throughly so is if not Evill a neighbourhood to Evill True praise consists not in a bare abstinence from Evill but in the pursuance the performance of good It sufficeth not therefore that we doe nothing which may afflict us but we must withall doe something that may exhilarate us This we must remember that to do good is one thing and to become good is another Although we cannot become good unlesse wee doe good But we become good not because we have done good works but because we did them well Discretion which considers the manner of doing good orders the Action so excellently that oftentimes there is more goodnesse in the manner then in the Action What will it availe us to do good if it be not well done It is to write faire and then to poure the Inke upon it Actions cease to be good unlesse well acted they are like excellent colours ill-layed on The more glorious thy intention is the more carefully thou must manage it Indiscretion is most evident in matters of importance One drop of Oyle upon Purple is sooner seen then a whole quart that is spilt upon Sack-cloath The Ermyn keepes his whitenesse unstained with the hazard of his life Hee values himselfe at a most sordid rate that esteems lesse of Virtue then this beast doth of his skin that prefers a foule life to a fair death that loves his blood more then his honour and his body more then his Soule Ennius saith that the way to live is not to love life Life is given us for another cause then meerly to live he is unworthy of it that would live onely for the love of life the greatest cause of life is Virtue what more absolute madnesse can there be then to make life the cause of sin yea the cause of death And for lifes sake to lose the crowâ— of life What greater unhappinesse then to dye eternally by refusing death The Virtuous youth Pelagius rather then he woulâ—d lose his Innocence suffered the most exquisite and studyed torments of that impure Tyrant Habdarrhagmanus He suffered many deaths before he was permitted to dye Hee saw his limbs his hands and his sinewes cut in sunder and lying dead by him while he yet lived This preservation of their honour some chast beauties have paid dearly for It cost Nicetas his tongue Amianus his Eye Saint Briget her face Apollonia her teeth and Agatha her breasts The lovely Cyprian Virgin paid her life for it Nature even for herself doth lay a snare And handsome faces their own traitours are The beauty of Chastity is best preserved by deformity and the purity of life by a contemptible shape The Shoomaker is carefull of the neatnesse of a shooe which is made to be worn in durt and mire And shall man be negligent to adorn his Soul which is made for Heaven and the service of the deity Every artificer strives to do his worke so as none may find fault with it And shall we do the works of life perfunctorily and deceitfully All that makes man to be respected is his worke as the fruite doth make the Tree and a good work can never be too much respected Keepe thy selfe alwaies in respect by doing good Thy own dignity is in thy own power If thy works be good thou shalt be accounted good too If better then any thou shalt be acknowledged for the best Man is the effect of his own Act he is made by those things which he himself makes Hee is the work of his own hands A rare priviledge that permits men and impowers them to make themselves Thou hast leave to be whatsoever thou wouldst be God would not limit thy happinesse He left thee power to encrease it to polish and beautifie thy selfe according to thy own mind Thy friend or thy neighbour cannot do it Thy owne good must be thy owne industry Virtue because she would be crosse to Fortune is not adventitious It is our great happinesse that this great good must not be borrowed Blessed be that Divine mercy which hath given us means to be saved without the assistance of our neighbours who have endeavoured to damn us That almighty hand which first Created man in the Image of his Creatour finished him not but left some things for him to doe that he might in all things resemble his maker It is one thing to be an Idol or Counterfeit and another to be a lively Figure and likenesse There are many Coppies which are not assimilant to their Originals like Pictures that have not so much as an ayre of those faces they were drawn by To the Politure and sweetning of the Divine Image there are some lines expected from thine owne hand If some expert Statuary suppose Phidias himselfe should leave unfinished some excellent peece like that Statue of Minerva at Athens and out of an incurious wearinesse give himself to some obscure and Artlesse imployment or to meere Idlenesse wouldst not thou much blame and rebuke him for it And canst thou deserve any lesse if by a loose and vitious life thou wilt either totally deface the Image of God in thy selfe or else leave it unfinished Doest thou think that God is maimed seeing thou doest leave his Image without hands I mean without good works Dost thou think that he is blind seeing thou dost extinguish or put quite out that discerning light and informing wisdome which hee hath given thee Hee that doth not integrally compose himself and will not carefully strive for perfection would represent God to be imperfect and a Monster Virtuous manners saith holy Maximus are types of the Divine goodnesse by which God descends to be represented by man assuming for a body those holy habits and for a soule the Innocent dictates of wisdome in the spirit by which he makes those that are worthy to become Gods and seals them with the true character of Virtue bestowing upon them the solid riches of his infallible and immortal Knowledge Work then while it is day while it is life-time work and cease not Finish this expectation this great spectacle not of men onely but of God and Angels Remember that the rewards and applause of this World are but a Paint of eternity The solid and permanent glory is given in Heaven When every man shall have praise of God The Limbner is carefull to beautifie and shew his utmost skill in that peece which hee knowes to be intended for judicious eyes Thou art not to paint but really to make a living Image of the Divine mind which also must be examined and judged by that searching eye from which nothing can be hidden have a care that no ill mixture nothing disproportionable nothing uneven or adulterate may be found in it The presents we offer to the true God must be true and solid works not the fictitious oblations of Jupiter Milichus Why wilt thou delight in a maimed Soule or which is worse in a Soul whose best part is dead Thou hadst rather have a
