole scoffe of Aue rex Iudaeorum we vow our selues to prayse him thus both with hart tongue All hayle O thou true King of Christian Catholikes All haile thou Sonne of God and of the Virgin We see thy sorrowes and they fill our soules with sadnes and we are wishing if it were thy will that we were so happy as to partake thereof O that our sighes were able to make a veyle wherwith to couer thy nakednes and our teares a bath wherwith to wash away thy vncleanenes our throughts a bed of flowers wherwith to refresh thy faintenes and our actions a banquet of fruite wherwith to recouer thee from that weakenes wherin we see that our sinns haue laid thee At least deere Lord let vs not be so miserable as to continue in those sinnes of ours since they are the cause of this excesse which hath beene wrought vpon thee But do thou make the rootes of our hartes tye thēselues hard about thy sacred feete that so like liuing plants they may grow vp vnder thee being watred by any one drop of thy omnipotent bloud distilling either from the piercing thornes of thy diuine head or from the stinging scourges of thy pretious body These corporall paines wherby we see that the body of Christ our Lord was so ouerloaden is that which Pilate bad the Iewes behould And whatsoeuer effect it wrought with them it breeds a very astonishmēt in vs not only in respect of what we see but much more by that which we are taught to beleeue and inferre by this obiect of our sight For as according to that of the B. Apostle Rom. 1. the inuisible things of God that is his infinite wisedome with the rest of his diuine attributes may be discerned after a sort by the vnderstanding through a consideration of the visible things which he hath made so by the vnspeakeable paines which we see inflicted vpon the sacred person of Christ our Lord who is the liuely image of God and the (c) Exteriour sufferance with patience is a great signe of great loue exteriour meekenes wherwith he bare them we may grow into contemplation of the excellency and perfection of his charity Howsoeuer therfore the exteriour of his flesh and bloud howsoeuer the diuine countenance which he carried being all cōpounded betwene extreme sorrow and extreme shame vpon the sense of that contempt and tormēt be an obiect which ought to draw vs all running after it yet if our Lord would giue vs leaue to diue so deepe we should wonder much more at the interiour of his soule then at the exteriour of his body Happy were we if we had eyes wherwith to looke into that hart which had so rich a mine of patiēce as could neuer be drawn dry by all the malice which was exercised by those laborious and malicious hands For how much soeuer we see there is more and more and yet still more to be seene whatsoeuer we can say or thinke is very farre frō being inough And we are still to remember that whatsoeuer the fruite of vertue be in all the actions and passion of our blessed Lord the roote from whence it riseth is euer most pure and perfect loue No interest no weakenes did worke on him but only an ardent desire of the glory of God to be manifested in the procuring of our eternall good The strength and purity of this loue doth most liuely appeare by the solitude and silence wherwith he suffered such hideous things as those To (d) A most pregnant signe of purity perfect confidēce in God not to care for comfort from creatures receaue crosses so as not to desire or care I say not for prayse but not so much as for any comfort from any creature is a cleere and pregnant signe of pure loue and perfect considence in God If so we can be content to suffer we haue cause to cast our selues at the feete of our Lord with humble thanks Cant. 2. for drawing vs so close after the odours of his pretious oyntments But the world is farre from this and our weake nature is willing to vphold it selfe by the wauering reed of humane consolatiōs which it wil needs cōceaue to be a staff strong inough to support vs. But we quickly find our errour to our cost And as if we did cast our selues vpon God he would not retire himselfe to let vs fall so by leaning vpon the comfort of creatures he permits vs then to sayle out of most tender mercy that afterward womay learne to stand fast in him The loue euen of the most ardent Seraphim is of little heate if it be set by the loue which raigned in the hart of Christ our Lord whilst he was scourged and crowned yet their loue may well be great since it groweth out of an immense ioy which they haue in the fruition and feeling of that euer present and infinite good which is God But heere our Lord did as it were infinitely excell that loue of theirs though all the sensible obiect which the inferiour part of his diuine soule had were the affronts which came frō the affliction wherin he was at that tyme and the top of shame and torment which so instantly afterward he was to find in the consummation of his Passion vpon the Crosse And what thē can heere become of any loue which we conceaue
our selues to beare towards this Lord of loue since ours is so full of frailty misery and vnfaithfull dealing What a kind of nothing will it proue if it be all compared with one only spark of this pure pretious loue qui attingit à sine vsque ad sinem fortiter disponit omnia suauiter Sap. 8. Wheras ours doth nether reach home nor last long nor is it of any intense degree but so very luke warme that vnlesse the heate of hart and the thirst of our Lord were very great he would cast vs out of his mouth not sucke vs in as he doth that so we may be incorporated into himselfe The Iewes preferre Barabbas before Christ our Lorde and Pilate through base feare gaue sentence of death against our Lord and with incessant Loue he endured all CHAP. 67. OExcessiue cruelty of those enuious hypocriticall Iewes for the appeasing wherof the mercy of Pilate was euen cōstrayned after a sort to be thus cruell He shewed him to them being scourged and crowned after this bloudy manner with hope that hauing drawn from him such a streame of bloud and tormenting him still with that crowne of thornes it might haue satisfied the thirst of their rage Togeather with that spectacle of pitty he made a protestation of our Lords innocency but it would not serue For they as if already they had bene confirmed in malice in hell it selfe did stil demaund with a cōstant and generall clamour that he might be crucified Matt. 27. So (a) All turned to the disaduantage of Christ our Lord. as this designe of Pilats came to faile nothing had been gayned therby but the shedding of almost al the bloud of Christ our Lord one drop wherof was a milliō of tymes more worth in true accōt thē as many creatures worlds as God himselfe can make the piercing of that head where lay the wisedome of the wisedome of God We may yet see by the way that though Pilate had a great desire to free him in regard of his innocency yet euen that desire was accompanied with an extremely-base conceite of Christ our Lord Since he resolued not to maintaine his cause but thought him a fit man vpon whom conclusions might