the joyes shall be such as neither the eye hath seen nor the ear hath heard nor hath entred into the heart of man O baseness of temporal goods what proportion doe they hold with this greatness since they are so poor that even time from whence they have their being makes them tedious and not to be endured Who could continue a whole moneth without other diversion in hearing the choicest musick nay who could pass a day free from weariness without some change of pleasures But such is the greatness of those joyes which God hath prepared for them who love and fear him as we shall still desire them afresh and they will not cloy us in a whole Eternity §. 2. St. Anselme observes this difference betwixt the goods and evils of this life and the other Anselm lib. de simil that in this life neither of them are pure but mixt and confused The goods are imperfect and mingled with many evils and the evils short and mingled with some good But in the other life as the goods are most perfect and pure without the least touch of any ill and so can never weary us for that were an evil so to the contrary those evils of hell in which there is no good at all are horrible and above all sufferance Eternal glory therefore is great both in respect of its purity being free from any ill and in respect of its perfection being highly and excellently good David said Ps 102. That God had removed our sins from us as far as the East is distant from the West which he hath not onely verified in the guilt of sin but in the punishment which is as tar removed from the blessed as Heaven is from Earth And although the spiritual distance betwixt them be greater than the corporeal yet that we may from hence form some conception of that also we will say as much as our weakness is able to attain unto of this Clavius in Sphae 〈◊〉 1. Our famous Mathematician Christopher Clavius sayes that from the Sphere of the Moon which is the lowest Heaven unto the Earth are one hundred and twenty thousand six hundred and thirty miles and from the Heaven of the Sun four millions thirty thousand nine hundred and twenty three miles and from the Firmament or eighth Heaven one hundred sixty one millions eight hundred fourscore and four thousand nine hundred and fourty three miles Here Plato wills the Mathematicians to cease their enquiry for from hence there is no rule of measuring further but without all doubt it is much farther from thence to the Empyrial Heaven For the onely thickness of the Starry Sphere is said to contain as much as the whole space betwixt that and the Earth In so much as if a Milstone were thrown from the highest of the Firmament and should every hour fall two hundred miles it would be 90 years before it arrived at the Earth The Mathematicians also and some learned Interpreters of the holy Scripture affirm that the distance from the Earth unto the highest of the Firmament is less than that from thence to the lowest of the Empyrial Heaven and therefore conclude if one should live two thousand years and every day should travel a hundred miles he should not in all that time reach the lowest of the Firmament and if after that he should also travel other two thousand years he should not reach the highest of it and from thence four thousand years before he arrived at the lowest of the Empyrial Heaven O power of the grace of Jesus Christ which makes us in a moment dispatch so great a journey That noble Matron who was tormented and put to death in England said unto those with grief and honour that beheld her martyrdome So short is the way which brings us to heaven that within six hours I shall mount above the Sun and Moon tread the Stars under my feet and enter into the Heaven of the Blessed But there was no need of six hours one little instant brings the souls of the blessed thither which being purified from their sins and pains remain further distant from the one and the other than Heaven is from Earth Proportionable unto this distance of place is the advantage which the greatness of Heaven hath above that of Earth and the same holds in their blessings Let us mount then with this consideration thither and from that height let us disspise all this mutable World Ptolom in Praefa Almages since even the Gentils did it Wherefore Ptolome said He is higher than the world who cares not in whose hands the world is And Cicero What humane thing can seem great unto him Tull. in Som. Scip. unto whom eternity and the greatness of the other world are known All the earth seems so little unto me that I am sorry and ashamed of our Empire with which we have onely touched some little part of it All the Kingdoms of the Earth are but as a point and unto Boctius seemed but as a point of a point Bar. 3. But of Heaven Baruch could say How great is the house of God how large is the place of his possession it is great and hath no end high and immeasurable So great is the advantage of things eternal above temporal although they were not eternal O what fools then are they who for one point of Earth lose so many leagues of Heaven who for one short pleasure lose things so immense and durable O the greatness of the omnipotency and goodness of the divine liberality which hath prepared such things for the humble and little ones who serve him St. Austin whose thoughts were so sublime and whose understanding was one of the greatest in the world found himself unable to express them nay even to think of them For being desirous to write of Eternal Glory and taking pen in hand he beheld in his Chamber a great light and felt a sweetness so fragrant as almost transported him and withal heard a voice which said Austin what doest thou mean doest thou think it possible to number the drops in the Sea or to grasp the whole compass of the Earth or to make the Celestial bodies suspend their motion that which no eyes have seen wouldest thou behold that which no ear hath heard wouldest thou conceive that which no heart hath attained nor humane understanding imagined doest thou think that thou onely canst comprehend What end can that have which is infinite how can that be measured which is immense Sooner shall all those impossibilities be possible than thou understand the least part of that glory which is enjoyed by the blessed in Heaven If one who had been ever bred in an obscure dungeon and never had seen other light than that of some dimme Lamp were told that above the Earth there was a Sun which enlightned the whole world and cast his beams far above a hundred thousand leagues in Circumference all the discourses which could be made unto
as well as Subject owe to the sin of our first Parents May you then being translated hence to the embraces of your Creator experimentally finde the true difference between things temporal and eternal in the blisful vision and fruition of our great All our all-mighty all-lovely all-glorious God who is all wonders at one sight all joyes and comforts in their sourse all blessings in their center the end of all labours the reward of all services the desire of all hearts and the accomplishment of all hopes and wishes May he then be to your Majesty all this which is here briefly expressed and infinitely more which is beyond expression And may he secure all these blessings to you for ever and crown them with his glorious Attribute of Eternity This is the no less hearty then dutiful prayer of MADAM Your Majesties Most humbly devoted In Christ Jesus J. W. A Summary of the Chapters in this Book LIB I. Cap. 1. OVr Ignorance of what are the true goods and not onely of things Eternal but Temporal pa. 1. Cap. 2. How efficacious is the Consideration of Eternity for the change of our lives p. 6. Cap. 3. The memory of Eternity is of it self more efficacious than that of Death p. 12. Cap. 4. The estate of men in this life and the miserable forgetfulness which they have of Eternity p. 18. Cap. 5. What is Eternity according to St. Gregory Nazianzen and St. Dionysius p. 25. Cap. 6. What Eternity is according to Boetius and Plotinus p. 29. Cap. 7. Wherein is declared what Eternity is according to St. Bernard p. 33. Cap. 8. What it is in Eternity to have no end p. 41. Cap. 9. How Eternity is without change p. 52. Cap. 10. How Eternity is without comparison p. 60. Cap. 11. What is Time according to Aristotle and other Philosophers and the little consistence of life p. 68. Cap. 12. How short life is for which respect all things temporal are to be despised p. 74. Cap. 13. What is Time according to St. Augustine p. 82. Cap. 14. Time it the occasion of Eternity and how a Christian ought to benefit himself by it p. 89. Cap. 15. What is Time according to Plato and Plotinus and how deceitful is all that which is temporal p. 98. LIB II. Cap. 1. Of the End of Temporal Life p. 104. Cap. 2. Remarkable Conditions of the end of Temporal Life p. 121. Cap. 3. Of that moment which is the Medium betwixt Time and Eternity which being the end of Life is therefore most terrible p. 140. Cap. 4. Wherefore the End of Life is most terrible p. 147. Cap. 5. How God even in this Life passes a most rigorous Judgement p. 174. Cap. 6. Of the End of all Time p. 181. Cap. 7. How the Elements and the Heavens are to change at the end of Time p. 185. Cap. 8. How the World ought to conclude with so dreadful an End in which a general Judgement is to pass upon all that is in it p. 205. Cap. 9. Of the last day of Time p. 213. LIB III. Cap. 1. The mutability of things temporal makes them worthy of contempt p. 228. Cap. 2. How great and desperate soever our Temporal evils are yet hope may make them tolerable p. 238. Cap. 3. We ought to consider what we may come to be p. 243. Cap. 4. The Change of humane things shews clearly their vanity and how worthy they are to be contemned p. 253. Cap. 5. The baseness and disorder of Temporal things and how great a Monster men have made the World p. 261. Cap. 6. The Littleness of things Temporal p. 269. Cap. 7. How miserable a thing is this Temporal Life p. 285. Cap. 8. How little is Man whilest he is Temporal p. 309. Cap. 9. How deceitful are all things Temporal p. 319. Cap. 10. The dangers and prejudices of things Temporal p. 326. LIB IV. Cap. 1. Of the Greatness of things Eternal p. 337. Cap. 2. The Greatness of the Eternal honour of the Just p. 347. Cap. 3. The Riches of the Eternal Kingdom of Heaven p. 359. Cap. 4. The Greatness of Eternal Pleasures p. 368. Cap. 5. How happy is the Eternal Life of the Just p. 378. Cap. 6. The Excellency and Perfection of the Bodies of the Saints in the Life Eternal p. 389. Cap. 7. How we are to seek after Heaven and to preferr it before all the goods of the Earth p. 399. Cap. 8. Of Evils Eternal and especially of the great Poverty Dishonour and Ignominy of the Damned p. 411. Cap. 9. The Punishment of the Damned from the horribleness of the place into which they are banished from Heaven and made Prisoners in Hell p. 422. Cap. 10. Of the Slavery Chastisement and Pains Eternal p. 429. Cap. 11. Of Eternal Death and Punishment of Talion in the Damned p. 450. Cap. 12. The Fruit which may be drawn from the consideration of Eternal evils p. 459. Cap. 13. The infinite guilt of Mortal Sin by which we lose the felicity of Heaven and fall into eternal evils p. 467. LIB V. Cap. 1. Notable difference betwixt the Temporal and Eternal the one being the End and the other the Means Wherein also is treated of the End for which Man was created p. 487. Cap. 2. By the knowledge of our selves may be known the use of things Temporal and the little esteem we are to make of them p. 506. Cap. 3. The value of goods Eternal is made apparent unto us by the Incarnation of the Son of God p. 515. Cap. 4. The baseness of Temporal goods may likewise appear by the Passion and Death of Christ Jesus p. 524. Cap. 5. The importance of the Eternal because God hath made himself a Means for our obtaining it and hath left his most holy Body as a Pledge of it in the Blessed Sacrament p. 540. Cap. 6. Whether Temporal things are to be demanded of God And that we onely ought to aym in our prayers at goods Eternal p. 553. Cap. 7. How happy are those who renounce Temporal goods for the securing of the Eternal p. 561. Cap. 8. Many who have despised and renounced all that is Temporal p. 569. Cap. 9. The Love which we owe unto God ought so to fill our souls that it leave no place or power to love the Temporal p. 581. Faults escaped in the Print P. 8. L. 25. more R. of more P. 46. L. 28. resting R. rosting P. 65. L. 20. knowest R. knewest p. 139. L. 23. are die R. are to die P. 198. L. 27. Borosus R. Berosus P. 200. L. 29. hard R. hardness P. 232. L. 24. Persians R. Assyrians P. 232. L. 26. Assyrians R. Persians P. 338. L. 10. intention R. intension P. 416. L. 35. the depriving R. in the depriving P. 555. L. 38. know R. knew What else may be faulty the Pen may mend Moreover P. 386. L. 35. after those words any thing to maintain it you may add if you please These representations are to be understood
