persons aliue Either for nobility and power out of the Citty of Rome which was the Empresse of the world or out of the Prouinces of Greece which was the Seminary of all morality and learning or out of the citty of Hierusalem which the opinion of sanctity the maiesty of Religious rites did easily outstrip all other places But (d) Why our Lord made not choyce of the noble wise or learned men of the world for conuersion therof 1. Cor. 1. he who afterward did condemne the pride pleasure of the world vpon the Crosse had before in the choice of his Apostles both confounded all discourse of flesh and bloud and withall he tooke care to magnify the attributes wherof I spake before of his power his wisedome and his goodnes By choosing as S. Paul affirmeth the meane things of the world to confound the noble the weake to cōfound the strong and the things which scarse were thought to haue any substance or being at all to confound other things which seemed as it were to beard and braue the vvorld It is true that he admitted of some few learned men for his Disciples as Gamaliel and Nathanael And of some fevv vvho vvere rich and noble as Lazarus Nicodemus and Ioseph of Arimathia that so he might not seeme to disdaine nobility and learning but yet his Apostles in a manner vvere all obscure and poore vnlearned men Both because such persons are vvont to goe more vvillingly after the call of Gods holy inspirations and partly also yea and chiefely to make the vvorld cōfesse that vvhen it should see vvhole Prouinces subdued to the faith of Christ our Lord by the preaching of his doctrine out of such ignorāt mouthes as theirs vvere knovvne to be it might be obliged to impute the same to no other cause but the omnipotēt povver of God the Father the infinite vvisedome of God the sonne vvho is Christ our Lord and the inexhausted goodnes of God the holy Ghost vvhich was able to doe such vvonders by such weake instruments Novv that (e) How Moyses in some respect was an extract of the Apostles 2. Cor. 2. vvhich vvas heere fulfilled in the person of the rude Apostles vnder the lavv of grace vvas punctually prefigured vnder the vvriten lavv in the person of Moyses vvho vvas but a sheepheard and a stammerer and so could haue no grace or guift of speech But Virtus Dei in infirmitate perficitur The strength and power of God is perfected and proclaymed in the weakenes of man And Moyses could not be so vntovvard either in fortune or nature for the busines which God imployed him in but the same God could vvith ease doe those wōderfull things by his meanes which he designed for the deliuery of his people from the seruitude of Pharao And this he wrought aftervvard in a more admirable māner by the ministery of his poore Apostles in freing soules from the tyranny of the spirituall Pharao which is the deuill The rebellious Angells and our fraile forefather Adam were grounded at the first in great priuiledges both of grace and nature but through disobedience and pride they all fell headlong downe The Angells to hell Adam into a deepe darke hole full of infirmity and worldly care But the Apostles had their foundation and first beginning in pouerty ignorance and simplicity and in fine in a being nothing of themselues And now as the pride of the former was abased so the humility of these latter as we shall see in the Chapter following was exalted by the holy and mighty hand of God whose name be euer blessed for the glory which he giues himselfe by his owne goodnes The incomparable Loue wherwith our Lord instantly rewarded the speedy obedience of the Apostles CHAP. 28. SVCH men as these they were whome our Lord designed to the Apostolate which yet was the most excellent and most eminent office in the Church of God And he vouchsafed to inuite them with such strength as well as with such tendernes of loue that they came when they were called They did it instantly and cheerfully and absolutely Saint Peter and S. Andrew Marc. 1. were casting their netts into the Sea and immediatly vpon the fight and voyce of our Lord Iesus who bad them come and follow him Matth. 4. they went and left their netts in the act of their falling into the water without staying so long as might serue to draw them vp againe And much lesse did they delay till they saw what draught they might chaunce to haue Ibid. S. Iohn and S. Iames were in the act of mending their netts and vpon the very first sight and hearing of the voyce of Christ our Lord who called them to him they did not so much as fasten one stitch or tye one knot but immediatly they put themselues vpon following him Leauing not only their netts but abandoning euen their very father through the desire they had to comply at full speed with the inspiration of God which spake more lowdly to their harts then the voyce of Christ our Lord as man had done to their eares of flesh and bloud S. Matthew as is touched Matt. 9. both before and afterward was in the (a) The admirable conuersion of S. Matthew Custome house in the midst of a world of reckonings accounts he was in the very act of sinning the company which he was in would not faile to encourage him in doing ill but yet our Lord had no sooner bid him follow him but he left all at the very instant without so much as saluting his friends yea this he did with such excesse of ioy as that to shew the comfort of his hart he feasted his new Lord and maister The world is full of men who can write and read but there are not so very many who cast account so well as this B. Apostle knew how to doe Preferring God before the world and the treasures of diuine grace before the corruptible riches of this life and lending such a watchfull and listning care to the inspirations of almighty God in the obedience wherof it was but for our Lord to call and him to come But neither he nor those others were in danger of (b) Men are far frō loosing by giuing much to God loosing any thing by obeying the voyce of Christ our Lord. To vvhom although for the tryall of their loue and for the increase of their merit he made no promise at all vvhen he called thē but only to those fishers that he would make them fishers of men yet aftervvards he made them knovv that they had to doe vvith a liberall God And for as much as they had left their little comodities to follovv him vvho seemed to haue lesse and for that they had so generously contemned the care of friends and goods for his loue and in regard that they had put themselues instantly and franckly vpon his seruice vvithout asking any day or desiring to be
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
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
Father could communicate to his Sonne no other nature but his own the Sonne is therfore Consubstantiall with the Father and true God who only possesseth immortality His Essence (d) The essence of Christ our Lord as he is God is an infinite kind of thing eternall and immutable which doth necessarily exist and wherein as in the soueraigne cause all other perfections are contained after an vnspeakably sublime manner And such excellency is resident in that most simple and pure Essence of his that he is infinitly farre from al necessity of any thing created towards the complement of his owne beatitude Now concerning the creatures they haue no being but by him or rather they haue it not so properly by him as in him Is any man Lib. 1. Conf. c. 0. sayth S. Augustine able to frame himselfe Or is any one of the veines whereby our being and life runneth towards vs drawne from any other roote then this That thou O Lord dost frame vs Thou to whome being and liuing are not too seueral things because supremely to Be and supremely to Liue is the very thing it it selfe which thou art for thou art supreme and art not changed And a little before speaking to God in the selfe same discourse he expresseth himselfe thus in most profound and yet most elegant manner Thou O Lord both euer liuest in thy selfe and nothing dyeth in thee because thou art before all ages and before all that which can euen be sayd to haue beene before and thou art the God and the Lord of all thy creatures And in thy presence do stand the causes of al thinges which are vnstable and euen of all thinges which are changeable the vnchangeable rootes remaine with thee and the eternall reasons of thinges do liue whilest yet the thinges themselues are but Temporall and Irrationall Thus sayth S. Augustine and so infinite is the essence of God and so absolutly nothing are all those thinges whose being is not deriued from him conserued in him Infinite also is his (e) The power of Christ our Lord as he is God Power and it reacheth to the making or changing of al those thinges which either are or els may be so worthily is he called The Omnipotent And not only doth he create all the substances of them all but he doth so truely and so immediatly of himselfe frame all their motions that without his concourse not so much as any moate of the ayre could stirre And vpon his three fingers Isa 40.22 he so conserues the whole machine of the world that if but for one moment he should suspend the influence which he giues it would instantly runne headlong into that Abisse of being Nothing out of which it was called by his voyce The (f) What a nothing the world is in comparison of God whole race of mankind is but a smoake a shadow a Dreame sauing that more truly it deserues the name of Nothing in respect of him No ball vpon a Racket no straw in the middest of a huge fornace no poore withered leafe in the mouth of a deuouring tempest can expresse the pouerty and infirmity of all the Creatures if they were all put into one when once they shall be compared with Almighty God Sap. 5. Iac. 4. Iob. 14. Psal 101. Iob. 20. Psalm 72. And if all the things which are created haue not the proportion of one withered leafe in comparison of a whole world what kind of thinges are thou and I and in what part of that leafe shall we euer be able to find our selues The breath of the Nostrils of the God of hostes Isa 29. makes the whole heauen to tremble He visites the world in thunder and earth-quakes and in the huge voice of a whirling tempest and in the flame of a consuming fire and the multitude of all the Nations before him shal be as some dreame by night Behold our Lord is stronge and mighty like a push of haile and a whirle-wind Isa 2â— which teares vp and like the force of an ouerflowing riuer which beares downe whatsoeuer it touches His very looking vpon the earth makes it tremble Psal 103. his touching of the Mountaines makes them smoake His head and haire are described by snow wooll Apoc. 1â— his face by the brightnes of the Sunne his eyes by the flame of fire his voyce by the noise of many waters and of huge thunder claps it sends out of his mouth a two edged sword He can rule all nations with a rod of Iron Psal 2.9 and he can bruise them like a potters vessell And he treads the presse of the wine of the fury of his wrath and in his thigh this Title is written Apoc. 9â— King of Kings and Lord of Lords in comparison of whome all other Kinges are toyes And so we see what is become of a Pharao Exod. 14. Dan. 4.4 Reg. 9. Act. 12. Isa 13. a Nabuchodonozor a Iesabell a Herod and a thousand others who haue succeeded them in sinne When therefore the day of God shall come it will be cruell and full of indignation wrath and fury it shall make the whole earth become a desert and it shall deliuer vp sinners to be grounde to dust Such I say is his Power and such will be his reuenge vpon the wicked if they will needs be wicked but he desires with admirable loue and procures with a sufficiency of grace that all the world may be saued if they will cooperate therewith and the wayes whereby he doth it are admirable because his Wisedome is as infinite as himselfe In (g) The infinite wisedome of Christ our Lord as he is God vertue of this Wisedome he doth most perfectly comprehend not only all the Creatures which haue or had or are to haue any being together with all their powers and proprieties but all others also which by his omnipotency he might create if he would He beholds future things which to him are present with a most steady eye He numbers all the Stars and calleth euery one of them by their names Isa 40. Psal 114. Ierem. 10. Isa 40.12 1. Paral. 18.9 Ierem. 1. Iob. 31. 34. Eccles 1. 23. He weighes out the windes he measures out all the waters He sees the secrets of all harts at ease He numbers all the paces of all our feet all the actions of all our hands all the casts of all our eyes al the words of all our tongues al the thoughts of all our harts all the minuts of all our tyme all the dropps of the sea all the graynes of the sand all the partes motions both internall externall of all his Creatures are numbred disposed by him And all this he doth with one only eternall act of his vnderstanding Nay he hath moreouer the Idea's or Formes of innumerable other worlds before him for the composition disposition and ornament wherof he conceaueth infinite waies meanes He
euer the beatificall vison of God Ioan. 8. Ioan. 11. our Lord Iesus as he was man had euer the beatificall vision of God This truth is thus declared in the Ghospell by the mouth of Christ our Lord I speake those thinges which I haue seene with the Father and where I am that is to say in Glory there shall my seruant also be For since he was from and in the very beginning the naturall Sonne of God and the vniuersall Father and head both of men Angells the influence whereof was to be deriued into all the members it was but reason and it could not be otherwise but that his Soule should be endued with this Beatificall knowledge as is declared by the holy Fathers By this knowledge he beheld and did contemplate the most B. Trinity after a manner incomparably more sublime and noble then any or all the other creatures put togeather And because by how much the more cleerely God is seene so much the more are creatures seene in him it will follow that the Soule of Christ our Lord did behould in God not only innumerable thinges but euen outright all those things concerning creatures which euer were at any tyme or which are or shall heereafter be since (c) It belongeth to Christ our Lord as le is our Iudge to know all â—â—inges vhich coÌ„terne the creatures vhom he is to iudg Matt. 28. â—8 he is the Lord of all the Iudge of all and hath all power giuen to him both in heauen and earth for the iust and orderly execution wherof it is euident that he must haue the knowledge of them all The Catholike Fathers and Doctours do also ascribe a second kind of knowledge to the soule of Christ our Lord which (d) Christ our Lord a Man had also infused knowledg they call Infused as being a kind of supernaturall light whereby it did certainely and clearely discerne and know all thinges created And although it be not so expresly contayned in holy Scriptures that Christ our Lord was indued with this knowledge in particular and distinct manner since they only affirme That he knew all thinges which is sufficiently made good by that beatificall vision whereof I spake before yet are there pregnant consequences weighty reasons which exact at our hands a firme beliefe that he had also this other Infused knowledge For the soule of Christ our Lord was alwayes truely Blessed he vvas not only a Runner tovvardes felicity as all other humane creatures are in this life but he vvas a Comprehender of it euen from the very first instant of his Conception It vvas necessary therfore that his soule being Blessed should haue all the endowments of a blessed Soule vvherof this Infused knowledge is one and vvhereby it did certainly and clearely know all thinges created vvhether they vvere natural or supernaturall And that in themselues and in their proper kind or element as they call it and not as only appearing and shining in another glasse as they are seene by that former Beatificall vision but directly and immediatly in themselues And for this it is that the incomparable S. Augustine doth declare That the Angels are endued both with a Morning and an Euening knowledge vnderstanding by the former the beatificall vision and by the latter the knowledge vvhich they call infused Our Lord Iesus had moreouer a third kinde of knowledge which is termed by the name of Experimentall This (e) Of the experimentall knowledg of Christ our Lord. knowledge is acquired by the industry of the senses and it was the fame in Christ our Lord for as much as concernes the meanes wherby it was gathered with the knowledge which we coÌ„passe in this life But yet with this great difference That in Christ our Lord it was without any danger of errour wheras in vs it is with very great difficulty of iudging right And it is in consideration of this kind of knowledge that the holy Euangelist affirmed Christ our Lord to proceed and grow Luc. 2. But those miserable men wherof I spake before hauing the sight of their Faith so short as not to discerne in his sacred soule any other kind of knowledge then this last did absolutely impute ignorance to it at sometymes of his life more then others as if it had not beene Hypostatically vnited to God in whome not onely the knowledge of all things but (f) Nothing is but so far as it is in God euen the very things themselues remayne and if they did not so remaine they could not be Now vpon this which concerneth the knowledge of Christ our Lord it followeth cleerly that he knew all things playnely which are which shall be and which euer were It followeth also that he neuer ceased in any one minute of his life from the consideration of what he knew since he had such knowledge as was wholly independant vpon those images or formes which vse to be impressed vpon the Phansy therfore the working of his knowledge was no way interrupted euen when he was sleeping And yet againe it followeth that hauing a perfect comprehension of all things created together with the causes and effects of them all he (g) Christ our Lord as Man was indued with the perfect knowledg of all arts and sciences consequently was endued with the truth of all Arts and Sciences He had moreouer a most sublime guift of (h) He had a most sublime guift of Prophesy Prophesy and that not after a transitory manner as others haue bene enriched with it by God but permanently and sticking as it were as close vnto him as his owne Nature And lastly it must follow that he was the possessour of all (i) Christ our Lord as Man was a most perfect possessor of prudence Prudence and the partes therof which might any way be fit either for the ordering of his owne actions or for the direction and gouerment of others So that by vvhat vve haue seene he might vvell be naturally the Maister and guide of al mankind which yet will more cleerly appeare by the Power and Sanctity of that pretious Soule The Power and Sanctity of the Soule of Christ our Lord is considered wherby we may also the better see his excessiue Loue. CHAP. 3. BESIDES the Consideration of the deuine Wisedome and knowledge of Christ our Lord I should deserue no excuse if vvhen there is question of his infinite Loue to vs I should not also touch vpon the Power and the Sanctity of his soule Which if they be seriously considered vvill greatly serue though I meane but euen to touch and go to set forth his dignity in himselfe and consequently it vvill put a more expresse and perfect stampe of value vpon his infinitely deere tender loue to vs. For (a) How euery seuerall excellency in Christ our Lord doth iustly rayse the valew of his loue the more he knowes and the more continually he cares and the more wisedome he enioyes and
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
enriched his Church Whose faith he hath strengthned whose hope he hath reuiued whose charity he hath inflamed whose holy feare and reuerence he hath rooted deeply by meanes therof Instructing vs as Father Salmeron doth excellently obserue concerning the B. Trinity (f) The Father the Sonne the holy Ghost in the voyce in the sonne the cloud Concerning the Incarnation of Christ our Lord his Doctrine Preaching by the addresse which we receiue of harkening to him His pasion and death by the excesse which he was to fulfill in Ierusalem The certainty of his Resurrection and glory and consequently of our owne The abrogation of the old law through the establishmeÌ„t of the new by the Fathers voyce concerning the sonne It taught them of Lymbus from whence the soule of Moyses came It taught the Terrestriall Paradise where Elias is belceued to repose It taught the militant Church in the person of the three B. Apostles But let vs as I was saying giue eare to Christ our Lord whose doctrine his heauenly Father and ours hath assigned vs to For he it is who will teach vs both these and all things else which it may any way import vs to vnderstand as I will instantly beginne to shew Of the vnspeakeable loue which our Lord Iesus shewed by deliueriug to vs his admirable Doctrine and of the manner which he held in teaching vs. CHAP. 32. OVR Lord Iesus came into the world for three maine reasons amongst aboue many others To teach vs the way to heauen by his diuine Doctrine and to guide vs by his admirable example and to redeeme vs by his most pretious bloud But as we should be nothing the better for knowing the way to any place Ser. de Ascen Dom. 4. if still we were deteyned in some prison so neither as S. Bernard saith should we be the better for knowing our iorneyes end if withall we knew not the way which leadeth thither It pleased therfore our Lord Iesus to declare his doctrine to the world And because according to Aristotle Doctio Disciplina are Relatiues for as much as he is become our Doctour we are already made his Disciples if we will The same Aristotle was Alexanders Maister and his Father Philip King of Macedon did esteeme it for no small part of his owne happines that his sonne was borne in a time when he might be instructed by so worthy a person And yet that worthy person was a mortall wicked man whose vnderstanding though very eminent was yet full of errour in many things and his will more full of disorder Wheras this diuine (a) The difference of Christ our Lord from other Doctours Doctour of ours was both truth and sanctity it selfe A Doctour he was and that most excelleÌ„t and complete without euer hauing bene any mans Disciple Such others as haue neuer bene Disciples doe no more vse to proue good Doctours then men proue good Captaines who haue neuer bene souldiers or good superiours who haue neuer bene subiects I deny not but some haue bene good Doctours who neuer were the disciples of men as for example Moyses and the other Prophets But besides that all they were instructed by the wisedom of God in supernatuall manner yet neither did they teach in such perfection as may be compararable by innumerable degrees to this of our diuine Doctour Nor yet did they giue the hand together with the torch nor the wood together with the coale of fire nor strength to execute together with the direction of what men were to doe Wheras (b) The great efficacy which only belongs to the Doctrine of Christ our Lord. Christ our Lord together with those diuine words of his own sacred mouth did make such a high way by the sweete gratious breath of his holy spirit into the harts of such as heard them though yet sometymes they were deafe inough as made then receiue them and lay them vp in conformity therof to performe things in a short tyme of extreme difficulty and contradiction to sense with excessiue gust How infinitely therefore are vve obliged to this Lord of ours vvho vvas designed from all eternity and did accept that himselfe vvould (c) An vnspeakeable mercy that Christ our Lord would teach vs by him selfe teach vs by himselfe For there vvas no remedy his loue could not be satisfied vvith doing lesse then all Nor vvould he permit that any Doctour vvho vvas lesse then his very selfe should haue the chiefe instructing (d) We are also taught by ment but that is only as by the instruments of God of our soules Novv his Doctrine being his must needs be infallible because he is God And to the end that it might not be too high or hard for our capacities he resolued as it vvere to tame that diuinity of his and to take it and tye it vp in the nets and toyles of flesh and bloud And so being incarnate he vouchsafed to conuerse amongst vs and as it vvere to vvatch his tymes those mollis fandi tempora vvherin vve might be likeliest to receiue that treasure of diuÃne knowledge vvhich had power to remoue our grosse ignorance They vvho trauaile vp and dovvne the vvorld knovv by experience hovv glad they vse to be if vvandring out of the vvay they meete some man vvho sets them right though it be but tovvards a nights lodging in a poore Inne vvhich sometymes is incomodious inough And such as giue themselues to study and are either ignorant of vvhat they vvould fayne vnderstand or perplexed othervvise through any difficulty vvhich may occurre are vvont to accompany and attend vvith extraordinary reuerence and affection those teachers vnder vvhome they vvere brought vp and by vvhose meanes they acquired knovvledge Which (e) They are very vngratefull who perfourme not great respects to such as haue been theyr teachers kind of gratitude is so deeply rooted in the mindes of such as are ingenuous that as long as they liue they retaine the memory of that benefit and there is no strangenes or small vnkindnes vvhich can blot it out We must therefore beseech our Lord IESVS to make vs thankefull to his diuine Maiesty in a high degree for his vouchsafing to exercise the office of a teacher ouer vs. Not through the care he hath to keepe vs only from vvandring betvvene tovvne tovvne or to vvorke through the difficulties of humaine knovvledge vvhich vnlesse it be vvell vsed is better left then had Nor only doth he this for some certaine tyme vvherin a course of study may be ended but he teacheth vs spirituall things vvhich are to be as long loued as eternity it selfe and insteed of discharging by any later negligence of his our former obligations to loue and serue him for it he is euer calling vpon vs vvith nevv fauours And insteed of absenting himselfe from vs his essence povver and his grace is present to our soules yea so present and especially to such as serue him