time have beene well spared Here was the foundation of the Churches of Japan and Amangucia This very Indian and none before him becomming the first fruits of that region unto CHRIST So glorious a document of Patience made him envy our Divine Philosophy that envy made him Ambitious and his holy Ambition made him a Christian So gainfull an Industry is Patience and such a compendious Art of overcomming Most wholsome is the advice of Pimenius Malice saith he never overcomes malice you must overcome malice with goodnesse But if we could overcome one Evill with another why will wee not reserve that Glory for Virtue By such a bloodlesse Victory did Motois overthrow his Adversary from whom he fled most valiantly lest he should offend him I do not say with his hands but with his sight for Patience hath no hands but shoulders His Adversary pursues Motois had lockt himself up became his own prisoner esteeming it guilt enough that another could be angry with him But hearing that his Enemy was come in being only Impatient till he had shewed more Patience hee breakes open the door bids him welcome and like one that had offended desires to be forgiven and afterwards feasts him This story I have touch'd upon that thou maist see how powerfull an Instrument of tranquillity and a quiet happy life Patience is that makes peace to beare fruit in another mans soyl and civilizeth forraigners How fruitfull then is she at home How prosperous a dresser of Virtues in himselfe is the patient man that will not suffer the propagation of Vices in another But Leander said that Patience doth either overcome or else win her Enemies I say she doth both win and overcome She wins men and overcomes Fortune nay she makes her though unwilling a most officious servant of Goodnesse The name of Patience is not an empty titular Honour it hath also very large and princely revenues for the maintenance of Virtue That Fable of the Divine in holy Maximus is truth He saith that wise men dwell in the shadow of a tree which the more the people cut it growes the more It strives and vies with the Iron or to borrow the Poets expression 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It lives when kill'd and brancheth when 't is lopt His own Mythology is most elegant By this tree saith he is signified wisedom which turâ— es misfortunes into Ornaments trouble into Virtue losse into gain and scars into beauty For the Patient and wise liver like the Serpent of Lerna when he is most mangled is most entire he drinkes in fresh spirits through his very wounds his courage is heightned by them and his spilt blood like dew doth cherish and revive him Like some faire Oke that when her boughes Are cut by rude hands thicker growes And from those wounds the Iron made Resumes a rich and fresher shade The benefit then wee receive from Patience is twofold It diminisheth the sorrowes of the body and increaseth the treasure of the mind Or to speak more properly there is one great benefit it doth us It turnes all that is Evill into Good Most apposite to this is that of Nazianzen Patience digesteth misery Concoction and Digestion of meats are the daily miracles of the stomack they make dead things contribute unto life and by a strange Metamorphosis turne Herbes and almost all living Creatures into the Substance of Man to preserve his particular Species No otherwise doth Virtue by Patience which is her stomack transform and turne all damages into benefits and blessings and those blessings into it self Lupines or bitter Pulse if steep'd in water will grow sweet and nourishing Patience doth macerate miseries to fatten it selfe with them Certaine Divine Raies breake out of the Soul in adversity like sparks of fire out of the afflicted flint The lesser the Soule minds the body the lesser she adheres to sensibility shee is by so much the more capable of Divinity and her own Nature When her Den of flesh is secure and whole then is she in darkness sleepes under it When it is distressed and broken then is she awake and watcheth by some Heavenly Candle which shines upon her through those breaches The wounds of the Body are the windowes of the Soul through which she looks towards Heaven light is her provision shee feedes then upon Divinity Sublime is that rapture of the most wise Gregory 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one food the best for all Is to feed on the great Gods mind draw An Immense light from the bright Trinity Death it self which the lust of eating brought into the World inedible or as Zeno saith indigestible is eaten digested and transubstantiated into life by Patience begun in Abel and perfected in JESUS CHRIST So that now that saying of Pirrho who affirm'd that there was no difference betwixt death and life is no longer a Paradox nor need we make use of that shrewd exaggeration of Euripides who knowes said he but this which we call life is death and death life we see that men when they are as we speak alive are then only sick but the dead neither sicken