ever in Heaven And it is no marvel though this great thought of Eternity should make so holy a King to tremble when as the Prophet Abucâ—ch sayes the highest hills of the world bow down and quake at the ways of Eternity Damas in vita ejus The holy youth Josaphat at the representation of Eternity Hell being placed on one side and Heaven on the other remained astonished without strength not being able to raise himself in his bed as if he had been afflicted with some mortal sickness The Philosophers more barbarous and who had less light were yet daunted with the conception of it and in their Symbols made choice of things of the greatest of terror to express it some painted it in the form of a Basilisk a Serpent the most terrible of all other who kills with his onely sight there being nothing more horror then that eternity of torments whereinto we are subject to fall Conformable to this St. John Damascen represented eternal duration under the figure of a fierce Dragon which from a deep pit lay waiting with open jawes to swallow men alive Others figured it by a horrible and profound Cavern which at the entrance had four degrees one of iron another of brass the third of silver and the last of gold upon which many little Children of several sexes and ages stood playing and passing away the time without regarding the danger of falling into that bottomless dungeon This shadow they framed not only to set forth how worthy Eternity was of their fear and amazement but also to express their amazement at the folly of men who laugh and entertain themselves with the things of this life without remembring that they are to die and may then fall into the bottomless abyss of Hell Those children who were playing at the entrance of that dismal cave being no other than men in this life whose employments are but those of children and who being so near their death and therefore unto Eternity which succeeds it have neither fear nor care to leave the pleasures and vain entertainments of this world Truly it is a thing of great amazement that being in expectation of two such extreams as are eternal glory and torments without end we live as if there were neither The reason is because men set not themselves seriously to consider what Eternity is which is either hell whilest God is God or glory without end For this cause it is that they remain as setled and obstinate in their fading pleasures as if they were immortal the which was signified by these degrees of so hard Mettals But in David who seriously meditated and framed a lively conception what the eternity of years was it caused so great a fear and so awaked his spirits with care and diligence that it produced in him an extraordinary change of life in so much as he said with great resolution within himself Now I begin This is a change from the right hand of the most high Now I begin Comment in Psal 76. as Dionisius declares it to live spiritually to understand wisely to know truly perceiving the vanity of this present world and felicity of the future reputing as nothing all my life past nor all the progress I have hitherto made in perfection I will henceforth seriously take to heart with a new purpose a new fervour and a a more vehement endeavour the paths of a better life and entring the way of spiritual profit begin every day afresh And because he knew his heart to be so much changed he confessed his resolution to be miraculous saying This change is from the hand of the most high as if he had said according to the same Dionisius to have in this sort changed me out of the darkness of ignorance into the splendor of wisdom from vices unto vertues from a carnal man unto a spiritual is onely to be attributed to the ayd and most merciful assistance of God who by the knowledge of Eternity hath given so notable a conversion unto my heart This great thought of Eternity doth mightily enlighten the understanding and gives us a true and perfect knowledge of things as they are For this cause in some of the Psalms which David made with this consideration as we have already said he added this word understanding Psalm 6. or for the understanding that is to give understanding to those who meditate upon the end of this life and the eternity of the other and therefore despise the goods of the world By the experience of what happened unto his own soul the Prophet exhorts all men that they meditate with quietness and leasure upon the eternity of the two so opposite conditions which hereafter expect them that they may not only run but flie unto with profit and suffer with patience all the difficulty which attend upon vertue and therefore with great mystery promises on the part of God unto those who shall sleep between the two lots that is unto those who in the quietness of prayer shall meditate upon the eternity of glory and of hell that there shall be granted unto them the silver wings of the Dove and her shoulders of gold because the spiritual life consists not onely in the actions of our own good works but also in the patient suffering the evil works of others in lifting up our selves from the durt of this earth and and flying towards Heaven by performance of the Heroical and precious acts of vertue and not yielding unto the troubles and afflictions of this life which oppress us All which is by a lively conception of Eternity effected with great merit and perfection and for this reason did the Prophet express it by the similitude of those things which men esteem the most precious as of gold and silver But because to suffer is commonly more difficult then to do and consequently more meritorious although both be very precious for this cause he said that the shoulders should be of gold and the wings of silver This also did the Patriarch Jacob hold for so singular a good that he gave it unto his son Isachar for a blessing telling him that he should lye down betwixt the two borders that is that he should at leasure meditate upon the two extreams of happiness or misery eternal For this reason he calleth him a strong beast as having the strength of mind to overcome the difficulty of vertue to support the troubles and burdens of this life to suffer the scorns and disgraces of the world to undergo great penances and mortifications by considering the two eternal extreams which attend us And not onely amongst Saints but amongst the Philosophers did the quiet and calm consideration of Eternity produce a great love and desire of things eternal and as great contempt of all which was temporal even without looking upon those two so different extreams which Christian Religion proposes unto us Seneca complained much that he was interrupted in the meditation of Eternity into
perish not for the paths of this life are full of dangers And with reason did Isidorus Clarius compare it to a narrow Bridge Isid Clar. juxt S. Greg. scarce broad enough to receive our feet under which was a Lake of black and filthy water full of serpents and of ugly and poisonous creatures which onely sustained themselves by feeding on those unfortunate people who fell from the Bridge on either side were pleasant Gardens Meadows Fountains and beautiful Buildings But as it were extream madness in him who was to pass so dangerous a Bridge to entertain himself with gazing upon those Gardens and Buildings without taking care where he set his foot so is it as great a fully in him who is to pass this transitory life to apply himself to pleasures and delights without taking care of his wayes or works To this Cesarius Arelatensis adds That the greatest danger of of this Bridge consisted towards the end where it was narrowest and this is the most streight passage of Death Let us therefore if we intend to gain Heaven look how we place our feet in this life least we misplace them in death and perish in that Eternity wherein our life is to conclude O Eternity Eternity how few there are that provide for thee O Eternity peril of perils and if we miss the mark whereat we ought to aim above all dangers whence comes it that we prepare not for thee whence comes it that we fear thee not which art to endure as long as God is God this present life is but to last a very little time our forces will fail us our senses wax dull our riches leave us the commodities of the world fly from us the want of breath make an end of us and the world at last call us out of it what then will become of us we are to be sent into a strange Countrey for a long time why do we not forecast what to do when we come thither But that we may the better see this our condition and so learn to be more cautious I will relate another Parable of the same St. John Damascen In vita Josaph There was saith he a City very great and populous whereof the Inhabitants had a Custom to elect for their King a stranger who had no knowledge of that Kingdom and Common-wealth This King for a year they suffered to do what he list but that being ended and he most secure without fear or apprehension of any thing amiss thinking he should raign as long as live they suddainly came upon him despoiled him of his royal apparel dragging him naked through the streets and banishing him into an Island far off where he came to suffer extream poverty not having wherewith to feed or cloth himself his fortune without thinking on it wholly changing into the contrary his riches into poverty his joy into sadness his dainties into hunger and his royal purple into nakedness But once it happened that he whom they elected was a prudent and a subtil man and having understood from one of his Counsellors this evil and wicked Custom of the Citizens and their notable inconstancy grew not proud and haughty with the Dignity of the Kingdom which they had conferred upon him but became careful in providing for himself that when he should be deposed and banished into that Island which he every moment expected he might not as his Predecessours perish with poverty and hunger The course he took was during his Reign to transport secretly into that Island all the Treasures of the City which were very great The year being ended the Citizens according to their Custome with his Predecessours came in an uproar to depose him of his Office and Royalty and to send him in exile into the Island whither he went without trouble having before-hand provided wherewith he might live in honour and plenty whilst the preceding Kings perish'd with want and penury This is that which passes in this world and the course which a wise man ought to take That City signifies this world foolish vain and most inconstant wherein when we think to reign we are suddenly despoiled of all we have and sent naked into our Graves when we least look for it and are most busie in enjoying and entertaining our selves with the fading and transitory pleasures of this life as if we were immortal without so much as thinking on Eternity whither we are in a short time to be banisht A Region far off and far removed from our thoughts whither we are to go naked and forsaken of all where we are to perish with an eternal death and shall only live to be tormented into a Land of the dead obscure and dark where no light enters but everlasting horrour and eternal sorrow inhabits He is therefore wise who foreseeing that he is to be despoiled of all he hath in this world provides for the next making such use of time in this life that he may finde the profit of it in Eternity and with the holy works of pennance charity and alms transports his Treasures into that Region where he is to dwell for ever Let us therefore think upon the Eternal and for it despise the Temporal and we shall gain both the one and the other The consideration of Eternity St. Gregory understood to be figured by the Store-house well furnished with precious wine into which the Spouse saith that the Bridegroom brought her and in her ordained Charity because saith he he who shall with a profound attention consider in his mind Eternity may glory in himself saying he hath ordained in me charity by which thought he shall better preserve the order of love loving himself the less and God and all things for God the more he shall not make use of the temporal things of this life not even of those which are most necessary but in order to the Eternal CAP. V. What is Eternity according to St. Gregory Nazianzen and St. Dionysius LEt us therefore begin to declare something of what is inexplicable and to frame some kind of conception of what is incomprehensible whereby Christians knowing or to speak more properly being less ignorant of what is Eternity they may have a horrour either to commit a sin or to omit an act of vertue trembling in themselves that for matters of so small value as are those of the Earth they are to lose things so great and precious as are those of Heaven Agrippina perceiving the great lavishness of her Son who poured out gold and silver as if it had been water desirous to reform his prodigality upon a time when the Emperour had commanded about a quarter of a Million to be bestowed upon some Minion of his caused that Money and as much more to be spread upon a Table and placed where he was to pass to the end that seeing with his own eyes the mighty mass of Treasure which he so wastfully mispent he might after with more discretion moderate his vast expences