grace to vvant this soueraigne meanes wherby to protest the faithfull and incommunicable homage vvhich she ovves to him For (c) The Oblation of Sacrifice is the highest act of religion a Sacrifice is a worship of Latria and the supreme act of religion wherby through the oblation and externall mutation of some corpor all thing according to the particular rites and sacred ceremonies which are perfourmed by persons who are peculiarly deputed for that purpose and are called Priests the excellency of the diuine Maiesty and the supreme Dominion which it hath ouer the life and death of all the creatures is acknowledged and protested Now therfore Christ our Lord vvould not depriue vs of this blessing But as vvith great aduātage to vs he had already changed the Circumcisiō of the old law into Baptisme so also was the diuine Goodnes pleased to make all those figuratiue Sacrifices of the same old lavv yeild vp their possession in the nevv and giue place to this one other most excellent Sacrifice of his ovvne most pretious body and bloud The Sacrifices of the old lavv vvere bloudy Num. 1. 3. and they vvere offred by that braunch of the Tribe of Leui which descended from Aron But yet Melchisedech also vvas a Priest and that long before Gen. 14. Psal 109. and he offred an vnbloudy Sacrifice and it consisted of bread wine Novv Christ our Lord vvho is our true high Priest did summe vp all the Sacrifices of both those kindes into his ovvne sacred selfe For as those former bloudy Sacrifices did prefigure the Sacrifice of his pretious life vpon the Crosse so that other of bread and vvine did prefigure the Sacrifice of the holy Masse And so truely and properly is this last a Sacrifice and so truly vvas he the Priest vvho offered it first in this last supper of his and so truly did he ordaine his Apostles to do the like by those vvords Hocfacite in meam commemorationem Doe this in commemoration of me Luc. 22. in their persons all those others also of succeding ages vvere appointed to doe it vvho should in like manner be ordayned by them that vnlesse this truth be sincerly and religiously granted vve shall neuer be able to verify those vvords of the holy Ghost vvherby it vvas prophesied thus by Dauid Psal 109. concerning Christ our Lord and so vnderstood by the holy Fathers of the Church as vve shall shortly see Tues sacerdos in aeternum secundum ordinem Melchisedech Thou art a Priest for euer after the order of Melchisedech But a true and lawfull Priest he is after the order of Melchisedech and a Priest he is to be till the end of the vvorld And although he be raigning still in heauen yet continually doth he exercise this office of his by his deputies vvho are true Catholicke Priests And principally it is he vvho offereth vp his ovvne body and bloud together vvith them he being the only true Originall Priest and these other though properly truly Priests yet being but partakers of his Povver Order by his grace Novv this body and bloud of our Lord IESVS vvho is the one only Sacrifice and vvho vvas offered vp in a bloudy māner vpon the Crosse is novv offered dayly in an vnbloudy manner vpon our Altars Conteyning (d) The sacrifice of the Masse is both Propitiatory Impetratory and of thanksgiuing doth benefit both the quick dead Mala. ◠in it selfe all sufficiency and aboundance of grace both for the liuing and dead for the propitiation of sinne and the paines vvhich follovv it the thanksgiuing for benefits already receiued the impetration of graces to be heereafter graunted by Almighty God And this is that Sacrifice wherof Malachy did so cleerly prophesy vvhen reprouing the Sacrifices of the old lavv he spake thus as in the tyme of the lavv of grace Ab ortu solis vsque ad occasum magnum est nomen meum in gentibus c. From the rysing of the sunne to the going downe therof great is my name among the gentiles And in euery place there is sacrificing and there is offered to my name a cleane oblation because my name is great among the Gentills sayth the Lord of Hosts Of the iudgemēt which the holy Fathers of the Church haue alwayes made of this holy Sacrifice and B. Sacrament and the great veneration which they had them in and the motiues whereby we may be induced to do the like CHAP. 47. VVELL might the Prophet say that this Sacrifice vvas pure and cleane since it is no lesse then God himselfe though not as God but man And the cheife Priest also is God vvho dayly offereth vp the same together vvith the subordinate Priest And although no Quire of Angells can speake as magnificently of it as the thing deserues yet the Fathers of the Church haue done theyr best to acknovvledge and admire it And for the comfort of my reader I vvill cite him a fevv of the many passages vvhich are found in them Who is more the Priest of God sayth (a) Cypr. l. 2. Ep. 3. S. Cyprian then our Lord Iesus Christ who offered a Sacrifice to God the Father he offered that which Melchisedech offered towit bread and wine that is to say his owne body and bloud When we offer this Sacrifice sayth (b) Cyril Hierosol one of the fathers of the first Councell of Nice in Catech. mist 5. Saint Cyrill we afterwards make mention of the dead We erect not Altars to Martyrs saith (c) August de ciuit Dei l. 22. c. 10. Idem Confes l. 9. c. 13. S. Augustine but we offer Sacrifice to him alone who is the God both of them and vs. This S. Augustine saith and he relateth els vvhere of his mother That when she was dying she desired him to remember her at the Altar where she was wont to be present euery day and from whence she knew that holy Sacrifice (d) The body of our Lord. to be dispensed wherby the hand wryting was blotted out which was contrary to vs. Our flesh sayth (e) Tertul. l. deresurrect carnit cap. 8. Tertullian doth secd vpon the body and bloud of Christ that the soule also may be made fat with God The bread which our Lord gaue to his Disciples as (f) Cypr. de coena Domini S. Cyprian saith of the Reall Presence being changed not in shew but in substance by the omnipotency of the word was made flesh That as in the person of Christ the humanity was seene and the diuinity lay hid so hath the diuine essence vnspeakeably powred it selfe into this inuisible Sacrament We doe rightly beleeue sayth (g) Gregor Nyssen in oratione catechistica cap. 37. S. Gregory of Nisse that bread being sanctified by the word of God is transmuted into the body of the word of God We know and haue it for most assured sayth (h) Cyril Ierosol cathe Myst. 4. S. Cyrill Bishop of
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
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
and fructifying Riuer and that of the other Saints as of inferiour streames So as all of theÌ„ deriue whatsoeuer good they haue from Christ our Lord. But as for others multae filiae congregauerÌ„t diuitias tu verò supergressa es vniuersas The Angells and Saints are all of them full of merits and celestiall graces but the Mother of our Lord God outstrips them all The prayses of the Blessed Virgin prosecuted by a testimony of S. Gregory and an entrance is made into the consideration of her diuine Vertuâ—s and first of her admirable Faith and Hope CHAP. 88. LET vs consider (a) Our B. Lady is far superiour to al Saints in Sanctity Greg. in 1. Reg. 1. what the holy S. Gregory saith to this purpose Potest Montis nomine Beatissima semper Virgo Maria Dei genitrix designari c. The euer most B. Virgin Mary the mother of God may be designed by the name of a Mountaine For a Mountain she was by the dignity of her election which exceeded all the altitude of any elected creature Was not Mary saith he a sublime Mountaine who to the end that she might arriue to conceaue the eternall Word did erect or rayse the high top of her merits euen vnto the Throne of the Deity aboue all the Quires of Angells For of the most superexcellent Dignity of this Mountaine Esay by way of Prophesy doth say In the latter dayes there shall be prepared in the top of the Mountaines the Mountaine of the house of our Lord. For this was a Mountaine in the top of the Mountaines because the altitude of Mary did shine aboue all Saints This I say Beda l. 2. Histor c. 2. is alleadged by the holy S. Gregory the great who by S. Bede is most worthily called the Apostle (b) A due prayse of S. Gregory of our Country whose high estimation deuotion to the sacred Virgin it is all reasoÌ„ that we should imbrace imitate Since he was the man vnder God who with most tender care and loue of him and vs coÌ„uerted vs in the person of our Progenitours from Paganisme to the faith of the Sonne of this Virgin And we may well reioyce in hauing such a Father and guide to follow whome we may iustly esteeme to haue bene one of the greatest Saints in the whole Church of God since the Apostles And perhaps it would trouble a man to set such another by him in all respects both for the great nobility of his birth the highest dignity of his calling the clarity of his wit the eminency of his learning his high contemplation in prayer his admirable humility his ardent charity imbracing with his loue such barbarous Nations so farre of and cherishing neere at hand all kind of Pilgrimes and poore people And lastly his most sweet inuincible patience and ioy in the midst of so many great calamities and Crosses as were imposed vpon him by wicked Princes by plagues by famine and by warre lastly by a body al loadeÌ„ with diseases and paines throughout all the course of his life togeather with a soule which was deeply wounded for all the sinnes of the world In so much as the holy Church hath all reason to say as she doth thus (c) Rom. Bren. infesto S. Greg. of him Admirabilia sunt quae dixit fecit scripsit decreuit praesertim infirma semper aegra valetudine It is an admirable thing to consider the things which he said which he did which he wrote and which he decreed especially being euer subiect to a body which was so weake and sickly But to returne and therby to clyme towards this Mountaine of ours wherby this Saint vnderstands our B. Lady it must first be graunted that the vertues are so neere of Kinne to one another as that it must breed no wonder if somewhat which I shall range vnder some one might be also reduced to some other head But this perpetuall Virgin was a very Mappa mundi (d) The B. Virgin is the very Mappe of vertues of the world of them all And as in a Mappe of the world the seuerall kingdomes therof are set out in seuerall colours that they may be discerned with greater ease so is it in the case of her diuine vertues as will be seene in our ponderation therof I will only with reuerence and admiration point out the chiefe that so by them we may contemplate the rest and these shall be her Faith Hope and Charity her Humility Purity and which includeth both Obedience PatieÌ„ce her most intiere Conformity to the will of God In all which vertues and in all the rest we belieue her to haue beene as perfect as S. Ambrose doth insinuate when he saith thus of her Lib. 2. de Virginitate Non tam vestigia pedis c. She seemed to grow in the degrees of vertue more swiftly then euen she could moue her feete For as much as (e) Her inexplicable Faith concerned her Faith she beleeued that supreme mystery of the B. Trinity which lay so hidden in the law of nature and was so little knowne euen in the tyme of the written law She had formerly vnderstood therof in the holy Scriptures but now vpon the words of the Angell she cleerly imbraced with her belefe the person of the Father from whome the Sonne was to be sent the person of the Sonne whome she was to conceaue the person of the holy Ghost who was to worke that high mystery in her Not only did she expresly belieue the mystery of the IncarnatioÌ„ of the Sonne of God which till that tyme had bene but shadowed vnder types and figures but she beleeued that in coÌ„teauing him herselfe should both continue a Virgin and yet be a mother Al this more theÌ„ this she beleeued that before the Ghospel was receaued before her Sonne was borne into the world and much more before he had wrought any miracles without demaÌ„ding any signe or proofe therof Iud. 6. Luc. 8. as Gedeon Zacharias had done And she beleeued theÌ„ with a far-far greater certainty and clarity of Faith then any thing had euer bene beleeued before Her Faith in fine was so great as that she was canonized for it by the holy Ghost in the mouth of S. Elizabeth And S. Augustine was not affraid to say Aug. de S. Virg. principio that although to be chosen for the mother of God was a kind of infinite felicity and fauour yet it (f) Our B. Lady was more happy in her great Faith theÌ„ in being the mother of God S. Tho. 3. p. q. 27. art 4. ad 2. was a greater to haue bin inriched by the hand of God with such a cleere and liuely Faith For by vertue of this Faith she also continued to belieue and to assist at the Passion of her Sonne our Lord when his owne people crucified him and when his Apostles were fled away as hath bene seene
reuiue and rayse it vp to receaue that homage without asking him so much as leaue O pretious sweet Humanity of Christ our Lord And (g) We at worthy of all punihment if wee become not euen the slaues of the Humanity of Christ our Lord. how shall we who know that thou wert humaned for vs and diddest not only descend to be a man but diddest degrade thy selfe further downe for the loue of vs how I say shall we sufficiently admire and loue thy Beauty which was so great euen in their externall eyes who had not withall the internall eyes of Faith wherwith thou hast enriched our soules And where shall we finde either holes or hills to hide or couer vs from thy wrath if we who are Christiās doe not by the eternall obsequiousnes of our harrs outstrip those obstinate but yet withall inconstant Iewes Obstinate in their mindes when they were grown to malice but inconstāt in mantayning those tender thoughts which they excellētly did sometymes oblige them to in the performance of so many Soueraigne signes of honour The admirable visible grace and disposition of the person of Christ our Lord is further declared CHAP. 6. VVHAT heauen on earth could euer make a man so happy as to haue beheld this sacred persō of our Lord Iesus in any of those postures which are described by the hand of the holy Ghost in holy scripture To haue (a) The incomparable grace of Christ our Lord in all his actions seen that god made mā as he was walking before the front of the Tēple whē his hart the while like a true Incensary was spending it selfe into the perfume of prayers which ascended before the Altar of the diuine mercy euen then and euen for them who there went in and out contemning and maligning him in the highest degree Mar. 11. Ioan. 20. To haue seene him walking and bestowing those deere limmes of his vpon those sands Mattb. 4. with incredible grace loue neere to that lake or sea of Galilea as if it had looked but like a kind of recreation when his enamoured soule was yet the while negotiating with his eternall Father Ibid. the vocation of his Apostles and by them the saluation of the whole world To haue seene him Luc. 4.16 c. standing vpon his sacred feet whilst with reuerence he would be reading in the Synagogue and then sitting downe afterwards when he would take vpon him the office of a teacher Ibid. 20. so pointing vs out by any little motion of his to the purity and perfection of euery action Marc. 3. To haue seene him sitting in the mindst of a roome with all that admiring multitude round about him whilst newes was brought him of the approach of his all-immaculate mother and of his kindred and domesticke friends who had reason to thinke euery minute to be a world of ages till their eies might be restored to that seate and Center of all ioy And he the while with diuine sweetnes and modesty looking round about him and lending a particular eye of mercy to euery soule there present and extending his liberall hand with an incomparable sweet noble grace did with his sacred mouth and with such a hart of loue as God alone is able to vnderstand adopt both them and all the world into his neerest deerest kindred vpon condition that they would do his Fathers will which was the only meanes to make them happy To (b) The infinite gratious goodnes of Christ our Lord. haue seene that sonne of God whose face is the delight and glory of all the Angells in heauen and at whose sacred feete they fall adoring with so profound reuerence deueste himselfe first of his vpper garment with such louely grace Ioan. 13.4 c. and gird the Towell about his virginall loynes with such modesty and fill the vessell full of water by the labour of his owne delicate armes with such alacrity and cast himselfe with such bottomelesse humility charity vpon those knees to which all the knees of heauen and earth were obliged to bow and from which the eternall Father was only to haue expected such an homage at the feete and for the comfort and conuersion of that diuell Iudas Yea and to wipe those very feete when he had washed them first and that perhaps with the teares of his owne sacred eyes to see if yet it might be possible to soften the hart of that Tygar who was able to defile such a beauty and to detest such a goodnes and who in despight of that prodigious mercy would needs be running post to hell by cōmiting that abhominable treachery They say the vale discouers the hill the darke shadow of a picture sets off the body which there is drawen Neuer was there such a peece of chiaro oscuro such a beautifull body as that of Christ our Lord neuer vvas there such a blacke shadovv as that vvretched man whome for the infamy of his crime I vvil forget to name But in fine to haue seene through the vvhole course of his life that holy Humanity sometymes svveating vvith excesse of labour some tymes grovvne pale vvith the rage of hungar some tymes pulled and vvracked seuerall vvayes at once by importunities sometymes pressed and as it were packed vp into lesse roome then his owne dimensions did require by crowdes of people and (c) Christ our Lord maintayned his grace and Beauty notwithstāding all the incōmodities to which he was put euer to haue beheld in his very face such an altitude of peacefull piety and such a depth of humility and such an vnlimitted and endlesse extent of Charity by remouing all diseases and dangers both of body and soule as heereafter (d) In the discourse vpon his Miracles will be shewed more at large for a man I say to haue had the sight of such an obiect would be sure I think to haue freed him from euer longing after any other Of Titus it was said that he was deliciae humani generis the very ioy and comfort of the world for the sweet receptiō which he vouchsafed to make to all commers Of Iulius Caesar it is recorded that being threatned with danger of a mutiny and defection in his army he spake to his souldiers this one only word Quirites (e) That word did shew that he held them no longer for souldiers of his but only as citizens of Rome and that thought pierced theyr harts with sorrow shame wtih such circumstances of grace and wisedome as that he drew al their hartes towards him at an instant It is true and it was much and there haue not beene many Caesars in the world But yet away with Caesar a way with Titus they were but durt and filth when they were at the best and now like damned spirits their soules are cursing God in hell And what Titus or Caesar dares shew himselfe when once there is question of grace and wisedome in presence
saith that vpon the very first (p) The soueraigne power which the aspect of Christ our Lord had ouer creatures aspect it was able to draw all such as lookt vpon it For if there be such vertue in a lodestone or a peece of amber as that it can draw to it rings of iron and straw how much more easely saith this Saint could the Lord of all the creatures draw to himselfe whom he was pleased to call So delighfull therfore and soe plentifull was this beauty and dignity of our Lord IESVS And if it appeared powerfull in their eyes at the first when they beheld it but by startes and glances much (q) The felicity of thē who might behold the person of Christ our Lord at pleasur Bernard serm 20. in Cant. more would it doe so afterward in the sight of his Apostles Disciples who had liberty and commodity to feed their senses at large vpon that sacred obiect In contemplation of this beauty in great part it was that they gaue themselues away to him without resuming themselues any more husbands forsaking theyr wiues and children their parents rich men their whole estates poore men the very instruments of their profession that they might haue the honour happines to follow him And to such excesse they grew therin that they did not endure Matth. 16. to heare so much as any speach euen of the Passion it selfe of our Lord though by it their redemption were to be wrought For till the Holy Ghost was sent to inhabite their soules after his Ascension they could (r) The vnspeakeable gust which the Apostles had to be euer looking vpō Christ our Lord. not content themselues to weane the outward man from the gust and ioy of looking on him But though our Lord were pleased to nourish their faith and withall to teach them how to find him reigning in their hartes by with drawing his corporall presence frō their eyes yet that loue was iust and due which they bore to him whome God had giuen to be Incarnate for a spouse to the Church and to all elected soules so to draw their hartes more powerfully by that sacred sight of his person then formerly they had beene withdrawne by vnlawfull pleasures Nay euen great part of our felicity in heauen is to consist in our behoulding the most sweete presence of the humanity of our blessed Sauiour and to enioy his embracemēts and yet the forme of his diuine face shall be the very same which in this life it was For (s) The figure of the persō of our Lord Iesus was so excellent as that neither doth glory now make it other thē it was neither did passibility mortality disgrace it Matth. 17.3 part q. 45. art 1. ad 1. so we find that after his Resurrection he continued to be knovvne by his former countenance and so he was also before that in his Transiguration as S. Hierome notes S. Thomas teacheth That his forme was not changed into another but onely that there was an addition of such splendour as belonged to a glorified body As on the other side the Passibility and Mortality which for our good he would haue it subiect to did no way depriue it both of perfect most powerfull beauty How this infinite God and super excellent Man our Lord Iesus Christ did with incomparable loue cast his eye of mercy vpon mankind CHAP. 8. VVE haue now beheld with the eye of our Consideration being illuminated by the light of Faith the incomparable excellēcy of the person of Christ our Lord and Sauiour consisting of his Diuinity as God and of his most holy soule and most beautifull and pretious flesh and bloud as Man And now this eternall God this second person of the euer Blessed Trinity the consubstantiall sonne of the eternall Father Colos 2. In whome the treasures of knowledge and wisedome were laid vp and in whome and by whome Ioan. 1. for whome were created all things and without him was made nothing that was made This God I say with being all that I haue already expressed being infinitely more then we know yea and more then we can explicitely beleeue did not onely cast the eye of his compassion vpon the misery of man but he resolued to reach out his helping hād towards the redresse therof He had created the world and made this man the Lord of it and (a) The indowments of Adam at his first creation indued him in the person of Adam with many precious guifts wherof some were supernaturall as Originall Iustice Grace and a kind of Immortallity with many others and some were incident as Connaturall to that condition wherof he was made namely an Vnderstanding freewill wherwith he was to know and loue Apoc. 2. first last the Creatour and Center of vs all A precept of Obedience was giuen to this forefather of ours to abstaine from tasting of the forbidden fruite which he contemning vpon his wiues pernicious counsell did (b) Vpon the first sinne of Adam his supernaturall guifts were destroyed his naturall guyfts decayed forfaite out right those supernaturall guiftes and deserued that those others which were but naturall should be so wounded and weakned as vve find them to be by sad experience This trying of conclusions cost him deere for instantly the vvhole state of his house vvas changed and his Passions vvhich vvere meant to be but inferiour officers became the Lords of that Reason vvhich vvas appointed to gouerne both them and him Novv then it is no meruaile if vvhen this vvas done he played the vnthrift and laid so many debtes and rent-charges vpon his land that in some sense a man may say The profits do scarce quitt the cost For (c) How soone the roote of sinne did beare aboundāce of bitter fruyte hence grevv that pride that enuy and malice vvhich being rooted in the hart did fructify so shortly after in the hand of the accursed Cain and in a vvord that consummation of all impiety grevv from thence vvhich did prouoke and dravv vvith a kind of violence a resolution from Almighty God to drovvne the vvhole vvorld except eight persons But euē those fevv vvere inough to make the rest of mankind the heires of their corrupted nature And so vve see vvhat a vvorld vve haue of this vvherin vve liue What a coyle doth this (d) The disorder of the Irascible Concupiscible is the ground out of which almost all our sinnes do grow Irascible and Concupiscible keepe in our bodies and soules vvhen either vve desire that for our selues through an inordinate loue of our selues vvhich lookes vpon vs vvith a face of ioy or pleasure or vvhen we vvould inflict matter of greefe or paine vpon others through an inordinate auersion from them The very schooles of sinne haue beene sett open in the vvorld and revvards haue bene propounded for such as haue excelled therin The Prouinces of the earth haue often
