dayly to increase through thy guilty cares and thy fruitles watches If the vaine Glory to be accōpted rich possessed thee thou hast beene neuer so but in opinion and apparence only since in the state whereunto age now bringes thee all the Riches thou hast heaped togeather and which yet thou art gathering are fruits whereof thou hast but the flowers by reason of their frailty Thou mayest carry the key of thy Coffers long inough thou art but the keeper of thy treasures and as a meere Depositarian thereof for thy auarice lets thee frō disposing them and consequently to gyue forth thy selfe to be the true owner of them If thou couldst haue any moment of cessation in thy folly I would demaund the reason of thy actions to know where thy hopes do bound and what glory is the But therof It may be thou wouldst dye rich what feeblenes knowest thou not thou hast need but of a sheet only for to couer thy Miseryes withall Hast thou heaped vp money in thy Cabinets with purpose to erect thee some stately Monument after thy death Foole as thou art thou hast past all thy lyfe without considering where thy Soule shall lodge after thy death and thou studiest now to prepare a house for thy body or rather for the worms which shall gnaw the same as if putrifactiō were some rare and precious thing If thou hast a desire to leaue thy children rich true Riches consist not but in Vertue onely with its sweet liquour oughtest thou to milch their infancy to murse them continually with its diuine nourishment Suppose through excesse of happines thou gainst the whole world a sport of Fortune and by a blow of a sad mischance whereto thy vices shall haue smoothed the way thou loose thy Soule in the last moment of thy lyfe what glory past what-domage present The Reigne of thy Greatnesses shall finish so and that of thy paynes shall then begin Verily thou shalt haue possest all the goodes of the earth but in truth likwise shalt thou feele therfore all the euills within the order of a diuine Iustice which shall make thy dolours eternal Be thou cōuinced thē by reason not to follow the way of a lyfe the most vnhappy that euer yet quickned the body and confesse with me how there hath beene but one Matthew Apostle whom this vast sea of the world hath saued from the shipwracke whereinto the weight of gold siluer went about to engage him Bias despoyled himselfe indeed of all his Riches but not of all his errours Laertius Neuola puts ouer the right of Maiority to his brother and consequently his richest pretensiōs but in despising one good he imbraced not the other Consider I pray to what point of pouerty was the Richman brought vnto in an instant since of all his Riches there was not left him meanes to buy a drop of could water to quench his thirst Confesse then Miser thy pleasures to be false and how they subsist not in thy spirit but through a deceiptful opiniō that blindes thee to cast thee into a pricipice The keeper of a Vineyard that resembles thee without imitatiō of thee is a great deale more happy then thou art for after he hath stirred the earth he gathers at the end of his daies-worke in the repose a sweet sleepe the fruit of his paines and thou on the contrary the thornes of thy thornes since an eternal torment succeds the dolours of thy dying life So as Couetous men in seeking of gould siluer in the bowells of the earth find hell without piercing into it which is the Cēter therof Thou proud and ambitious Man tell vs I pray thee what are thy pleasures I know well how thy Spirit full of vanity pitches thy hopes vpon the highest Throne of Fortune that blind in the knowledge of thy faults thou findst no glory which is not far beneath thy merit But wherin consists thy Contentment if it be to expect Thrones and attend to Crownes Did one euer see a feebler pleasure since the nature of it is nothing els but wind and smoke Thou tramplest the Earth with a disdainfull foot as if thou hadst reasons inough to persuade vs that it were not thy Mother Thou out-facest the heauens with an arrogant looke and the force of thy ashes is dispersed in the aire not being able to fly any higher Againe thou makest no doubt that if the Heauens haue found thunder to punish the insolency of the Angels it were like to want new punishments to chastize the vanity of men It may be thou flatterest thy selfe with this vaine beliefe that being raysed aboue the common sort thou hast beene formed in some new kind of mould and that thou art so dispensed with in this law condemning vs to the sufferance of all manner of paines Returne I pray thee from this wandering and open thine eyes to consider thy ruine Thy Pride and thy Arrogancy are the plumes of the Peacocke sustayned by two foundations of Misery figured by the feet of this Foule Carry thy head as high as thou wilt it must necessarily fall of its pride in declining to the Earth And if thou letst thy selfe be dazeled with the glittering of thy sumptuous Apparell this verity conuinceth thee of folly since all thou wearest is but the worke of wormes nor do I wonder now that they deuoure vs so after death for it is but to pay themselues for the paynes they haue taken in laying the web wherewith we couer our nakednes So as if thou regardest thy selfe neere thou shalt see how the wormes of thy apparell couer those of thy body that therefore thy Arrogancy hath no other foundation then that of thy corruption And vpon this assurance tell me now what are the delights of thy vanity And you great Monarkes who find the Earth too little to bound within its spaces the extent of your Empire do you I pray make vs participant of your Contentments and tell vs something of the Sweetnesses which you tast during the raigne of your absolute powers It is a pleasure you will say to commaund a world of people to impose thē lawes after your owne humour A feeble Pleasure Whiles it proceeds but from a Soueraignty which subiects the spirit of him that commaunds because indeed he ought to correspond with the actions of his Subiects You do what you will your selfe It is true but that is not the way to content your selfe if your deeds be not exempt frō reproch If they feare you it is but for the knowledge they haue of your Tyranny If they loue you to what end serues the affectiō of your subiects while you seeme not to merit the same You go into al places whersoeuer your desires call you without euer meeting with resistance in your designes but why follow you not the path of vertue Displeasures rather then delights attend you at the end of the Carriere I know well how Greatnesses Riches and all Magnificences
deuoure the rest of our miseryes O happy Tombe where our soules do recouer their liberty where our bodyes do fynd the end and terme of of paynes O happy Tombe where we are reduced to corruption to arise in glory O happy Tombe where death euen dyes with vs and where lyfe reuiues with our selues for an Eternity O happy Tombe where we render to the earth the earth of our body to put our soules in possession of the inheritance of heauen O happy Tombe where we passe from death to lyfe from sadnes to ioy from infamy to glory from payne to repose and from this vale of teares vnto the mansion of delights From the tyme that the children of Israel had tasted in the desart the sweetnes of the heauenly Manna the most delicious meates of the earth were growne to be contemptible to them their harts euen chaÌ„ging their nature fell incessantly gaping after this celestiall food So likewise may I say that from the instant wherein a holy Soule is once fed with the food of the grace which is found in an innocent lyfe the world is an obiect of horrour and amazement vnto it its thoughts desires creep not on the earth any more if it sigh it is but after its last sigh if it complayne it is only for the long terme of its banishmeÌ„t in this vale of miseryes The hope of dying serues it as a coÌ„fort in its trobles and solace in its paynes it lyues in the prison of its body as slaues in the prison of their crimes with a necessary constancy alwayes attending on the last houre therof and this last moment where begins the eternity of glory Me thinkes the sentence of death which the diuine iustice pronounced once to our first Parents in that earthly Paradise was much in their fauour agaynst the euills wherewith their lyfe was fraught For if God had made the same to be immortall with all mischifes which succeeded their offence of all created things had man beene found to be the miserablest of them and most worthy of compassion but the same Goodnes which moued the Creatour to effect this goodly worke did euen moue him likewise to conserue the same His sentence was of death but in the rigour of his iustice he let his merry to appeare at the same tyme since from the payne of death we passe to the delights of a permanent and immortall lyfe In so much as this sweet coÌ„solation is inseparable from our tormeÌ„ts for they shal one day finish O sweet End since thou breakst the chaynes of our captiuity O sweet End since thou makest vs to reuiue neuer for to dy O sweet End since thou putst an end to all our sufferances O sweet End since we dye to reuiue for euer How Worldlings dye deliciously without euer thinkâ—ng thereof CHAP. XIII WE must needes confesse how the soules of the world are so deepely taken with the sleepe of their pleasures as they are euen drowned in their blindnes without feare of the precipices that encompasse them round Ioy transports them gladnes rauishes them rest charmes them hope comforts them riches moderats their feare health fortyfies their courage all the vanityes nurse them and bring them vp in the forgetfulnesse of themselues so as they may neuer be able to vse any violence for to breake the chaynes of their captiuity A pittifull thing how they neuer consider the while that this ioy wherwith they are so carryed away eueÌ„ vanishes quite lyke a flash of lightening that this gladnesse wherewith they are rauished destroyes it selfe with its owne violence in running incessantly vnto its end That the repose which charmes them coÌ„cludes with an eternall vnrest that the hope which coÌ„forts them quite changes it selfe by litle litle into despayre That these riches which do moderate their feare during their lyfe augments it at their death that the health which strengthens their courage whiles the calme and tranquility of their fortune lasts doth bread them a thousand stormes throgh the absence thereof where they run danger of ship wracke And finally that all those vanityes which serue them as a Nurse and Schoole mistresse to trayne them vp in vices are as so many bad Pylots which make a traffike of their losse and ruine When I image with my selfe the blindnesse whereto the men of this world are brought I cannot chuse but be moued with compassion for them Is it not a strang thing and worthy of pitty that they runne as fast as euer they can vnto Death without cease without intermission without fetching of their breath and without euer taking any heed of the way they hold as if they liued insensible in all their senses The Sunne which riseth euery morning sets euery euening for to let them see how the light of their life should haue at last a last setting as well as it The Age which makes them hoary and which keepes reckoning of their yeares through the accoÌ„pt of the wrinckles which it causeth to grow on their face preacheth nought els but the necessity of their departure All their Actions termine not a whit but to the ruine of the body from whence they fetch their motion since euery action of it selfe still tendes to its end How can they chuse but thinke of death if all the subiects which are found in Nature do euen cary the very lineaments thereof in the face The Sunne dyes in running his race The Moone dyes in her perpetuall inconstancy The ayre dyes with its coruption The birds seeke death in flying The brute beasts in running and the fishes in swimming in the water The seasons dye in springing againe as well as the trees The flowers dye with the day that hath seene them blow forth The earth dyes in the order of tyme since her yeares are counted The Sea sinckes it selfe by litle and litle into its proper abysses The fyre consumes it selfe in its heat and Nature it selfe that serues for a second cause in the generation of all things destroyes it selfe by litle and litle with them I speake nothing of men since they haue nothing more proper then Death What meanes trow you to forget this sweet necessity of dying whose law very happily dispenseth with none yet for all that do not doubt but there are many in the world who would neuer be dying but this were a childiâ—h language of theirs so farre from reason and common sense as one had need to declare himselfe to be a starke foole for to excuse himself of the errour or rather of the cryme We do all waies contemne the good vnknowne and as we naturally lyue in the apprehension of loosing that which we possesse we cleaue to the present so true it is that all things do escape vs and fly away froÌ„ vs. What a life were it for vs to lyue eternally in the miserable condition wherein we are borne What a life would it be to be alwayes breathing in sighes in mourning in playnts What a
part If thou cast thy selfe into the Sea of thy teares Ionas shal be affording thee roome within his little Oratory for the publish togeather the diuine meruailes of the Omnipotent If thou crucifiest all thy Passions S. Peter wil lend thee another halfe of his Crosse to participate of his Triumph so as in the extremest dolours shalt thou be tasting the extremest delight What may happen to thee in thy sufferāces worse then Death Ah what is more glorious then to suffer and dy for loue And after God what may we loue besides him What may we desire since his diuine presence very perfectly fils vs aswell with happines as with Glory If we must needs be stoned as S. Stephen was what ioy to haue our Soule enforced to go forth of the body with the strokes of flints that those very stones might serue as Stayres to mount vp to Heauen by If we be to be laied on the gridiron as S. Laurence was shall we seeme to complaine against the fire for reducing vs to ashes while we are but ashes ourselues And then a Hart which is truly amourous doth burne of it selfe in such wise as the flames of the world cannot but help it to dy readily which is all it desires If we be drawne in peeces with foure horses as S. Hyppolitus was are they not sweet streynes of pleasure rather then of payne for to haue the life snatched away with the armes and legs for the Glory of him who hath created the Soule of that body And besides what an honour was it to S. Hyppolitus to see his Spirit carried on a triumphant Chariot so drawne with foure horses to the Pallace of Eternity If one should be fleaed with S. Bartholomew what a happines trow you would it be to him who liuing but of the loue of God shold behould this amorous life by a thousand wounds to abandon Nature it selfe after hauing made of his bloud a Sea of loue to fynd on its waters the port of Eternall ioy If they throw vs downe headlong from a pinnacle of the Temple as S. Iames was how sweet a thing to be oppressed vnder the weight of this Crosse Should we haue so little courage amidst so many companiōs who with their bloud haue tracked vs out the way of glory The Pagans who euen buryed their hopes in their Tombe not pretending other good then that of a vayne Renowne haue let vs see some kind of magnanimity in their actions for whatsoeuer horrour and amazement Death may haue with it yet could it not daunt them awhit till the last shocke of its assaults Mutius vanquished the fire with one hand which vanquished all things in seeing it deuoured with its flames without being moued with it Rutilius foūd his country in his exile Socrates drunke vp a glasse of poyson to the health of his Spirit for to giue testimony to his friends that he was not sicke of the feare of death And Cato he made of his bosome a sheath for his poynard Ah! and what Shall all these Soules of the world haue offered such glorious triumphs to vertue without knowing it and we trample its Aultars and profane its Temples after we haue adored them for though all be impossible to base Spirits yet a generous hart can do all What a shame were it for thee my Soule to fly those perils that giue Crownes cāst thou not boldly thrust thy selfe pell-mell into a throng of ten thousand crucified fifty thousand beheaded an hundred thousand rent with Scourges two hundred thousand ouerwhelmed murderd with seuerall punishments wherein cruelty exercised its tyranny Of a million of poore Hermits and of Religious who haue happily yielded vp their life to the rigorous austerities of a number without number of dolours And finally of two Millions of holy Soules all sacrificed on the Aultar of the Crosse Darest thou go to Paradise by a way all strewed with roses knowing thy Sauiour to haue passed by that of Thornes What a shame is it for thee to be in Paradise alone without hauing suffered a litle euil for him who should bestow so much good vpon thee What wonder shines in this diuine Thought that he who hath created the world should haue suffered all the euills therof for recompence He hath made the Thornes to grow for to crowne his head withall He hath formed in the Earth the mines of Iron for to forge the nayles and with the liberal hād of his Prouidence hath he watered the trees which furnished the Iewes with those stakes wherunto he was tyed and at the same tyme fed protected the false witnesses that accused him the Iudges that condemned him and the Executioners who tormented him It is true in the order of his iustice he condemned Adam to death and in the order of his loue he executes the Sentence vpon his owne lyfe He would haue miseries to reigne in the world but it was but for himselfe since he hath suffered them altogether So as my Soule if in the extremity of thy Sorrowes the feeblenes of thy courage should make thee to let fal some complaint turne thy face to the Crosse-ward to admire the glory which is inseparable to it One cannot go from one extreme to another without passing through the midst I would say that from the Paradise of the Earth we cannot ascend to that of Heauen without passing through the fire which is that midst where we are necessarily to be purified lik◠as gould in the fornace But since the generous are more animated through Hope of Recompence then feare of payne be thou touched my Soule with the sweet feelings of the felicity which is promised vs rather then with the rigour of the Flames which are prepared Thou wouldst yield to Loue rather then to Force to the end thy desires be not mercinary And represent to thy selfe that as the punishments of the guilty are eternal so are likewise the ioyes of the blessed immortall After the tasting of a thousand yeares of pleasures they haue not yet begun after an hūdred thousand yeares of rest they find thēselues in the first moment according to our manner of speaking After a hundred thousands of millions of yeares of contentments of ioy felicity they are alwaies in the first point of their happines with so perfect a ioy of the knowledge as they do nothing but reioyce in those delights In so much as euen as long as God shal be God shall the Glory last where the happy Spirits are filled with al sorts of pleasures and consequently for euer O Eternity how profound are thy Abysses The Imagination cannot sinke its plummet into the bottome of thē but is alwaies grieued to haue so ill employed its Tyme After it hath thought all its life on the meruailes or rather on the miracles which are enclosed within thy labyrinthes it dies in the impotency of approaching to the entry This Dedalus hath no thred this Carriere hath no stop this Circumference hath no Center
