and vse of Baptisme that ordinarily it shall be administred by her Priests and in her Churches and solemnized with her sacred and most significant * Ritual Roman Ceremonies as namely the signe of the holy Crosse Exorcisines Insufflations Inpositiou of hands together with salt and holy Oyle with diuers others vvhich are thought fit to accompany an action of so great importance and the figures vvherof vvere deliuered and recomended by Christ our Lord himselfe as S. Ambrose notes vvhen he cured that person vvho vvas possessed by a diuell both dumbe and deefe by putttng spittle vpon his tongue and thrusting his fingars into his eares and saying Ephata vvhich is Be opened at most of vvhich Ceremonies though Sectaries vvill take liberty to laugh and scoffe vve Catholikes vvill not be ashamed to reueale them as vve are taught to doe not only though chiefely for the authority and custome it selfe of the holy Church but partely also because vve see in the vvritings of most auncient and holy Doctours Vide Bellar de Sacram Bap. l. 18. c. 26. both frequent and venerable mention to be made therof Hovvsoeuer I say all this be true yet neuerthelesse it vvas the gratious pleasure of our blessed Lord and it is the practise of his true Spouse the holy Church in case that the person to be baptized be in any extremity of daunger to forbeare all those ceremonies vvhich cannot then conueniently be vsed And it sufficeth for the eternall saluation of that soule that the vvater be applyed those fevv sacred vvords pronounced vvhich are prescribed And this in those cases may be done not only by lay men but euen by vvomen and all in the vertue and through the loue and by the merit of the Baptisme of Christ our Lord. Lib. 2. in Luc. Tom. 5. ser de Baptismo For one man was went as S. Ambrose sayth but he washed all the world One man descended that we might all ascend One man tooke vpon him the sinnes of all that so the sinnes of all might dye in him Our Lord was baptized not meaning to be cleansed by those waters but to cleanse those very waters that so they being washed by the flesh of Christ our Lord which knew no sinne might be intytled to the right of Baptisme Ser. de Temp. And S. Augustine doth also say A mother there was who brought forth a sōne yet she was chast the water washed Christ and it was made holy by him For as after the birth of Christ our Lord the Chastity of the B. Virgin was glorisied so after his Baptisine the sanctisication of the waters was approued To her saith he afterward was virginity imparted and vpon it fecundity was bestowed as we shall instantly and cleerly see The discourse concerning Baptisme is contynued and the great Loue of our Lord in the institution of that Sacrament is more declared CHAP. 22. THIS Baptisme instituted thus by Christ our Lord is both a mistical kind of death and withall it is a new begetting of a soule to life The first Adam is put to death that Christ our Lord who is the second Adam may be formed in vs. The whole world lay drowned till thus it was fetcht from vnder water The holy Apostle speakes of Baptisme as of a kind of death Cap. 6. For he tells the Romans that they he were washed together with Christ our Lord by Baptisme vnto death that is to sinne which is the worker and cause of death That as our Lord rose from the dead by the glory of his Father so we may walke in newnes of life And shortly after whosoeuer of vs are baptized in Christ Iesus are baptized to his death And againe to the Colossians you are buried together with him in Baptisme in whom you are risen to life This Baptisme is also a Regeneration wherby we are made the adopted sonnes of God and the brethren Coheires and liuing members of Christ our Lord. And the same Lord sayth Ioan. 3. Vnlesse you be borne againe of water and the holy Ghost I. Pet. 1. you shall not enter into the kingdom of God And besides he hath regenerated vs into a liuing hope This ioynt Resurrection with our Lord is made to that newnes of life wherof the Apostle speakes els where Colos 2. Rom. 6. For by this Lauer we are renewed by which we are also borne agayne So that we see how this Baptisme of Christ our Lord according to the seuerall partes therof was a figure in the exteriour both of the burying of our soules from sinne and of the begetting therof to grace his descending into the waters signifying the one and his returne out of them the other This Sacrament which was procured for vs by the labour and loue of our Lord IESVS in a most particular manner doth imprint a Caracter vpon the soule which is indeleble for all eternities and wherby we are maked and knowne to be the sheepe of Christ our Lord. It is the gate or entrance of all the other Sacraments and auowed to be such by the Councell of Trent Concil Trident. sess 7. Can. 9. de Sacram in genere It is a necessary meanes for the taking away of Originall sinne and for cloathing the soule with the primitiue stole of Iustice. In former ages they who were baptized were called Illuminated persons and baptisme it selfe was called Illumination and the Sacrament of Faith Yea baptized persons are said to be Illuminated by the Apostle himself It takes away both the sinne and all that penalty which may by due to it It fills the soule which grace and vertue and it is both necessary to saluation it guideth to it The weight of which word (a) What thing the word Saluation doth import Saluation whosoeuer doth consider well withall that it is applyed to vs by such an obuious and familiar meanes as this will not be so apt to snarle and quarrell at the Ordination of God as if it were a point of cruelty to separate such persons from himselfe as reach not Baptisme through his inscrutable iudgments for the sinne of Adam to which the whole race of man is subiect as they will be to admire his mercy and adore his Charity for chalking out such an easy way wherby so many millions of creatures might with great facility decline the euerlasting torments of hell and be entytled to the eternall ioyes of heauē For this is the happy case of all them who dye in their infancy after Baptisme hauing formerly bene subiect to Originall sinne and the curse therof which is double death although afterward they were to haue had no effectuall meanes of euer producing so much as any one good thought For these soules are instantly to be translated by the only meanes of this holy Sacrament to the habitation and possession of that celestiall kingdome And there doe they feele and there doe they tast the incorruptible fruite of that incomparable
content for loue of vs to be spit vpon to be buffeted stript stareke naked scourged crucified blasphemed for the loue for the good of man I find it not so strange that a Iew who called Christ our Lord Impostour and Traytour should deny this Doctrine of the blessed Sacrament because he beleeues him to be a Traytour and a Lyer who said That the bread was his body I find it not so strāge that a Pagan or a Morisco should deny it for he also denies to beleeue that God did make himselfe man and dye But that a Christian who saith that Christ is God and who acknowledgeth those words of Hoc est corpus meum to haue bene spoken by his owne sacred mouth and that so immediatly before he dyed and besides in the nature of a last will and Testament which no ordinary wise man would haue penned in doubtfull and ambiguous termes that a Christian I say should cut himselfe out such a motly kind of faith at this and argue against Gods power by saying that his body must needs be subiect to all the qualities of other naturall bodyes whether he will or no and against his infinite mercy by not beleeuing that he would submit himselfe though he sayd he did to such indignities as they conceaue him to be subiect to by this kind of communication of himselfe this I say is strāge and I say agayne that it deserues to be eternally deplored with teares of bloud For in (g) The denyall of this doctrine doth shoot at the disgrace of Gods omnipotency or infinite wisedome or infinite loue in fine all the arguments which they bring against the probability of this diuine truth are but so many arrowes shot vp by them against his omnipotency And all those reasons wherby they would taxe it of any absurdity or inconuenience are but so many teeth which offer to carpe and teare away some part of his infinite wisedom And all those charges wherby they would lay aspersion vpon it of indignity are but so many protestations that they are not capable of the supereminent science wherof the blessed Apostle speakes Ephes 3. cōcerning the infinite goodnes and loue of Christ our Lord to man Of the Obligation which we haue to God for so great a benefit and who are most bound to be deuoted to it and why and how happy they must needs be who frequent it with deuotion CHAP. 51. LET the same loue of IESVS Christ our Lord intercede with the Eternall Father that they may not for euer be depriued of this food of life Without which it is no meruaile if they be dayly more and more disposing themselues to dye that fearfull double death both of body and soule And for our parts we who are Catholikes let (a) The great obligation which Catholiques haue to God for the blessing of our faith vs adore that excellent Maiesty for this high mistery and especially for that light of faith and grace wherby he hath enabled vs to beleeue it to loue him for it Nay let vs do it so much the more as there are too many in the world who dishonour and blaspheme him euen for this very excesse of his goodnes Which though he designed to all mankind yet to vs alone he hath giuen efficacious helpes wherby to gather the true fruite therof And so let (b) We must procure God amends for the faults of others vs double our deuotiō to this bread of Angells as that we may make Christ our Lord a kind of amends as I may say in respect of the much loue which he hath wholy lost vpon the vnbeleeuers blasphemers of this mystery so that we must pay not only our owne but others debts Especially it will concerne such of vs to be entirely deuouted to it as haue much dishonoured or prophaned this diuine Sacrament either by any notable want of preparation before the receauing it or of recollection afterward and much more if when they came to this Table they examined and looked vpon their conscience through the false spectacles of selfe loue and passion and not through the cleere pure christall glasse of the law of God For thus they taught themselues to beleeue grosse lyes insteed of truth and to walk in the darke through the most intricate and obscure waies of sinne and thereby they haue come to pollute themselues and prophane the holy thinges of God and to commit as many sacriledges as they receaued Sacraments and they would infallibly and most iustly haue dropt downe into hell if our Lord had not been infinitely mercifull towards them Such persons as these and there are too many such in the world when they communicated or celebrated in such a state of mind in mortall sinne as this did deserue to be strucken with suddē death at the Altar where they stood or before which they kneeled and there to haue made their entrance into the eternall torments of hell fire It (c) Our Lord might haue inflicted great punishmēts for this great fault and yet still haue been full of mercy had bene mercy and infinite mercy in God if giuing them grace to repent their sinnes afterward he had but strucken them at the present with some signe from heauen in the face of the world according to some such examples of his Iustice as were seen sometymes by the testimony of S. Cyprian and others in the primitiue Church Or els if he had depriued them of the vse of reason and made them mad and franticke for a while Or els if towards the sauing of their soules he had permitted them for a tyme to be possessed with Legions of deuills in their body and to be subiect to their rage by tearing their flesh with their owne hands and throwing themselues into fire and water and foaming and vttering dreadfull cryes and wandring by night in darke woods or els amongst the sepulchers of dead men as we find in the holy Ghospel that possessed persons did vse to doe This more then this seuerity might our Lord haue vsed against the prophaners of this mystery yet haue shewed excessiue mercy if withall he had giuen them grace to repent at last But these sinnes are frequent though the exemplar punishment be not so For our Lord expecteth vs to penance that so he may not be forced to take reuenge and this he doth in the bowells of his owne charity and the inuinciblenes of his patience for which let all the Angells prayse him But for this very reason of his infinite goodnes euen abstracting from the double trebble dangers which either delaies of our conuersion or relapses from grace doe vse to bring it will be tyme for vs all to turne the leafe that the good may be better and the bad may procure to be growing good For (d) Euen the excellency of the food makes the not digesting it the more daungerous but as for this food by grace we may digest it
then the very death of God And since Christ our Lord being the increated wisedome of the Eternall Father would needs vndergoe all those torments for the remission extirpation of sinne it is a cleere demonstratioÌ„ that he felt the weight of our sinnes more heauily then he did his bitter and opprobrious death since no wise man would accept to suffer a greater paine for the excusing of another which were lesse So that as by the humility and charity of God which is so liuely exprest in the crucifixion of our Lord IESVS we are obliged to loue him and to imitate his Humility and his Charity so by the consideration of that Maiesty of God which we may discerne and of the high purity of his nature and his great hate of sinne we are taught to reuere him and to tremble 2. Cor. 5. and to carry firme resolutions to serue him with all fidelity and care and rather to dy a thousand tymes then once to presume to offend him in the least degree S. Paul declareth to vs that Deus erat in Christo mundum reconcilians sibi The (b) How Christ our Lord is the Mediatour betweene God and man ommpotent God did descend to be vnited to the humanity of Christ our Lord that so he might reconcile the whole world to himselfe and yet neuerthelesse they are few who will be reconciled to saluation by our blessed Sauiours death in comparison of the multitudes which are to perish For so our Lord assured vs saying Matt. 7. The way to heauen is a hard and narrow way and few will dispose themseues to walke in it but the way to perdition is a wide and easy way and it will be walked in by many Now this streight way was the life and Doctrine of Christ our Lord according to what himselfe had sayd Ioan. 14. Egosum via veritas vita I am the way the truth and the life So that it is not the only death of Christ our Lord which saues the world but that death must be applyed to vs by such meanes as the wisedome of God hath ordayned This meanes consisteth in our meeting with God in the person of IESVS Christ our only Lord. For as God descended downe by him so by him we must ascend vp towards God For this cause he is said to be medius mediator the middle person and mediatour betwene God and man and indeed the only true medius terminus wherby we may euer grow to a good conclusion The desire of Christ our Lord is to rayse vs thither according to his own diuine promise But a man is not drawne to spirituall things by force or by the paces of his feete or by the knowledge of his head but by the prayers and pious affections of his hart and the reformation of his life by a faythfull cooperation with the grace of God So as if we meane to reape the benefit of this Passion we must first (c) Beliefe of the mistery of the passioÌ„ of Christ our Lord. belieue with a supernaturall and vndoubted faith that it was performed by God and man for the redemption of the whole world We must then reflect (d) Consideration vpon it with most cordiall and profound loue detesting (e) Detestation of sinne our sinns which were the causes of his suflerance and resoluing as I was saying to dye a thousand deathes rather then to offend him who was so much offended by them We must (f) Reflection vpoÌ„ the vertues of Christour Lord. consider the admirable vertties which he exercised with diuine perfection vpon the Crosse and in the whole course of his holy life and death his humility his patieÌ„ce his meekenes his silence his purity his conformity and his Charity And we are carefully to consider that it was in his power to haue suffered as much as he suffered if he had bene so disposed without letting vs knowne the maÌ„ner of it But he was pleased to doe it in the eye of the world to the end that the world might see the patterne of all that vertue which it was to imitate And that as by the substance of his death he would redeeme vs so by the circÌ„stances manner of it he would instruct and oblige vs to his loue For this it was Matth. 2. that when the Angell reuealed to S. Ioseph that the Sonne whome the sacred virgin should bring forth was to be called IESVS he assigneth a reason of giuing him that name the Office which he was to haue in sauing his people from their sinnes And as there are belonging to sinne a guilt or fault and a paine or punishment so was this IESVS to deliuer his people from them both and not to be a Sauiour by halfes yea and by the lesser halfe in deliuering them only from the punishment of hell as Libertines make theÌ„selues beleeue but especially to free them by his grace and the holy example of his life and death from committing the very sinnes themselues as was * 〈◊〉 the 〈◊〉 of 〈…〉 shewed before For the application also of this death and passion to the saluation of our soules we must be led by this example to suffer such Crosses with patience as our Lord by the hand of his Eternall and Fatherly prouidence shall haue appointed vs to imbrace as the way and meanes of our saluation Our Lord in his sufferance vpon the Crosse did sanctify and facilitate all the Crosses which should euer come to mankind And as it is most true that to all such as apply this Passion to their soules by faith and loue the eternity of their torment in hell is conuerted by vertue of this sufferance into the temporall paines of voluntary pennance or else of sickenes sorrow pouerty shame and the like imposed by our Lord God or else into the paines of Purgatory supposing that they haue not satisfied in this life and though the temporall Crosses which they indure are withall made light therby so wee be to the world for giuing life to men who are so vnworthily wicked as to (g) An vnworthy most wicked erâ—our thinke that Christ our Lord hath suffred all that men haue in effect no more to doe but to belieue that he did suffer it How can such people thinke that God is wise if he should haue committed such a folly How can they thinke that he is Iust if he would haue falne into such a partiality How can they thinke that he is holy if he should haue exercised such impiety Nay how can they thinke that he is merciful if he should haue acted such a part of cruelty as it would haue bene for him to take his owne very Essence and substance his owne increated vnderstanding the second person of the most glorious and euer blessed Trinity and to knit that person by hypostaticall and indissoluble Vnion to the body and soule of the sonne of the All-immaculate Virgin Mother by the ouershadowing of
both extremely laborious withall very lickerish after all the delightfull obiects which it lookes vpon And for listening gazing it growes first to cheapning then to buying by the disorder distēpered heate therof it blowes with vehemet desire vpon them And so it rayseth a dust into the eye of the vnderstāding wherby it is made as blind almost as the blind will it selfe And wherby it growes persuaded that how deere soeùer that cōterfeit ware do cost it may proue a kind of sauing bargaine to vs in the end Now what a case are we therfore in if our Loue being so restles a thing as it is so resolued to be euer feeding vpon some obiect or other we suffer that to be such a one as besides the endles tormes of the next life can neuer bring vs to any true rest in this For the soule can neuer rest in the possession or fruition of any creature The reason heerof is playne because the rest of any thing consisteth in the attayning inioying of that last end to which it was ordayned in the creation therof And therfore the soule of man being made for the fruition of God whose glorious vision is only able to make vs say It is inough what meruaile is it that it can take no lasting true contentment in any thing which is lesse then God The holy S. Bernard sayth heervpon to this essect It is no meruaile that the soule of man can neuer be satisfied with the possessions honours pleasures of this world For the soule desires to feed vpon such a meat as may carry proportion to it selfe Now the entertaiments of this life carry no proportion at all to the soule in the way of giuing it entiere satisfactiō For the soule is spirituall immortall and all these obiects are either temporall or carnall And therfore as he who were ready to starue for lacke of meate would be ridiculous if he should thinke to kill his hungar by going to a window gaping there like some Camelion to take in the ayre which ayre is no cōpetent and proportionable food for a body of flesh bloud iust so a man who shal pretend to satisfy fulfill the desires of a spirituall immortal substāce as we know the soule to be by feeding fowly vpon the Carrion of Corporall thinges is at least as very a foole as the former And besides his folly his losse of labour in the meane time he wil heerafter grow to suffer by it so much more hē the otherr as the eternall dānation of a soule is a matter incōparably more considerable then the death of a mortall body No it is God alone who can quēch the infini e appetite of his reasonable creatures He alone made the whole world for vs vs for himself he only is our Center place of rest He only is that first Truth which our vnderstāding should aspire to know the only Good which our Will should be so inflamed to Loue. And because as hath bene said the question is but of the Meanes wherby we must tend to this most perfect End and for that by the treachery of our sēses we are induced to place our harts the affectiōs therof vpon dāgerous vicious obiects it is therfore shat I am procuring to set that one before vs which is the most strōg sweet perfect meanes which may not only inuite but assist vs also admirably otherwise towards the ariuing to our last End The line which leades to this faire full point the way which guides vs to this eternall habitation is that top of beauty and excellency Iesus Christ our Lord vpon whom if we can perswade our selues to fasten the rootes of allour Loue we shall not only be happy there but euē heere And to the end that we may consider the innumerable inualuable reasons which we haue to loue this Lord of ours I haue laboured first to shew the vnspeakeable dignity of his person then the infinite loue it selfe which he hath borne to vs. And this I haue deduced out of the principal misteries of his most sacred life bitter death as they haue bene deliuered to vs in holy Scripture And although whilst I treate of the Loue of our Lord to vs in euery one of the particular mysteries I do also shew the straite obligation into which we are cast of returning loue for loue to him yet I procure to do it more expresly towards the end of the book in the two last Chapters The holy ghost be he who by sweetly breathing vpō our soules may inable vs to do this duty well which hath bene so highly deserued of vs which only is able to make vs happy OF THE LOVE OF OVR LORD IESVS CHRIST declared by shewing his Greatnes as he is God CHAP. 1. THE Loue of our Lord Iesus Christ to this wretched and wicked creature Man is such a Sea without any bottome and such a Sunne without all Eclipse that not only no fadome can reach it must not so much as any eye behould it as indeed it is And whither soeuer we looke either vp or downe or towards any side we shall find our selues ouer wrought by the bulke and brightnes thereof Now (a) The quality of the persōs which loue each other giueth price and value to the loue it selfe because the loue of any one to any other doth take a tincture from the quality of the persons betweene whome it pasles therefore the loue of our Lord to vs is proued heereby to be infinite and incomprehensible because the dignity and Maiesty of his person is incomprehensible and infinite It will therefore be necessary to declare some part of the excellency of his person And for his sake who loued vs with so eternall loue I beg in this beginning an exact attention Because (b) The reason why exact attention is heere required what I am to say in this place being the ground whereon the rest of this discourse must rise will both giue it clearer light and greater weight and more certaine credit Nor can any thing which shall be deliuered in the progresse heerof be so high or deep or wide or hard to the beliefe whereof the soule wil not be able to flye at full ease and speed betweene the wings of faith and loue when it considers and ponders well who it is of whō we speake Our Lord Iesus Christ being perfect God and perfect Man as God is the only begotten eternall sonne of his Father and wholy equall to him And because (c) The generatiō of the Son of God he is begotten of him by an act of Vnderstanding proceeding out of that inexausted fountaine of his wisedom as if it were out of a wombe he is therefore called the Wisedome begotten the Word the Image and the Figure of his Father from whome togeather with the Sonne the Holy Ghost proceeds And for as much as the
though euery one will not reach so high That we must be perfect as our heauenly Father is perfect And that whoso euer will be so must sell all that he hath and giue it to the poore and follow our Lord and that such a one shall haue his treasure in heauen That if any man would come after our Lord he must deny himselfe and take vp his Crosse and follow him For he that would saue his life should loose it and he that would loose his life should saue it That his disciples must goe in Mission for the conuersion of soules without depending vpon the hauing of any viaticum or the wearing so much as shooes or carrying a wallet with them for any prouision That they must looke persecution and euen death it selfe in the face and not so much as premeditate what they are to say for themselues in those occasions These are the most fragrant flowers wherof that rich garment is wouen or rather these are the most choyce Iewells wherof that pretious Crowne is composed which Christ our Lord brought downe from heauen With intention to put it vpon the heads of all such persons as meant to be disciples of his Doctrine and to become Graduates in his schoole of Perfection And (c) The faithfull practise of the Doctrine of Christ our Lord makes men happy euen in this life verily euen in this life the study and practice of this Doctrine of Christ our Lord doth make men happy after a sort and put them heere into a kind of tast of that felicity wherof they are to take the whole daughts heerafter in the kingdome of heauen For so great is the purity power thereof as to lodge a man out of the reach of humane things by making him place his felicity euen in Crosses both of paine and shame wherof in such a world as this he shal be sure to haue no want And to make him see that his misery cōsists in nothing but in swaruing frō this way to his felicity Happy is he who feeles the truth of this in his soule and most miserable is he who although he feele it not will not yet beleeue that the thing is true For he who beleeues not this truth will neuer seeke it and he that seeks it not will neuer find it It cannot (d) Considerations which facilitate the practise of this Doctrine be denyed but that this Doctrine requires hard things at a mans hands But so it must be considered that he who teacheth it doth withall giue much grace wherwith to learne it A burthen is more or lesse grieuous according to the strength more or lesse which he hath who is to beare it And it is no heard matter for one who is of infinite power to giue vs strength to carry according to the weight of that which is to be imposed and especially if that power be accōpanied with a goodnes which is as infinite Indeed it we consider the Doctrine as it is in it selfe we may say it is not only hard but impossible and especially it will seeme so then when we accompany that thought with a deepe consideration of the miserable frailty of our nature the strength of our passions and the importunity of sensible obiects which solicite and haunt vs euen to death in euery corner But yet on the other side we shall beleeue it to be both possible and easy if we remember as I was saying the omnipotēt wise loue of Christ our Lord the aboundant grace which is deriued to vs from the merits of his holy life and death the exāple of many Saints who hauing bene made of the same metall with vs haue by the fauour of God and their good endeauours translated as it were their soules out of this wildernes of beasts into the paradise of Angells euen before they parted from their mortall bodies And not only hath this bene performed by Sains deceased but we doe most certainly know and conuerse with so good seruants of God as that in great measure they ariue to it also in this life So that we haue all reason to be full of hope that by the same meanes we may follow whither (e) Wear left without excuse it we do not follow where so many are gone before they haue gone before Or at least we are to confesse that the fault is no bodies but our owne if we doe it not For if it be a burthen Christ our Lord will make it light and if it be a yoke he will make it sweet And he who thirsteth after comfort is inuiced by the lowd cry of Christ our Lord to goe drinke therof at that liuing fountaine of his grace And a promise is made to all the world Ioan. 7. that whatsoeuer shall be asked of God in the name of Christ our Lord shal be graunted Matt. 11. And whosoeuer is either loaden with sinne or doth labour vnder those punishments which as the reliques of sinne doe hange vpon him is allured by the voyce of Christ our Lord himself to repaire to him that he may be refreshed And indeed what refreshing or comfort is there to be had in this life till selfeloue be laid downe and the pure and perfect loue of Christ our Lord be taken vp in the practise of his diuine Doctrine selfeloue and selfewill it is which puts vs to such paine in this pilgrimage For these are the rootes of all our inordinate affections which place vs as vpon a beacon where we are subiect to all the windes of perturbation and passion which can blow either of desires or hopes or feares or any other care whatsoeuer Yea and if we watch our selues well we shall find sometymes that euen concerning the same persōs or things we are in effect at the (f) This is most true how strág soeuer it may seem selfe same tyme both in hope and feare in loue and yet in hate in a burning kind of little enuy against them and yet vpon the mayne with an ardēt desire of their good And in fine we know not sometymes what our selues would haue nor what we ayle What meruaile is it then if we be often vnlike to what we had resolued to be that we are so extremely vnequall so mutable and so miserable How can we choose but be perfect slaues if thus we tye our selues to selfe loue which giues the plague death it selfe to al true liberty of spirit professed and imparted by the practice of the Doctrine of Christ our Lord which is only able to make men free This is not that prophane supposed liberty to (g) The levvd liberty of the Ghospell of sectaries which the sectaries of this age do intytle their Ghospel and which is indeed but expresse subiection to sinne and true slauery But true Christian liberty doth consist in vntying the soule from all imperfection sin in subduing mortifying our inordinate inclinations and passions acoording to the pure and perfect law of Christ