be tryed and to put him at a venter to the sufferance of that intollerable scorne and paine rather thē he would speake one resolute word in his behalfe Our Lord all the while had the wisedome wherwith to weigh euery one of those thoughts of his to the very vttermost that it could beare and he had patience to endure it and aboue al he had the loue wherwith to offer it to his eternall Father for our discharge Yet Pilate still went on with a velleity or coole kind of appetite to saue his life and he set another Proiect on foote which he thought might peraduenture take effect and that was grounded vpon this custome The Iewes Matt. 27. Marc. 17. Luc. 23. were wont in honour and reuerence of their great Passeouer to free some prisoner who was lyable to death by the hand of Iustice There was at that tyme a seditious murtherer in prison and he was called Barabbas Now Pilate was of opinion that putting the question betwene Christ our Lord and that wicked man they would neuer haue bene able to let that murtherer weigh downe our Lord IESVS in the ballance of their pitty But he was deceaued and they demaunded the sauing of Barabbas and cryed out amaine whē there was speach of who should be dismissed Non hunc sed Barabbam not him but Barabbas whē there was speach of what should be done with IESVS they sayd Tolle Tolle crucifige eum Away with him Away with him let him be crucified If then our (b) A deep wound inflicted vpon the tēder hart of Christ our Lord. blessed Lord were not wounded with griefe he neuer was nor could be wounded That he should liue to see the day wherin that people which was his owne flesh and bloud which had particularly bene chosen of God which he instructed with so much care which he had cured of all diseases with so much power that people which so lately before vpon that day which now hath the name of Palme-sunday had exhibited to him the greatest triumph in tokē of homage which perhaps had bene seene in the whole world Matt. 21. Marc. 11. Ioan. 12. That now I say it should so abase him below a Barabbas a seditious and bloudy thiefe notwithstanding that Pilate who was a Pagan and in other respects a most wicked man did let them see that yet he was a Saint in respect of them by intreating them rather to dismisse the King of the Iewes (c) Note this contrapositiō then him on the other side that Christ our Lord should with so profōd meekenes endure such a height of scorne without shewing that he misliked it without oncce reproaching the wicked life of that malefactour by so much as setting out the innocency of his owne without vpbrayding the ingratitude of that lewd natiō by so much as saying that he had neuer murthered any of them as the other had done but to let them do their worst by way of offence and he the while to do his best by way of patience and loue and euen then to giue vp to God that very act of his acceptation both for Barabbas and for them who were much more faulty then that wretched man what shall we say heere but that the hart of our Lord was grown a whole world of griefe loue and that we are miserable who cānot euen consume with the very thought therof But woe be to vs for we are so far frō this as that euen we our selues are the body wherof that wicked race of Iewes was a figure For so often doe we also prefer Barabbas before Christ our Lord as we choose the forsaking of God for the committing of a mortall sinne of whatsoeuer kind it be Nay therin we doe preferre euen the very diuell before God himselfe And yet so infinite is his loue as that still he beares it at our hands as then he bare it at theirs But shall we now lend an eye to our Lord IESVS as he was procuring to pay the debt of Pilats curtesy to him or rather of that lesse malice then was vttered against him by those Iewes As God he did cast into the hart of Pilats wife a vehement desire that her husband would not cooperate to his destruction as he was mā yet the frozen hart of that miserable creature would not kindle it selfe by such a sparke But the Iewes pressing hard and pretending Luc. 13. Ioan. 19. that Christ our Lord had made himselfe a King and protesting that they would haue no King but Cesar and withall that (d) The same argument preuayls too must in these dayes if Pilate should dismisse Christ our Lord they would proue him to be no saithfull subiect and friend
the Sea and I haue bene euen drowned in the tempest He came into the depth of those thoughts wherof the holy Prophet said Psalm 91. that they were too very deepe Nimis profundae factae sunt cogitationes tuae A Sea it was rather of mud then waters and he was plunged Psalm 68. in limo profundi non est substantia into that pit of mire from which he could nether be free nor find any resting place for his feete therein Nor is it strange that he should say that he was drowned when vpon the Crosse he came into the Tempest indeed since we find that in the garden where this Tempest was only present to his imagination it had almost cost him his life The imaginatiō of fearfull men doth often by way of anticipation represent things worse then they proue indeed because they seeme to feele whatsouer their weake harts are induced to feare But in the minde of our Lord IESVS Christ it could not be so for he foresaw things iust as they were to proue and that bare foresight had cast him into that bitter Agony it had made him powre out a sweat of bloud and it had forced him to say Marc. 14. that his very soule was sad euen to the death A wonderfull thing it were that a coale of fire should be buried and drowned in water yet should cōtinue still to burne Christ our Lord is this (a) The vnquēch able loue of our Lord. liuing coale of the fire of loue for though he were all steeped soaked and euen drowned in the water of affliction for our sinnes Cant. 8. Yet aquae multae non potuerunt extinguere caritatem The siery coale of his loue could not be quenched by those many waters Nay as wind doth kindle other coales so did these waters of tribulation kindle this of his loue to vs. Already vpon his condemnation the Tytle or cause of his death was deliuered in writing by Pilate to be fixed to the instrument therof which was his Crosse This tytle carried these words Matt. 27. Luc. 23. Marc. 18. Ioan. 19. Iesus Nazarenus Rex Iudaeorum Iesus of Nazareth King of the Iewes And for so much as concerned the intention of Pilate it was deliuered by a kind of chance But the superiour prouidence of God did ordayne for reasons of infinite wisedome that it should be so And although the wicked Iewes were scandalized therat and would faine haue had it changed from affirming positiuely Ibid. that he was king of the Iewes to a saying only That he had said so yet could they not be gratified therin The words were written in Hebrew Greeke and Latine which were the mother and maister-tongues of the world and so were to continue to the worlds end And now they were consecrated in most particular manner to the publique seruice of our Lord God and as such they are and will be vsed in the holy Catholike Church