haue heere beneath extends any further then the Sepulcher Euen as at your birth you were wrapped in Clouts so likewise dying wil they be foulding you in a sheete how rich soeuer you be And your Diademe shall remaine in your Pallace for to Crowne others withall in the selfe same way where they are to follow you since they likewise are continually to dye But this is not all you are also to passe the examine of your life before a soueraigne Iudge and dreadfull in his Iustice. You shal haue no other succour thē that of your workes If they be good their recompence is prepared and if they be naught then paynes attend them In what amazement and in what terrour is a Soule brought vnto before the face of his God whiles his crymes accuse him and condemne him to euerlasting fires O how the Iudgements of God are different frō those of men cryes that great Saint You delicate Soules whome a little griefe makes to looke pale with feare astonishment and feeblenes what will you do in Hell where euills are in their excesse without finding any end in them The noyse of a fly troubles you and that of a Caroch hinders you from sleepe Ah! What shall that be in those darcksome places where the dreadfull cryes of the Torturers and of the guilty shall continually strike your eares If you passe but one might only in the world without a winke of sleep you fall to complayning after you haue fetched a thousand a thousand sighes in expectation of day there below within those obscure dwellings the darcknesses are eternall like as the disorders and disquietnesses are One winters day killes you quite within the goodly prisons of your chambers a summers-day within that of your Halles built of proofe agaynst the heate of the sun for to auoyd alike the incommodityes both of cold and heate And in Hell shall you alwayes burne if the cold of ice doe not giue you some respites to the tormentes of your fires and by that meanes one punishmēt come to succeed another Hēce it is that the Prophet cryes Lord haue pitty vpon me in the day of thy Iustice. O day full of horrour amazement Where the liuing flames after they haue deuoured the world shall prosecute the guilty Soules in the deepest Abysses for to exercise the Iustice of the Omnipotent What vnprofitable cryes what vaine lamēts They may sigh long inough for the voyce of their repentance shal be so feeble as it shall not be able euer to cōuey its accēts to the cares of God But what disorder also of a iust cruelty The innocent shall curse the guilty Father and shall reioyce in his torments as in so many effects of the diuine Iustice for the punishments of the damned make a part of the felicity of the happy Spirits reioycing in the Iustice of God as well as in his Mercy The cryes of the accursed Soules O Lord are as so many Canticles of thy Glory since they publish incessantly the truth of thy Iustice. O impious Soules in your voluntary blindnes Why will you not suffer your reason to see how the pleasures you tast in this world do bring the consequence of the euills which you suffer in the other When will you confesse that the hope which makes you to imbrace with so much affection the future is vayne and deceiptfull that it hath for foundation of its promises but the argument of your Misfortunes You run after imaginary goods in the end of your Carriers you shall find but true euils Since repose seemes as naturally sweet vnto vs why haue we not the Eternity therof Our lyfe is a new Hell of annoyes and disquietnes and yet neuertheles within the Hell of this life we build to our selues another Hel to lyue there eternally What a prodigy of cruelty do we seeme to exercise agaynst our selues for to sell an immortall felicity for a moment of pleasures So as if the ioy which is promised vs hath not baites which are powerfull inough to attract vs to it let the payne which followes the offence purify our desires iustify all our enterprises O how S. Augustine makes on this subiect a sweet harmony to resound in our eares when he sayth I loue thee not Lord for the feare I haue of thy Hell nor for the hope of thy Paradise but rather for the loue of thy selfe How many mercinary Soules do we see in the world who haue no other obiect in their actions thē that of Glory or that of Payne in a word who loue not God but for his Paradise nor feare him awhit but for his hel What affectiō As if vertue had not Charmes inough to make it selfe beloued without the helpe of recompence and of paine Alas Lord what manner of respects would the wicked affoard you in this world if you could be without Paradise or if you had not a Hell for to exercise your Iustice in since with all your felicities your punishments they so deepely forget the Greatnesse of your infinite Glory and your equall power as to liue without yeilding to your diuine Maiesty but the least homage of thoght Who as if they were Gods themselues on earth regard not Heauen but to looke on the Starres My Soule Loue then thy God for his owne sake since he is perfectly louely nor euer thinke of his Paradise but in thinking of him since he is thy soueraigne Good Feare him in like manner without musing on the Thunders of his Iustice with an amourous feare which hath for obiect but Humility and Respect So as if in this world the Good be alwaies good content thy selfe with the satisfaction which is inseparable to it For Vertue hath this proper to it that of it selfe it recompenceth those who put its precepts in practice euen as Vice incessantly racks and tortures those who follow it All laudable actions produce in generous harts certaine feelings of ioy so extreme as when Renowne shall haue no Laurels nor Palmes for to crowne them with yet he that is the Authour of them shal not cōplayne thereof since he hath beene already rewarded for it euen before he lookt for any certaine recompence at all And the cōtrary is noted in pernicious criminall effects Payne can hardly be seuered from the Offendour nor the Hangman from the Guilty A secret torment glides in his entrailes and himselfe serues as a Hangman against himselfe for to tyrannize vpon himselfe So true it is that diuine Vertue of it selfe communicates the good of its Nature and Vice the euill But let vs not go forth of Hell with our thoughts for not to enter thereinto in effect Flatter not your selues so my Dames as to thinke that Hell belonges not to you it is for the guilty Iudge your selues without passion whether you be exempt frō cryme or no since at all tymes at euery moment you offend God diuers wayes If you will mount vp to Heauen after your
after the light This fatall Mansion is fertile onely but with thornes and troubles let vs get forth of it's bounds to fynd the true tranquillity and according as we shall approach to the good of death so shall we distance our selues froÌ„ the euils of lyfe O sweet death where our miseries termine themselues O cruell life where our disasters take their begining O welcome death where our annoyes do find their sepulcher O dread life where our dolours find their cradle The most afflicted draw al their coÌ„solation from the hope of death Are we not of this number as subiect to all the disgraces of Lot and to the cruell lawes of Fortune With what sweeter hope may we mitigate our paynes then with that of a speedy breaking the chaynes of our captiuity If we dyed not euery houre there would be no contentment to liue For what likelyhood is there that a trauailour should take any pleasure to stop in the midst of his way during the tyme of a storme Now the world is neuer without tempests What remedy were it to make a stop at a flash of lightening or a cracke of Thunder in the midst of the way of our life Being pressed with a storme and encompassed with Rockes shall we not be seÌ„ding our desires before hand to the port with this griefe for not hauing wings to fly more swiftly thither So as if the ship of our life cannot land but at the shore of the sepulcher is it not at this port whither we are to aspire euery moment to put vs in the Lee from Shipwrackes whereof so many wise Pilots haue runne hazard I haue no feare but of old age said Zenon For of all euils that of life is the most intollerable In effect if we thinke on the diuers torments that pull away our life by little and little from vs we should be of Socrates his opinion who of all the momeÌ„ts of our life prizeth none but the last O happy moment irkesome to those that go before I am troubled said Dauid in the house of men when shall I arriue into that of my Lord He was alwaies going thither but the way seemed so long and tedious to him as he sighed continually after the end of his iourney All things tend to their Center the Stones being raysed from the earth do borrow wings to their weighty nature to descend downe beneath where they alwayes haue their looke The Riuers though insensible are touched with this amourous curiosity to reuisite continually their Mother And the Piramidall flames of fire do witnes they burne but with desire of ioyning theÌ„selues with their first beginning And howbeit their endeauours are vnprofitable yet haue they neuer other scope The Heauen is our Center with what more violent passions may we be quickned then with that of being rauisht from our selues to ioyne as Atomes to their vnity as rayes to the body of their light Those Torches of the night whose number is infinite and beauty incoÌ„parable not so gallaÌ„tly shew vs their twinckling baytes but to enthrall vs with their wonders They shine not to vs but to shew vs the way of their Azure vaults as being the only place of our repose And it seemes the galloping course of the Sunne goes not so turning the great globe of the Heauens but to shew the way from aloft vnto the Inhabitants of the Earth If some one had the gift of prophecy that it were foretold vs in a certaine tyme set downe that we were to possesse an ample fortune be it of goods or greatnesse all transitory a like were it not credible the day of this attendance would be to vs of a long put-off How many sighes as witnesses of our languours should we be sending forth before this felicity so promised The greatest dolour we could possibly suffer would be but of impatience for through force of passionately desiring this good all sorts of euils would be insensible to vs. The Sunne that posts so swift would then go sluggishly and its diligence could not stay vs a whit from accusing it of slouth as often as we gazed vpon Heauen Let vs now consider the mystery of this Proposition and say that our Sauiour and the King of Prophets hath giuen vs this assurance from his mouth that the last instant of our lyfe shal be the first of our immortality and so on the day of our death should we possesse an infinite number of felicityes be they in immortall goods be they in the greatnesses of nature it selfe From what sweet disquietnesses might we seeme to be exempt in the expectation of this happines The holy Soules who breath in this world the ayre of grace liue not but of the ioy they haue of continually dying With how many sighes of loue and languour smite they Heauen at all houres All the fayre dayes the Sun affoards them to their eyes seeme to be so sad lowring as hardly do they marke the differeÌ„ce between the light and darknes because they loue but the eternall dayes which are to shine to the birth of their felicity And this is the day of death where ceasing to be men we begin to be as Angels S. Frauncis wounded on all sides with a thousand darts of loue sighes in the presence of his Mayster for griefe that he cannot dye of his wounds He contemplates the wounds of his Redeemer and his lookes haue this Diuine vertue with them as â—o make his soule to ressent the smart And through the force of his sweet torments the amorous passion wherewith he is taken makes him to ressent the dolours of his Mayster in so much as the markes thereof themselues are imprinted in his stigmatized Body â—hen it is that soowning with ioy extasied with pleasure and rauished with a thousand â—orts of felicityes wholy Diuine he sequesters himselfe from the earth to approach vnto Heauen He feeles himselfe to dye of loue without being able notwithstanding to loose his lyfe for though his wounds be mortall since all termine at the hart yet their cause is immortall So as dying in his lyfe and liuing in his death he dyes he lyues without dying and without lyuing Of dying what apparence since he is sunke in the spring of lyfe Of lyuing who would belieue it Let vs then say that if he dye it is of a Death a thousand tymes more sweet then lyfe and if he liue it is of a lyfe of extasy which feeles nothing of the humane This sweet Saint seeing himselfe vnder the wound of the bloud of his Maister belieued verily he should make shipwracke through force of desiring the same in so goodly a sea whose tempests were so much the more gratefull to him as loue serued it selfe of his sighes to driue away the storme And in truth how could he loose himselfe in the presence of his Sauiour whose Crosse serues him as well for a watch-tower as for a Hauen in the midst of the torments which his wounds haue caused to
grow in him He would feygne haue found some rocke within this sea of loue but the Pilot who steeres the ship of his life is a Port of assurance for all the world since he cōmands the winds and tempests What pleasure needs must this great Saint take to see himselfe thus smitten with the selfe same woūds of his Maister The Crosse fayles him howsoeuer yet he hath it in the hart The Crowne of Thornes he misseth but what say I he weares it in his Soule But then at least he seemes not to be depriued but of Nayles and Gaule I deceiue my selfe For as for the nayles he caryes the markes thereof as well in hands feet as side and for gaule the tongue takes very greedily the sweet bitternes therof O great Saint thrice happy Tel vs the pleasure which is to dye since you dy so sweetly in the extasies of your felicities How irksome needs must life be to you and the earth be in contempt with you in this trāsportation of ioy wherunto you are raysed S. Stephen hath beheld the Heauens opened and you his hart who hath created them S. Paul hath seene so admirable things as might not be tould and you felt such delicious as cannot be expressed S. Peter hath beene dazeled through a beame of glory you by one of loue whose light hauing pierced your darksome body hath made it transparent to the eyes of all the world so communicating it's diuine qualityes thereinto as the markes therof remayne eternal S. Iohn hath slept vpon the bosome of his Maister and by a sweet transport your hart got through and sought within the bosome of his hart your most assured repose This same disciple hath beene a witnesse of his torments and you participant of his paynes with this glory yet moreouer of bearing as well the wounds in the Soule as the markes on the body So as your fauours are so deare as none dare enuy them for fear of presumption though otherwise they be most worthy of enuy I wonder the thoughts of Death should be displeasing since we dye with pleasure in the life we lead There are none so blind in the knowledge of themselues that know not how they dy euery houre were it not iust then that we should thinke vpon that which we are continually a doing And wherefore shall we not take pleasure at this thought if it be the most profitable sweet that we are able to conceiue It is impossible to thinke of death but we must needs be thinking of Eternall life which succeds the same or rather say we It is impossible to thinke of the Soueraigne God and not to thinke of the imaginary euill of death And where shall we be finding of thoughts both sweeter and deerer then those of our Soueraigne Good So as if for the raysing of our spirits thither we are to passe into the imaginations and idea's of death the light of the Sunne which shal serue vs for obiect shall disperse all those vayne shaddowes which subsist not but through a false opiniō The starre of the day neuer shewes more bewtifull thē when it hath escaped through flight from a shole of clouds which do hide its light Those obscure clouds so strongly relieue the flash of its light as thence it appeares to be radiant in excesse The like may we say of our Reason being as the Sunne of our life that from the tyme it escapes from all these vayne shadowes of feare and dread which do veyle its brightnes it appeares so shining as it serues for a torch to passe very confidently withall from this life to the other The Will loues but the Good it is the Needle that is alwayes a pointing at this Pole It is the Iron which incessantly followes this Adamant as its only obiect In such sort as we are not capable of loue but to purchase the good which is presented vnto vs be it false imaginary or true And therin is iudgement giuen vs to know the difference that is from the one and the others Now that life is a false good there may no doubt be made since it hath no other foundation in it then misfortunes myseries That it is an imaginary good we are enforced to belieue whiles its pleasures are but of fancyes and dreames But that death is a true good we are to hould for certaine since it is the end of the terme of our exile of our captiuity of our sufferances For we cannot enter into glory but by the gate of the tombe where being reduced to our nothing we returne to our first beginning Sweet then are the thoughtes which make the life fastidious and death pleasing yet more sweet the desires that termine all our hopes in Heauen Such as know not the Art of dying well diliciously are vnworthy to liue Impatience in the expectation of death is more sensible to a holy Soule then the greatest pleasures to a man of the world We cannot loue life but in cherishing the fatall accidents that are inseparable from it which made Terence to say That he loued not any thing of all that which was in him but the hope of a speedy dying In effect there is no greater consolarion in life then that of death For were it immortall with all the encombrances that cleaue vnto it of all the conditours that are found in nature that same of man would prooue to be the most vnfortunate The afflicted loue not but by the sweet expectation of death and the others of the hope of a second life with reason imagining with themselues that if on earth they be touched with some pleasure they shal be one day accomplished in Heauen with al desirable delights And through the good of our death it is that we possesse the soueraigne good of eternall life It is the entry of our felicity the passage from the false and imaginary to the true and alwayes permanent He is yet vnborne whose hart being glutted with al sorts of contentments hath neuer gaped after new pleasures There is not a Soule in the world how happy soeuer it thinke it selfe that points not its pretensions beyond that same which it possesseth We hold it good to be rich our desires are alwayes in chase of Good We are raysed to the top of the greatest dignities we build new Thrones in our imagination not finding on earth scope inough to satisfy our Ambition withall In so much as mā hath alwaies vnrest in the repose which he hath once proposed to himselfe which makes vs sensibly to perceiue that the obiect of our desires is forth of nature and that if we sigh in the midst of our felicityes it can be but of the hope we haue to possesse some greater then they We haue lyued long inough then in Tantalus his Hel where we are continually a thirst without being euer able to drinke We must be vsing of some violence with our selues and go couragiously before death since it is that which