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
restrayning it according to those conditions to which then he vouchsafed to let himselfe be subiect But howsoeuer he vvas no sooner deliuered from thence theÌ„ the poore (c) How our Lord as soone as he was borne did intertaine those poore she pheardes with a Quire of Angells Sheephards were wooed by him to receaue the token of his impatient and incomparable loue And according to that infinite finite wisedome which became his God head which is woÌ„t to gouerne inferiour Creatures by such as are superiour to them as also because he would both call and free those poore men at once from errour he disdayned not to sollicit them by a quire of Angells that the glory of so supernaturall and sublime a visioÌ„ might auert them from all that vvant of faith vvhich his poore appearance might easily haue inclined them to Those Angells proclaymed did appropriate as it vvere (d) All glory is due to God All glory to God vvhich vvas so highly and truly due to him per excellentiam for the admirable humility and charity vvhich vvas expressed by him in this act vvithall they published and applyed all good and peace to men But yet to men not so farre forth as they might only chance to be mighty or witty or noble or wealthy or learned And much lesse to such as should be giuen to repine or who should be so abounding and regorging with sensuall pleasures all which are the sadd effects of selfe loue and very contrary to the loue of our Lord Iesus in whome alone originally true peace is found but only it was bequeathed to men of a good will The (e) The condition of a will which is truly good property of which true good wil is to put euery thing in his due place And what place can deserue that the loue of our hartes should be lodged in it by vs but that deuine person of our only Lord and Sauiour Iesus Christ Who in this little space of one night hath knit vp such a world of testimonies of his deere loue to vs and who did cast himselfe downe from the top of glory to the bottome of misery that so he might carry vs vp to the place from whence himselfe was come And who though he were not only the true owner but the sole Creatour of the whole world and who created it no otherwise then by filling it with his very selfe was yet content to see his owne sacred humanity so depriued turned out of all as that no place should be emptye for the receauing of him Quia non â—rat ei locus in diuersorio but only such a one as might seeme rather to haue bene taken from beasts then giuen by men These (f) How rich those poore shepheards were mada at an instant Sheepheards indeed were of that good will which was so commended by the Angells and as such they carried not only peace from that sight of Christ our Lord and his blessed mother but ioy also And that no ordinary but an excessiue ioy which is another guift of the holy Ghost and a meere and mighty effect of his diuine loue To the participation wherof together with a most entire thanksgiuing the holy Catholike Church inuiteth all her faithfull Children in these most glorious and magnificent words vpon the day of this great Festiuity The Preface of the Masse vpon Christmasse day in the Preface of the most holy Sacrifice of the Masse Verè dignum instum est aequum salutare nos tibi semper vbique gratias agere Domine sancte pater Omnipotens aeterne deus Quia per incarnati verbi mysterium noua mentis nostrae oculis lux tuae clariatis infulsit vt dum visibiliter Deum cognoscimus per hunc in inuisibilium amorem rapiamur Et ideo cum Angelis Archangelis cum Thronis Dominationibus cumqueue omni miliâ—ia caelestis exercitus hymnum gloriae tuae canimus sine siue dicentes Sanctus Sanctus Sanctus Dominus Deus Sabaoth Pleni sunt caeli terra gloria tua Hosanna in excelsis Benedictus qui venit in nomine Dommi Hosanna in excelsis It is reason that we giue thee eternall thankes O holy Lord O omniporent Father and eternall God in regard that by the mistery of the Incarnate Word a new light of thy splendour hath cleered vp the eyes of our minde That so whilst we are growne to know God after a visible manner we may be vehemently carried vp to the loue of inuisible things And therfore together with the Angells and Archangells with the Thrones and Dominations with all those Squadrons of that Celestiall Army we sing out this Himne of glory saying to thee without end Holy Holy Holy Lord God of Saboath the heaueÌ„s earth are ful of thy glory HosaÌ„ana in the highest Blessed be he who cometh in the name of our Lord Hosanna in the highest Thus I say doth our holy mother the Church exhort vs to reioyce and giue thankes to God for his great mercy in this diuine mistery and he is no true sonne of that mother who will not hearken to her voyce Of the vnspeakeable loue which our Lord Iesus expressed to vs in his Circumcision CHAP. 13. Luc. 2. BVT as for the loue which our Lord did shew to those poore Sheephards some ignorant carnall person may chaunce to say or at least to thinke That it did not cost him much Let such a one therfore looke vpon his painefull and shamefull Circumcision Paynefull and shamefull to him but of vnspeakeable loue and benefit to vs. And first for as much as concernes the paine it deserues to be considered that the soule and body of Christ of our Lord had another manner of vnderstanding (a) The soule and body of our B. Lord were more sensible of shame and payne theÌ„ any other and delicate feeling then any other Creature hath euer bene acquainted with Exod. 4. Num. 5. D. Aug. lib. 2. de gratia Christ cap. 31. Which circumstance I will not heere dilate because when afterward I shall haue reason to speak of his sacred passion the occasion will be fayrely offered But the paine must needs be excessiue to haue a part of the body so cut of by a violent hand and that not with a kinfe or any such sharpe instrument which would haue brought it to a speedy end but according to the custome with a stone which was ground into a blunt kind of edge and which must needs prolonge the torment of the patient Yet (b) Dishonour to a noble hart is far more insufferable then payne paine how great soeuer is but a toy to a generous minde in respect of reproach and shame And amongst all degrees of shame that is farre the greatest which implyeth the party to haue deserued it and that in the deepest kind Now as when there is question of pride the affectation and desire to haue a fame of sanctity is farre superiour
Apostle saith He who is circumcised is bound therby to fulfill the Law And lastly Gal. 5. when he who was the eternal spring the ouerflowing riuer and the bottomlesse sea of all sanctity would be contented for our good for the drawing vs by his example to loue paine and shame to be accounted by men for a creature as odious and abhominable in the sight of God as all sinners are But he thought not all this too much so that he might free vs from the curse of that law to which he would be subiect Aduising and enabling vs heerby to Circumcise (l) The corporall Circumcision of Christ our Lord must teach vs how to circumcise our affections the inordinate affections of our harts which are as so many veynes wherby the bloud of lise is drawne from that true loue which is only due to such a Lord as this who is all made of loue Now because this miserable race of men would not fully correspond with that incomparable Charity of Christ our Lord it was so much the more agreable to the iustice of God the Father to acknowledge and revvard this vnspeakable humility of his sonne And therfore then it vvas that he stampt vpō him the name of Iesus Luc. 2. Phillip 2. to which the knees of all Creatures should be obliged to bow Celestiall vvhose charity he had surpassed terrestriall vvhose life he had instructed and Infernall vvhose pride he had confounded And heerby vve further see hovv infinitely are vve bound to this Lord for this strange loue of his vvho vvhen there should be question of taking such aname as might be proper to him laid all such names aside as might expresse the Maiesty of himselfe and made only choyce of that name of Iesus vvhich might declare his Soueraigne mercy to vs. The Names vvhich grovve from God are farre vnlike to those which are imposed by men for these latter are meere extrinsecall denominations and the former are a most exact abridgement and mappe of those Conditions which grow within So that together vvith this name our Lord Iesus vvas sublimed to the office and dignity of a perfect Sauiour of mankind Not (m) What an yowor thy and weake Sauiour Christ our Lord is made by the Sectaries such a Sauiour as the Sectaries of our age are miserably vvont to make him vvho conceaue him to haue only saued our soules from Hell vvhich is but a punishment of sinne as vvas sayd before and vvhich punishment hovv great soeuer it be is incomparably of lesse deformity and true misery and vvere farre rather to be accepted and chosen then the least sinne it selfe vvhich can be committed but such a one as doth chiefly saue our soules from the guylt of sinne and that by sanctifiyng vs indeed vvith his inherent grace and not by a kind of Iustice vvhich only is imputed to vs vvhilst the vvhyle indeed it is none of ours Through the vvāt vvherof the leaprousy of our soules should not be cleansed and cured but only they should be couered and clad as those deceauedmen conceaue with the robe of his innocency Our Lord giue them light to see and knovv hovv deeply dangerously they deceaue themselues and dishonour him vnder the pretence of piety and peruerse and counterfaite humility vvhilst they make him but such a Sauiour as this Audi Piliacap 88. This errour as Doctour Auila saith proceedeth from the want of knowing the loue which Iesus Christ doth beare to such as are in the state of grace whome his bowells of mercy would not permit that whilst himselfe was iust full of all good things he should say to such as he instifyed Content your selues with this That I abound with these good things and esteeme them for your owne in regard that they are in me although in your selues you remaine vniust impure and naked There is no head which would hold such language as this to his liuing members nor one spouse to another if he should deerly loue her And much lesse will that Celestiall spouse say so who is giuen for a patterne to the spouses of this world that so after his resemblance they may treate and loue their fellow spouses You mensaith S. Paule loue your wiues as Christ loued his Church who gaue himselfe ouer for it to sanctify it and to clense it by baptisme and by the word of life If then he sanctify and wash and clense it and that with his owne bloud which is the thing that giueth power to the Sacramēts to cleanse soules by his grace which they impart how can that soule remaine vniust and silthy which is washed and cleansed by a thing which is of so extreme efficacy And in conformity of that which was affirmed before the same Doctour Auila doth also cleerly shew afterward that such opinions as that do no way serue (n) The doctrine of imputatiue Iustice is expresly impugned by holy scripture and doth impeach the honour of Christ our Lord. either towards the verifying of the Scriptures or for the doing of Iesus Christ sufficient honour For since the payne sayth he which is due to sinne is a lesse euill to any man then the guilt of the same sinne and the iniustice and deformity which is caused therby it cannot be said that Christ our Lord doth saue his people from their sinnes if by his merits he only obtaine that they may not be imputed to them for their punishment vnlesse first he should take the guilt away by the guift of grace Nor yet that he obtayneth purity and piety for men vnlesse by detesting sinne they may keepe the law of God This is the iugdement of Doctour Auila We (o) The catholik Doctrine concerning this poynt therfore according to that truth which is reuealed by Almighty God and propounded to vs to be beleeued by the holy Catholike Church his imaculate Spouse doe cōfesse to the ioy and triumph of our hartes with irreuocable vowes of the highest gratitude that we can conceaue for such an infinite benefit not only that he is the Sauiour of vs from hell which is but as an effect but from sinne also it selfe which is the iust cause therof And not only so but that he saues vs further also from the want of all those helpes graces of the holy Ghost which are conueniēt vt sine timore Luc. 1. de manibus inimicorum nostrorum liberati seruiamus illi in sanctitate institia coram ipso omnibus diebus vitae nostrae That being deliuered from the hands of our enemyes we may serue him without feare in holynes iustice before him all the dayes of our life At the end of which dayes we shall be admitted to see a day in heauen which hath no end and which admits no cloud This I say is to be the precious fruyte of this morning sacrifice of his Circumcision to put vs into a state which can admit no euening For as S. Augustine sayth dies
and miseries which they found that our Lord had bene pleased to indure for thē and which the world doth so deepely feare and so deadly hate The Tyrant in the meane tyme Vide Maldonat in c. 2. Matt. after some six or seauen yeares expired according to the most probable opinion not disposing himself to lay downe that batbatous bloody minde wherby like a wolse he persecuted the lamb of God Ioan. 1. who taketh away the sinnes of the world and vvho during all that bitter banishment of his did neuer cease to vvooe him by inspirations and many other meanes to depart frō his dānable designe came at last to his due deserued end For he fel into the cōpasse of those impenitēt sinners vvhich S. Augustine discribeth thus after his diuine manner Confes l. 5. cap. 2. Subtrahentes se lenitati tuae offendētes in rectitudinē tuam cadentes in asperitatē tuam Videlicet nesciunt quòd vbique sis quem nullus circumscribi◠locus solus es praesens etiam his qui longè fiunt à te They withdrew thēselues saith he from thy mercy and they met with thy Iustice and they fell vpon thy rigor or reuenge And all because they knew not that thou O Lord art euery where whome no place doth circumscribe and who only art present euen to them who will needs make themselues far of from thee This was Herods case who in vayne did looke for the Lord of life heere or there to murther him who was not only heere or there but euery where Or rather with him there is no such thing as any where but only so far forth as it is made to be so by his Omnipresence Particularly our Lord had still bene knocking at his hart But the Tyrant locked him out seeking him in that wicked manner the more he sought him so the further of he was frō finding him though yet himselfe was found by him Confes lib. 4. cap. 9. For as the same S. Augustine saith els where of a sinner Quo it quo fugit nisi à te placido ad te iratum vbi non inuenit legem tuam in paena sua lex tua veritas veritas tu Whither goeth a sinner or whither flyeth he but from thee being pleased to thy selfe being offended And where shall he not find thy law to his cost and thy law is Truth and this Truth is thou thy selfe By this law of Iustice and by this Truth the tyrāt was found out at last For our Lord considering that he would not make vse of his loue to him by asking pardō resolued that he would make him an instrument of his own loue to vs by giuing vs an example which we might auoyd And so he (e) How the Iustice of God vpon Herod was grounded in his mercy loue to vs. Vide 10. seph l. 17. Antiquit. cap. 8. Euseb l. r. Hist Eccle siast strocke him with extreme afflictions of minde and vnspeakeable torments of body according to the description of Iosephus For within he was all burning as in fire his lyms were swolne his pudenda turned themselues into vermine and his whole body was of so hatefull a smel as that he might rather be thought a lining and feeling and talking dunghill then a ma and so he dyed Yet now though our Lord did shew his Maiesty as a God he would not yet forsake his owne humility patience and charity as man but he expected in Egypt till this hungry wolfe were dead And then vpon the admonition of an Angell he returned and went into Galilea and so to Nazareth where he remayned with his sacred mother and the holy Patriarche S. Ioseph his supposed Father Lue. 2. And he grew as the Euangelist saith and was strengthned being full of wisedome and the grace of God was with him Both which he shewed after an admirable manner at his disputing and teaching in the Temple as will appeare by that which followeth Of the great Loue which our Lord Iesus shewed by his disputing and teaching in the Temple CHAP. 20. AS on the one side our Lord IESVS did omit noe exquisite diligence which might serue for the deliuery of himselfe to the knowledge and the loue of men so yet on the other he vsed it with so much caution as to make such as saw him rather to desire then to glut themselues vpon him For (a) How sweetly our Lord did manifest himselfe by degrees he being as he was the Souerayne originall light of the whole world chose to manifest himselfe to it which lay in darknes by degrees least otherwise insteed of being illuminated it might be dazeled He was twelue yeares old before he made any shew of himselfe but only by making those holy Pilgrimages to the Temple at three seuerall tymes of the yeare To which howsoeuer he were not bound in that tender age nor could he be indeed obliged at all yet it is most likely that euen before he would binde himselfe as now we se he did by his loue to giue vs that great example of his deuotion as also not to depriue his all-immaculate mother and S. Ioseph of that comfort which without him they could not so well enioy Those indeed were Pilgrimages (b) How Pilgrimamages to holy places ought to be performed which the world may looke vpon both for admiration imitation With what silence what introuersion what height of piety were they performed and hovv present to the minde of our B. Sauiour were all those persons of the world who vvould deny and deride such Religious iourneyes to holy places And such others also vvho both beleeuing practising the same would yet abuse that holy institution either by voluntary and long distractions or else by oftentation and for both those kindes of people would his loue sollicit him to be deeply sorry He saw also such others as would greatly honour him and his Saints by such deuotions and not only did he take particular larioy in euery one of them but by his merits and prayers and especialliy by euery one of those holy paces did he obtaine at the hands of his eternall Father that grace and strength wherby such actions might be well performed But when they were at Ierusalem in the frequent assembly of that people it was not so strange that the parents should loose the sight of the Child wherupon (c) The griefe of our B. Lady and Saint loseph vpon the losse of Christ our Lord in the Temple they sought him with griefe inough They thought that some of their freinds and kindred might haue procured to make him returne with thē as who would not haue byn glad to become as happy as he could by the excellent presence of our Lord. So as they looked him amongst their friends a dayes iourney off from Ierusalem and not finding him there they returned to the Citty full of care and found him the third day
in the Temple With how vnspeable loue both to God and man did our Lord IESVS dispossesse himselfe for a while of the greatest ioy and comfort that he could receaue in this world which was the sweet society of his sacred mother wherein although through the eminency of grace which had beene communicated to her happy soule in the very first instant of her Immaculate Conception he could neuer haue found the least distraction from the immediate and most perfect seruice of Almighty God yet because the parents of his disciples and seruants would not all be such but would often be diuerting and diswading vs from corresponding with his inspirations and our obligations he was pleased not only to giue vs an example at large but euen to impart the very expresse words themselues wherby we might ouercome their intreaties And rather then we should not be instructed to forsake all flesh and bloud when once there should be question of Gods seruice and rather then we should not be armed well agaynst those temptatioÌ„s which might grow to vs from our Parents he was content to exemplify the case in his owne sacred person with a seeming diminution to his B. Mother For this it was that when the all-immaculate virgin spake to him in these tender words Sonne why hast thou so done to vs Lâ—â— 2. behold thy Father and I sorrowing did seeke thee Our B. Sauiour answered thus not in the way of reprehension as certayne course-harted people will needs conceaue but (e) In what sense our Lord Iesus spake to his B. mother out of compassion to them and out of instruction to vs Why is it that you sought me did you not knowe that I must be about those things which are my Father And to show that his meaning was but to benefit vs by that expression of himselfe and not to cast the least aspersion of imperfection vpon his most holy mother and S. Ioseph he caused his holy spirit to record it instantly after in holy Scripture that he departed from the Temple with them and came to Nazareth was subiect to them And heere let him that can consider and admire the vnspeakeable dignity and excellency of our B. Lady to whom the God of heauen earth would become a subiect And let him much more adore God for the infinite humility and Charity of our Lord IESVS (e) The incomparable loue of Lord in being so subiect to our B. Lady and S. Ioseph who vouchsafed by this stronge example of his to procure the quenching of our pride and the kindling of our loue by making himselfe a subiect to flesh and bloud for our sake he who was the superiour and soueraigne Lord of all the creatures both in heauen earth He shewed well what he was whilst yet he sate in the Temple amongst the Doctours Of whome he heard what they could say and he asked them to see what they would answere And many other things he also did at the same tyme though holy Scripture by wrapping them vp in silence doe rather leaue matter for our soules then for our senses to worke vpon For he did both pray his eternall Father for their conuersion to his diuine Maiesty and for the manifestation of his glory not only in their hartes vvho vvere present then but in as many as by their meanes should aftervvard come to knovv vvhat had passed there The sacred Text affirmes How all that heard him were aslonished at his wisedome and answeres and that seeing him they wondred And vve may vvell assure our selues that theyr admiring his diuine presence theyr being astonished at his vvisedome vvas to that holy soule of our Lord Iesus an occasion of much mortisication which nothing but ardent Charity could haue made him so willingly imbrace For he was then but twelue yeares old and he had bene bred in a poore and plaine appearance and he dwelt in the very depth of profound hamility And humility when indeed it is profound doth make a soule much more abhorre admiration and prayse then any hart which is vayne can appreh end and hate to be despised The vvhile if all they were so amazed by hearing him vvho vvere the Doctours of the law and vvho vvere likely to despise all the world in comparison of themselues and if the very sight of him made them wonder vvhose eyes vvere euen almost put out by the dust of Enuy and Hypocrysy vvhich the mind of pride had raysed into them which our Lord IESVS by the dropps of his diuine grace vvas procuring them to lay in a farre higher manner must (f) We are particularly bound to admire the wisedome and grace of our Lord Iesus we vvho are Christian and vvhome our Lord instructs not only at some certaine tymes as he did that people in the Temple but to vvhose harts he is euer preaching in a most particular manner happy are they who apply the eares therof to his sacred mouth adore the Maiesty of his wisedome and power and admire the dignity and beauty of his humanity and be inflamed and euen consumed with the sense of his eternall prouidence and ardent loue But yet withall we must consider that howsoeuer it be said and that most truely Thâ—it he proceeded in wisedome and age and grace with God and men this is only to be vnderstood of that kind of wisedome which might grow through experimentall knowledge by way of the senses which he had like vs though yet with this difference as (*) Cap. â—â— hath bene shewed that euen therin he was free from all possibility of errour which we are not For his wisedome otherwise was so great as not to be capable of any increase as nether was his grace wherof in the instant of his Conception that diuine soule of his had receiued all absolute fulnes But he may be truely said to haue increased dayly with God and men in Grace that is in Fauour because euery day more more his soule was beautified by new acts in the sight of God and daylie he made more and more discouery of himselfe to men according to the rates of their Capacity and they would not haue bene men but beasts and blockes if they had not bene taken by such an obiect We are taught withall by his growing thus in grace before God and men to performe our actions in such sort as that we must nether procure to please God alone by not caring for the edification of men nor yet men alone through Hipocrisy or want of purity in the intention but they both must goe together hand in hand as daily our Lord when he grew afterward to mans estate did effectually teach vs more and more Of the excessiue loue which our Lord Iesus shewed to vs in that he would vouchsafe to be Baptized CHAP. 21. VVHAT thought of man or Angell can reach to that humility which Christ our Lord being longe since growne to be a man and now vpon the poynt of
