reach or is sure kill hee not first in the end to kild by him Poore men he looks should part with all their goods to haue him but take knowledge of them Hee seekes to get him a Maiesty in his frowne and doe some-thing to seeme terrible to the multitude Euen curtesie and humility he peruerteth to pride where hee cannot otherwise pray Hath no childe of pride so many disciples as this tip-toe Ambition Why call I him Ambition when he hath changed his name vnto Honor I meane not the honour of the field Ambitions onely enemy which I could wish might be euer and onely honourably but Brokerly blowne vp honour honour by anticke fawning fidled vp honour bestowed for damned deserts Of this kind of honour is this Elfe we call Ambition compacted Yet will I not say but euen in the highest noblest birth and honourablest glory of Armes there may be Ambition Dauid was ambitious when he caused the people to be numbred Nebuchadnezzar eate grasse for his Ambition Herod was Ambitious when in Angelicall apparell he spoke to the people The truest image of this kind of Ambition was Absolom Iulius Caesar amongst the Ethnicks surmounted who when he had conquered Gallia Belgia this our poore Albion and the better part of Europe and vpon his returne to Rome was crowned Emperour in the heighth of his prosperity he sent men skil'd in Geometry to mesure the whole world that whereas he intended to conquer it all hee might know how long hee should be in ouer-running it Letters had they directed to all Presidents Consuls Dukes Palatines Tetrarchs and Iudges of Prouinces to assist them safe conduct them Their Commission was not onely to measure the earth but the Waters the Woods the Seas the Shores the Vallies the Hils and the Mountaines In this discouery thirty yeares were spent from his Consul-ship to the Consulship of Saturnius when God-wot poore man twenty yeares good before they returned he was all to be-poyniarded in the Senate house and had the dust of his bones in a brasen vrne no bigger then a bowle barreld vp whom if he had liued all the Sea and Earth and Aire would haue beene too little for Let the ambitious man stretch out his limbes neuer so he taketh vp no more ground being dead then the Beggar London of many ambitious busie heades hast thou beheld the rising and downe falling In thy stately Schoole are they first tutord in their Art With example thou first exaltest them and stil lifts them vp til thou hast lifted vp their heads on thy gates What a thing is the heart of man that it should swell so bigge as the whole world Alexander was but a little man yet if there had beene a hundred Worlds to conquer his heart would haue comprised them Did men consider wherof they were made and that the dust was their great Grand-mother they would be more humiliate and deiected Of a britler mettal then Glasse is this we call Ambition made and to mischaunces more subiect Glasse with good vsage may be kept and continue many ages The dayes of man are numbred threescore and tenne is his terme if he liue any longer it is but labour and sorrow Glasse feareth not sicknes nor old age it gathereth no wrinkles with standing It hath not so many that scoute and ly in waite for his end as Ambition for hee as all man-kind is continually liable to a million of mischances besides a legion of diseases lingering about him Admit none of those meet with him Time with his Sicle wil be sure not to misse him A man may scape a sicknesse a blow a fall a wild-beast he cannot escape his last destiny External daungers such as these be euery one is circumspect and careful to auoide Not any one ponders in his thought how to auoid the death that growes inward From the rich to the poore in euery street in London there is Ambition or swelling aboue their states the rich Cittizen swels against the pride of the prodigall Courtier the prodigal Courtier swels against the welth of the Cittizen One Company swells against another and seeks to intercept the gaine of each other nay not any Company but is deuided in it selfe The auncients they oppose themselues against the younger suppress them and keepe them downe all that they may The young men they cal them dotards and swel rage and with many othes sweare on the other side they will not bekept vnder by such cullions but goe good and neere to out-shoulder them Amongst their Wiues is like warre Well did Aristotle in the second of Phisickes call sinnes Monsters of nature for as there is no Monster ordinarily reputed but in a swelling or excesse of forme so is there no sinne but is a swelling or rebelling against God Sinne sayth Augustine is either thought word or deed opposite to the eternall will of God Then if all sinnes be opposing themselues against God surely ambition which is part of the diuels sin cannot but be the cherrishing of open enmitie against God and so immediate I conclude that so many ambitious men as are amongst vs so many open enemies God hath Ambition is any puft-vp greedy humour of honor or preferment No puffing or swelling vp in any mans body but is a sore when the soule doth swell with ambition both soule and body without timely phisicke of repentance will smart full sore for it Humilitie was so hard a vertue to beate into our heads that Christ purposely came downe from heauen in his owne person to teach it vs and continued thirty yeers together nothing but preaching and practising it here vpon earth The foolish things of the world saith Paul God chooseth and not the hauty or ambitious in conceite God might haue chosen Kings and Emperours or the Scribes and Pharisies to be his Disciples but foolish Fisher-men he chose In worldly policy he vsed a foolish course to win credite to his doctrine but foolish is the worldly policy that onely from the diuell borrowes his instance Christ chose them whom the diuell scorned to looke so lowe as to tempt in whose harts he had not yet laid one stone of his building They were the onely fit men to receiue the impression of his Spirit Whether it bee a blessing or no giuen to all Fisher-men for the Apostles sakes I know not but surely there is no one trade in their vocation liues so faithfully painfully as Fishermen that in their apparell or diet lesse exceede Hee that should haue told the diuell Christ would cast his nets amongst Fisher-men he would haue laught him out of his coate for a cockscombe What reason what likelihood was there was he borne in a Fisher-towne was he allied either by the Father or the Mother to Fisher-men Nay how should he come almost in all his life to heare of a Fisher-man Tush tush hee will be altogether in the Temple amongst the Doctors the High-priests and the Elders them will I ply