withhouldes this second life from vs wherein abides the accomplishment of our happines To dye is but to cast into the wynd the last sigh of our miseries To dye is but to make a partition of our selues commending the body to the Earth the Soule vnto Heauen To dye is but to bid a last adieu to the world preferring the company of Angels before that of men To dye is to be no more vnhappy To dye is to despoyle vs of our infirmities and to reuest vs with a nature exempt from sufferances O sweet death since it leades vs to the spring of life O sweet death since it giues vs the Eternity of glory in exchange of a moment of dolour O sweet death since it makes vs to reuiue for euer in a felicity immortall O yee Soules of the world thinke then alwayes of death if you will tast with pleasure the sweetnes of life For it shal be euen in this last moment where you shal receiue the Crowne of all the others you may sigh long inough in your chaynes you are neuer like to be delyuered thence if death come not to breake the gates of your prison Go before it then and carry in your countenance the desire of meeting it rather then a feare to be touched with it We should suffer with a good cheere that same which we must of necessity endure What say I endure Were it a payne to approach to the end of ones euils Were it a payne to become for euer exempt from their sufferances Let vs rather say a Contentment since thereby do we get forth of sadnes to enter into ioy Let vs call it a Happines since so we do abandone the dwelling of misfortunes to liue eternally in that of the felicities of Heauen That there is no contentment in the world but to thinke of Death CHAP. III. DEATH hath it's delights as well as Lyfe Iob was neuer more happy nor more content then at such tyme as he saw himselfe vpon the Throne of his dunghill oppressed vnder the burden of his miseries He dyed so deliciously in the depth of his dolours as he would haue suffered alwayes and haue dyed incessantly in that manner His wounds serued him as a mirrour to his loue For in looking thereinto he became amourous of himselfe but yet loued he not himselfe but to dye continually so pleasing was death vnto him therby to obey him who had imposed that law vpon him Loue changes the nature of things From the tyme that a Soule is chastly taken with this passion it neuer suffers for the subiect which it loues The paynes and torments therof are changing the name quality within the hart They are Roses rather then Thornes For if it sigh it is of ioy and not of payne if it be necessary to dy to conserue this louely cause of its life it is no death to it but a meere rap◠of contentment which seuers it from it selfe in fauour of another selfe which its loues more then it selfe In such wise as it begins to liue content from the point it begins to dye in or rather to take its flight towards the obiect it hath proposed to it selfe of the full perfection of its loue From this goodly verity do I draw this lyke consequence That the hearts wounded with diuine loue do neuer sigh in their torments but of the apprehension they haue of their short durance Death which to vs seemes so foule and deformed vpon the sudden changing it's countenance in their respect appeares a thousand tymes more beautifull then lyfe Whence it is that they are alwayes thinking thereon to to be alwayes content since it is the point where their paynes do termine where their felicityes begin The most pleasing thoughtes which our spirit can tell which way to conceyue can haue no other obiect then that of contentment of profit and of vertue in so much as they are the three sorts of goods whereto our will is tyed Now where shall we find more pleasure then in the thought of death since it is the great day of our Fortune where we take possession of the delights of Heauen Where more profit then in the selfe same thought since the soueraygne good which is promised to vs is the But the End and Obiect thereof And where more vertue then to thinke alwayes of Death whilest with the armes of these sweet thoughts we triumph ouer vice I belieue it is impossible to tast pleasures without thinking of death in regard these delights are continually a flying away and incessantly dy with vs in such wise that if we cannot ressent the contentments but within their fruit in running alwayes after them they are rather displeasures then pleasures and therefore we hold there are no greater delights thē those of thinking of Death as being the only meane to make them eternall When I resent vnto my selfe S. Laurence extended vpon the deuouring flames but yet more burned with the fire of his loue then with that of his punishment how he cryes out with a cheerefull voyce in the midst of the heates which consume him to be turned on the other side as if he thought he should not dye but by halfes being so but halfe burned I do feele my selfe rauished with the same iumps of ioy that transported him Death is so welcome to him as he deliciously roles his body on the coles as if they were very beds of Roses So as if he be touched with any payne at all it is for not suffering it for that his life being all of loue finds its element in the fire that consumes it and therefore he sighes of gladnes in the height of his torments In effect how shall he expire admidst those heats if his hart be all aflame already his Soule of Fire For if he were to be turned into ashes the stronger must needs preuayle So as he cannot be consumed but through the fire of his loue O sweet encounter O welcome combat And yet more deere the Triumph Death assayles him with flames it assaults him with heats but the fire wherewith he is holily burned triumphes reduceth him to ashes so to render them as cōsecrated This great Martyr neuer tasted in his life more sweet pleasures thē that of feeling himselfe to dy vpon this bed of flames because resenting death he felt the delights of immortall life wherof he made himselfe a crowne Kings Princes and all those who are raysed to some great fortune confesse it to be a great pleasure to dy since they dy euery hore so sweetly amidst their greatnesses I say so sweetly for their spirits and their senses are so strongly occupyed with their continuall ioyes as the Clocke which keepes accompt of the houres of our lyfe may sound long inough its 24. houres a day and they heed it no more then if they were starke deafe And the night full of horrour which represents to vs the same of the Sepulcher cānot fright them any more then
if they were quite blind Needs must the charmes of their pleasures be strong to make them insensible to that which toucheth them so neere S. Augustin sayd how the greatnesses of the world aspersed a kind of leprosy on the soule which euen benummed all the senses of the greatest Potentats of the earth In effect all their sighes all their actions do but carry the countenance of Death with them yet perceyue they no whit therof A strange thing To liue and not to thinke of lyfe at any tyme or rather of Death since to liue and dy is but one thing It is yet true notwithstanding that we dye without euer thinking of death wherin do we spoile our selues of the sweetest contentments of lyfe because our whole felicity consists in dying well and the meanes to incurre a glorious death is alwaies to thinke of the miseries of lyfe to the end to be encouraged through hope to possesse the eternall glory which is promised vnto vs. We do naturally loue our selues with so strong affections that all the powers of the world are not able to burst the chaynes thereof But what more mighty proofes may we affoard of this verity then that of thinking continually of Death since the same is the day of our Triumph When shall I begin to liue not to dye for euer sayth the Royall Prophet Our lyfe is a continuall combat and the day of our Death is that of our Victorie All the Martyrs though they were in the thickest of the fight and alwaies in the action of defending themselues yet in this warre of the world thought themselues very happy to find the occasion where they might make to appeare the last endeauours of their courage in the midst of torments for that they found in Death the crowne of immortall lyfe O sweet lyfe and cruell the attendāce As often as we carry our thoughtes beyond nature and euen to Heauen our spirit remaines wholy satisfyed therewith because that in this diuine pitch where it sees it selfe eleuated aboue it selfe it begins to liue the lyfe of Angells The earth is in contempt with it and when the chaynes of it's body fall off in their first condition it suffers their tyranny through constraint So that if it be permitted vs at all moments to abādon the world in thought to haue thereby some feeling of heauenly delights should we be our enemies so farre as to contemne these diuine pleasures in groueling without cease in our miseryes while the only meanes to be touched with it is to thinke on Death since there is no other way in lyfe to fynd the felicity we seeke for We may piously say that the Virgin purest most holy liued on earth a lyfe litle differing from that lyfe which is liued in Heauen her spirit all diuine intertayned it selfe alwayes with the Angels or rather with God himself while she had the glory of bearing him within her sacred wombe or in her armes In so much as her life was a voluntary Death all of loue seeing that through loue she tooke no pleasure but to dye so to possesse more perfectly the onely obiect of her lyfe She prized not her dayes but in the expectation of their last night as knowing its darknes was to produce the brightnes of an eternal day wherof herselfe had beene the Aurora O how sweet would it be to be able to liue in that sort for to dye deliciously It is not a life truly immortall to be alwayes thinking of death if death afford vs immortality How fastidious is the life of the world the Prophet cryes Let vs now then be ioyning our voyce to his cryes and say that death only is to be wished for All the holy Soules which in imitation of my Sauiour haue adorned thēselues with thornes haue been turning the face to the tombwards there to gather Roses With death it is where they termine their dearest hopes So as if they liue content it is not but through the sweet hope which they haue to dye O yee prophane Spirits who sacrifice not but to voluptuousnes pull off the hood of passion that thus blinds you to destroy those aultars of Idolatry whereon you immolate your selues without thinking of it for punishment of your crymes If you will know the true pleasure indeed it consists of thinking of Death as of the Spring that produceth our delights Our Crownes are at the end of their cariere nor shall we euer come to possesse the Soueraygne God to which we aspire with so much feruour and vnrest but by the way of Death When shall I cease to lyue with men sayth Dauid He is euen troubled amidst the greatnesses of the earth His Scepter and his Crowne are so contemptible to him as he would willingly change his Throne with the dunghill of Iob on condition to dye with his constancy To liue is no more then to be sequestred from that which one loues and after God what may we loue After him what may we desire So as if now these holy affections these diuine wishes cannot looke on glory but in passing by the Sepulcher let vs thinke continually on Death as of the way we take which we are yet to make This is the onely meane to render vs content for that these thoughtes are inseparable from the eternall felicity which is promised vs. That it belongeth but only to good Spirits to thinke continually of Death CHAP. IIII. SVCH as know the Art of familiarizing death with life through continual remēbrance of their end do neuer change the countenance in any perils They looke to resume both their bloud and life at once with the same eyes they behold the things which are agreable to them so as they remayne inuincible in their miseryes through the knowledge they haue of their condition Wounds neuer hurt their soules and all the maladies wherewith they may be touched afflict but their body only Their good Spirit habituated with the ordinary encounter of a thousand sad accidents inseparable from life tasts their bitternes in its turne and feeles their thornes without any murmuring The end of all actions ought to be the first ayme of the iudgement that conceiues them if it will shun the griefe of hauing done them So as from the tyme that we are capable of reason are we to serue our selues of it to consider the necessity of our mortall and transitory condition that the continuall obiect of our end may serue as a condition meanes to arriue happily thereunto The wiser sort are those who repent at least for that which they haue done true wisedome consists in not cōmitting folly And what more great may a man admit thē that to neuer thinke of death since it is the end where all our actions receiue their prize or payne Remember thou Death the Wisemā sayth and thou shalt neuer syn O glorious remembrāce who raisest vs to so high a degree of honour as neuer to offend God which is the only
perfection of the Soule next to the knowing him and louing him withall O glorious remembrance which changest our frayle and guilty Nature into one which is wholy innocent O glorious remembrance that makest vs deliciously to breath the ayre of Grace since they liue in the estate to dye euery hower for to liue eternally O glorious remembrance which on earth makest vs the inhabitants of Heauen O glorious remembrance where the Spirit finds both its Good and repose When I represent to my selfe the pittiful estate of our Condition I am afrayd of my selfe for disasters and miseryes do so attend vs at the heeles as there is almost no medium betweene dying and lyuing We sigh without cease the whole ayre we breath our very being that so tumbles alwayes towards its end wisheth not but it s not being whither euery instant leades it without intermission What better thoughtes may we now conceiue then of these verities since it is too true that we are borne vnhappy for to liue miserable vntill the point of dying And the only meane to change this misery into happines is euery moment to thinke vpon it for feare of falling euer into neglect or forgetfulnes of our selues There are feeble Spirits who dare not carry their thoughts vnto the end of the cariere of their life they euen faynt in the mid way their shadow affrights them they feare euery thing they imagine without considering the obiect of their feare subsists not but in their fancy only and how by that meanes to become ingenious to torment themselues To feare death is to feare that which is not since it is but a mere priuatiō and to haue a further feare of the thought is to fly the shadow of his shadow which is nothing Wherein these Spirits do but feed their owne weaknes liuing in death and dying in their life without dreaming once of Death But what goodly matter will they say so to mayntaine their errour for one to thinke of that which naturally all the world abhors Is it not to be miserable inough to be borne and to lyue dye in myseries without one be burying his spirit before his Body through the continual memory of his end It is euen as much as to make ones selfe vnhappy before hand so to dreame of the euils which we cānot auoyd It is inough to endure thē constantly when they arriue without going to meet with thē as if it could euer arriue too late Feeble apparences of Reason Admit that Nature abhorres Death as the ruine of this strait vniō of the body with the soule know we not also how this nature blind in all its passions and brutish in all its feelings takes alwayes the false good for the true not being able to worke but by the Senses which as materiall take its part To belieue now that our miseryes augment by this thought that we lyue dye miserable were much while on the cōtrary we do blunt the point of their thornes in so thinking of them in regard this continuall consideration of our misfortunes in this life makes vs to take the way of vertue for the attayning one day the glory and felicity of the other To imagine it also to be a griefe to dreame assiduously of Death as of an ineuitable euill is a meere imaginatiō which cannot subsist but within it selfe For we are neuer to thinke of Death but as of a necessary good rather then of an infallible euill since otherwise it i◠nothing of it selfe We should only represent to our selues that we are to change both condition and life and how this change can be no wayes made but at the end of our course whither we are continually running and that without pause awhit Our being of it selfe destroyes it selfe by little and litle withall things els of the world besides It is a funerall Torch burning by a Sepulcher that shines as long as the wax of our body lasts while euen the least blast of disaster is able to extinguish it for euer For howbeit the earth be large and spacious yet hath it noe voyd place in its whole extent but where to point euery one his Tombe euen as nature which though fruitfull of it selfe to produce many wonders yet finds an impotency withall to engender twice its lyuing workes The Fables informe vs well how Euridice was delyuered from her chaines in Hell but not from her prison she had the power to approach vnto the bounds of the dismall place of her captiuity but not to set her selfe at liberty So as if the Poets within the Empire which they haue established to themselues haue religiously held this inuiolable law of not to be able to dye twice with what respect ought we to adore the truth so knowne to euery one and so sensible to all the world And the knowledge which we haue thereof should vncessantly draw our pirits to these thoughtes to the end they sstray not in the labyrinths of sin which is the only Death of the Soule When I represent to my selfe the faces which these men of the world do make when they are spoken to of Death I haue much ado to belieue they are capable of reason since they faile thereof in the consideration of this important verity that they are but meere putrefaction and a little dust ready to be cast into the wind in the twinckling of an eye That walke they where they will they but trample their Tombe vnderfoote since the earth seemes to chalēge its earth whereof they are moulded and framed They shut their eares to the discourses that are made to them of Death which they are one day to incurre and open them to hearken to the Clocke whose houres minutes insensibly cōduct them into the Sepulcher whither willingly they would neuer go In so much as howbeit they are hasting euery moment to death yet they dare not be casting their eyes on the way they hould as if the sight could forward their paces wherin truly I can not abide nor excuse their pusillanimity since the danger whereinto they put themselues produceth an irreparable domage This same is an infallible maxime That such as neuer dreame of death do neuer thinke of God forasmuch as one cannot come at him but by Death onely On the other-side not to thinke euer of the end which should crowne our workes were as much as to contemne the meanes of our Saluation and so to forget our Sauiour who with his proper lyfe hath ransomed ours The eye cannot see at one and the selfe same tyme two different obiects in distance one from the other The lyke may we say of the Spirit though it's powers be diuerse yet can it not fasten its affections vpon two subiects at once vnequall and seuerall one from the other If it loue the Earth then is Heauen in contempt with it if it haue an extreme passion of selfe-loue to its lyfe the discourses of death are dreadfull to it And by how much it sequesters it selfe