incouraged towardes the vse Pennance and so this mystery of the Temptation is concluded CHAP. 26. BVT although our Lotd did vvhat he did vvith diuine vvisedome and that the same course may be taken by the Doctours and Pastours of his Church to ansvvere vvith holy Scripture to the obiections vvhich shall be brought out of Scripture eyther by the deuill or by his seruants yet this course is not so safe for euery ignorant and ordinary man but rather to remit himselfe to the beliefe and practise of the holy Catholike Church or at least to the iudgment of such learned Priests as are next at hand And as for dealing with the deuill himselfe it is no point eyther of wit or grace to chop Logicke with him And vve see that Luther got nothing by him out of the arguments which the Deuill pretended to bring out of holy Scripture Luth. de Missa Angulari Tom. 7. printed at VVitemberge Anno 1558. fol. 228. 229. D. Bernser 15. supra Psalm Qui habitat against the Sacrifice of the Masse for heereupon did Luther as himselfe doth plainly confesse impugne and detest that holy Sacrifice Besides it is the diuells custome as it is also of his disciples to falsify the text as S. Bernard notes him to haue done in this very place For it sayth not that the Angells had charge ouer him to beare him vp that he might not knocke his foote against a stone but that they might keepe him in all his wayes Wherupon the Saint doth challeng the deuil in these termes Quid malignè c. What is that O thou maligne spirit which he commaunded his Angells to doe It was that they should keepe him in all his waies Doth he peraduenture say In his precipices What kind of way was that to haue cast himselfe downe from the pinnacle of the Temple This is no way but a ruyne or if it be a way it is no way for Christ our Lord but for thee Thus saith Saint Bernard Now in this manner of cyting Scriptures the deuill is but too faithfully imitated in his infidelity and so hath he bene by the Sectaries of all ages Tom. 2. Hom. 31. in Lucam Wherupon Origen sayth of the Heretiques of his tyme As the deuill alledged the Scriptures so doth Marcion Basilides and Valentinus alledge them And then he giueth this aduise If at any tyme thou heere a man alleadge a testimony out of Scripture be sure thou doe not instaÌ„tly approue in thy minde what thou hearest himsay but first consider who it is that speaks and what his iudgment and beliefe is least else he may counterfeit himselfe to be that Saint which he is not and least being infected with the poyson of (a) Take heed of heresy how saintly soeuer it may looke Heresy he lye hidden like some wolfe in a sheeps cloathing yea least it be the deuill who speaketh to thee of out Scripture Now the same which Origen said of those Heretiques of his tyme is to be said with as much truth of many others in this age of ours And we are nether to beleeue what they say therin nor yet greatly to wonder at their boldnes deceipt in this kind of proceeding since the deuill whose cause they plead did point theÌ„ out to it so long agoe The study therfore of holy Scripture to the end of answering and consuting the aduersaries of God and his Church must chiefly be vsed by them who are called to the office of instructing others and for the present we wil coÌ„sider what else is taught vs heere by Christ our Lord. Our Lord IESVS fasted forty dayes and although there haue been Saynts in the Christian Church who haue miraculously been enabled to produce theyr fast into the same length yet doth it not belong to vs to imitate the same whose forces eyther of body or minde will not reach so far But yet by that excesse of our Lords fast we are obliged to doe what we can therin without great preiudice to our health which we are bound to keep for his seruice It will become vs to doe this so much the more as (b) Our whole life is a Temptation it is certaine that all this life of ours is neither more nor lesse then a contynuall subiection to Temptation And euen in the case of Christ our Lord himselfe it is said of the Deuill when he was confounded by the answere of our B. Sauiour that yet he departed not as one may say for good and all but only for a tyme. And therfore Christians must make account that they are euer to stand vpon their guard agaynst him For if the danger be still at hand it is agaynst all reason that we suffer the preuentious and remedies to be Farre of And since our heauenly Maister hath made vs with so much loue see what they are we haue no more to doe but to consider and worke after his example And though for as much as concerneth fasting we must euer be vsing it at least as farre as we are bound by the ordination of the holy Church yet it seemes that this action of our B. Lord doth oblige vs in a more particular manner to be exact and deuout in the fast of Lent For as much as according to the tradition of the Church and the expresse declaration of the holy (1) Diuus Hier. l. 2. con loui c. 11. D. Max. de leiu Quadras D. Ambr. ser 34. D. Augâ—epist 119. c. 15. Fathers his fast in the wildernes by the space of Fourty dayes did dedicate and sanctify and consecrate and auow the fast of Lent by diuine authority And so also in the (2) Hier. Ep. 54. ad Marcell Leo. ser 6. de Quadragis lgna Epist ad Philip. Fathers there is aboundance of proofe that as the institution of this fast is recomended to vs by the soueraigne example of our B. Lord so the precept therof and the appoiting of the tyme with other circumstances was deriued downe to Christians by no lesse then the Tradition of the Apostles But why should a hart which is truly and nobly Christian need the spurre of a coÌ„mandement to doe a thing which redoundeth so expresly to the honour and ought to be imbraced in imitation of such a mercifull louing Lord It must suffice vs to know that he is gone before vs by the way of penance that howsoeuer his Law did not oblige vs to follow him yet his Loue would A generous soule will not endure to spend the daies and nights in dalliance when such a friend and benefactour such as omnipotent creatour and bountifull redeemer is keeping so strict a watch or rather is passing the very pikes and entring the breach and that not for his owne but for our good For our good it was vvhich Christ our Lord did seeke in all our ignorances vvhich he tooke care to instruct in our miseries vvhich he applyed himselfe to remoue and in our comforts vvhich he
most excellent instructions which our Lord through his loue did giue to man in this mistery of the Transfiguration CHAP. 31. I Should enlarge my selfe too much if I would particularize and presse those instructions which our Lord did giue to all his disciples both liuing then and succeeding afterward in that silent sermon of his Transfiguration and we haue reason to take them all as so many tokens of his tender loue to vs. But because they may seeme so rather by inference and reflection then by way of lineall and direct expression I will content my selfe briefly to point them out In the first place we are told that he assumed those holy and happy disciples of his vp the hill and therby we are taught that we cannot clymbe but when he takes vs by the hand By telling vs also that he would not be transfigured before them but vpon the hill he tells vs that vnlesse she aspire towards (a) No solide and sublime gust in God with out a serious study of perfection Perfction we must content our selues without tasting the delicious fruites of ConteÌ„plation Againe we are heere expresly told that Christ our Lord went vp to pray and that whilst he was in prayer this rapt of Transfiguration came vpon him So that as it was by prayer and coÌ„uersation with God that Moyses came downe from the hill with such a deale of light in his face by prayer also it is that we may receaue innumerable graces and may grow to be transformed in minde which imports vs more then to be transfigured in body By letting vs know that he was transfigured only for that tyme he giues vs to vnderstand how he hid his excellencies both till then and euer afterward and therby he proclaimes to vs by a loud voyce how (b) The more we hide our selues froÌ„ the view of men the more open shall we be to the gracious eyes of God Ibid. carefull we must be to hide our faâ—ours and priuiledges from the eyes of men And the same was also taught yet againe when our Lord IESVS commaunded afterward that they should not speake of that vision till he were risen from the dead By mentioning the Passion when he was in the midst of the Transfiguration we are instructed how to carry our selues in the varieties and changes of this life For in the winter of distresse we must keep our selues aliue by the memory or hope of some consolation eyther to come or past And in the spring or Sommer of spirituall ioy we must free our selues from growing vayne or giddy by thinking of some approach of desolation By the feare of the holy Apostles we may see the misery of mans nature Confel lib. 11. cap. 9. which was so ill drest by Adam that as S. Augustine saith Sic infirmatus est in egestate mea vigor meus vt non sufferam bonum meum So is my vigor taken downe in this infirmity of my condition that I cannot so much as indure mine owne good as heere the Apostles were frighted euen by the fight of so much glory as attends the speaking of a word from heauen And how then must we reuere with a most profound internall awe that God of inaccessible light and infinite Maiesty whose essence is wholly vnconceaueable since his words cannot be heard without extreme apprehension by such wormes of misery as we are By the coÌ„ming of that voyce which was so soone to breake off the vision whilst they were in the midst of those celestiall ioyes by which voyce our B. Lord was declared to be the beloued sonne of God and that they were comaunded to heare him they we are made to know that we are not in this world to looke for a state of contynuall inioying but of labouring The (c) This is a world of sowing and the other of reaping seeing of God and the being to doe so eternally belongs to heauen in this life we are not to looke for seeing but we must attend to hearing and which is meant therby to obeying Heerby he also tells vs that we must not demurre euen in the most spirituall gusts which we may haue when obedience or charity commaunds the contrary Especially since our Lord himselfe made such hast to giue ouer his Transfiguration that he might descend and so proceed first to preaching then afterwards towards his pasion For there was his hart because his loue was euer looking towards vs and had not that same very loue of vs obliged him to be glorious at that tyme for our sakes since the members could not partake of any such influence which came not first from the head yea and euen if they could haue done it yet would it not haue bene so full of sauour to them vnlesse first it had passed from him it appeares well inough both by the antecedents and consequences of his sacred life that he was not eyther greedy after pleasure or weary of taking paines for vs. Loue and pure loue it was which kept his glory all that while in silence Loue it was which made him mortify himselfe as a man may say with taking into his mouth that only tast of ioy And lastly an euerlasting loue it was which carried him in such hast from Mount Thabor to Mount Caluary where he was to be transfigured a fecoÌ„d tyme but after a far other manner For (d) How our Lord Iesus was Transsigured the second tyme vpoÌ„ mount Caluary insteed of glory he was to be all clad with a kind of Leprosy His face was not to be resplendent but loaden partly with impure spittle and partely vvith his ovvne pure svveat and pretious bloud which made a strange kind of marriage together in that sacred and most venerable Temple of the diuinity His garments were no more to be white but spotted with dust and filth the souldiers were to dispose of them by lotts He was not to be placed betwene a Moyses an Elias but to giue him the more solemne bitter scorne he was to be lodged betwene two murthering thecues No bright shyning cloud was there to appeare to doe him honour but the Sunne would be ashamed to behould the soÌ„ne of man so lewdly treated and darknes would couer the whole earth Since therfore we see such deadly signes of loue in his pretious hart towards vs we may haue the honour to be taught by him how to guide our liues let vs dispose our selues with supreme reuerence to giue our eares and hartes (e) Our Lord Iesus is declared our Doctour from heauen to the diuine words of his mouth since he is made our Doctour by no lesse then a voyce which comes from heauen it selfe and that in the name of the eternall Father saying That Christ our Lord is his beloued sonne in whome he is so highly pleased and that him we must be sure to heare We will besides adore him for presenting vs with this admirable vision wherby he hath so aboundantly
our fault an occasiō of being much deceaued in the beliefe and worship of Almighty God through the abundance of difficulty vvhich is therin as vvill soone be shevved In the meane tyme let vs cōsider the supreme nobility which the spirit of God hath vsed in conueying his sense into these words Though vvhy doe I speake of any single sense as if there vvere but one vvheras indeed as it treats of high things after an h̄ble manner so though it treates of but a fevv things it doth it yet after a copious manner Alta humiliter Confes l. 12. cap. 30. pauca copiosè as S. Augustine saith And the same excellēt Saint doth proue els vvhere at large or rather he doth not so labouriously proue as take it from a knovvne and certayne truth That out of few and they the selfe same words Ibid. c. 25. a great number of most true senses may be drawne He sayth moreouer That he can see no reason Ibid. c. 31. why the man who wrote them vvhich in his case vvas Moyses should not be beleeued to haue knowne and seene all those senses in those words Per quem Deus vnus sacras literas vera diuersa visuris Ibid. c. 26. multorum sensib us temperauit He by whose ministery our Lord did accomodate and temper the words of holy Scripture to the seuerall and yet all true senses which many men would picke out from thence The Saint doth else vvhere make the case his ovvne and deliuereth himselfe in this manner If (c) S. Augustine shewes the variety of senses of holy Scripture and why he that wrote it did vnderstand those diuers senses I had bene Moyses and that I had beene inioyned to write the booke of Genesis I should haue wished to haue had such a guift of speach and such a way of composing as that they who could not yet vnderstand in what māner God createth should not sly off from the words as being too hard for their capacity And yet they againe who were able to vnderstand it into whatsoeuer true sense or meaning they might haue come by their consideration therof might haue found that the same had not bene left out in those few words which thy seruant vsed And if any other man should yet in the light of truth haue seene some other sense neither should that also haue been found wanting in his words And this discourse he shutteth vp with saying shortly after I will not therfore O my God be so precipitated in my iudgment as to beleeue that man not to haue deserued this fauour at thy hands Without doubt Moyses meant and thought by those words when he wrote them whatsoeuer we are able to find true therin as also whatsoeuer therin is to be found though we cannot find it or at least not yet How (d) The Nobility of holy Scripture noble and how excellent a thing doth it appeare by this that the holy Scripture is And how great a benefit and withall how high an honour hath God imparted to man by putting such a booke into his hand as wherof S. Augustine saith els where That our B. Sauiour is God humaned and the holy Scripture is God proclaymed or preached And we may by this excellent meanes both heare what he saith to vs when vve vvill and make him also heare whatsoeuer vve haue a mind to say to him The supernaturall excellency of holy Scripture is euident not only by the multitude of true senses vvhich euen the same words affoards but by the misterious expression which it makes of the very things othervvise We may see saith Fa. Salmerõ in those Canonicall bookes certaine most high sublime senses meanings In his prolegomena 2. vested ouer with a poore humble garment of words as if it were a kind of diuinity vnited to the humanity Or as a Christ laid in a Maunger wrapped in clouts so as that euen therby the height of holy Scripture doth appeare It is also contriued with such a kind of temper that sometymes it is obuious and of easy accesse and someytmes againe very obscure hard Thus sayth Father Salmeron Confes l. 3. c. 5. And S. Augustine giueth this iudgment of it That it is not a thing vnderstood by men who are proud nor yet discouered to such as are children But that it is humble in shew and sublime in substance and ouershadowed with mysteries This follovving proposition at the first sight may seeme perhaps a little strange That from the very difficulty of the holy Scripture to their vnderstanding for whose instruction and comfort it was written an argument should be fetched to proue the greatnes of Gods loue euen therin But in it selfe the thing is most sincerely true Salmeron in Proleg 2. I vvill hope to make it cleere by the helpe of that good man in the margent out of the excellent fruits vvhich grovv to vs by this very obscurity I vvill first procure to prooue both out of him and the glorious S. Augustine that indeed it is very obscure and then hovv it grovves to be so though the pride of Sectaries be so great as to make euen the profoundest Doctrine of Christ our Lord to be most easy vvhensoeuer themselues vvill vouchsafe to be the Doctours of it S. (e) The great obscurity of holy Scripture Augustine vvho may vvell goe for one of the vvonders of the vvorld in point of vvit did auovv in his Confessions vvhether his humility vvould or no that vvhen he was not tvventy yeares old he vnderstood Aristotles Predicamēts vvithout any teacher at al. And there he taketh God to vvitnes Confes l. 4. cap. vlt. That of himselfe he read and vnderstood all the bookes that he could procure which wrote of any of the liberall arts And afterward hath these vvords Whatsoeuer I read concerning the arts either of Logicke or Rhetoricke whatsoeuer of Geometry Musicke and Arithineticke I vnderstood without any great difficulty and without the instruction of any man as thou O Lord my God dost know And yet to see how the same S. Augustine being not afterward at the only age of twenty but more then twice as many yeares when he wrote the booke of his Confessions doth well shew how farre off he held himselfe euen then to be from being able to vnderstand the holy Scripture be but pleased to read the second Chapter of his eleauenth booke where he begs light and strength and coniures our Lord by so many-many titles to inspire him with the vnderstāding therof with so ardent affection and almost affliction of minde that it would in a manner halfe greeue ones hart to see him in such straites See also in another place if the eye of his soule with hauing in it such a deale of the Eagle as it had did not tremble and dazle with behoulding the mistery and maiesty of holy Scripture For thus he saith speaking of the first words of the first booke which
is that of Genesis Mira est profunditas c. Confes l. 12. c. 14. Wonderfull saith the Saint is the profoundnes of thy words wherof yet behold the superficies or appearance doth euen smile vpon vs little ones But yet the profoundnes therof in the same holy Scripture Proleg 2. fol. 10. as is aboundantly proued by Salmeron and amongst other instāces he sheweth how the Prophet Osee saith of his owne prophecy in the end therof Who is wise that he may vnderstand these things and who is intelligent that he may know them Which implyeth not yet an impossibility but only a great difficulty Iu Proaem l 1. Comment in Ose 2. Pet. 3. as S. Hierome notes And S. Peter affirmeth that there were some passages in the Epistles of S. Paul hard to be vnderstood which vnstable vnlearned people did peruert towards their owne perdition as they also did other scriptures So they also doe in these dayes whersoeuer heresy hath set her clouen foote And that complaint is most iustly made in these sad tymes of ours Epist 13. ad Paul which S. Hierome made in his tyme. Agricolae Coementarij fabri metallorum c. Clownes Daubers Smythes Wood-cleauers Butchers Dyers and the like cannot learne their trades without a teacher But euery prating old woman euery doting old man and euery wrangling Sophister and in fine who will may presume to lay hold vpon holy Scripture and to tosse it and teach it before they haue learnt it And for my part I confesse that in my life I haue nor heard of many thinges which might make a man laugh and weepe both at once then that one passing once in a prison of London from one chamber to another with a candle in his hand which the winde blew out and stepping in hard by to light it in a little Sellar where Ale and Beare was to be sould he found the Tapster very grauely leaning vpon a barrell with his Byble lying open before him And forsooth he was in study of the Prophesy of Ezechiell So that I know not whether ignorāce be more blind or pride more bold But these kind of men may learne to be confounded when they consider that euen the B. Apostles after they had heard so many Sermons and Parables deliuered and expounded by Christ our Lord himselfe And after hauing inioyed his diuine cōuersation for the space of three yeares together were yet so farre from vnderstanding the sense of holy Scriptures that our Lord himselfe was fayne immediatly before his Ascension to appeare to them expresly for this purpose that he might instruct them and open their meaning to them Which may sufficiently serue to shew how full of difficulty they are in thēselues how impossible to be vnderstood but by the particular fauour of that Doctor of our soules How the holy Scripture growes to be so very obscure and of the infinite wise loue which our Lord hath shewed to vs euen therin CHAP. 38. I Will touch in a few words out of Salmeron the chiefe reasons which make the holy Scripture so very hard Proleg 2. fol. 14. that so I may come to shew how the tender loue of our mercifull Lord doth euidently appeare to vs euen therin This (a) The height of the misteries of Christian Religion difficulty is partly caused by the magnitude and multitude of the mysteries which are there deliuered surpassing all humane vnderstanding and which are able euen to amaze the minde As that of the B. Trinity the Predestination and Reprobation of soules The Incarnation death and Resurrection and Ascension of the sonne of God The Institution of the B. Sacrament such like The variety euen of literall senses wherof the very same words are capable and which are assigned by the holy Fathers themselues besides those other senses which are misticall and spirituall The (b) Predictions of future thinges Predictions of Future things which doe abound in holy Scripture and which as they be hard euen in their owne nature so heere they were much harder to be vnderstood because the holy Ghost had sometimes an expresse designe to hide thē vnder certaine metaphors to the end that on the one side they might lye close frō the notice of wicked kings who otherwise would haue put the Prophets to present death and on the other side that those mysteries might grow in fit tyme by meanes of prayer and other diligences to be conceaued and knowne by the faithfull people of God The seeming of euident contradiction which is in seuerall places of holy Scripture As where it is affirmed that God said vpon the first day let light be made and light was made and yet it is also said That the sunne was made vpon the fourth day The variety (c) Variety of tongues of tongues wherin it was written and into which it is translated euery one wherof hath seuerall manners of speach and seuerall Prouerbes and Parables The great multitude of (d) Multitudes of Tropes Figures Tropes and Figures of all kinds which euery where doe so abound that euen the most learned haue inough to doe The extent (e) The arts and sciences which holy Scripture doth comprehend of so many Arts and sciences as are comprehended by holy Scripture without the vnderstanding wherof it cannot also be vnderstood The (f) Vniuersall propositions which yet are not vniuersally to be vnderstood multitude of vniuersall propositions which yet are not vniuersally to be vnderstood as All things are lawfull to me but all things are not expedient c. The great number (g) Places subiect to variety of sonses by reason of diuersities of natures persōs of places which are subiect to an ambiguous sense both by reason of diuers distinct persons in one and the same diuine nature as in the B. Trinity as also of diuers natures in one and the same person as the diuine and humane nature of Christ our Lord. The (h) The different states of the Church two different states of the Church Militant and Tryumphant and the (i) The double comming of Christ our Lord. double comming of our B. Sauiour once in humility to redeeme vs once in Maiesty to iudge vs. The (k) The suddaine change from one person to another suddaine and instant change of the persons who are brought in to speake and the persons also of them to whome the speach is made which is very often vsed in the Prophets and Psalmes Neither (l) The limitation of thinges inioyned to some and not to others and yet no limitation expressed are all things meant to be inioyned to all but some things only to certaine and peculiar persons by the not knowing of which difference vnaduised men are led on to errour The (m) The easy passage which is made from the letter to the spirit and from temporall thinges to eternall easy and frequent passage from the letter to the spirit from carnall things