all the rest which hath bene said as himselfe doth incomparably surpasse whatsoeuer other thing which it is euen in his power to giue I will also in this place sorbeare to hearken to that other diuine consort of Musicke which he made in that least Sermon of his next before his sacred Passion which S. Iohn relates in his holy Ghospell For that of the B. Sacrament is considered in a discourse therof a part and that of the infinite loue of our Lord in his last Sermon is toucht in the beginning of that of the Passion And we haue heere I hope bene shewed inough to make the loue of our B. Lord appeare Not only in regard of what he conceaued in his owne pretious hart towards man but moreouer for the abundant blessings which he hath imparted to the world exteriourly For we see to what greatnes and happines the meanest of vs is sublymed through the high account into which we are taken by Almighty God Only we must be sure that his infinite goodnes do not giue vs occasion and colour for contynuance in our wickednes For as much as in God all is infinite a like (i) All is a like Infinite in God and therfore euen the very infinitenesse of his Mercy doth shew vs how Infinite his Iustice also is and euen by the excesse of his mercy when men are sory for their sinnes we may inferre the intollerable rigour of his Iustice against such as are impenitēt The holy Scripture is also ful of most particular proofe how deepely our Lord doth detest al sinne and willfull sinners This hath bene pointed at before vpon another occasion in the discourse of the infinite power of God and in the end of the Passion it will also be resumed agayne For the present therfore I conclude concerning the most excellent Doctrine of Christ our Lord deliuered especially in holy Scripture and I passe on to the consideration of his Miracles Of the excessine Loue which our Lord Iesus shewed to man by the Mirac'es which he wrought on earth CHAP. 41. THE excessiue loue of our Lord Iesus was farre from being content to expresse it selfe towards man by any one single way alone but it was solliciting him in euery minute of his most holy life to try as many as might be found for our good He therfore considering with diuine wisedome that men were composed of flesh and spirit and consequētly (a) Men being cōposed of flesh and spirit are to be wrought vpō both by spirituall and sensible meanes that they must be wrought vpō aswell by sensible as by spirituall meanes knowing also that through the miserable disorder of their mindes they were then more capable would be more obliged by ease health of body then by graces powred into the soule he was therfore pleased to accompany the purity and perfection of his Doctrine with the power and Maiesty of his miracles And as by creation of the world he led men vp by meanes of visible things towards a knowledge and beliefe of the inuisible so in the case of our reparation and redemptiō he would also vse the corporall cure of men from sicknes as a disposition wherby theyr soules might be recouered from sinne Heerby our Lord doth euidently discouer to be a true perfect louer of mankind For as the property of loue is not (b) The measure of our loue of God is to exceed all measure to be tyed vp within the compasse of any ordinary law and the measure which that power vseth is to exceed all measure so did our Lord out of the nobility of his loue to man refuse to walke within so small a circle as the lawes of nature did lead him to These lawes of nature were made by almighty God at the creation of the world it is not al the power of heauen or earth vnder him which can inuert that order Psal 148. Praeceptum posuit non praeteribit He gaue the precept and it shall not passe away And it was good cheape for him who made al things of nothing to commaund that nothing should faile of that inuiolable course wherin all things were appointed to proceed According to the law of nature no returne is made from priuation to the habit as from a fixed blindnes to sight and much lesse from death to life But the law of the loue of our Lord IESVS did ouertop that other law made those things grow true and samiliar which otherwise were not only hard but impossible Moyst bodies were appointed by the law of nature to giue place and such as are heauy and solid to sinke downe below thē But yet when there was question of giuing comfort to his poore Apostles Matt. 14. the loue of Christ our Lord made him lay those lawes aside and he went walking towards them vpon the sea which was glad to performe the Office of a pauement to his pretious feete Penerration of bodies is a thing wherof nature cannot endure to heare but yet for the vnspeakeable loue which he bare to (c) The honour which was done by Christ our Lord to the purity of his B. Virgin mother the honour and excellency of his all-immaculate mother that ornament and glorious gemme of heauen earth he was not affrayd to giue that principle of Philosophy the lye And he passed out of those bowells of supreme Purity into those armes of matchlesse Piety without the least offence to her most entire Virginity But yet in this there is the lesse wonder because he wrought the like in fauour of his Apostles whom he loued by innumerable degrees lesse then his most excellent mother Isa 7. For in their case also his loue was transcendent in the selfe same kind vnto his lawes For hauing first passed through the sepulcher he went afterward through Ioan. 20. Ibid. through those doores which were shut betwene them him that so he might as it were perfume them all at once with his sweet breath of Peace But why doe I name those persons who were so highly priuiledged as if our Lord had only bene in loue with them and not indeed as yet indeed he was enamoured of all mankind so farre as to make his miracles distill down vpon them like so many drops of dew for their reliefe or comfort in all occasions And although these miracles of Christ our Lord could not haue bene wrought but by the omnipotent power of almighty God yet may that power be accounted to haue been but as a kind of instrumēt wherby he wrought them and that indeed they flowed from his loue as from their prime cause and roote He wrought no miracles for the ostentation of his power and therfore we see how often he precisely comaunded both men and deuills Marc. 3. 5. 7. Luc. 5. Luc. 4. Matth. 20. Matt. 21. Marc. 11. that they should not publish what he had done He wrought none for any commodity of
if we will we are to know that the more nutritiue the food is in it selfe the more imminent wil our dāger be if we will needs be still so weake as to want that heat of loue wherwith it is to be digested by our soules And it may happen to vs heere as is vseth to doe in the case of common food that insteed of health we shall find our selues more desperatly sicke of surfetting by our approach to this bread of heauen But so on the other side if we prepare and purge our selues by penance if we arme strengthen our selues by prayer and practise of solid vertue this tree of life will fructify in our soules after a strange proportion and the more the oftner we shall feed thereon Nor shall we need to feare that by frequenting this mystery either the benefit which it will impart to vs or the veneration which we shall be enabled to carry towards it cā any way decrease but the contrary The (e) Why the frequenting this bread of Angells doth breed increase of reuerence and loue of God pleasures of the world glut a man for the tyme and he is ready to starue for hungar afterward And so the couersation of many is valued highly till it come to be inioyed but by custome and familiarity there growes contempt It is not it cannot be so in this case of ours For the honor and profit delight which is both found and felt by treating in this inward manner with the infinite spring and fountaine of all Good doth easily put vs out of feare that euer there can be any want of reuerēce but only with such as come not to it as they ought In all things but especially in this blessed Sacrament he is of infinite greatnesse and goodnes to such as will resort to him with h̄ble loue or rather who will but giue him leaue to resort to them and who lay no impediment in his way but that he may inioy them all as he desires For as much more willingly doth Christ our Lord repose in such a soule then euen in the Emperiall heauen it selfe as the preparing of that soule although it be yet but the seate of his grace did cost him more then the building of heauen though it be the seate of his glory For heauen did but cost him a word which was but one simple act of his will but the soule of man did cost him many a bitter sigh and many a salt teare and so many drops of his pretious bloud as that he had no more left to giue The next discourse is to giue vs a larger prospect vpon the obiect of his infinite sufferance as this is striuing to make vs feele and ponder the care he takes to keep vs from suffering any misery at all either of sinne or paine For in this diuine Sacrament of Sacraments to (f) The many offices which our Lord performes to soules in this B. Sacrament the poore oppressed Orphane he shewes himselfe a most deere and louing Father To the sicke and wounded patient an expert careful Phisitian To the negligent and wandring sheepe a pittifull and watchfull Pastour To the ignorant and vnlearned scholler a wise and most diligent Maister To the penitent and afflicted soule which splits with griefe for hauing offended such a Goodnes and melts with loue through the desire to enioy such a beauty he is a pardoner a protectour a perseruer a cherisher an illuminator an inflamer a companion a friend a spouse an all in all O fire (g) The conclusiō of this discourse in the way of prayer diuine O sacred food O heauenly feast So heauenly as thou dost incorporate thy selfe in vs vs in thee dost after a sort euen Deify our nature in this mortall life of ours by making it in a manner one thing with thyne Let thine eye looke backe vpon thine owne auncient mercies And since thou hast taken such strange pitty vpon thy Creatures by thy vouchsafing hitherto to dwell in such durty houses take pitty now at last vpon thy self And make henceforth these our harts such holy Temples as may become thee O thou King of glory to inhabit and therin for euer to be adored Let all the faculties of our soules and all the senses of our body hange like so many incensories before thy Altar and breath out eternal prayse of thy holy name and euen spend themselues wholy in thy seruice in contemplation of this infinite benefit Thou hast lodged a treasure as rich as thou thy selfe art rich in these fraile vessells of our soules Giue vs therfore grace to carry thē about with such a care to keep them safe from breaking as that the Iewell may be for euer ours Humble vs deere Lord by what other way thou wilt but let not our former sinnes be punished by our contemning or vnderualuing these soueraigne mercies Luc. 12. And since vpon thy bringing the fire of they holy Spirit into the world thou didst expect that it should be all inflamed do not permit that we should yet remaine so voyd of heate when thy vnspeakeable goodnes doth so often bring into our bosomes yea and into our very breasts that fornace of this very fire which is thy self this death of sinne this spring of vertue this bread of life this cure of passions this strength of weakenes this treasure of grace this banquet of ioy this roote of glory this conduit and conue yance of all good things Of the infinite Loue which our Lord Iesus discoueuereth to mākind in his sacred Passion with a reflection vpon the dignity of his diuine person and the vse which heer we are to make thereof CHAP. 52. OVR Lord IESVS was figured in the old Testament Isa 1. Gen. 49. with great propriety by the flower of the roote of Iesse and by the Lion of the Tribe of Iuda A flower he was both through the sauour of his benesits and through the odour of his diuine conuersation as the precedent discourses will haue shewed and a Lion he was also by the nobility of his strength and Passion as will now appeare Fortitude is both actiue and passiue yea and the Passiue is farre the greater and farre the harder of the two The (a) The whole life of our Lord may in some sort be called a Passion course of his whole life was like a field so thicke so wed with crosses and cares that it may all be accounted to haue bene a kind of continued Passion but yet because the last day and night of the same life did so abound therwith it is this alone which is eminently knowne and called by that sad name In this state he was to be when the Prophet Esay foresaw and spake of him to this effect He hath no grace or beauty Isa 53. we haue seene him and there was nothing in him to be seene we desired that he might be contemned as the most abased thinge amongst men A man of
wee are in greatest straites And as for the vse of prayer since it is an eleuation of the mind towards God a treaty of the soule with him Since he admits vs whensoeuer we apply our selues to haue audience Since not only he receaues vs if we come but he loues vs so deerly much as to inuite vs and commaund vs yea and to be highly offended if we refraine Since he inclynes himselfe to enrich vs with al heauenly graces vpon the only price of being desired by vs that he will make vs rich and that the more we aske the more we haue Since he is of so excellent condition as neuer to cast his benefits into our teeth which temporall Princes who are but dust and ashes otfen doe and yet the fauours which they cā afford are but trash and toyes and euen they are often tymes denyed and yet all men are glad to be their suytours Since according to the persons vvith whome we are accustomed to conuerse vve sucke their qualities into our selues therfore by negotiating the busines of our soules with that fountaine of Sāctity it is not possible but that we should improue our selues therin Since howsoeuer in other things the Saintes of God haue bene of different gust one excelling in exteriour penāce another in mortificatiō of himselfe within one addicting himselfe to action anotherto contēplation and the rest best to a life mixt of both yet there was neuer any Saint vnlesse some perhaps who haue bene conuerted and canonized both at once with some Martyrs Crowne who hath not bene diligēt in the vse of Prayer And lastly chiefely since we find it to be recommēded both by the Doctrine exāple of our Lord IESVS throughout the whole time of his holy life especially now in the garden whē he was to treate of the great affaire of our redemption And when after a sort it was put to a kind of question whether he should liue til the next day leaue his life vpō the crosse by the hands of others or else to dye that night of the pure griefe of his owne distressed and wounded hart Since we see him at an instant become victorious ouer al the powers of earth and hell And that he who immediatly before was so defeated immediatly afterward was so full of courage as to say to his Apostles in the third visit which he made thē at euery of which tymes he found them sleeping Rise vp Matt. 26. behold the man who is at hand to betray me Since by this example the practise of our blessed Lord both mentall and vocall prayer are set out vocall in few words though thrice repeated the mentall as being much the more excellent taking vp a farre longer space of tyme for when he fell into that Agony it is expressed by the Euangelicall history as hath bene said already that he persisted long in Prayer Ibid. Since the Apostles who were commaunded by our Lord to watch and pray least els they might enter into Temptation did for the present fall a sleep through their negligence in the vse of that holy exercise when they should haue waked and shortly after did forsake their Maister when they should haue accompanied him to his crosse Since these things I say are so and not only these but a thousand more which appeare in their workes who write of Prayer and much more in their harts and liues who vse it much What Christian soule is that which will not apply it selfe to this holy happy exercise Which howsoeuer it be a guift of God and depends vpon the liberality of his holy hand yet as he worketh in all things sweetly so doth he also in this particular and he is pleased to vse some men towardes the instruction of others the former exercising their charity and the latter their humility It (b) It is necessary to take counsayle in the vse of mentall Prayer of some good spituall maister wil therfore be wholly necessary for him who will study this art of arts to betake himselfe to some well experienced guide Though in regard that it is not so much a busines of the head as of the hart the best maister vnder heauen will be a pure and vertuous life For prayer and practise of vertue are very circular depēdant vpon one another And he who prayes deuoutly will liue vertuously and he who procures to lead a vertuous life will quickly be able to praye deuoutly And we see the effects of this happy exercise as hath been said by what it wrought in the wounded soule of our Lord IESVS and how it raysed him vp into so much strength as to enable him to goe and meete those enemies of God and him in the face whome not long before he besought his eternall Father that he would auert Wherby yet we must not vnderstand that we are authorized to thrust our selues into imminent and certaine danger of death whē without any disseruice to Almighty God or disaduantage to his cause we may auoyd the same But (c) How we are to carry our selues in the flight of persecution more or lesse only that when our Lord doth call vs to it and when the hower is come which he in his eternall prouidence hath prefixed we are to encounter to imbrace the Crosse with alacrity In former tymes the malicious Iewes had a minde to haue apprehended so to haue precipitated him downe from a hill Ioan. 7. but he made himselfe inuisible to their eyes and the cause is there assigned because his hower was not then arriued And so he could also heere haue as easily made himself insensible to their hands if it had not bene that the same hower of his which was not come before was come now And with vnspeakeable loue he was pleased that that other should be said to be no hower of his because it vvas not appointed for him to suffer in Luc. 22. But this vvas his hovver and it vvas also the hovver of those perfidious Ievves and of the Prince of darkenes by reason of the povver vvhich then vvas giuen them ouer Christ our Lord. The apprehension of Christ our Lord and a iust expostulation with the Traytour Iudas for that hideous treason of his togeather with a description of mortall sinne and the danger which we are put into by all voluntary veniall sinnes CHAP. 58. THE Traytour Iudas who made himselfe the keeper of that clocke for that tyme had woone it vp and set it so by the men vvhome he had put to vvorke that it vvas grovven ready euen then to strike For behould he came vvith a band of Pagan souldiers a great svvarme of Ievvish Officers to apprehend and sell his Mastier ouer into the possession of death Whosoeuer had seene those two troopes encounter one another might (a) Christ our Lord and Iudas did leade the two kingdoms of God the diuell haue beheld a most liuely picture in little of
man would doe some villanous lying boy They buffeted him with their fists and in that they vsed him like some idle and base vvicked slaue They spit vpon him and so they did as good as say that he vvas an infamous most odious blasphemer who deserued to be the outcast both of God and man They blinded him thē they boat him againe and to make themselues merry as a Lord of mis-rule is vvont to doe in a iolly Christmas they vvould bid him Prophesy who had beaten him and therby they called him foole and sot And they alluded to the vvickednes of vvhich they vvould needs suppose him to haue bene guilty in aspiring to be accounted a Prophet by the people Such vvas (d) The inuincible loue of Lord did conquer the power of all their rage the excesse of their rage and our Lord the vvhile vttered not one vvord of reproofe nor shevved not one gesture of mislike though his thoughts vvere not silent but vvell imployed Yet not vpon securing himselfe from their vvrongs but vpon sorrovving prosōdly for their sinnes To haue seene any creature in that vvofull case vvould haue moued any cruell hart to pitty how much more to haue seen though it had not bene as he vvas also God but only man that excellent beauty of the diuine countenance of our Lord so abhominably defeated and euen murthered as it vvere by those perfidious Ievves For murthered it vvas by those cruel buffets insteed of odoriferous and pretious gumms it vvas imbalmed in their nastly and impure spittle And it may also be accounted to haue bene buried in that beastly cloath vvhervvith they blinded those svveet-sad-eyes The least of vvhat they did to him at that time doth inuolue such a deale of indignity as is beyond al conceit but (e) How infamous an affront it was for them to spit vpon our Lord. yet that of the spitting seemeth to exceed the rest It is an odious and infamous kindof affront not vsed to any flaue euen by his Lord vvho hath an absolute dominiō ouer him But if at any tyme it be it is to shew a meeting together of the extremity of contempt and hate in the hart of him who desires by this vgly meanes to shevv it selfe Nay when we do but spit for the meere discharge and ease of nature we procure to doe it so as that no person of respect may so much as see it If by errour it should fall vpon some stoole or andyron or euen but vpon a mans shoe he is not well till it be wyped And therfore I doe not wonder if they forbare to strike or euen to touch his face after they had so desiled it till first they had put a veyle betwene The true place of spittle is either the ground that instantly it may be trodden out orelse the fire where in a moment it may be consumed But now this vnholesome excrement which being deliuered out vpon necessity is not suffered to continue vpon the meanest basest creatures or cloathes we weare was thought good inough to dwell vpon the most pretious parts of the person of Christ our Lord. And although the Prophet Isay might meane by that great diffiguring of our Lord which he foresaw and foretold the whole troope of torments which came vpon his diuine person yet it seemes that this of his spittle was pointed at by him in particular manner The holy Scripture doth further say that they vttered many other most blasphemous things against him But whether it were that it would exceed the bounds of modesty for vs to heare of the words or deeds themselues which those miscreants vsed or els to the end that euery one might haue the greater merit to contemplate in pious manner what they were the holy ghost thought fit to wrap them vp in silence Which certainly was done vpon high designe and great mistery and S. Hierome saith that till the day of Iudgement should arriue we were not fully to know the strange meanes wherby that night they vexed our Lord in the house of the high Priest Yet whatsoeuer they either did or said it is certaine that the very things themselues were not so odious in the sight of God as was the ground from whence they grew An (f) The scornes which they put vpon our Lord were doubled by the root of malice frō which they came itch they had at the very rootes of their prophane harts in chafing and scratching wherof by doing those detestable dishonours to our Lord they did triumph and spring with a most petulant and pestiferous kind of ioy And so on the other side though the very outrages themselues were far more enormous then we can conceaue which declare the infinite patience and humility of Christ our Lord yet the liberall hart of loue wherwith he offred them all to God for our good and wherwith he behoulding vs all at that very time could haue bene content to suffer more as afterward we shall see he did is that which ought both to comfort and confound vs most How our Lord was solemnly adiudged worthy of death for Blasphemy and of the death of Iudas and how they send our Lord to Pilate CHAP. 62. BVT then as the importunate malice of them who had our Lord IESVS in charge kept him farre inough from taking any rest so the Priests and elders themselues might not so well be said to be gone to sleepe as to bed through the rage of enuy which in all likely-hood kept them both waking and thinking that euery minute was an age till it were day at which tyme they intended to persecute our Lord to death They did therfore all Confestim manè Marc. 15. at the very point and peepe of day call themselues togeather in the forme of a Councell Where the vvicked Cayphas giuing account to that vvhole assembly of vvhat had passed the night before amongst those fevv vvhich could be gathered togeather vpon the sudden did againe vvith the same hypocritical shew of piety presse our Lord that for the reuerence of the liuing God he would declare to them Whether he were the Christ or no Our Lord out of his knovvledge that whatsoeuer he should say they would netther beleeue him nor answere him nor yet dismisse him vvould vvillingly haue forborne his answere but being pressed by this coniuration he declared to them yet once againe to this effect That he was the Christ And that once the tyme would come when they would know it to their cost and beleeue it when it would be too late when they should see him sitting at the right hand of the power of God and comming downe vpon the clouds of the ayre Heere vpon they (a) Our Lord Iesus the God of life condemned to death solemly pronounced him to be an expresse blasphemer and that he vvas worthy of death And so they instantly carryed him away bound to Pilate Whilst the meaner sort were loading him with a thousand wrongs the