nor suffer any sorrowes Certainly the death of a good liver is eternal life Every Action of a wise man is a certain emulation of Death wee may see it exprest in his patience The Soul by this Virtue disintangles and frees her selfe from the troubles of Mortality For the frivolous flesh burning with fevers or drown'd in dropsies or any other diseases the attendants of corruption which possesse and fill up the narrow Fabrick of Man the Soul as in great inundations when the lower roomes are overflown ascends to the battlements where she enjoyes a secure healthfull ayre leaving the ground-roomes to the tumult and rage of the distemper'd humours She ascends thither where griefe cannot ascend Carneades comming to visit Agesilaus grievously tormented with the Gout and turning his back to be gone as if impatient of the violence and insolencie of the disease whose custome it is to shew litle reverence towards the best men the prerogative of Virâ—â—e can give no protection to Nature Agesilaus pointing from his feet to his brest calls him back with this Check stay Carneades the pain is not come from thence hither Hee shew'd by this that his mind was in health though his feet were diseased and that the pain had not ascended thither where the Soule sate inthroned At this height she hath two priviledges more then ordinary she is lesse affected with the body because at some distance from it and hovers above griefe because above sensibility shee is nearer to God and dresseth her selfe by his beames which she enjoyes more freely as from a kind of Balconie or refreshing place having onely a Knowledge but no Sense of the bodies affliction From this place she overlookes the labours and conflicts of the flesh as Angels from the windowes of Heaven behold Warre and the Slaughter of distracteâ—â—â—en One benefit more shee hath by Patience that
those which are drowned these last are innumerable thought it is thought otherwise because they are sunk into the bottom and cannot be seen Admit not I beseech thee for a testimony againstâ— Death those ejulations and tears which darken Funerals and make foul weather in the fairest faces Opinion makes the people compassionate and they bewail not the party that is dead but their owne frailty Call not for evidence to the teares of strangers because thou knowest not whence they flow but call for it to thine own for none of us is happy or miserable but in his own sense which makes us any thing What reason hast thou to think life better then death because others mourne when thou dyest who when thou wert born didst weep thy selfe It is madnesse to judge our selves miserable because others think so The solemnities of death are contrary to the ceremonies of life At the birth of man others laugh but he himself weeps At his death others weep but surely hee rejoyceth unlesse his ill life hath made his death deadly Nor must thou think that his joy is either little or none at al because it is not manifested unto thee Thou mayst lye watching by the side of one that dreams of Heaven is conversing with Angels but unlesse hee tells it thee when he is awaked thou canst discover no such thing while he sleepes The Infant that is born weeping learns to laugh in his sleep as Odo and Augustine have both observed So he that bewailed his birth with tears welcomes the shadow of his death with smiles He presaged miseries to follow his nativity and beatitude his dissolution Weeping is natural tears know their way without a gâ—ide Mirth is rude and comes on slowly and very late nor comes it then without a supporter and a leader It must be taught and acquired Weeping comes with the Infant into the world Laughing is afterwards taught him the Nurse must both teach and invite him to it When he sleeps then he sips and tasteth joy when he dies then he sucks and drinkes it Mourning and grief are natural they are born with us Mirth is slow-paced and negligent of us The sense of rejoycing if we beleeve Avicenna comes not to the most forward child till after the fortieth day Men therefore weep at thy death because it is an experiment they have not tryed and they laugh at thy birth because the miseries of thy life must not be born by them Thou onely art the infallible diviner of thy own frail condition who refusest it with teares which are the most proper expressions of unwilling constrained nature But as the ceremonies of Life and Death are contrary so he that is born and he that dyes have different events Death to some seems to destroy all but she restores all By discomposing things she puts them in their order For he that inverts things that were beâ—ore inverted doth but reduce them to their right Positure The Funeral rite of the Tâ—bitenses who are certain East-Indians is to turn the inside of their garments outward they manifest that part which before was hidden and conceale that part which before was manifest by which they seeme in my opinion to point at the liberty of the soul in the state of death and the captivity of the body whose redemption must bee expected in the end of the world This inversion by death is reparation and a preparative for that order wherein all things shall be made new Most true is that saying of the Royal Preacher 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A good name is above precious ointment and the day of death is better then the day of ones birth But thou wilt ask To whom is the day of death better than the day of his nativity It is in the first place to him that dies True thou wilt say if he be a just and holy man Yea say I though he be wicked Who doubts that there can happen in all their lives a better day to the just and honest then the day of death which frees them both from seeing and from feeling the miseries which are in this world As for the unjust it is most certain that