to spirituall from temporall to eternall from the Kings of Israell to the King Messias and so also there is often passage the other way from the spirit to the letter and so in the rest It is also made very hard by the Equiuocatiō (n) The ambiguity of the Hebrew tongue of words wherof the Hebrew tongue is so full Which since it was the first and consequently the most compendious and short of all others it must necessarily containe many seuerall significations in few words And from hence it growes that generally such variety hath bene found in the Translations of the old Testament and some part also of the new Nay (o) The misplacing of points c. the very difference in placing a point doth make sometimes a different sense and so doth the manner either of writing or pronouncing a proposition As namely whē it is ambiguous whether any thing be affirmatiuely or Ironically or Interrogatorily to be read This with more is shewed by Father Salmeron For these and for many other reasons the vnderstanding of holy Scripture is very hardly learnt and we see by sad experience what diuisions doe abound in the world by occasion therof when men will call disobedience and pride by the name of holy Ghost and Euangelicall liberty There are amongst Sectaries of seuerall cuts and kindes sixteene different opinions concerning their Doctrine of Iustification All which they seuerally doe yet pretend to be grounded in holy Scripture and yet this Scripture it is which they will haue to be so cleere and plaine And vpon those fower words Hoc est corpus meum This is my body there are almost fourescore diuersities of opinion Our aduersaries themselues doe by their deeds of disagreement with one another proclayme the difficulty of holy Scripture which yet in words they will deny that so they may be excused in making it say what they list The truth is this That indeed it is full of difficulty and our Lord who made it so did with infinite loue prouide therin for our good and that more wayes then one For (p) The many and great goods we get by the very difficulty of holy Scripture See Salmeron vhi supra therby we are obliged as Father Salmeron doth also further shew to confesse the vnspeakeable wisedome (q) We are brought to a great beliefe of the high wisedom or God of Almighty God which doth infinitely surpasse all knowledge or conceyte of ours euen then when he vouchsafeth to expresse himselfe by words the ordinary signification wherof we vnderstand And (r) Our pride is humbled by this meanes he depresseth pride in vs and depriues vs of all confidence in our selues Heerby (s) It spurres vs on to prayer Psalm 119. he doth also stirre vs vp to make with all humility most earnest prayer to his diuine in maiesty that he will open to vs the secrets of his law as we see S. Augustine did and all the Saints haue done especially King Dauid who was euer singing of this songe It also growes through the great obscurity of holy Scripture that the Church is filled with much variety (t) It breds great variety of diuine knowled◠in the Church of diuine knowledge neither is there that possibility to draw seuerall true senses out of plaine easy places as out of such as are obscure According to that of S. Augustine The obscurity of diuine Scripture is profitable for this that it begetteth bringeth to light seuerall Doctrines of truth whilst one man vnderstandeth it after one manner and another after another And (u) It breeds diligence in study and care to conserue in memory for this very reason also learned men are incited to a more diligent and earnest study therof And consequently they wil entertaine that knowledge with more gust which they haue acquired with more labour This (x) It inuiteth vs to purity of life obscurity is also a cause which makes vs purify our soules the more because like loues his like And holy things will neuer be well comprehended but by holy persons Moreouer it helpes to maintaine and make good that order (y) It helpes to maintaine the Church in due sub ordinatiō Order in the Church which our Lord God hath thought fit to hold in the dispensation of his guifts and graces For as the superiour Angells doe illuminate them who are inferiour so hath he bene pleased that amongst men some should excell others in learning and diuine knowledge who as Doctours and Pastours might interpret the same to others It (z) It saueth Pearles from being cast to swyne keepes impure and wicked persons from knowing those misteries which belong to God wherof they are vnworthy vncapable since they will not vse them well And our Lord himselfe hath said in his Ghospell that so it was fit to be and that seeing Marc. 4. Matt. 7. they might not see and that hearing they might not vnderstand and that pearles must not be cast before swyne And lastly the frailty of our corrupted nature is excellently prouided for by this meanes since through the difficulty which we find in holy Scripture we are (a) It nourisheth vs in reuerence and a holy awe kept in reuerence and in a kind of holy awe wheras if throughout they were familiar and gaue easy accesse to all cōmers they might through our fault grow instantly to be contemned On the (b) The Scripture is wouen both with hard and easy thinges and this is of great vse to vs. other side if all the parts thereof were hard a like we should giue ouer to seeke that which we despayred to find And therfore the good pleasure of our Lord hath bene to make the holy Scriptures obscure yet with a kind of plainenes and plaine but yet with an obscurenes That by their plainenes in some places they might illuminate vs and by their difficulty in others they might exercise vs. And that the easy places might helpe vs towards the vnderstanding of the hard and the hard might serue to imploy our wits and to make vs know withall how much we are bound to God for hauing made some others easy And this is the substance of that which Father Salmeron hath deliuered both concerning the reasons which make the holy Scriptures hard and the fruits which grow to vs therby Through which we may easily discerne the tender and wise care and loue of this diuine Doctour of our soules Not only in giuing vs such excellent lessons but for hauing done it in such an admirable manner as (c) A demonstration of the loue of our Lord to vs in this particular that whilst we are studying them we must almost in despight of our owne proud hartes be imploying our selues withall both vpon the exercise of prayer and the practise of the solide vertues of humility patience obedience purity and charity And if yet we shal not think that our Lord hath shewed vs loue
the whole world at once Ioan. 7. Apocal. 22. If any man thirst let him come and drinke and it shall cast him nothing Come to me all you who labour Matt. 11. or be ouerloaden and I will refresh you No man is excluded whome he offers not to imbrace nor no misery is exempted from that hand of pitty which vndertakes to cure thē al. Is any thing more punctuall then his visitations who vouchsafes not only to knock at the doores of our vnworthy harts but to tel vs that he stands there Ego sto ad ostium pulso Apocal. 3. for that purpose as if it were to wayte our leasure and to know our pleasure whether we be content that he come in or no Is any thing more sweet euen then his conuersation which he expresseth in this manner Apocal. 3. That if we open our soules to him when he begges entrance he will come and sup with vs He saith not only that we shall sup with him but that he also will sup with vs and doe vs the honour to make vs able to inuite and feast him Ioan. 16. He saith also els where That if we will loue him not only he but his Father also will loue vs and that they both will come in and dwell with vs. Yea and yet in another place That he will not onely sup with vs but serue vs. Luc. 121 And he was richly as good as his word when at that last supper of his he washed and wiped the feete of his Apostles as we haue seene elsewhere Nor did he only induce men to doe vs good by his putting his very selfe into our persons that so himselfe might receaue the fauour from vs but he discouraged men from doing vs any hurt by the selfe same reason vvhen he expostulated with S. Paul Act 8. asking why he persecuted him wheras yet he had but persecuted his seruants Is any thing more tender then those comparisons vvherby he vouchsafes to discouer the beating of his diuine hart and the boyling vp of his profound loue Whilest with the teares in his eyes he contemplated that misery Matt. 23. vvhich the vngratefull and blind Ierusalem had dravvne vpon her selfe by her sinnes And vvhen after the manner of an Interiection he exclaymed and asked that vvhich himselfe could only tell hovv to ansvvere hovv often he vvas desirous and had endeauoured to dravv those vvicked men to himselfe vvith as much vvorking and earning of his bovvells of pitty as any Hen could vse in the defence and sauegard of her chickens from some rauenous Kyte Novv as the (d) What a great deale of tender loue is inuolued in the cōparison of our Lord and vs to the Hen and her Chickens Hen by spreading her vvings makes a Buckler of defēce for her chickens against any violent hurt which may approach them so also doth she make them a kind of Arbor of solace and recreation vnder vvhich they may repose against the scorching heate of the s̄ne She contemnes her ovvne safety in respect of theyrs and shee grovves euen sicke vvith sorrovv vpon the least apprehension of any hurt which may be comming towardes them What name shall we giue to that vouchsafing of our B. Lord when in compassion of our miseries and in the ardent desire he had to free vs from them he disdayned not to apparaile himselfe with the similitude of a Sheepheard (e) The Parable of the sheepheard Matt. 28. Who hauing a flocke of a hundred sheepe left ninety nine wherby the Angelicall nature is designed to seeke that one being the figure of man kind which went wandring and loosing it selfe in the desert of this world And to looke it so long as at last to find it and to take it first into his armes and then to lay it vpon his owne shoulders all stincking and rotting as it was And then so returne home so ouer-ioyed as if this Pastour could haue no other felicity but in the feeling and remouing of the calamities of his sheep Whom to shew how much he loues thē beyond the loue that is borne by the sheepheards of this vvorld to theyr seuerall flockes he professeth that there is not one of them vvhom he doth not know and call by his particular name Our Lord did also stoope so low as to expose himselfe to our sight in the person of a (f) Of the widdow who lost a peece of syluer Luc. 15. vviddow Who hauing lost one single groate vvhich figureth any soule vvhich is lost by sinne laid aside the contentment vvhich she might haue takē in all that rest of her substance vvhich she had not lost And the lights her candle svveepes and searches euery corner of her house neuer leaues to labour till at length she haue found it out And then not being able to cōtaine herselfe she inuites her neighbours and her friends that they vvill helpe her to reioyce for her good successe since of her selfe she is not able to be glad inough And (g) The story or Parable of the Pro gall child Luc. Ibid. vvho shal also be euer able to expresse the tender loue he shevved to man in being pleased that the Parable of the Prodigal child should remaine to the vvorld vpon record That so for euer it might appeare as in a most fresh and liuely picture hovv impossible it vvas for the most grieuous sinne of man to quench the infinite mercy of almighty God so that once he vvould returne by penance Yea and he shevveth that the same Father who hath the patiēce to endure all the wikednes which can be committed hath not the patiēce to endure that the sonne should wade so farre in sorrow not to find him til he should get home But he must needs put himselfe vpon the way yea and forgetting as it were his state and grauity must run to meet him And at the first meeting to imbrace him and presently to fall vpon his necke and to be fully reconciled to him by a kisse of peace And howsoeuer the sōne did but his duty in accusing himself of his grieuous sinne yet the Father would take no hold of that nor contynue him in cause to be blushing or so much as thinking of what was past But he instantly changed his discourse and comaunded his seruants in all hast to goe fetch the most sumpcuous prime garment which he had and that he should be all cloathed with it that a ring of honour should be put vpon his fingar and that the fatt calfe should be killed and that a banquet should be made and that Musicque should declare how full of ioy he was I spare in this place to speake of another banquet or feast which the holy Scripture records him to haue made to man with infinite loue in the Institution of the blessed Sacrament And (h) The B. Sacrament is incomparably the greatest guift which cā be giuen yet this doth as farre exceed
Hierusalem that this bread which is seene by vs is not bread although the tast esteeme it to be bread but that it is the body of Christ Many mothers saith (i) Chrysost hom 83. in Matt. S. Chrysostome put out their children when they are borne to be nurst by others but Christ our Lord would not doe soe but doth nourish vs with his owne body and so doth conioyne glew vs to himselfe O miracle (k) Chrysost l. 3. de Sacerde tio O benignity of God sayth the same S. Chrysostome He that sitteth aboue with the Father at the same instant is handled by the hands of all and he deliuers himselfe vp to such as will receaue and imbrace him And in (l) Chrysost hom 24 c. 10.1 Epist ad Corinth another place he sayth thus That which is in the Chalice flowed out of his side and of that doe we communicate This indeed as sayth S. (m) Saint Ephrem who was familiar with Saint Basil the great lib. de natura Dei non serutanda cap. 5. Ephrem exceedeth all admiration all speach and all conceipt which Christ our Sauiour the only begotten sonne of God hath done To vs who are clad with flesh he hath giuen fire and spirit to eate namely his body and his bloud My bread sayth (n) Ambros l. 4. de Sacra menâ—is S. Ambrose is vsuall bread but this bread is bread before the words of the Sacrament but wheÌ„ the coÌ„secration once doth come of bread it is made the flesh of Christ. Let vs therfore settle this point how that which is bread can be made the body of Christ By consecration This consecration of what speach and words doth it consist Of the words and speach of our Lord Iesus For all the rest which is said is either prayse giuen to God or there are particular prayers made for the people and for Kings and others But when he comes to the tyme of making the B. Sacrament the Priest doth no longer speake in his owne words but in the words of Christ The speach therfore of Christ is that which makes this Sacrament What speach of Christ Thevery same wherby al things were made Our Lord commaunded and the heauen was made Our Lord commaunded and the earth was made Our Lord commaunded and the sea was made Our Lord commaunded al the creatures were made Thou seest therfore how effectually the speach of Christ doth work If (o) Note this consequence then there be such power in the speach of our Lord Iesus as to make those things be which were not how much more effectually will it worke towards the making of them be which are and to make them be changed into other then what they were Therefore (p) Marke well the expresse authority of this Saint that I may answere thee I say That it was not the body of Christ before the consecration but after the consecration I say to thee that then it is the body of Christ. Christ was carried sayth (q) Aug. in Psal 33. Conc. 1. Ibid. S. Augustine in his owne hands when commending his body to his Apostles he said Hoc est corpus meum this is my body for then he carried his body in his hands And agayne Our Lord would place our saluation in his body and bloud But how did he commend his body and bloud to vs In his humility For vnlesse he were humble he would not be eaten and drunke The good Pastour sayth (r) Greg. in hom 14. in Euang. S. Gregory the great laid downe his life for his sheepe that he might turne his body and bloud into our Sacrament might feed the sheepe which he had redeemed by the nutriment of his flesh Vnder the species of bread sayth S. (s) Cyril Ierosol in Catech. Myst 4. Cyrillus Ierosolymitanus the body is giuen thee and vnder the species of bloud the wine that so thou maist become participant of his body bloud So shall we by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is Carryers of Christ when we shall haue receiued his body and bloud into our body and so as S. Peter saith we shall be made consorts of the diuine nature And according to that of S. (t) Cyril l. 10. in Iohn c. 11. Cyrill if any man shall mingle wax which is melted by fire with other wax which is also melted in such sort that they both doe seeme to be but one made of both so by the coniunction of the body and bloud of Christ our Lord he is in vs and we in him S. (u) Greg. l. 4. Dialog c. 58. Gregory doth surther say What faithfull soule can doubt but that in the very hower of the Sacrifice the heauens doe open at the voyce of the Priest and that in this mystery of Christ Iesus the Quires of the Angells doe assist the highest and the lowest things doe meete Terrestriall and Celestiall things are ioyned and there is made one thinge of things which are visible and inuisible Heere then we are taught by the holy Fathers of the Church whome I might haue cited to this purpose both more at large and more in number the inscrutable loue of our Lord IESVS to mankind expressed in these high mysteries of the blessed Sacrament and the holy Sacrifice of the Masse But how shall we be able to disingage our selues for being euen ouerwhelmed with the huge weight therof since the superexcellent Humanity of our (x) The incompable dignity of the person of Christ our Lord. Lord IESVS consisting of that pretious body which first was framed out of purest bloud of the all-immaculate Virgin by the only hand of the holy Ghost and of that glorious soule which in the first instaÌ„t of the creation therof was hypostatically vnited to God the sonne the second person of the most B. Trinity and the same person being indiuisible from the other two of God the Father and God the holy Ghost that this person I say of Christ our Lord should be communicated to all the Priests of the holy Catholike Church to be offred daily ouer all the world and to be receiued into the brest both of them and al the other faithfull children of that mother as often as theÌ„selues should desire What Cherubim is able to discouer the greatnes of this benefit and what Seraphim hath his hart hoat inough to breath out such ardent flames of loue as grow due to God vpoÌ„ this account How full of reason was the exclamation and admiration of holy Dauid when he said Psalm 34. 9. That there was none like to God in the cogitations which he interteyned for our Good No man no creature could euer haue aspired to such a happines or so much as to haue conceaued that euen the diuine nature it selfe had bene able to expresse such goodnes But God is God and God is loue and the loue euen of Creatures is full of (y) How full of Inuention great loue is inuention for
to tyme He shewed them what a glory it would be for them to resemble their Maister in his Crosse and he made them knovv vvithall that they should not carry it alone but that in the place of his owne corporall presence which then was the obiect of their senses he would send them a comforter the Holy Ghost from heauen who should inhabit and sanctify their soules He promised them his Peace which should shew them a safe and quiet port wherin to ride in the very midst of all the difficulties and greatest daungers of this world He told thē in plaine tearmes that he loued them and he besought thē that as they loued him they would keepe his commaundements and that if they would doe so both he and his Father would come and visit and dwell with them He told them moreouer that euen his eternall Father loued them and that whatsoeuer they would akse they should be sure to haue whether they should aske it of himselfe or of his Father in his name yea and he desired them to aske somewhat of him that so their ioy might be full as if he had bid them try and be euen iudged by themselues whether he had said true or no. It serueth also to shew the very passionatenes as I may say of his loue (d) Agreat proofe of the tendernes the loue of our Lord Iesus that he was content to repeate the selfe same expressions of it many tymes To declare that he could not say that inough which he thought he could neuer doe too much We see how tenderly he called them his seruants his Disciples his friends and that he would tell them all his secrets his Sonnes and euen his little Sonnes whome yet he would not leaue as Orphans without a Father And now we shall heare him pray the eternall Father for them in most efficacious and obliging words That he would sanctify them in his Truth He presseth him by the highest points of diuine Rethoricke which could be though of He puts him in mind Of the eternall loue he bare the Sonne and of the faithfull seruice which he the Sonne had performed to the Father He also representeth the Fathers Mission of the Sonne and he avoweth That as the Father had sent him so had he seent them He begs the vnion of all his children with one another and of all those children with himselfe that so he being in God and they being in him they all might also come to be one in God In this (e) How earnest our Lord Iesus was for vs in his suyte to his eternall Father suite of his he is so importunate and proceeds so farre to vrge the same that in effect he tells the eternall Father that he will not be denyed therin Nor was he content that this should be an vnion of inferiour degree but an vnion with perfection and consummation Iust so as in a broath which is made of diuers meats there is an vnion of those meates in that broath and if they boyle in it till they euen boyle away there is not only an vnion of the meates but a consummation thereof into that broath And although in most places of holy Scripture when our Lord spake to his Apostles or Disciples he meant not that his words should be for them alone but that all the world should be comprehended in their persons to whome then he spake Yet his loue at that tyme was not content to intend vs only by way of inference but that dying flame would needs be sending out certaine flashes which yet extend themselues so farre as euen to lay expresse hold vpon euery one of our indiuiduall persons who haue the happines to be members of the holy Catholike Church Which they only are who beleeue the Doctrine of Christ our Lord by the preaching of the Apostles or of those Apostolicall men who haue a lawfull and direct mission from them And therfore he said for now I cite his owne very words I pray not only for them that is to say for his Apostles but for those others also who will beleeue in mee by their preaching that they be one as thou O Father art in mee and I in thee so they also may be one in vs and the world may beleeue that thou hast sent me And that glory which thou hast giuen me I haue giuen to them that they may be one thing as we are one thing In thee and thou in mee that they may be (f) A strāg desire for Christ our Lord to make to God in our behalfe consummated in one and the world may know that thou hast sent me and that thou hast loued them euen as thou hast loued me I will O Father that they whome thou hast giuen mee may be with me there where I shall be That they may see the glory which thou hast giuen mee because thou louedst me before the framing of the world O thou iust Father the world hath not known thee but I haue knowne thee and these haue knowne that thou hast sent me And I haue made my name known to thē and I will make it knowne that the same very loue wherwith thou hast loued me may be in thē I in thē These amongst many others were the words of our bleffed Lord in that last diuine sermon of his Wherby we may see the amourous and restlesse desire which tooke possession of his hart wherwith he sollicited his eternall Father that we might behold the glory which he had giuen to him and placing as it were his whole (g) Our Lord Iesus did place his honour in beeing Lord by his eternal Father for vs. credit vpon the obteyning of these fauours for vs when he begs it to the end that so the world might come to know that the Father had sent him As if he should haue said that in the face of the world he had giuen his word both for our Redemption and Sanctification Vnion and for our right to raigne in heauen with himselfe and that if the eternall Father should not make good that word the world might haue reason not to beleeue that he was as he had said the Sonne of God The horrour and terrour and sorrow of Christ our Lord togeather with his Prayer in the Garden CHAP. 54. NO sooner had he ended that speach but instantly he went out with his Disciples ouer the Torrent of Cedron Ioan. 18◠He did perhaps passe ouer that Torrent without once tasting any droppe therof but the whole world was a kind of Torrent of affliction to him his whole life was that way wherin he did not only tast but take deepe draughts therof before he exalted his head Psalm 109. by ascending vp to heauen Already did the sensible or inferiour part of his soule begin to be obscure and sad with care He was pleased to leaue it after a sort to it selfe for the increase of that paine which he desired to suffer For els his