hart with most blasphemous and bitter scoffs The people which past in troopes Matt. 27. Marc. 15. Ioan. 19. before him did with serpentine tongues and countenances full of scorne cry out vah to him And they accompanied it with the most contumelous gesture and iogge of the head which they could deuise as the holy Scripture it selfe doth insinuate And that interiection with the words that followed doe as bad as say after this manner Thou wretch thou hypocrite thou vgly impostor thou wert talking of wonders but to what an end hath thy wickednes brought thee now at last Thou hadst a minde to be a King but what beggar is so base as not to be thy better might it please your Maiesty to come downe from the crosse that we your most humble and faithfull seruants and vassalles may doe you homage Thou talkedst of being the Sonne of God the Sauiour of the world Will it please your Diuinity to be good to your Humanity Will it please you to let your Charity beginne at home and to saue your selle Thou talkedst of what thou couldst do if thou wert disposed and that the Temple was but a toye and that thou wert able to put it downe and rayse it vp againe in a trice Might your Omnipotēcy be intreated to beginne with throwing downe that Crosse and to cast away those nayles and by iuggling to play least in sight as in former occasions you haue been known to doe Vah wretched wicked thing the worst of creatures the out cast of the world we hate thee we abhorre thee we despise thee we spit at thee we defy thee The earth hath refused to be trod vpon any longer by those pernicious feete of thine the heauen is walled vp against the entry of such a miscreāt as thou There is no place for thee but hell dye therfore quickly and be damned These are infinite blasphemies and we all abhorre them all as we doe the deuill himselfe but infallibly they are but triuiall things in comparison of those others which were darted out indeed against our blessed Lord vpon the Crosse For (c) A demonstration that the blasphemies which were vttered against our blessed Lord were most enourmous thinges though the holy Scripture toucheth them in in few words since they acted their worst by the way of doing they would be sure not to fall short in saying And the rage they had would quicken vp their wits and the excessiue wrongs which then already they had done him would exact at their hāds a making good of what was past by the vttermost most demonstration of how deepely they detested him at that present The high Priests besides are recorded in holy Scripture to haue put scoffs vpon him after a particular manner and they sayd to this effect This fellow had a guift to helpe other folkes but he hath not the tricke to saue himselfe If he he the King of Israell let him come downe from the Crosse and we will belieue him The good mā did put his trust in God but if God haue a minde to him let him take him The barbarous souldiers also were still vpon their old haunt of scorning him Ibid. hauing bene bribed in all appearance by those wicked Iewes euen from the beginning when he was scourged and crowned with thornes And they were so voyd of pitty as to be offering him vinager though they did but euen that in iest and scorne at that tyme wheras wine was wont to be giuē to all men who were placed in that deadly trance Yea and euen one of those very theeues who then were suffering death togeather with him tooke tyme not to thinke of his owne torments or imminent death togeather with the danger of eternall damnation which he was in through the lust he had to be like those sauages vnder whome he suffered and he would needs be then at leasure to reproach blaspheme our blessed Lord. How our Lord Iesus did exercise the Offices of Redeemer and Instructour vpon the Crosse and of the three first wordes which with incomparable Loue he vttered from thence CHAP. 71. SVCH was the cruelty of all kinds of people against our Lord as he was hanging vpon the Crosse and such was the affliction which in the inferiour part of his soule he felt vpon euery one of those particular paines and scornes Nor was there so much as one single word a signe gesture or a thought of malice in any one of all those many harts which wēt not to his by the way of griefe Yet see also how it wrought in the way of loue As soone as the Crosse was reard and that already they had set al those markes vpon him which were to carry him to his graue that still he was hearing the bitter scoffs blasphemies wherby they prophaned his sacred eares he went exercising two of his chiefe offices in a most admirable manner and in a most eminent degree These (a) Our Lord Iesus the Mediatour of our redemption and the Doctour of our soules by by way of instructiō were to be the Mediatour of our Redemption and the Doctour in that Chaire of the holy Crosse for our instruction He then turned himselfe in most gratious but most dolorous manner to his eternall Father beseeching him to forgiue al their sinnes who had any way concurred to that death of his Father sayth he forgiue them for they know not what they do Ibid. Of God as God he knew not how to hope for such a fauour in respect of them and therfore he coniures him by the tēder name of Father that so he remēbring him to be that most beloued Sonne Matt. 3. he in whome he was well pleased he might be mercifull to those wretches whose cause he had vndertakē to plead For howsoeuer they had found in their harts to giue him so many wounds of death with so much scorne and rage yet he could not find in his to forsake them in theyr sinns but to begge that they might haue grace to returne by penance And because he easily foresaw that the crime was so enormous of it selfe his vnspeakeable charity went seeking waies how to excuse the grieuousnes therof by taking a part from their malice and ascribing it to their ignorance who committed it And he who in that Agony in the Garden prayed but conditionally that the bitter Chalice of his punishment might passe from him had so much more (b) Out Lord had far more care of vs thē of himselfe care of them then of himself as to pray in absolute termes that the Chalice of Gods fury might not come to thē Not only he did it in absolute termes but he did it at his death when Fathers are not wōt to refuse their sonnes And he did it more ouer in the midst of those excessiue torments when euen enemies vse to gratify one another and he did it by way of represēting so good a reason for the obtayning of his suite
be the last of his life But (b) The reason why our Lord declared his thirst this Lord of ours was pressed so close by his spirituall thirst of suffering as it were infinite things for the loue of vs and for the gayning instructing our soules by these examples of his inuincible patience as that it made him contemne euen forget his owne materiall thirst though it were to him of excessiue paine This Originall of Religious Obedience which is Christ our Lord doth also shew heerby the forme wherin Religious persons are to expresse themselues to their Superiours Which (c) A good lesson for Religious men is not to be so much by way of earnest desire of that which they would haue as by way of declaration of that wherof they are in want and when that is done the Superiours are to proceed as they see cause For so did Christ our Lord forbeare to desire to drinke and he only said That he was thirsty to those souldiers who were made his Superiours by his owne admirable humility and charity submitting himselfe entirely to their wills who were bribed and bent to doe him all the mischiefe they could For when he told them of his thirst what was it which they could find in their harts to giue him The same thing which they had offered him before in iest and in the way of scorne the same they were content to giue him now in earnest for a conclusion to all their cruell courtesies When they were going to crucify him they would not giue him wine til it were distempered with Gaul Matt. 27. Marc. 25. which is the Embleme of malice and bitternes And now that he is giuing vp the Ghost they present him with a spunge full of Vinegar which is the Embleme of rage and sowernes O vncharitable wretches and who made you of men such sauage monsters But O infinite Charity and meekenes and patience of Christ our Lord who accepted of al without the least reproofe of their impiety And as at the foote of the Crosse he had refused to drinke of that Gaul because it was mingled with wine to the end that he might be suffering whilst he liued without any drop of the wine of comfort yea or so much as the being knowne to want it so now that he was vpō the very point of death he refused not to drinke of that pure vinegar because it was all sharpe and sower He left those draughts which should haue any mixture of comfort in them with Crosses for those Martyrs whome he meant to make glorious by following his diuine example And by his taking the vinegar of tribulation he did conuert it into the wine of strength cōfort after a cōtrary māner to that wherby wicked men are wont through their ingratitude to turne the wine of his blessings into the vinegar and Gaul of sinnes agaynst him Abusing the abundance of his mercy and making that a motiue of their wicked liberty which would tye any honest hart so much the more inseparably to his seruice He also dranke this vinegar to (d) The many excellēt reasons why our Lord was pleased both to endure and to declare his thirst the end that as already he had sanctified the mortificatiō of the other senses by his example for the instruction and consolation of his faithfull seruants so also they might be taught by this to be far and very farre from all superfluous care of meate and drinke and much more from all inordinate delight therin since all the sweete meates wherwith our blessed Lord was pleased to make vp his mouth in this mortall life was but a draught of vinegar out of a sponge at his death By this drinking therfore he enableth vs to be content with course and common and vnpleasant meat and drinke and by the merit of his thirsting after this corporall drinke he hath killed and quenched our spirituall thirst after vaine and vicious delights which nourish and feed vp our soules in sinne And so also on the other side according to S. Augustines expositiō of the sixty eight Psalme our Lord IESVS did not only declare his extreme thirst of corporall drinke but also his ardent thirst after the saluation of his enemies and of all the world How infinitely therfore shall we be without excuse if we giue him not to drinke of our good deeds since he is so greedy of them and was so tormented for want therof Yea and how worthy shall we be of all reproach and paine if he hauing begun to vs in so sad a Cup with desire thirst of our good we shall not procure to resemble him by thirsting both in body and soule after the aduancing and increasing of his Glory Of the entyre consummation of our Redemption which was wrought by Christ our Lord vpon the Crosse and of the perfection of his diuine vertues expressed there CHAP. 75. OVR Lord IESVS hauing drunke this vinegar declared that whatsoeuer had bin prophesied to be accomplished by himselfe was now fulfilled and he signified it by saying this word Consummatum est All is fulfilled And as he who only refresheth and filleth the soule of man with whole flouds of ioy was already content to be tormented with thirst so now for the apparailing of our soules with the life of Grace he was ready to deuest himselfe of the life of Nature He had formerly complyed with the care which he had of our instruction and now we haue seeue how he hath accomplished our Redēption by his Passion By meanes of this Passion he finished the building of his Church And since he had formerly layd a note of folly Ioan. 19. vpon such a man as should beginne to rayse a building and not bring it afterward to perfection our Lord who was the increated Wisedome of the Eternall Father must needs be farre from falling into any errour of the same kind And indeed it was wholy necessary that in his great goodnes to vs he should not depriue vs of such a diuine example of perseuerance as now we haue obtayned by the Cons̄mation of his course of Passion vpon the Crosse since (a) All labour is lost without perseuerance Deut. 23. without perseuerance all our labour is but lost Our Lord did therfore perseuere and he did perfect that which he had begun If the workes of God are most truly sayd to be entirely perfect his Passiō was to be so in most particular māner which amōgst these other workes is said with a kind of eminency to be his worke Now what sufferance could be more perfect in the way of humility then for the Lord of life and glory most willingly to endure a death of excessiue contumely and shame at the hands of his Rebellious Sonnes and most wicked slaues What more perfect in the way of patience and purity of hart then to suffer without the accesse of any imaginable comfort as Christ our Lord vouchsafed to doe What more perfect in the
God whilst we are in working and to presse with instance Ibid. when we are concluding Father saith he into thy hands I commend my spirit 1. Cor. 6. And if we will procure to be one spirit with him as S. Paul exhorts vs all to be already (a) How we assure our selues to be cōmended by Christ our Lord. Hebr. 5. we may perceaue that Christ our Lord did no lesse pray for vs then for himselfe He prayed as the same Apostle sayd els where Cum clamore valido lacrymis with a lowd cry and with teares and therfore it is no meruaile if he were heard by the Eternall Father both for himselfe and vs. But yet so as that we must concurre with him and suffer pray cry out and weepe for our selues and for our sinnes since he hath traced out the way of doing it for the sinnes of others But the misery is many tymes that whilst we doe so often vsurpe this holy Prayer of our blessed Sauiour wherby we protest our selues to commend our spirit into the hands of God we doe but cōmend it only in word or at the most we doe but giue it with one hand and take it backe againe with the other and indeed we deliuer it ouer to his enemies by sinne or at least to strangers by fulfilling vaine and lesse good desires Wheras if we would doe it as Christ our Lord was found to doe we should no sooner bequeth our selues to the seruice of our Lord but that instantly we would take a lōg euerlasting leaue of a wretched world Our Lord when he had giuen his spirit to God expired Luc. 23. And we if we expire not if we dye not to the sinnes and vanities of this life the spirit will be still where it was and we doe but say we giue him that which indeed we reserue for others or at least for our selues But that other kind of alienation b There will be no true life and liberty vnlesse there be a true death to imperfection passion is the only way to haue a true possession of our soules Seruire Deo regnare est This bondage doth only bring perfect liberty This kind of expiring by death doth only inspire vs with true life Christ our Lord for loue of vs did leaue as we haue seene his life of nature that we might be animated by the life of grace And woe be to that wretched man who shall rather choose death then life and such a life as hath been bought to our hād by parting with such a iewell as was the life of Christ our Lord. He had vnspeakeable cause to loue his life but we haue no cause at all to be in loue with ours The reason why we may punish euen hate as one may say our bodyes with a iust and holy kind of hate is because otherwise they will be giuing ill counsell to the soule The (c) In what case we desire a separation betweene the body and the soule 2. Pet. ◠reason why in some cases we may wish so farre as may stand with the good will of God to haue this Tabernacle of our flesh and bloud dissolued by death may be because we doe highly apprehēd a feare of sinne and so we may be glad to dye the first death when we hope our selues to be in good state least afterward we may dye the second And besides we haue reason to long for the sight of God from which we are exiled in this Pilgrimage But Christ our Lord did euer see the face of God and the Superiour part of his soule was as glorious as closely vnited to the Diunity in the bitterest torments of the Crosse as now is it at the right hand of his Father And besides there could be no daunger that euer that impeccable soule could sinne As therfore there was no cause why Christ our Lord should of himselfe desire or euen admit of any separation of his soule from his body so whatsoeuer motiue it were that should induce him to it that must necessarily be acknowledged for a great one For neuer did nor neuer could any creature in any reason so deerly and delightfully loue the cōiunction betwene his soule and his body as Christ our Lord loued his Nor consequently could any or all the creatures so much apprehend and abhorre any separation of the body from the soule as Christ our Lord would haue apprehended and abhorred that of his if some mighty reason had not moued him to it Because (d) The reason why Christ our Lord must needs loue the coniunction of his body and soule after a most eminent māner no creature nor all the creatures put togeather had euer found any body so sweetly so continually and so perfectly obedient to all the dictamens of a holy soule as our Lord IESVS had sound his body and this is the only or at least the principall reason why any man should loue his body So that for Christ our Lord to indure that the coniunction of such a body and soule should be broken for how short a tyme soeuer was the Crosse beyond all the corporall Crosses which he endured in his Passion concerning himselfe Yet of this he admitted as we see And since there was no power which could oblige him to it in the way of force it doth cleerly appeare that he performed it vpon a commandement of loue For loue is the King of all affections and disposeth of them all at pleasure And amongst seuerall loues the Superiour loue is still the King to whom all inferiour loues giue place If then Christ our Lord did so deerly and so iustly loue his owne pretious life incomparably more then any of vs can by any possibility loue ours and if yet that loue were content to yield to his loue of vs and that indeed he dyed of pure and perfect loue which is yet declared further to vs by that sweet declyning of his head when he gaue vp the ghost let vs endeauour to conceaue what an infinite kind of loue this was And let vs beg of him by his owne pretious wounds that he will make vs in all things as like himselfe as he desires And that as a meanes therunto he will print himselfe thus crucified vpon our harts and that the eye of our mind may be euer looking at ease vpon this sweet figure the (e) The grace and beauty of the Crucifix sweetest that hath bene seene or can be conceaued the fittest to moue all the affections of a Christian hart whether they be of compassion or admiration And verily I thinke that it is not only faith which brings vs to be of this beliefe but that euen abstracting from the quality of the diuine persō of Christ our Lord the cause for which he suffered which yet indeed are the things that subdue vs most the very figure it selfe of an excellent man so exposed to publique view vpon a Crosse is the loueliest and the
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
and the world In the former three he aymed at our only good and in the latter to his owne which yet withall was also ours In the first of those three which was the prayer to his Father Pater dimitte illis non enim sciunt quid faciunt Father forgiue them for they know not what they doe those persecut ours of Christ our Lord were principally intēded by that diuine goodnes but yet withall those men were a kind of figure and represented after a sort all the sinners of the whole world in their persons and so he prayed for the forgiuenes of them all Luc. Ibid. In the second which was his speach to the good Thiefe Amen dico libi hodie mecum eris in Paradiso I tell thee that for certaine thou shalt be with me in Paradise this very day the same good thiefe was assured of his saluation after a most eminent manner but yet withall he was a Type and his person did expresse the character of all sinners truly penitent whome our Lord doth instantly restore to his grace fauour Ioan. 19. vpon their humble and constant desire thereof In the third which was the speach to his B. Virgin-Mother and his most beloued disciple Mulier ecce filius tuus and then Ecce mater tua woman behould thy sonne then to him behold thy mother as this sacred Virgin and this Disciple were in most particular manner designed to be the Mother and Sonne of one mother so yet S. Iohn therin did carry the person of all mankind by being made the Sonne of that most excellent Mother Such was the stile which our Lord held in his death and such it had euer bene throughout the whole course of his life to speake (c) How the speaches of Christ our Lord were many of thē meant chiefly to such as were then present to him and yet expresly also to such as were to succeed in the world afterward chiefly to thē who were present and yet expresly also to those others who were absēt thē vnborne And this truth doth abundantly appeare by the Euangelicall history and to doubt heerof were to say the sunne is darke Since God was content to be made man for the loue of men we are brought more easily to belieue that man shall be made a kind of God in heauen And so when we know and consider that through Christ our Lord who is the naturall Sonne of God we may all become the adopted Sonnes of God yea and so we are if we dispose our selues to be like God our Father and consequently to Christ IESVS our elder brother for that the Father and Sonne are so very like that one of thē is well knowne by the other it (d) How we are made the brothers of our Lord Iesus both by the fathers the Mothers side will seeme lesse strange and nothing disagreable to the infinite mercy of our Redeemer that as he had vouchsafed to make vs his brethren by the Fathers side who is God he would also be pleased to make vs his brethren by the mothers side as he was man adopting vs in the person of S. Iohn to be all the Sonnes of the sacred Virgin Nor did that deernes of his loue shine lesse in that he would cōmunicate his mother to vs thē in that he was pleased that al his other blessings should be common betwene him and vs. And as Ioseph the Patriarke loued his brother Gen. 41. by the mothers side with most tendernes so it seemes as if our Lord would euen oblige himselfe to affect vs with a greater tēdernes of loue now that he had receaued vs as it were into the same very bowells of purity which had borne himselfe As our Lord IESVS is our brother for many reasons especially because we are made his coheyres of eternall glory in the kingdom of heauen so in regard that we are made so by the benefit and purchase of his redemption consequently that he begot vs by so excellent a meanes to that rich inheritance he (e) How Christ our Lord is not only our brother but our father also Isa 9. Ephes 2. is also in holy Scripture called not only our brother but our Father And so the holy Euangelicall Prophet Esay speaking of the glorious Tytle of Christ our Lord setteth this downe among the rest that he is Pater futuri saeculi The Father of the future age that is of Christians whome by his faith and Sacraments he would beget to God This Tytle of Father cost him very deere for was there any Mother who by the way of naturall birth did bring forth any child with such excesse of torment to her selfe as this Father of ours IESVS Christ our Lord did with excesse of anguish and affliction beget euery one of them who of the children of wrath were to be made by his meanes the Sonnes of God And therefore as in course of naturall descent Christ our Lord was the Sonne of the sacred Virgin so if we consider him as the Father and regeneratour of vs all to grace then our Lord and the blessed Virgin may in some sort be accompted rather as the spouses then as the Sonne and Mother of one another This way of cōsidering Christ our Lord our B. Lady ought not seeme strange to vs since partly holy Scripture and partly the cōsēt of the holy Fathers of the primitiue Church do so expresly set it forth to our sight 1. ad Cor. 15. For frō hence it is that Christ our Lord is so often called the (f) How our Lord Iesus is called the second Adam our B Lady the second Eue. second Adam who was to repaire the ruines which the former had drawne downe about the head and eares of mankind And hence also it is that we see it manifestly insinuated in holy Scripture and cleerly and euidently expresled by the holy Fathers that as Christ our Lord came to supply the place of the former adam so our B. Lady was to vs a second a better Eue then the former that she wrought both for her selfe vs as a most eleuated instrument and partly as a cause of our restitution to that inheritance which had bene forfeited by the former But yet with this great difference that as betwene the former Adam and Eue the Originall prime poyson of the first sinne came chiefly and primitiuely from the serpent to Eue and then in a second kind of degree from her to Adam and frō him to vs So betwene this latter Adam and Eue which is Christ our Lord our B. Lady the roote ground of that grace wherby the redemption of the world was wrought came originally and fundamentally from God to Christ our Lord and after a secondary instrumentall manner through her Sonne our Lord to our B. Lady It is shewed how our Blessed Lady and Eue doe resemble one another and how they differ and our Blessed Lady is
OF THE LOVE OF OVR ONLY LORD AND SAVIOVR IESVS CHRIST Both that which he beareth to Vs and that also which we are obliged to beare to Him DECLARED By the principall Mysteries of the Life and Death of our Lord as they are deliuered to vs in Holy Scripture With a Preface or Introduction to the Discourse IHS D. Aug. Confess lib. 10. cap. 29. O Amor qui semper ardes numquam extingueru Charitas Deus meus accende me O thou Loue which euer burnest and art neuer quenched O Charity my God do thou enkindle me Permissu Superiorum M.DC.XXII TO THE MOST GLORIOVS AND EVER-BLESSED PERPETVALL VIRGIN MARY the All-Immaculate Mother of our Lord God RECEAVE this Treatise O Queene of Heauen with thy Hand of grace which the hart of thy Seruant doth prostrate at thy purest Feet as a token wrapped vp in words of the most reuearing and admiring Loue which he owes wil euer be striuing to pay to thee And vouchsafe of thy Goodnes to present it to thy Son our Lord the sole Redeemer and Sauiour of the World since it aymes at nothing els but his glory which with infinite mercy he hath vouchsafed to place in the exchange of Loue with mortall Man Thy selfe and thou alone art that happy Creature who by the aboundant sloud of his Grace wert made able to swim through all the moments of this life in the Purity and Perfection of this dunne Loue. Nor didst thou euer fayle therof from the first instant of thy Immaculate Conception in the bowells of thy blessed mother to that other of thy Assumption in the armes of thy most beloued Sonne O suffer not his Creatures who are also adopted sonnes of thine to be still so vnlike their mother as to disperse and dissipate themselues by inordinate Loue vpon the transitory obiects of this world It is inough it is too much that hitherto we haue defiled our soules and that forsaking the cleere vntroubled spring of diuine Beauty we haue bene miserably glad to stifle and drowne our selues whilst yet we are the workes of his Hands and the ioy of his Hart in the muddy pooles of profane Delight Behold how we sigh groane in thy sacred eares some of vs vnder thè seruile yoke of present sinnes and some others vnder the sad effects and consequences of our former wickednes since we are full of weakene towards good workes and of an auersion from ioyfully and perfectly complying with the superexcellent wise and holy will of God Demaund of that God obtaine of thy Sonne that he will print himselfe fast vpon our Soules that so O glorious Queene O thou most certaine Comfort of the Afflicted we may be discharged by thy prayers from these chaynes which are striuing to dragge vs downe as low as Hell And once being free we may fly vp from whence we are fallen and adhere to God with thee by an Eternall Loue. THE PREFACE DECLARING THE POWERS belonging to the Soule of man with their proper obiects and acts and how all the whole world liues by Loue and that the obiect of our Loue must be only God directed by meanes of Iesus Christ our only Lord and Sauiour IT is the ancient and iust Complaint of our Holy and Wise forefathers that men affect the knowledg of certaine fâ—rraine and fruitlesse things not caâ—ing to consider or euen know themselues We are apt to woÌ„der at the huge height of mountaines the vnwearied walke of riuers the subtile course of seas the perpetuall motion of planets and in the meanetyme we reslect not vpö that which growes in our owne bosomes which yet is a fitter subiect for our admiratioÌ„ to worke vpon The most inestimable riches of the whole materiall world is but beggary and misery in comparison of the mind of Man For what Monarch had euer such Ambassadors and Spies as are his Senses or such Solicitours as are his Desires or such Officers and Executioners as are his Passions or such a Lord Steward of his Houshould as is his Reason or such a Secretary of State as is his Inuention or such a Treasurer as is his Memory or such a President of his Counâ—aile as is his Vnderstanding and which of them had euer so absolute a Dominion ouer his Countries Vassalls as man hath ouer himselfe by the vse and exercise of his will Of all these Powers the Vnderstanding Will are the most important as being they to which the rest are all reserred Verum or that which is True is the Obiect of the VnderstaÌ„ding the Obiect of the Wil is BònÌ„ or that which is Good The Act which the VnderstaÌ„ding exerciseth towards his Obiect of Truth is Knowledge for the Vnderstanding doth euer desire to know that which is exercised by the Wil towards the Obiect of God is Loue for al creatures which caÌ„ Loue are carried to a desire of that which is Good or at least which seemeth good to the. And indeed it may be truly sayd if it be discreetly vnderstood that there is no creature at all which hath not a Loue that it lookes after Euen all the inanimate Creatures do moue with a restles desire to their proper CeÌ„ter through a quality which is impressed vpon them by the common Creator of them vs. Fire flyes vpward earth falls downe ward they are driuen by their weight they aspire to their places By force you may with hold them but if you leaue them to themselues you shal quickly see where they haue a mind to be And as the actual Loue which a reasonable creature bears to any Obiect is accoÌ„ted for the weight wherby he is carried to his iourneyes end Amor meus pondus meÌ„ eò feror quocumque feror D. Aâ—â— Confes lib. 13. c. 9. so the weight or Virtus motiua of inanimate Creatures may well be accounted called their Loue wherby they are carried knowledg of Good Bad so also must he needs haue a more vniuersall and noble meanes for the reaching arriuing to the perfection of so excellent a nature From hence also it comes that as it is proper to him to apprehend his End so he must be enabled with all the meanes coÌ„ducing to it This last End of man is perfect complete Beatitude So as the true and vndoubted Obiect of his Will is Omne bonum which is All Good This Perfectió supposech of it self implyeth in any creature which can aspire therunto to be to liue to know So that if any man be asked whether he would be glad to Be to Liue to Know to be Happy he cannot doubt of it though he would vnlesse he were out of his wits then in effect he would be no man Now Beatitudo as saith Boetius est status omnium bonorum aggregatione perfectus And (c) Confes lib. 10. c. 21. S. Augustine saith That if any man should be asked whether he would be happy or no all the world would say yea as