no day can be more beneficiall to them then that which sets an end to their impieties tyranny perjury and sacriledge To deny a sword to one that would murther himself is benevolence to deny money to a Gamester that would presently cast it away is courtesie and to deny life to those that would use it to their owne damnation is Mercy and not Judgement But to whom besides these is the day of death better then the day of life Certainly to God Almighty because in that day when the wicked dye his Justice on them and his Mercy towards his own are conspicuous to all and acknowledged by all And to whom else Not to speak of the rich and ambâ—tious It is good to all men to the whole Creation and to Nature it self For in that day the fair order and prerogative of Nature is vindicated from the rage and rape of lustfull intemperate persons It becomes constant consonant and inviolable by putting off those gross vestiments which make her productions subject to the assaults and violence of man who is the most perverse and shamelesse defacer of Gods Image in himself and the most audacious and abhominable contemner of his Ordinances in his works by using them to a contrary end and quite different from that which their wise Creator made them for But let us not consider the goodnesse of death by those evils onely which it freeth us from but by the blessings also which it brings along with it Their soules are by some men less valued then Fortune and temporal power Some cast away their lives to winne a Crowne yea the Crowne and the Kingdome of another They plot to forfeit a Crown of Eternall glory by usurping a transitory one They murther their owne soules by shedding the blood of some innocent persons permitted to be overcome by men that they might have power with God and prevail Shall the short soveâ—aignty and sway of some small corners and spots of earth be compared to the everlasting triumphs in the Kingdom of Heaven The death of the sufferer is in this case the most gainfull the more he loseth by it upon earth his gain is by so much the greater in heaven The shorter our stay is here our time above if reckon'd from the day of our death is the longer but hath no end at all and the more our sufferings are the greater shall our glory be Hegesias the Cyrenian when he praised death promised not these blessings of Immortality but onely an end of temporall miseries and yet he did so far prevail with his Auditors that they preferred death to life they contemned the one and so lusted after the other that they would not patiently expect it but did impatiently long for it they fel upon their own swords and forced death to come on by
stage if we stay any long time in it and pay not the debt we owe death requires interest she takes his hearing from one his sight from another and from some she takes both The extent and end of all things touch their beginning neither doth the last minute of life do any thing else but finish what the first began We may know also what death is by the apparition or Image of it We see it and make tryal of it assiduously we cannot act life one day but wee must act death at night Life is a Terrace-walke with an Arbour at one end where we repose and dream over our past perambulations This lesser rest shewes us the greater the Soule watcheth when wee sleepe and Conscience in the Just as well as the unjust will be ruminating on the works of life when the body is turned into dust Sleepe is nothing else but death painted in a night-peece it is a prelibation of that deepe slumber out of which we shall not be awaked untill the Heavens be no more We go to bed under a Scene of Stars and darknesse but when we awake we find Heaven changed and one great luminary giving light to all We dye in the state of corruption errours and mistinesse But wee shall be raised in glory and perfection when these clouds of blacknesse that are carried about with diverse winds and every Enemy of truth shall vanish for ever and God alone shall be all in all We affect sleepe naturally it is the reparation of man a laying by of cares The Coppy cannot match the pattern if we love sleep then why should wee hate the Idaea of it why should we feare death whose shadow refresheth us which nature never made nor meant to fright us with It was her intention to strengthen our hope of dying by giving us the fruition of this resemblance of death lest we should grow impatient with delay she favour'd us with this shadow and Image of it as Ladies comfort themselves with the pictures of their absent lovers There is no part of life without some portion of death as dreames cannot happen without sleepe so life cannot be without death As sleepe is said to be the shadow of death So I think dreams to be the shadowes of life for nothing deceives us more frequent then it When we shal be raised from death we shal not grieve so much because the joys of life were not real as because there were none at all It was said by one that he had rather dream of being tormented in Hell then glorified in Paradise for being awaked he should rejoyce to find himselfe in a soft featherbed and not in a lake of unquenchable fire But having dreamt of Heaven it would grieve him that it was not reall Paracelsus writes that the watching of the body is the sleep of the Soul and that the day was made for Corporeall Actions but the night is the working-time of Spirits Contrary natures run contrary courses Bodies having no inherent light of their own make use of this outward light but Spirits need it not Sun-beams cannot stumble nor go out of their way Death frees them from this dark Lantern of flesh Heraclitus used to say that men were both dead and alive both when they dyed and when they lived when they lived their Soules were dead and when they dyed their Soules revived Life then is the