whatsoeuer is muttered by the aduersaries therof who are also the aduersaries both of the signe of the materiall Crosse of Christ and of the liuing Crosse also which is Mortification and Penance But the while though Almighty God had his ends heerin for our good as hath been sayd yet their malice went by other wayes and they vsed it to no other purpose which was only for the increase of his ignominy in the eyes of them who seeing such a glorious Tytle aboue and such a dolorous and deiected person vnderneath Matt. 17. Marc. 15. Luc. 23. Ioan. 19. might the more readily and profoundly contemne him and our Lord did with excesse of charity stoope to all The souldiers whilst he was suffering had so little care or thought of him as that instantly they were at leasure to fall to rifeling for his cloathes And they who made no difficulty to breake through teare his sacred body frō head to foote tooke care not to breake or cut his seam-lesse coate Our Lord was stil cōtent with all and not only was he resolued to giue his life for their soules but he gaue way that his cloathes should apparell the bodies of his persecutors He had said before that our bodies were more worth thē our garmēts Matt. 6. And if this be true in our case how much more infinitely true was it in his Both because through our Pride our cloathes be richer thē he euer wore and because our bodyes are so much baser thē that most pure and pretious body of his But these wretches did cast vp their account after another fashion marking all things els with great Figures but esteeming this Lord of all things for a meere Cypher The sacred Text doth further note that they being appointed to watch guard him whilst he was hanging vpō the Crosse were so far from bearing any part of his sorrow out of pitty as that they set (b) Barbarous wretches themselues downe at their ease which a man would scarce haue done at the death of any common rogue especially if it were a death of torment Let Pagans take their pleasures for a tyme when the Sonne of God is suffering such bitter paine for them Let the prophane souldiers of Pilate who figure out the libertines of this world sit downe and take their ease notwithstanding that our Redeemer made choyce of paine and by choosing it did facilitate and sanctify it vpon his owne sacred person to our vse But as for vs who are Catholikes and Caualliers of Christ let it be farre from vs to doate vpon delights which he auoyded and to abhorre affronts and paines Bernard ser 5. in festo omnium SS an vncomly thing for any inferiour member of a body to hunt after commodity and ease when the head of the same body should be crowned and pierced with thornes Pudeat sub capite spinoso mēbrum fieri delicatum Our head is crowned and we are not liuing parts of his body but the Canker of heresie hath consumed vs or at least the Gangrene of sensuality hath killed vs if we suffer not togeather with this head by true compassion which true compassion implyes not a pittying but a ioynt suffering according to our strength of body and the dictamen of true loue to the beloued and which if it be true indeed more easily your may perswade the soule which hath it not to liue then the body not to suffer The mortall life of our blessed Lord was drawing on apace towards an end but yet for the little while that it was to last he was not content with that one Crosse alone to which he was nayled by the cruell hands of those executioners but he admitted also of other crosses to which he was shot by the blasphemous tongues of all those kindes of people which were present They had put him out of the reach of their fingars that he might hange as he did vpon Irons in the ayre But yet they gaue him not ouer so for they wounded his
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
noblest Image and peece of Architecture that can be deuised The head being inclined downeward towards a kisse of peace and the armes extended abroad which shew that it is wholy against their will that they imbrace vs not because they are nayled And the whole frame of the body carrying and conuaying it selfe downe by degrees into a point after such a louely gracefull maÌ„ner as that not only the eye of Christianity but euen of curiosity it selfe can desire no more But (f) The straite obligation of Christians to our Lord Iesus Christ as for vs to whome it belongs in a farre superiour kind to this it will become vs to adore him who suffered so for vs withall the powers of our soule and to wish that in some proportion he would make vs able to pay our debts by euen dying for the loue of him as he vouchsaft to doe for loue of vs. In the meane tyme we may well be humble and wonder how we are able to belieue such things as these and yet to liue Of the great Loue of God expressed in those prodigious thinges which appeared vpon the death of our Blessed Lord. Of the hardnes of mans hart which keepes no correspondence with so great loue Of the bloud and water which flowed out of the side of Christ our Lord and how he did in all respects powre himselfe out like water for our good CHAP. 77. IT pleased the greatnes and goodnes of Almighty God that immediatly before the death of Christ our Lord Matt. 27. the veile of the Temple should rend it selfe that the earth should quake that the stones should cleaue that the Sepulchers should open and many of the dead should rise shew theÌ„selues in Ierusalem (a) The vse of the prodigiâ—â— which appeared vpon the death of our Lord Iesus so these thinges might serue for a figure of the great conuersions from the obstinacy and death of sinne which were to follow vpon the death of our B. Lord. As also to the end that those inanimate creatures might reproach the ingratitude of them who had life and reason and that the people of the other world might coÌ„demne the vast impiety of them of this who had murthered thus the Lord of life Now the same action lyes against all sinners of these dayes aswell as against them of those For whosoeuer do commit any mortall sinne doe by the testimony of S. Paul their best towards the recrucifying of our Lord Iesus Hebr. 6. and they preferre Barabbas before him as hath bene said And howsoeuer the finne of those persecutours seeme to haue beene greater then ours can be in regard that they concurred not only maliciously but immediatly to his destruction yet for as much as they did not though they ought to haue knowne expresly that he was the Sonne of God which we acknowledge and beleeue him to be and because the holy Ghost was not then descended as now he is into our soules or desires to be if we be ready to receaue him that sinne which would be lesse in it selfe is greater in vs. And we are not worthy to liue if we fly not from all that which giues disgust dishonor to such a Lord and if we suffer not with him who suffered so cruell things for vs. We shall else be lyable to that sad complaint of S. Bernard For speaking against the hardnes of mans hart which refuseth to relent towards the true loue of God wheras yet those very stones and earth relented he