Firmament is not his handy-worke nor will they credite one generation telling another of his wonders They followe the Pironiks whose position and opinion it is that there is not hel or misery but opinion Impudently they persist in it that the late discouered Indians are able to shew antiquities thousands before Adam With Cornelius Tacitus they make Moyses a wise prouident man well seene in the Egiptian learning but deny hee had any diuine assistance in the greatest of his miracles The water they say which he strooke out of a Rocke in the Wildernes was not by any supernaturall worke of GOD but by watching to what parte the Wild-asses repayred for drink With Albumazar they holde that his leading the Chyldren of Israell ouer the Red-sea was no more but obseruing the influence of Starres and wayning season of the Moone that with-draweth the Tydes They seek not to know God in his workes or in his Sonne Christ Iesus but by his substance his forme or the place wherein he doth exist Because some late Writers of our side haue sought to discredit the story of Iudith of Susanna and Daniell and of Bell and the Dragon they thinke they may thrust all the rest of the Bible in like manner into the Iewish Thalmud and taxe it for a fabulous Legend This place serueth not to stand vppon proofes or by confutation to confirme principles neither dare I with the weake droppe of my wit offer to vpholde the high Throne of the Godhead since hee that but stretcht out his hand to vnder-prop the Arke falling was presently striken dead O Lord thou hast tenne thousand stronger pillers then I am I am the vnworthiest of all wormereserued wretches once to speake of thee or name thee My sinnes are alwaie before me Princes will not let those come before them with whom they are displeased I am afraid the congealed clowdes of my sinne will not let my praiers come neere thee O fauour thy glory though I haue displeased thee with folly I will not bee so vnweaponed-ieopardous to ouerthrow both thy cause and my credite at once by ouer-Atlassing mine inuention That which I vndertake shall bee onely to throw one light Dart at their faces from a farre and exhort all able pennes to arme themselues against thine Atheisticall maledictours Of Atheists this age affordeth two sorts the inwarde and the outward The inward Atheist is hee that deuours widowes houses vnder pretence of long prayers that like the Panther hideth his face in a hood of Religion when he goeth about his prey He would professe himselfe an Atheist openly but that like the Pharisies he feareth the multitude Because the multitude fauours Religion he runnes with the streame and fauours Religion because he would be Captaine of a multitude To be the God of gold he cares not how many gods he entertaines Church rites hee supposeth not amisse to busie the Common-peoples heads with that they shold not fal aboard with Princes matters And as Numa Pompilius in Rome and Minos in Athens kept the people in awe thrust what tyrannous laws they list vpon them the one vnder pretence he did nothing without conference of the Nimph Egeria the other vnder colour he was inspired in a certaine hollow Caue by Iupiter so hee makes conscience and the spirit of God along side-cloake for all his oppressions and pollicies A holy looke he will put on when he meaneth to doe mischiefe and haue Scripture in his mouth euen whiles hee is in cutting his neighbours throate The propagation of the Gospell good Saint-like man hee onely shootes at when vnder suppressing of Popery hee striues to ouer-throwe all Church-liuings So that euen as the Gospell is the power of God to saluatiō to euery one that belieueth so is it in him the diuels power of beguiling and vndoing to euery one that belieues him He it is that turneth the truth of God to alie and buildeth his house by hypocrisie that hath his mouth swept and garnished but in his heart a whole legion of diuels The outward Atheist contrariwise with those things that proceede from his mouth defileth his heart He establisheth reason as his God and will not be perswaded that God the true God is except he make him priuie to all the secrecies of his beginning and gouernment Straightly he will examine him where hee was what he did before he created Heauen and Earth how it is possible he should haue his beeing from before all beginnings Euery circumstance of his prouidence he wil run through question why he did not this thing and that thing and the other thing according to their humors Being earthly bodies vnapt to ascende in their ambitious cogitation they will breake ope and ransack his Closet and if conueniently they may not come to i◅ then they will derogate and depraue him all they can Little do they consider that as the light which shined before Paul made him blinde so the light of Gods inuisible misteries if euer it shine in our harts will confound and blind our carnall reason Philosophies chiefe fulnesse wisedoms adopted Father next vnto Salomon vnsatiable Art-searching Aristotle that in the round-compendiate bladder of thy braine conglobedst these