death of the Soule and the life of the body But death is the life of the Soule and the death of the body I shall return now to prosecute the Commendations of death because it comes but once Death like the Phoenix is onely one lest any should be ill That which comes but once is with most longing looked for and with most welcome entertained That poor man the owner of one Ewe nourished her in his bosome she did eate of his meat and drank out of his Cup as Nathan exemplified The Father that hath but one Son hath more cares then he that hath many so should we be more carefull to provide for death which comes but once then for the numerous and daily calamities of life By providing for that one wee turne the rest all into so many joyes Whatsoever is rare whatsoever is pretious it is single and but one There is nothing so rare nothing that is comparable to a good death But it is not the universality or diffusivenesse of it that makes it so but the contempt and the subduing of it hâ—s death is most pretious by whom death is contemned Dissolution is not a meere merit but a debt we owe to nature which the most unwilling must pay That wisedome which can make destiny to be her servant which can turne necessity into virtue Mortality into Immortality and the debt we owe to nature into a just right and Title to eternall glory is very great What greater advantage can there be then to make Heaven due to us by being indebted to nature and to oblige Divinity by paying a temporal debt Clemens called them Golden men who dyed thus that is to say when it was necessary to dye They made necessity their free will when either the publick liberty the prerogative of reason or the word of God called for their sufferings For though death be a debt due to Nature yet in these causes Nature doth willingly resigne her right and God becomes the Creditor If we pay it unto him before the time of pure resolution Nature is better pleased with that anticipation then if we kept our set day He is the best debtour that paies before the time of payment The day of payment by the Covenant of Nature is old age but the good man paies before the day If the noblenesse of thy mind will not incite thee to such a forward satisfaction let the desire of gaine move thee for the sooner thou payest the more thou dost oblige Hee that suffers an immature death for the good of his Country for the sacred lawes or the vindication of the truth of God and not for his owne vain glory doth free himselfe from the Natural debt and doth at the same time make God his debtour and all mankind To a man that dyes thus all men are indebted God owes him for the Cause and men for the effect The last doth at least set us an example and the first improves the faith and gives life to Charity Adde to this that this great good of a passive death is a voluntary imitation of the Son of God who laid down his life for the life of the World And it is also done without our industry this great virtue this glorious perfection requires not our care and activity to bring it about This death is most pretious and the best because it is executed by others and not by ourselves To suffer death not to dye is glorious If prisoners break their chaines it is neither their glory nor their security but augments their Guilt and hastens their condemnation So
who neither can enjoy ought that is pleasant at the present nor lay up for themselves any hope of true joyes hereafter They misse the fruition of this short life and can have no hope of the everlasting They abuse these temporal blessings and shall never be admitted to use the eternall Their substance here is very little but their hope there is none at all A most wretched and deplorable condition unless they make a virtue of this desperate necessity and lay hold on the onely soveraign remedy of bettering their estate by submitting in time to the wholsome rules of heavenly and saving reason Especially because the goodliest things of this present time are such rags and fragments that he that loseth the whole fraught and true treasure of that one precious life which is to come may be justly said to lose both It remaines then that we direct and fixe all the powers of our minds upon the hope of the life to come Which hope that you may morefully and clearly apprehend it I shall manifest unto you under a type or example taken from temporal things If some man should offer unto another five peeces of silver this day but promise him five hundred peeces of gold if he would stay till the next morning and put him to his choice whither he would have the silver at present or the gold upon the day following is there any doubt to be made but he would chuse the greater sum though with a little delay Goe you and doe the like Compare the Crummes and perishing pittance in this short life with the glorious and enduring rewards of the eternall And when you have done chuse not the least and the worst when you may have the greatest and the best The short fruition of a little is not so beneficial as the expectation of plenty But seeing that all the fraile goods of this world are not onely seen of us but also possessed by us It is most manifest that hope cannot belong unto this world in which we both see and enjoy those things we delight in For Hope that is seen is not hope for what a man seeth why doth he yet hope for Rom. 8. ver 24. Therefore however hope may be abused and misapplyed to temporal things it is most certaine that it was given to man and ordained for the things that are eternal otherwise it cannot be called hope unlesse something bee hoped for which as yet or for the present life is not had Therefore the substance of our hope in the world to come is more evident and manifest then our hope of substance in the present Consider those objects which are the clearest and