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
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
the whole body of Gentilisine to himselfe Now (a) The difference betweene the arrowes of Gods mercy of his Iustice Psalm 119. God hath arrowes of diuers sortes The arrowes of his Iustice are pointed and they wound and kill Sagittae potentis acutae cum carbonibus desolatorijs Those arrowes of that mighty man are sharp and they carry at the heads therof certeyne coules as hoat as the fire of hell But the arrowes of his mercy and Charity are forked and barbed and though they wound it is farre from being to death vnlesse it be a sweet death of loue besides those arrowes do not loose their hold And so that Archer with his long Arme can by that very arrowe draw the wound and wounded person within his reach that so after the wound hee may giue the cure In this manner did our Lord by that starre both strike and draw those Magi after it Matt. 2. till at last they arriued in that stable which was then growne to be a heauen on earth There in the throne of his sacred Mothers armes they adored their Lord hauing already been made so rich as to receaue wherwith they might make a present to him and do him homage For (b) All comes frō God both the meanes wherby the mind wherwith any good is done of him it was that they had both the meanes and minde wherwith they made him a fit present which yet withall he was pleased should be such that it might as a man may say be two to one against himselfe For though by the Gold which they offered they did him homage as to their king yet the Frankencense fignified the Priesthood which he was to exercise in their seruice both at the last supper and vpon the Crosse and the Mirrhe was to put him in minde of his buriall which must suppose his precedent death Let him that can contemplate the ardent loue of our Lord which swells slames in euery circumstance of those actions which any way concerne this sacred Infancy of his For no sooner was he borne but he had his death and passion in his eye And besides it deserues our admiration to see with what suauity that diuine goodnes was pleased to gather the first flower of the Gentils with his holy hand It was said of God before Psalm 108. by the Prophet Dauid Quia ipse cognouit figmentum no strum record at us est quoniam puluis sumus He knew wherof we were made he remembred that we are but dust This was said longe ago but it is practised dayly and howerly on vs. And in conformyty of this knowledge his loue is neuer fayling to condescend to our naturall inclinations (c) The great goodnes of God in condescēding to man Sometymes he serues himselfe of our secular studies sometymes of our vaine curiosities yea and sometymes of our very sinnes wherby he may cyther dispose vs to a conuersion from heresy or any other impiety or els to a vocation to his better seruice So I think may any man obserue in himselfe that our Lord hath proceeded towards him so it is euident that he procceded with these Magi (d) The Magi were taken and brought to God by the bayte booke of their own naturall inclination For as they had much imployed thēselues vpon the contemplation of nature by meanes of the Starrs so by a starre which was the likelyest lure to which they might be drawne to stoope for though their eyes looked vpward for a while yet soone after it brought them downe vpon their knees at the sight of the diuine infant he vouchsafed to summon them to his seruice How certaine must it be that the loue of our Lord did subdue and melt the soules of these holy men after a strange manner whose messenger alone the starre did so illuminate and in flame them interiourly that they felt not the incommodities and daungers of so longe labourious a pilgrimage as they were making It may also be further seene by this That vpon the recouery of the sight therof for whilst they were in Ierusalem the starre was seene by them no more to teach vs that (e) Courts are not proper for contemplation of celestiall thinges Courts and store of company are not wont to intertaine but rather to estrange our internall eyes from the sight of heauen the sacred text doth thus declare in most weighty words the excesse of ioy which they were in Matt. 2. Videntes autem stellam gauisi sunt gaudio magno valde Vpon the recouery of the sight of the Starre they reioyced and it was with a mighty and most excessiue ioy And when it had led them to that stable where the Omnipotent Infant lay neither was the eye of their faith obscured not the edge of their most reuerent and withall most ardent loue abated but rather whet by that shew of humility and pouerty which they met withall And they opened their treasures they made litter as it were of their owne Royall persons and were so rauished by those diuine beames of Charity which passing from that Sphere of fire of our Lords sacred hart did seize on theirs that in their returne they had now no more thoughts of meaning to be regaled by Herod according to the purpose which they had made before For by (f) Vpon the sense of celestiall comforts the delights of this world grow contēptible that tyme they were fedd from the table of heauē with supernaturall visions and most sweet solid comforts of that kind from our Lord they carryed home another manner of heat and ioy then the Starre which was but a figure of our Lord could helpe them to in their going thither Though yet those holy soules were the least part of that obiect vpon which the loue of our Lord did meane to worke for we it was who in their persons were designed And therfore as the holy Catholike Church doth vse these words of S. Paul Tit. c. 3. in the office which she celebrates on Christians day Apparuit benignitas humanitas Saluatoris nostri Dei non ex operibus iustitiae quae fecimus nos sed secundum suam misericordiam saluos nos fecit c. The benignity and sweete mercy of God our Sauiour hath bene made cuident and cleare to vs not through any workes os iustice which we haue wrought but according to his owne mercy wherby he saued vs c. So may we also vse them in the consideration of this holy mistery of his Epiphany Nay we may doe it in some respects vpon a more particular reason For in the Natiuity our Lord did appeare manifest himself to the Iewes in chiefe but heer in (g) The Epiphany doth most properly belong to vs who descend from Gētiles the Epiphany he seems to haue had a particular ayme at the vocation of the Gentils from whome we find our selues descended Then he reueyled himselfe to vs who
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
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
publishing his Ghospell did expresse in his holy Baptisme and consequently to that Charity which cast him vpon the practise of this profound impenetrable humility For it was (a) Our Lord Iesus began all from Charity we must beginne all from Humility not in him as it is in vs who must beginne with acts of humility as with the foundation that so we may arriue to Charity afterward which is the consummation of a spirituall building But in him all moued at the very first from pure and perfect Charity which was as a kind of cause of his humility They want not good ground of reason who affirme that betwene the Birth and death of Christ our Lord he neuer performed an act of greater loue then in being thus Baptized For as the expression of true loue consisteth more in doing then in saying so consisteth it also much more in suffering then in doing And as the least sinne is more abhorred by a soule which is faithfull to God then the sensible toâ—ments euen of Hell it selfe So the dishonor for that soule to be thought sinfull which is not only pure but wholly impeccable as that of Christ our Lord and Sauiour was doth sarre outstrippe all other aspersion and infamy whatsoeuer as was also insinuated else where Yet (b) By how rugged waies our Lord Iesus was content to passe in his loue to vs. by these rugged wayes would he passe and vpon these bitter pills would he seed yea and he did it with vnspeakeable ioy for loue of vs. And not only had he bene content to be Circumcised which shewed as if he had bene obnoxious to Originall sinne but to declare that the his loue longer he liued amongst vs the more care he to vs. tooke to shew how he loued vs he now vouchsafed to be baptized which according to all apparence did betoken as if he had been subiect euen to actuall sinne To this let it be added that since Circumcision was ordayned by the law to which although he were not boÌ„d indeed yet was it thought that he was bound it might not only seeme fit but euen iust that he should be Circumcised both to doe honour to the law and to preuent all scandall of the people But for him to receiue the Baptisme of S. Iohn was no appointement of the law of God but a meere voluntary deuotion which might haue bene forborne without any sinne or the iust offence of any man And (c) It was a farre greater act of humility for our Lord to be baptized theÌ„ to be circumcised therfore as I was saying it was admirable humility performed out of vnspeakeable charity that for our example and benefit our Lord would fasten such a marke of actuall sinne vpon himselfe But the gratious eye of our Lord being lodged vpon the miseries of man and his hart beeing full of most ardent desire of our felicity he contemned himselfe and resolued to enter into the waters Luc. 7. And though S. Iohn being then the greatest among the sonnes of men did well know and with a most deiected faythfull hart acknowledge how farre he was from being worthy to baptize that true naturall Sonne of God yet so precise was the pleasure of Christ our Lord in this particular that the holy Baptist betooke himselfe to his obedience And our Lord vouchsafed to let him know and vs withall that perfect Iustice is not obserued where the heroycall acts of Humility and Charity are not performed S. Iohn had bene preaching the doctrine of pennance to the levves immediatly vvherupon they vvere baptized by him in Iordan Matt. 3. And the holy Scripture affirmes that Christ our Lord vvas baptized after them as resoluing belike to be the last of the company And vvithall it is very probable by the sacred Text Ibid. that he vvould also be present at the sermon of S. Iohn like a common Auditour and being the increated wisedome of God he vouchsafed to seeme as if he had needed to be taught by man What proclamations are these of his affection to vs and of direction how we are to proceed with others It being reason that we should blush euen to the bottome of our harts when we take our selues in the manner of striuing for precedence euen of our equalls whilst yet we see the SoÌ„ne of God place himselfe after all his inseriours And (d) Lay good hold on these lessons when we shall thinke much to resort for Sacraments other spirituall comforts to such as we conceaue to be any way of inferiour TaleÌ„ts to our selues Or els when we shal haue shame to frequent the remedies of sinne when heere we may behould the Sauiour of all our soules and the institutor of all the holy Sacraments through ardent charity assist at a sermon and receaue the water of Baptisme with profound humility from the tongue from the hand of a mortall man himselfe being the King and the God of men But the seuerall spirituall aduices which our Lord IESVS did giue vs by the example of his high vertues in this mistery though they be in themselues of great importance towards the shewing of his loue yet doe they lessen when they are compared to that maine drift which he had in this holy Baptisme of his For his prime (e) The principall scope which it seemes that Christ our Lord had in his being baptized meaning was vpon the cost of his Humility and Charity expressed by his being thus baptized to institute a more high soueraigne Baptisme in the nature of a Sacrament By the grace wherof all soules might be washed and cleansed from sinne as certainly as any body is from spots vpon the application of common water O boundles sea of loue which no baÌ„cks of our iniquity could keepe in from breaking out ouer the whole world His loue it was which made him vndergoe the paine of putting his pure naked body vnder water and of shame to be thought a sinfull creature That so by the merit of such loue as water washeth other creatures himselfe might wash euen the very water yea and sanctify all the water in the world towards the beautifying of soules by the meanes of his pretious merits How clearly doth it shew that Christ our Lord is an equall and incomparable kind of friend to all for he placed the remedy of all the Originall sinne of little children and both of the Originall sinne and actuall of such as are already coÌ„uerted baptized to the faith of Christ our Lord when they are of yeares not (f) How good cheape a Christian man be Baptized in the taking of generous wines nor in the application of costly Bathes nor in the drinking pearles and pretious stones distilled into some pretious liquor but only in being touched by a little pure simple water wherin the beggar is as rich as the King And howsoeuer his holy Church which is inspired and guided by his holy spirit hath ordeyned in the exercise
doth fall farre short to expresse the beauteous brightnes of his face for if (a) The beauty of all glorified bodies any one of the glorified bodies shall be as bright as is the sunne then is it certain that if all the starres in heauē should be so many seueral s̄ns they would al be but as mud or inke in cōparison of the splēdour of Christ our Lord of what brightnes then must his face haue been His garmēts were said to haue byn as white as snow Ibid. that no dyer vpon earth was able to arriue to such a height of whitenes To shew that both art and nature may haue some little resēblance but are able to carry no full proportion with things of the other world They were ouershadowed with a cloud but euen that very cloud was bright For as the brightnes of this world is indeed but a kind of light-coloured blacke so that which in the other is least bright doth infinitely exceed whatsoeuer we can heere conceaue to be so most At the thundring of that voyce they were indeed strucken with feare yet we may safely say that they were more afrayd then hurt And (b) They are happy and glorious frightes which grow vpō soules vpon such supernaturall occasions 2. Pet. 1. howsoeuer for the tyme the high Maiesty of the mistery did ouerwhesme them yet withall it strucke such a deepe roote of most reuerent admiring loue into their harts as they neuer knew how to forget And S. Peter and S. Iohn could not faile in their seuerall Epistles to produce the Record of this Transfiguration of our Lord vpon the holy hill as a principall euidence of his glory and their ioy I imagine this terrour of theirs to haue bene resembled in some sort by that state of mind which the diuine S Augustine had found in himselfe though incomparably after an inferiour manner when he spake these wordes Confes l. 11. cap. 9. Quid est hoc quod interlucit mihi percutit cor mē sine laesione inhorresco inardesco Inhorresco in quantum dissimilis tui sum inardesco in quant̄ similis tui sum What is that o Lord which so brightly shootes in vpon me and which strikes my hart through without hurting it And I tremble with horrour and yet I burne with loue I tremble for as much as I am vnlike thee and for as much as I am like thee I burne with loue So did the Apostles tremble and so and much more then so did they burne with loue through the fire wherwith our Lord had inflamed them first But the same loue which wrought vpō them in this mistery by way of heare might also worke vpon them in that extaticall ioy which they receiued therby by way of light to make thē see of how sublime glory he was content to depriue his sacred humanity for loue of them both from his holy Natiuity till that tyme and from that tyme vntill his death For the superiour part of his happy soule from the very first instant of his conception and euen in the bottome of his bitterest passion did continually and as certainely enioy the (c) Our Lord Iesus was still indued with the Beautificall vision Beatificall vision of God as now it doth at the right hand of his Father So also did it in Iustice belong to his sacred flesh and bloud to inioy al the priuiledges of a glorified body as Clarity Immortality Subtility and Impassibility And because these indowments were incompatible with those dolours and death which he designed through the excesse of his loue to suffer for our more copious Redemption he did therefore suspend those influences of glory vpon his humanity So that the miracle falls out to be not to find him thus for a short tyme transfigured towards glory vpon that holy hill but to find him in this valley of misery throughout all those three and thirty yeares of his life transfigured towards humility and contempt and paine him I say who ought in right to haue regorged in complete glory The inferiour part of his soule that is to say the sensitiue appetite therof ought also to haue bene glorious intirely and at all the instants of his mortall life And yet for loue of vs he suspended also the glory due to that to the end that in his loue he might haue the larger leaue to suffer for vs. And that he might feele all those afflictiōs of mind for our sakes for the propitiation of our sinnes and for the purchase of grace from God which we find him to haue endured throughout the rest of all his sad dayes and nights and particularly to haue cost him once so deere as to haue made him pay a sweate of bloud Yea and for as much as concernes this feeling part of his soule we are not so very certaine that it was not suspended in him Luc. 22. euen for this short time of his trāsfiguration Nor was it necessary that it should feele the same ioy for those reasons vpon which his body was trāsfigured But of this we (d) in the middest of that glory the loue of our Lord carried him to speake of his passiō with Moyses and Elias are sure that euen then his speach was of the passion he was in contemplation of the causes why it was to be indured that might wel affect his mind with great sense of griefe Nay euen that very glory which his B. body might thē enioy may rather in some respects go for a surcharge to him of misery then for any accesse of felicity For that ease in suffering disgrace and difficulties which if he had would he might haue gotten as a man may say by the long contynued practice therof was now remoued by this glimse and tast of glory And he (e) The griefe which our Lord felt afterward must needs be the more paynfull to him for his hauing felt this glory soone before was after it to beginne the same lesson of feeling griefe againe as if he had neuer learnt it before And if a Prince falling into extreme calamity would feele it incomparably the more through that riches and abundance wherin he had liued till then how much more painfull to our Lord must those afflictions and persecutions needs be which came to him after his transsiguration then if the Transfiguration had neuer bene So that vpon all these reasons and by all these meanes he doth admirably expresse his tender loue to vs for as much as he would not only liue so long without that glory which was his due but moreouer because whē he would enioy it yet he would doe it but for so short a tyme againe because he sought our ioy comfort and not his owne therin Nay for as much as concerned himselfe his then future paine and scorne was perhaps to be felt by him with a quicker sense then if neuer he had admitted of that glory and ioy The
his owne or for the reliefe of any corporall necessity which he was and would be subiect to For though the Foxes had holes yet the Sonne of man had not where to lay his head And one morning when he returned from Ierusalem to Bethania he is said expresly to haue been h̄gry and he refused in the (d) Matt. 4. wildernes to turne certaine stones into bread for the satisfaction of his owne extreme hungar And his Apostles were soe oppressed in this kind Matt. 12. as that they were defended by him in gathering the eares of that corne which belonged to others yea and that vpon a Sabaoth day which did belong to God except their case had beene of precise necessity they coued not so well haue bene excused in doing it But the whyle though they fed themselues Christ our Lord did not so for if he had those malicious Iewes whose teeth were sharplier whet against him then all the rest or rather not against them at all but only in regard that they belonged to him would haue byn sure to haue bitten him vvith their reprehension So great therfore was his necessity and yet he would not stretch forth his arme of power to help himselfe by any supernaturall meanes Nor doe we find as I was saying that he who wrought such worlds of miracles for worlds of men did serue him selfe of any one to his owne aduantage Matt. 17. It is true that he did miraculously enable S. Peter to take a peece of money out of the belly of a fish to be paid as tribute to the Prince though he saith he was no way bound to doe it So that (e) Our Lord would rather worke a miracle then suffer the occasion of any scandall◠he who would not worke a miracle for the sauing of his owne deere life would yet be sure to doe it for preuenting the scandall of other men And withall that he might shew how obedient men ought to be to theyr tēporall Princes so that it be in things which indeed and truth are only temporall He wrought no miracles either by way of preuention or for the deliuery of himselfe Luc. 4. from his most wicked enemies sauing only when once or twice he grew inuisible to their eyes that so he might preserue himselfe for greater tormets afterwards Whē once he came to his Passion he told them indeed what he could haue obtained of God for his deliuerance Matt. 25. namely so many Legions of Angells And he gaue them also a tast of what he was able to do for himself Ibid. if he had been willing by the miracle which then he wrought vpon Malchus Ioan. 18. And by that other also of stryking thē who came to take him with sad astonishemēt to the ground by the only saying of Ego sum But he kept his miracles for the instruction ease of other men and the only Miracle which he wrought for himselfe was to make by the omnipotent force and power of loue a God of infinite and eternall Maiesty to vndertake for such wormes such a vvorld of misery He vvrought no miracles for the winning of fauour from great persons Luc. 23. Nor could the splendour of Herods fortune nor the extreme curiosity of his mind because it vvas but curiosity obtaine any one at the hands of our Lord. Matt. 13. Marc. 6. He vvas not desirous to win the affection and estimation of his ovvne cōpatriots For though it cannot be said but that he vvrought some miracles among them yet those some vvere so very fevv by reason of their incredulity that in comparison of such as he vvas pleased to vvorke in other places they may in a manner be accompted none He did not a vvhit depend vpon the acknovvledgment and seruice Luc. 17. which he might expect from such persons as he cured For we see he was not discouraged by the ingratitude of those Leapers from whome he well knevv that it was almost (f) One of ten returned to giue him thankes ten to one that he should not haue so much as thanks for his labour But the force and fire of pure and perfect loue alone it was which moued that diuine hart of our Lord to passe ouer the law of nature by working of miracles whensoeuer there were motiues and meanes to doe good to men therby Whilst himselfe the while who was the author of them all would yet lye as hath been said vnder the same lawes of nature so to worke the more easily vpō their soules by the admirable example of his sufferance whose bodies he had restored by a miraculous deliuerance How all the miracles of the new Testament doe tend◠to mercy and how our Lord did neuer deny the suite of any one and of the tender manner which he held in granting them CHAP. 42. IF the meaning of Christ our Lord had bene but only to proue that he was God he might haue insisted vpō that course which formerly had bene held with the people of God in the old Testament At which tyme howsoeuer some miracles were wrought which tended to the comfort of the good as that of parting (a) Exod. 15. the Red sea when the children of Israell were to passe and of the (b) Exod. 13. pillars both of the Clould and that of Fire of (c) Ibid. the rayning downe (d) Deut. 3. Manna in the wildernes and some others yet these miracles which shewed the loue of God to the good were not so many by much as those others by which he shewed his power and iustice against the wicked As vve may easily see by the ten miraculous (e) Exod. 9. e. Plagues vvherby Pharao and the Egyptians vvere scourged the burning of Sodome (f) Genes 19. and Gomorrha the destruction (g) 4. Reg. 19. of Sennacherib and his army vvith many more Much lesse can those auncient miracles of mercy come into competition for n̄ber vvith the innumerable miracles of this kind vvhich vvere vvrought on earth by Christ our Lord. Of vvhome vve cannot find that euer he vvrought any one of reuenging Iustice Luc. 9. nay he rebuked S. Iames and euen the beloued S. Iohn himselfe for mouing him to reuenge by supernaturall meanes an affront vvhich the Samaritans had put vpon him Matt. 16. and them The Ievves indeed desired to see some signe from heauen vvhich might haue fed theyr curiosity but our Lord vvho loued them so infinitely much more then they did thēselues refused to humour them in that vvhich vvas not to haue profited them at all and vvhich it vvould haue cost him nothing to performe he resolued vvithall to vvorke another miraracle vvhich vvas figured in the Prophet Ionas in the belly of the vvhale vvhich imported the death of God for their sinnes wherby they were admirably to be relicued and himselfe beyond imagination to be tormeuted Amongst (i) Our Lord did neuer finally refuse the humble suyte of
the ceremonies which were sanctified by his miracles not a motion of his hand with relation to the cure of any man wherin some mistery was not wrapped vp or els some ceremony sanctified and recommended to the vse of the holy Church And so we see how in the administration of Baptisme those very ceremonies are imbraced by vs which Christ our Lord did vse to sicke persons of seuerall kindes all whose spirituall diseases doe meet in the person of an infant till he be baptized For he is spiritually deafe and therefore doth the Priest put his fingars into the childs eares and cryeth Ephata He is spiritually dumbe and therfore his tongue is touched with spittle And he is yet in the power of the deuill and a child of wrath and therfore is he exorcized as we see to haue bene done vpon possessed persons by our B. Lord. Oftentymes he cured both the bodies of sicknes and the soules of sinnes though the Patients desired but to be corporally cured And when he did not cure their soules it was only because they were not nor would not be well disposed to receiue that blessing But otherwise what he wrought vpō their bodies was ordayned by that diuine goodnes to the helpe of their foules if they hearkned to his inspirations they did instantly recouer both in the outward and inward man Many also of the miracles of Christour Lord (c) Many miracles were ordayned by our Lord to facilitate the beliefe of Christian Religion Ioan. 11. Matt. 14. Matt. 15. Marc. 8. did sweetly prepare a way for the beliefe of other nobler miracles which did also concerne the highest misteries of the Catholike faith As namely the raysing vp of Lazarus disposed men to beleeue the resurrection of the dead at the last day And those two miracles of the walking of our Lord vpon the sea and the stupendious multiplying of the loaues of bread in the desert doe both together open a faire and ready passage towards a beliefe of the Catholicke Doctrine concerning the reall presence of our blessed Lord in the most venerable Sacrament of the Altar For his walking on the sea shewed that his body was no way subiect to the ordinary conditions of a naturall body whensoeuer he should be pleased to exempt it from them although of it selfe it were a perfect naturall body And his multiplying of the loaues did deliuer in plaine language to the world the soueraigne power which he had and hath to multiply what and how much he would Which two points being accorded there remaines no difficulty in belieuing our doctrine of the reall presence of our Lord in the blessed Sacrament So (d) The cōclusion of this discourse of the miracles of Christ our Lord. that to cōclude the loue of our Lord IESVS in the working of his miracles was extraordinarily great Both because the things themselues were so greatly great and because they were wrought with such a perfect and pure intention of Gods greatest glory and our greatest good They tended not only as we haue seen to the cure of bodyes but also of soules And not only of soules to be conuerted at that tyme but through all ages also afterward by the discouery of our spirituall infirmities and by the institution of most holy ceremonies and by facilitating a beliefe of the highest misteries Making one miracle to be a step and introduction for another as I haue shewed in the particular of the blessed Sacrament And (e) Consider all these circumstāces with attention if for euery one of them alone a loyall and gratefull hart would find it selfe obliged to loue him withall the power it hath what effect ought such an aboundant cause as they all together doe make vp to worke in vs and how ought they to induce vs to honour and adore such an incessāt goodnes For if it would goe for a great fauour that a Principall man should once vouchsafe to visite a sicke beggar or leprous slaue the more principall the one of them were and the more base the other so much the greater fanour it would be And if to that visit he should be pleased to add the tendernes of some compassionate speach and almes and euen of corporall seruice about that creature and not only once but often and not only to one but to all the world how iustly would such a charity exact all admiration at our hands Let vs therfore loue and eternally adore our blessed Lord who being the God of heauen and earth vouchsafed to looke vpon such miserable creatures as we are with such eyes of pitty And (f) How those auncient miracles oblige vs to the loue of our Lord. although those former cures were not wrought for the recouery of our indiuiduall bodyes yet there is no single circumstance belonging to any one of them which giueth not a copious supply of instruction and comfort to our soules and especially that last and greatest miracle of all miracles of the institution of the most blessed Sacrament of the Altar So that to omit all other moderne miracles which yet are innumerable Christ our Lord doth still vvorke miracle vpon miracle in this blessed Sacrament For this is consecrated in thousands of places daily and hourely and it is imparted as easily and liberally to the worst and wickedest of vs all if euen now at last we haue a resolution to mend as it was to his own most blessed mother and his Apostles And this is not only a lasting miracle of instruction and direction and consolation both of body and soule as those others were but it is a miracle of high communication and perfect vnion Wherby the omnipotent Maiesty of God Matt. 26. Marc. 14. Luc. 22. Ioan. 13. is content after a sort to make sinfull man become one thing with himselfe That diuine goodnes vouchsafing to leaue it to his Church by way of Legacy in the night precedent to his passion as euen now I am endeauouring to shew Of the infinite Loue which our Lord Iesus shewed to vs in the institution of the blessed Sacrament and the holy Sacrifice of the Masse CHAP. 45. OVR Lord God of his goodnes giue vs grace that in vs it may be verified which hath bene vttered by his owne sacred mouth Habenti dabitur Matt. 13. To him who hath shall be giuen And that since he hath indued vs with Faith in the beliefe of the misteries of his pretious life and death we may still haue Faith more and more wherwith to giue a firme feeling inflamed kind of assent to all the testimonies of his infinite loue which haue bene made to vs his miserable creatures For (a) What loades of mercy our Lord doth lay vpon our soules verily in this kind he layes such loade vpon vs and doth as it were so presse vs euen to death with his deare mercies that if the eyes of our mindes were not eleuated by his supernaturall grace and fixed therby vpon an