comes it then that a Dwarf or Pigmey in time affrights us and an armed Giant in eternity makes us not tremble how is it that eternal hell moves us not and yet we fear a temporal pain how is it we do not penance for our sins why have we not patience in our afflictions why suffer we not all that which can be suffered in this life rather than to suffer one onely torment in eternity The pains of this valley of tears being they are to have an end are not to be feared in comparison of those which shall never have it how contentedly then ought we to suffer here a little and for a short time that we may be freed from suffering much hereafter and for ever What we have considered in evils and afflictions the same is to be considered in goods and blessings If one were to enjoy all the pleasures of the senses for a thousand miriads of years but were to pass no further we ought to change them all for one onely pleasure that would last for ever Why then exchange we not one perishing pleasure of the earth which is to last but for a moment for all those immense joyes which we are to possess in Heaven for a world without end All the temporal goods of the world might well be quitted for the securing of only one that were eternal how is it then that we secure not all the eternal by forbearing now and then one which is temporal It would infinitely exceed the Dominion of the whole world so long as the world shall last to be Lord but of one little Cottage for eternity time holds no comparison with it all that is temporal how great soever being to be esteemed vile and base and all that is eternal how small soever high and precious And that we may exaggerate this consideration as much as possible the very being of God himself if it were but for a time might be quitted for some other infinitely less excellent which were eternal And shall then the covetous man satisfie himself with those poor treasures which death may quit him of to morrow and perhaps the Theef to day despising for them the eternal treasure of Heaven For certain if God should promise as to enjoy the pleasure of one onely sense for ever in the next life we ought for it to part with all the pleasures we have in this how huge a folly is it then that promising all those immense joyes of Heaven we will not for all them together part with some of those poor ones on earth The second way by which Eternity unto whatsoever it is joyned makes the good infinitely better and the bad infinitely worse is because it collects it self wholly into every instant so that in every instant it makes us sensible of all that which it is to contain in its whole duration and being to endure for an infinity it amasses as it were into every instant a whole infinity of pleasure or pain every instant being sensible both of what it contains at present what is past and what it shall contain in future So as a Doctor sayes Les de perfec divi lib. 4. c. 3. In Eternity all the good a thing can contain successively in an infinite time is recollected into one instant and made perceptible and enjoyable all at once As if all the pleasures a most delicious Banquet could afford successively by parts and that in an infinite time should be resumed all at once and all that delight should be conferred joyntly and together for eternity certainly this would make it infinitely better and of more esteem The same thing Eternity causes in evils and pains recollecting them in a certain manner into one and making them sensible all at once and although they be not all really and actually together yet it causes them to be apprehended altogether and so produces in the Soul a grief infinite and without limit Those then are truly evils which are totally and every way evils both in extension their duration having no end and in intension their being and essence having no limit or measure What afflicted person who considers this can be impatient since all the griefs of this life have both an end and limit The greatest temporal evils are but as biting of gnats in respect of the least of those which are eternal and therefore that we may escape all the eternal it is not much to suffer one temporal Let us tremble at the consideration of those two lances of Eternity those two infinities whose wounds are mortal and pierce the damned from side to side those two unsupportable rocks which overwhelm and crush whom they fall upon into pieces All that we suffer here is to be laughed at a fillip with a finger a trifle in respect of the eternal which embraces all times and with the evils of them all falls every instant upon the head of the damned §. 2. Besides what hath been already said Goods and Evils eternal have this condition that they are not onely qualified and augmented by the future but also by what is past although temporal so as the blessed Souls in Heaven not only enjoy the glory which they have in present and that which is to come but also what is past even unto those real and true goods of this life to wit their vertues and good works with the memory of which they recreate and congratulate themselves for all eternity in so much as all goods past present and to come concur in one to fill up the measure of their joy and the goods of all times even of those of this life are amassed and heaped up in their felicity How different from this are temporal goods since even those which we possess in present suffer not themselves to be entirely enjoyed here is no good which is not alloyed by some want danger or imperfection And if for the present they afford so little content much less do they for the future since the security of what we possess is so uncertain that the fear of losing it often disseasons the present gust The same fear also robbs our remembrance of the comfort of what is past since we fear to lose that most which we have formerly taken most pleasure in enjoying On all sides then the eternal goods are much more excellent unto which we ought to aspire and strive to purchase them even at the cost of all which is temporal and in this life as much as may be to imitate the same eternity the which is to be done by the practice of those three Vertues which St. Bernard recommends unto us in these words Serm. 1. in Festo Om. Sact. With Poverty of spirit with Meekness and Contrition of heart is renewed in the Soul a similitude and image of that Eternity which embraces all times For with poverty of spirit we merit the future with meekness we possess the present and with the tears of repentance recover what is past And truely he
and therefore reprehended his Nephew for spending a short time in walking for his recreation telling him that those hours might be better imployed and being present when the same Nephew caused one which in reading pronounced a word with an ill accent to repeat it again admonisht him that too much time was lost in that useless repetition Seneca esteemed time above all price and value and in this manner sayes Redeem thy self unto thy self recover and preserve that time which hitherto hath been taken surprised or slipt from thee For whom wilt thou give me that shall set a price upon time or give a value unto a day who understands himselt daily to die If therefore the Gentils who had no hope by time to purchase Eternity made so great account of it what shall we Christians unto whom it is an occasion of eternal happiness Let us therefore hear St. Bernard Serm ad Scho. There is nothing sayes he more precious than time But out alass nothing at this day is more vilified A day of salvation is past and no man reflects on it no man thinks no man complains that he hath lost a day which shall never râ—â—rn But as a hair from the head so a moment of time shall not perish The same Saint also grieving to see a thing so precious so much mispent speaks in this manner Let no man make a small esteem of the time which is spent in idle words Say some We may yet chat and talk untill this hour be past O wretched speech Vntil this hour be past This being the hour which the goodness of thy Creator hath bestowed upon thee that in it thou mayest do penance for thy sins obtain pardon acquire grace and merit glory O lamentable speech Whilst this hour passes this being the hour wherein thou mayst gain divine mercy and commiseration In another part he speaks much to the same purpose exhorting us to benefit our selves by the time of this life His words are these Serm. 75. in Cant. Whilest we have time let us do good unto all especially since our Lord said plainly that the night would come when no man could work Art thou perhaps to find some other time in the world to come wherein thou mayst seek God and wherein thou mayst do good This being the time wherein he hath promised to remember thee and is therefore the day of mercy because here our God and King hath long agoe wrought thy salvation in the middest of the earth goe then and expect thy salvation in the middest of hell What possibility doest thou dream of obtaining pardon in the middest of eternal flames when the time of mercy is already past No sacrifice tor sin remains tor thee being dead in sin no more shall the Son of God be crucified for thee Once he died and shall now die no more That blood which he spilt upon the earth shall not descend into hell The sinners of the earth have drunk it up There is no part left for the devils or for sinners which are the companions of devils wherewith to quench their flames Once descended thither not the blood but the soul of Christ This only visit made by the presence of the soul when the body hung without life upon the Cross was the portion of them who were in prison The blood watered the dry land the blood was poured upon the thirsty earth and did as it were inebriate it The blood wrought peace for those who were upon earth and those who are in heaven but not for those which were in hell beneath the earth Once only as we have said the soul went thither and made in part redemption speaking of the souls of the Holy Fathers who were in Limbo that even for that moment the works of charity might not be wanting but it passed no farther Now is the time acceptable now is the time fit wherein to seek God And certainly he that seeks him shall finde him if so be he seek him when and where he ought to do All this from St. Bernard § 2. Consider what an eternal repentance will follow thee if thou makest not use of this occasion of time for the purchasing of the Kingdom of Heaven especially when thou shalt see that with so little adoe thou mightest have gained that everlasting glory which to satisfie a short pleasure thou hast lost tor ever In what to fury and madness was Esau Gen. 19. when he reflected that his younger brother had gotten the Blessing of the first born by his own base selling his Birth-right for a dish of Lentils he cried out and tore himself for spite and anger Behold thy self in this mirrour who for one vile and short pleasure hast sold the Kingdom of Heaven If God had then thrown thee into hell what wouldest thou have done but lamented that with eternal tears which in so short a time was lost Cain when he perceived that he and his posterity were cursed and made infamous for not knowing how to benefit himself by that occasion Gen. 9. which was first offered unto him and made use of by his Brother what resentment had he then or ought to have had Measure by this the sense of a damned person who for not making use of the time of this lite shall see himself cursed by God for an Eternity and others far less than himself made blessed and rewarded in heaven The Sons-in-law of Loth when they saw they might have escaped the fire and that being invited they had rejected and laughed at the counsel of their Father-in-law when afterwards they perceived it to rain fire and sulphur upon them and their Cities what grief and vexation had they for refusing the benefit of so fair an occasion offered at their own doors O what sorrow what pain what madness what desperation shall seise upon a damned creature when he shall call to mind how often he hath been invited by Christ to salvation and shall now feel a tempest of fire and sulphur pouring down upon him for ever in hell King Hannon who had so good an occasion to preserve that peace whereunto he was intreated and invited by David when after he saw his Cities ruin'd the Inhabitants burnt like bricks in a furnace some thrasht to death others torn in pieces what would he have given to have made use in time of so fair an offer or of holding friendship with so great a King but what is this in respect of what a sinner shall feel when he shall see himself burnt in hell fire become an eternal enemy of the King of Heaven and deprived tor ever of raigning with his blessed Saints what despite what grief of heart shall he then have The evil Theef who was crucified with the Saviour of the world what doth he now endure for refusing that good occasion which his companion embraced what a repentance hath now the rich Glutton for not laying hold of so great an opportunity offered him at his own home