most visible when we would best discern them we put them not into our eyes because they are better seen and judged of at a distance It is just so in the case of present things and the future For the present as if put into our eyes are not rightly and undeceivably seen of us but the future because conveniently distant are most clearly discerned Nor is this trust and Confidence wee have of our future happinesse built upon weak or uncertain Authors but upon our Lord and Master JESUS CHRIST that allmighty and faithfull witnesse who hath promised unto the just a Kingdome without end and the ample rewards of a most blessed eternity Who also by the ineffable Sacrament of his humanity being both God and Man reconciled Man unto God and by the mighty and hidden mystery of his passion absolved the World from sinne For which cause he was manifested in the flesh justified in the Spirit seen of Angels preached unto the Gentiles believed upon in the World and received into glory Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him and given him a name which is above every name that at the name of JESUS every knee should bow of things in Heaven and things in Earth and things under the Earth And that every tongue should confesse that the Lord JESUS is in glory both God and King before all ages Casting off then the vaine and absurd precepts of Philosophy wherein you busie your selfe to no purpose embrace at last the true and saving Knowledge of Christ You shall find even in that imployment enough for your eloquence and wit and will quickly discern how far these precepts of piety and truth surpasse the conceits and delirations of Philosophers For in those rules which they give what is there but adulterate virtue and false wisedom and what in ours but perfect righteousnesse and sincere truth Whereupon I shall Justly conclude that they indeed usurpe the name of Philosophy but the substance and life of it is with us For what manneâ— of rules to live by could they give who were ignorant of the first Cause and the Fountain of life For not knowing God and deviating in their first principles from the Author and the Wel-spring of Justice they necessarily erred in the rest Hence it happened that the end of all their studies was vanity and dissention And if any amongst them chanced to hit upon some more sober and honest Tenets these presently ministred matter of pride and Superstitiousnesse so that their very Virtue was not free from vice It is evident then that these are they whose Knowledge is Earthy the disputers of this world the blind guides who never saw true justice nor true wisedome Can any one of that School of Aristippus be a teacher of the truth who in their Doctrine and Conversation differ not from swine and unclean beasts seeing they place true happinesse in fleshly lusts whose God is their belly and whose glory is in their shame Can he be a Master of Sobriety and Virtue in whose School the riotous the obscene and the adulterer are Philosophers But leaving these blind leaders I shall come againe to speak of those things which were the first motives of my writing to you I advise you then and I beseech you to cast off all their Axioms orgeneral Maxims collected out of their wild and irregular disputations wherein I have knowne you much delighted to imploy those excellent abilities bestowed upon you in the study of holy Scripture the wholsom instructions of Christian Philosophers There shall you be fed with various and delightfull learning with true and infallible wisedome There to incite you to the Faith you shall hear the Church speaking to you though not in these very words yet to this purpose He that believes not the word of God understands it not There you shall hear this frequent admonition Feare God because he is your Master honour him because he is your Father There it shall be told you that the most acceptable Sacrifice to God are justice and mercy There you shall be taught that If you love your self you must necessarily love your neighbour for you can never do your selfe a greater Courtesie then by doing good to another There you shall be taught that there can be no worldly cause so great as to make
with misery and immortality with rust and rottennesse Such another Divine rapture is that in his Poems Et res magna videtur Merc ari propriam de re pereuntâ— salutem Perpetuis mutare caduca c. And is the bargain thought too dear To give for Heaven our fraile subsistence here To change our mortall with immortall homes And purchase the bright Stars with darksome stones Behold my God a rate great as his breath On the sad crosse bought me with bitter death Did put on flesh and suffe'rd for our good For ours vile slaves the losse of his dear blood Wee see by these Manifesto's what account he made of this great deed so great that none now adaies thinke of doing it Go thy way sell whatsoever thou hast and give to the poor is a commandement as well as take up the Crosse and follow me This last cannot be done but by doing the first Well sell oftentimes but seldome give and happily that is the reason we sell so often He that keeps all to himselfe takes not the right way to thrive The Corn that lies in the Granarie will bring no harvest It is most commonly the foode of vermine and some creatures of the night and darknesse Charity is a relique of Paradise and pitty is a strong argument that we are all descended from one man He that carries this rare Jewell about him will every where meete with some kindred He is quickly acquainted with distressed persons and their first sight warmes his blood I could believe that the word stranger is a notion received from the posterity of Cain who killed Abel The Hebrewes in their own tribes called those of the farthest degree brothers and sure they erred lesse from the law of pure Nature