from thoughtes of its end the lesse approacheth it to God through those very thoghts Lord I will thinke of my last dayes sayd the Prophet for to remember thee This great King and great Saint withall did belieue the memory of Death was inseparable from that of his Mayster since dye he needs must one day himselfe O sweet Death and yet more sweet the remembrance if it be true that it powerfully resists agaynst all manner of vice We cannot know good spirits but throgh good actions there is none better in lyfe then then of preparing ones selfe for death Whatsoeuer we can do which is admirable indeed looseth the whole admiration if it haue not relatiō therunto nor may a man be thought to haue lyued but to dy rather who thinkes not euer of this sweet necessity whereof the law dispenseth with no man The greatest perfection consists for one to know himselfe so as the Spirit cannot make its Eminency appeare but by beholding it selfe in its nature created to render the continuall homage of respect to its Creatour And being abased in this necessary submission it should consider that its immortality boūds vpon eyther an eternall payne or els on a lyke glory and that it is not at all but to be happy for euer or eternally vnhappy Vpon these considerations it may found the verity of its glory since it could not tell how to purchase eyther a iuster or a greater then that of knowing well it selfe For as then its diuine thoughts make it to take it's flight towards the place of its origin not prizing the earth but to purchase there the merit of Crownes which it pretends to possesse in Heauen Among the infinite number of errours which make the greatest part of the world to be guilty of crime this same is one of the most common of al To esteeme forsooth those extremely who are eloquent be it of the tongue or pen and to put them in the rancke of the more excellent Spirits As those also who through a thousand sleights being al very criminal cā tell how to amasse a great deale of riches to ariue to the highest dignityes Thus do the spirits of the world and are so esteemed by such as they But I answere with the Prophet how all their wisedome is folly before God The good spirits indeed are alwaies adhering to good and there is no other in lyfe then that to be allwayes thinking of death for to learne to dy well Since in this apprentiship only are comprized all the sciences of the world Eloquennce hath saued neyther Cicero nor Demosthenes Riches haue vndone Cresus greatnesses haue thrown Belus King of Cyprus out of his Throne into a dunghill To what purpose serues it to know how to talke well if we speake not of things more necessary and more important of our saluauation To what end serues it to be rich since we must needs be a dying miserable On the other side there is no other riches then that of Vertue and I had much rather possesse one aboue then the crownes of all the Kings of the World below What pleasure may a man take to behold himselfe raysed to Thrones since he must needs in a moment be descending into the Sepulcher What is become of all those who haue beene mounting the degrees of Fortune beene seene on the top of most eminent dignities Disastres or time which changes all things haue let them fall into the Tombe so as there remaynes no more of thē but the bare remembrance that sometymes they haue beene Consider we then and boldly let vs say how it belongs to good Spirits only to be euery houre thinking of Death since we dy euery hower That these thoughtes are the most sublime where with a good soule may entertaine it selfe That of al the wayes which may lead vs to Heauen there is none more assured then that of continually thinking of the last instant which must iustify or condemne all the other of our life for that our actiōs take their Rule frō these thoughtes to receiue the price of them All the rest is but vanity and meere folly Out of these thoughtes there is no good Out of these thoughtes there is no repose Who thinks not of death thinks of nothing since al seeme to termine at this last moment The most happy are miserable if this thoght make not vp the greatest part of their happines And the richest are in great necessity if they dreame not of that of their mortall condition Whatsoeuer is said if Death be not the obiect of the whole discourse they are but words of smoke that turne into wynd Whatsoeuer is done if Death be not the obiect of the actions all the effects are vnprofitable In fine all glory all good all repose all the contentment of the world consists in thinking alwayes of Death since these thoughtes are the only meanes to atteyne the eternall felicity wherto they termine And a generous Spirit cannot giue forth more pregnant proofes of its goodnes then in thinking on the Death of the body whiles euen of this moment depends the life of the soule How those spirits that thinke continually of Death are eleuated aboue all the Greatnesse of the Earth CHAP. V. IT is impossible to know the world without contemning it since the disastres and miseryes wherewith it is stuft are the continuall obiects of this knowledge And from the point that our iudgment hath broken the visards of the false and imaginary goods which vnder the maske of their goodly apparences deceyue our will it suddenly abhors in them that very same which passionately heertofore it seemed to cherish Whence it happens that we can neuer enter into knowledg of the world but we acquit our selues of it at the same time throgh a sorrow for not hauing despised it sooner since all its goods are but in apparence onely and its euils in effect So as if it be a Tree we may boldly say that miseryes are the leaues therof misfortunes the branches and death the fruit And it is vnder the shadow of this vnhappy Tree where our forefathers haue built our first tombe Man may seeme to disguise himselfe if he will vnder the richest ornaments of Greanes with the fayrest liueries of Fortune Well may he trample Scepters and Crownes vnderfoot in the proudest condition whereto Nature and Lot might haue raysed him vp He is yet the same I meane a peece of corruption shut vp in a skin of flesh whereof the wormes haue taken possession already from the momēt of his birth Let him measure as long as he will a thousand tymes a day the ample spaces of the world with this proud ambition to make a conquest of them all yet he must be fayne to let them fall if he would find the true measures of them without compasse enclosed all within seauen foot of earth which shall marke out his Tombe If he assemble with the same ambition all the Thrones of Kings
for to make them serue as Aultars whereof himselfe shall be the Idol he shall not choose but lend his eares to the Oracles of sweet Necessity though cruel for him for he must dy and consequently serue one day as a victime vpon those very Aultars where they shall be yielding of Sacrifices to his person Let him bestow Empires as fauours Kingdomes for presents and whole Citties for the least recompence and then when he returnes into himselfe for to know what he wants he shall find that he needs no more but a peece of a sheet to shrowd with all his miseryes the horrour of his infection and corruption Let the Sunne neuer rise but to giue light to his triumphes if he ioyne not â—o his victories those other of his passions â—e shall celebrate but his owne ouerthrow â—nd triumph on himselfe without thinking of it Let the heauens be rayning on his head as many felicityes as there are disasters on earth all his happynes concludes with Death while by the way of his prosperities he goes on euery moment to the Sepulcher In fine although through his great possessioÌ„ of goods he know not what to desire not what to looke for yet shall I not forbeare ere the lesse to put him in the rancke of the most miserable of the world if vertue be not the richest of his treasures For not changing his condition awhit in the accomplishmeÌ„t of his greatnesses and of all his delightes he is alwayes the same a little ashes a little dust a little earth And howbeit of the ashes of the wood of Libanum of the dust of Azure or of some more noble or fertile earrh yet is al but meere putrefaction and the crust of all these goodly apparences is full of infection I esteeme him very happy great rich who contents himselfe with the meriting of these greatnesses these felicities and these riches for the glorious contempt which he makes of theÌ„ for being abused in the knowledge of himselfe he beholds all the world beneath him and desires but the continuatioÌ„ of his repose since in the only thought of Death he possesseth al the goods of life The great Monarkes of the world seeke the inteÌ„tions of lyuing happy in their greatnesses he the meane of dying content in his miseries they are alwayes in care to extend the bounds of their Empire he pleaseth himselfe to bound his ambition with what he possesseth since he wants not any thing for his voyage They make a masse of riches he takes glory in pouerty knowing that the richest are robbed at the end of the course of â—ife and that we go forth of the world in â—ike manner as we enter into it with the first habit of those miseries which we haue inherited from our parents In such sort as â—hinking perpetually of Death in the way where it is to approach euery moment he casts not his eyes vpon greatnesses but to haue pitty on those who possesse them He contemplates not the fauours of Fortune but to publish the inconstancy thereof So â—f he regard Thrones it is but to measure â—he depth of the precipices that enuiron theÌ„ since all crownes for him are made both of tare and thornes And the Scepters as light as reedes giue him not any other Enuy â—hen that of trampling them vnderfoot insteed of holding them in his hands since â—hey are the markes of a glory of smoake which resolues into nothing to returne to its first beginning There is no doubt but such as thinke coÌ„tinually of Death are raysed aboue all the greatnesses of the earth because Eternity is the obiect of their thoughtes So as if they desire greatnesses they wish they may be eternall if they enuy Treasures they marke the possession of them beyond Nature to the end Inconstancy of tyme may not bereaue them of them They haue no ambitioÌ„ for this vayne glory of the world which the least mischance may change into infamy nor for these Crownes which a litle wind of disgrace makes to fal from the head All their glory is to thinke of death for to be able to attayne at the last instant of lyfe the Crowne of immortality wherein consists the perfection of all felicityes possible to be desired Greatnesses are of the same nature with those who possesse theÌ„ they are but smoke they are but wind for we see theÌ„ to vanish away in the twinckling of an eye with their subiect So as if they seeme to subsist notwithstanding in their continuall flight they are changing the countenance euery houre To be great aboue the common sort of men in honours and in riches onely iâ— to be miserable if the true greatnes of man consist in meriting all and possessing nothing In so much as he who thinkes oâ— Death in despising the felicityes of this life makes himselfe to be worthy of the glory of the other and in these only thoughtes is he raised so aboue himself as if he were capable of vanity he would not know himself For from the tyme that he ioynes the thoughts of Death to the verity of his mortall condition he tasts before hand in the midest of his course the sweetnes of the goods which he pretends to receyue at the end I would say that the sensible imaginations which he hath of dying coÌ„tinually as there is nothing more certayne then it makes him to tread vnder foote all the greatnesses of the earth since that his soule directs his lookes vnto Heauen In effect were it not as much as to offeÌ„d a Prince to offer him at sea the Crowne of a Kingdome in the midst of stormes and tempests wherewith his ship were miserably tossed or els at such tyme as he were seene to be taken with a mortall disease For he might answere very pertinently they should attend him to make him those offers on the shore or when he were recouered of his health Now we seeme to represent this Prince since like vnto him do we floate vpon this sea of this world where the Ship of our life is incessantly tossed with diuers misfortunes Fortune comes to present vs in the fury of this tempest both Scepters and Crownes would it not be accounted rash now for vs to receiue them at her hands in this pittifull estate whereinto we are reduced not to hope for a calme or cessation for feare of seeing our hopes quite buryed with our life in a cruel shipwracke whose danger euen followes vs as neere as the shadow doth the body So as if she make vs the same offers during the mortal malady wherewith we are seised from the moment of our natiuity since we begin to dy from the instant that we begin to liue were it not a folly to accept them And for vs to answere her and to wish her to expect till we come vpon the shore is a vayne attendance while there is no other port in the sea of life then that of the tombe and to attend also for the cure of
are and now is he all dust The flash of his riches did dazle all the world except Solon who discouering his miseries in the midest of his greatnesses maintayned him to be poore with all his treasure Go you sometymes before your death and imagine the houre which you breath in to be your last and then consult with the Oracle of your iudgement for to know the good which you would haue done before this cruell separation of your selfe from your selfe And after it shall haue taught you your duty suffer not your selfe to be ouertaken by the sundry disasters which euery moment may be taking away your lyfe Serue your selfe of your Riches without glewing your affection to them Since you are the mayster of them suffer them not to be your mayster You haue found them in the earth and there let them rest for you nor let any one be fetching thē forth Wel may you be hiding them in your coffers for a tyme but the day of Death discouers all it is in your hands to make vp the last accompt eyther of the profit or domage which they shall peraduēture haue caused to you You might haue purchased Heauen with your almes where it may be you haue rather bought euē Hell with your prodigalities You might haue built Temples to the glory of him who hath bestowed them on you you haue offered them in sacrifices vpon the Aultar of your passions to the Idols of your soules Will you neuer open your eyes to discouer the precipices which encompasse you round Will you be alwayes cruell to your selues to the preferring of the mansion of the earth before that of heauen the delights of the world before those of Eternity and the vayne riches of heere beneath before the treasures of the eternall glory Imagine you that before you were borne you were nothing that being borne you haue but quickened a peece of corruption whose life cōceales the infection and whose Death bewrayes the same Say now then you Rich men as Cresus shall I terme you miserable with Solon since Death takes all away from you saue only the sorrow of hauing liued so ill a life That he who thinkes alwaies of Death is the wisest of the world CHAP. IX VERITY is the obiect of all Sciences And of all verityes there is none more knowne nor is more sensible then that of our mortall condition since we dye continually without cease In so much as the best science of the world consists in the knowledge of ones self The disasters and miseries that befal vs euery houre are goodly schooles for vs to become learned As for me I hould that the onely meditation of death instructs vs in all that which is necessary for vs to know Who doubtes but that he who thinkes alwayes of his end is a great Deuine if all the goodly Maximes of this diuine science termine at the eternall life which followes death That he is a Philosopher we must needs belieue for if Philosophy learne vs the art of reasoning we can serue our selues of reason no wayes better then to be alwayes a thinking of death and the contemp of lyfe That he be an Astrologer is a meere necessity because throgh the mouing of his lyfe he vnderstands that same of the stars which shine vpon him imagining with himselfe that as he goes by litle and litle to finish his course in the Tombe so lykewise the Sun approches to the end of its lucid race where it is to fynd at last its vtmost That he is a Mathematician the resemblances are too playne since that according to the measure of the knowledge he hath of himselfe he can measure