you looke for some Traytour or seditious enemy of God and man your leuell is ill layed Though yet for the glory of God for the exercise of all vertue and for the recouery of the world from hell and sinne I am content to be mistaken for such a one Yet nothing could induce them to relent But as the manner is with men who when they are desperately resolued to doe a thing which their conscience telleth them that reason requires them to forbeare the greater the force of that reason is which is prest against them the more eagarly are they inflamed euen blinded with rage to worke their will As soone therfore as they had apprehēded bound him with far greater cruelty then any Christian hart knowes how to imagine it cannot be chosen but that they would dragge him more like a dogge then a man Not (g) What soeuer incommodity they indured was reuéged by the vpō our Lord. that he went vnwillingly but because the presse must needs be great and they were also in bloud against him and would all so desire to be the executioners of some particular affliction and affront vpon him that they could not but hinder one another And then if any of them were iustled if any chanced to st̄ble or fall vpon whom would they reuenge themselue but vpon him who with patience which was indeed diuine permitted himselfe to be carried in that painefull iourney to the howse of Annas vnder that cruell cudody which the accursed Iudas had aduised them to keep him in Of the blow which was giuen vpon the face of our B. Lord in the high Priests howse of the fall of S. Peter How our Lord was taxed first of Blasphemy and of the excessiue Loue of our Lord in dll these particulars CHAP. 60. SHALL I need to say that it shewed an infinite kind of loue in our Lord that he vvould vouchsafe to be presented before Annas and then before Cayphas at their seuerall hovvses Matt. 26. Luc. 22. Ioan. 18. and before all that race of persidious Ievves vvho thē very thē cōspired his death That he being the fountaine of vvisedom knovvledge and the King of glory vvould for our sakes be arraigned and be contented to passe vnder the censure of those slaues of the deuill vvho vvas his slaue And he in their prosecuting of that suite against him to maintaine that inuincible patience and profund silence notvvithstanding all their clamours and so seldome to haue opened that blessed mouth of his He referred himselfe that first tyme when he vvas examined about his Doctrine to the iudgment of themselues Ioan. 18. vvho had heard him teaching in the Temple And vvhen for saying but so in the vvay of anvvere to the high Priest a barbarous vvretch Ibid. vvho vvas attending in that Court knevv that he should please his betters by it stroocke that face vvith his polluted hand vvhich the Angells doe so reuere and reioyce to see he did not damne him nor strike him dead 1. Pet. 1. vvhich yet most easily most iustly he might haue done nor so much as sharpely rebuke or reprehend him for it though it vvere so levvd an affront as is neuer vvont to be put vpon any slaue in the vievv of Iustice But he asked him only vvith great meeknes why he strooke him if he had spoken well and if he had spoken ill Ibid. why did he not informe the Court against him By vvhich kind of plea our Lord though he vvere the Creatour of all things did not assume to himselfe the least aduantage aboue the vvickedest and basest thing aliue That so by suffering he might shevv hovv much he loued vs. For the more he suffered the more rich the Church vvas to be of merits so the more copious our Redemption Whilst these things vvere acting Psalm 120. in the house of Cayphas S. Peter who at the apprehension of Christ our Lord vvas fled avvay vvith the other Apostles for (a) Our Lord was euer in care to giue vs comfort our Lord IESVS vvas content to be vvholly abandoned euen by his dearest friends that it might serue for our comfort vvhen vve are forsaken by ours could find no resting place for his thoughts till together vvith S. Iohn he came after our Lord to the hovvse of Cayphas But vvhether it vvere that his countenance complayned of some perplexity or that the manner of his speach or habit made it be thought that he vvas a Disciple of Christ our Lord he vvas questioned by diuers and he denied his Maister to them all and said vvith oathes and protestations Marc. 14. that he did not so much as know the man A great offence in it self a iust punishmēt of a former fault which he had made in presuming vpon his ovvne strength For that vnspeakeable loue vvhich he bare to our blessed Lord vvhich vvas not only as of a friend to a friēd or as of a Disciple to his Doctour but of any indulgēt father who might halfe doate vpon a Sonne did seeme novv to him to be so cōnatural to his very soule as that he thought he could not loose it but vvith his life Wheras in very deed it vvas the meere guift of God and for such he ought to haue acknovvledged it and so distrusting himselfe he should haue confided in our Lord. It vvas therfore pleasing to our deere Redeemer to permit that denyall out of infinite loue both to S. Peter and to vs though it could not but goe the vvhile very deeply to his ovvne tender hart that S. Peter who was not only one of his friends but of his fauourities should forsweare that he did not so much as know him He (b) How our Lord did loue S. Peter euen in suffering him thus to full Ibid. loued S. Peter in suffering him thus to fall for therby he taught him how to stand more firmely afterward which is neuer to be done by any soule but vpon the ground of humility He loued him also most deerly in making him rise againe so soone both by the shew of his corporall presence to the others eyes of flesh and bloud and by the sweet pure light of his grace which was imparted to the eyes of his soule And that light had so much heat also with it as to draw vp the vapours which powred themselues down afterward at full speed through his cloudy eyes Our Lord be euer blessed for his owne infinite goodnes who in the bitterest of those sorrowes shewed such mercy and had such memory both of him and vs. For thus the world is filled with Sea-markes which instruct vs how to saile through the Tempest of this life towards the safe port of heauen That when we passe by a Iudas we may take heed of auarice and enuy because it ends in desperation And when we passe by a S. Peter we may forbeare to fall vpon selfe conceipt which will put vs vpon many sinnes and
which afterward will cost and can be only cured by penance It was also an act of excessiue charity in Christ our Lord to let him feed vpon the experience of his owne frailty that so hauing a resolution to make him the supreme Pastour of his Church and to giue him the keyes of pardoning Matt. 16. and reteyning sinnes he might easily pitty others since he had fallen into so deepe a pit himselfe and all others also might be kept very farre from presuming to confide in their owne vertue since euen S. Peter was not able to secure himselfe from growing worse But as for those (c) A defence of S. Peter from the reproach which sectaries would lay vpnn him Luc. 22. wicked people who in the hatred they haue to the Catholike Church would impute to the head therof that in this denyall of his he had lost his faith they are not so much as to be heard For the holy Scripture insinuates no such things but the very contrary since Christ our Lord himselfe declared how he had prayed already to his eternall Father that S. Peters faith might neuer faile and moreouer the voyce of reason and the streame of all the holy * Aug. de correp gra c. 8. Chryshom 81. in Matth. Theophilact in c. 22. Lucaeâ— alij passim Fathers doth condemne that errour And we see how soone he returned to bitter penance for his fault And it was farre from the loue of our Lord to suffer that this most excellent Apostle should fall out-right into infidelity who had neuer offended him before but venially and only out of too free a hart Nor euen now but by the meere mistaking of the confines of Grace and nature which were not so well set out till afterward by the comming of the holy Ghost And of this we are certaine that before he had loued our Lord most vnspeakably tenderly and at a clap he had left all the world (1) Matt. 9. for him and had cast himselfe into the very (2) Matt. 14 Sea to approach him and at the apprehension of our Lord he had drawne his (3) Ioan. 18. poore single sword in his defence against so many hundreds of Armed men and he had woÌ„ded one of the hoaâ—est of them it was nothing but euen (4) Mare 14. the very passion of loue to our Lord that seized his hart which could carry him so instantly into so apparaÌ„t danger as it must be for him to put himselfe in the high Priests howse when he was but then newly come from wounding his seruaÌ„t Malchus And though this sinne of denying our Lord IESVS were a very great one yet all the deuills of hell cannot make it more then of meere frailty and his pennance for it began almost at the very instant when it was committed and that continued till the last moment of his life At which tyme he gaue insteed of teares his bloud vpon a Crosse as our Lord had done for him but with his head turned downeward through humility And the holy Scripture sheweth Luc. 24. how our Lord appeared to him alone after his Resurrection we heare not that he once rebuked him for that former sinne And before his Ascension vve are very sure since the holy Ghost it selfe hath said so that our Lord making S. Peter declare the loue which he bare him at three seuerall tymes before the Apostles he gaue him the charge both of them and all the rest who would be either lambes or sheepe of his flocke Ioan. 15. Now since our Lord himselfe vvho vvas offended and vvho best can tell hovv deepely did so svveetly and so magnificently forgiue and forget S. Peters sinne it is but a signe of a cankered and malicious minde to be exagerating the same vpon al occasions And let them vvho are so insolent in taxing this Prince of the Apostles for his sinne of frailty in denying Christ our Lord vvho is the head Note at that tyme vvhen truth could be discerned but as by the light of a candle Let them I say take heed that dayly themselues be not committing farre greater sinnes against the same truth vvhilst they are not only denying but blaspheming and afflicting it in the body of Christ our Lord which is his Church vvhich truth Isalm 19. they yet may see as by the light of the Sunne For in she sunne God hath placed his Tabernacle vvhich S. Augustine vnderstandeth of his Church The vvicked Priests suborned false vvitnesses against our Lord but he vvould not so much as reproach them for it much lesse conuince them of levvd practice nor enen open his mouth vvhen it might any vvay haue bene in his ovvne discharge Only vvheÌ„ Cayphas coniured him in the name (d) The high seuerence which our Lord did carry to the name of God Matt 26. of God to say whether he were the Sonne of God or no both because he had the place of high Priest at that tyme and yet further for the high reuerence vvhich he carryed to the holy name of God his ansvvere vvas expresse and cleere though short and meeke That he was the sonne of God And heerpon they declared him to be vvorthy of death as a blasphemer O false painted face of the world how vayne and deceiptfull are thy iudgments and how many are there now a dayes who if they should see a Cayphas sit with great solemnity authority and attendance vpon the cause of Christ our Lord who were coÌ„temptibly staÌ„ding at a barre and should heere a Cayphas affirme that he were an ennemy to the word of thé Lord or the State would infallibly ioyne with him against our Lord be drawne by those vayne appearances to beleeue for the tyme that they said true But whatsoeuer the thought of the people was of Christ our Lord his enamoured hart did so deadly thirst after their good and ours vpon any termes as that he being God did not abhorro to be accounted a blasphemer of God so that by the applicatioÌ„ of that pretious merit to vs we might of slaues become the Sonnes of his eternall Father And (e) The loue of our Lord Iesus to vs made him easily ouercomâ— all difficulties Ibid. howsoeuer it was an vnspeakeable detestation of that thing which raigned in his most reuerent soule yet was his loue to the name and imputation therof in effect as vnspeakeable since the more deeply he had cause to be auerted from it the more aboundantly he deserued by it for vs. But the Priest cried our Blasphemy what need haue we now of any witnesses Those hypocryticall eyes were cast vp to heauen the garments were rent and our Lord without his answering any one word was esteemed and decreed by them all to be worthy of death We haue read of Saints who haue bene armed with patience against all other affronts but when they haue bene called Heretiques they could not chuse but breake their pace and declare
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
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
her and the whole world For he gaue this blessed mother of his to be the mother of S. Iohn and in his person of all mankind by these words of his Woman behold thy Sonne And he gaue to S. Iohn and to all the world in him a tytle of calling and knowing the sacred Virgin by the name of Mother when he sayd to him Behold thy Mother Ibid. So sweet a songe did this dying Swan of ours deliuer so rich did he make his holy Catholike Church when departing out of the world he left it such a legacy as this wherof heerafter I shall speake a part Of the darcknes which possessed the world and the excessiue desolation which our Lord endured with incomparable Loue whilst he was saying to his eternall Father Deus Deus meus vt quid dereliquisti me CHAP. 72. ALL these former seuerall words so full of diuine consolation and instruction were vttered with vnspeakeable loue by our blessed Lord soone after the rearing of his Crosse with himselfe vpon it And then did a kind of darkenes ouerspread all the earth Matt. 17. Marc. 15. It was not possible that it should grow at that tyme by any naturall cause of an Eclipse for then it could not haue lasted so very long that is to say three whole howers Ibid. Ab hora sexta vsque ad nonam Besides that the Sunne Moone were then in such relation and position in respect of one another as that the Sunne could be no way Eclipsed then And in fine if this darknes had growne by an Eclipse it could not haue reached to be vniuersall ouer the whole earth as yet the holy Scripture saith it was and so it hath bene testified and proued not only by the EuaÌ„gelists whose word is of all authority with vs Christians but also by S. Denis Areopagita See this Apud Bell. de 7. verb. Dom. Lucianus the Martyr Tertullian others who wrote therof at once in seuerall parts of the world Besides that Phlegon a Pagan which may serue for the confusion of Iewes and Atheists in this point affirmeth how in that yeare and vpon that very day and hower when our Lord did suffer The day was turned into so expresse night as that the starrs were then seene in the firmament This (a) The reason of that miraculous darcknes which did ouerspred the earth darkenes was drawne vpon the world by the miraculous power of God to declare the perfect innocency of our Lord IESVS and the enormity of their sinne who had condeÌ„ned him whose sentence he reuersed after this omnipoteÌ„t manner And as in some respects it could not but be of excessiue terrour to see a Noone day turne Mid-night as it were at an instant and that without any naturall cause at all so yet it was an effect of the infinite loue of God and of the former prayer of Christ our Lord when he beged the forgiuenes of their sinnes For this was then a meanes of the conuersion and of the pennance afterward of all that troope of people as S. Luke affirmeth wherby the greater part of them is only to be vnderstood who continued till the end of the Passion Luc. 27. For they saw the wonderfull things which happened and they returned into the citty beating euery one his brest through excesse of sorrow And so euery one of them went raysing a Trophey to the infinite mercy of our Redeemer (b) The infinite mercy of our Lord God who gaue such abundance of effectuall grace euen to theÌ„ who had made theÌ„selues his deadly enemies and that before he was taken downe from the Crosse as if it had bene euen in reward of all their wickednes and cruelty agaynst him But as now the whole world was ouer-wrought with a material darkenes by the miraculous hiding of the sunne which did such homage to the Creatour of all things as by absenting it selfe to make a kind of veâ—â—e wherby his nakednes might the lesse appâ—â—â—e so also were the harts in effect of the whâ—â—◠〈◊〉 â—â—orld and especially of those cruell persoâ—â— tours growne spiritually darke by the abundance of sinne which puts out the light of grace whersoeuer it enters Now to these two kinds of darkenes which were at that tyme in the world and worldly men another kind of obscurity did correspond in Christ our Lord in such sort as that we may securely affirme that since the world was created and inhabited there was neuer any such generall darkenes as that For by the light as a man may say of that darkenes euen halfe an eye would easily discerne how mightily the Power the Wisedome the Sanctity the Angelicall beauty the Princely Maiesty the diuine Dignity and the incomparable Felicity and glory of the true and naturall Sonne of God (c) The darcknes of desolation of Christ our Lord and how his supreme dignity was also obscured was obscured at that tyme. The sunne was doubly gone for besides the darkning of the materiall Sunne himselfe who was the true Sunne seemed no more a Sunne but rather a moone and that all Eclipst For as the Moone when she is Eclipst though she haue her globe all bright towards the heauen yet is it all blake towards the world iust so Christ our Lord though in the superiour part of his soule he saw God and was as high in glory as now when he is raigning in heauen yet in the inferiour part therof there was a most profound darkenes and desolation This drew out of his mouth those words of the Psalme wherof it seemes he was in coÌ„templation at that tyme. Matt. 27. Psalm 21. Deus Deus meus vt quid dereliquistime My God my God why hast thou for saken mee Misterious words which were vttered to shew the vnspeakeable affliction of Christ our Lord. Who for the greater glory of God the Father and through the excesse of his loue to vs and for the more abundant propitiation and satisfaction of our sinnes for the more complete crowning of his owne humility patience and supreme purity of mind was pleased to want all kind of prorection which might be of any comfort to him In other respects he was as hath bin said so conioyned and vnited to Almighty God as that it was wholy impossible that euen for any one instant he should euer be separated or abandoned by him For as God he was vnited by way of Essence to the Father as man he was vnited to the Diuinity by hypostaticall Vnion Bell. Ser. de sept verbis as a soule which saw the face of God from the very first instant of his Conception he was vnited to him by the Vnion of glory And as that vessell of sanctity which was not only all filled but ouerflowed by the holy Ghost whose guifs he receiued not according to any set or limitted measure but beyond all measure I say as he was this vessel of sanctity he was vnited to God by will and
Grace And from any one of these Vnions not only could he neuer be separated indeed but not so much as doubt that he might be so To say therfore that he was forsaken by God in respect of any of those former wayes of Vnion is grieuously to blaspheme the God of heauen and earth and to prophane the dignity and Maiesty of the soule of Christ our Lord and impiously to interprete and attribute that excesse of his diuine charity to the deepest dishonour which he could receâ—ue as that most wicked (*) Caluin Lib. 2. Instit. cap. 26. §. 10.21.12 in harm mc. 27. Matth. Sectary hath presumed to doe Affirming that our Lord despayred of Gods mercy vpon the Crosse when he vttered those words And that he felt the very paines of the damned in his soule the greatest wherof is the knowledge and feeling of hauing lost Almighty God And although he will pretend that he exalts the mercy of God heerby since God suffered his Sonne to endure the very paynes of hell for the reliefe of man yet besides the hideous blasphemy which these words doe euen of themselues inuolue the wretched Heretique is so blind withall as not to know or so wicked as not to confesse (d) A demonstratioÌ„ wher by that blasphemy is defected that the dignity of Christ our Lord was such in regard of the hypostaticall vnion with the diuinity that any one single sigh alone of his being applyed by faith and charity had bene of merit to saue innumerable millions of worlds of meÌ„ though euery of them had bene as wicked as that most wicked man himselfe If therfore one only sigh had beene inough for the redemption of the world then certainly those other many and most sublimely accomplished acts of vertue which that happy soule of Christ our Lord did worke through the whole course of his diuine life being accoÌ„panyed by those vnspeakable torments which he endured with a kind of infinite loue to vs in his sacred passion before his death will make his redemption of vs most superabundantly copious without needing to haue recourse to any such impious and hereticall blasphemy as that miserable man suckt from the authour of lyes to be dispersed by the disciples of his lewd Doctrine The Catholike Doctrine the truth is that which hath already bene declared That our Lord IESVS was content to be depriued of all sense feeling of diuine comsort which he expressed by those dolorous words of his And his pleasure also was that we should be told that he vttered them with a loud voyce Ibid. To (e) Why our Lord spake those words with a loud voyce the end that euen from the most remote corners of our hard harts we might heare theÌ„ and adore him for them And now as he asked not that question with a lowd voyce as if the eternall Father could not haue heard him if he should haue spokeÌ„ softly so neither did he aske it at all as not knowing or needing to be certified why he was so forsaken by him since our Lord knew all things And how should he be ignorant of that which so much concerned himselfe he who knew the secrets of all harts and how the eternall Father would dispose therof Colos 23 and in whome the all treasures of knowledge wisedom were heaped vp But he asked that question to the end that we might seeke for the Answere of it and seeking it might find it and finding it out might learne to know both the grieuousnes of sinne therby which was so sharpely punished vpon Gods owne only Sonne the infinite torments from which we are to be deliuered by such a costly meanes the inestimable value of grace for the purchase wherof to our vse Christ our Lord was content to sel whatsoeuer he could part withall both in body and reputation euen in the inferiour part of his very soule the vnspeakeable glory of the kingdome of heauen which was only to be opened thus by the Golden maister-key of the infinite loue of Christ our Lord. For vpon the only turning of this key towards vs those lockes do all fly open wherin the eternity of selicity is treasured vp for vs in the house of God Of the excessiue loue which our Lord Iesus did expresse by the silence and solitude wherwith he endured those vnspeakeable torments vpon the Crosse and how the whyle he was negotiating our cause with God CHAP. 73. THIS Passion opens the doore of eternall felicity to vs but heere we see how for the tyme it did shut the gate of comfort against our B. Lord. For betwene the end of his three first speaches and this complaint which he made to his eternall Father which was the first of his fower last there passed vpon the point of three full howers during all which tyme this Sonne of the Virgin did not once so much as open his blessed mouth O that our Lord would heere graunte the suite of his humble seruants whilst they desire to haue some sight and tast of that dolorous condition wherin then he was lodged for our sinnes O that we might partake some little part of that amazement wherwith al the quires of heauenly spirits did abound when they saw their Creator planted in the ayre vpon a Crosse deformed from head to foote with torments prophaned with blasphemies attended in sileÌ„ce by darkenes yet withall so far from taking reuenge of any dishonor that had bene done him as that he suffered still with entire submission and with inuincible loue both of God and man But that which still me thinks makes the rest more strange and wherin more of the God appeares is that straÌ„ge kind of silence (a) The admirable silence of our Lord and how he did not once coÌ„plavne either of his paynes or our sinne wherof I spake before and that totall absence of expressing any manner of complaint by so much as any one word yea or euen sigh or groane It was said before that our Lord himselfe had inuited the world to behold the case wherin he was and if we were content to do so vpon the summons of Pilats Ecce homo how much more are we to six our harts vpon this tragicall figure of our owne making now that we are called to it by Christ our Lord. I cannot thinke of this strange spectacle what me thinkes I would nor can I yet say what I thinke but in weake and cloudy manner Our Lord giue vs grace to thinke and say heerof as we ought and that we any doe as he deserues But certainly since he hath giuen vs such faculties of mind as wherwith to wonder at strange things his meaning is that we should imploy them vpon such an obiect as is his bottomles hart in this tyme of his hanging vpoÌ„ the Crosse For then was he sacrificing himself vpon that Crosse as vpoÌ„ the Altar of whole world at once Then (b) The infinite affaires our Lord did