three great bodies Heauen Earth and the wide world of Waters thine Icariansoaring comprehension tossed turmoiled but about the bounds and beginning of Nilus in Nilus drownd it selfe being to seely and feeble to plunge thorow it If knowledges second Salomon had not knowledge enough to engraspe one Riuer and alledge probabilitie of his beginning and bounding who shall engraspe or bound the heauens body Nay what soule is so metaphusicall subtile that can humorously sirenize heauens soule IEHOVAH out of the concealements of his God-head He that is familiar with all earthly states must not thinke to be familiar with the state of heauen The very Angels know not the day nor howre of the last iudgement if they know not the day nor houre of the iudgement which is such a generall thing more priuate circumstances of the God-head determinately they are not acquainted with And if not Angels his sanctified attendants much lesse are they reuealed to sinners Idle-headed Atheist ill wouldst thou as the Romans acknowledge and offer sacrifice to many gods that wilt not grant one God From thy birth to this moment of thine vnbeleefe reuolue the diary of thy memory and try if thou hast nere prayd and beene heard if thou hast been heard and thy prayer accomplisht who hath heard thee who hath accomplisht it Wilt thou ratifidely affirme that God is no God because like a Noune substantiue thou canst not essentially see him feele him or heare him Is a Monarch no Monarch because hee reareth not his refiant throne amongst his vtmost subiects Wee of all earthlings are Gods vtmost subiects the last in a manner that he brought to his obedience shal we then forget that wee are any subiects of his because as a mongst his Angels he is not visibly conuersant amongst vs
my Brother and Sister In slaying them that are sent to declare the wil of God you resist the will of God and are guilty of all their damnations which are yet vnconuerted whom liuing their preaching might haue reduced The violating of any of the Cömmandements is death Thou shalt not kill is one of the principall Commaundements your fault at the first sight deserueth Hell-fire What doe you but proclaime open warre against heauen when you destroy or ouer-throwe any of the Temples of the holy Ghost which are mens bodies They are the Tabernacles which the Lord hath chosen by his Spirit to dwell in But the bodies of my Saints and Prophets vvhich you slay and stone are no triuiall ordinary Tabernacles such as Peter my Disciple would haue had me to make in the Wildernesse for Moses Elias and my selfe but Tabernacles like the Tabernacle at Ierusalem where I haue ordained my name to be worshipped Their words as my words I will haue worshipped Their heads are the Mounts from whence I speake to you in a holy flame as to your fore-fathers wandring in the desert I haue tolde you here-to-fore they are the Salt of the Earth with whose Prayers and Supplications if this masse of sinne were not seasoned it would sauour so detestably in Gods nostrils hee were neuer able to endure it They are the eyes and the light of the world if the eye lose his light all the whole body is blind and hence it came that they were surnamed Seers for they only foresaw praied and prouided for the people I tell you plainly if it were possible for you to plucke the Sunne out of Heauen and you should do it so consequently leaue all the world in darknesse you should not be liable to so much blame as you now are in killing them I send vnto you They are your Seers your Prophets your chiefe Eyes which you haue slaine destroied and put out Was Caine a Vagabond on the face of the earth for killing but one Abel tenne thousand iust Abels haue you slaine that were more neere and ought to haue beene more deere to you then Brothers and shall I not destitute your habitation for it scatter you as vagabonds through-out the Empires of the world As you haue made no conscience to stone my Prophets and slay them I sent vnto you so shall the strange Lords that leade you captiue and they amongst whom many hundred yeers you shal soiurne make no coÌ„science to cut your throats for your treasure and giue a hundred of you together to their Fencers and Executioners to try their weapons on for a wager and winne maisteries with deepe wounding you O Ierusalem Ierusalem deepe woes and calamities hast thou incurd in stoning my Prophets and slaying them I sent vnto thee How often would I haue gathered thy children together when they went astray How often would I haue brought them home into the true sheep-fold when I met them straying I came into the World to no other end but to gather together the lost Sheepe of Israell You are the flock and Sheepe of my pasture when I would haue gathered you together you would not heare my voice but hardned your harts You gather your selues in counsaile against me euery time I seeke to call you or to gather you Deny if you can that I sent not my Prophets in all ages to gather you That with my Rodde and my staffe of correction I haue not sought from time to time to gather you that by benefits and manifold good turnes I haue not tryde all I might to tye you or gather you vnto me Lastly that in mine own person I haue not practised a thousand waies to gather you to repentance and amendment of life If you should deny it and I not contradict it the diuell my vttrest enemy would confirme it Let me speake truely and not vauntingly although it be lawfull to boast in goodnes such hath alwaies bin my care to gather you that I thought it not enough to gather my selfe but I haue prayed to my Father to ioyne more Labours and Gatherers with me to reape and gather in his Haruest How often haue I gathered the multitude together and spoke vnto them When the people were flocked or gathered vnto mee out of all Citties and had nothing to eate I fed them myraculously with fiue Barlie-loues two