of thy life This is admirable counsel that since thou knowest thou art to dye and knowest not when that thou perform each action as if it were thy last and as if in ending it thou wert to expire thy self Above all let us endeavour to leave sin and evil inclinations to leave the cares of the earth and to elevate our whole heart and affections unto heaven and there to place our thoughts which are to be upright and setled in God Almighty A crooked tree when they cut it down falls that way it was inclined when it grew If one doe not bend towards heaven whilest he lives which way can he fall in death it is much to be feared into Hell CAP. III. Of that moment which is the medium betwixt Time and Eternity which being the end of Life is therefore most terrible WE ought then seriously to consider which is certainly a matter of great amazement all which is to passe in that moment of death for which the time of this life was onely bestowed upon us and upon which depends the eternity of the other O most dreadful point which art the end of Time and beginning of Eternity O most fearful instant which shuttest up the prefixed tearm of this life and determines the business of our Salvation O moment upon which depends Eternity how oughtest thou to be placed in our thoughts with profit that we may not hereafter when it is too late remember thee with repentance How many things are to pass in thee In the same instant life is to finish all our works to be examined and that sentence given which is to be executed for all eternity O last moment of Life O first of Eternity how terrible is the thought of thee since in thee not onely life is to be lost but to be accounted for and we then to enter into a Region which we know not In that moment I shall cease to live in that moment I shall behold my Judge who shall lay all my sins open before me with all their weight number and enormity In it I shall receive a strict charge of all the Divine benefits bestowed upon me and in it a judgment shall pass upon me either for my salvation or damnation eternal How wonderful is it that for so many matters and of so great importance there is no more time allotted than the space of an instant no place left for reply intercession of friends or appeal O fearful moment upon which so much depends O most important instant of Time and Eternity Admirable is the high wisdom of God which hath placed a point in the middest betwixt Time and Eternity unto which all the time of this life is to relate and upon which the whole Eternity of the other is to depend O moment which art neither Time nor Eternity but art the Horizon of both and dividest things Temporal from Eternal O narrow moment O most dilated point wherein so many things are to be concluded so strict an accompt is to be given and where so rigorous a Sentence as is to be pronounced is ever to stand in force A strange case that a business of eternity is to be resolved in a moment and no place allowed for the intercession of friends or our own diligence It will be then in vain to repair unto the Saints in Heaven or the Priests upon Earth those will not intercede for thee nor can these give thee absolution because the rigour of the Judge in that instant wherein thou expirest allows no further mercy Apoc. 20. St. John sayes that Heaven and Earth shall flye from the presence of the Judge Whither wilt thou then goe to what place canst thou repair being the person against whom the Process is commenced It is therefore said that Heaven and Earth shall flye away because neither the Saints of Heaven shall there favour thee with their intercession neither can the Priests of the Earth assist thee with the Sacraments of the Church There shall be place for nothing that may help thee What would then a sinner give for leave to make one poor Confession when it is too late that which would now serve thy turn and thou despisest thou wouldest then have done and canst not Provide thy self therefore in time whilest it may avail thee and deferre it not until that instant wherein nothing can do thee good Now thou mayest help thy self now the Saints will favour thee expect not that moment wherein thy own endeavours will be useless and wherein the Saints will not assist thee To the end we may frame a more lively conceit of what hath been said Lib. 1. Epist 10. I will relate a Story which St. Peter Damian rehearseth in an Epistle of his to Pope Alexander the second of that name whereof the Saint sayes it caused dread in him as often as it came to his mind Thus it was That two men going to fell wood in a Forest there issued forth a Serpent ugly and of a huge size with two heads and mouths of both open thrusting out their tongues with three points or small darts in each of them and seeming to cast out fire at his eyes set upon them One of the two men of more spirit and courage at the first assault of the Serpent struck it with his hatchet and cut off one of his heads but unfortunately let fall his hatchet The Serpent feeling himself wounded full of fury and rage took him at the disadvantage without his weapon and roled his train round about his body The miserable man cried out to his Companion for help or at least that he would give him his hatchet to defend himself or do some execution upon his enemy that was now dragging him towards his Den. But his Companion was so cowardly that he durst not any wayes succour him but affrighted and astonished fled away leaving that wretched man in the power of the Serpent which with great rage carried him to his Den without resistance or any succour at all notwithstanding the hideous out-cries and lamentations the poor Captive made This History is but a slight draught of what a Sinner will experience in the instant of the departure of his Soul out of this life when without any aid at all or hope of it he shall find himself at the mercy of the infernal Dragon who will use him with all violence imaginable St. Peter Damianus sayes he could not express the horror this sad accident caused in him insomuch that it made him tremble many times to consider what pass'd betwixt the Serpent and the man in that Den there being no body to afford any help to the poor fellow in that distress where neither his strength nor cries could any wayes avail him to decline the fury of that ugly Monster now ready to tear him in pieces Wherefore if to be void of all hopes of temporal life and to be in the power of a Serpent is a thing so dreadful what fright and astonishment
since he hath employed his omnipotency for our good and profit let us employ our forces and faculties for his glory and service CAP. VI. Of the End of all Time BEsides the end of the particular time of this life the universal end of all time is much to be considered that since humane ambition passes the limits of this life and desires honour and a famous memory after it Man may know that after this death there is another death to follow in which his memory shall also die and vanish away as smoke After that we have finisht the time of this life the end of all time is to succeed which is to give a period unto all which we leave behind us Let man therefore know that those things which he leaves behind for his memory after death are as vain as those which he enjoyed in life Let him raise proud Mausoleums Let him erect Statues of Marble Let him build populous Cities Let him leave a numerous Kindred Let him write learned Books Let him stamp his Name in brass and fix his Memory with a thousand nails All must have an end his Cities shall sink his Statues fall his Family and Linage perish his Books be burned his Memory be defaced and all shall end because all time must end It much imports us to perswade our selves of this truth that we may not be deceived in the things of this world That not only our pleasures and delights are to end in death but our memories at the farthest are to end with Time And since all are to conclude all are to be despised as vain and perishing Cicero although immoderately desirous of fame and honour Cieer in Ep. ad Luc. as appears by a large Epistle of his written unto a friend wherein he earnestly entreats him to write the conspiracy of Cataline which was discovered by himself in a Volume apart and that he would allow something in it unto their ancient friendships and Publish it in his life time that he might enjoy the glory of it whilest he lived yet when he came to consider that the world was to end in Time he perceived that no glory could be immortal and therefore sayes By reason of deluges and burnings of the earth In Somn. Scip. which muâ—â— of necessity happen within a certain time we cannot attain glory not so much as durable for any long time much less eternal In this world no memory can be immortal since Time and the World it self are mortal and the time will come when time shall be no more But this truth is like the memory of death which by how much it is more important by so much men think lest of it and practically do not believe it But God that his divine providence and care might not be wanting hath also in this taken order that a matter of so great concernment should be published with all solemnity first by his Son after by his Apostles and then by Angels Apoc. 10. And therefore St. John writes in his Apocalyps that he saw an Angel of great might and power who descended from heaven having a Cloud for his Garment and his head covered with a Rainbow his face shining as the Sun and his feet as pillars of fire with the right foot treading upon the Sea and with the left upon the Earth sending forth a great and terrible voice as the roaring of a Lyon which was answered by seaven thunders with other most dreadful noises and presently this prodigious Angel lifts up his hand towards Heaven But wherefore all this Ceremony wherefore this strange equipage wherefore this horrid voice and thunder all was to proclaim the death of Time and to perswade us more of the infallibility of it he continued it with a solemn Oath conceived in a Set form of most authentique words listing up his hand towards Heaven and swearing by him that lives for ever and ever who created Heaven and Earth and all which is in it There shall be mo more time With what could this truth be more confirmed than by the Oath of so great and powerful and an Angel The greatness and solemnity of the Oath gives us to understand the weight and gravity of the thing affirmed both in respect of it self and the importance of us to know it If the death of a Monarch or Prince of some corner of the world prognosticated by an Eclipse or Comet cause a fear and amazement in the beholders what shall the