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
prooued to be the spirituall mother of all mankind and of the mercifull prouidence of our Lord God therein CHAP. 80. THE sinne of eating the forbidden fruite was no sooner committed but God did curse and threaten the Serpent in this māner Inimicitias ponam inter te mulierem semen tū semen illius ipsa conteret caput tuum c. I will put emnities betwene thee and the woman and betwene thee with thy seed and her with her seed and shee shall bruize thy head c. Now this woman and her seed is Christ our Lord and our B. Lady togeather withall the faithfull who were to follow And the serpent and his head is the deuill all his wicked members whether they be Pagās Iewes Turkes Heretikes or loose Catholikes In (a) Our B. Lady was Preordained 〈◊〉 trīph ouer sinne hell this Spirituall warre so great honour is done to our Blessed Lady by God himselfe that by him it is fore-tould that she shall be victorious therin For howsoeuer the Sectaries of this age out of a malignity which they carry against this euer-blessed Virgin will not haue it to be read ipsa cōteret shee shall bruize the serpents head but ipse cōteret that is Christ our Lord shall doe it yea howsoeuer diuers of the auncient Fathers doe according to the Hebrew letter read it Ipse though not out of any such reason as is suggested by these aduersaries of her honour yet it is plaine that the vulgar translation which is of the greatest authority of any other in the whole Catholike Church and was made by S. Ierome who besides his sanctity was the learnest man in those tongues who liued thē or perhaps hath liued since in the world doth read Ipsa and not Ipse Apud Canisium l. 5 c. 9. Ambr. de suga saeculi l. 7. Aug. lib. 11. c. 36. Greg. lib. 1. mor. c. 38. Beda in Genesim Bern ser 2. sup mis sus and so also doth S. Ambrose S. Augustine S. Gregory Venerable Bede S. Bernard and many more And indeed whether the lection be Ipse or Ipsa the sense will fall out to be in effect the same Because if we read Ipsa the B. Virgin is to be vnderstood to haue this priuiledge from God through Christ our Lord and though we should read Ipse yet we know euen therby that Christ our Lord was not pleased to do it but by her and he expressed for her honour that it should be done by the seed of her and that none but such as are her seed shall euer be able to ouercome the Serpent Vpon this reason it is that the holy Fathers are so frequent and expresse in styling our blessed Lady Mater viuentium The mother of such as liue by grace as Eue was called Mater viuetium the mother of such as liued by nature though afterward she deserued both to be accompted and called Mater morientium the mother of such as dy by sinne Hieron de Scrip. Eccles Epiph. l. 1 to 2. hist 31. S. Irenaens whome S. Epiphanius and S. Hierome calleth the Successour of the Apostles the Disciple of S. Policarpe and the Martyr of Christ who florished within an hundred and odd yeares of Christ our Lord himselfe doth often and at large and expresly shew the cōparison which in some respects is to be made between our B. Lady and our Grandmother Eue Irenaeus l. 3. contra haeres c. 33. but I will only cite one passage or two out of him As Eue proouing disobedient grew to be a cause of death both to her selfe the whole race of mankind so Mary hauing a man predestinated for that purpose but yet she being still a Virgin and being also obediene was made a cause of saluation both to her selfe and all mankind And shortly after he affirmeth That that knot which was tyed by the disobedience of Eue Lib. 5. aduersus haeres c. 19. was loosened by the faith of Mary And in another place he saith expresly that the Virgin Mary by her obedience to God was made the aduocate of the Virgin Eue. Iustinus the Martyr who was yet more ancient then Irenaeus wryteth thus of Eue our blessed Lady In dial c̄ Tryphone A man was borne of a Virgin that so by the same way wherby disobedience had entred by the same might pardon be obtayned For Eue being yet a Virgin by conceauing that word of the serpent brought forth disobedience and death but the Virgin Mary after she had conceaued faith with gladnes the Angell Gabriell bringing her that ioyfull message made answere thus Be it vnto me according to thy word Tertullian saith Cap. 7. carne Christi Eue beleeued the serpent Mary beleeued Gabriell that which the former sinned in beleeuing the latter by beleeuing did blot out S. Austen sayth that the disobedient Eue deserued punishment but Mary by her obedience obtayned the pardon of it S. Epiphanius who is his auncient sayth Lib. 3. haeresi 78. That Eue was made the cause of death to men for death came by her into the world but Mary was the cause of life by whome life was begotten to vs and the Sonne of God came into the world by her And where sinne abounded there did grace ouer abōd and whence death proceeded thence did life also proceed to the end that death might be exchanged into life And againe he sayth els where From Eue all the generatiō of mankind is descended in earth but heere this life is brought into the world by Mary that she might bring forth him who liueth and she is made the mother of the liuing S. Chrysostome sayth Hom. interdict arboris ad Adam apud Canis l. 4. de Mar. Deip. l. 16. apud Coc. cium lib. 3. Thesau art 50. super fignum magnum de laud. vir apud Can. ibid. death came by Adā life came by Christ. The Serpent seduced Eue Mary gaue consent to Gabriell The seducing of Eue brought death but the consent of Mary begot a Sauiour to the world S. Bernard sayth as to Eue Thou wert too cruell by whome that serpent did infuse that deadly poyson euen into thy very husband but the Beleeuing Mary did reach forth the Antidote or remedy both for men and women The former ministred errour this latter the propitiation of errour the former suggested that offence and the later brought forth the redemption of the same Make hast therfore sayth he in another place O Eue to Mary Let this daughter answere for her mother let her remoue the reproach of her mother let her satisfy the Father for the mother for behold if man were cast downe by a woman he is not to be raysed vp but by a women With the same facility I might alleadge a great number of other holy Fathers to proue both the proportions and disproportions which runne betwene our Grandmother Eue and the most blessed Mother of God and vs the All-immaculate
Virgin But this which I haue already said will suffice to shew how the one was a type and figure of the other and that the holy Fathers of the Church declare that howsoeuer they are both our Mothers in seuerall respects yet that the East and West are not so farre off from one another as this latter holy humble Eue doth in sanctity excell the former And now to the point of her being the Mother of vs all see further how * De sanct Virgin c. 6. Ambr. apud Bonau in spec Virg. c. 8◠Cyrillus Alex. hom con tra Nestorium S. Augustine saith she is the spirituall Mother of the members of the Church for as much as she cooperated to the end that the faithfull might be borne in the same Church S. Ambrose also saith If Christ be the brother of all beleeuers how can she choose but be the mother of Christ And so doth S. Bonauenture deliuer the blessed Virgin to be not only the particular Mother of Christ our Lord but the vniuersall mother of all the faithfull And S. Cyrill giues a massy reason heerof when speaking as to the blessed Virgin he professeth himselfe in these words By thee all those creatures who are retayned in the errour of Idolatry are conuerted to the knowledge of truth But the (b) An excellent cōsideration of S. Bernard vpō the sweet prouidēce of our Lord God concerning the B. Vir. cited by Pa. Arias Bern. ser sup missus est holy S. Bernard shall conclude this point when he saith to this effect Christ our Sauiour did suffice for the reparation of mankind because all our sufficiency doth come to vs by him and all that also wherof we haue need for our saluation Yet was it most conuenient for our good and comfort that he should be associated in this reparation of ours by such a companion as might be a mother and such a mother as that she being the mother of God might be also ours This holy Saint in the same place doth giue many reasons heerof full of conueniency and consolation which heere I shall not need to represent In his booke de imitat B. Virg. But it appeares clearly inough that as Father Arias notes for the multiplication of mankind in the course of nature God framed our first Father Adam And notwithstanding that he might haue giuen sufficiency of power to him alone for the multiplication of mankind if he had bene so pleased yet he would not doe it but he resolued to giue him a companion and helper which was our Grandmother Eue according to the sweet disposition of his diuine prouidence In the selfe same name Arias l. de imitat B. Virg. when the world was lost by sinne our Lord God hauing resolued to beget and multiply iust men who might be heires to the kingdome of heauen he gaue his only begotten Sonne to be Incarnate who by his life and death might beget and breed vs to saluation And although it be most true that this Father of ours is all sufficient by himselfe alone to performe this worke of our Regeneration because he is of infinite vertue and who according to the rigour of Iustice doth merit grace and glory for his children and doth obtaine pretious fauours and satisfy for all kind of sinne yet neuerthelesse God was pleased according to the designe of his owne excellent wisedome to giue to Christ our Lord the most sacred and most holy of all meere creatures his All-immaculate Virgin Mother Mary to be a companion to himselfe in the spirituall generation of the world as the mother therof who might assist and serue him in so great a worke Not by way of praying for vs or of iustifying vs or of giuing vs grace or glory as of her owne guift for al that is proper to the redeemer and Sauiour of the world but to the end that she might concurre to the reducing of sinners by the way of sweetnes and loue interceding and praying for them and offering vp for their good all those excellent operations seruices which she performed in this life to her blessed Sonne our Lord and so obtayning celestiall fauours for them and facilitating their way to heauen by discouering the infinite mercy and suauity of Almighty God to the eyes of their mind And if (c) A cleer consequence 1. Cor. 4. S. Paul might say in the word of truth I haue begotten you to the Ghospell how much more might this blessed Lady say it in a most eminent manner who did beare and bring forth our Lord IESVS and did both therby and otherwise so admirably and immediatly cooperate towards the saluation of the whole world Not only do many particular Fathers ascribe the title of Mother to our blessed Lady but the holy Catholike Church doth ioyntly glory in calling her by that sweet name and esteemes her selfe happy that she may haue recourse to her as such Nor giues she only way to all her faithfull children to acknowledge this maternity of hers in priuate manner but in that publike Office In the Office of the Church wherin she celebrates the prayse and memory of her Spouse at all the howers both of euery day and night as one who well vnderstands by that spirit of sanctity and truth in which she is guided that no honour doth more delightfully redound to our Lord IESVS then that which magnifyeth the happy creature who gaue him a body of her owne all-immaculate flesh and bloud The externall Excellencies and attractiuenesse of our Blessed Lady The reasons of congruity which prooue her innocency and purity and the innumerable motiues which oblige the world to admire loue her CHAP. 81. TO the end that we may be inuited and incouraged to gratitude towards Almighty God for giuing his glorions mother to be also ours and that we may both conceaue of her dignity comply with our own duty as is fit I wil procure to shew both what kind of excellent creature she is in her selfe of how admirable vse and aduantage to vs. Touching the (a) The glorious and holy extraction of our B. Lady Nobility of her descent it wil suffice to heere what S. Bernard saith There is somewhat of the celestiall Ber. ser super Signum magnum Apoc. 12. which shineth in the progeny of Mary That euidently she is descended of Kings that she is of the seed of Abraham that she is sponge from the stocke of Dauid And if this be little let it be further added that by a speciall priuiledge of sanctity she was knowne to haue bene granted to the world from heauen That long before she was pointed at from aboue to our forefathers That she was prefigured by misticall miracles and fore tould by propheticall Oracles For as much as may further concerne the sanctity of her extraction we must know that it came frō the tribe of Leui as wel as from that of Iuda For howsoeuer seuerall tribes were not generally
the mother of God The B. (a) A iust consideration of the excellency of our B. Lady drawen from he◠her high Office Hebr. 1. Apostle inferred the supreme excellēcy of Christ our Lord from the name of Sonne which God had giuen him and that therfore he did infinitely excell the Angells For to which of them saith the Apostle was it sayd at any tyme Thou art my Sonne this day haue I begotten thee Now the same kind of discourse hath also place in honour of our B. Lady For since togeather with the name Office the God of power and wisedome is wont to giue all the abilities and ornaments which may concerne the same what thought can there be that there should be any thing in any meere creature yea or in all of them put togeather which might presume to compare with the superexcellent mother of the immortall God And therfore it is no speculation or streined conceite but a consequence which flowes apace or rather flyes as a man may say downe the hill That as the dignity of Gods mother is incomparably beyond the dignity of Patriarks Prophets Precursours Apostles and whatsoeuer is high or holy in the kingdome of God so also doth her sanctity exceed theirs as farre as a mountaine exceeds a moate or as the sea exceeds any shallow brooke And the meanest act of vertue which euer was practised by this B. Lady did in the intensenes of it farre and farre excell the greatest of that kind which euer was exercised by any other except her Sonne our only Lord Sauiour Farre be it from any Christian to conceaue by the reserued manner and speach which sometymes is held by Christ our Lord to our B. Lady in holy Scripture wherby he did but meane to teach the world certaine lessōs or els to deliuer some hidden mysteries that he could haue any intention to rebuke her as faulty in the least degree yea or euen to reprehend her as not being worthy of all honour But it is to be considered that our Lord IESVS was a Priest after the order of Melchisedeth Hebr. 5. 7. of whome it is recorded that he was without Father and mother As man our Lord was without a Father and though he had such an excellent mother as we know yet in the eye of the world he would giue little notice therof at some particular tymes any more then to that eye he would giue any knowledge of the dignity of his owne diuine persō Luc. 1. When our (b) Of the great honour which is done to our B. Lady by Saints by Angells and by our Lord God himselfe Luc. ibid. B. Lady and the Angell were in conference togeather we haue partly seene the honour and homage which was performed to her by that celestial Spirit a high Prince of Gods heauenly Court When our B. Lady was single with S. Elizabeth in the performance of her Office of humble charity we know how that Saint that Prophetesse that mother of the great Precursour of Christ that Kinswoman of our B. Lord was in confusion to receaue the honour of a visit from her And she was drawne to forget as a man may say euen the very rules of modesty by crying out with a lowd voyce in admiration of the blessed Virgins excellency and felicity When Christ our Lord was priuate not in the exercise of his publicke Office of Doctour of the world in which priuacy he continued for thirty of the three thirty yeares of his whole life who can doubt with how perfect profound reuerence that Sonne of God and very God would be sure to carry himselfe to his sacred mother The holy Scripture expresly saith that when he returned frō being found in the Temple he continued subiect Luc. ◠not only to our B. Lady who was his natural and most worthy mother but to S. Ioseph also who was but his putatiue Father It would (c) Note the force of his reason therfore be strange if when we are taught by so expresse euidence what honour was done to this sacred Virgin by Angells and Saints and euen by God himselfe in this mortall life during those thirty yeares of his subiection to his parents excepting that only instant tyme of his teaching in the Temple at twelue yeares of age we should argue any vnderualew to haue bin in the mind of such a Sonne towards such a mother or of any irreuerence or want of care and due respect in the mind of such a mother towards such a Sonne And all this but only vnder the colour of some words which our Lord might say to her in the hearing of others at such tymes as when he considered her not so much as he knew her to be the mother of himselfe whe was God but as she seemed in all appearāce to be which was a carpenters wife Angells in heauen but because as it was incomparably Superiour to it in proportion so yet it carried a kind of resemblance in the condition therof So that if any man should aske me what was the true name and as it were the very nature of Christ our Lord I would say God Incarnate and so also if he should aske me the same question concerning the Mother of God I would not doubt but to say that she were Vertue or Sāctity or the Angelicall nature incarnate and that the perfection of all created sanctity vnder that alone of Christ our Lord had taken vpon it the habit of her holy flesh and bloud therby to illuminate and inflame the world And that (f) Our Lord Iesus is the only mediatour of Redemption and our B. Lady is the most excellent mediatour of Intercession vnder him to God the father and between him self vs. as Christ our Lord was to be the Mediatour of Redemption betwene God the Father and man so was she vnder him to be the most excellent Mediatour of intercession betwene vs and him as the holy S. Bernard doth expresly affirme How the sanctity of our B. Lady doth much import to the honour of Christ our Lord. How notwithstanding all her excellency we anow her to be nothing in respect of Christ our Lord as God and by innumerable degrees inferiour to him as man and how much more honourably our Lord redeemed her then others CHAP. 83. IF a man who were full of want should need the helpe of a woman towards the obtayning accomplishing of some honorable and vsefull designe of his and if she should cheerfully concurre therin and so the end desired should be obtayned by him could that man be so wicked as not to acknowledge the merit of that other creature and not to inrich and honour her as far as her condition would beare especially if he were mighty and not to be made the poorer by it Or at least if the case should be so put as that his owne future honour were so interessed in the honour excellēcy of that other as that they two
the world by way of generation from her most holy parēts That her soule was so inriched in contemplation of the merits of her only Sonne IESVS Christ our Lord and that by him and him alone she was redeemed but (f) How much more excellently our B. Lady was redeemed by Christ our Lord then any other but yet after a more excellent manner then other creatures as became the dignity and loue of such a Sonne to such a mother For whereas he redeemed all others by applying his merit to their soules in the way of redresse and remedy of the sinnes eyther originall or actuall into which they had fallen he had applyed it to hers by way of preseruatiue and for the keeping it euer in perfect innocency And this kind of more noble Redemption is so far from hauing diminished the glory of Christ our Lord as he is God as that it maketh a cleere demonstration not only of his infinite goodnes and power in regard of her but of his infinite wisedome in respect of himself Since both at all other tymes and especially in the Conception of this Queene of heauen he had a soueraigne care of her sanctity and did so studiously prepare and preserue that holy tree vntoucht by the dew or mist or euen breath of any imperfection or sinne wherof himselfe meant to be the fruite Of the great eminency of our Blessed 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 purisy our soules CHAP. 84. THIS is therefore that which Catholicks teach concerning the excellency of the mother of God who are farre from fancying that she is any more then a meere creature and who belieue that she originally oweth all her greatnes to the Grace and goodnes of our Lord God But so also doe they belieue and teach that amōgst all the most excellent creatures of God this one doth incomparably excell Sicut lilium inter spinas Cant. 2. as a beautifull and odoriferous Lilly would doe amongst a cōpany of vnpleasant and ill fauoured thornes A beautiful Lilly she was both planted in the Garden of God wherin God planted himselfe as in a Garden Candens folijs virgultas aureas in caelum versas emittens The pure leaues of her excellent conuersation shining brightly in the eyes of all and the cogitations and affections of her soule being highly raysed towards heauen by fyery but most sweet contemplation And albeit this princely mother of God and vs were not free in nature of her selfe from the shame or spot of sinne as her Diuine Sonne was yet had she the high priuiledges of pure and perfect Sanctity granted to her with another manner of care and loue then fauours vse to be imparted by earthly Princes Who yet are wont to be so good to their Queens-mothers as gaue occasion to old Vlpian to record this custome L. Princeps ff de legibus Augusta licet legibus soluta non sit Princeps iamen eadem illi priuilegia concedit quae ipse habet Though the Queene saith he be not free in rigour from the law yet doth the King impart those priuiledges to her which himselfe inioyes In so much as that the incomparable Doctour S. Augustine that bright and burning lampe of the Church of God being in argument with the Heretique Pelagians who extolled the dignity of mans nature beyond the lymits of true faith and whome therfore the Saint was to represse as much as might be by declaring the great generall deformity of mankind and he doth therfore conclude all the world to lye vnder sinne he yet doth wholy except this blessed mother of God lib. 1. de nat gra c. 36. And he saith that euen for the honour of her Sonne our Lord he will not enter into so much as any questiō of her whensoeuer there is speach of sinne For we know sayth he that since she deserued to beare him who had no sinne she was supplyed with such store of grace as serued for the totall conquest of all sinne That Eagle (b) S. Augustine saw that truth with cleere eyes and if the brightnes of our B. Ladyes beauty and glory doe strike the weake sight of owles into a dazeling Let them in Gods name and by the helpe of his gratious hand procure to purify and fortify that sight of theirs and cease (c) The way to conceaue rightly of our B. Lady is to purify our owne soules to quarrell with the sunne for being so cleere For so will they quickly find and farre more to the comfort of their harts thē I can make thē know that our high veneration to the sacred Virgin is so far from derogating from God as that it adds vnspeakeably to the notion which we haue of him and to the supreme adoration which we carry to him For since notwithstanding that our B. Lady is proclaymed by vs to be such a world of purity and perfection as we belieue her to be which yet both came from the liberall guift of God and in comparison of him it is not only not much but euen very nothing at all how easily and yet how highly doe we grow to magnify and dignify God himselfe by the consideration and confession of her greatnes And therfore hauing cleered this doubt and discharged this scruple which in many is made but by hypocrisy and enuy though it goe maskt vnder the pretence of piety and zeale which forbids them as they say to belieue so honourably of our Blessed Lady I proceed for their instruction and our consolation to shew how the spirit of God hath declared it selfe by holy Scriptures and holy Fathers in her honour and fauour Of the great Excellency of our Blessed Lady set out by the Figures Appellations and Allusions of the old Testament CHAP. 85. VVE are now to looke backe vpon what was said and shewed before how Adam was a figure of Christ our Lord Eue of our B. Lady we are also to consider that as there are many other figures of him so are there also of her throughout the whole currēt of the old Testament according to that which was cited before out of holy S. Bernard Ser. super Signum magnum That this Queene of heauen was both cleerly foreseene particularly misteriously foretold by the holy writers who liued vnder the old law The principall figures of Christ our Lord after Adam were Abel Isaac Iacob Ioseph Gen. 2.4.22.29.37 Exod. 2. Ios 1. Iud. 13.1 Reg. 17.3 Reg. 2. Ion. 2. Moyses Iosue Samson Dauid Salomon and the Prophet Ionas And in the selfe same manner God was pleased that as there was an admirable simpathy and conueniency betwene this diuine Sonne and his Blessed Mother in other things so also there should be in this That her excellency in like manner should be prefigured both by Persons and Things throughout the course of holy Scripture Our