sayth most sweetly thus Bernard serm de Pass Dom. Solus homo non compatitur pro quo solo Christus moritur Christ our Lord dyed for man alone and yet man alone takes no compassion of Christ our Lord wheras yet other creatures for whome he dyed not had compassion that is in theyr kind they suffered with him The (b) The deadly malice of the Iewes to Christ our Lord which ouerliued his death malice of those Iewes was such as to thinke all that nothing which we haue heere described to haue bene inflicted vpon the persoÌ„ of Christ our Lord when he was aliue And therfore they thought that he could not be dead so soone Ioan. 19. Bloudy wretches they were For if malice had not put them out of their wits they would rather haue wondred how he could haue liu'd so long considering how barbarously he had bene treated But though he were dead their contempt hate was still aliue a Captaine looking on Ibid. had so little pitty as to pierce his sacred side with a Launce and to execute cruelty vpon his Corpes which no Ciuill person would haue done vpon the carcasse of a beast Our Lord before he dyed forsaw what they meant to do and resolued to suffer it and so to gayne the glory of ouercomming by suffering by being ouercome And he was pleased Rom. 5. that where their sinne and malice did abound there should his grace and loue superabound For behould he had reserued certain bloud and water next his hart and the Eagle S. Iohn who had eyes wherwith to behould the Sunne did see it issue out of his side He deliuered himselfe in these words Ioan. 19. Et continuò exiuit sanguis aqua That instantly bloud and water did issue forth As if he should haue sayd that they had lyen there to watch their tyme to the end that as soone as euer the ouerture should once be made by that point of the Launce they would instantly not fayle to spring out and spend themselues for the good of man For through the opening of that wound Beniamin was borne Gen. 35. though Rachel his mother dyed in trauaile And the Church of Christ our Lord doth proceed from thence and like another Eue it was fram'd out of the side of our B. Sauiour who was the second Adam when he was dead as the former Eue was framed out of the side of the first Adam Gen. 2. when he was sleeping And therfore no meruaile if the Church of Christ our Lord all her lawfull and faithfull children doe carry a most profound internall tender loue and reuerence to the Crosse of Christ our Lord especially to this sacred wound of his side as to the country from whence shee came and whether shee procures to goe And in conformity of this loue the same Church is carefull to be stil refreshing our memory of this Crosse making the (c) The frequent vse of the holy signe of the Crosse signe therof in all her Sacraments Ceremonies and Benedictions teaching her true Catholikes not to be ashamed therof but to blesse our selues often according to the custome of all ancient Saints with that holy signe vpon our foreheads vpon our mouths vpon our harts that so the whole man may be euer walking in remembrance of this mistery and that so we may be the better disposed to beare with patience and loue any contempt or
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
thanks and ardent sighes as cleere and pure as God himselfe had sent them downe without the sticking of one graine or crumme of dust to her And therefore now if she were so absolute in that inward and profound contēpt of herselfe we shall cease to find it strange that so intirely she contēned exteriour things And yet of it selfe what a wonder was it for the Queene of heauen and earth to be so ioyfully deliuered of the euer liuing God in his misterious Natiuity as we haue seene before with all the circumstances of disaduantage dishonour that could be thought But the want of all worldly things was that sumptuous banquet vpon which the soule and body of the B. Virgin loued to feed for loue of him who had emptied himselfe into that Humanity for loue of vs and which obliged vs therby to discharge euen the lawfull loue of all other things wherin the height of purity doth consist 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 CHAP. 91. FROM hence did also grow that entyere Conformity of her will with the holy wise will of God which as she had neuer ouershot in the prosperous part of her life as at the salutation of the Angell and S. Elizabeth when her Sonne was adored by the three kings in his royall throne of her lap so did she neuer fall short of it to the breadth of a hayre in any affliction or tribulation We saw before in part what her Humility was and how profoundly low it layd her owne account and how pure she kept her hart frō any cōplacence in her self vpon those highest prayses wherwith the Angell and S. Elizabeth did adorne celebrate her grace greatnes We (a) How deeply true humility abhorreth prayse know withall both by the cleere light of truth and by the faithfull records of Saints liues that an ambitious person cannot more greedily hunt after prayse then a soule truly humble will shrinke in and auoyd and abhorre the same And if euen a man who is but moderatly vaine will not easily be induced euen for very shame to prayse himselfe very much and with deliberation what an vnspeakeable auersion must needs that most humble of all humble soules haue had from all extolling of herselfe But yet since the will of God was such Luc. 1. and that the holy Ghost was pleased to vse the instrument of her tongue which of it selfe was so truly a louer of holy humble silence towards the proclayming of her owne prerogatiues and greatnes she did most ioyfully concurre to prayse herselfe and to avow that God hath done great things to her and that for them all Generations should call her blessed It was the will of God that her Sonne should fly as by the wings of her armes into Egipt for feare of that Kite King Herod and she went vpon a minutes warning with a Conformity (b) How a will which is in a conformity to the will of God must be both supple and stifie as stiff as any rocke withall as supple and gentle as any wax with a resiguation so profound as not so much as to aske when she should be freed from that Crosse It was Gods will that S. Ioseph should haue the honour of the Angels visit Matt. 2◠that she should obey a mā whose incōparable Dignity did much consist in this that he was admitted to take the care of her and to do her seruice yet behould she did punctually obey all his orders in her delight to be complying with the commaundement of our Lord God as if she had bene the beggar he the King And that we may see how many businesses the holy Ghost is able to do at once and how by commāding some one thing he giueth matter for many soules to persorme the acts of most heroicall vertue at the same tyme Vt reuelentur ex multis cordibus cogitationes it will not be a misse to consider as infallibly the thing is true in it selfe that as it was a point of most humble and pure Conformity for the B. Virgin to take law from (c) How holy S. Ioseph was mortified in being obliged to