death of the whole World and with it all things temporal and of Time it self foretold by an Angel with so prodigious an apparition and so dreadful a noise produce in them who seriously consider it For us also this thought is most convenient whereby to cause in us a contempt of all things temporal Let us therefore be practically perswaded that not onely this life shall end but that there shall be also an end of Time Time shall bereave Man of this life and Time shall bereave the World of his whose end shall be no less horrible than that of Man but how much the whole World and the whole Race of mankind exceeds one particular person by so much shall the universal end surpass in terrour the particular end of this life For this cause the Prophecies which foretell the end of the World are so dreadful that if they were not dictated by the holy Spirit of God they would be thought incredible Christ therefore our Saviour having uttered some of them unto his Disciples because they seemed to exceed all that could be imagined in the conclusion confirmed them with that manner of Oath or Asseveration which he commonly used in matters of greatest importance Math. 13. Luc. 21. Amen which is By my verity or verily I say unto you that the world shall not end before all these things are fulfilled Heaven and earth shall fail but my words shall not fail Let us believe then that Time shall end and that the World shall die and that if we may so say a most horrible and disastrous death let us believe it since the Angels and the Lord of Angels have sworn it If it be so then that those memorials of men which seemed immortal must at last end since the whole Race of man is to end let us only strive to be preserved in the eternal memory of him who hath no end and let us no less despise to remain in the fading memory of men who are to die than to enjoy the pleasures of our senses which are to perish As the hoarding up of riches upon earth is but a deceit of Avarice so the desire of eternizing our memory is an errour of Ambition The covetous man must then leave his wealth when he leaves his life if the Theef in the mean time do not take it from him and fame and renown must end with the World if envy or oblivion deface it not before All that is to end is vain this World therefore and all which
is esteemed in it is vain all is vanity of vanities Let us onely aim and aspire unto the eternal because the just onely as the Prophet sayes shall remain in the eternal memory of God The memory of man is as men themselves frail and perishing What man ambitious of a perpetual memory would not rather choose to be esteemed by ten men who were to live a hundred years than by a thousand who were to die immediately after him Let us therefore desire to be in the memory of God whose life is eternity Our memory amongst men can last no longer than men themselves which shall all die like us and there can be no memory immortal amongst those who are mortal It is therefore very expedient that the end of the World should be accompanied by the universal Judgement of all men wherein shall be revealed their most secret and hidden thoughts and anions That the murtherer who hath slain his neighbour lest he should discover his wickedness may not hope that therefore it shall remain conceal'd and That no man should be bold to sin for want of witnesses since the whole World shall then know that which if any but himself had known here would have burst his heart with shame and sorrow CAP. VII How the Elements and the Heavens are to change at the end of Time LEt us now look upon the strange manner of the end of the World which being so terrible gives us to understand the vanity and deceit of all things in it and the great abuse of them by man for questionless were it not for the great malice and wickedness which raigns in the World the period of it would not be so horrible and disastrous Lib. recognit S. Clement the Roman writes that he learned of St. Peter the Apostle that God had appointed a day from all eternity wherein the Army of Vengeance should with all its forces and as we may say in ranged battail fight with the Army of Sin which day is usually called in the holy Scripture The day of the Lord in which battail the Army of Vengeance shall prevail and shall at once extirpate and make an end both of Sin and the World wherein it hath so long raigned And certainly if the terrour of that day shall equal the multitude and hainousness of sins we need not wonder at what the sacred Scripture and holy Fathers have foretold of it But as it is usual in war res to skirmish and make inrodes before the day of battel so before that dreadful day wherein all punishments are to encounter with all offences the Lord shall from divers parts send forth several calamities which shall be fore-runners of that great day of battel and shall like light Horse-men scoure the Campania which St. John in the Apocalyps signified by those Horse-men which he saw sally forth upon divers-coloured horses one red another black and the third pale so the Lord shall before that day send Plagues Famine Warres Earthquakes Droughts Inundations Deluges and if those miseries do now so much afflict us what shall they then doe when God shall add unto them his utmost force and power when all Creatures shall arm against Sinners and the Zeal of divine justice shall be their Captain-general which the Wise-man declares in these words Sap. 5. His zeal shall take up arms and shall arm the creatures to revenge him of his enemies he shall put on Justice as a breast-plate and righteous Judgement as a helmet and he shall take Equity as a buckler and shall sharpen his Wrath as a lance and the circuit of the earth shall fight for him Thunderbolts shall be sent from the clouds as from a well-shooting how and shall nit fail to hit the mark and Hail shall be sent full of stormy wrath The Waters of the sea shall threaten them the Rivers shall combat furiously a most strong Wind shall rise against them and shall divide them as a whirle-wind Very dreadful are those words although they contain but the Warre which three of the Elements are to make against Sinners but not onely Fire Air and Water but Earth also and Heaven as it appears in other places of Scripture shall fall upon them and confound them for all creatures shall express their fury in that day and shall rise against man and if the clouds shall discharge thunderbolts and stones upon their heads the Heavens shall shoot no less balls than Stars which as Christ sayes shall fall from thence If Hail no bigger than little stones falling but from the clouds destroy the fields and sometimes kills the lesser sort of cattle what shall pieces of Stars do falling from the Firmament or some upper Region It is no amplification which the Gospel uses when it sayes That men shall wither with fear of what shall fall upon the whole frame of nature for as in Man which is called the Lesser world when he is to die the humours which are as the Elements are troubled and out of order his eyes which are as the Sun and Moon are darkned his other senses which are as the lesser stars fall away his reason which is as the celestial vertues is off the hinges so in the death of the greater World before it dissolve and expire the Sun shall be turned into darkness the Moon into blood the Stars shall fall and the whole World shall tremble with a horrid noise If the Sun Moon and other celestial bodies which are held incorruptible shall suffer such changes what shall be done with those frail and corruptible Elements of Earth Air and Water If this inferiour World do as the Philosophers say depend upon the Heavens those celestial bodies being altered and broken in pieces in what estate must the lower Elements remain when the Vertues of Heaven shall faulter and the wandring Stars shall lose their way and fail to observe their order How shall the Air be troubled with violent and sudden Whirle-winds dark Tempests horrible Thunders and furious flashes of Lightning and how shall the Earth tremble with dreadful Earth-quakes opening her self with a thousand mouthes and casting forth as it were whole Volcanies of fire and sulphur and not content to overthrow the loftiest Towers shall swallow up high Mountains and bury whole Cities in her entrails How shall the Sea then rage mounting his proud waves above the clouds as if they meant to overwhelm the whole Earth and shall certainly drown a great part of it The roaring of the Ocean shall astonish those who are far distant from the Sea and inhabit in the middest of the firm land wherefore Christ our Saviour said Luc. 21. that there should be in the Earth afflictions of Nations for the confusion of the noise of the Sea What shall men do in this general perturbation of Nature they shall remain amazed and pale as death What comfort shall they have they shall stand gazing one upon another and every one shall conceive a new fear by beholding in
were violently overthrown and evened with the ground in so much as the face of the World changed by the furious discord of the Elements produced many unheard of Prodigies For the vast body of the waters suddenly and unexpectedly returning and entring far into the land many thousands of people were drowned whose dead bodies after the swellings of the waves were asswaged and retired unto their natural and usual bed were found some with their faces downward grovling upon the Earth some upwards looking upon the Heavens and some great Ships the waters left upon the tops of houses as it happened in Alexandria others far from the Sea-shore and as we our selves are witness who saw one as we passed by Methion then old and worm-eaten All this lamentable story is from Ammianus Marcellinus No less fearful is that which is related by Nauclerus and Trithemius that the year 1218. Naucler Gen. 41. sub fin Trit Chron. The enraged Sea entring into Frisia there were drowned in the Fields and in their own houses more than a hundred thousand persons Langus adds that afterwards in the year 1287. the Ocean again reentring the same Province retired not till it had left 80000 persons drowned behind it This mortality is not much in a whole Province in respect of what the Sea hath done in one onely City Surius in his Commentaries of the year 1509. writes that the day of the Exaltation of the Cross in September the Sea betwixt Constantinople and Pera swelled with that rage and fury that it passed over the walls of both Cities and that there were drowned onely of Turks in Coustantinople above 13000. Unto these so certain examples we shall not need to aad what Plato writes Tertul. Apolog. Cap. 39. although Tertullian and many Authors of these times approve it That the Atlantick Island which was seated in that spacious Ocean betwixt Spain and the West-Indies and which was a greater part of the World then Asia and Affrick both together replenished with innumerable people was by an Earthquake and the rain of one onely day and night in which the Heavens as it were melted themselves into water and the Sea over-past his bounds buried in the Ocean with all the Inhabitants and never since appeared But I will not make use of this History to exaggerate the force of the Elements enraged against man The modern Stories which we have related with more certainty are sufficient and by that which happened in Frisia may be seen with what fury the Ocean imprisoned within his proper limits issues forth when God permits it to fight against Sinners What shall be then when the Lord of all shall arm all the Elements against them and shall give the Alarm to all creatures to revenge him upon men so ungrateful for his infinite benefits The Air also which is an Element so sweet and gentle in which we live and by which we breath when God slacking the bridle draws force out of weakness with no less fury ruins and overthrows all it meets It hath been seen to tear up whole woods by the roots and transport the trees to places far distant Ovied In Hist Indic l. 6. ca. 3. Surius in Comment Conrad Argen in Chron. Surius writes that the 28 of June in the year 1507 at midnight there arose such a Tempest in Germany that it made the strongest Buildings shake uncovered Houses rooted up Trees and threw them a great distance off Conradus Argentinas writes That Henry the sixth being Emperour he himself saw great Beams of Timber blown from the roof of the chief Church in Ments as big as the Beams of a Wine-press and that of heavy wood as Oak