infallible truth we might be beaten blind with seeing and starued with surfetting as we see many others are and the very vastnes of those misteries which are opened to vs for our cōfort by Christ our Lord would make vs halfe doubt whether they were or could be true or no. The beloued Apostle and Euangelist S. Iohn had lodged himselfe so long so neere the hart of our blessed Lord that he was easily able to discerne and declare how excellently he loued vs from the beginning and that withall his loue continued towards vs to the end Iesus autem Ioan. 13. cùm dilexisset suos in finem dilexit eos Nay the motion of the loue of his diuine hart towards man hauing bene so naturall in him it is no meruaile if it vvent more violently in the end of his sacred life then at the beginning All the passions of that happy soule were intyrely subiect to the commaund of his reason and he held it to be a thing agreable to the dignity immutability of the God he was to speake of all things as was toucht before after a positiue manner and wonderfully as we vse to say within compasse Superlatiues and Exaggerations vsed to be thin sowed in the blessed mouth of our Lord IESVS Nor is he in effect euer found to haue said any thing as seeming to haue bene transported with any extraordinary or passionate desire or care but (b) When he came towardes the passiō our Lord did seem to breake his pace only concerning that which he was to suffer in his sacred Passion and that which he was to doe in the night precedent to the same When formerly he was aduising his Apostles to haue great confidence in the prouidence of God by letting them see what a care he had euen of sparrowes and inferring therby that he would incomparably more haue care of them he exaggerated not the matter Matt. 10. but did only aske If themselues were not to be more esteemed then many sparrowes Wheras yet one soule is more in the sight of God not only thē many sparrowes but then al the whole material world put together When he had a mind to tell them what a misery it was for that wretch that he would make himselfe the betrayer of the sonne of man Matt. 8◠he only said wo be to that man it had been better for him if he had neuer been borne which was but a very plaine and positiue manner of expression For as much as not only this greatest sinne which euer was perhaps conceaued but the least mortall sinne that can be imagined without repentance doth make a man much more vnhappy then if he were vtterly depriued of being When he professed the omnipotency of his eternall Fathers power to deliuer him out of the hands of them who tooke and tyed him he told them only Matt. 26. that if he should pray for any helpe of that kind his Father would send more then twelue legions of Angells to his succour Wheras he might as good cheape haue said twelue thousand as twelue legions But our Lord IESVS was not wont to vse any superlatiue manner of speach and he hath had many seruants who haue carefully imitated him in this as in the rest But yet neuer thelesse whē he reflected vpō the thought of that passiō which he was resolued to vndergoe for the Redēption of mā the very desire of the approach of so happy a day made him cōfesse that he was in paine till it did arriue Luc. 12. Baptismo habeo baptizari quomodo coactor donec veniat Or rather he did not so much say that he was in paine as by words of interrogation in the way after a sort of seeming impatient he asked himselfe this very question in effect How much am I payned how straitely am I imprisoned til I haue my fil of suffering for the loue of man Iust (c) Our Lord did long for the tyme when he might institute the B. Sacrament so may we see that when the time of celebrating the feast of the Paschal lambe was come he grew euen greedily desirous to eate it in the company of his B. Apostles before his Passion And for their comfort he would not choose but say Luc. 22. Desiderio desider aui manducare vobiscum hoc Pascha antequam patiar That he desired it and that with desire vpon desire and such desire as could neuer be appeased till he were satisfied till that tyme of the last supper were past wherin he had resolued to impart vnspeakeable tokens of his loue to them and so the other tyme of his Passion wherin he was to endure the depth of all torments and affronts for the same loue were then immediatly to come In the euening therfore and within few howers of his Passion this enamoured Lord of ours hauing all the parts and passages therof in his eye and looking as it were in the very face of death and such a death he yet (d) Our Lord kept the shew of all his sorrow to himselfe Ioan. 13. laid vp all the sorrow in his owne hart and would discouer to his Apostles no other semblance then of ioy and comfort least his griefe might be a cause of theirs He conuersed with them after his ordinary and familiar manner he disposed himselfe first to eate the Paschall lambe with them After that he sate downe with them to a common Supper He kept his diuine countenance full of quietnes and peace He tooke them close about him on all sides He cheered them vp with his gratious eyes and he carued them with his liberall hands Nay with those hands to the dispēsation wherof his eternall Father had cōmitted all things he disdayned not then to wash the vncleane feete of those poore Apostles For which purpose first he put of his vpper garment as any hired seruant was to haue done Ioan. 13. and by the force of his owne armes he tooke a big vessell full of water out of that he silled a lesser He girt himselfe with a towell into which he tooke their corporall vncleanes as a figure of how he would purify their harts by his sacred Passion For then he was to beare the deformity of their sinnes vpon the shoulders of his body which was a kind of winding sheet to his soule When our Lord had thus performed this act of religion in eating of the Paschall lambe and of incomparable suauity in his conuersation of vnspeakeable humility in the Lotiō of his Apostles feete he returned to the table and amazed all the (e) The Angells might well be amazed to see the sonne of God giue his owne body in food to sinners Angells of heauen whose vnderstāding did euen agonize in seeing him performe that supereminent act of Charity when he instituted the blessed Sacrament of the Altar and ordeyned the holy Sacrifice of the Masse which was so worthy of an infinite God This was done by diuine
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
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
the inioyning and if it were possible for the very exchanging themselues by loue into one another And now as God is infinite in all things so is he infinite after a particular manner in his loue and by consequence he is infinite in his inuention How inspeakeable honour had it bene for man to haue bene though but admitted to the sight alone of Christ our Lord in the blessed Sacrament Num. 88. For if the sight of that brasen serpēt with faith in Christ our Lord who was then but to come so long after were able to cure the Israelites of the stings of serpents how much more would the only sight of our blessed Sauiour with faith haue sufficiently serued to cure their soules of all their sicknesse How much happines had it bene for vs to touch the sacred host with our hāds the senfible part of the same host being a garment which sits so close vpon the body and soule of Christ our Lord. For we know that a woman was cured of a bloudy flux Matt. 9 14. Marc. 6. Luc. 8. by the only touch of the hemne of his looser garment Such honour and happines had bene much for vs to haue receaued but it was nothing in cōparisō of the excessiue charity of our Lord which would not be satisfied with doing lesse then all For what could euen his omnipotency haue added to the trace which heere he hath deuised not only of a coniunction but of an vnion and that such an one as is the most internall which can be imagined being in the way of food S. Augustine sheweth how God hath made as able to feed vpon him by a meer spirituall manner in the mistery of the Incarnation and we may fitly apply the same wordes to this Sacramētall kind of feeding as indeed these two misteries haue great affinity with one another God (z) A passage of S. Augustine which well deserueth to be consi dered Manual cap. 26. became man sayth this incomparable Saint for mans sake that so man might be redeemed by him by whome he was created And to the end that God might be beloued by man after a kind of more familiar manner he appeared in the likenes of man That so both the internall and the externall senses of man might be made happy in him and that the eye of our hart might be fedd by the consideration of his diuinity and the eye of our flesh and bloud by that of his humanity That so whether we should worke inward or outward this humane nature of ours which was created by him in him might be sure to find store of food This S. Augustine sayth and if this might be well affirmed in respect of the Incamation of our Lord IESVS how much more may it be sayd in respect of the mystery of the blessed Sacrament where we feed not only spiritually but besides after a sacramentall and yet reall māner How we doe both feed and are fedd vpon in the blessed Sacrament and of the admirable effects which it must necessarily cause in such as do worthily receaue it and of the reason why it must be so and of the Figures which forshewed the same CHAP. 48. VVE may wel perceaue that our Lord IESVS is a great freind of (a) God is a great friend of vnion Vnion His person is distinct from the other persons of the B. Trinity but the essence is one and very same of them all When he was resolued to become man he was also pleased to knit mans nature to the nature of God by the Hypostaticall vnion An infinite honour this was to man for it grew true heerby that man was God and that God was killed vpon a Crosse for the loue of men Yet though by that vnion in his Incarnation he brought vs all to be his allies he did not personally vnite himselfe to vs all But by this last (b) How our Lord vniteth vs to himself sacramentall vnion of him and vs when purely we take his pretious body bloud into our selues vnder the quality and condition of food he maketh euery one of vs much more one with him And then no meruaile if the honour he doth vs if the ioy he giues vs when the fault is not our owne be the greatest which we can receaue in this world For we inioye none of the other mysteries of the life and death of our Lord IESVS but onely by faith and memory wheras this is present to vs in very deed and present so as the food which we receaue is present to vs. And so in like manner when no impediment is at hand it breeds a great loue of his goodnes and a great delight in his sweetnes in fine an vnion of vs both in one Though with this difference from other food that as S. Augustine was taught by our Lord we change not him into vs Confes l. 7. cap. 10. as by eating other food we vse to chāge it but we are changed into it by it if we approach to it with a pure and hungry soule so feeding in this B. Sacrament vpon him he feedeth also vpon vs. Nor is it strange that we should both feed and yet be fed vpon when Almighty God is a party to the contract Omnia quaecumpue voluit fecit He can doe what he will and he is pleased to will Psalm 113. that he and we should feed vpon one another And to such as endeauour to be truly and entirely and purely his he contenteth not himselfe with lesse then thus to come to them in person with desire of vnion And he is (c) The vnspeakeable benefits which are reaped by worthy receauing the B. Sacrament Psal 147. washing away all the dregs of sinne by that fountaine of grace He is thawing all frozen hardnes of the hart by the sweet breath of his Spirit Flabit Spiritus eius fluent aquae and he is consuming the rust of their selfe loue by that burning fire of his charity comforting them in all afflictions and satisfying them in all their doubts and wants illuminating their vnderstanding and composing their will and fixing their imaginatiō and possessing and imprinting himselfe vpon their memory calling in and consecrating their senses and sealing vp their harts to himselfe And changing at length the whole tast of their soules he make them loue that which he loues and hate that which is any way offensiue to him To conclude of deuills which perhaps they were they become as so many Angells in flesh bloud are naturalized after a sort with God grow to be euen very Christs according to that of the blessed Apostle who said of himselfe Viuo (d) O happy holy state ego Galat. 2◠iam non ego viuit verò in me Christus I liue yet now not I but Christ is he who liueth in me by my liuely imitation of his diuine vertues and by a perfect conformity or rather transformity of my spirit
our Redemption The misery is shewed and the errour is partly conuinced of such as doe not imbrace the beliefe of those diuine Mysteries CHAP. 50. VVHo shall therfore be euer able inough to admire this Soueraigne Lord of loue for the mercy which he hath shewed vs in this blessed Sacramēt of his most pretious body and bloud and for the care he hath taken of the cōpletenes of our comfort heerin Psalm 105. Quis loquetur potentias Domini auditas faciet omnes landes eius Who I say shall be able to declare Gods power and to proclaime his prayses And how much reason therfore is it that there should not be in the world any Priest or other faithfull Christian who will not set vp the rest of all his comfort in this life in frequenting this bread of heauen and in spending some part of his dayes and nights in preparing to receaue this diuine food with due deuotion If our Lord IESVS Lue. 14. tooke it ill in the Ghospell that they would not resort to that supper of his which was indeed a type of heauen it selfe and yet withall of this heauenly mystery how heauily wil he lay it to our charge if we be negligent in comming to this Table whē himselfe is both he who inuites to the banquet the very bāquet it self But O (a) The lamentable ingratitude of such as are not Catholiques misery to be eternally deplored euen with teares of bloud that in these woefull dayes of ours there should be any found with the name of Christians vpon their forehead who yet renounce the benefit yea and expresly blaspheme the inuiolable truth of this mystery Miserable creatures they are a thousand tymes miserable who do by this meanes eyther ignorantly or maliciously degrade and depose themselues from the most soueraigne point of Christian dignity which the infinite wisedome and loue of God himselfe was euen able with all his omnipotency to impart to the meanenes and weakenes of sinfull men Yet some of them being pressed as it were to death by the euident words of Hoc est corpus meum so often iterated by so many of the holy Euangelists haue begun of late yeares to affirme that they beleeue the reall presence of our Lord in the blessed Sacrament as well as wee but only that they dare not pronounce de modo But (b) Theyr speach de modo is a false and foolish stift our Lord doth know that they speake not as they meane but only to abuse the people Neither can they beleeue it as we doe according to their other particular declarations concerning this doctrine And yet in truth if they did beleeue the thing it selfe and did only differ de modo as they say they doe amongst which modo's or wayes they vnderstād our doctrine of Transubstantiation to be one how could they dare so wickedly blaspheme this our Doctrine cōcerning the modus yet professe that they are ignorant of the modus or way how the reall presence comes to be in the B. Sacrament But this (c) The scope of this book is not to teach faith but loue Treatise is not intended for the setling of the truth of the Catholike faith and to conuince them of errour who inpugne it but only to inflame the hart of the true Christian to heate of loue vpon those reasons and motiues which are already ministred by the light of faith to our soules That other taske hath bene performed by multitudes of our learned Authors wherof the world is ful I will only beseech them for the loue of our Lord IESVS that they will procure to purify their hartes from sensuality and other sinne which blindes that soule wherin it raignes till then we will wonder the lesse that men of so bestiall life as the founders of their religion were had no sight wherwith to pierce into so pure mysteries The carnall man cannot discerne of things belonging to God 1. Cor. ◠and if not of things which are but belonging to him how much lesse of the substance of this blessed Sacrament which is God himselfe as truly God as he is God who made heauen and earth In the meane tyme these people deserue much pitty at our hands who whet the teeth not only of infidelity against God but euen of Enuy against themselues For what doth it looke like but enuy since they refuse to beleeue and to imbrace so great a good vpon this cheife reason because they thinke it is too good to be true And (d) The counterfeyt sanctity and preposterous pretence of the humility of Sectaries this peruerse and preposterous humility togeather with a seeming to take such a counterfayte care of the dignity and Maiesty God is one of those bucklers vnder which they hide themselues from the darts of loue which he would faine be shooting at their soules For they say it is an indignity and what if a rat or a dogge should eate the blessed Sacrament and I know not what vnsauoury stuff of the kind But they consider not the while that God receaues farre more dishonour in being prophaned by a Iudas or any other obstinate sinner then if the body of our Lord should be eaten by as many rats as there are blaspheming Heretikes in the world That Sunne true Sunne of Iustice can well inough tell how to keep his beames from being defyled vpon any filthy dunghill And if he could not it would goe hard with him For the diuinity of Christ our Lord IESVS is actually intrinsecally in all the parts of all the creatures of the whole world both by essence presēce and power yea and in all the deuills of hell as truly as in any Angell of heauen or els that thing would instantly giue ouer to be And now if the (e) Note this most certay ne and apparant consequēce diuinity of Christ our Lord be in all vile places without any indignity the humanity how noble soeuer it be will be farre from disdayning to keep it company Little doe these deceaued creatures consider how low our mercifull Lord could be content to descend for the loue of man towards the receauing if there should be cause of dishonour by the meanes either of beasts or other men And I should thinke that the Temptation of Christ our Lord by the Prince of darkenes in the wildernes Matt. 4. might read them a lowd lesson vpon this subiect For there our B. Lord was not only tempted by the deuill but that diuine goodnes did suffer that sacred Sonne of the blessed Virgin to be taken as hath been said posted vp downe in those armes or hands which the infernall Spirit had assumed to himselfe for that purpose Or if they had rather looke vpon the Sonnes and slaues of the deuill then vpon himselfe Let them (f) Note also this consequēce behould how that holy humanity being so knit to God as that it made the selfe same person with him was
soule being vnited to the diuinity would haue bene farre from feeling any thing but vnspeakeable ioy But leauing eight of his Disciples not farre of he tooke to himselfe the three whom he fauoured most Marc. 14. S. Peter S. Iames and S. Iohn as the fittest to be eye witnesses of his afflictiō because they had beene fortified by hauing bene present at his Transfiguration Matt. 17. Marc. 14. Luc. 22. He bad them watch and pray least else they might enter into Temptation But the lead of their sad harts drew downe and closd ' the doores of their heauy eyes making them sleep after a sort whether they would or no. Our Lord had by that tyme retyred himselfe a little euen from them into perfect (a) Solitude is fit for such as pray solicitude Not that he had need therof who knew not what be longed to a distraction but to teach vs in such cases what we are to doe Yea and to make euen men of the highest prayer and contemplation not to contemne the preparations and helpes which weaker persons are wont vse When he had prayed a while he went to visit his Apostles And so he did agayne at two seueral tymes afterward for no paine of his owne was able to make him forget them And although in all reason they were to haue been sharply reprehended for such a dulnes yet he would not open his mouth towards the holding of any such language But (b) The wōderfull meeknes of our B. Lord. he pittied them rather and bad them at the last sleepe on and to the extreme confusion of such as for tryflles are cholerickly transported against their seruants he excuseth and defendeth and euen comendeth them for the promptitude and good desire of their minde although their body of flesh bloud were fraile Returning therfore againe to pray his soule was ouer wrought with griefe in such excesse that his valiant hart which knew not what belonged to feare and his silent tongue which vsed not to vent it selfe by speach were not ashamed to professe that he was all seized with terrour that he was oppressed with a kind of wearines that he was surcharged with so profound sorrow as made him say That his soule was sad euen to the death What a blessed goodnes was this in him to plucke vp those stakes dikes which formerly had made it impossible for such thought as those to breake in and ouerflow him and now to giue way to such (c) The weakenes of our Lord hath obtayned strength for his seruants in their sufferāce weakenes in himselfe that by the merit therof so much grace might be applied to men and not only to men but euen to tender and delicate Virgins as that in vertue therof they might be able with patience and euen with ioy to endure as cruell Martyrdomes as euer the rage of the most barbarous Tyrants could inuent For as we grew to haue perfect life by the obediēce of his death and true honour by his humility and shame so by this weakenes of his we haue gayned strength by his wearines alacrity and by his griefe his faithfull seruants haue obteyned ioy in their greatest misery From hence we may also gather an other fruite of cōfort that since our Lord himselfe went so farre in the expression of his distresse his seruants must not thinke when thēselues should be much deiected by their crosses in the inferiour part of their soule that therfore God is angry with them if still in the superiour they will imitate this Lord of ours Who notstanding he desired that the Chalice might haue passed from him did yet resigne himselfe with intire abnegatiō of his owne wil accepting thus Luc. 22. imbracing the wil of God Pater si est possibile transeat à me Calix iste attamen non mea voluntas sed tua siat Father if it be possible let this Chalice passe frō me yet not my will but thine be done Now as the charity was vnspeakeable which our Lord IESVS was pleased to expresse both in bearing such a vveight as this for our Redemption in letting vs heare the groanes which it cost him for our instructiō consolation so who shall be able to sound into that bottomlesse pit of his profound humility which drew the God of glory to submit himselfe to such indignity and to make him content to need the comfort of a creature though he were an Angell which Angell must come downe from heauen like a prince of glory whilst the creatour of all the Angells was planted there so full of misery And that he would find himselfe in such necessity of (d) How he persisted in prayer persisting in his prayer sometymes (1) Luc. 22. vpon his knees sometymes (2) Marc. 14. prostrate vpon the ground often repeating the same Prayer and that in the selfe same words as if it had bene like to proue a kind of doubtfull case what would become of him at last But of that there was no doubt at all for besides his Hypostaticall vnion with the diuinity his happy soule was fully in God And both by the straytes into which he was content that the inferiour part therof should be cast for as much as concerned any sense of cōfort as also by the course which he tooke to become victorious in the end he went recording wayes and rules for vs wherby we might also conquer all our enemies Our blessed Lord in the meane tyme was labouring as it were for life to such plunges was he brought as to find himselfe in expresse agony Luc. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for so the holy Euangelist declares Now this is the state of dying persons in the last moments of their life when the eyes being already dymme the teeth being knit the hart strings being straynd and all the noble partes being in commotion as this Globe of the lower world vvould be in a generall earth quake the diuorce of the body and soule seemeth neere at hand And it is to be noted that this grevv in him vvithout any torment then inflicted vpon his body and only from the (e) The excessiue anguish of mind which our Lord Iesus felt anguish of his minde Hovv exquisite therfore and hovv insufferable must that anguish be But the more closely he vvas to be set vpon by that Sea of sorrovv vvhich seemed as if instantly it vvould svvallovv him vp the more firme vvas his hope in God and so also must ours be in such occasions And after the rate of our discomforts so is our Prayer to be increased Forvve see it is affirmed of our blessed Sauiour that vvhē he vvas grovvne to be in Agony he produced his prayer into great length Ibid. Et factus in agonia prolixius orabat Prayer is therfore that vvhich still he recommends to vs heerby and vve see vvith hovv profound reuerence it must be made and vvhat high estimation vve are to make