the height depth and breadth of all things being of the same nature with him That he should be ignorāt of Arithmetick it were not credible for since he can tell how to compt all the moments of his life he must needs be very skilfull in numbers I should thinke he had skil in musike too since he puts his passions in accord to charme his spirit with their sweet harmony He must of necessity be a great Phisitian since he busyes his soule so in the chiefe health of his innocency to attaine immortality in musing alwayes vpon Death So as with reason might we hould him to be the wisest of the world and the wisest that are to authorize my saying may well be glad to imitate him Aristotle thou hast ill imployed thy tyme to stand so much in discourse of the world without knowing the miseries thereof For if thou hadst had the knowledge of them why hadst thou not followed the example of Alexander in seeking forth a new one not for to conquer it as he but for to liue in eternally happy And as his valour had put the conceipt into his head so might thy spirit haue giuen thee the same proiect It is playne therefore thou hast spoken of the Earth with the language of heauen and of heauen with the language of the earth Thou hast made an Anatomy of nature discoursing with iudgemēt of all the second causes which do make the springs of the whole to moue Thou hast gyuen the definition of al things but only of thy self as if thou couldst not haue remembred them all but with forgetting thy selfe Thou wast busyed much in counting the nūber of the heauens without assigning thy place there put aloft Thou hast noted the diuers motions of the Sunne thou hast spoken of it's Eclypses without once informing thy selfe of the cause which hath giuen it the being and light Thou hast discourst very aptly of the reuolution of ages and of the continuall vicissitude of tyme without taking any heed to the perpetuall inconstancy of thy life Thou hast maintayned that whatsoeuer subsists in the world runnes post to it's ruine and yet as if thou perceiuedst not thy self to runne awhit towards the Tōbe with the rest of created things thou hast spoken not a word of this second life wherein abides the perfection of all our happines Thou hast yielded the Sunne to be eclypsed Thou hast afforded the Moone to take diuers coūtenāces vpon her Thou hast giuen leaue to Serpents to be changing their skin and to the Phenix to reuiue of it's ashes and cruell to thy selfe the while thou hast taken away the hope from thee of euer arising againe Thy spirit hath beene like to a torch which consumes it selfe to giue others light For thou labourest to discouer to men all the goodlyest secrets of nature and hast voluntarily hidden from thy selfe the secrets of thine owne saluation Thou hast lent Ariadnes threed to an infinite number of spirits who were intangled in the labyrinth of the world without once being able to get forth thy selfe though the knowledge of its causes and effects thou hast euen damned thy selfe Fooles speake not but of thy Prudence and wise men of thy Folly It had beene a great deale better for thee thou hadst possest all the Vertues then to speake so of
them without them in their absence Thou madst profession to teach mē the language of reason and thou hast neuer beene speaking with thy selfe thereof therby to bring thee into the contempt of the earth and desire of heauen Thy light hath dazeled thee thine armes haue vanquished thee the greatnes of thy Spirit hath made thee miserable For with endeauouring to merit Crownes thou hast raysed thy selfe aboue all the Empires of the world to make thy selfe to be adored that thy Example might serue as a law vnto others thou hast beene the first Idolatour of thy selfe Thou wouldst not belieue that there was one God in heauen because thou saidst thy self to be a God on earth Thou wouldst not speake of the other lyfe as knowing wel that he who distributes the good the euill to ech one should seeme to prepare there a Hell for thee to punish thy arrogācy So as if it were once affoarded thee to re-begin thy course againe thou wouldst doubtles forget the vanity of all thy learning to be thinking continually of Death whiles these only thoughts do learne vs all manner of sciences The glory which is left thee for hauing spoken of the world is shut vp in the world and though it should last as long as it yet shall it alwayes dye with it Thy reputation is reuereneed on earth and thou art trod on vnder foot in Hell Men do honour thy name and the deuils torment thy soule Behold all the recompence of thy trauailes Let vs say boldly then that he who is alwayes thinking of Death is ignorant of nothing and that for to be esteemed wise he should liue with his thoughts as the only obiect of the glory we hope for and of the felicity we attend euery houre Plato to what purpose serues thee that faire Renowne which thou hast caused to suruiue thy ashes They speake euery one of thee but if they fetch any argument of thy wisedome they conclude vpon thy folly while Death dishonours thy lyfe We may compare thee to Hanniball for after he had triumphed ouer others he let himselfe be vanquished by himselfe hauing receyued a law from his passions a seruitude from his vices In lyke māner may we say of thee that thou hadst couragiously triumphed ouer all thy popular errours which are thy chiefe domesticke enemies after I say thou hadst left thy goodly actions for so many examples of morall vertues thou buryedst the richest Crowne within thy Sepulcher and that which surmounts all tyme and the inconstancy thereof for at thy Death thou adoredst many Gods as repenting thee of the opinions yea of the beliefe thou hadst in the course of thy lyfe Thou tookest a great deale of paynes to procure the surname of Deuine through thy diuine thoughtes but in the highest of thy soaring pitch thy spirit as an illegitimate yong Eagle not being able to endure the splendour of the sun of faith was cast down headlong from the top of the heauens to the lowest of the earth where dying alwayes in punishments and reuiuing euery momēt in their dolours it shall liue for euer in eternall paynes Let vs say then agayne once more that all sciences are but meere vanity except such as teach vs to liue well and dy happily And that after this manner who thinkes continually of Death is the wisest of the world A Contemplation vpon the Tombe of Salomon CHAP. X. RETVRNE yet once agayne O great Queene of Saba to behold this wise Salomon come attended with your magnificent trayne that euen the selfe same subiects who were the witnesses of your ioy may be the same likewise of your sadnes in this cruell change both of tyme fortune You haue passed through many a sea and happily beene quit of a thousand dangers on the land for to visit this great Monarke as the onely Abridgement of the wonders of the world Put your selfe once more into the perils of the same rockes and into a new danger of so long a voyage to see the setting of this Sun the ashes of this Phonix I would say the Tombe and corruption of this incomparable of this inimitable of this mighty King of Sages What metamorphosis The splendour of his Riches had once dazeled your eyes now the horrour of his pouerty doth begg euen teares of your compassion Heeretofore you cōtemplated his power with astonishment and now see into what plight of feeblenes haue miseries brought him You admired the greatnes of his Empire that likewise of his spirit ioyned with the perfection of his wisedome but now consider how all these goodly qualityes haue not beene able to exempt him from the Sepulcher where he serues as a prey vnto the worms You haue adored him on the Theater of his Vanities at such tyme as he represented the personage of the greatest King that euer wore a Crowne and turning the leafe within the twinckling of an eye is this very King no more then a loathsome carkasse whome horrour amazement hold in pledge vntill such tyme as he be conuerted into dust which he hath beene indeed but that is all And hardly dare we now maintaine him to be he since that in seeking him out within himselfe is he not to be found So vanisheth the glory of the world all flyes into the Tombe Solon since thou hast borne the surname of all the seauen Sages of Greece come visit this tombe of the wisest of the world of this incomparable Salomon He was great of birth great in happines great in power great in riches most great in knowledge But behold now how his rich cradle is chāged into this poore Sepulcher How his felicity hath taken the visage of misfortune How his power is bounded in the impotēcy thou seest him in He is not great but in miseries he is not rich but in wormes and in the knowledge of the follies which he hath wrought Among so many goodly lawes which thou hast gyuen to the Athenians remember thy selfe of that which nature hath imposed vpon thee to dy at all howers vntil such tyme as thou be quite dead Thou dost in vayne command thy bones to be cast into diuers places after thy Death for if they putrify not all at once ech one of thē shall produce a stench from the marrow in the place where it shal be buryed Thou must necessarily follow the lot of this great Sage since you are brothers both of the same condition Thou hast taught others long inough learne thou that which as yet thou knowest not Thou teachest all the world to liue learne thou thy selfe to dy well Thy knowledge is but vanity For though thy precepts be engrauen in marble and brasse time which deuoures all things shall deface the remembrance of them to so bury thy glory If thou lyuest not for thy soule rather then thy body they will scarce belieue thou hast lyued at all Periander come behould thy Companion of renowne so as if thou knowest
your impatiēt desire and longing hope but will you cōfesse me the truth that it is but a day of rayne tempest For you cast forth a thousand sighes to the winds and powre out as many teares being so moued through the farewell you giue to your selues whiles you giue your selues to another without knowing for the most part your owner which yet were nothing if the clauses of your contract did not signe you out the death both of the one and the other the incertainty also who shal be the first For you must confesse that if you loue your selues perfectly indeed you dye euery houre of the apprehension you haue of an euill which neyther the one nor the other can tell which way to auoyd I will not speake a whit of the accidents and miseryes without number which are inseparable to this cōdition I leaue the knowledge therof to those who haue had the experience But I pray you to confesse freely if you be content with the felicities that remayne to you or no Thou Couetous man returne then to thy selfe after thou hast pulled off the hood of thy blindnes for to publish how the sole treasure of Grace can enrich the soule with all sorts of contentments and that with out this good are all goods false Thou Ambitious man the deuine Iustice now puts thee on the racke to make thee cōfesse this truth that in the onely possession of Grace are comprehended all the desirable greatnesses that are since he that possesseth it is the greatnest of the world You Courtiers all the Fauours which you seeke for are but wind and smoke It is tyme now to acknowledge your vanity and to bid a last adieu vnto the world The Kings Princes whome you court so are euen as miserable as your selues since they can afford you but transitory goods Alas for a handful of earth will you relinquish the pretensions you haue to heauen If you will bestow your tyme well then court you an omnipotent King as our God is whose Fauours haue no price whose Graces are infinite whose Goods are eternall as his Glory is wherewith he crownes our labours Know you not that his Almighty hand stayes and mooues agayne when he pleaseth the wheele of fortune How this blind Goddesse receiues frō his prouidence whatsoeuer she giues and that she so serues but as a channell to conuay both disasters prosperities into the Earth So as if your hart do sometymes fetch sighes of loue after those obiects of dust do you then command your spirits not to stand so gazing on the beauty of a riuer that glides away incessantly like its waues For whatsoeuer may be seene faire in Nature is but a feeble ray and a first Idea of the purest of this soueraigne and adorable Essence wherein consists the accomplishmēt of al perfection as the onely inexstaustible spring from whence they issue without spring or begining Represent vnto your selues that whatsoeuer seemes so fayre to day shal be changing the countenance to morrow In so much as for to find a permament beauty and of louely qualityes indeed that might alwayes abide in its purity we had need to acquit our selues of the worlds circuit or bounds to carry our thoughtes into Eternity as to an only mansion where all things are eternall This is the lesson of that great Prophet when he cryed Lord when shall I be able to quench my thirst in the spring of thy eternall pleasures In vaine do you seeke for a foūtaine of delights to quench the thirst of your hart withal for what greedines soeuer you haue to drinke after you haue drunke you shall find your selues more a thirst then euer and the reason is good which is that the water of this fountaine retaynes the nature of the soyle that produceth the same whence it is that all the goods of the world are not able to satiate the Ambition of one holy Soule as being created to the possession of infinite goods After one cōtentment had they sigh anone after another and so after another and another without cease Our spirit being quickened with a deuine obiect points alwaies its lookes beyond what it possesseth it permits it self sweetly to be drawn like the iron by its deuine Adamant for to vnite it selfe vnto it as to its end whither it tends without cease or intermission In effect what would become of vs if our desires hopes were buryed in the tombe Such as know what it is to liue liue not but of the hope of a sweeter life in this sweet hope do find nothing that is worthy of them but the contempt they make of all things O generous contempt of the world wherein consists our whole glory You Courtiers I leaue you to thinke vpon it vntill such tyme as you be disposed to put it in practise for to exercise withall your more hidden and secret vertues My Dames you will permit me to tell you the truth The fayrest day of your life is that of Death This is that nuptiall day of your Soule with its Creatour a day of pleasure rather then of teares since therein do you bid an eternall Adieu vnto the world and to all its myseries A day of gladnes rather then of sighes since you giue your selues through loue to him who of his goodnes hath afforded you al things In the expectation of this happy day it is that the fayrest dayes should be tedious to you Neuer cast your eyes vpon your glasse but to count the wrinckles which age makes to grow by little and little on your brow as so many presaging markes of Death approaching Represent vnto your selues sometimes how all the pleasures which you haue had are passed that those you now enioy do passe and that those which you are lyke to tast shall also passe away then imagine with your selues in what lamentable case shall you find your selues at the end of the course of your lyfe with all the Thornes of your withered Roses with how many assaults of griefe shall you haue your hart thē battered With how many alarmes the soule affrighted and with how many tortures shall the one the other be rackt Performe betymes what good soeuer you would willingly haue had done at this last houre and take you away their power and liberty from vpbrading you one day for the euill whose paines you shal carry in that last day It seemes as you lyued not but to repent you at your death for hauing lyued so ill not considering the while that slow repentances are ordinarily changed into despayre I bewayle you my Dames as often as I thinke of the infinite number of the vanities which do busy your spirit How much time you bestow euery day in trimming vp that dunghill of your body as if your guilty industry were able to driue away the miseryes from thence You do all what you can to make your selfe beloued and know you not that nothing is more louely then Vertue Do