flying in the air above a miles distance Above all who is not amazed at what Josephus writes in his Antiquities and Eusebius in Praepar Evangel that the Tower of Babylon which was the most strong and prodigious Building of the World was by God overthrown with a Tempest What shall I speak of those fearful Tempests of hail and lightning flying through the air from place to place to chastize Sinners one of which slew all the Flocks and Heards of the Egyptians And in Palestine of another Hail of a strange greatness that slew innumerable Amorites Of latter times in these parts in the year 1524. Clavitellus writes that near Cremona there fell Hail as big as Hens eggs Clav. Fol. 260. Corn. A lap in cap. 9. Exod. Olaus Mag. l. 1. c. 22. Conimb In Meteor c. de grandine Hist Tripart l. 7. c. 22. Ezek. 38. Apoc. 16. and in the Campania of Bolognia in the year 1537. there fell stones or 28 pound weight Olaus Magnus writes that in the North Hail hath fallen as big as the head of a man And the Tripartite cap History that the year 369. there happened such a Tempest in Constantinople that the Hail was as rocks Certainly it is not then much what the Prophet Ezekiel sayes that in the end of the World shall fall huge stones and what St. John writes that they shall be of the weight of a talent which is 125 pounds of Roman weight With what horrible thunder shall that Tempest resound which shall throw a stone of that greatness In Seythia they write that divers persons have fallen dead with the terrible noise of the thunders in those parts What noise then shall those last Tempests make which God shall send in the end of the World All those alterations past of the Elements are no more than skirmishes What shall then be the battel which they are to give unto Sinners when the Heavens shall shoot it's arrows and give the Alarm with prodigious thunders and shall declare their wrath with horrible apparitions Greg lib. 4. dialog Cap. 36. Joan. in Vit. Greg l. 1. c. 37. Zonar in Iren. Plin. l. 1. c. 13. St. Gregory the Great writes as an eye-witness that in a great Pestilence at Rome he saw arrows visibly fall from Heaven and strike many men John the Deacon sayes it rained arrows How shall it the be when the Heavens and Air rain pieces of stars The world was amazed when ill the time of Irene and Constantine the Sun was darkned for 17 dayes together and in the time of Vespasian the Sun and Moon appeared not during the space of 12 dayes What shall it be in the last dayes when the Sun shall hide his beams under a mourning Garment and the Moon shall cloath her self with blood to signifie the wanes which all the creatures are to make with fire and blood against those who have despised their Creator When on one side the Earth shall rouse it self up against them and shall shake them off her back as unwilling to endure their burthen any longer When the Sea shall pursue and assault them within their own houses and the Air shall not permit them to be safe in the fields Certainly it shall be then no wonder if they shall desire the mountains to cover them and the
overwhelmed and themselves compell'd to escape the burning of their Country to struggle with the water and that which way soever they turned they perceived death still to follow them and were certain to perish What shall be then the streights and exigences of that general burning when those who shall escape Earthquakes Inundations of the Sea the fury of whirlwindes and lightning from Heaven shall fall into that universal Fire that Deluge of flames which shall consume all and make an end both of men and their memories Of those who lived before the Flood and were Masters of the World for so long a time except it be of some few which the Scripture mention we know nothing Those heroical actions which certainly some of them performed and gained by them incomparable fame lye buried in the waters and there remains no more memory of those who did them than if they had never been born No more permanent shall be the fame of those which now resounds in the ears of the whole World Cyrus Alexander Hannibal Scipio Caesar Augustus Plato Aristotle Hippocrates Euclid and the rest no more World no more Fame This Fire shall end all that smoke Nor is the World without convenient proportion to end in fire which is now so full of smoke There are few comparisons as hath been said in the beginning of this work which express better what the World is than that which St. Clement the Roman learned of St. Peter the Apostle who said the World was like a house full of smoke which in such manner blinds the eyes as it differs not those within it to see things as they are and so the World with its deceits so disguises the nature of humane things as we perceive not what they are Ambition and humane honour which the World so much dotes after are no more than smoke without substance which so blinds our understandings that we know not the truth of that we so much covet It is no marvail that so much smoke comes at last to end in flames The smoke of the Mountains Vesuvius and Aetna when it ends in fire and bursts forth into those innumerous flames hath amazed the World and rivers of fire have been seen to issue from their bowels Zon. In Tito Proc. l. 2. Vesuvius is near unto Naples and the fire hath sometimes sallyed forth with that impetuous violence that as grave Authors affirm the ashes have been seen in Constantinople and Alexandria And St. Augustine writes St. Aug. l. 3. de Civit. c. 31. that the ashes of Mount Aetna overwhelmed the City of Catanea and in our time when Vesuvius burst out the very flame of it terrified places far distant and secure And now lately in the year 1638. the third of July near the Island of St. Michael one of the Terceras the fire bursting out from the bottom of the Sea 150 fathomes deep and over-coming the weight of so huge a mass of water sent up his flames unto the clouds and made many places although far distant to tremble With what fury shen shall the general Conflagration of the World burst forth that part which shall issue forth of Hell and from beneath the Earth shall fill the World with ashes before it be involved in flames and when a crack of thunder or a flash of lightning amazes us so much that fire which falls from heaven what violence and noise shall it bring along with it Lot the Nephew of Abraham being secure in conscience and promised by the Angel of God that for his sake the City of Segor should not be burnt but that he might rest safe in it was notwithstanding so affrighted with the fire which fell upon other Cities in that Valley of Pentapolis that notwithstanding he saw it not yet he held himself not late but retired unto the Mountains What counsel shall sinners take in that extremity when their own Conscience shall be their accusors and when they shall behold the World all on fire about them whither shall they flye for safety when no place will afford it Shall they climb unto the Mountains thither the flames will follow them Shall they descend into the Valleys thither the fire will pursue them Shall they shut themselves up in strong Castles and Towns but there the wrath of God will assault them and that fire will pass their Fosses consume the Bulwarks and make an end both of them and their fortunes Besides the contempt of all things which the world esteems which we may draw from this general destruction of it by fire we may also perceive the abomination of sin since God to purifie the World from that uncleanness wherewith our offences have polluted it is resolved to cleanse it with fire as he anciently washt it with the waters of the Deluge Such are our sins that for being onely committed in the World the World it self is condemned to die what shall then become of those who sinned Less de perf div l. 13. c. 10. But from this so terrible a fire the Saints then alive shall be free that it may appear it was onely prepared for Sinners and that nothing can then avail but vertue and holiness The rich man shall not be delivered by his wealth nor the mighty by his power nor the crafty by his wiles onely the just shall be freed by his vertues none shall escape the terrour of that day by fast sailing ships or speed of horses the Sea it self shall burn and the fire shall overtake the swiftest Post onely holiness and charity shall defend the Servants of Christ unto whom the tribulations of those times shall serve to purifie their Souls by suffering that in this life with reward which they should otherwise have done for a time in the other without it Albertus Magnus observes the convenience of the two Elements by which God resolved twice to destroy the World The first by water against the fire of the flesh and heat of concupiscence which so inordinately tytannized over all vertue before the general Flood The second he hath appointed to be by fire against the coldness of charity which in those last dayes shall raign in the aged and decrepit World And as in the Deluge of waters onely the chaste Noah and his Wife who were most continent in Matrimony and his Sons and Daughters who observed chastity all the time they continued in the Ark escaped drowning so in that general fire of the World onely the Just who shall be replenished with charity shall be free from burning The Deluge of waters overwhelmed not him who was not burnt with the heat of carnal love neither shall the Deluge of fire destroy them who are enflamed with divine charity CAP. VIII How the World ought to conclude with so dreadful an end in which a general Judgment is to pass of all that is in it TO be subject to an end as hath been said were sufficient to breed in us a contempt of all things temporal for what is
purified in that general burning and then shall be renewed the Earth the Heavens the Stars and the Sun which shall shine seaven times more than before and the creatures which have here been violated and oppressed by the abuse of man whereof some had taken armes against him to revenge the injuries of their Creatour and others groaned under their burthen with grief and sorrow shall then rejoyce to see themselves freed from the tyranny of sin and sinners and joyful of the triumph of Christ shall put on mirth and gladness This is the end wherein all time is to determine and this the Catastrophe so fearful unto the wicked where all things temporal are to conclude Let us therefore take heed how we use them and that we may use them well let us be mindful of this last day this day of justice and calamity this day of terrour and amazement the memory whereof will serve much for the reformation of our lives Let us think of it and fear it for it is the most terrible of all things terrible and the consideration of it most profitable and available to cause in us a holy fear of God and to convert us unto him Joh. Curopol in hist apud Rad. in opusc in vitis PP Occidentis John Curopolata writes of Bogoris King of the Bulgarians a Pagan who was so much addicted to the hunting of wilde beasts that he desired to have them painted in his Palace in all their fury and fierceness and to that end commanded Methodius the Monk a skilful Painter to paint them in so horrible a manner as the very sight might make the beholders tremble The discreet Monk did it not but in place of it painted the Day of Judgement and presented it unto the King who beholding that terrible act of Justice and the coming of the Son of God to judge the World crowning and rewarding the just and punishing the wicked was much astonished at it and being after instructed left his bad life and was converted to the faith of Christ If onely then the Day of Judgement painted was so terrible what shall it be executed Almost the same happened unto St. Dositheus Anon. in Elog. Dorothei Dosithei who being a young man cokored and brought up in pleasures had not in his whole life so much as heard of the Day of Judgement until by chance he beheld a Picture in which were represented the pains of the damned at which he was much amazed and not knowing what it was was informed of it by a Matron present which he apprehended so deeply that he fell half dead upon the ground not being able to breath for fear and terrour after coming to himself he demanded what he should doe to avoid that miserable condition it was answered him by the same Matron that he should fast pray and abstain from flesh which he immediately put in execution And though many of his house and kindred endeavoured to divert and disswade him yet the holy