giue orders to our B. Lady S. Ioseph so was it matter of excessiue mortification to his most holy most wise and most faithfull soule to giue directions as by meanes of reuelation to that superexcellent mother of God whome so profoundly he did reueare and admire sauing only that he also would obey the diuine will therin But to returne to the Conformity of the B. Virgin and to make short in this particular and to say the chiefe of that which can be said in a word It was the will of our Lord God that his Sonne and hers being both God and man and euen as man being the most innocent and most excellent holy person that euer was should be put to the grieuous and most ignominious death of the Crosse And she saw that he had bene buffeted and dragged and hoodwincked and scourged Crowned with thornes pierced with nayles and defiled with spittle defamed with slaunders and profaned with blasphemies exposed starke naked to the view of the world vpon that top of a hill and placed betwene a coople of murdring theeues and so he continued till at last he parted with his pretious life being all dissolued into a very fountaine of bloud This I say she saw and because his death was agreeable to the will and the manner of it to the permission of our Lord God she resolued with ineffable strength of minde to will all that part of his death which God would and to permit all that which he (d) The vnspeakeable cōformity of our B. Ladies wil to the will of God permitted And she laid her selfe so wholy aside as not only not to giue it the least impediment but not so much as once to harbour the least thought that way And notwithstanding that she grieued at it more then all the creatures of God togeather could haue grieued though all their griefe had bene summed vp into one drop of griefe since she loued him more then they all could do and the griefe tooke measure by the loue she yet looked on whilst this was done and she stood vpon her feete which is the posture of strength and she turned her hart vp to God by way of offering vp euen that Sonne in vnion of his owne diuine oblation and she endured all that torment with inuincible patience And whilst (e) What a miracle of grace was this Luc. 1. the sword of sorrow which S. Simeon had foretold and which for the space of so many yeares she had with a most steady eye foreseene with the point still turned towards her and with a most carefull hart considered and which she was then in the very act of Feeling to passe and transpierce her
Charity Patience at the Crosse are trāsplanted out of the desert of this world into that gardē of God in heauen For thither is she assumed both in soule body to the fruition of more glory then is possessed by all the Angells and Saints There is she ingulfed in the bright vision of God where she sees and in whome she loues all the soules which haue recourse to her with incomparable Charity and care And if S. Augustine could truly say of his deceased friend Nebridius who was gone to God Confes l. ◠c. ◠I am non ponit aurem ad os mē c. He doth not now lay his eare to my mouth but he applyes that spirituall mouth to that spring of thine and he drinketh wisedome after the vttermost rate of his owne greedy thirst being happy for all eternity Neither yet doe I thinke that he is so inebriated with thee as that he can forget me since thou O Lord whome he is drinking art mindfull of vs. If S. Augustine I say could thus reflect vpon Nebribius who shall be euer able to expresse the perpetuall memory or rather the euer presēt sight and care of vs which the mother of our Lord God now raigning in such glory as becometh such greatnes hath incē parably more tēderly more liuely of vs then S. Augustines Nebridius could haue of him So much more as she was made our mother heere so much more as now that she is there she drinkes whole seas of God for any one drop which Nebridius could drink consequētly as she is more perfectly happy trāsformed into that Abisse of charity God himself whose loue desire care of our eternall good is infinite Proceed therfore O thou glorious Queen in being glorious raigne thou for euer vnder God alone ouer all his creatures Proceed in being gracious to vs thou who wert so ful of Grace euen before thou wert made the mother of God Thy soule did magnify our Lord at the visit which thou gauest to S. Elizabeth with (c) The princely gratitude of our B. Lady expressed in the Magnificat to our Lord God more delight ioy thē euer had bene cōceaued by any creature And thou didst thē most diuinely expresse his goodnes to thee in a māner of Court so choice noble as might wel declare that thou wert born a Queen thou didst singe Magnificat to our Lord for hauing respected as it were cast an eye of fauour towards thee And how truly indeed wert thou as good as thy word therin when thou saidst that thou didst Magnify or make great our Lord. For whilst he was bestowing those great fauours vpon thee according to those other words of thine Fecit mihi magna qui potēs est sanctū nomē eius Our Lord hath done great things to me and his name is holy thou wert euen very then returning those great things againe to him with the additiō of thine owne most humble thāks So that the greater he made thee the more great and glorious he was also made by thee And besides how couldst thou mak him shew more glorious and more great then in saying that with the cast as it were but of an eye he had made such a mother for himself as thou This Magnificat of thyne is celebrated with diligent and dayly deuotion by the holy Catholike Church in memory of that high ioy which thou hadst in thy Angelicall hart when the holy Ghost expressed it selfe by that well tuned Organ of thy tongue But now O soueraigne Lady that thou art all transformed in God thou art singing it out in a far higher straine Thou canst not say any more that he but casts an eye of fauour towards thee for now he lookes vpō thee with a full face and thou art able to see him as thou art scene 1. Cor. 13. And since the more thou seest of him the more dost thou also see of vs. Vouchsafe to implore his mercy towards the reliefe of our misery which thou canst not but find to be extreme Behould vs who are children of thy soule since by Faith thou becamst the mother of all such as were to liue by Grace And intercede thou for vs with that Sonne of thy sacred wombe whose lawes though we haue transgressed and whose Passion though we haue renewed and whose grace though we haue quenched by our innumerable sinnes yet for as much as frō our soules we are sory for thē that there was mercy in store for his very Crucifiers let it not be wāting to vs who are procuring as thou knowest to be his seruants Since we fly to the sanctuary of thy feete for succour since with the most reuerend of our thoughts we take hold of that Altar of thy purest wombe wherin the Iudge of the quicke and dead did make the first Sacrifice of himselfe to his eternall Father for the redemption of the world defend vs by thy prayers O Queene of pitty from that sword of Iustice which is ready to