then the rest of the Nations which were left to their owne lusts The afflictions of man are more moving then of any other Creature for he onely is a stranger here where all things else are at home But the losing of his innocency and his device of Tyranny have made him unpittied and forfeited a prerogative that would have prevailed more by submission then all his posterity shall do by opposition Not to give to one that lacks is a kind of murther Want and famine are destroyers as well as the sword and rage very frequently in private when they are not thought of in the Publick The blessed JESUS who came into the World to rectifie Nature and to take away the inveterate corruptions of man was not more in any of his precepts then in that which bids us Love one another This is the cement not onely of this World but of that other which is to come Blessed are the mercifull and give to him that asketh thee proceeded from the same lips of truth And in his description of the last judgement he grounds the sentence of condemnation pronounced against the wicked upon no other fact but because they did not cloath the naked feed the hungry and take in the stranger Love covers a multitude of sins and God loves the chearfull giver But this is not our whole duty though we give our bodies to be burnt and give all our goods unto the poor yet without holinesse we shall never see the face of God Darknesse cannot stand in the presence of light and flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdome of God The great difficulty then as our holy Bishop here saith is to become a living sacrifice and truly the next way to it is by an Evangelical disposing of these outward incumbrances this will open and prepare the way before us though it takes nothing from the length of it The Hawke proines and rouseth before she flyes but that brings her not to the mark Preparations and the distant flourishes of Array will not get the field but action and the pursuance of it His Estate in France being thus disposed of he retyred into Italy where having done the like to his Patrimonies there hee came to Millaine and was honourably received by holy Ambrose then Bishop of that Sea But these gay feathers of the World being thus blown off him by the breath of that Spirit which makes the dry tree to become green and the spices of the Garden to flow out all his kindred and former acquaintance became his deadly Enemies Flyes of estate follow Fortune and the Sun-shine friendship is a thing much talked off but seldome found I never knew above two that loved without selfe-ends That which passeth for love in this age is the meere counter to it It is policie in the cloathes of love or the hands of Esau with the tongue of Jacob. These smooth Cheats the World abounds with There is Clay enough for the potter but little dust whereof commeth Gold The best direction is Religion find a true Christian and thou hast found a true friend He that fears not God will not feare to do thee a mischiefe From Millaine he came to Rome where he was honourably entertained by all but his own kindred and Siricius the great Bishop It was the ill Fortune of this zealous Pope to be offended not onely with Paulinus but with that glorious Father Saint Hierome It was a perillous dissolutenesse of some Bishops in that Century to admit of Lay-men and unseason'd persons into the Ministry This rash and impious practice Siricius had by severall strict Sanctions or decrees condemned and forbidden and it is probable that the reason of his strange carriage towards Paulinus and Hierome was because he would not seem to connive at any persons that were suddenly ordained though never so deserving lest he should seeme to offend against his own edicts It is a sad truth that this pernicious rashnesse of Bishops fighting ex diametro with the Apostolical cautions hath oftentimes brought boars into the Vineyard and Wolves into the sheepfold which complying afterwards with all manner of Interests have torne out the bowels of their Mother Wee need no examples Wee have lived to see all this our selves Ignorance and obstinacie make Hereticks And ambition makes Schismaticks when they are once at this passe they are on the way toward Atheisme I do not say that Ecclesiastical polâ—ty is an inviolable or sure sense against Church-rents because there is a necessity that offences must come though wo to them by whom but rules of prevention are given and therefore they should not be slighted The Bride-groom adviseth his spouse to take these foxes while they are litle In a pleasant field halfe a mile distant from Nola lies the Sepulcher of the blessed Martyr Felix To this place which from his youth hee was ever devoted to did Paulinus now retire It was the custom of holy men in that age noâ— onely to live near the Tombs of the Martyrs but to provide also for their buriall in those places because they were sure that in the Resurrection and the terrours of the day of Judgement God would descend upon those places in the soft voyce that is to say