as he stood in competēcy with his brother-in-Law about the Crowne of the whole world at once yet notwithstanding his miseries made him an homicide of himselfe through a stroke of despaire Maximus came to the Empire from the lowest degree of a seruile condition but from the tyme that he was on the ridge of Greatnesse did Fortune make him to descēd so low by the same degrees he mounted vp with as his Misfortunes had no relation with his Prosperities Thus passeth the glory of the world leauing a great deale more astonishment behind then euer it afforded admiration If a great Architect should seeme to perswade vs to belieue that our dwelling house were on the point of falling and that we were in daunger to be buried in its ruines I would imagine with my selfe we should lyue alwaies in payne to auoyd the effects of his presages seeking with all sollicitude the meanes to eschew those perils So as if I turne the Meddall it wil appeare this tottering and ruinous house to be nothing els then that of the world wherof that great Architect who hath layd the first foundations hath affoarded vs the truth of this assurance that it shall fall to ruine very soone The Heauen and the Earth shall passe away What solidity then can we establish heere beneath in this soyle as well of Pouerty as of Infamy since it shakes vnder our feet through its continuall vitissitude The ruines thereof appeare without cease before our eyes in the course of its deficiency our life pursues the same way And neuertheles with what blindnes do we fall a sleep in the ship of our deliciousnes not considering how it floats vpon the stormy sea of the world as abundant in shipwrackes as the land of Mishaps We must neuer turne away our eyes from the obiect of Inconstancy since it is naturall to all that which hath subsistence heere beneath The Monarchy began with the Assyrians It passed to the Persians from the Persians to the Macedonians from the Macedonians to the Romanes and at this day the Empire is in Germany In so much as after that this so famous and illustrious a Crowne shall haue run through the foure corners of the earth it shall resolue into earth following the course of those that shal haue possessed the title eyther by right of hazard or by the right of Birth So as if Heauē Earth do passe whatsoeuer shall beare the image of the creation is cōprized within this reuolution of Ages where all concludes in a last end There is nothing so great in the world as the Hart which contemnes all Greatnesses Tyme as Mayster of all which is in Nature le ts forth Crownes and Scepters to Kings to some for a day to others for a moneth to some others for a yeare and to others for more but after the terme is expired it giues no more dayes one succeds in the place of another vnder one and the selfe same Law of condition Let the infinite number of Kings heere present themselues that haue raygned vpon Earth and if euery one hath had his Crowne it may likewise be sayd that ech hath had his Tombe Then seeke not Greatnesses my Soule but in vertue and in the glorious contempt of things of the Earth Thou seest how Magnificences haue not charmes but for a day their glittering fadeth with their light and what foundation soeuer they haue they carry in their being the Necessity of their ruine To what end shouldst thou raise thy Ambition vpon Thrones if they be States of vnhappines and inconstancy Enuy not Kings their Crownes nor Scepters since it is the title of a transitory glory Felicity cōsists not for to rule with Empire but rather to find repose of life in the condition wherin he is borne And what more sweet repose can one looke for then that of desiring nothing in the world This is a pleasing paine to be alwayes in vnrest to find that soueraigne good which we seeke for I would say that Eternity where delightes are durable in their excesse When thou shouldst be exalted aboue all the Greatnes of the Earth what happines and what contentement would be left thee since the Tyme of their possession glides without respit with the pleasures where with they are quickned In such sort as if at the rising of the sunne thou receyuest Sacrifices in homage at the setting thou shalt find thy selfe stript by Fortune or by Death Fixe not thy thoughts then but on the obiects which hould touch with Tyme nor seeke thou euer to runne after things that fly away Thy immortall nature cannot eye but Eternity sigh then incessantly after its Glory if thou wilt one day haue it in possession There be some who seeke their repose all their pleasure in Riches as if Gould had this Vertue to eternize their contentments Set not thy hart vpon things of the world saith the Apostle When the Poets would speake of Riches they put before vs the Gould of the riuers of Hebrus and Paectolus to let vs see how they fly away from our eyes as the waters Put case a man should possesse all the treasures of the earth yet should he not seeme to be richer awhit for all that since he were but the guardian and not the owner of those treasures Riches consist not in possessing much but rather in contenting ones selfe with a little Cresus could neuer satisfy his couetous desire during his life which induced his enemies to fill his Body with the gould wherewith he could not fill his Soule What Folly to seeke Eternity in Riches where is ordinarily found but Death This very man heere made accompt to stuffe his Coffers with Gould Syluer knew at last that his Treasures were so many fatall Instruments that serued for nothing but to take away his life so as being deceiued in his hopes he became sollicitous to conserue very charily the meanes of his losse of his ruine He therfore that goes to seeke for the Riches of the East puts himselfe to the mercy of the waues and in seeking the repose of his life approaches so neere to Death as he is distant from it no more than the thicknes of the shipboard What feeblenesse of humane Spirit to put in hazard whatsoeuer one holdes most deere on Earth for the purchase of a little Earth I had rather a great deale be Iob on the dunghill then Cresus on the woodpile for the one flouted at Fortune in his miseries and the other had recourse to Solon to repent himselfe for not hauing followed the way of Pouerty rather then that of Riches since the latter led him to Death Crates the Theban considering that he floted without cease within this vast sea of the world despised Riches for feare to suffer Shipwracke with so heauy a fraight The Wheele may well run about but can neuer get forth of the lymits of its Circle so lykewise man may well trauayle runne ouer the
world to heape vp treasures but he fetches the turne only of the Circle of his lyfe the while of necessity most the Ship be landing at this last port of the Sepulcher where he finds himselfe as poore as when he entred into the cradle I know not for whome the Richman trauayles for before the iourney of his trauayle be finished his dayes are runne out and being on the point to reape the fruite of his passed paines death gathers those of the repose of his lyfe The Mercinary soules who lend forth their conscience to Interest insteed of their Money sell as in told Coyne the portion they pretend in Heauen for a little Earth Blind as they be they spin the web of their captiuity forge the Armes which are one day to reuenge the enormity of their crymes Abused soules they consider not how all the Gould of the world is yet now in the world howbeit the greatest part therof hath beene possessed by an infinite number of Mortals and so shall leaue them behind them as others how rich soeuer they be now without carrying ought els into the Tombe but griefe for not hauing made so good vse of them as they should To what point of misery was reduced the impious Richman of the Ghospell in a moment after he had possessed an infinite number of Treasures He behoulds himself in estate of begging a drop of water for to quench his thirst To what end serued all his pleasures past but to augment his present paynes He employed his Riches to purchase Hell and all his goods to gayne the euill he endures O humane Folly To put ones selfe in hazard to loose Eternity for enioying of a fading Treasure Good is not good but as permanent and yet looke they after transitory delights that subsist not but in flying Demaund they of Cyrus what hath he done with all his Riches he will answere he hath left them in the soyle that brought them forth Xerxes hath enioyed theÌ„ as well as he and as he so hath he borne no part thereof into his Sepulcher They may cause monuments to be built to their Memory but Tyme that deuoures all hath wrought new Tombes for their Tombes in such fort as if yet there be memory of their death it is but onely by reason of their lyfe They make a question which of the two was more rich eyther Alexander or Diogenes the one whose Ambition could not be bounded with the whole extent of the Earth and the other whose desire hopes were shut vp in the space of his Tub. For me I do hould with Diogenes since he is the richest who is best content I could neuer yet imagine the pleasure which Caligula tooke to wallow vpoÌ„ Gold for if the lustre of that mettall contented his eyes he might haue beheld himselfe a far of since the eye requires a distance proportioned to the force or feeblenes of its lookes but deceaued as he was he considered not the while how this Gould He differed not awhit but only in colour since they were both of Earth And in effect they can not authorize its pleasure but through the relatioÌ„ which was there of the nature of the one with that of the other The Poets represent to vs how the Goulden fleece was guarded by a Dragon lyke as the Goulden Aples of Hesperides and the Morall which may be gathered from these Fables is nothing els but the danger and payne which is inseparable from the conquest of Treasures The Historians obserue that in all the Countries where this mettall abounds the inhabitants are so poore as they haue scarse a ragge of linnen to couer their nakednesse withall What may we imagine in contemplation of this Verity but that all the Gould of the Earth cannot tell how to enrich a maÌ„ while the riches of the world are borne and dye in a pouerty worthy of compassion Then seeke not my Soule other Riches then those of Eternity Thou canst not tell how to buy heauen withall the gold of the earth and without the enioying of its felicities all goods are counterfait al Sweetnesses but full of Bitternes Imagine thee now to lyue vnder the Reigne of a goulden Age and that through an excesse of Fortune thou treadest vnder foot all the Pearles of the Ocean and all the goulden haruest of the Indies And not to loose thy selfe in this imagination consider the estate of this felicity tast in conceyt a part of the pleasures which thou wert to possesse if effects should answere to thy thoughts and then boldly confesse with the Wiseman how all these transitory goodes are treasures of Vanity that in the iust pretensions thou hast to an Eternall glory all these atomes of Greatnes can serue thee no more but for obiect of thy contempt Suppose thou wert the absolute Mistresse of the world what good couldst thou hope for in the fruition therof if all be replete with euils Crimes haue Temples there Vices haue Aultars All the Idolls are of goulden Calues and such as make professioÌ„ to follow Vertue are within the order of a malady of a contagious Spirit according to the common opinion So as through a Law of Tyme the most laudable Actions are subiect to reproaches Leaue then all the goods of the Earth to the Earth since thou art not borne for them seeke as a pledge in the sweet thoughtes of Eternity for the accomplishmeÌ„t of thy delightes The world is not able to satiate thy desires since it hath nothing in it that is not transitory And howbeit it be susteyned in its inconstancy it leaues not to wax old in changing to ruine it selfe by little and little in ruyning all things Thinke neuer then but of Eternity Speake not but of Eternity Let thy desires and thy Hopes regard but Eternity Let alwayes Eternity be in thy memory the conteÌ„pt of the world within thy hart If thou beest capabel of Hatred be it but for the Earth and if thou beest capable of Loue be it but for Heauen since it is the mansion of Eternity There are others who seeke their contentment in magnificent Pallaces as if they were shelters of proofe against disasters and misfortunes Charles the VIII tooke pleasure to build very proud Fabrikes as belieuing it may be to close his eyes in dying through the Splendour of their wonders but his lot an Enemy of his hopes snatched away his last breath being sound of health vpon a straw bed and in place encompassed round with Misery Heliogabalus likewise was deceued of his purpose for being on the point when the â—enormity of his Crymes had passed sentence of his Death on behalfe of the Gods he shuts himselfe in the fairest hall of his Pallace and prepares for his Enemies all the Richest instruments of Death he could recouer as thinking to sweeten the bitternes thereof with so goodly armes but his foresight was vnprofitable for the Gods permitted that as he had tasted the
of the Soule and al the dolours wherwith our life is touched Now then if it be true that we dye euery moment is not euery moment I pray a Death to vs Let vs go then my soule to God since he cals vs the Sunne lends vs not its light but to shew vs the way to him The Starres shine not in heauen but to let vs see the pathes trackes therof So as if the Moone do hide her self frō our eyes by Interstitions it cannot be but of choler as sensible of the contempt we shew of her light Let vs go to this holy Land of Promise and passe the Red Sea of sufferance and punishments in exāple of our Sauiour who with no other reason then that of his Loue would purchase through his bloud the Glory he atteyned to The world can afford vs but Death Death but a Tombe and the Tombe but an infinite number of wormes which shal be fed with our carcasse They runne after the world the world is nought but misery they do loue then to be miserable What blindnes my Soule to sigh after our mishaps passionately to cherish the subiect of our losse Let vs go to this Eternity where the delights euer present raigne with in the Order of a continuall moment Let vs get forth of this mouing circle and breake the chaynes of this shameful seruitude wherein to Syn hath brought vs. Away with the world since whatsoeuer is in it is but myre and dust it is but smoke to the eyes putrifaction to the nostrills the noyse of thunder and tempests to the eares thornes to the hands smart to our feeling All those who put any trust therein are vtterly deceyued All those who follow it are absolutely lost All those that honour it are wholy despised and all those who sacrifice to its Idols shal be one day sacrificed themselues in expiation of their crimes Besides we see how all that know it do abandon it for if it promise a Scepter it reaches vs a Shephooke Thrones are seated on the brimme of a precipice nor doth it euer affoard vs any good turne but as the vigill of some misfortune Away then with the world and all that is within it since all its wōders now are but dust Whatsoeuer it hath more rare is but Earth whatsoeuer it hath more fayre is but wind Euery King is no more but a heape of Worms where Horrour Terrour and Infection astonish and offend the senses that approch vnto it Corruption sayth the Wiseman speaking of man vaunt thou as much as thou wilt behould thy selfe brought vnto the first nothing of thy first Being Let vs not liue my Soule but for Eternity since it is the true spring of lyfe Out of Eternity is there no repose out of Eternity no pleasure out of Eternity all hope is vayne Who thinkes not of Eternity thinkes of nothing since out of Eternity all things are false Let vs behould but Eternity my Soule as the onely obiect of glory All flyes away except Eternity it is it alone which is able to satiate our defires and termine our hopes I will no other comfort in all my annoyes then that of Eternity I will no other solace in all my miseryes then that of Eternity After it do I desire nothing after it do I looke for nothing I lyue not but for it and my hart sighes not but after it All discourses are displeasing to me except those of Eternity It is the But and end of all my actions it is the obiect of my thoughtes I labour but to gather its fruits al my vigils point at the pretensions of its Crownes My eyes contemne all the obiects except those that conuey my spirits to its sweet Idea's as to the only Paradise I find in this world Whatsoeuer I do I iudge my selfe vnprofitable if I refer not my actions to this diuine cause whatsoeuer I thinke whatsoeuer I say and whatsoeuer I imagine all is but vanity if those thoughtes if those words those imaginatiōs rely not in some fashion on Eternity In fine my Soule if thou wilt tast on Earth the delightes of Heauen thinke continually of Eternity for in it only it is where the accomplishment of all true contentments doth consist The Glory of Paradise AATER that rich Salomon had a thousand tymes contented his Eyes in admiration of the fairest obiects which are found in Nature That his Eares euer charmed with a sweet Harmony had deliciously tasted in their fashion the most sensible repasts they are affected to That his Mouth had relished the most delicate meates where the Tongue finds the perfection of its delight after I say he had quenched the thirst of his desires in the sea of all contentments of the world and satisfied the appetite of his senses in the accomplishment of the purest delicacies he cries out aloud That all was full of vanity The Pompe of these magnificences may well represent themselues to his remēbrance but he cryes out before it That it is but vanity His riches his Greatnesses his Triumphes all his pleasures serued him as a subiect within knowledge of their Nature for to exclayme very confidently that all was full of vanity What pleasures now after these delights may mortalls tast What Riches may they now possesse after these Treasures To what Greatnes may they aspire which is not comprized within that of his Empire To what sort of prosperities may they pretend which is not lesse then his happines And yet neuertheles after a long possession of honours delights which were inseparable to his soueraigne absolute power he publisheth this truth that all is full of smoke and wind and that nothing is sure heere beneath but death nor present but miseries Soules of the world what thinke you of that you reason not somtimes in your selues to discouer the weaknes of the foundation whereon your hopes are piched You loue your pleasures but if it be true that knowledge should alwayes precede Loue why know you not the nature of the Obiect before it predominate the power of your affections Agayne you loue not thinges at any tyme but to possesse them Ah what know you not the delights of the world do passe before our eyes as a lightning that in their excesse they incessantly find their ruyne you thinke your selfe content to day because nothing afflicts you do you cal that pleasure to runne after pleasure for it is impossible for you to possesse that imaginary contentment but in running after it since it flyes so away without resting Let them represent to themselues the greatest contētments that may be receyued in the world at the same tyme let all the diuers Spirits who haue tasted the vayne Sweetnesses appeare to tell vs in secret what remaines to them thereof Thou Miser tell vs I pray thee what pleasure hast thou to shut vp thy goulden Earth within thy coffers to lend it to the interest of thy conscience and to make it