fall vpon our heads Thou saidst that all Generations should call thee Blessed and we are a part of them withall the powers of our soules we blesse both thee and God for thee and we vow our selues to belieue whatsoeuer excellency may be ascribed to a meere creature And we make this protestation withall that so farre we are frō derogating therby from the worship of Latria which is only due to God as that we know not in this world how to do him more high honour and seruice then by offering him first to himselfe and next by honoring and praysing thee For the greater thou art the greater do we acknowlege him to be who made thee what thou art or nothing Obtaine of that holy Spirit who ouer-shadowed thee heere which doth as it were ouerwhelme thee there in that region of eternall blisse that we also may be quickned inspired by it so may be walking on towards heauē by those paces which thy pure feete haue traced out I cannot beseech thee to obtaine wine for vs as thou didst for them of Cana for we want no wine since we are nourished by the milke of thy maternall loue which is better thē the best most pretious wine And we may also be inebriated as oftē as we shall wel dispose our selues by that Vinum germinaus virgines Lach. 9. that pretious bloud in the body of thy Sonne our Lord in the venerable Sacrament of the Altar But the misery is that our soules want mouths wherwith to tast it or rather they are all crammed with the corrupted food of delight in creatures and our blindnes is such through the mist of passiō which ouergrowes vs that we see not what we eate and much lesse can we discerne the sad effects which it works within and amongst them this one that it depriues vs of gust in heauenly things It is therfore O Queene of heauen that we cast our selues humbly
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
contynue his generall custome in speaking softly but cryed out with a loud voyce and he did it vpon the last day of the feast of the Tabernacles which was a tyme of great solemnity that so he might be heard by the greater number of people and he inuited them all Ioan. 71 to drinke of that water of life with a full mouth Confess l. 12. cap. 10. For he indeed is the true fountaine of life Hunc bibam tunc viuam saith S. Augustiue Let me drinke of him and I shall liue What (f) His ardēt sighes groans scalding sighes what profound internall groanes would that flaming hart be often sending out by his sacred mouth to the Iustice seate of God wherof we finde some expresly to be recorded in the holy Texte that so the diuine Maiesty Marc. 71 beholding the sorrowes of his soule might be obliged to forgiue the sinnes of ours How deere (g) The charming accent of his voice and how delightfull must the ordinary accent be of his heauenly voyce since the accent euer carrieth a kind of neerer coniunction to the mind and which euen for that cause can hardly be described by any words And now the nearer it was to the incomparable soule of Christ our Lord who can doubt but that needs it must be so much the fuller of delight and grace But especially how beautifull were those holy happy (h) The inestimable pure and perfect beauty of his eyes Gen. 49. eyes of his those heauēly Orbes And what felicity was theirs who might at leasure glasse themselues therin they being so full of latent Maiesty but yet sweetned by such Humility and Charity Those eyes which are pulchriores vino as the Patriarch Iacob saith speaking literally of Christ our Lord for the quality they had to inebriate with being looked vpon farre more powerfully and more sweetely then any most pretious wine can doe the man who drinks it With what kind of modest grace do we thinke that he vvould now be raysing them vp Ioan. 11. towards heauen beholding the Creatures in Almighty God and then returning them downe to the earth Ioan. 8. to see God in his Creatures And what kind of fountaines do we thinke they grew to be when they did so often swymme in teares through the compassion of our miseries Haebr 5. ◠Luc. 19. and the remission of our sinnes at the raysing of Lazarus for the ruines of Ierusalem at the giuing vp of his soule into the eternall Fathers hand and those many tymes more which are not set downe in the sacred text How sweetly would they lay themselues to sleepe being folded vp in those liddes the only sheets which any part of him did vse for the releese of that frayle nature which for our sakes he had assumed And he lent them rest with so much the better will because (i) Christ our Lord did negotiate our saluation with God as well whē he was sleeping as waking Ioan. 2. Matt. 4. sleepe gaue no impediment to the working of his minde for our good the knowledge of which mind was no way as hath beene said else where dependant vpon his Fancy as ours is How were they able when he was pleased to do it to pierce the hartes of men by way of terrour when for the zeale of his Fathers glory he punished the buyers sellers in the Temple vvithout their daring once to bring him to the least account for that supposed excesse And by way of powerfull mercy when seing his Apostles he called them at once from the world to his eternall seruice And looking afterward vpon S. Peter in the tyme of his passion by only looking (l) The lookes of Christ our Lord did moue S. Peeter to contrition Luc. 72. Luc. 7. he retyred him at an instant from his sinnes as wil be seen more at large afterward And not only did those eyes so full of maiesty and modesty and humility suauity captiue those hartes which they beheld but others who beheld them were as inseparably also captiued therby as if there had beene no place left for election whether they would be takē prisoners or no. The enamoured (m) How the diuine presence of Christ our Lord did most chastly captiue the soule of S. Mary Magdalen Penitent S. Mary Magdalene who formerly was so abandoned to the pleasure of sense found her soule so maistered by this diuine obiect of our B. Sauiours presence that her former honny did instantly turne gall and she was so ingulfed into a sea of chast and pure delight that in the life tyme of our Lord she did euen as it were nayle her selfe to his sacred feet Nay she forsooke them not in his very passion when they were nayled to the Crosse She was in chase of them till his Resurection and after his Ascension she confined her selfe for all those thirty yeares of her suruiuing to a rude and most retyred desert disdayning with a holy kind of scorne that her eyes should feed vpon any other obiect then that which her memory would euer be sure to help her to of her most beloued and most beautifull Lord. His sacred presence had not any superficiall or glearing beauty belonging to it but (n) The Beauty of Christ our Lord was so aboundāt as to make a mā despise all temporall riches a beauty which conteined a Mine of plenty S. Mathew shall witnes this and he shall do it better then by words For instantly vpon our Lords commaundement and their mutuall sight of one another he followed him and that for euer and he discouered in our