fishes I would not haue shewd the wonders of my God-head but to gather you together The first gathering that I made was of poore Sea-faring men whome I haue preferd to be myne Apostles Would you haue beene gathered together when I would haue had you you had gathered to your selues the Kingdome of Heauen and all the riches thereof Now what haue you gathered to your selues but ten thousand testimonies in the Sonne of Gods testimony that he desired and besought you to suffer your selues to be gathered by him and you would not Souldiours that fight scatteringly and doe not gather themselues in ranke or battaile array shall neuer winne the day If you knew how strong and full of stratagems the diuell were with how many Legions of lustfull desires he commeth embattailed against you that secret ambushes of temptations he hath layde to intrappe you then would you gather your selues into one body to resist him then would you gather your selues to gather in prayer to with-stand him then would you gather for the poore which is to gather for Souldiers to fight against him Eâ—…eemosyna a morte liberat et non patitur hominemire in tenebras Almes deedes deliuer a man from death and keepeth his soule from seeing confusion As water quencheth fire saith the Wise-man so almes giuing resisteth sinne And if it resisteth sinne it resisteth the Diuel which is the father of sinne All my Fathers Angels stand gathered together about his Throne No bread is made but of graines of Corne gathered together no building is raysed but of a number of stones glued and gathered together There is no perfect society or Citty but of a number of men gathered together Geese which are the simplest of all foules gather themselues together goe together flie together Bees in one Hiue hold their consistory together The starres in Heauen do shine together What is a man if the parts of his body bee disparted and not incorporated and essentiate together What is the Sea but an assembly or gathering together of waters and so the Earth a congestion or heaping vp of grosse matter together A Wood or Forrest but an host of Trees encampt together A generall Counsaile or Parliament but a congregation or gathering together of special wise men to consult about Religion or lawes O what a good thing is it sayth Dauid for Bretheren to liue or be gathered together in vnity If there were no other thing to ratifie the excellence of it but the euill of his diameter opposite which is diuision or distraction it were infinitely ample to establish the title of his dignity Nor Dauid nor all
eye-bals well-neere to pinnes-heads with weeping as a Barber wasteth his Ball in the water a further depth of dolour would I sound mine eyes more would I wast so I might waste and wash away thy wickednesse So long haue I wasted so long haue I washed and embained thy filth in the cleare streames of my braine that now I haue not a cleane Teare left more to wash or embaline any sinner that comes to me The fount of my teares troubled and mudded with the Toade-like stirring and long-breathed vexation of thy venimous enormities is no longer a pure siluer Spring but a miry puddle for Swine to wallow in Black and cindry like Smiths-water are those excrements that source downe my cheekes and farre more sluttish then the vgly oous of the channell T is thou alone vlcerous Ierusalem that hast so fouled and soyled them In seeking to gather fruite of thee I gather nothing but stayning Berries which embrued my hands and almost poysoned my hart Neuer wold I mention this or mone me if thou hadst not embrued or brawned thine owne hands not in Berries but in blood and more then almost poysoned thine owne hart What talke I of poyson when it is become as familier to thee as meate drinke Thou hast vsed it so long for meate and drinke that true nourishing meate and drinke thou now takest for poyson Consuetudo est altera natura Custome hath so engrafted it in thy nature that now not onely poyson not hurts thee but fostereth and cherisheth thee What-soeuer thou art is poyson and none thou breathest on but thou poysonest With Athenagoras of Argus thou neuer feelest any paine when thou art stung with a Scorpion Thou hast no sting or remorse of conscience Thy soule is cast in a dead-sleep and may not be awaked though Heauen Earth should tumble together For discharge of my duty and augmentation of thine euerlasting malediction since Teares threats promises nor any thing will peirce thee heere I make a solemne protestation what my zeale and feruent inclination hath beene euer since thy first propagation to win weane thee from sathan and notwithstanding thou stonedst my Prophets and slewest them I sent vnto thee I stil assayed to reuoke thee bring thee back againe to thy first image not once or twise or thrise but I cannot tell how often I would haue gathered thee euen as a Henne gathereth her Chickins vnder her wings butthou wouldest not Blame me not though I giue thee ouer that hast giuen mee ouer long patience hath dulled my humour of pitty No sword but will loose his edge in long striking against stones My leane withered hands consisting of nought but bones are all to shiuerd and splinterd in their wide casos of skinne with often beating on the Anuile of my bared breast So penetrating and eleuatedly haue I praid for you that mine eyes would tayne haue broke from their anchors to haue flowne vp to Heauen and mine armes stretcht more then the length of my body to reach at the Starres My heart ranne full-butt against my breast to haue broken it open and my soule flutterd and beate with her ayry-winges on euery side for passage My knees crackt and the ground fledde back Then O Ierusalem would I haue rent my body in the midst like a graue so I might haue buried thy sinnes in my bowels And had I been in heauen as I was on Earth the Sunne should haue exhalted from thee all thy