griefe of our Lord Iesus novv vve vvill but consider hovv infinitely the nature of God doth abhorre any one single sinne And hovv straitly our Lord IESVS had obliged himselfe out of loue to satisfy Gods Iustice for them all And hovv certainely he savv that the farre greater part of men vvould take no benefit at all by that bitter Passion But that some would not beleeue it some others vvould not apply it yea and that some would euen blaspheme it as thinking it impossible that God himselfe should be so good to them If vve consider that men vvho seriously desire to serue God vvith perfection are profoundly afflicted euē for the least discorrespondence to the motion of his holy Spirit and much more for any small defect into vvhich by their fault they may haue fallen And vvhen there hath beene question of greater sinnes there be men and vvomen vvho haue dyed as hath been sayd euen of pure repentance sorrovv for them And yet hovv fevv sinnes had they to be sory for in comparison of the sinnes of the vvhole vvorld And hovv little could they be sorry euē for their ovvne in cōparison of the griefe vvhich did seize the hart of our blessed Lord for those very sinnes Which (d) We shall greeue for onr sinnes after the rate of our know ledge and loue of God vvas so much greater then theirs as his knovvledge loue of God them his vnderstanding detestation of all sinne vvas greater If vve cōsider the seuerall kinds of sinne vvhich as hath been touched before vvere distinctly represented to the minde of Christ our B. Lord All the sinnes of Idolatry heresy offending after an infinite māner his most religious piety All the sinnes of pride his profound humility All the sinnes of vvrath his inuincible patience All the sinnes of cruelty and enuy those bovvels of his charity and mercy All the sinnes of gluttony and prodigality his his perfect pouerty and sobriety All the sinnes of abhominable bestiall and not so much as to be named sensuality his impenetrable supercelestiall purity If concerning Idolatry vve consider that it is either exteriour or interiour Exteriour vvhen Sacrifice is offred to a materiall externall Idoll interiour vvhen Christians or any other do lodge a creature in theyr harts which though they know not to be God yet they esteeme and obey and doe more honour to it then to God And if vve consider hovv for these seuerall kindes of sinnes he felt and vvas to feele a seuerall kind of Crosse an outvvard crosse to vvhich they vvould crucify his sacred body and another vvhich vvas inward to which he crucified his ovvne hart through griefe and loue In (e) How our Lord was wounded by the considetion of Gods iustice and bate of sinne and our great misery particular our Lord had his eye vpō that inflexible decree of God which dāned so many millions of Angells for one only sinne And how for one sinne he droue Adam out of Paradise Yea and how not only for the fault or guilt of sinne he is so terrible but euē for the penalty due to any one sinne although the fault be put away by pennance that he inflicteth excessiue paine in Purgatory if satisfaction be not made in this life He had besides in his sight the miserable weakenesse of man towards all good workes which weakenesse men cōtract by sinne besides the sinnes thēselues and these are the effects teliques therof And he well knew that they would make it very difficult for men to serue God without a great abōdāce ofgrace which he only could tell how to merit for thē Add to this that he cleerly saw all those vast affronts which in that night and the next day were to be done to himselfe with the hideous torments which he vvas sure they would inflict vpon him He also saw the Martyrdomes of all his Prophets past his Apostles and other Martyrs which were then to come the banishment and confiscation of his seruants persons and goods the contempt and prophanation of his Sacraments There was no place wheron he could tell how to rest the head of his hart The Synagogue was all in effect corrupt and almost dead and buried His Church vnder the name of Christian not then borne One of his Apostles was gone to betray him another would shortly deny him and the rest were vpon the point to runne from him His B. Mother in whom only he might haue taken intiere delight was to suffer martyrdome in her soule which was to be transpierced with a sword of sorrow Whithersoeuer he might cast his thoughs in the search of some little comfort they were bowed as it were and beaten backe againe into his owne sad hart which was become a whole Sea of sorrow How would he grieue for all this vvho grieued till he wept againe Ioan. 11. and till he was troubled and did groane in spirit for the only temporall death of Lazarus All these things I say being vvell considered and duely pondered I (f) It is no wonder if such incōparable causes of griefe did produce so strange effects in the wounded hart of our Lord Iesus cease to meruaile that such a generall muster of hell as this had like euen vvith the only apprehention therof to haue extinguished the pure lampe of his pretious life Or yet that it cost him so much shame vvith the horrour to see such a vvorld of filth cast before him vvhich novv he vvas to take vp and to make his ovvne as vvas able to put him into expresse Agony Or in fine that it drevv out that svveat and euen shovver of bloud as if it had bene to shevv the profound reason vvhich euen all his body had to blush therat Or els according to the deuoute contemplation of holy S. Bernard as if he should haue shed teares ouer all his body since his sacred eyes alone had not inough of the sluce for such a purpose Of the excellency of Prayer declared by occasion of that Prayer of our B. Lord in the Garden CHAP. 57. INFALLIBLY he must needs haue dyed vnder this huge weight of sorrow if particular force had not bene sent him by the good will of God as the sorrow of the same kind though incomparably of an inferiour degree hath depriued many others of their life Nor are we able to discerne visibly by what meanes this strength and succour came imparted to him but only by the visitation of the Angell and the feruour and perseuerance of his Prayer to the eternal Father (a) We ought to carry great deuotion reuerence to the Angells of God Now since our Lord who as God was the King of glory did not yet disdaine as man to accept that seruice and assistance from an Angell much more must we who are in the next degree to Nothing carry great deuotion to those blessed spirits who come to vs with succour in their hands at such times as when
the kingdom of God of the deuill The former being lead by Christ our Lord who marched in the head therof with his meeke and innocent humble little flocke The latter guyded by Iudas with a great multitude of followers who were tumultuous wicked bloudy enuyous and hypocryticall men But (b) Amost iust expostulatioÌ„ agianst the Traytour Iudas tell me O thou miserable creature since the SoÌ„ne of the virgin tooke but twelue Apostles out of the whole world and made choyce of thee for one of them what could moue thee to forget so high a benefit much more what could induce thee to conspire the death of such a benefactour Since he had giuen thee the charge of the little teÌ„porall meanes he had and that by consequence thou must needs be next at hand both at the receiuing of those Almes which were afforded to our Lord IESVS those others also which he would be euer imparting to the poore out of his little store how couldst thou freeze in that yce of thy malice and enuy euen then when thou wert as it were rosting round betweene those two burning fires of charity What colour euen of common sense couldst thou haue to sell that Lord for thirty peeces of siluer Matt. 17. to whome thou hadst seene the very Fishes of the Sea pay Tribute Matt. 17. and how a word of his mouth fed at seuerall tymes so many thousands of men and women in the wildernes Couldst thou being an Apostle sel that Lord for thirty peeces of siluer Matt. 16. when thy selfe hadst seene so lately that the enamoured penitent S. Mary Magdalene who was but newly conuerted from a life of sinne could find in her noble and tender hart to cast away as a man may say three hundred such peeces Marc. 14. as thy thirty were vpon a pretious oyntment wherwith to honor the head of our blessed Lord as it were in the way of a complement Since thou hadst found by dayly experience that he knew the thoughts both of his friends and them who would needs become his foes what phrensey was that which could make thee thinke that thou wert able to ouerreach him by the disguyse of a treacherous kisse wherby thou didst as bad as call him foole into the bargaine And since thou hadst seene that his body was not obnoxious to the obligations of other bodies but that the windes and seas obeyed him and that he could walke vpon the waters and become inuisible when he would what stupidity besides the impiety was that in thee to bid them be carefull to hold him fast and lead him safe wherby thou didst insinuate that he was but a kind of Iugler or Impostour who would worke himselfe out of their fingars by some tricke or other of Legier-de-main Hadst not thou seene the worlds of Miracles which he had wrought He who had restored eyes to the blind could not he haue bidden thyne eyes see no more He who had made Paralitiques stiâ—re and goe could not he haue made all thy bones and sinewes wither in thy skin He who only with a Lazarus veni foras had fetcht that dead man out of his graue Ioan. 11. had not he bene able with the burning breath of his mouth to haue spit thy kisse into thy throate and at the instant to haue depriued thee of life But tell me yet againe O thou Monster and insamy of mankind could those accursed feete of thine lead thee on to such a mischiefe which euen but that very night had bene washt wiped by those hands of mercy Could thy tongue become the forge of so much treachery as to salute him with Hayle Maister when thy errand was nothing els but to betray him could that mouth imploy it selfe in deliuering him vp to death by animating those wretched meÌ„ against him who yet needed no incouragement of thine which for diuers yeares had bene dayly fed both at his table and from his trencher If thy kisses were so cruell what vvere thy vvounds or rather vvhat wound vvas euer so mortall as thy trayterous kisse And although thine ovvne reprobate conscieÌ„ce did not strike thee through vvith horrouâ— vvould not the presece of all thy fellovv-Apostles beate thee blind vvith shame vvho vvere so many vvitnesses against thee of all those benefits which thou hadst receiued that euen then so lately at the hands of such a meeke and mercifull Lord And hadst thou no body to sell him to but those very men of the whole world who did hate him most And was it possible for thy Tygars hart not to relent at least when thou camest to behould that holy person of his And though now he were no more able to worke vpon thee as an obiect of loue yet was it possible that thou shouldest not be wrought vpon by him as he was growne to be an obiect of compassion For thou couldst not but discerne a great change in his diuine countenance towards palenes and weaknes since thou hadst seene him last before through the Agony which he had susteyned and the sweat of bloud which he had powred forth in the Garden At least wert thou able to receaue the sound of that celestiall voyce into thine eares which besides the sacred tune did expresse that sweet and charming ditty Marc. 14. Luc. 12. Amice ad quid venisti osculo silium hominis tradis My friend consider what it is about which thou comesi caust thou find in thy hart to betray the sonne of the Virgin with a kisse And was not euen this of power to make thee at length retract the treason which thou hadst contriued hadst thou more theÌ„ a LegioÌ„ of deuills in thee which at the hearing of his voyce would not leaue thee free for of other meÌ„ we read that he dispossessed theÌ„ of whole Legions all at once by the only word of his sacred mouth At least if there were no remedy but thou wouldst needs coÌ„mit that vast sinne it might haue serued thy turne to haue betraied him by a deputy or if thou must needs do it in sight it might yet haue beene froÌ„ a far of But to do it both in thine owne person that so very neere at haÌ„d as both to speake to him to heare him to embosome thy selfe by a kisse and so betray him was such a high straine of wickednes that we need no lesse then the assurance it selfe of Gods holy Spirit to make vs beleeue that it should be true O (c) The 〈…〉 in 〈◊〉 mortall sinne which art both mortal immortall in that thou puttest the soule to death but a death which yet knows not how to dye What ruyne dost thou bring to the hart of man wherin thou raiguest what perfect miracles dost thou worke there in reuersall of those others which are wrought by Grace For as Grace illuminates as it inflames as it instructs as it enriches as it exalts as it delights as it vnites iust so dost
Testament an (b) Iudas Apostle one of the twelue whom God had elected out of the whole world to be his Embassadours one who had liued neere three yeares in the sight and tast of that fountaine of sanctity Christ our Lord and of that stream of purity charity his all-immaculate mother whom all generations shall call blessed One who had wrought miracles Luc. 2. and exercised dominion ouer the Princes of darknes by commaunding them to depart out of possessed persons One before whome the King of glory had kneeled downe to wash his seate one who had bene fed with the body of our blessed Lord which he gaue with his owne sacred hands This man this Monster to shew vvhat a monstrous thing euery liuing man is sure to be at the instant that he deserues to be forsaken by the omnipotēt mercy of our Lord God made such hast to hell as that he suffered not his eyes to sleepe nor his eye lids to slumher till hauing entred into a part with those perfidious Ievves for thirty peeces of siluer he put himselfe vpon betraying and by a kisse this Lord of life into the hands of death This Lord (c) The loue of our Lord to vs in the losse of Iudas gaue vvay to this inestimable offence against himself that it might be a great and lovvd vvarning Peece of meeknes for as much as he vouchsafed to suffer of humility feare for as much as Iudas presumed to do To the end that no priuiledge of fauour or possessiō of present vertue might make any man rely vpō his ovvne strength which is al but vveakenes 2. Cor. 7. But that adhering to God by faith hope loue we might worke our saluatiō with a filiall seare a trēbling ioy For the whole race of mankind was nothing at all in the way of nature and to nothing it would instantly all returne if it vvere not conserued by the omnipotency of God as by a kind of continuall nevv creation And in the way of grace vve are all lesse then nothing and the holyest soule vvhich euer vvas might instantly plunge it selfe in sinne if it vvere abandoned by Gods grace If then we haue our being both in the state of nature and of grace by the particular fauour of our Lord God it follovves that the more graces he giues and the more fauours he shevves to a soule so much the more must it be subiect to him And they are to serue but as so many bills of debts vvherby it is bound to find hovv base and beggarly a thing it is of it selfe and consequently hovv profoundly humble and gratefull it must be to our Lord vvho only knevv hovv to enrich it For our Lord is a great God and vve are vveake vnvvorthy thinges vvho can giue him nothing by vvay of retribution but only a continuall faithfull and humble acknovvledgment that vve are (d) How we are to entertaine the memory of Gods fauours of our owne sinnes nothing vvorth And as through his infinite goodnes vve may call to mind euen our greatest sinnes vvith much comfort vvhen once vve haue done true penance for them so through his infinite greatnes the soule which receiueth fauours and visitations of him in particular manner must thinke of them with great apprehension and feare vnlesse they be intertayned with much humility and improued by Prayer and other industry The griefe which our Lord IESVS had for euery single sinne of the whole world was excessiuely great as we haue shewed How excessiue therfore must it needs haue been to see this hideous sinne of this Apostle And by the measure of his griefe we may find the measure of his former loue for loue it was which made him grieue The thing which might comfort him in that affliction was to cōsider what an innumerable number of soules would take warning by this sinne of Iudas As soone therfore as that treacherous kisse was giuen and that our Lords sacred words and inspirations were contemned by that miserable creature our Lord IESVS went on towards the troope enquiring whome they sought And when they told him that it was IESVS of Nazareth Ioan. 18. he instantly answered that he was the man But as on the one side they saw him a man so on the other he then gaue himselfe Gods truest (e) The Maiesty of our Lord Iesus euen when he he was mortal seemed miserable Name of Ego sum I am though they vnderstood it not But he thought good to let them see that he had somewhat in himselfe of the God And so resoluing to try all imaginable wayes for the mollifying of their marble harts and perceauing that the mildnes which he had vsed with Iudas succeeded not he gaue such a Maiesty to those two words as serued to cast them to the ground We may imagine heerby with what terrour he wil appeare when he comes as Iudge who in his very Passion wherin he meant but only to suffer could so declare his power We may also well perceaue heerby that they were strangely confirmed in malice since a miracle of that nature being wrought vpon the persons of themselues had no meanes to make thē rise to pennance But they rose by the permission of God to continue in their sinne and to aske our Lord the same questiō a second time and a second tyme to receaue an Answere to the same effect Our Lord (f) Our Lord had no care of himselfe but much of his Apostles Ibid. adding further by way of commaundement that they should suffer his Apostles to retire themselues whatsoeuer they might haue a mind to doe with him And it seemes to haue bene impossible for that diuine Lord to haue cast his thought vpon any creature to whome he must not be shewing mercy For when S. Peter in detestation that they should presume to lay hands vpon his Maister had picked out one of the busiest of them Ioan. 18. and had cut of his right eare our Lord was so willing to suffer as to mislike the impedimēt which his disciple was about to giue And by a touch of Malchus eare with his omnipotent hand he cured that enemy who came to lead him to the Passion hauing repressed his friend who went about to hinder it And euen as they were binding him he made no resistance at all he reproached them not by declaring their sinnes he vpbraided not the miracles which so aboundantly he had wrought vpon them or theirs he framed no quarell against them but only this action of vnkindnes Luc. 22. That he bauing imployed himselfe so much vpon instructing and teaching them to their good liking in the Temple they should now come forth against him with swords and Clubbes as they would haue done against some insolēt bloudy thiese As if he had said If you come indeed to seeke the true Redeemer and Saniour of your soules you shall find to your comfort that I am he But if
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
that they detested that imputation But heere the Saint of Saints could be content to be called Blasphemer yet to make no demonstration that he tooke the least offence therat The abundant and most bitter scornes which our B. Lord indured with excessiue loue in that night precedent to his death CHAP. 61. EXCESSIVE was the indignity and dishonour which Christ our Lord endured at that first examination by Annas and Cayphas which yet will seeme but a kind of nothing if it be cōpared to that which followed in the rest of that woefull night when our Lord was imprisoned in the high Priests house And if at his being taken he were as well bound by ropes as the Traytour Iudas could deuise there is no doubt but that now they would lodge him in a dungeon low inough and load his delicate body with as many irons as it could beare It is true that the Prophet Hieremy had beene thrust downe into a deepe well the Prophet Daniell into a Lake of Lyons and the Patriarcke Ioseph was cast into a cesterne and the (a) The seruants of our Lord were cōforted by him in their afflictions but himselfe would feel none in his Martyrs of Christ our Lord haue suffered vnsufferable kinds of torment yet whatsoeuer affliction or feare they were subiect to the hād of God was there either to deliuer or at least to cōfort thē therin But our Lord had heere resigned al comfort he had resigned that hower that is the whole tyme of his bitter Passion to the Prince of darkenes and he had suspended the vse of his owne power for as much as concerned the receauing of any sensible consolation at all I would therfore be glad to know what dolorous infamous affront that could be which in that night of shame sorrow was not put vpon our blessed Lord by those instruments of the deuill If whilst he was yet abroad at liberty whilst he was rauishing them with his diuine words euen in spight of their peruerse harts whilst he was both dazeling the eye of enuy and hypocrisy with his sanctity and amazing them by the Maiesty obliging them by the mercy of his miracles they would yet be finding meanes to snarle against him and to vndermine him what kind of quarter is it likely now that they would keep with him when all the miracles which he wrought were to let them outrage him as much as they would and all the language which he vsed was that inuincible silence which he neuer brake in all that nights bitter durance If whilst he shewed so many tokens of his being the Sonne or at least a man of God they would yet take occasion from the facility and suauity of his conuersation to esteeme him as a drinker (1) Matth. 11. of wine If from his mercy and loue to the gayning of peruerted and impure soules that he was a man who (2) Ibid. liked to spend his tyme in bad company If frō his saying that he was auncient to (3) Ioan. 8. Abraham that he was proud and made himselfe God knowes what If from the wonders which he wrought vpon the Sabaoth (4) Luc. 13. that he was an irreligious and prophane person If from seeing that he did supernaturall things at other tymes that he performed them by a (5) Luc. 11. pact with the deuill If from their obseruation that his fanctity and benignity made the people loue him that (6) Luc. 23. he was a popular seditious and vnquiet person If from his auowing that he (7) Ioan. 10. and his Father were one that he was an expresse Blasphemer and as such a one they were once about to stone him If then I say they were so insolent and arrogant shall we thinke that now they could grow calme and tender-harted towards him When already they had seene him receaue a cruell buffet from that Sycophant in the very view of the high Priest and that the same high Priest did not so much as once reproue him for it which certainly he would haue done if that fellow had but presumed to beate his dogge Shall vve thinke that it gaue him any credit for them to obserue that one of his Disciples had betrayed and sold him to thē for a toy Shall we thinke that his meekenes would appease the rage of those hungry wolues they hauing bene so lōg in hunting after this innocent lambe Who in that tyme of his sheering no nor yet in his flaughtering afterward did not so much at open his mouth to make any one complaint Or rather shall we not conclude that they tooke offence euen from that very patience of his Which howsoeuer indeed it grew frō no other cause but only a profōd roote of loue they (b) His very patience made thē more outragious against him would yet impute it either to some witchcraft which might kindle their hate against him or cls to some extreme stupidity which might vrge them on to an increase of contempt Or finally shall we thinke that our Lord would change their mindes to make thē in some miraculous kind forbear him though otherwise it were much against their will which priuiledge yet he had neuer vsed to help himself thereby in his whole life It is not credible It is not possible But a most vndoubled truth it is that those wretches did afflict and dishonour him all they could and that our Lord was not only willing to endure al that but al the rest which they could deuise The holy Scripture it selfe doth this once giue such a view of what kind of Banquet was then set before this spouse of our soules to feed vpon as that the consideration therof which hath bene taken by deuout persons hath made tempests of sighes rise from their harts and floods of teares flow from their eyes through the compassion of his griefe and the admiration of his diuine loue in (c) A bitter Pottō sucking downe so greedely such huge draughts of the scalding bitter stuffe which in that dolorous night was put vpon him It tell vs Matt. 2◠that they strocke him with the Palmes of their hands that they did beate and buffet him that they spit vpon him that they hoodwincked him that they would be stryking him againe and that they scoffed and scorned him bidding him prophesy who it was that had strocken him But is it possible that the God of heauen and earth should suffer such thinges at their hands and that for the saluation of vs yea and euen of them and of all the world Yea so possible it is that God would suffer it as that it would haue bene wholly impossible that any who had not bene God should haue endured it Consider therfore heere what variety of affronts they found out for him and how euery one of them had a kind of particular reproach belonging to it They boxed him as hath bene said with their hands at large and therin they treated him as a
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
pronounce an vniust sentence against him but he tooke him into his house hand to hand And finding vpon the speach which passed betwene them that our Lord had no designe vpon the honours and aduantages of this world nor (f) Our Lord had nopretēce vpon any other kingdom then that of heau◠pretended to the exercise of any other kingdome then that of heauen to which he endeauoured to draw men by teaching them to obey God who is the supreme King therof and the Iudge for his part not caring what became of heauen or heauēly things Ioan. 18. he came quickly forth againe declared that he found the man not guilty How Pilate examined our Blessed Lord and how he sent him to Herod Of the scorne which Herod put vpon him How the returned him to Pilate and how Pilate resolued at last to scourge him CHAP. 63. BVT they persisted in their malicious clamours and protested that the prisoner had bene sowing rumours Luc. 13. making stirres throughout all Iury beginning at Galiley and proceeding as farre as that very place Now Galiley was belonging to the iurisdiction of Herod who had bene the murtherer of S. Iohn Baptist and betwene Pilate and him Ibid. there had bene ill (a) A curtesy of a Courtier quarter till that tyme. But he chauncing to be then at Ierusalem this Pilate put a Court-tricke vpon him for he sent the prisoner to him as if it had bene out of a kind of respect wheras chiefely it was because he would faine be rid of the cause To Christ our Lord nothing came amisse who still with his accustomed humility patience silence obedience and most ardent loue and desire of the saluation of mankind did apply himselfe to renounce any gust of his owne and gaue himselfe all away to theirs And this true Prince of Peace was cōtent to vndergoe all that paine and to endure all that scorne which would be put vpō him both at Herods Court and in the way Ibid. betwene him and Pilate vpon condition that so he might be an occasion of recōciling the emnities of those two though both conspired to his preiudice For he knew that by that curtesy Ibid. which Herod would take so kindly at the hands of Pilate from that tyme forward they would be friends This Herod was a famous infamous person for his sensuality his cruelty and a world of other vices And for as much as he had heard often speach of Christ our Lord and of the reputation which he had both for his wonderfull workes and for his admirable wisedome he had an (b) The curiosity of Herod Ibid. extreme curiosity to satisfy himselfe in those two points In conformity therof he earnestly desired to see some miracle of his working And for as much as concerned the fame of his wisedome he procured by a world of questions which he asked to see whether truth would answere to the voyce which ran of him But our Lord IESVS who was not come into the world to make men sport but to doe them good nor to satisfy the curiosity of their heads but to impart true sanctity to their harts would not vouchsafe to loose one word vpon that wretched King nor cared he through his loue to be suffering for vs to defend himselfe against all those impudent lyes which by the Priests and Elders were thundred out in a perpetuall storme of words against him Yet euen Herod himself could not be so vniust as to allow of the plea which was made in accusation of him for as much as concerned the substance of his cause but yet (c) The falle and foolish iudgemēt of the wife men of this world Ibid. conceauing by occasion of his continuall silence that either he was some silly fellow in himselfe or els perhaps that in comparison of him our Lord thought himselfe to be of farre inferiour speach and wit and therfore would not discredit himselfe by saying any thing he did contemne him with his whole guard of souldiers after a most disdaineful manner and in token therof he returned him to Pilate with a fooles coate vpon his backe This act amongst the rest bred an extraordinary contempt of Christ our Lord in the peoples minde in regard that Herod and his Court were esteemed as a kind of Touch wherby men might be knowne distinctly iustly for what they were But howsoeuer this contempt did our Lord vouchsafe to vndergoe and this coate of scorne was he contēt and glad to weare for our confusion in respect of our former vanity and for our instruction how we are to carry our selues in future occasions Which (d) Agreat lesson of many vertues at once must not be to stand vpon the reputation of our sufficiency wit or knowledge we who are but wormes and flyes when the King of glory the word the increated Wisedome of Almighty God wherby all things were made is content for our sakes to cast himselfe before the eyes of our Faith all contemned and derided as any Idiot or naturall foole might be Nor are we to care though our patience be accounted feare or our humility basenes or our silence simplicity Nor when it concernes the seruice of God and the good of soules are we to shrinke from our duty and good desires though all the world should despise and hate vs for it But when Pilate found that Herod had not thought him worthy of death he was glad of that occasion and pressed it hard vpon the Iewes as knowing indeed that it was not the zeale of Iustice but the rage of enuy which had incensed them against him Sometymes he questioned our Lord IESVS to see if any thing would come from him in the strength wherof he might acquite him But our Lord who desired nothing lesse then what might tend to his owne discharge and nothing more then what might tend to our aduantage was so profoundly and inuincibly silent as did amaze the Iudge Marc. 25. And woe had bene to vs if this silence of our Lord had not bene exercised by him through the merit wherof the eternall Father will looke with mercy vpon those millions of sinnes which be howerly cōmitted through the impertinent indiscrect and vncharitable impure speach of men Sometymes againe the Iudge would be vsing all the art he had to make them desist from their desire of his ruine Marc. 25. Luc. 23. and in particular he thought of two expedients The former of them was to punish him so cruelly out of very pitty as that with the sight therof they might be moued with compassion towards him So that he resolued to haue him scourged and to that end he deliuered him ouer to the discretion of his souldiers who had none The torment of Christ our Lord Audi Piiac 120. in this mistery of his flagellation is excellently pondered by Father Auila He faith therfore to this effect That (e) Note this for it deserueth all attention if a