Lord Iesus another mannor of beautifull abundance then all the whole world could helpe him to And perhaps there is not a better proofe of the rich beauty and excellency of our Lord nor a stranger conuersion of any man recorded Luc. 54 then of this Apostle Who was as we may say in flagranti crimine in the very seate and chaire of sinne beseiged by the company of others who were likely to be as much depraued as himselfe He was in the exercise and occasions of new extorsions and yet (o) The Cōuersiō of S. Matthew was most heroicall he left all without taking so much as an howers tyme to cleere his bookes of account which could not choose but be intricate And all this vpon the single sight hearing the voyce of a meere man as Christ our Lord appeared to be And yet I say so rich was our Sauiours beauty and so attractiue was his manner of speach that instātly it was able to draw that Publicā though he were besotted by desire of gayne to follow him who through his pouerty seemed withall to be the owner of no earthly thing but only of his owne indiuiduall person But the Maies̄ty and splendour of the diuinity though it lay hid Cōment in Matth. c. 7. did yet shine so brightly in his face of flesh bloud as S. Hierome
vvould faine haue hindred their childreÌ„s death but his grovving out of pure and perfect loue out of a thirst of their instant and eternall good he permitted it to his ovvne bitter griefe And by (g) A stroÌ„g comfort to such as are persecuted for the cause of Christ our Lord. the selfe same measure vve may also discerne the same loue vvhich by our Lord is borne to all the rest of his seruants vvhome he suffereth to suffer for his truth and he deserueth to be adored vvith all our soules since he makes euen them vvho pretend meane to be our greatest enemies to be the chiefest instuments of our glory and good The great Loue of our Lord Iesus is further shewed in his flight to Egypt CHAP. 19. THIS act of so great loue vvas in the hart of our Lord Iesus but he contents not himselfe to loue vs only vvith his hart vnlesse vvithall he may put himselfe to further paine and shame And behould vvhen he vvas fast a sleepe in those deere armes of his all-imaculate and most holy mother and in house with that holy Patriarcke S. Ioseph an Angell appeared to that Saynt being also at that tyme a sleepe Requiring him to rise Matt. 2. and take the child and his mother and to fly into Egipt and there to remaine till he should be willed to returne because Herod would procure to destroy the child But where shall we find meanes wherewith to admire and adore this Lord of ours Who for the discouery of the infinitenes of his loue would vouchsafe so farre to ouer shadow the omnipotency of his power as that he being the Lord of Angells would be directed by an Angell a Obserue the strange humility charity patience of our Lord in this Mystery and being God himselfe would be disposed of by a man and being the seate and Center of all true repose would be raysed from his rest at midnight together with that heauenly Virgin to be sent flying from the face of an angry tyrant in so tender yeares into a Country so remote so incommodious so barbarous and so Idolatrous It was a iourney of (*) Three hundred English â—â—yles See Baradius Tom. 1. l. 10. cap. 8. twelue daies at the least for any stronge traueller could not be of lesse then thirty or forty for this little family which was forced to be fleeting thus from home This family which was compoÌ„ded of a man in yeares who loued to conuerse in the howse of his owne holy hart a most pure and most delicate virgin who was not wont to be shewing herselfe to strange places and persons and that excellent diuine infant who would permit himself to want as much assistaÌ„ce as that weake state could need which must needes increase the trouble both of them and him Their pouerty without all doubte was very great for though the Magi when they opened and offred of their treasures to him must be thought to haue left inough for the contynuall entertainement of such a company yet by a circumstance which may be considered heere it will be euident that they were growne poore againe For at the Prosentation of our Lord in the Temple wherof I haue already spoken but heer it will be fit to looke backe vpon it once agayne our B. Lady was and would be purified Not that she had need of being purisied she in comparison of whose high purity the most pure Seraphims of heauen are but drosse and dust but because our Lord her Sonne would be subiect to the imputation of sinne by Circumcision our B. Lady his mother would be thought subiect to the comon shame of mothers by purification To which heroicall act of contemning her selfe our Lord by his example had drawne her thereby withall did make vs knowe that it was not impossible for meere creatures by meanes of that grace (b) The omnipotency of Gods grace which is imparted to vs with so much loue to abandon and dispise our selues and not only to be content but euen delighted in being dispised by others Now at the Purification of al women an oblation was to be made by order of the law and a lambe was to be offred by the rich and a paire of Turtle doues or two yong Pigeons Leuit. 12. by the poore And (c) A demonstration to prooue what shift our B. Lady made to grow quickly poore agayne since this latter was the offring which the B. Virgin made it is cleere that through her charity to others her selfe would needs become poore againe She hauing such a stronge example of pouerty before her eyes as that God should make himselfe a naked child for the good of men and she not fayling to learne and lay vp the lesson of this vertue which was the first that was made to her by our B Lord. So that since they were persons so very poore and so vnfit for trauaile and to take a iourney of so great imcommodity and lengh without so much as an ynch of any ground of hope that after such or such a tyme expired they should returne was such a dish ful of difficultyes for them to feed vpon as could neuer haue been digested if it had not been dressed and sawced with the most ardent loue of our Lord lesus By this example of his he hath giuen vs stronge comfort in all those banishments distresses which we may be subiect to And it hath wrought so well with the seruants of God as that they haue triumphed with ioy for the happines of being able to suffer shame or sorrow for his sake But (d) The great change which was wrought in Egypt after the Presence of our Lord Iesus especially did it worke wonders in that rude and wicked Country of Egypt For he had no soeuer perfected the mistery of our redemption vpon the Crosse but through the odour of his sacred infancy that Prouince did early get a kind of start beyond all the others of the vvorld in breeding and nursing vp huge troopes of famous Marlyrs Anchorites Eremits and other holy Monks in the strongest Mortification and penance which hath beene knovvn in the Christian vvorld And novv let vs see vvho hath the face vvhervvith to deny or the hart vvhervvith to doubt the effects of the infinite loue vvhich our Lord did shevv by this flight of his into Egipt Where such a renouation of the invvard man vvas made as that insteed of dogs and catts and serpents and diuels vvhich vvith extraordinary diligence of superstition were vsually there adored beyond the other parts of the world so many Tryumphant Arches were erected there so shortely after in honour of Christ our Lord as there were high and happy soules who consecrated themselues to his seruice in a most pure and perfect manner with detestation of all those delights which flesh and bloud is wont to take pleasure in And they imbraced with the armes both of body and soule all those difficulties