trespasses as meteors which the clowdes his Cofferers receiuing might foorth-with haue conduited downe into the Sea and drowned for euer Fooles be they that imagine it is the Windes that so tosse and turmoile them in the deepe they are no winds but insurrectiue sins which so possesse the waues with the spyrite of raging I drowned all the sinnes of the first World in water all the sinnes of the first World now welter souse and beate vnquietly in the Sea whither the World of waters was with-drawne when the Deluge was ended And as a guilty conscience can no where take rest so no more can they in the Sea but embolning the billowes vppe to the ayre with roring and howling darte them-selues on euery Rocke desiring it to ouer-whelme them and because they know they can neuer be recouered with the same enuy which is in the diuels they seeke to drowne and ramuerse euery ship that they meete If happily there be a calme it is when they are weary of excruciating them-selues I that was borne to suppresse treade downe sinne vnder foote in the night time when that sinne-inhabited element is wont to be most lunaticke walke on the crests of the surges as on the dry land Another cause why the Sea so swelleth barketh of late more then ordinary is for when I sent the diuels into the Heard of Swine they carried them head-long into the Sea where they drowned and perrisht them and then loth to come to land to be controlled and dispossessed againe by mee they entred and inhabited the Sea-monsters such as the Whale the Grampoys the Wasser-man whome they haue suborned and inspyred to lye in waite for Ships-wrack Sinne takes no rest but on earth and on earth no rest in the night but the day The night is blacke like the diuell then hee may boldly walke abroade lyke the Owle and his eyes nere be dazeled Solus câ—…m solo hee may conferre with his subiects tempt terrifie insinuate what he will Hee knowes that God hath therefore hydde all other obiects from mans sight in the night that then he should haue no occasion to gaze elswhere but full leysure to looke into himselfe In which regard least he shold looke into him selfe and so repent hee will not let him see with his owne eyes but lendeth him other eyes of despaire or security to see withall If of security then either hee perswades him there is no God and that Religion is but subtile Lawgyuers policy to keepe silly fooles in awe with scare-crowes or that if there be a God he is a wise God and like a wise Counsailer troubles not himselfe with euery vaine twittle twattle of this man or that man but considers wherefore we are made and beares with vs thereafter Yea which is horrible hee sootheth him vp that if God would not haue had him sinne hee would neuerhaue giuen him the partes or the meanes to sinne with If he be a whore-maister hee remembreth him how Abraham went in to his mayde Hagar How Lot committed incest with his Daughters How Dauid lay with Berseba and slew Vrias And how I my selfe woulde not let the woman that had committed adultery bee stoned to death but bidde her goe home to her house in peace sinne no more If he be a drunkerd Noah was drunke the fore-named Lot was drunke and Dauid mencioned before likewise made Vrias drunke Yet all these were men that God delighted in If hee bee a periurd person why Peter for-swore himselfe
wee put our selues to in purchasing earthly wealth we may purchase Heauen Welth many times flyes from them that with greatest soilicitude greedines seek after it For Heauen it is no more but seeke and it is yours knocke and it shall be opened With lesse sure I assure you is the kingdome of Heauen obtained then a sute for a Pension or office to an earthly King which though a man hath 20. yeares followed and hath better then three parts and a halfe of a promise to haue confirmed yet if hee haue but a quarter of an enemy in the court it is casheird and non-suted God will not be corrupted he is not partiall as man is he hath no Parasites about him hee seeth with his owne eyes and not with the eyes of those that spake for bribes Hee is not angry or commands vs to bee driuen backe when we are importunate but hee commands vs to bee importunate and is angry if we be not importunate In the Parable of the godlesse Iudge and the importunate Widdow hee teacheth that importunity may get any thing of him So in the similitude of the man that came to his friend at midnight to desire him to lend him three loaues and his friend aunswered him His doore was shut his children and seruants in bedde and hee could not rise himselfe to giue them him at length hee still continuing in knocking that for him neither he not his might rest to be rid of his importunity not for he was his friend he rose vp and gaue him as many as hee needed How much more shall our GOD giue vs what wee aske that asketh no other treuage at our handes for giuing but asking and thanksgiuing We must hunger and thirst after righteousnes and we shall be satis-fied Hunger and thirst makes the Lyon to rore the Wolues to howle Oxen and Kine to bellough and bray and Sheepe of all Beastes the most selie and timorous to bleate and complaine Can man then that in spyrite and audacitie exceedeth all the beasts of the field hungering thirsting after righteousnesse hold his peace Would God euer haue encouraged him with a blessing to hunger and thirst but that the extremity of hunger and thirst might driue him to the extreamity of importunity and prayer I cryed vnto the Lord saith Dauid and he heard me Hee did not coldly bashfully or formally onely cry to the Lord as not caring whether hee were heard or no but hee cryed vnto him with his whole hart euen to the Lord he cryed and he heard him Ezekias cryed vnto the Lord and he heard him The blood of the Saints vnder the Altar as all blood is sayd to cry vnto the Lord for vengeance Thy brother Abels blood hath cried vnto me