for a little number of instants be reigning so long in your vices Thou seest then my Soule how false is the Good of Greatnesse and that of Riches how imaginary it is How the pleasures of Banquets full of Alôes dye in their spring and the delights of the flesh haue no other foundation then that of corruptiō It is now tyme my Soule that I let thee see sensibly this difference that is betweene the contentments of the Earth and those of Heauen to the end that in the knowledge of their nature the one so contrary to the other thou maist shunne those pleasures that fly away sigh for loue after the delights of Eternity There is this difference S. Augustine notes betweene eternall transitory things that before we possesse the transitory goods we passionately desire them and from the tyme we enioy them we fall sensibly to mislike them On the contrry the desire of eternall things we neuer thinke of yet from the tyme we possesse them we are not capable of loue but for them Consider a little you Mortals what this is but an age of pleasures whose last moment seemes to make vs forget all the others that went before in such wise as there rests but a vayne Idaea of the Tyme past Search you somwhat curiously withîn the memory of ages into that of daies which haue runne away coūt their houres if you will and you shall confesse that it seemes to you to be but yesterday since our first Father was chased out of the terrestriall Paradise so true it is that Tyme passeth and swiftly glideth away The Sage Roman sayd That if to these long yeares we adde a great number of others and of all together make vp a Raigne of a life the most happy that euer yet hath beene seene if we needs most destine a last day to performe the funerals of all the others and vpon that day a certaine houre and in this houre the last moment a great part of our life will go way in doing ill the greater in doing nothing and the whole in doing otherwise then our duty required There is alwaies a thirst of the delights of the world and though we seeme to quench the same in its puddle springs yet is it but for a moment for the heat wil be renewing againe and the desire of drinking will presse vs then more then euer Vntye thy self thē my Soule from all the feelings of the Earth and with a pitch full of loue eleuate thy Thoughtes to this sweet obiect of Eternity If thou aspirest to Greatnesses represent to thy selfe how the happy spirits trample vnderfoot both the Sun and Moone and all those Starres of the Night whose infinite number astonish our senses S. Paul was but lifted to the third Heauen and yet neuertheles could he not expresse in his language the Meruayles which he admired And S. Peter on the Mount Thabor being dazeled through the glittering of one sole Ray most confidently demaunds permission of his Mayster to build in the same place three Tabernacles hauing now quite forgot the Earth as if it had neuer beene Alas O great Saint with what extasies of ioy shouldest thou be accomplished in this diuine Bower of Eternall felicityes if one feeble reflection of light so rauished thee from thy self as made thee breath so deliciously in a lyfe replenished with clarity as thou didst put in obliuion the darknes of the world where thou madest thy abode What might thy Glory by now To what point of happines might we seeme to termine it Thou possessest the body whose Shadow thou hast adored thou behouldst vncouered that diuine Essence whose Splēdor makes the Cherubims to bow the head for not being able to endure the sweet violences of its clarity Iudge with what feeling I reuerence thy felicity if the onely throughts I haue of them do make me happy only before hand The Kings of the world my Soule establish the foundation of their Greatnesses vpō the large spaces of the earth and all the earth togeather is but a poynt in comparison of Heauen And therefore the onely obiect they haue in their combats triumphes is no other then that of the Cōquest of this little point Get forth then my Soule of its Circumference since thou art able to aspire to the possession not of the world for it is but misery but of a mansion whose extent may not be measured and whose delights are eternall Wouldst thou haue Thrones The Emperiall Heauen shall be thy foot-stoole Wouldst thou haue Crownes The same of immortall Glory shall enuiron thy head Wouldst thou Scepters Thou shalt haue alwayes in thy hand a soueraigne power which shall make thy desires vnprofitable not knowing what to desire out of thy power Hast thou a desire to haue treasures Glory and Riches are in the howse of our Lord And not this trāsitory glory of the world which chaunges into smoke but another wholy diuine that depends not a whit vpon Tyme and which reaches beyond all ages Not those riches of the Ocean nor those of the Land which are vnprofitable in their vertue full of weaknes in their power but of Riches that haue no price and which make thee owner of the Soueraigne Good wher all sorts of felicityes are comprehended If thou be delighted with Banquets heare the Prophet what he sayes Lord one day alone affoards more contentment in thy house then a whole age in the feasts of the world The diuine food wherewith the happy Spirits are fed hath not in it selfe only these sweetnesses in quality but it nature So as this is a vertue essentiall to it continually to produce what soeuer they way imagine in its chiefe perfection We reioyce in thee O Lord in remembring thy breasts a great deale more sweet then wine They write of Assuerus that he raigned in in Asia ouer one hundred twenty seauen Prouinces and that he made a Banquet in his Citty of Susa which lasted an hundred and fourescore dayes where he set forth with Prodigality all the Magnificences which Art and Nature with common accord could furnish him at the price of infinit riches But the end of this Feast did blemish the Glory of its beginning and continuance for that all the pleasures which dye are not considerable in their Birth nor in the course of their Reigne Hence it is my Soule that the only delights of these Banquets which the King of Kings prepares for thee are worthy of thy desires since they shall last for an Eternity Those there haue begunne vpon Earth for to finish one day and these heere shall beginne in Heauen for neuer to haue end Some are borne and dye in Tym◠and others are borne in Eternity to endure therein as long as it Wouldst thou lodge in Pallaces The Rich house of our Lord shal be the habitation of the iust But what house do you belieue it is Represent vnto thy self that when they enter into the Pallace of some Great Prince
felicityes adore the diuine Obiect of their Glory And while thine eyes shal be tasting in their fashion the delights which are foūd in the admiration of things perfectly fayre lend thine eares to that sweet harmony wherwith al those happy Spirits make vp a Consort in singing without cease Holy Holy Holy is our Lord the Heauens and Earth are filled with the maiesty of his Glory O diuine melody How powerfull are thy streynes since through our thoughtes they make thēselues so sensible to our harts With how many different pleasures and all perfectly extreme art thou rauished now my Soule With what rauishments of Ioy art thou transported besides thy selfe In what sweet extasies art thou not wādering After what sort of goods canst thou seeme to aspire vnto Thou beholdest all Greatnesses in their Thrones Riches in their mynes Glory in its Element and the Vertues in their Empire Thou tastest the true Contentments in their purity after a manner so diuine as thou possessest all without desiring any thing yet neuertheles not all since the obiect of thy delights is infinite which makes thee tast new Sweetnesses not in the order of increase of pleasure but in that of the accomplishment of the rest as being alwayes perfectly content Nor yet is this all my Soule to make thee admire in Idaea the Meruailles of all these diuine obiects of glory and of felicity It behoues me now to represent vnto thee besides the strayte vnion that ioynes the happy Spirit with his soueraigne Good I would say the Soule with God But how may it be done God cannot produce a Species or an Image of himselfe which is able to represent him in regard the Species and the Image are alwayes more pure more simple then is the Obiect whence they proceed Now what Species or Image may be purer and more spirituall then God Besides that all the Species and all the Images are so determined in the forme of the thing they represent as they cannot seeme to represent another And it is true that God is not a thing determinate because it hath not a particular Being separated from others in such sort as he eminently conteynes ech thing as the Apostle saith Portans omnia verbo virtutis sue There is no Species which is able to determine this God indeterminate there is no Image created or produced that can represent this God increated Hence it is that God cānot vnite himself to the Soule through a Species or Image as we do other things The Deuines say that God vnites himselfe to the Soule per se really they call this vnion per modum species But for to cleere the obscurity which is in all this mystery you must note that when as God vnites himselfe to the Soule he eleuates the same to a being which is supernaturall and diuine In so much as it resēbles God himselfe not so as it looseth its proper Essence but within the perfectiō wherto it is eleuated it deriues from the Obiect which cōmunicates to it al the glory that it possesseth 〈◊〉 relatiōs to his similitude in such sort as in regarding this happy Soule they behold God Moreouer it may be said more cleerely that God vnites himself to the Soule in such manner as the Fire is vnited to the Iron forasmuch as the Fire as agent is more noble then the Iron it conuertes the Iron into its semblance with so much perfection as one would say the Iron had chaunged its proper forme into that of the Fire yet notwithstanding the Iron looseth not awhit of its essence Now this vnion of Fire with Iron is a reall vnion per se and not through Species nor through Image So God who is called the Deus noster ignis consumens est is vnited to our Soule per se really and receyuing the same into himselfe reduceth it to a being supernaturall and deified in so much as it seemes to be no more a Soule but God himselfe A verity which S. Iohn publisheth when he saith we shal be like vnto him From the Tyme that a Soule is vnited with God he illumines it with a light of glory to the end it may see him and contēplate him at its pleasure and with him all things which are in him formally and eminently to vse the termes of the Schoole-men in so much as it is ignorāt of nothing within the perfection of its wisedome O admirable Science Then shall it be when it shall cleerely see within the Abysses of diuine secrets that which God did before he created the world How he produced eternally another himselfe without multiplication of Deities and how betweene the producent and the person produced proceeds an eternall loue of him who engenders and of him who is engendred which is this adorable Trine-vnity It shal see besides how this God being engēdred Eternally in himselfe without mother might be borne once on earth of the most glorious Virgin without Father With what Prouidence he gouernes all things with what Goodnes he created Man with what Loue he redeemed him How he iustifies inuisibly without forcing the liberty How the works of his Iustice accord with those of his mercy How he saues through his grace How he leaues them reprobate without fault How his infallible Science agrees without the Contingency of things How the Predestinate may damne himselfe and the Reprobate be saued though the Science of God remayne alwaies infallible and immutable as it is The verity of all these secrets shal be represented to its eyes more cleere then the Sunne O what Science my Soule or rather what incomparable felicity proceeds from all these sundry pleasures When shall this be that thou cryest out with the Queene of Saba speaking to thy Lord in lyke manner as she spake vnto Salomon What wisedome is thine O great King what glory and what magnificence admire they in thy Kingdome What Citty is this same replenished with so many goods what delicious meates and what precious wines do they tast at the table of thy banquets What lustre of greatnes appeares in all those that attend vpon thee Renowne may well publish thy prayses in all places of the Earth if al the Heauēs together are not large inough to conteyne the rumour of them O happy Spirits who reigne in the mansion of this immortall glory I wonder not awhit at your so trampling vnder foot the Crownes and Scepters of the world in iust pretension to the felicity you possesse What fires what torments and what new punishments would not one suffer for to purchase this soueraygne good where repose is so durable Gibbets Hangmen all the instruments of Death are as so many Trophies of the glory which succeeds shame and payne O how these diuine words of S. Augustin do cause a sweet melody to resound while he sayes Let the deuills prepare me from henceforth as many ambushes as they will let them addresse the last assaults of their power to encounter me let
fastings macerate my body let Sackcloth and Cilices torment my flesh let tribulations oppresse me vnder their weight let the long vigills shorten my lyfe let him there giue affronts of his contempt and heere of his cruelties let cold freeze the bloud within my veynes let the scorching of the Sun tanne me let its parching reduce me into ashes let aches cleane my head in peeces let my hart reuolt agaynst my Soule my visage loose its colour all the parts of my body stoope to their ruine let me yield my lyfe to the suffering of diuers torments let my dayes slide away in weeping continuull teares and let the wormes in fine take hould of my flesh and the corruption of my bones All this would be nothing to me so I might enioy Eternall Repose in the day of Tribulation I will belieue it O great Saint for what is it to endure al the euils of the world within Tyme for to possesse all desirable goods in the bower of Eternity O sweet residence where Ioy eternally endures and where delights are immortall Where nothing is seene but God where they know nothing but God! If they thinke it is of God if they desire it is God himselfe And howbeit the harts do there sigh without cease for loue those sighes proceed not but from the contentments of fruition where Loue alwaies remaines in its perfection Let Antiquity vaunt as much as it will of the Temple of Thessaly of the Orchards of Adonis of the Gardens of Hesperides of the pleasures of the fortunate Ilands Let Poets chaunt the pleasures of their Elizean fields and let humane Imagination assemble in one subiect whatsoeuer is more beautiful and delicious in nature they shall find in effect that all is but a vayne Idaea in comparison of the immortall pleasure of this Seat of Glory Let them imagine a Quire of Syrens and let them ioyne therto in Consort both the harpe of Orpheus and the voyce of Amphion Let Apollo and the Muses likewise be there to beare a part all this melody of these consorts were but an ircksome noyse of Windes Thunders in competency of the diuine harmony of Angels Let them make a Perfume of all what Sweets soeuer that Arabia Saba hath had let the Sea cōtribute therto all its Amber and the flowers all their Balme such a perfume notwithstanding would be but a stench infection in regard of the diuine odours which are enclosed in the Emperialll Heauen O how S. Paul had reason to dye of loue rather then griefe in his prolongation to reuiew the felicity which he admired in his rauishment I desire to dye in my self for to go to liue in him whom I loue a great deale more then my selfe sayd he at all seasons O sweet death to dye of Loue but yet the lyfe more sweet that makes this Loue eternall Me thinkes the sad accēts of that great King Dauid strike nine eares when he cryed out aloud This life to me is tedious in the absence of my Lord. This Prince possessed the goods of the Earth in aboundance and Greatnesses and Pleasures equally enuironed the Throne of his absolute Power in such sort as he had all things to his harts content But yet for all that he could not choose but be trobled in the midst of the delights of his Court since so we see his hart to send vp sighs of Sorrow vnto Heauen to liue so long a tyme on Earth What sayst thou now my Soule of the Greatnesses Magnificences of this diuine Pallace where Honour Glory and all the Maiesties together expose to view whatsoeuer els they haue more precious and more rare where Beauty appeares in its Throne in company of its graces of its sweetnesses of its baytes of its allurements and of its charmes where with power alwayes adorable it attracts the eyes to its admiration through a vertue borne with it subdues their lookes to the empire of its perfections In such sort as the eyes cannot loue but its obiect after admiring it they are so taken with the meruailes wherwith it abounds where Goodnes exercising its soueraigne power forges new chaines of loue to attract the harts vnto it and after hauing made a conquest of them it nourisheth them with a food so delicious as they neuer breath but of ioy transporting them wholy in the accōplishment of their felicity In such sort my Soule as all the pleasures together being eleuated in their first purity are there found to be collected in their origē to the end the Spirit might neuer be troubled to seek its desires Consider the difference that is betweene the Contentments of the Earth and those of heauen I would say those of the Pallace where Creatures make their aboad and of those where the Omnipotēt lodgeth Thou hast seene within this first Pallace the Meadowes enamelled with flowers the Champaygnes couered with rich haruests and the Valleys peopled with a thousand brookes but these spring vp at the peeping of the Aurora and wither at its setting These haruests fetching their being from corruption returne in an instant to their first beginning after they haue runne daunger to serue as a prey to tempests and disport to the winds And these Brookes feeble in their vertue may well moderate the ardour of a vehement thirst but not quench it wholy since the fire thereof alwayes renewes from its ashes On the contrary within this celestiall house the Lyllies wherewith the Virgins are crowned and the Roses which the Martyrs weare equally on their head remayne alwayes disclosed as if they grew continually The haruests there are eternall in behoulding them their diuine nature hath this property that it satiates the Soule through the eyes after so perfect a manner as it is rauished in its repose The Fountaynes are of bottomlesse Springs of all the immortall delights that may fall vnder the knowledge of the vnderstanding howbeit they quench not thirst yet haue they power to do it but to make their sweetnesses more sensible they entertayne the drougth within their Soules without disquietnes to the end that being allwayes a dry with a thirst of loue full of pleasure they may alwayes drinke that so without cease they may rest contented Within that first Pallace the chaunting of the Birds did charme thine eares and within this heere the sweet musicke of the Angels rauisheth Spirits Within that terrestriall dwelling the Spring the Summer Autunme were incessantly occupied in producing thy pleasures in this celestial bower an Eternity accomplisheth thee withall the goods wherto imaginatiō may attain There beneath had you diuers houses of pleasure for to walke in and heere on high the first thought of a desire is able to build a number without number within the spaces of the Heauens with a perfection of an incōparable Beauty So as if thou be delighted with the Courts of the Kings and Princes of the world to behold the Greatnesses that attend vpon them turne