fear of God and the dread of eternal condemnation which he might incurre remained so fixt in his memory that nothing could withdraw him from his rigorous penance and holy resolution until becoming a Monk he continued with much fruit and profit Let us therefore whiles we live ever preserve in our memory this day of terrour that we may hereafter enjoy security for the whole eternity of God THE THIRD BOOK OF THE DIFFERENCE BETWIXT THE TEMPORAL and ETERNAL CAP. I. The mutability of things temporal makes them worthy of contempt HItherto we have spoken of the shortness of time and consequently of all things temporal and of the end wherein they are to conclude Nothing is exempted from death and therefore not onely humane life but all things which follow time and even time it self at last must die Wherefore Hesichius Damas in Par. l. 1. as he is translated by St. John Damascen saith That the splendour of this world is but as withered leaves bubles of water smoke stubble a shadow and dust driven by the wind all things that are of earth being to end in earth But this is not all for besides the certainty of end they are infected with another mischief which renders them much more contemptible than that which is their instability and continual changes whereunto they are subject even whilest they are For as time it self is in a perpetual succession and mutation as being the brother and inseparable companion of Motion so it fixes this ill condition unto most of those things which pass along in it the which not onely have an end and that a short one but even during that shortness of time which they last have a thousand changes and before their end many ends and before their death many deaths each particular change which our life suffers being the death of some estate or part of if For as death is the total change of life so every change is the death of Come part Sickness is the death of health sleeping of waking sorrow of joy impatience of quiet youth of infancy and age of youth The same condition hath the universal world and all things in it for which cause they deserve so much contempt that Marcus Aurelius the Emperour wondered that there could be found a man so senseless Aur. Anton l. 6. de vita sua as to value them and therefore speaks in this manner Of that very thing which is now in doing some part is already vanisht changes and alterations continually innovate the world as that immense space of time by a perpetual flux renews it self Who therefore shall esteem those things which never subsist but pass along in this headlong and precipitate river of time is as he who sets his affection upon some little bird which passes along in the air and is no more seen Thus much from this Philosopher This very cause of the little value of things temporal proceeding from their perpetual changes together with the end whereunto they are subject is as St. Gregory notes signified unto us by that Woman in the Apocalyps Greg. l. 34. moral who had the Moon under her feet and her head adorned with twelve Stars Certainly the Moon as well as the Stars might have been placed in her Diadem but it was trod under foot by reason of the continual changes and alterations which it suffers whereby it becomes a figure of things temporal which change not onely every Moneth but every day the same day being as Euripides sayes now a Mother then a Stepmother The same was also signified by the Angel Apoc. 10. who crowned with a Rainbow descended from heaven to proclaim that all time was to end with his right foot which presses and treads more firmly he stood upon the Sea which by reason of its great unquietness is also a figure of the instability of this World And therefore with much reason did the Angel who had taught us by his voice that all time and temporal things
with which the rich man remained amazed and was taught that to give himself over to gluttony and the immoderate pleasure of his taste was no less hurtful for him than to feed on poisonful creatures or to have to do with Lions Serpents and Tygers And it is certain that Lions and the most furious beasts have not kill'd so many as have died by surfeits and pleasing too much their pallats CAP. VI. Of the littleness of things Temporal SEtting aside how vain the things of this World are let us particularly consider how little they are and we shall perceive that though their vanity which swells and blows them up seems to extend them yet they are in themselves poor short and little especially if we compare them with things eternal Beginning therefore with that temporal good which seems to have the greatest bulk and makes the greatest noise to wit Honour Fame and Renown we shall see how narrow it is Men desire that their fame should ring through the whole World and that all should know their names and if they did what are all in respect of those in the other World since the whole Earth in respect of the Heavens is but a point But who is he that can be known of all who live Millions of men there are in the World who know not whether there be an Emperour of Germany or a King of Spain Let no man then afflict himself for this vain honour for even in his own Country all shall not know him Many thousand years are past and no man knew thee and of those who shall be born hereafter few shall remember thee and although thou remainest in the memory of those yet they also in the end must die and with them thine and their own memory must perish and thou shalt as before thou wert continue a whole eternity without being known or celebrated by any And even now whilest thou livest there are not many who know thee and of those most of them so bad that thou oughtest to be ashamed that such mouthes should praise thee who speak ill even of one another Wherefore then doest thou torment thy self for a thing so short so vile and so vain All these things are so certain that even the Gentils acknowledged them Hear onely one who was placed in the highest degree of glory and dignity in the whole World Marc. Anton. l. 3. p. 200. since he was Lord of it the Emperour Marcus Antoninus who speaks in this manner Perhaps thou art sollicitous of honour Behold how quickly oblivion blots out all things Behold a Chaos of eternity both before and after How vain is the noise of fame how great inconstancie and uncertainty of humane judgements and opinions in how narrow a compass are all things inclosed The World is but a point and of it how small a corner is inhabited and who and how many are those in it who are to praise thee And a little after he adds He who desires fame and honour after death thinks not that he who is to remember him shall shortly die also and in the same manner he who is to succeed after him untill that all memory which is to be propagated by mortal men be blotted out But suppose that those who are to remember thee were immortal what could it import thee being dead nay even alive what could it profit thee to be praised all that is fair is fair of it self and is perfected within it self and to be praised is no part of the beauty He therefore who is celebrated is for that reason neither better nor worse These Antidotes are drawn by the Pagan Prince against the poison of ambition Why therefore should we Christians esteem any honour but that of God What shall I say of the vanity of those titles which many have assumed against all reason and justice onely to make themselves known in the World Let us judge how it will fare with us of Europe by those who have taken titles upon them in Asia For if the fame of those in Asia arrive not to the knowledge of us in Europe no more shall ours in Europe to theirs in Asia The name of Echebar was thought by his Subjects to be eternal and that all the World did not only know Jarricus in Thesau Indic but fear him But ask here in Europe who he was and no man hath heard of him and demand now of the most learned and few shall resolve you unless perchance he find here in my writing that he raigned in Mogor How few have heard of the name of Vencatapadino Ragiu he imagined that there was no man in the World who knew him not The same thought had his Servants and called him The Lord of Kings and supreme Emperour The titles which he arrogated to himself and put in his Edicts were these The Spouse of good fortune King of great Provinces King of the greatest Kings and God of Kings Lord of all the Horsemen Master of those who cannot speak Emperour of three Emperours Conquerour of all he sees and Preserver of all he conquers Formidable unto the eight Regions of the World Lord of the Provinces which he overcomes Destroyer of the Mahometan Armies Disposer of the riches of Zeilan He who cut off the head of the invincible Viravalano Lord of the East South North and West and of the Sea Hunter of Elephants He that lives and glories in his military valour These titles of honour are enjoyed by the most excellent in warlike forces Vencatapadino Ragiu which rules and governs this World How many can tell me before I declare it here that he was the King of Narsinga If then these warlike and potent Princes are not known in Europe No more shall Charles the Fift and the Grand Captain and many other Excellent men in arms and litterature which have flourished in these parts be known in Asia and Africa If we shall reflect upon the truth of those titles which many arrogate unto themselves we shall perceive them all to be vain How many are called Highness and Excellence who are of a base and abject spirit and continue in mortal sin which is the meanest and lowest thing in the World How many are called Screnissimi who have their understanding darkened and their will perverted Others call themselves most Magnificent with as much reason as Nero might be called most Clement This vanity hath proceeded so far that men have not feared to usurp those titles which only belong to God and have thereupon raised great warres and slain innumerable people Wherefore St. John said that the Beast which rose out of the Sea had upon his head names of Blasphemy and afterwards that the purple Beast was full of names of Blasphemy in regard of the blood that hath been spilt in the World for those vain titles and some of them contrary unto the essence of God as the calling of Rome Eternal and deifying her Emperours which was no better than blasphemy The things wherein
at least mortifie our affections for what is promised us hereafter and because it is most agreeable to God and profitable for our selves as may appear by this story related by Glycas Glycas ex eo Rad. in Aula Sancta cap. 12. A certain Anchorite had lived forty years in the desert retired wholly from the world and applying himself with great observance of his profession to the salvation of his Soul A desire at last entred into his minde to know who in the world was equal to himself in mortification Whereupon he besought God to reveal it unto him and it pleased his Divine Majesty to grant his request and it was answered him from heaven that the Emperour Theodâ—sius notwithstanding that he was Master of the greatest glory of the World yet was neither inferiour unto him in humility nor in overcoming himself The Hermite with this answer moved by God repaired unto the Court where he found easie access unto the courteous and religious Emperour unto whom the Servants of God and such as were famous for sanctity of life were alwayes welcome Not long after he found means to speak unto him and know his holy exercises At first he onely acquainted him with common vertues That he gave large Alms That he wore hair-cloth That he fasted often That he observed conjugal chastity and That he caused justice to be exactly observed These vertues seemed well unto the Hermit especially in such a person but yet judged all this to be short of himself who had done those things with greater perfection For he had renounced all and given all he possessed for Christ which was more than to give almes he never knew woman in his life which was more than to observe conjugal chastity he never did injury or injustice unto any which was more than to cause it to be kept to others his hair-cloth and fasts from all sorts of dainties were continual which was more than to abstain some dayes from flesh Wherefore altogether unsatisfied he further importuned the Emperour beseeching him to conceal nothing from him That it was the Divine will that he should acquaint him with what he did and that therefore he was sent unto him from God The Emperour thus