prerogatiues prayses of this most gratious most glorious Queene of heauen the ornament both of this and the other world wherby she is delineated in the old Testament may be well content to vanish in the sight of those others which are most perfectly declared in the new The wonderfull excellencies of our B. Lady which are declared in the new Testament be heere set forth CHAP. 86. LET therfore that be first remēbred which was touched before vpon other occasiōs that the holy Scripture is wont to expresse it self in few words that they vse to be deliuered in a very positiue māner least otherwise the earnestnes of asseueration might derogate from the authority of that infallible spirit of truth wherby they are written Let it be also considered that little is said in the whole Euangelicall history of Christ our Lord himselfe in the way and vnder the Tytle of expresse prayse For he was to giue himselfe for a perfect patterne of profōd humnility which permits not a man either to prayse himselfe or to like that it be done by his next fellowes His resolution was that his workes should speake of him and so they did and this was also the case of our Blessed Lady who as she was next him in grace so was she also next him in humility But yet neuerthelesse as it was necessary that Christ our Lord should be declared to the world for the Sauiour of it and for the Sonne of God and of the Blessed Virgin wherby the incomparable excellency of his person was to be discerned and the admirable perfection of his actions discouered so by a necessary consequence of that relation which runs betwene a Sonne and his mother the dignity of her person who was the mother of God must also needs be incidētly not only incidently but expresly also shewed and the matchlesse sanctity of all her actions and operations therby inferred For notwitstanding all the reseruation which I haue said to be vsed in holy Scripture let vs see if it haue bin able to containe it selfe from magnifying our Blessed Lady euen in other termes then by only saying that she was the Mother of God Which word alone had yet bene sufficient to aduance her as farre aboue al the world of creatures both in heauen and earth as a single figure being placed before a whole million of Cyphers would expresse a number which would scarce be told I will first in a word point out the priuiledges and prayses of this perpetuall Virgin which are mentioned in holy Scripture in effect as they ere raunged togeather by Canisius lib. 1. c. 2. that deuout and learned seruant of hers And from thence I will proceed to a short consideration of those diuine vertues which were imparted to her togeather with those prerogatiues which were necessarily to be supposed to be in her by those prayses For of her and to her it was said by the Archangell Gabriel and note that he said it not as in his owne person but as in the person of God himselfe whose Ambassador he was All haile O thou full of Grace Luc. 2. Our Lord is with thee Blessed art thou amongst women Thou hast found grace with God Thou shalt beare a Sonne and thou shalt call his name Iesus That Sonne of thine shall be great and he shall be called the Sonne of the most High Our Lord God will giue him the seate of his Father Dauid He shall raigne in the house of Iacob for euer and that kingdome shall haue no end Vpon thee shall the holy Ghost descend and the vertue of the most high shall ouershadow thee And so therfore that which of thee shall be borne holy shall be called by the Sonne of God Vpon her presence also it was and vpon the first sound of her sacred voyce that S. Elizabeth was indued with the spirit of Prophesy and ful-filled with the holy Ghost Luc. 1. that her Sōne did spring in her wombe with ioy as hath bin said which supposeth the vse of reason then imparted to him Vpon her Visitation it was that S. Elizabeth was not able to containe her selfe but cryed out to this effect with an extaticall kind of loud voyce Is it possible that this poore creature should receaue such a fauour as not only to be saluted by the mother of my Lord but that she should preuent me with such a painefull visit How come I to be capable of such high honour Blessed art thou amongst women and blessed is the fruite of thy wombe Happy I say art thou who hast belieued for whatsoeuer our Lord hath sayd to thee shall be performed And heerupon the humble and loyall soule of the sacred Virgin when she found that her Cosin had receaued a reuelation of the diuine mystery which had bin wrought in her◠lent her tongue to the holy Ghost Luc. 1. who therby pronounced that holy Canticle of the Magnificat And so farre was she (a) The holy Ghost did force the sacred tongue of our B. Lady to giue her selfe due prayse ouerruled therby as prophetically to foretell her own excellency and not only to say That our Lord had done great things to her but that all generations of men should call her blessed It is but reason O Queene of heauen that those Generations should call thee blessed by whose only meanes vnder God his curse is to be remoued from them And if the good (b) A consequence which cānot be denied Luc. 11. womā in the Ghospell vpon the seeing and hearing of Christ our Lord when he was teaching did proclaime the blessednes of that wombe which had borne such a Sonne and of the breasts which had giuen him sucke and if according to the iudgmēt of antiquity she was inspired therin by the holy Ghost Beda l. 4. c. 4◠in Luc 11. she of whome our Venerable Country man S. Bede affirmes that by the example of her faith and deuotion whilst the Pharisies were tempting blaspheming Christ our Lord she did both confound the slaunders of those principall Iewes who then were present and the persidiousnes of those Heretiques who would spring vp in tyme which was then to come how much more are we to blesse her who haue so much more knowledge of her excellencies then the other had For she did but conceaue her at that time to be mother of some great Prophet or man of God wheras we are taught by the light of faith that she was no lesse then the mother of God himselfe How miserable therfore are they who do their best to giue both the holy Ghost and her the lye whilst they acknowledge her not to be truly blessed for as much as they make her subiect both to originall to actuall sinnes An incomparable dignity it was for thee O sacred Virgin to be made the mother of the euer-liuing God And if we with our misty sight discerne that dignity to haue bene so great what did those pure sweet
best but one in all that heauenly Paradise of God She is the true mother of Pearle but yet withall she is a Pearle and the richest after that other which doth adorne the Throne of the Diuinity She is the woman whome in the Apocalips Apoc. 1â—â— S. Iohn saw cloathed with the sunne and he also saw in his Ghospell of Verbum caro factum est Ioan. 11 that the Sonne was cloathed and kept warme by her She is also said to be like the sunne in brightnes yet not glareing or dazeling but togeather with the brightnes of a sunne she hath the sweetnes of a neuer-wayning or changing Moone She is sweet but strange after the example of Christ our Lord Sap. 8. Qui disponit omnid suauiter pertingit â fine vsque ad finem fortiter And for this she is also said to be Terribilis vt castrorum acies ordinata as terrible as a battell placed in good array The terrour which a complete Army giues is great but that is only to the enemies for to friends it is a spectacle both of security and glory She (e) The most sweet condition of our B. Lady Cant. 4. conquers with curtesy and mercy or if she do it by force yet is it not to kill but to take prisoners to enchaine them in the armes of her protectioÌ„ She is that stroÌ„ge Tower of Dauid but yet withall she will needs be so weake as to yield herselfe vpon the call of any afflicted creature In (f) How our B. Lady was allied lincked with all the three Persons of the B. Trinity fine she had God the Father for her Father and God the Sonne for her Sonne and God the holy Ghost for her Spouse Her Sonne was wholly his Sonne in one of his natures his Sonne was wholly hers in the other and yet it was but one and the selfe same SoÌ„ne of theÌ„ both Who as he did infinitely after a sort enrich that Humanity which he receiued from her so it became his Maiesty and greatnes and wisedome goodnes besides his filial reuerence and loue to impart himselfe to her as hath bene said in the most abundant manner and withall those priuiledges graces which any meere creature could receaue Of the seuerall deuotions that wè are to carry to our B. Lady CHAP. 93. NOW therfore this glorious Virgin being giuen vs by the gratious hand of our Lord God to be our mother and she withall being a mother of such Soueraigne excellency as we haue seene it will remaine for vs to acknowledge the infinite obligation which we haue to our B. Lord for such a (a) How enriere deuotion we are to carry to our B. Lady benefit and to consider how great deuotion and humble affection we ought to carry towards her that so we may obtaine the more abundant blessing at her hands This (b) Wher in that deuotionâ— doth consist deuotion and humble affection will consist and ought to be expressed by our procuring to haue her much and with a mighty estimation in our memory To congratulate reioyce withall the powers of our soule for her glory To dilate and spread the fame of her excellency To implore her ayde of our misery And lastly chiefly to imitate her Humility her Purity her Charity with all the rest of those diuine vertues which triumphed and raigned in her holy soule We Catholikes do all esteeme her as we ought and I will perswade my selfe that such as are not so if yet withall they will pretend to belieue in Christ our Lord will begin to do it If any of vs had interest but a little-little peece of one of the corruptible garmeÌ„ts of Christ our Lord how happy and how rich would he esteeme himselfe in the part which he might haue in such a iewell And if that peece were of that garment in particular which he had worne next his owne sacred flesh how much more would he glory in such a treasure Now although we haue no such Relique of our owne as this yet by the prouidence of God his seamelesse coate is extant in the hands of the Church And because it had the honor to touch his sacred body there is no Monarch in the world who ought not to adore God for that fauour and who may not licke the dust of that ground vpon which so pretious a iewell were conserued What are we then to thinke and what to do In Hypopante Domini apud Canisium towards this Relique of God the B. Virgin of whome it is sayd by Methodius that excellent learned holy Saint and Martyr who was celebrated so greatly by Saint Hierome That she was the garment and cloake of Christ our Lord which he being the true Elias did leaue to vs when he ascended vp to heauen that so his spirit and grace might doubly come downe vpon vs. For not only had he touched her and beene cloathed by her but he lodged also in her pretious wombe many moneths and alone it was that himselfe had taken a body which might be touched He was then in effect but one and the selfe same thing with her and so truly are (c) The streight vnion betweene the mother the Sonne the mother and the child reputed both to be then but one that they haue both but the good Angell of the mother and the child hath none of his owne till he be seuered from her by his birth And yet euen afterward it is rather a separation in respect of place then a diuisioÌ„ in respect of nature for in that consideration they are in effect still the same With what an admirable tender and most reuerent loue must we therfore resort to this mother of God who was once one thing with the Humanity of the same God and who neuer after grew so much lesse one in the way of corporall vnion as she did by moments go increasing in the vnion of her spirit with his We see what respects are carried euen to Reliquaries made of metall if the Reliques which they keep be well authorized of some Glorious Saint And much more we know that the sacred Chalice is not so much as to be touched but by Ecclesiasticall persons for reuerence of the B. Sacrament which it contayned therein Deere (d) Our B. Lady is the Reliquary of God himselfe Lord and how highly reuerently are we then to touch this Reliquary of the diuinity of God since the matter wherof it was made gaue matter out of it selfe for the making of his humanity which was the very Relique it selfe How Religiously are we to approach to this Custodia which did minister the Corne wherof that bread of heauen was baked by the fire of the holy Ghost wherwith the whole world is to be fed for euer For then do we approach to this Custodia then we touch it when we aspire towards her with our pious affections deuout prayers which are the
hands of our hart Most happy are those soules to whom our Lord imparts a cordiall and filiall deuotion to this Queene-mother of heaueÌ„ for they read that truth written in their owne harts which others do but read in bookes Namely that it is a great signe of Predestination to be particularly deuoted to her And if I were disposed to proue that an auersion of the hart from doing her honour and seruice were an euident signe of Reprobation in punishment of that and other sinnes I (e) The filthy life and fearful end of such as haue opposed to the honour of B. Lady Vide Canis l. 5. c. 20. should need but to make a Catalogue of such as haue maligned her For the proofe of this latter truth let Nestorius Iouinianus Heluidius with the impure Apostata's of this last age be looked vpon and let their wicked life otherwise be coÌ„sidered togeather with the fearfull end to which many of them did arriue And so also let them looke backe with their memory vpon Copronymus that most flagitious Emperour that bloudy laciuious Sorcerer who by lawes solemnely made did depriue our B. Lady both of her due estimation and inuocation Apoc. 13. Et aperuit os suum in blasphemias ad Deum blasphemare nomen eius Tabernaculum eius and he opened his mouth in the way of blasphemy against God and his holy Tabernacle And afterward he dyed blaspheming God himselfe through the torments of most loathsome diseases which carried him from hence to hell On the (f) Compare the persons who haue beene deuoted much to our B. Lady with those others other side let it be weighed what excellent Princes they were who from tyme to tyme haue done right to this Queene of heauen by erecting Temples in her honour As Constantine the great S. Helene S. Pulcheria and Charlemaine to omit innumerable others And what worthy holy persons they also were who haue written in her prayses and commended themselues with humble deuotion to their intercession and who withall haue filled the world with the odour of their exemplar and holy liues as namely S. Athanasius S. Basil S. Chrysostome S. Gregory Nazienzen Petrus Chrisologus S. Iohn Damascene with troupes of other Fathers of the Greeke Church and of the Latine S. Ambrose S. Augustine S. Hierome S. Gregory Venerable Bede S. Anselme S. Bernard and worlds of others whose bookes are full besides the testimonies of prayers to Saints and sometymes to such as had then lately liued with themselues and how much more to this Blessed mother of God this Saint Superiour to all Saints vnder Christ our Lord whose honour they haue defended from all Heretikes Some of whome had taken pleasure and pride either to degrade her body from integrity or her soule froÌ„ SaÌ„ctity and who haue withal discouraged disswaded the world from procuring by their prayers to her to obtaine the effects of Gods mercy towards her children And when it shall be found what a difference there is betwene these two troopes of men both her aduersaries I hope by so liuely examples will be reduced and her humble sernants and obedient Sonnes will be animated to the increase and doubling of their deuotion towards her Which the Saints of all ages haue delighted in and which supposing that she is the mother of God the very light of reason doth inforce and which God himself hath approued by innumerable most vndoubted both corporall and spirituall miracles in all the corners of the Christian world The pitty of our B. Lady towards vs now that shee is in heauen is set out and shewed to be farre beyond what it was when she liued on earth And this discourse is concluded with a Prayer to her CHAP. 94. IF whilst (a) A particular poÌ„deration of our B. Ladyes vnqueÌ„chable charity whilst she liued on â—â—â—th 〈◊〉 1. she was heere in this mortall life she would vouchsafe being the mother of God to expresse such an act of Humility and Charity as cost her pure feete so many painefull steps ouer that hilly Country to S. Elizabeth If she put herselfe vpon that labour immediatly after she was announced the mother of God If it was not any visit of complement but that by her presence she was the meanes of enriching the body and soule and Sonne of that Saint with celestiall graces And that she went not to come quickly away againe but staid assisting seruing her for the space of three moneths in all which time S. Ambrose excellently poÌ„ders Luc. 2. l. 1. CoÌ„ S. Luc. c. â— how much S. Elizabeth must needs be sanctified by the diuine conuersation of the sacred Virgin since the first shew of her presence wrought such wonders in her If the sanctification of S. Iohn were the first spirituall increase which our Lord incarnate wrought in harts and it was done by meanes of this B. Virgin and the first corporall miracle was also wrought by her meanes at the Marriage of Cana when she would descend so low as to assist at the dynner of people who were so very poore as that they were not able to haue wine inough for their most solemne Feast If of herselfe without being desired she had an eye vpon their wants and a hart which wrought towards the reliefe therof If she had compassion of them not only concerning some such thing as bread which had bene of meere necessity but for the obtayning of wine which is a creature chiefely ordayned for our delight and comfort If to procure it she solicited her Sonne our Lord to worke a miracle in their fauour which till that tyme he had neuer done and yet he would not faile to graunt her suite If as soone as by her prayers for them she had induced Christ our Lord to giue them wine she did instantly turne her praying to him into a kinde of preaching to them aduising them to doe whatsoeuer he should require at their hands through the deere solicitude and feare she had least otherwise they might haue fayled of due obedience especially when she knew in what manner he went to worke the miracle which was first to haue the vessells filled with water which might haue seemed to be a very contrary meanes to the desired end which was to helpe theÌ„ to a supply of wine If these things I say were done by her when her Charity was far lesse (b) A coÌ„parison of what our B. Lady was on earth to what shee is now in heanen her state incomparably inferiour to that which now it is what persoÌ„ is that so vnworthy whome this Queene of heaueÌ„ wil not auow own froÌ„ heauen What wound of any soule is that so grieuous which she will disdayne to dresse what waÌ„t of coÌ„fort can that be so extreme which she wil not imploy herself to remoue by interceding to her Sonne our Lord Now that those Lillyes of Purity and those Violets of her Humility those red Roses of her burning
great Loue which our Lord Iesus shewed by his disputing and teaching in the Temple pag. 107 Chap. 21. Of the excessiue loue which our Lord Iesus shewed to vs in that he would vouchsafe to be Baptized pag. 114 Chap. 22. The discourse concerning Baptisme is contynued and the great Loue of our Lord in the institution of that Sacrament is more declared pag. 120 Chap. 23. Of the vnspeakeable Loue to vs which our Lord Iesus shewed in his being tempted in the wildernes by the Diuell pag. 126 Chap. 24. The excellent examples and instructions which our Lord Iesus gaue vs with great Loue in this mystery of his Temptation pag. 13â— Chap. 25. The Temptations which the Diuell did seeke to put vpon our Lord Iesus are declared opened pag. 135 Chap. 26. It is shewed how we are to carry our selues in the vse of holy Scripture and we are instructed concerning Lent and we are incouraged towardes the vse of Pennance so this mystery of the Temptation is concluded pag. 140 Chap. 27. Of the great Loue which our Lord Iesus shewed to mankind in the Vocation of his Apostles pag. 145 Chap. 28. The incomparable Loue wherwith our Lord instaÌ„tly rewarded the speedy obedience of the Apostles pag. 151 Chap. 29. Of the excessiue Loue which our Lord Iesus shewed to maÌ„ in the mystery of the TransfiguratioÌ„ pag 157 Chap. 30. The incoÌ„parable ioy which the Apostles tooke through the loue which our Lord Iesus shewed theÌ„ in his TraÌ„sfiguration how himselfe was content to want the glory of it both before and after for the loue of them pag. 152 Chap. 31. The most excellent instructions which our Lord through his loue did giue to man in this mystery of the Transfiguration pag. 166 Chap. 32. Of the vnspeakeable loue which our Lord Iesus shewed by deliuering to vs his admirable Doctrine of the manner which he held in teaching vs. pag. 171 Chap. 33. Of the tender loue which 〈◊〉 Lord Iesus shewed by the incommodity which he was subiect to whilst he deliuered his Doctrine to vs and of the surfet which some are subiect to if we take not heed by the aboundance of his blessings pag. 176 Chap. 34. The same discourse is continued concerning the great loue which our Lord Iesus expressed in his Doctrine pag. 181 Chap. 35. The incomparable purity of the Doctrine of Christ our Lord and with how great loue he helpeth vs towards the practise therof pag. 186 Chap. 36. Of the vnspeakeable Loue of our Lord Iesus in ordeyning that the greatest part of his diuine Doctrine should remaine in writing and of the great benefit which growes to vs by the holy Scripture pag. 195 Chap. 37. How carefull we must be not to be rash in the vse of holy Scripture and of the great obscurity therof pag. 201 Chap. 38. How the holy Scripture growes to be so very obscure and of the infinite wise loue which our Lord hath shewed to vs euen therin pag. 209 Chap. 39. Of the great teÌ„dernes of the Loue of our Lord which is shewed to man by the expresse words of holy Scripture and first of the old Testament pag. 216 Chap. 40. The infinite teÌ„der Loue of our Lord which is expressed in the Scriptures of the new Testament pag. 226 Chap. 41. Of the excessiue loue which our Lord Iesus shewed to man by the Miracles which he wrought on earth pag. 233 Chap. 42. 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 pag. 239 Chap. 43. The great 〈◊〉 of Loue which our Lord Iesus expressed in the working of his Miracles is more declared pag. 247 Chap. 44. How the corporall Miracles of our Lord Iesus had an ayme at the reformation of soules and did tend to the discouering and facilitating the beliefe of great mysteries pag. 252 Chap. 45. 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 pag. 257 Chap. 46. 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 pag. 264 Chap. 47. Of the iudgement 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 â—â—â—iues wherby we may be induced to doe the like pag. 270 Chap. 48. How we do both feed are fedd vpon in the B. Sacrament 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 pag. 277 Chap. 49. Of the great Loue of our Lord in conueying the B. Sacrament to vs vnder the species of bread and wine Why it is neither necessary nor conuenient nor scarce possible for all Christians to coÌ„municate of the Chalice Of diuers kinds of Vnion And how liberall our Lord is to vs in letting vs all frequent these diuine Mysteries so often pag. 284 Chap. 50. The misery is shewed and the errour is partly coÌ„uinced of such as do not 〈◊〉 the beliefe of those diuine mysteries pag. 292 Chap. 51. Of the Obligation which we haue to God for so great a benefit and who are most bound to be denoted to it and why and how happy they must needs be who frequent it with deuotion pag. 298 Chap. 52. Of the infinite Loue which our Lord Iesus discouereth to mankind in his sacred Passion with a reflection vpon the dignity of his diuine person the vse which heere we are to make thereof pag. 304 Chap. 53. Of the most tender diuine Loue care which our Lord Iesus shewed at his entrance into the PassioÌ„ in his last sermon long prayer to his eternall Father pag. 308 Chap. 54. The horrour terrour and sorrow of Christ our Lord togeather with his Prayer in the GardeÌ„ pag. 313 Chap. 55. What griefe it must needs cause to our B. Lord to be estranged from feeling comfort in God pag. 319 Chap. 56. The incoÌ„parable sorrow of Christ our Lord through his consideration of the dishonour of God and the sinne and misery of man togeather with the sight of what himselfe was to suffer pag. 324 Chap. 57. Of the excelleÌ„cy of Prayer declared by occasion of that Prayer of our B. Lord in the Garden pag. 331 Chap. 58. The apprehensioÌ„ of Christ our Lord a iust expostulatioÌ„ with the traytour Iudas for that hideous treason of his togeather with a descriptioÌ„ of mortall sin the danger which we are put into by all voluntary veniall sinnes pag. 335 Chap. 59. Of our Lords great loue to vs in permitting that fal of Iudas of that vnspeakeable mercy which he shewed