sayd God to Caine. The prayer of the fatherless and Widdow which God heareth aboue al things is called a cry Vsurers you are none of these cryers vnto God but those that hourely vnto God are most cryde out against God hath cryde out vnto you by his Preachers GOD hath cride out vnto you by the poore Prysoners on their death-beds haue cride out of you and when they haue had but one houre to intercessionate for their soules and sue out the pardon of their numberlesse sins the whole part of that howre sauing one minute when in two words they cryde for mercy haue they spent in crying for vengeance against you After they were dead their Coffins haue beene brought to your doores in the open face of Cheapside and ignominious Ballads made of you which euery Boy would chaunt vnder your nose yet will not you repent nor with all this crying be awaked out of your dreame of the Diuell and Diues Therefore looke that when on your death-beddes you shall lye and crye out of the Stone the Strangullion the Gout you shall not be heard your paine shall be so wrastling tearing and intollerable that you shall haue no leisure to repent or pray no nor so much as lift vppe your hands or think one good thought Euen as others haue curst you so shall you be ready to curse God desire to be swallowed quick to excorse the agony you are in As the deuill in the second of Iob being asked from whence he came answered From compassing the earth so you being askd at the day of iudgement from whence you come shall answer From compassing the Earth For Heauen you haue not compast or purchast therfore shall Hell-fire be your portion Euery man shall receiue of God according to that in his body he hath wrought If in your bodies you haue done no good works of God you shall receiue no good words The words of God are deedes he spake but the word and Heauen Earth were made He shall speake but the word and to hell shal you be had Good deedes deriued from faith are Rampiers or Bulwarkes raised vp against the deuill he that hath no such Bulwarke of good deedes to resist the deuills battery cannot chuse but haue his soules-citty soone raced Good deeds are a tribute which we pay vnto God for defending vs from al our ghostly enemies planting his peace in our consciences In stead of the ceremoniall Lawe burnt-Offerings and Sacrifices which are ceased God hath giuen vs a new Law To loue one another that is to shew the fruites of loue which are good deedes to one another The Widdowes Oyle was increased in her Cruse and her Meale in in her tubbe only for doing good deeds to the prophet of the Lord. Few be there now-a-dayes that will doe good deedes but for good deedes that is for rewardes If seates of iustice were to be sould for money wee haue them amongst vs that would buy them vp by the whole sale and make them away againe by retaile Hee that buyes must sell shrewd Alcumists there are risen vp that will pick a merchandise out of euery thing and not spare to set vp their shops of buying and selling euen in the Temple I wold to God they had not sould and pluckt downe Church Temple to build them houses of stone God shall cutte them off that enritch themselues with the fatte of the Altar Oues pastorem non iudicent saith an antient writer quia non est Discapulus supra Magistrū multo minus deglubent Let not the Sheepe iudge their shepheard because the scholler is not aboue his maister much lesse are they to pluck from their maister the Shepheard to shaue or to pelt him to the bare bones to whom for feeding them they should offer vp their fleeces Diis parentibus et Magistris sayth Aristotle non potest reddi equiualens To the Gods our Fathers and our Schoolemaisters can neuer bee giuen as they deserue Hee was an Ethnick that spoke thus wee Christians onely because he hath spoke it will do any thing against it From God our Parents and our Schoole-maisters which are our Preachers say we can neuer bee pluckt sufficient To make our selues
it Thou hast contended to be a more beautifull Creator and repolisher of thy selfe then he His owne workmanship thou hast made him out of loue with by altering and deforming it at thy pleasure There is no workman that regardeth or esteemeth his owne workmanship after it is translated and transposed by others Except thou quickly vndoest and with-drawest all thy ouer-working he will in wreakfull recompence that thou hast so disgrac't him alter thee deforme thee translate thee transpose thee and leaue thy house desolate vnto thee The last Daughter of Pride is Delicacy vnder which is contained Gluttony Luxury Sloth Security But properly Delicacy is the sinne of our London Dames So delicate are they in their dyet so dainty and puling fine in their speech so tiptoe-nice in treading on the earth as though they walkt vpon Snakes and fear'd to treade hard least they should turne againe Their houses so pickedly and neately must be trickt vp and tapistred as if like Abraham or Lot they were to receiue Angels The floare vnder foote glisteringly rubbed and glased that a Iew if he should behold it would suspect it for Holy ground Nothing about them but is wealth-boastingly and elaborately beautified onely their soules they keepe poore beggerly Iob scrapt his sores with a potshard if they haue any sore or noisome malady about them they will ouer-gilde it and make it seem more amiable then any other part of the body Their habitations they make so resplendent and pleasurable on earth that they haue no mind to goe to heauen Into heauens pleasures they cannot see for their eyes are dazled with terrestiall delights Those that will haue their harts thorowly enflamed with the ioies of the world to come must place no ioy in this world nor frame to themselues any obiect that may too much content They must haue somthing euermore to amate and check their felicity and with Macedon Philip to remember them of mortalitie