and miseries which they found that our Lord had bene pleased to indure for thē and which the world doth so deepely feare and so deadly hate The Tyrant in the meane tyme Vide Maldonat in c. 2. Matt. after some six or seauen yeares expired according to the most probable opinion not disposing himself to lay downe that batbatous bloody minde wherby like a wolse he persecuted the lamb of God Ioan. 1. who taketh away the sinnes of the world and vvho during all that bitter banishment of his did neuer cease to vvooe him by inspirations and many other meanes to depart frō his dānable designe came at last to his due deserued end For he fel into the cōpasse of those impenitēt sinners vvhich S. Augustine discribeth thus after his diuine manner Confes l. 5. cap. 2. Subtrahentes se lenitati tuae offendētes in rectitudinē tuam cadentes in asperitatē tuam Videlicet nesciunt quòd vbique sis quem nullus circumscribi◠locus solus es praesens etiam his qui longè fiunt à te They withdrew thēselues saith he from thy mercy and they met with thy Iustice and they fell vpon thy rigor or reuenge And all because they knew not that thou O Lord art euery where whome no place doth circumscribe and who only art present euen to them who will needs make themselues far of from thee This was Herods case who in vayne did looke for the Lord of life heere or there to murther him who was not only heere or there but euery where Or rather with him there is no such thing as any where but only so far forth as it is made to be so by his Omnipresence Particularly our Lord had still bene knocking at his hart But the Tyrant locked him out seeking him in that wicked manner the more he sought him so the further of he was frō finding him though yet himselfe was found by him Confes lib. 4. cap. 9. For as the same S. Augustine saith els where of a sinner Quo it quo fugit nisi à te placido ad te iratum vbi non inuenit legem tuam in paena sua lex tua veritas veritas tu Whither goeth a sinner or whither flyeth he but from thee being pleased to thy selfe being offended And where shall he not find thy law to his cost and thy law is Truth and this Truth is thou thy selfe By this law of Iustice and by this Truth the tyrāt was found out at last For our Lord considering that he would not make vse of his loue to him by asking pardō resolued that he would make him an instrument of his own loue to vs by giuing vs an example which we might auoyd And so he (e) How the Iustice of God vpon Herod was grounded in his mercy loue to vs. Vide 10. seph l. 17. Antiquit. cap. 8. Euseb l. r. Hist Eccle siast strocke him with extreme afflictions of minde and vnspeakeable torments of body according to the description of Iosephus For within he was all burning as in fire his lyms were swolne his pudenda turned themselues into vermine and his whole body was of so hatefull a smel as that he might rather be thought a lining and feeling and talking dunghill then a ma and so he dyed Yet now though our Lord did shew his Maiesty as a God he would not yet forsake his owne humility patience and charity as man but he expected in Egypt till this hungry wolfe were dead And then vpon the admonition of an Angell he returned and went into Galilea and so to Nazareth where he remayned with his sacred mother and the holy Patriarche S. Ioseph his supposed Father Lue. 2. And he grew as the Euangelist saith and was strengthned being full of wisedome and the grace of God was with him Both which he shewed after an admirable manner at his disputing and teaching in the Temple as will appeare by that which followeth Of the great Loue which our Lord Iesus shewed by his disputing and teaching in the Temple CHAP. 20. AS on the one side our Lord IESVS did omit noe exquisite diligence which might serue for the deliuery of himselfe to the knowledge and the loue of men so yet on the other he vsed it with so much caution as to make such as saw him rather to desire then to glut themselues vpon him For (a) How sweetly our Lord did manifest himselfe by degrees he being as he was the Souerayne originall light of the whole world chose to manifest himselfe to it which lay in darknes by degrees least otherwise insteed of being illuminated it might be dazeled He was twelue yeares old before he made any shew of himselfe but only by making those holy Pilgrimages to the Temple at three seuerall tymes of the yeare To which howsoeuer he were not bound in that tender age nor could he be indeed obliged at all yet it is most likely that euen before he would binde himselfe as now we se he did by his loue to giue vs that great example of his deuotion as also not to depriue his all-immaculate mother and S. Ioseph of that comfort which without him they could not so well enioy Those indeed were Pilgrimages (b) How Pilgrimamages to holy places ought to be performed which the world may looke vpon both for admiration imitation With what silence what introuersion what height of piety were they performed and hovv present to the minde of our B. Sauiour were all those persons of the world who vvould deny and deride such Religious iourneyes to holy places And such others also vvho both beleeuing practising the same would yet abuse that holy institution either by voluntary and long distractions or else by oftentation and for both those kindes of people would his loue sollicit him to be deeply sorry He saw also such others as would greatly honour him and his Saints by such deuotions and not only did he take particular larioy in euery one of them but by his merits and prayers and especialliy by euery one of those holy paces did he obtaine at the hands of his eternall Father that grace and strength wherby such actions might be well performed But when they were at Ierusalem in the frequent assembly of that people it was not so strange that the parents should loose the sight of the Child wherupon (c) The griefe of our B. Lady and Saint loseph vpon the losse of Christ our Lord in the Temple they sought him with griefe inough They thought that some of their freinds and kindred might haue procured to make him returne with thē as who would not haue byn glad to become as happy as he could by the excellent presence of our Lord. So as they looked him amongst their friends a dayes iourney off from Ierusalem and not finding him there they returned to the Citty full of care and found him the third day