and my friends stand looking upon me afar off and they passe by me like hasty floods or the streames of a brook that will not be stay'd They convey themselves away and are ashamed of me who displeased them by pleasing God And in his first Epistle I beseech you saith he If I shall have need for now my servants and those I made free-men are become my despisers that you would take care to send the old Wine which I beleive I have still at Narbon hither unto me and to pay for the carriage Do not fear dear brother to make the poor your debtor c. The Noble Spirit is the bravest bearer of indignities and certainly extraction and a virtuous descent let popular flatterers preach what they will to the contrary is attended with more Divinity and a sweeter temper then the indiscrete Issue of the multitude There is an eminent difference betwixt flowers and weedes though they spring from the same mould The Ape contending with the Lyonesse told her that she was a very fair creature but very barren For you said the Ape bring forth but one at a birth and I bring six or more 'T is true replyed the Lionesse but thy fix are six Apes and my one is a Lyon The greatest part of men which we commonly terme the populacy are a stiffe uncivill generation without any seed of honour or goodnesse and sensible of nothing but private interest the base waies of acquiring it What Virtue or what humanity can be expected from a Raymond Cabanes a Massinello or some Son of a Butcher They have one barbarous shift which Tigers and Beares would blush to commit They will cut the throats of their most generous and Virtuous Benefactours to comply with times and advantage themselves Yea they will rejoyce to see them ruined and like inhumane Salvages insult over their innocent and helplesse posterity I could compare those fawning Hypocrits that waite not upon men but upon their Fortunes to that smiths bitch in the Apologues of Locmannus the Persian which sleeping in the forge could not be awaked with all the noise of the hammers the Anvile and the Bellowes but if the smith would offer to stirre his teeth to eat shee would start up presently and attend upon him with all officiousnesse She would share with him in the fruits of his labours but would not watch and look to the shop one minute while he laboured Paulinus had now first lost these false friends but was loaded for it with the love and commendations of true ones And I know not which offended him most to be despised by the first or commended by the last He had like Saint Paul great heavinesse and continuall sorrow of heart to see that his brethren and kinsmen according to the flesh hated him because he loved Christ And on the other side his humility would not suffer him to beare the labour of love I meane the generall applause and sincere commendations conferred upon him by his Christian friends Severus in one of his Epistles written to him after hee had spent some lines in the commendation of his zeale and constancie contrary to the custome of that plaine age subscribed himself his Servant To the first he replyed that his excessive love had drawn him to the sin of untruth And the last he desired him to desist from for this reason Cave ergo ne posthac c. Have a care hereafter saith he that you who are a Servant of Christ called unto liberty terme nor your self the servant of a sinner and of one that is not worthy to be called your fellow-servant The virtue of humility will not excuse the vice of flattery Thus Gregorie the great when Pope Anastasius had exceeded towards him in his laudatory elocutions blasted them all with this humble reply Quod verò me â—s domini quod lucernam c. Your calling me the mouth of the Lord a shining light and a strong helper is nothing else but an augmentation of my iniquity for when I deserve to be punished for my sins then do I instead of punishment receive praise Severus in another of his Epistles to Paulinus earnestly intreated him to suffer his picture to be taken by a limner which he had sent to him for that purpose that he might have it to set up together with the picture of Saint Martin before the sacred font in a fair Church which Severus was then in building This friendly motion Paulinus was very much offended with and would by no means consent unto teling Severus that too much love had made him mad And in his eighth Epistle reasoning with him about this request What kind of picture saith he would you have from me the picture of the earthly or the Heavenly man I know you love onely that incorruptible image which the King of Heaven doth love in you I am ashamed to picture what I am and I dare not picture what I am not But Severus resolving to force it from him would not be satisfied with any other returne whereupon he sent it to him with these following verses the elegant expresse of his unfeined humility The first coppy relates to the pictures and the latter to the Font. Abluitis quicunque animas membra lavacris Cernite propositas ad bona facta vias c. You that to wash your flesh and Soules dâ—w near Ponder these two examples set you here Great Martin shewes the holy life and white Paulinus to repentance doth invite Martins pure harmlesse life tooke Heaven by force Paulinus tooke it by teares and remorse Martin leads through victorious palms and flowers Paulinus leades you through the pooles and showres You that are sinners on Paulinus look You that are Saints great Martin is your book The first example bright and holy is The last though sad and weeping leads to blisse The verses relating to the Font were these Hic reparandarum generator fons animaruÌ„ Vivum viventi lumine flumen agit c. Here the great well-spring of wash'd Soules with beams Of living light quickens the lively streams The Dove descends and stirs them with her wings So weds these waters to the upper springs They strait conceive A new birth doth proceede From the bright streams by an immortall seed O the rare love of God! sinners wash'd here Come forth pure Saints all justfied and clear So blest in death and life man dyes to sins And lives to God Sin dies and life begins To be reviv'd Old Adam falls away And the new lives born for eternal sway Nor did the manners of holy Paulinus differ from his mind all his Garments all the Utensils of his poor Cot were so many emblems and memento's of humility Grace is an Elixir of a contrary Nature to the Philosophers stone it turn'd all the gold and Silvervessells of this great Senatour into earthen dishes and wooden spoons Righteousnesse and honesty are alwaies poor In his first Epist to Severus he presents him with