Delicacy is nought but the art of security and forgetting mortality It is a kind of Alchimical quintessensing a heauen out of earth It is the exchanging of an eternall heauen for a short momentary imperfect heauen Blessed are they that by pining and excruciating their bodies liue in hell here on earth to auoid the hell neuer ending Many of the Saints and Martyrs of the Primitiue Church when they might haue spent their daies in all affluence and delicacy and liu'd out of gunshot of misery haue notwithstanding tooke vnto them the contemptiblest pouerty that might be They haue abandoned all their goods and possessions and in the Wildernesse conuersed with penurie and scarcity to beate downe and keepe vnder their rebellious flesh Some of them haue drunk puddle water fed on the lothsomest things that might be to bring their affection out of loue with this transitory infelicity Some of them haue grated rawed their smooth tender skinnes with haire shirts and rough garments that they might liue in vncessant smart take no ease or rest in this life where no rest or ease is to be taken vp but only a watch-mans lodge to soiourne in for a night or such a house as the Moath buildeth in a garment Others all naked on sharpe shreds of broken flint and fragments of of potsheards haue spred their weary limbs that lust in their sleepe might not assaile them Holy S. Ierome in the Desert thou builts thee a Cell to liue out of the haunts of concupiscence where parched and broiled in Sommer with the raging beames of the Sun and quiuering and quaking in Winter all riueld and weather-beaten with the sharp driuing shours and freezing Northern-winde thou drunkest no kind of liquor but the Ice-chilled water from the cold Fountain nor eats any meate but tough dried roots On the bare ground thou lodgedst and with abstinence and want of sleepe lookedst pale and wan This didst thou to mortifie thy insurrectiue masse of corruption This didst thou to teach mortification and sobriety to these licentious times of ours No course doe wee take to mortifie the Lawe of our members all mortification we censure by the name of superstition our fasts are no fasts but preparatiues to Euening feasts our mourning is like the mourning of an Heyre who then laughes inward when hee weepes most outward It is not prayer alone may kill the olde man in vs either it must be sanctified and assisted with fasting abstinence or it cannot cast out a spirit of such might It is heauenly policy as well as humane policie to weaken our enemy before we fight with him Wee must weaken our enemy Gods enemy the flesh with abstinence and fasting before we fight with him or els he will be too strong for vs. Physitions minister Purgations before they apply any Medicine Surgions lay Corsiues to any wound to eate out the dead-flesh ere they can cure it Abstinence and fasting are as Corasiues to eate out the dead-flesh of gluttony drunkennes concupiscence in our loins which so proiected and eaten out Christ is that kind Samaritan that will come and bind vp our wounds carrie vs home with him to his house or Kingdome euerlasting Thus much of Delecacy in generall now more particularly of his first branch Gluttony which if any Country vnder heauen be culpable of England is All our friendship curtesie is nothing but gluttony Great men shew their state magnificence in nothing so much as gluttony The birth day of our Sauiour his Resurrection and Ascension wee honour onely with gluttony How many Cookes Apothecaries Confectioners and Vintners in London grow pursie by gluttonie Vnder Gluttony I shrowde not onely excesse in meate but in drink also Our full platters and our plentifull cups vnapt vs to any exercise of Christianitie or prayer We do nothing but fatten our soules to Hell-fire Our bodies we bumbast and balist with engorging diseases Diseases shorten our daies therfore whosoeuer englutteth himselfe is guilty of his owne death and damnation Qui diligit epulas sayth Salomon in egestate erit Hee that loueth dainty fare shall feele scarcity Venter maero aestuans dispumat libidinem The belly abounding with wine and good cheere vomiteth forth lust Gluttony were no sinne or not so heynous as it is did it not pluck on a number of other heynous sinnes with it or that wee so engorging our selues infinite of our poore brethren hungerd staru'd not in the streets for want of the least dish on our Tables Very largely haue I inueighed against this vice elsewhere wherefore heere I will trusse it vp more succinct Text vpon Text I could heape to shew the inconuenience of it In London I could exemplify it by many note-worthy specialties but in so doing I should but lay downe what euery one knowes and purchase no thank for my labour To my iourneys end I haste discend to the second continent of Delicacy which is Lust or Luxury In complaining of it I am afraid I shal defile
such as fitteth farre-spent languorment manifest as it were in a dead-march her vntimely interment Forty yeares were expired after our Lords lifting vp into Heauen when the Temple-boasting Iewes elate in their owne strength began to pretend a wearines of the Romane regiment and coueted to raigne entire Lords ouer the Lords that raign'd ouer them Eleazer the Sonne of Anani the High-priest was the first that seminariz'd this hope of signiorizing and freedome amongst them Proudly he controlled Agrippa all the other Lieftenants droue them from their dignities to Rome to seeke succour and rescue and swayed ouer the multitude as the King and Father of their liues In the meane-while the Element was ouer-hung with prodigies GOD thought it not enough to haue threatned them by his Son but he emblazond the aire with the tokens of his terror No Starre that appeared but seemd to sparkle fire The Sun did shine all day as it is wont at his Euening going downe The Moone had her pale-siluer face iron