man would exhibite a spectacle wherby the lookers on were to be moued to loue that man would take care to giue it all those aduantages of grace and beauty which were any way to be attractiue of loue If he were to present an obiect wherby the spectators were to be strocken with feare he would not faile to accompany it with such instruments and demonstrations of terrour as might affect and afflict their mindes with feare And so heere since Pilates care and study was how to winne those implacable Harpies from that hungar and thirst after the destruction and death of Christ our Lord no doubt can be made but that he would adorne and dresse him in the most lamentable attyre of torments which he could deuise that so by the sight of that excessiue misery he might conuert their perfect malice into some little mercy This designe of his he was obliged to communicate with the Executioners who were to be his souldlers for els he had not bene true to his owne end And then I will leaue it to the reasonable imagination of any creature if such an insolent race of people as that vseth many tymes to be hauing receaued an expresse direction from their Commaunder for the execution of such a cruelty vpon a prisoner who was so persecuted by all the principall men and Magistrates of his owne profession were not likely to shew cruelty inough vpon that pretious body of our blessed Lord. Of the cruell Scourging of Christ our Lord and how with incomparable patience and charity the endured the same CHAP. 64. THEY strip thim therfore into the same nakednes wherin he was borne wherin he had neuer bene seene but in his infancy nor then but by the sight of the Angells and those farre purer eyes of the All-immaculate virgin mother They stripped him I say who in all the daies of his blessed life had neuer seene so much as any part of himselfe discouered naked but only those hands which were still imployed in shewing mercies There are millions of men and women in the holy Catholike Church who in their high loue of purity do neuer so much as looke euen vpon their owne face in a glasse and much lesse vpon any naked part of their body excepting only in the occasions of meere necessity when they shift their cloathes yea and then they do it very sparingly and with a kind of horrour euen to see themselues But from those necessities Christ our Lord was still exempt who in all his life did neuer shift or change his cloathes And that * Euthym. in cap. 27. Match Maldonat in cundem loium omnes recentiores cōmuniter Garment which was wouen without any seame at all by those pure hands of his sacred Mother did miraculously grow togeather with the body it selfe Now in the loue of mortification and purity all the Saints of the Church must not compare with him wherin he exceeded them all more then heauen doth excell the earth If therfore there be amongst vs so many thousands of sacred virgins who would rather giue vp their liues then they would once expose their naked bodies to open view Let vs beg of our Lord by his owne supreme purity that he will giue vs to vnderstand make vs sensible at the very rootes of our hartes of how (a) The excessiue affliction which it must giue to our B. Lord to be striped naked great a torment it was to him in the way of shame to be stript stark naked before those Pagan souldiers and to let that pretious banquet of his pure humanity be fed vpon deuoured by those petulant prophane eyes of theirs How great a torment was it to thee O Lord in the way of shame and yet withall how meekely didst thou endure it and how much ioy did it giue thee to be sacrificing the merit therof to the eternall Father for the impetratiō of all that Angelical purity which hath florished since that tyme in so many mortall bodies of flesh and bloud They tyed him then to a piller as naked as I haue heere bescribed as if there had beene danger that either like some slaue he would haue run away or els like a child he would be shrinking declining the strokes wherwith they had resolued to load him But he was inwardly bōd so fast Ose 12. with such cords of Adam which were chaines of loue as that in comparison therof those outward cords were but as threds of a spiders webbe which would haue bene farre from holding him to that piller against his will him who makes the foundations of the earth tremble the pillars of the world shake with the least breath of his Nostrills whensoeuer he thinks fit to worke vpon the world by way of terrour They began then to scourge our Lord Ioan. 1◠with excessiue cruelty And as a violent tempestof hayle would destroy a fruit tree which were in flower so did those cruell men not only blast that diuine sweet beauty of our Lord by breathing vpō it with the filthy ayre of their lasciuious and scornefull tongues but they brake through it with those scourges They clasped and circled him in with euery blow as so many snakes would doe some pretious and odoriferous plant which yet were so medicinall withall as to be able to cure a whole world of men of a whole world of diseases It is able to grieue any ciuill noble hart to see in Italy and especially at Rome how the barbarous Goths and Vandals when like an inundation they ouerflowed those florishing fields of the world did leaue the markes of their long nayles behind them in the ruines of so many sumptuous buildings and curious statues But what hath any sumptuous building or any curious statue to doe by way of comparison with that pretious humanity of our Lord. That Temple of the holy Ghost which the fulnes of the diuinity did substantially inhabite Colos 2. and that superexcellent Image that double Image of the eternall Father For an image he was of God euen as he was but man but then againe as God he was an Image begotten not made by the increated vnderstanding of the eternall God And what comparison thē cā there be betwene the barbarousnes of those Goths and Vandalls with these men of bloud who drew this holy house into such decay They did not only (b) How the house of Gods humanity was handled vnfurnish it but they procured to beate downe the walls and they made so many wide windowes in it with their rude hands as by which the soule would infallibly haue flowne out and forsaken it if it had not bene held fast perforce by the tye of loue that so it might liue to endure the rest of torment which was prouided for it A strange kind of ornament it was for that garment of his pretious humanity being hypostatically vnited to the diuinity to be so thicke ouercast and imbrodered with stripes insteed
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
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
follow him in the streets would not sayle to place theÌ„selues in the windowes making vp like some kennell of wide-mouthed dogs the full cry of Traytour Deuill Sorcerer Drunkard Idiot False prophet Hypocrite Blasphemer and a hundred reproaches more then these which their immortall malice would be sure to dart out against him And besides it is very probable that they would accompany these bitter words with barbarous deeds for what should hinder them since they had all power in their hands and such springs of poyson in their harts They below kicking him on as they would haue done some mad musled dogge when through the excesse of weaknes he was scarce able to goe and they aboue whilst he was resting would be casting vncleanesses vpon his sacred head Our Lord the while had his holy eyes cast down but his hart was raysed his hands were bound but his affections were at liberty and enlarged He went fulfilling the Prophesies Isa 53. Sicut homo non audiens sicut mutus non aperiens os suum Like a man who had not bene able to heare what they sayd against him and as farre from speaking to them as if he had bene wholy dumbe and as S. Gregory sayth Greg. in 3. psal pâ—enitent Qui cogitationes iniquorum nouerat blasphemantium voces non audiebat And he who knew euen all their wicked thoughts would not so much as seeme to heare their blasphemous words To confound our great impatience or to speake more properly our want of Faith and loue when we will not for the glory of God and in imitation of his diuine exaÌ„ple who endured so infinitely much for vs endure the least reproach or so much as any touch that way without reply and perhaps reuenge The Crucifixion of our Blessed Lord his quicke sense and seuerall paynes distinctly felt and of his vnspeakeable patience and Loue to vs therein CHAP. 69. THE hower was then all run out and our Lord IESVS who according to that of the blessed Apostle Philip. 2. Thought it no wrong to esteeme himselfe equall to his Father did empty himselfe not only by taking the nature of man vpon him but he did also humble himselfe withall to death yea and to the very death of the crosse which was the most opprobrious of all others They had stripped him thrice before starke naked in the Court of Pilate First when they went to scourge him then when they put on the Purple Robe and after when they disrobed him and led him towards the Crosse in his owne cloathes And now (a) The fomer scornes were put againe vpon our Lord but with circumstances which did much increase both his paine and shame they did the same againe but with the addition of two circumstances which did extremely increase both his shame and paine For his garments were euen baked as it were to his sacred body both by the length of tyme which had occurred betwene his beginning and ending that last and most dolorous procession of his betwene Pilats house and Mount Caluary as also by the weight of the Crosse which during part of that tyme lay with intollerable paine vpon his shoulders and lastly by the binding of his armes and hands both to his body and to one another These cloathes being growne so fast to his flesh and pluckt off by those rude hands with as much rigor as they could tel how to vse must needs increase his torment to a strange proportion It could not also choose but that his seÌ„se of shame was also raysed to a great height For before that sacred humanity was seene but by as many as could throng into Pilates Court But now vpon the top of Mount Caluary as if it had bene at a kind of generall day of Iudgement Romans Grecians Pagans Iewes and they of all the Prouinces of the East Priests and people men and women of all conditions and ages and in fine an Epitome of the whole world was present For the increase of his confusion and to hide the hatefull spots of their iniustice they led in his company two murthering theeues to execution that (b) Why they lead him in the company of thee us their notorious crimes might make some impression or influence of bad aspect vpon the innocency of our Lord IESVS And to the end that the worst in all respects might not be wanting to him they resolued that his Crosse should stand in the midst of the other two Marc. 15. as in the more honorable place of infamy This crosse they now brought him to and as before they laid it vpoÌ„ him they laid him now vpon it It was already bored through And if perhaps they had made those holes which were meant for his hands further off from those others which were deputed for his feete theÌ„ the leÌ„gth of his body would beare they must be faine to add to the rest of his tormeÌ„ts that other of the rack to make theÌ„ reach For their particular coÌ„fort who for his sake should be afflicted in the same kind by the persecutours of his Church The executioners being there with their haÌ„mers and nayles did extend spread him vpon that hard bed of death and they transpierst those hands of Charity and those seete of humility purity with sharpe stroÌ„ge nayles driuen in by a multitude of blowes making his pretious body the very anuile whervpon the hammer of our (c) Our sinnes were they which crucified our Lord by the hands of the Iewes sinnes did by the hands of those crucifiers beat so hard If any one of them relented at the sight of that diuine sweet sadnes through the compassion which such an obiect as that could not easily choose but exact euen of Tygars it tended but to the increase of his paine For the more kind they were the longer they were likely to dwell about doing that office and so the more cruell they fell out to be If on the other side as they woÌ„ded his hands with theirs so they had also in their will a vehement desire of his destruction and death that cruelty and sinne of their hart went streight to his and wounded him worse through his loue to them then through their hate they wounded him So that whether they were cruell to him more or lesse being considered in theÌ„selues yet in regard of him all wrought by (d) All wrought by way of increasing torment to our Lord. way of increasing torment The extreme parts of our body which be our head our hands and our feete haue all those veines and arteries and sinewes shut vp and as it were driuen by the direction of nature into a narrow compasse which goe at ease through larger parts The fleshly parts of the body are dull in comparison of those others and indeed so dull as that compared with these they can scarce in effect be said to feele Yet who is he that if being a person of honor he were content that his flesh
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
as wherby he would conuince and oblige the Eternall Father to graunt it It was true that they knew not that he was the naturall Sonne of God but that ignorance was their fault and a iust punishment of blindnes for their other sinnes And the workes which he had done did manifest him to be what he said he was And though he had not bene the Sonne of God yet their owne conscience told them that he could not but be a man of God and of a most innocent and holy life and therfore they ought in reason to haue been very farre from intending such a ruine as they brought him to There was therfore much to be said against them little for them But yet our Lord through his infinite loue did let passe that much Hebr. 5. and laid hold of that little And he was heard by the Father for his reuerence And many of those miserable men were conuerted by the mighty hand of God and not only many of them but many millions of our soules in after ages are dayly conuerted in the vertue and strength of this holy Prayer Now withall this soueraigne Doctour did then read many lessons in one Namely (c) The instuction which is giuen vs by this prayer of Christ our Lord. that we must excuse the faults and much more the disputable cases which occurre by way of question whether or no our neighbours haue done ill yea and euen we are to pardon our greatest enemies in admiration and imitation of this diuine charity of Christ our Lord. For whatsoeuer affronts or wrongs they may be offering to put vpon vs who sees not what fleabytings they must be in cōparison of the wo into which our Lord was cast vpō the crosse Besides that he was the King of glory and did suffer for vs who were the most wicked slaues of Sathan Since therefore we were forgiuen being the enemies of God and who were in all reason to be condemned to hell fire for our many and most grieuous sinnes what rigour shall we not deserue at his hands if we forgiue not our enemies for loue of him Now to let vs see withall how farre he was from loosing any thinge in the sight of God by induring the bitter paine and ignominy of the Crosse he tells vs in language plaine inough that the Father who before had deliuered all power into his hands did meane nothing lesse then to resume the same and he shewed euen then that he was God For instantly he (d) The admirable mercy of our Lord to the good Thiefe Luc. 23. subscribed the petition of the Good Thiefe who rebuked the blasphemy of his companion and besought our Lord that he would remember him when he should be in his kingdome with such a gratious Fiat and vpon one single and short request as may aboundātly let vs see that we serue no lesse thē an infinite God that it costs him nothing to giue kingdomes or rather that it costs him much but that he is content to impart them to vs at an easy rate Yea euen as easy as it is to aske so easy shall it be for vs to haue if death preuent vs of being able to doe other workes of pennance And besides we learne by this that our Lord is so liberall and so full of loue to our felicity as that he takes no day with vs if the disposition which we bring be good any more then he did to this happy Thiefe who heere did make so good a ful point of stealing as that after a sort he may be accōted to haue stolne away the kingdome of heauen and he obtayned that this sentence should be pronounced by the mouth of truth it selfe It shall be so and this very day thou shalt be with me in Paradise O infinite goodnes of our Lord who had fogotten as it were to speake when it cōcerned him to haue answered for himselfe but who had neuer yet learnt to hold his peace when his speach might cōcerne the comfort saluation of such as desired the same Hereby we may cleerly find the great force of Grace which at an instant is able to make a great Saint of the greatest sinner So that as we may not presume of Gods mercy at the last hower of our life because we see what became of he wicked Thiefe so by the good Thiefes exāple we are bound not to despaire therof Withall we may well perceaue in the person of Christ our Lord who was wholy innocent and of the good Thiefe who was growne penitēt of the wicked Thiefe who was hardened in his sinne that (e) There is no kind of people which is not in this life to beare a Crosse Bell. de sept verbis in this life of tryall there is no kind of mē who can expect to liue without their Crosse as heere we see that all three sorts of men are crucified Good men haue their Crosses and so haue the bad and so also haue they who of bad grow good But with this difference it goes that the Crosses of good men end in glory and of the bad in euerlasting torment and shame Now since our Lord was so mercifull to this good Thiefe though he had led all his life in sinne how much more would it concerne him not to be vnmindfull of his deerest friends and especially of his all-immaculate mother and his beloued Disciple This Mother and Disciple had found him out as he was passing betwene Pilats Court and Mount Caluary For as much as concernes the excessiue griefe which had dominion ouer the hart of the sacred Virgin I shall haue oportunity to speake heereafter of it and for the present I only take occasion heerby to loue the loue of our Lod who by ordayning that his blessed Mother with S. Iohn should be present neere his Crosse at the tyme of his Passion besides the enamoured penitent Saint Mary Magdalen and Mary of Cleophas and Salome was pleased to add to his owne former griefe this second griefe which consisted in that he saw them grieue And especially in discerning with the eyes of his minde the fulfilling of that sad prophesy of Simoon who foretold that the sword of sorrow Luc. 2. should one day pierce the very soule of his blessed Virgin-Mother He had no will to call her Mother in regard that he would not wōd her yet more deeply by putting her in mind of such a seeming miserable Sonne But especially he forbare (f) The reason why our Lord did not call our B. Lady by the name of mother from the Crosse to vse that name because he being so odious in the eyes of all that wicked and abused world it could not chuse but to haue bene of great disaduantage to her at that tyme to be known and considered for his mother by so many as were spectators there But he did that in other words with admirable charity which did liberally prouide for the comfort both of
way of conformity and obedience then without once harkening to the inferiour part of the soule to range the Superiour to the will of God not only with solid patience but with supreme ioy What more perfect in the way of Charity then to endure the extremity of affront paine for his mortall enemies And at the very tyme when those enemies were tormenting him for him to be protecting them and negotiating their cause with bitter sighes in the cares of almighty God What more (b) The incomparable perfection of the worke of the passion of our Lord. perfect in the way of contemplation then in such distresse to be looking at ease so many wayes at once from the death and contumely of a Crosse as if it had bin from some tower of recreation and delight To haue God himselfe and all the world so perfectly and cleerly in his eye and all at once To be offering euery graine of all the Passion in forgiuenes of all the sinnes of the whole world wherof then he saw euery one more distinctly and cleerly thē any man did euer see any one of his own What more perfect in the way of diligence in giuing vs direction how to carry our selues then that when himself was so deeply wounded by those incomparable torments and affronts he would furnish vs with such diuine documents and examples drawne from his owne sacred person Wherby we may become victorious in all our combats find the edge of our afflictions so abated as that they should neuer cast vs vpon despaire What thing is more perfect in the way of corporall sufferance then so to suffer as that there may be nothing which suffers not There is nothing higher then the head and we haue seene how the head of Christ our Lord did suffer by that hideous crowne of thornes There is nothing lower then the feete and we haue seen how the feete haue suffered by cruel nayles There is nothing of a man more wide or large then his hands spread abroad at the armes end and we haue also seene how he suffered by nayles driuen through his hands Those hands wherin he said that he (1) Isa 49. had written vs and (2) Ioan. 12. wherby he would draw vs towards himselfe with diuine pitty when once he should be exalted vpon the Crosse In fine there is nothing more then all and we haue seene how he hath bene scourged all ouer pierc't and fettered and spit vpon and boxt and buffeted and bored and beathen through with Iron for the pure loue of vs. And euen whilst he was hanging vpon the Crosse in expectation of death he vouchsafed still to be affronted and blasphemed beyond all morall beliefe and he the while euen when vinegar was giuen him to drinke in that torment of thirst which he endured did regorge in the deernes of his loue to vs. He perfected (c) How our Lord Iesus did perfect the figures and sacrifices of the old law vpon the Crosse wherof he also fulfilled the prophesies Luc. 22. 1. Cor. 11. the imperfection of the old law in the law of grace which he did promulgate heere He perfected all the Sacrifices of the old Testament in this Sacrifice of himselfe vpon the Crosse the memory wherof he had already commaunded his Priests to perpetuate by the dayly oblation of his owne pretious body and bloud vpon their Altars He perfected all the Prophesies which were made concerning his owne life and death He perfected all those figures which had bene deliuered of him in the old Testament for the disposing of the mindes of the faithfull towards the beliefe of their Messias who was thē to come We haue heere the history of Noe. For as he was made drunke Genes 9. by the vine which he planted and had his nakednes discouered by his children so was our Lord stript naked more then once as we haue seene and that by his children of whome his Prophet in his person said Isa 1. Filios enutriui exaltaui ipsi autem spreuerunt me I tooke care to breed and bring vp my children and they tooke pleasure to despise and dishonor me He was also inebriated by the loue which he bare to his people which like a vine he planted with miracles and pruned with Doctrine and watered with bloud And that vine inebriated him also with another kind of wine the wine of torments and reproach wherwith he was stuft and cloyd By which kind of liquor although he were not because he would not be disgusted yet we haue heard him by his Prophet thus complaine of this vine after a most deere and killing manner Isa 5. Expectauit vt faceret vuas fecit autem labruscas I expected that my vine should haue yielded me wine for the comfort of my hart but it yielded me nothing but veriuyce which hath set my teeth on edge We haue heere a better then that (1) Num. 21. Brasen serpent the sight of whome will cure the bytings of all those serpents which are our sinnes We haue heere the true Dauid who kild that Gyant (2) 1. Reg. 17. Golyas being a figure of the Prince of darkenes with the fiue stones of his fiue sacred wounds and he cut of the Gyants head with the Gyants sword conquering the Deuill by death which was his weapon drawne by sinne The same might be shewed in al the other figures which were deliuered of our Lord in the old Testament which were perfected and fulfilled vpon the Crosse So that our Lord might iustly say Consummatum est The worke of my Passion the worke of mans redemption both in regard of the thing it selfe and of the manner how it hath bene wrought and borne is perfect consummate and complete Of our Lords last prayer to his eternall Father of his excessiue griefe and loue expressed in the separation of his soule from his body and of the grace beauty of the Crucifix CHAP. 76. THERE did now remaine no more but that our Lord IESVS hauing taken care of the whole world and hauing particulerly powred forth those seuerall benedictions vpō it frō that treasure-house of the Crosse should also commend himselfe into the hands of the eternall Father A te principium tibi desinit might the soule of Christ our Lord say to God He began his Passion with the inuocation of his Father Luc. 22. in the Garden he cōtinued it by praying to him whē the Crosse was erected with himselfe vpon it and now he concluded it by recommending himselfe into his hands still vnder the sweet and gracious tytle of his Father Instructing vs therby in all our actions especially in such as are of moment most of all when we are either endeauouring or enduring any thing which doth immediatly concerne the glory of God and the true good of men as this mistery of our redēption highly did to prepare our selues by Prayer before we beginne to eleuate our mindes often to