nor this Line a point Eternity termines to God alone God alone to Eternity O incomprehensible Mystery that a God should recompence a sigh of Loue with an infinite loue one moment of paine with an Eternity of Glory For hauing tasted neuer so little of the vinegre of his Chalice to quench our thirst for euer in the torrent of these diuine Sweetnesses For hauing shed one teare of repentance to make vs liue eternally in ioy and smiles For hauing fasted one instant to satiate vs for euer with meats the most delicious which are found in Heauen And finally to recompence one night of trauaile with a day of eternall Repose Thinke neuer my Soule but vpon this Eternity What pleasures soeuer thou tasts in the world represent to thy selfe they shall one day finish and that in their end all the Thorns of their Roses shall assemble to make thee feele the sorrow of their priuation if thou wouldest haue content be it not but for Eternity it is to dye continually for to lyue with men and it is to liue allwayes to lyue with God It were to be vnfortunate to be happy on Earth since the true way of felicity is Heauen Felicity is as immortall as immortality it selfe and whither Tyme cannot reach to because it is out of Tyme In such wise my Soule as thou shouldst learne to speake this diuine lāguage of the Angels whose Eccho the Prophet is when he saith I languish O Lord in the expectation of seeing you in the mansion of your glory Let this Languor deuoure thee to the end that dying of loue for thy God who is soueraignely louely thou maiest go to liue for him since this is the only Spring of life Of the Infernall Paynes THE Great King Ezechias was brought to such a point of feare and astonishment when the Prophet assured him he shold dye the morrow after as that if his lot had reserued him for shipwracke he had now runne that danger in the Sea of his teares That fatall Sentēce tooke away his lyfe before he dyed for from the moment that the same was once pronounced vnto him he breathed but the ayre of Approaches to an ineuitable death where all Sorrowes heaped togeather in one what they had of bitter or rigorous to torment anew his afflicted Spirit This poore Prince had but Sighes Teares to defend himselfe withall agaynst the batteries of a soueraigne Will He plaines but of himselfe he cryes but onely to moue Pitty he armes his hand with fury against his bosome and with redoubled blowes smites his breast belieuing he layd hard on his hart the while as complice of the crymes whose punishment he carryed What shall he do the night steales away insensibly and the light which shall succeed his darknesses is not to shine but to shew him the way to the Tombe Sleepe hath already taken its leaue of his eyes for feare of being drowned in his continuall teares Repose abandons his spirit in feare of Death which possesseth him In so much as being reduced into a last point of Sufferance he apprehēds that euery sigh which he casts to the wind is to be the last of his life The remembrance of his faults so forcibly aggrauates the punishment as he dares not thinke of them but with the sorrow of heauing comitted them a Sorrow indeed so powerfull as disarmed the diuine Iustice of its Thunders This great King lifts vp his hart through Feare deiected constraines it to seeke for hope in that midst of despaire He humbly cōfesseth the truth of those crymes but with the same tongue wherewith he publisheth them he protests before his God his Iudge to commit them no more and for assurance beseeches the same God and the same Iudge to cast downe his eyes into the depth of his Soule to see the feelings therof in so much as he was heard Isay the Prophet receaues commaundement to reuoke the Sentence of his Death to prolong the terme of his life and to make the Sunne turne backe for some part of its way O admirable Goodnesse The whole course of the Vniuerse is chaunged rather thē to refuse a mans request who promiseth to God to chaūge the course of his life But what difference betweene the Sentence which the Prophet pronounceth on the behalfe of God to a guilty King that which God himselfe shal pronounce on that great day of his Iustice to the criminal Soules They are both verily two Sentences of Death but the one is signified in Time by a lyuing man to a man that is liuing yet the other is proclaymed out of Time by a God to Spirits which are criminall incapable of repentance Besides we see how the first Sentence was reuoked through grace while the other remaines inuiolable by Reason Mercy moderates the rigour of that there Iustice augmēts the paine of this heere with an Eternity O most dreadfull Sentence There was with the Persians a certaine Prison whence the guilty were neuer to go forth which they called by the name of Lethe as who would seeme thereby to represent a place of Obliuion where the Thoughts of men do neuer approach This Prison may well be compared to that of Hell from whence the Thralls do neuer get forth nor where the happy Spirits do neuer descend in thought It is a place of forgetfulnes since God remembers not the wicked Soules but to cause them only to be tortured by the instruments of his Iustice They haue no other dwelling then that of their sepulchers cryeth out the Psalmist which is as much to say as they shal be buried eternally in the tombe of Hel or as S. Augustine saith they shal be full of life in the midst of their torments in being alwaies renewed againe amidst their paynes without euer dying O cruell life Seing it is more vnsupportable then Death Let the most afflicted Soules appeare forsooth vpon the Theater of their Martyrings let Iultius recount at large the history of his sufferāces Let Persindas represent to vs sensibly the cruelty of his punishment at the light of the Sunne where he is exposed al couered with honey to the mercy of the Flies Let Lepidus Crassus communicate with vs through Contagion a part of his euill at such tyme as they straitly bound his body to a carkasse to the end the stench might serue as a Torturer to tyrannize his lyfe to death Let Phocinas the Locrian shew vs clerely by the light of the Fire which consumed him the torments wherewith he was tyrannized in feeling himselfe by little and little reduced into Ashes Let Pamindus the Philosopher expresse to vs in the Amazement of his mortall silence which the punishment of his tongue cut out had brought him to some feeble dolour of his smart Let Lysander buryed in the brasen Bull by the Tyrant of Syracusa make vs to heare the sad accents of his cryes for to publish with the language of his plaints the truth of
it is alwayes inseparable from the mortall condition wherein you are borne You must dy and appeare in this fatall Couch not with your gorgeous Attire nor Royall Mantles but rather with shirts well steept in a cold sweate where your liues are to run shipwracke To cary your Crownes vpon your heads they are so feeble as they cannot endure the weight To hold your Scepters in your hands candles rather would beseeme you better to affoard you light to find the Sepulcher Your Subiects are already assembled about your beds to see anew this verity that you are all equall in the necessity of dying Those Titles of Maiesty which they affoard you haue no more grace with them amidst your miseries Me thinkes in truth it is very much to call you Men since you begin to be no more so It is euen iust now that you are to dy the day is come the hower approches death is already on the way to your Pallace you may do well if you please to put your Souldiers in Centinell for to stop him in the entry Behold how he knockes at your Chamber doore you must necessarily vouchsafe for to speake vnto him since he comes on the behalfe of God to signify the sentence of death vnto you I doubt me that you haue the Spirit much occupyed in the apprehension of your present affayres and that you would willingly put of the accompt to some other day but that may not be Tyme hath strooke the houre which is to beare sway at the end of your daies What sighes what sobs what plaints cast you forth to the wind the remēbrance of your Greatnesses past torments you now while your guilty consciences put your soules on the Racke like as the dolours already haue put your bodies For to cast your eyes vpō the guilded Seelings were to increase the horrour of the Sepulcher which they prepare you To behould likewise your Courtiers who stand about you the displeasure you find to leaue them makes you to turne your view another way Whereas it were better to set your eyes on the approches of Death and in the feeling of your present Miseryes to publish in dying this verity that you are but ashes durt corruption Diogenes was walking one day in a certaine Churchyard where he entertayned his sad thoughts in the meditatiō of death at what tyme Alexander surprized him by a suddaine approch demaunds of him what he was doing in so dismal solitary a place I am busied said the Philosopher in seeking out the bones of Philip your Father amidst so great a number of these you see heere but the payne which I take is vnprofitable because they are all equall This Answere is full of Mysteries for it seemes to represent vs to the life this Verity That the greatest Kings of the world differ not awhit but in goods and greatnesses only from the wretchedst that are since in the Tombe they resemble ech other so much as it were impossible to marke any difference betweene them But me thinkes the houre is already spent and that Death knockes harder now at the Chamber doore then before Behold how he enters in carrying his Sithe in the one hand an Hower-glasse in the other to let vs see that if he mow the hay of your life with his Sithe the sand of the Hower-glasse which he carries being taken for the Foundation of your vaine-glory is euen now run out so as if there remaine any little behind it is but only to giue you leasure to open your mouth for to cast forth the last breath in this last moment O fearefull momēt wheron depends the Eternity of Glory or the Eternity of paine This is that last breth which condemnes or iustifies all those who haue gone before O fearfull moment wherin is pronounced the Sentence of our second life or Death O fearefull moment since it presides the birth of our wretchednes or of our felicity O fearefull moment wherein all our good or euill consists O fearful moment wherein Paradise is offered or Hell afforded O fearefull moment wherin we are made companions for euer of the Angels or of the deuils O fearfull moment where the Soule before God findes the Eternall recompēce of its good deeds or euerlasting paynes of its crimes O fearefull moment what ioyes what sorrowes what pleasures and what dolours doest thou comprize in thy short durance As often as I thinke on thee I do tremble with feare for this moment is a great deale more dreadfull then death it selfe This only moment is it my Soule whereupon the Eternity depends Imploy thou all those of thy life vpon the thoughts of this last Thou approchest vnto it euery hower euery instant robs thee of somewhat of thy former life Whatsoeuer thou doest thy body doth nothing but dye from its transitory life depēds thy eternall life for out of the Earth canst thou merit nothing for Heauen Thinke thou alwayes on this last moment where Crownes and Punishments are prepared Crownes of an infinite glory Punishments of a dolour immortall All thy actions shall there be receiuing their price or paine Price of Paradise or payne of Hell Hence it is that the Prophet cries I shall remember the day of my death for to liue eternally Cast your eyes now vpon those Kings extended dead vpon their rich Couches What say I those Kings can Maiesty corruption be compatible together What apparence of beliefe in beholding them to be such that they are Kings since all their Royall qualities are dead with them Would not a man say they were heapes of Earth so raysed aboue the Earth where the worms are beginning to take their fees Approach to this fatall couch you proud Spirits who measure the globe of the Earth through this vayne beliefe that you merit the Empire of it and in your imagination contemplate the while those that possesse them in effect and you shall behold them quite through teares laied stretched at your feet without pulse without motion Their Maiesties are full of horrour and miseryes in their turne haue taken hold of their owne since they are all borne mortall and consequently miserable what strange Metamorphosis from Colossus's of Greatnesses quickened with a lyfe full of splendour and of glory to be chaunged in an instant into an heape of durt whose putrifaction infectes the whole world You Monarkes Kings Princes be you Idolatours of your Greatnesses as much as you please I attend you at the end of your Carriere to let you see on the backside of the Medall that you are but corruption if you doubt thereof let him that suruiues another approch to his Tombe he shall sensibly know that there is nothing more true in the world Thou miser approch to this mournfull Couch there is place inough for thee Thou needs must dye the houre is strooke but tell me how much gold and siluer dost thou leaue in thy coffers and to what end serue they but to purchase
to put him to silence in so much as his teares and sighes are feigne to speake for him to his dying daughter who makes him answere in the same language both of the eyes hart without being able to let fall a word Her mother hath her eyes glued vpon her pale and diffigured countenance and in this dumbe action of hers whereto an excesse of dolour hath brought her she suffers a great deale more payne to see her dye then she had pangs before to bring her forth And so in order al those that loued her and whome she dearely loued came in to yield her this last duty of visit But howbeit they premeditated somewhat to say vnto her their tongues became mute at their approch and their eyes made supply of discourse in their fashion For what meanes is there to speake in a dolefull place where Death goes imposing an eternall silence The Priest approacheth to the bed with a Crucifix in his hand which he presents to this foule sicke wretch she takes it with a trembling hād knowing it to be the Crosse whereupon the Omnipotent Iudge was nayled If she cast her eyes vpon his Crowne of Thornes she drawes them into her hart by her lookes in remembring the roses which she had deliciously troad vnder her feet during her lyfe But there is now no more tyme to be carying the same into the soule because her senses as halfe dead are vnsensible of their prickings If she reguard the visage of this her Sauiour all couered with comtempt she sinckes downe with the confusion of the outrages that she hath done to herself remembring the guilty care which she hath taken in playstering her face of earth and ruyning in that manner with a sacrilegious hand the sacred workmanship of heauen and of Nature and for hauing imployed the better part of her tyme in these errours to the disparagement of her soule as if the same were corruptible like the body The torments which her God and her Iudge hath suffered for her vpon this Crosse which she holds in her hand and which she neuer had borne in her hart do shamefully vpbrayd her now for the delights of her lyfe Then falls she a sighing at it but her sighs of wind are taken but for wind she weepes thereat but her teares of water are taken but for a litle water since she cannot wipe away the blot of her crymes because their spring deriues not from the hart and that her teares proceed from the feare of present death rather then from a sorrow of lyfe past There need no other witnesses to condemne her withall then the wounds of her Sauiour for as he had suffered all the paines of the world so she had tasted all the pleasures Alas if she could but turne backe againe and returne to the midst of the course of her life if her words might haue the same vertue which those of Iosue had for to cōmaund the Sunne to returne backe agayne to its East to affoard her leasure to do penaunce in is it not credible my Dames but that she would be dipping the bread of her nourishment within the water of her teares for to bewayle her sins But that is in vayne to desire the returne of life since she must dy and the houre is already strook Alas how many liuing deathes deuoure this poore body before her life be snatched away at last What strange torment seemes to racke her soule she dyes with sorrow for not being able to liue any longer and notwithstanding euery moment of life is to her an age of dolour She is so engulfed in tormēts as she imagines that all the afflictions in the Earth are assembled in her Chamber or rather in her Soule since now she is brought into extremes through the force of anguish Sorrow for the past apprehension of the future horrour of the Sepulcher and the vncertainty she is in of her saluatiō do hould her spirit continually on the racke That little which she sees is but to bid Adieu to the light that little which she vnderstands is for her last and being thus brought into this extremity now it is when the diuel lets her see to the life the pourtrait of all the offences which she hath euer committed to the end the enormity of them being ioyned with their number might make her to turne her face to despaire To make yet an exact Confession all her Spirits are in disorder and the powers of her Soule so feeble as they can serue but for resentment of her euills She would fayne speake but a mortall stuttering with-holdes her tongue halfe tyed and on the other side the smart of the payne which she suffers is so sharpe as she cannot open the mouth but to cry A dolour without cease torments her continually her dying life is wandring euery moment in the punishments she is in when she finds her selfe it is but to loose her selfe agayne in her syncopes which are the forerunners of her Death The eyes bolt out of her head as if they had this knowledge that they were vnprofitable vnto her her mouth awry and halfe open giues passage by the eye vnto her bowells to behold the torments she is in It is now tyme my Dames you present her with a Mirrour for to employ her last reguards on the sad contemplation of the dreadfull ruines of her beauty what faces makes she the while her hideous looke affrights not only little children but euen likewise the most couragious Behold your selues my Dames within this glasse if you will but apparantly see the faults which are hiddē vnder your own from point to point or rather vnder the Spanish white wherewith you are paynted Behold into what estate are reduced your alluremēts your charmes your sweetnesses and your bayts which you so put in the rancke of adorable things These are no Fables no Illusions nor Enchantements these you haue seen the other day this foule dying wretch with a lustre of beauty that dazeled all the world who to day seemes to mooue you to pitty and horrour at once Marke well all her actions but quickned with dolour and dread these are the true examples of those which you shall one day suffer it may be to morrow or euen to day who knowes And then dare you waxe so proud of your beauty as you do while the crust thereof is now thus broken as you see in the presence of so many persons who haue seene how the inside was all but full of corruption In this meane while the sicke person dyes by litle and litle It is now tyme to make the funerall of those fayre eyes since their light is thus extinct The Priest may cry in her eares long inough for death hath taken vp his lodging there and euery one knowes that she is deafe Her hands her feet are without motion as well as without heat the hart seemes to beate as yet but it is onely to bid Adieu to the Soule which is