spotted with freckle-imitating bloud-sprinklings and for her dim frosty circle a blacke inky-hood embayling her bright-head Ouer the Temple at the solemne feast of the Passeouer was seene a Commet most coruscant streamed tayled forth with glistering naked swords which in his mouth as a man in his hand all at once he made semblance as if hee shaked and vambrasht Seauen daies it continued all which time the Temple was as cleare light in the night as it had beene noone-day In the Sanctum sanctorum was heard clashing and hewing of Armour Whole flockes of Rauens with a fearefull croking cry beate fluttred and clasht against the windowes A hideous dismall Owle exceeding all her kind in deformity and quantity in the Temple-porch built her nest From vnder the Altar there issued penetrating plangorus-howlings and gastly dead-mens grones A goodly young Heyfer hal'd thither for a burnt offering being knockt downe and ready to be drest miraculously calued a Lambe The sacrificing kniues that diu'd into her entrailes wold afterwards by no meanes be cleansed but from her bloud as from mans bloud tooke vnto them an vnremoueable rust In the feast of Weekes in the inner receite of the Temple was heard one stately stalking vp and downe and exclaiming with a terrible base hollow voice Migremus hinc Migremus hinc è Templo emigremus Let vs go hence Let vs go hence out of this Temple let vs hie vs. What should I ouer-blacke mine Inke perplex pale Paper rumatize my Readers eyes with the sad tedious recitall of all the prognosticating signes of their ruine Stories haue lost and tyred themselues in this Story Should I but make an Index to any one Writer of them it would aske a Booke alone Some few abreuiated alleagements I will content my selfe with and so passe on-ward to more necessary matter Aboue and besides the Propheticall apparitions in ouer about the Temple in the Citty there happened no lesse note-worthy praedictions The East gate thereof which was all yron and neuer wont to be opened vnder twenty men together the dry rusty creeking of whose hookes and gymmes as it was in the opening might be heard a mile off now of the owne accord burst wide ope and being ope was twise more hard then before to be shut A base mechanicall fellow there was sprung out of the mud of the Communalty who for foure yeares together before the warres begunne went crying vp and downe Woe to Ierusalem and the Sanctuary thereof Woe to euery liuing thing that breatheth therein The wars once entred he got him on the wals and often re-iterating his stale-worne note adde thereunto Woe and thrice woe to my selfe and with that start a stone out of an Engine in the Campe and stopt his throate Many monstrous birthes at this instant were brought foorth in diuers places of the Citty sprung vp founts of bloud The Element euery night was embattailed with Armed men skirmishing and conflicting amongst themselues the Emperiall Eagles of Rome were plainly there displayed to all mens sight A burning sword also was set forth visibly bent against the Citty The strangest and horriblest tempests of thunder and lightning had they that euer was heard of The Earth left to be so friutfull as it wont No season but it exceeded his stinted temperature Euery thing rebelled against kind as thinking scorne to accommodate themselues to their vses that had so rebelled against the Lord. For all this there was no man that would gather himselfe no man that would depart from the ill worke he had in hand Ambulabant vt caeci quia Domino peccauerunt Their eies were ouer-filmed or blinded because they obeyed not their Maker NOw is the time that all Riuers must runne into the Sea that whatsoeuer I haue in wit or eloquence must be drayned to the delineament of wretchednesse The Romanes like a droue of Wild bores roote vp and forrage fruitfull Palestine That which was called the Holy Land is now vnhallowed with their Heathen swords Wherefore you Pilgrims that spend the one halfe of your daies in visiting the Land of Promise and weare the plants of your feete to the likenesse of withered rootes by bare-legd processioning from a farre to the Sepulchre vngainefully you consume good houres for no longer was Iudea a Land of Promise then her Temple stood Vespasians inuasion hath prophaned it a Mount of dead bodies ouer that Sepulchre is raised which you perigrinate to adore that Sepulchre you see is but a thing built vp by Saracens to get mony with and beguile votiue Christians They delude your superstition and make it their tributary slaue No Hog-sty is now so pollutionate as the earth of Palestine and Ierusalem Our Sauiours steps are quite vnsanctified in them and trodden out of sent by the irruptiue ouer-trampling of the Romanes A new story of flesh-manured earth haue they cast vpon it and made it no more the walke of Saints and Prophets but a poysonous nurcery of Beasts of pray and Serpents O God enlarge mine inuention and my memory sincerely and feelingly to rehearse the disornamenting of this mother of Citties Vnderstand that before the arriuall of Vespasian there were in Ierusalem three factions Eleazers which was the fundamentiue and first Iehochanans next and Schimeons the last Eleazer and Iehochanan the vngodliest that euer God made Schimeon except and hee might well haue beene Schoole-maister to Cain or Iudas hee was such a grand Keysar of cut-throtes From the noblest of the Iewes discended but his Nobility ere he came to it by his degenerate conditions he forfeited A man hee was that made a mockery of all Lawes and Religion and any thing which Authority forbad most greedily would embrace thinking as the best Pastures are hedged in the best Orchards wald about the best Mettals hutcht vp so there was nothing excellent but was forbidden and whatsoeuer was forbidden was excellent For malice or hatred he would not stab or murder men so much as against