paine that is to say any spirituall Crosse which the holy wise hand of God shall think fit to send vs and to do it for his sake who dyed vpoÌ„ that materiall Crosse And now we haue seene by all this holy History of our Lord IESVS that whether he be aliue or dead he is all ours and in despight of sinne he will make vs also wholy his if we will but now and then consider how he sold and abandoned himselfe for our benefit Psalm â—â— It was sayd by his seruant in his person Sicut aqua effusus sum I am powred out and spilt like water which euery base creature treads vpon Now water besides is a most obedient kind of thing It easily takes what impression you will it applyes it selfe to whatsoeuer place you will put it to Looke backe therfore and see if our Lord haue not bene powred out like water What place or posture or what kind of punishment did he refuse which they would put him in Or what thing was that which they would not make him subiect to which eyther the head could inueÌ„t or the hart inflict or the hand could act He seemed not in that part to haue bene so much a man as a very thing a passiue substance a liuelesse instrument a pile of grasse in the presence of a great winde vpon which they had all power to worke their will for he had giuen his away He turned head at nothing but accepted of all the scorne and paine which they could load him with In the (d) How our Lord was subiect to all kinds of oppressioÌ„ Garden we haue seene how for waÌ„t of others he was his own executioner tooke such sad thoughts into his hart as himselfe was not ashamed to expresse In his appreheÌ„sion or taking he was subiect to the fury of a popular tumult though it were coÌ„tenanced afterward by the lying face tongue of Iustice in the house of Annas and Cayphas to make that seeme laudable which indeed was damnable He was subiect in that house to the hypocrisy and enuy of the Priests of his owne Law togeather with the indignity which the Sycophant did him by that blow vpon his diuine face In the imprisonment of that night he was wholy subiect to the courtesy of those keepers of his who had only a care not to kill him before day that then they might after a manifold kind of manner In the examinations of Pilate he would submit himselfe to the Tribunall of a Pagan and in that of Herod to the scorne of the secular power of his owne Religion And both there afterward in Pylates Court to all the torments and shame which could be deuised by those disolute souldiers In his way to Mount Caluary he would be silent to that world of clamour and when he was arriued to the top of the hill those bloudy executioners were not so insolent cruell in commaÌ„ding as he was mild ready to obey If (e) How entirely our blessed Lord would needs submit himselfe to al kind of insoleÌ„cies they had a minde to binde him he meekely offered them his armes for that purpose If they had a mind to box beate him to plucke him by the venerable hayre or beard if to spit vpon his diuine face he neuer so much as turned it either from their rage or scorne but they strocke spit vpon him at their pleasure If they had a minde to strip him starke naked they did it he replyed not against it though I nothing doubt but that it was the greatest torment which he endured and they stripped him not only once but fower seuerall tymes and the last tyme of the fower did continue till that happy syndon his winding sheete receiued shut him vp from their eyes If they had a mind to scourge him he let them doe it in most bloudy manner which transformed that vnspeakeable beauty into a kind of leprousy at an instant If they would resolue that his imperiall head should be also wounded that after a manner both of torment reproach beyond example he did not so much as aske by what commission they did it but he submitted that diuine head to a crowne of long piercing thornes If not content with that they were yet desirous to renew his paines to giue him at once many wounds in that most sensible part of his body and that as often as they should list he lent them a Reed wherwith they might doe it by striking him vpon the head at theirfancy If yet they should resolue to pierce his body through through in the most liuely parts therof with cruell nayles he extended his hands feete to admit what soeuer they could deuise to doe If they had an humour to scoffe and to blaspheme him he had eares wherwith to heare them and yet he had a hart wherwith to pray for them whilst they were cursing him So truly and so entirely did he powre himselfe out as any water might be spilt which costeth nothing He powred forth his sighes and prayers in the presence of God and his teares in the view both of God and man He powred forth his bloud both through the anguish of his minde through the torments of his body He powred forth his honour in being so prophanely blasphemed and so opprobriously spit vpon and in being so shamefully and so often buffeted and stript of all his cloathes in the sight of all those worlds of people and lastly he powred forth his precious life which he resigned into the hands of his eternall Father A Conclusion of this discourse of the Passion of Christ our Lord and the vse which we are bound to make thereof For the greater that the loue and mercy is which he expressed therein the more excessiue will his rigour be for our contempt therof CHAP. 78. BVT howsoeuer this water of the fountaine of life were spilt with strange liberality for our good yet there fel not one drop for which we shall not be called to a most strict account if we be so wretched as not to saue it from being lost For we (a) The mystery of the Passion death of Christ our Lord doth looke very many wayes at once are to vnderstand that it was not any one onely part which was represented by Christ our Lord vpoÌ„ the Crosse but they were very many it coÌ„cernes vs much to marke theÌ„ all Not only doth the infinite mercy of God shine brightly in this mistery wherin we see that his own increated Sonne was content to dy for the saluation of man but his infinite Iustice also doth no lesse appeare since it would not be satisfied with lesse then the death of such a Sonne Not only may we heere discerne the pitty which he beareth towards sinners but he giueth vs also as cleere a prospect vpon his vnspeakeable detestation of sinne since for the abolishing therof he was then to imploy no lesse
the holy Ghost and to make him lead a life which as on the one side it was of vnspeakeable sanctity for which he could not choose but loue him more then innumerable milliōs of worlds so on the other it was loaden with misery of many kinds and it came at last to end in such a death Passion as we haue heere described and all this for the sauing of most wicked soules from hel who by the account of these men should still remaine in the seruitude of sinne and Sathan whome yet this Lord came to ouercome and that he should carry and conduct them to heauen to be coheires with him in that kingdom notwithstanding that in this world they had not endeuoured to imitate his holy and painefull life nor had bene truely carefull to fulfill his law nor had conceaued any cordiall and fruitefull griefe for hauing transgressed it and much lesse had voluntarily imbraced for his loue some part of those mortifications paynes and crosses wherwith his pretious life death did so abound Take heed of such dangerous and impious opinions as these and withall doe not thinke your selfe free from them by only saying that you are so vnlesse you beleeue withall in the very bottome of your hart that voluntary mortification and pennance and patience and humility and charity are vertues wholy necessary for a Christian man And that the Passion of Christ our Lord is not to be applyed but by this meanes No (h) Who are true louers of the Crosse of Christ our Lord. creature shall be saued by the Crosse of Christ our Lord but he who shall loue this Crosse and no man doth truly loue it who will not rather dy then crucify our Lord agayne vpon it by committing a mortall sinne and no man doth greatly loue it who for the loue of our Lord doth not also abhorre all veniall sinne and who doth not voluntarily depriue himselfe of many commodities and delights which euen lawfully he might haue vsed and who also will not imbrace not only all such paine and shame as cannot be auoyded without sinne but many other contradictions and austerities to which yet he is not bound but only by the law of loue This loue doth worke like fire in the harts of such as are deuoted to the Crucifixe our Saints liues are full of great proofes therof how much soeuer they pay they thinke it very little in comparison of the very much they owe. The blessed Apostle S. Paul hath expressed this truth very plainely largely in these few words 2. Cor. 5. Charitas Christi vrget nos 2. Cor. 5. The Charity of Christ doth vrge vs on As if there he had sayd as he did abundantly else where to this effect The loue of Christ our Lord and the memory of the bitter things which he endured for his wicked creatures doth spurre vs on to suffer much for him I doe not beate the ayre but I beate my body 1. Cor. ◠least preaching saluation to others my selfe may become a reprobate 2. Tim. 2. It is true that we shall raigne togeather with Christ but it must first be true that we must suffer also with him It is true that I am an Apostle and more then an Apostle that the sonne of God himselfe came visibly to call me to his seruice Act. 9. declared me to be a vessell of election and that I should carry his name before the Kings and Nations of the world that I was rapt vp into the third heauē wher I was made partaker of such high misteries 2. Cor. 12. at it is nether lawfull nor possible for me to vtter But yet it is true withall that all they who will pretend to be true Christians must crucify their flesh with the concupiscences therof Galat. 5. and they must put on Christ our Lord as they would put on a garment Rom. 13. and frame the same Iudgement of things which he framed liue by the same spirit which liued in him That is to say both the inward 1. Cor. 12. and the outward man must be so composed as that wheresoeuer he goes he may carry with him the very odour of the piety if Christ our Lord. 2. Cor. 2. And for my part saith he I am euer carrying the mortification of Christ lesus in my very body 2. Cor. 4. that so in this very body of mine his life may be made manifest to men To this effect spake the B. Apostle in seuerall partes of his Epistles and he indeed was a true louer of the Crosse of Christ our Lord Rom. 5. and this loue made him so glory in tribulations and mortifications and afflictions for the loue of the same Crosse as that he thus cryed out Galat. 6. Away with glorying in any other thing The same doth also belong to vs according to our proportion and if we faile heerof we must condemne our selues for vngratefull creatures and procure to mend As knowing that otherwise we doe our best to make our Lord loose the labour which he tooke for vs. For as the incomparable S. Austen sayth to this effect Christ our Lord De vera relig cap. 16. apud Ariam to giue vs the example of all vertue tooke vpon him all those painefull and contumelious things wherby vertue might be exercised and obtained He was pleased to be poore that men might so be drawne to despise those riches which they loued to their so great preiudice for as much as they are instruments wherby they purchase and procure delights which destroy the soule He refused to be a tempor all King that so men might despise places of honor cōmaund which they had with so great anxiety desired He admitted of all kindes of affronts and shame to the end that men who were wont to fly from them through pride might vndergoe them with humility He suffered wrongs and so great wrongs as it was for him who was most innocent to be tormented and condemned to the death of the Crosse for a malefactour to the end that men might be able to suffer wrōgs with patiēce He accepted of grieuous things being scourged and crowned with thornes and he was afflicted many other wayes to the end that men who abhorred torments might imbrace them when they should be necessary towards vertue He accepted and loued the Crosse which was the most painefull cōtumelious death of all others to the end that men might admit of any such kind of death as God should send All those things by the desire wherof we tooke occasion to sinne namely riches pleasures and temporall honors he brought downe into a base account by his abstayning from them and so he taught vs to despise them And all those other things by the flying wherof we faile of vertue and fall to sinne namely affliction contempt and paine by his suffering them willingly and by imbracing them with so ardent loue he made
to be amiable and easy to be endured And thus was the whole life which Christ our Lord did lead in this world an example and a liuing Doctrine of the actions which we were to performe and of the vertues which we were to practise This is said by S. Augustine Therfore to conclude this discourse of the Passion of our B. Lord we haue (i) The summe of this whole discourse of the Passion of our B. Lord. seene how painefull it was with how great loue he endured it and with how heroicall vertue it was performed We haue seene the end and ayme he had therin which was not only the redeeming of vs from hell but the recouery of vs from sinne the inducing vs to fly from all inordinate desire of honour estate and vaine delights to imbrace after his exaÌ„ple for his loue the exercise of all vertue the mortification both of the inward and outward man Let vs take heed that we contemne not the treasures of his mercies least we be consumed by the fiery torrent of his Iustice Let vs not pretend to make him loose his labour for auoyding of a little labour of our owne He is the wisedome it selfe of God and can tell how to value to a haire such a huge indignity as that would be And of this truth we must be well assured for it is not only reuealed to vs by way of Faith but it is written in our harts by the law it selfe of nature and reason That (k) The more good God is to men the more bitterly will they be punished for the contempt of such goodnesse if a mercy be offered abused a vengeance will belong to that offence If the mercy be great the vengeance will not faile to be great and if the mercy be infinite the vengeance also will be infinite And though Christ our Lord be a Lyon and the roaring of a Lyon is a frighfull thing yet he is also a Lambe we haue seene how he hath bene shorne and slaine and this LaÌ„be is not willingly alienated from his loue to vs. But if he be then laesa patientia vertitur in furorem The more inuincibly patient he was the more implacably furious he will be And for my part I doe not heare in the whole booke of God any word which strickes with greater terrour then when it speakes of the wrath of the Lambe Apoc. 6. The holy Ghospell describing Christ our Lord vpoÌ„ the Crosse saith that they blasphemed him as they were passing by Many blaspheme him by their deeds who doe not so by their words Matt. 27. but hauing an Aue Rex in their mouthes they strike him with the Reed in their hands If we desire insteed of blaspheming to doe him seruice and so to be happy both in heauen and euen heere our way will be not to passe so lightly by his Crosse but there to behould contemplate him at good leasure For how miserably shall we be out of countenance at the hower of our death if our conscience may iustly then accuse vs that we could not so much as find in our harts now then to thinke of those bitter things which the Sonne of God God did find in his hart to endure and that with infinite loue for our saluation Our Lord (l) Our great ingratitude to God will make vs see how very wicked we are otherwise IESVS giue vs grace to know how very wicked things we are And this knowledge being once well grounded in vs and our Lord being desired that for the loue of his bitter Passion he will make vs see the loue he bare vs in it we shall grow to take delight in looking often vpon that book with the eyes of our soule and so they will be happily shut vp from the sight and loue of other obiects We shall then quickly find that the Crosse is no such cruell thing as we haue coÌ„ceaued but that it is short and light and the reward therof remaines for euer Besides that the memory of her friends is honorable afterward euen with the enemies therof Wheras those persecuting Iewes with Cayphas and Pilate Herod al the libertines of the world who indeed are the enemies of Christ our Lord Philip. 3. and of his Crosse as S. Paul affirmeth howsoeuer they triumphed for a tyme were soone either beate downe by disgrace like so many bladders or blsters or els blowne vp by a little tyme out of the estimation of God and man like so many squibbs And now they haue found their place in hel where they shall remaine as long as God is God and so will their successors in sinne succeed them also in their punishment from which our Lord deliuer both them and vs. Of the vnspeakeable Loue of our Lord Iesus in bequeathing to vs vpon the Crosse his All-immaculate Virgin Mother to be the Mother of vs all CHAP. 79. OVR Lord IESVS hauing made his last Will and Testament in that night precedent to his death at which tyme he gaue vs his owne pretious body and bloud not only for the food of our soules in the blessed Sacrament but for a Sacrifice to God in the way of homage as to a Soueraigne Creatour by the institution of the Masse and being that night and the next day arriued so farre in the course of his bloudy and bitter Passion as after innumerable other affronts and torments to see himselfe both naked nayled through hands and feete vpon a Crosse the (a) The loue of our Lord Iesus did after asort increase with the torment which he â—â—dured â—â—â—our 〈◊〉 bowells of his mercy were so farre from being changed or cooled toward vs that the neerer they were to breake for griefe the faster he made them beate for loue And therfore as some tender-harted husband would haue done in fauour of his most faithfull and beloued wife who hauing setled his affaires in tyme of health by way of Testament wherby he had honorably prouided for her estate and comfort would yet wheÌ„ he drew neere to death in further proofe of his affection increase her ioynture by some Lordships and plucke of his ringe of greatest price from his owne fingar that he might put it vpon hers iust so was our Lord IESVS pleased to proceed with the holy Church his Spouse To whome notwithstanding the legacy of his owne pretious body which he had giuen vs already by Testament he did also now when he drew close vpon the confines of death with incomparable Charity (b) Our Lord Iesus bequeathed his B. mother to be also ours as it were by way of Codicill annexed to his last will Luc. 23. bequeath his sacred Mother to vs as it were by way of Codicille which he annexed to that former Will of his It hath bene seene already how our Lord vpon the death-bed of the Crosse did vtter seauen Words or rather declare himselfe by seauen seuerall speaches both to God
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
She was iustly therfore said to be full of grace who alone obtayned the grace which neuer was merited by any other of being filled by the authour himselfe of grace But that which (c) Of the valew of the vulgar translatioÌ„ of the Bi. ble by S. Hierome ought to serue our turne is the vulgar edition which was made by the most learned S. Hierome and is authorized by the decrees of the Catholike Church Besides that diuers Councells haue also acknowledged her to haue bene full of grace in coÌ„formity of this salutation of the Angell And (d) Our B. Lady was saluted by the Angell in the Syriake toÌ„gue moreouer the Syriacke readeth thus Peace be to thee O thou full of grace And it is most probable and as good as certaine that the Angell did speake to our B. Lady in Syriacke which was the language of that time place and not originally in Greeke which for ought we know our B. Lady did not 〈◊〉 at that tyme. So that for our parts we will coÌ„template her with holy S. Bernard Ser. de Natiuit Virginis as a slower which the ayre of the holy Ghost did not only blou vpoÌ„ but breath through that so her delicious odours might abundantly bestow themselues vpon the world This salutation of the Angell with full of grace in his mouth was such a one and deliuered in such a sense as by the Testimony of S. Ambrose had neuer bene heard In 1. Lucae or found before according to the vnderstanding wherin it was allowed to her but was only reserued for her who was to be made the most worthy Mother of our Lord God Now what can be imparted more pretious in this life then the Treasure of (e) The incompable excellency of the Grace of God Grace or what proportion can exceed the fulnes therof The true value of this iewell is only to be exactly vnderstood by our Lord God himselfe because he only vnderstands the infinitnes of his glory which is that fruite wherof Grace is the seed He only is able out-right to penetrate the true deformity of sinne which is so incoÌ„patible with Grace as that although a soule were defiled withal the sinnes of the whole world one degree of Grace would expell and kill them all at the very instant that it should enter into that soule And so if any one soule had all that Grace which is in all created soules any one mortall sinne would instantly expell it all Not only doth it remoue deformity but it indues the soule with such excessiue beauty as makes it of odious to God and obnoxious to the eternall fires of hell most dearly amiable in the sight of that diuine Maiesty and it giues it tytle and right to the kingdome of heauen Not only doth it beautify but it doth dignify the soule subliming it as S. Peter saith to consort with God himselfe and that not after any ordinary manner but euen to partake of his diuine nature and such a soule is treated to all purposes as a daughter of the eternall Father a sister to Christ our Lord a most beloued spouse of the holy Ghost and a fellow-cittizen and sweet companion to all the Angells and Saints in the kingdome of God This Grace is no load but it lightneth it is no dead thing but perpetually it is liuing working wonders if it meete with no impedimeÌ„t in the soule as in our B. Ladies it neuer did As she was full of Grace so was that Grace full of fruite For Grace in a soule is the mother of all vertue nay if it be not fruitefull it is not Grace In that soule of the Blessed Virgin it did fructify in such strange proportion as no created thought can coÌ„prehend though shortly I will procure with reuerence to point therat But in (f) The misery of such as forfait the Grace of God for the coÌ„mitting of a vile sinne the meane tyme if the dignity and excellency of Grace be such how miserable is that man who for his inordinate desire of a temporall delight which besides that it drawes him downe to hell is past as soone as the name is vttered or for a sume of honour which at the most can make him happy but by heare-say or for the rickes of this world which is but durt one degree remoued and which may be stolne and must be left and whilst it is inioyed cannot make a man either healthfull or stronge and much lesse learned holy or wise will be so deadly foolish as to depriue himselfe of this celestiall patrimony of Grace which was bought for him at the high rate of the passion and death of Christ our Lord and was imparted to him with so much loue to the end that by him and with him and in him he might eternally be happy The (g) The vniust Cauill of some men against our B. La. dies honour in being full of Grace Act. 2. Act. 6. aduersaries of our Blessed Ladyes exellency whilst they deny her to be full of Grace deny that to Gods Mother which yet they must graunt to many seruants of his of whome the holy Scripture saith that they after their manner were also full of Grace Namely the Apostles and they who were present with them when the holy Ghost came downe And particularly it is said of Saint Stephen the Protomartyr That he was full of Grace And yet againe on the other side they doe vniustly accuse vs as though when we say that she was full of Grace we sought to equall her with her Sonne our Lord of whome it is also said by the beloued Disciple that he was full of Grace But (h) Of seueral plepitudes of Grace Ioan. 1. euen that disciple both in the same very place makes vs know that there are seuerall kindes of plenitude of Grace And that the plenitude of Christ our Lord was of the only begotten Sonne of God which was infinitely after a fort beyond the plenitude of our B. Lady as heâ—s being as of Mother was also incomparably beyond that of the Apostles and S. Stephen and all the Saints and Angells put togeather who are but wayters in the Court of heauen Not that there is any difference in the very being full amongst them who all are ful but the difference is in the capacity of the vessel into which that treasure is infused wherof some are more extended more capable and others lesse And it doth also consist in the various kindes of graces wherof some are more intense as also more pretious and sublime theÌ„ others The plenitude therfore of the B. Virgin presumes not to make the least comparison with that of Christ our Lord but so also must not the plenitude of other seruants and Saints once enter into competition with the plenitude of the most worthy mother of the euer liuing God The plenitude of Christ our Lord was of the originall fountaine of all Grace that of our Blessed Lady as of a sweet
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
very soule yet neither in so many yeares was that Mare pacificum that profound Sea of her sweet soule once troubled at it nor at the foote of the crosse did she vtter any one word of lesse Cōformity nor expresse otherwise any little shew of womanish weake cōplaint Nay S. Ambrose who considers her in this most dolorous but yet most glorious state dares not affirme the she did so much as weep Stantem lego flentem non lego Ambr. de obitu Valent prope sinem I read saith he that she was standing at the foote of the Crosse but I doe not read that she was weeping for the Crucifix And to increase the wonder let it be further considered as it is most true though she had such griefe as hath bene said for the torment and death of Christ our Lord which was the effect yet incomparably she had more griefe for the dishonour of God and the sinne of man which was the cause therof But still howsoeuer she was all resigned and so in conformity of the most excellent will of God as still to stand like an immoueable marble tower in the midst of such a world of waues To conclude therfore concerning her vertues she had not in her whole life one thought wherby she did not exercise some vertue or other in all perfection Nay if we be so miserable as by one and the same act of ours to offend sometymes against many vertues at once (f) Our B. Lady did exercise at once many vertues in the top of perfectiō how much more sure was her diuine soule to be like a huge rich Carbuncle cut full of faces or squares to cōply by euery act of hers with the obligation perfection of many vertues at once And those vertues had the very properties which her own excellent person had for they were not only most purely faire for as much as cōcerned thēselues but most chastly attractiue and actually fruitfull in the mind of others And God alone is able to n̄ber vp those innumerable millions of vertuous acts of all kindes which haue bene wrought by Christians in imitation contemplation of her vertues And not only haue men produced them by her example but when that was done they haue refined perfected them in a high degree And yet still withall they conceaue and consider and feele themselues in their very harts to be but as vnprofitable seruants as Christ our Lord cōmaundeth all the world to thinke they are when they should haue done all they could Wherin no soule hath reasō to find difficulty whē it remembers this holy mother of God who would know her self by no better name then of his slaue The entiere Conformity of the B. Virgins will to the will of God is prosecuted And it is shewed how a world of priuiledges and perfections which seeme incompatible were assembled in her CHAP. 92. VERILY we Christian Catholikes are much bound to God for infinite (a) Out Lord doth seeke to draw vs to him by obiects of incomparable strength sweetnes fauours it deserueth to go amongst the greatest of them that he sets before vs such puissant yet delightfull obiects as these A God incarnate dying vpon a Crosse and an Angell incarnate and more then a whole Quire of Angells in the person of his B. Virgin Mother at the foote therof They draw vs vp towards them by depressing vs downe below our selues For euen what Saint will not run out of cōntenance as farre as the feete of shame can carry him and shrinke into a feeling knowledge that he is indeed a kind of nothing if he be cōpared I say not only to Christ our Lord but to our B. Lady When the body is tormented the mind will help to hold it vp but when the Martyrdome is indured by a sword of such sorrow in the soule what is able to stay it but such a perfect obedience and patience and loue as hers which tyed it after an immoueable manner to the pillar of Gods will and which (b) The house of our B Ladies hart was immoueable planted that house of her hart vpon a rocke so firme as could not once be shaken by all the waues of earth and hell The visible Sunne did hide it selfe at that tyme as in the discourse of the Passion was declared so also did the inuisible Sonne which was the the Sonne of this sacred Virgin hide himselfe in her For where did he shine and burne but there Cant. 2. Dilectus meus mihi ego illi was then the word of them both hand to hand and she might well affirme in a much more eminent manner Coloss 3. then S. Paul that her life was hidden vp with Christ in God What (c) Our B. Lady did abound with thinges which seem incompatible with one another a world of things which seeme incompatible with one another do we see encounter and imbrace themselues in this sacred Virgin In her we see affliction and ioy Nobility and pouerty A cleere knowledge that she was the Cedar of Excellency with a perfect contempt and making herselfe the shrubb of hysop by humility The fire of Charity and the snow of Purity Her person vpon earth her conuersatiō in heauen A child of Adam in nature and his mother in Grace and a child of Christ our Lord in grace his mother in nature So that shee is both mother and daughter nay she is both Virgin Mother In her sacred wombe she coupled God and man Eecl 42. Et qui creauit me requieuit in tabernaculo meo and he sayth she who created me hath reposed in this (d) Her sacred wombe Tabernacle of mine She gaue a new and that an Eternall being to him who gaue the totall being which is inioyed both by her and all other creatures She was Grauida as S. Bernard saith but not Grauata great with child but it was a burthen without any weight For she carried him in her wōbe who carried and conducted both him and the world in his three fingars S. Bern. hom 3. super Missus est post med She was turbata non perturbata troubled at the salutation of the Angell but not disturbed by it as is also affirmed by the same S. Bernard She is a faire full riuer which could neuer fall but did ouer flow so far as to be a Sea but subiect to no tempest and alwayes if we will we may glasse our selues in her smooth shining waters A Sea she is to saile in and a port to rest in She is also a well sealed vp Fons signatus Cant. 4. but yet we may all draw that from thēce which will quench our thirst for she is not only well but water She is also a garden shut vp but yet we all may gather of those excellent Hortus cōclusus Cant. 4. and odoriferous flowers Nay though she be a garden herselfe is also a flower and the
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
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