urged said unto him Know then that when I assist at the horse-courses and spectacles in the Circus where my presence is required I so withdraw my minde from those vanities that though my eyes be open I see them not The Hermit remained astonisht at so particular a mortification in so great an Emperour and perceived that Scepters and Purple could not hinder a devout Prince from mortification of his affections and meriting much with God Almighty Theodosius further added Know also that I sustain my self by my labour for I transcribe certain parchments into a fair hand which being sold the price payes for my food With this example of poverty amongst so much riches and temperance in the middest of so great dainties the Hermit was wholly amazed and learned that abstinence from ease and pleasures of this life was that which made this religious Prince so gracious and acceptable unto our Lord. Finally so perverse are the delights of the World that though lawful yet they hinder much our spiritual proficiency and if unlawful are the total ruine of our Souls § 4. What shall we then say of the Royal and Imperial dignity which seems in humane judgement to embrace all the happiness of the World Honours Riches Pleasures all are contained in it But how small is a Kingdom since the whole Earth in respect of the Heavens is no bigger than a point and certainly neither Honours Riches or Pleasures are greater or more secure than we have described them Let us hear St. Chrysostome speak of the Emperours of his time Hom. 66. ad pop Look not upon the Crown saith he but upon that tempest of cares which accompany it Fix not thy eyes upon the purple but upon the mind of the King more sad and dark than the purple it self The Diadem doth not more encompass his head than cares and suspicions his soul Look not at the Squadions of his Guard but at the Armies of molestations which attend him for nothing can be so full of cares as the Palaces of Kings Every day they expect not one death but many nor can it be said how often in the night their hearts tremble with some sodain fright and their souls almost seem to forsake their bodies and this in the time of peace But when a warre is kindled what life so miserable as theirs how many dangers happen unto them even from their Friends and Subjects The floor of the Royal Palace is drowned in the blood of their Kindred If I shall mention those which have happened heretofore and now of late thou wilt easily know them This suspecting his Wife tied her naked in the mountains and left her to be devoured by wild beasts after she had been a Mother of divers Kings What a life had that man it being impossible he should execute such a revenge unless his sick heart had been eaten and consumed with jealousie This put to death his onely Son This killed himself being taken by the Tyrant This murthered his Nephew after he had made him his companion in the Empire This his Brother who died by poison and his innocent Son ended his life onely for what he might have been Of those Princes which followed one of them was with his Slaves and Chariots miserably burnt alive and it is not possible for words to express the calamities which he was forced to endure And he which now raigns hath he not since he was crowned suffered many troubles dangers griefs and treasons but in Heaven it is not so After this manner St. Chrysostome paints forth the greatest fortune of the World the Imperial Majesty which must needs be little since it is so unhappy that it suffers not to enjoy those frail goods of the earth in security but makes the possessors oftentimes perish before them But it is far otherwise in Heaven the Palace and House of God where the just without mixture or counterpoise of misery are to enjoy those goods eternal as we shall see in its proper place Lastly let us learn from hence not to admire the greatness of this World nor to desire the benefit of it Which lesson was well taught by St. Spiridion unto his Disciple who accompanying him one time unto the Court of the Emperour suffered himself to be transported with those things which he beheld The greatness and lustre of the Court The rich Garments Jewels Pearls and precious Stones dazled the eyes of the raw and unexperienced youth but above all the sight of the Emperour seated in his Imperial Throne with so much splendour and greatness almost drew him besides himself St. Spiridion willing one day to correct his errour asked him as if he had not known it Which of those were the Emperour His Disciple not reaching his intention
not true and fine gold which she wore but false and counterfeited for although it seemed gold it was but alchimy and yet being gilt she sold it for true gold So the Prosperity of the World comes decked with the goods of the earth which she fells for true goods setting them forth as great secure and lasting when they are nothing less All is but deceit and cozenage which is well exprest by Seneca when he sayes That is onely good which is honest other goods are false and adulterate What greater falshood and deceit than to make those things which are most vile and base to appear so precious and of such esteem that men pretend nothing greater and being more changeable than the Moon to appear constant and secure in so much as we remain so satisfied with them as if they were never to change and being fading and corruptible we seek after them as if they were eternal and immortal remembring nothing less than their end and ours forgetting wholly that they are to perish and we to die It is evident they are false since they promise of themselves what they neither have nor are Those who work in prospective will so paint a room that the light entring onely through some little hole you shall perceive beautiful and perfect figures and shapes but if you open the windows and let in a full light at most you shall see but some imperfect lines and shadows So the things of this World seem great and beautiful unto those who are in darkness and have but little light of heaven but those who enjoy the perfect light of truth and faith finde nothing in them of substance The felicity of this life is but a fiction and a shadow of true happiness and by that name is often qualified in holy Scripture which excellently expresses the nature of it For the shadow is not a body but a resemblance of a body and seeming to be something is nothing The inconstancy also and speedy change of humane things deserves this name because the shadow is alwayes altering and ends on a sodain And as the shadow when it is at length and can increase no further is nearest the end so temporal goods and humane fortunes when they are mounted up as high as the starres are then nearest to vanish and disappear sodainly And therefore one of the friends of Job faid Job 5. I saw the fool that he had taken deep rooting and instantly I cursed his beauty for the more firm he appeared to stand the more near he was unto his fall And David said he saw the Sinner exalted as a Cedar but he endured no longer than he turned his eyes What is to deceive but to publish that for truth which is not and to promise that which shall never be accomplished I leave to the witness of every one how often the issue of their hopes have proved vain not finding in what they desired that content which they expected In riches they hope for peace and repose but meet with nothing but unquietness and cares and many times with dangers and losses For this Christ our Redeemer called riches deceits saying that the Divine Word was choaked with the falshood and deceit of riches He is not content with calling them false and deceitful but calls them falshoods and deceits for what can be more false and perfidious then promising one thing to perform just the contrary The prosperity of this world promises us goods and gives us evils promises us ease and gives us cares promises security and gives us danger promises us great contents and gives us great vexations promises us a sweet life and gives us a bitter With reason it is said in the Book of Job that the bread Job 21. which the worldly man eats shall be converted into the gall of Aspes because that in those things which seem necessary for his life as the bread of its mouth he shall meet his death and when he hopes for pleasure he shall finde gall and no morsel which shall not leave some bitterness behinde it There is no felicity upon earth which carries not its counterpoise of misfortunes no happiness which mounts so high which is not depressed by some calamity For as they anciently painted humane Fancy in the form of a young man with one arm lifted up with wings as if it meant to flye towards heaven and the other weighed down by some great weight which hindred it from rising so humane felicity how high soever it soars hath still something to depress it §. 2. If we will evidently see how deceitfull are the things of this world this is a convincing argument that no man after he hath enjoyed what he most desires is content with his condition which apparently shews their deceit neither doth any man cease to desire more though he possess the greatest and most ample fortune in the world which also argues their falsehood since they satisfie not those who possess them No man but envyes the life of some other and grievs and complains of his own though far more happy Constantine the Great who was arrived at the height of humane felicity Euseb in Orat. de laudibus Constan said his life was something more honourable than that of Neat-heards and Shepheards but much more painful and troublesome Alfonsus King of Naples said the life of Kings was the life of Asses for the great burthens which they bear So as in the book of Job it is said Job 22. that the Giants groan under the waters In which place as Albertus Magnus explicates it by the Giants are understood the mighty ones of the earth upon whom it sends troubles and vexations for so the name of Waters signifie in that place of holy Scripture which makes them groan under the intolerable weight of them They are like the Giants which in great Cities are shewed at their solemn Feasts that which appears is some great and stately bulk covered with Gold and Silks but that which appears not is the little poor man which carries it upon his shoulders sweating groaning tyred and half dead with the weight The Sumpter-mules of the Grandees of Spain at their first coming to Court are loaden with great wealth of Silver Vessel Tissue-Beds and rich Hangings their Sumpter-clothes imbroidered their Winding-staves of silver their Cords of silk with their great Plumes their Bells Bosses and other Furniture But although their load be rich and sumptuous yet in fine it is a load and oppresses them and they are ready to faint and sink under the weight of it So is Honour Empire and Command Even King David confessed as much and sayes That his loyns were as it were disjoynted and he was bruised and wearied with the burthen Some Kings have said that which is particularly related by Stobaeus of Antigonus Stob. Ser. 3. who when he was crowned King of Macedonia said O Crown more noble than happy if men knew how full thou art of cares and
just Sentence of God be praised for a Conqueror over the World and the invisible Powers of Hell and how shall that Soul rejoyce when it shall see it self being freed from all danger and troubles to triumph over all its enemies What can it desire more than to be partaker of all those divine goods and even to accompany Christ in the same Throne O how chearfully do they combat upon Earth O how easily do they bear all afflictions for Christ who with a lively faith and certain hope apprehend so sublime honours Certainly with much reason may the happiness of Saints be called by the name of Glory since the honour which they receive is so transcendent What an honour shall that be when the Just in the other lise shall receive no less a recompence of his holiness than God himself The nature of honour is to be a reward of vertue and by how much greater the reward is which a powerful King bestows upon some valorous Captain by so much greater is the honour which he confers upon him What honour shall it then be when God shall give unto those who have served him not onely to tread upon the Starres to inhabit the Palaces of Heaven to be Lords of the World but transcending all that is created and finding amongst his whole riches nothing sufficient to reward them shall give them his own infinite essence to enjoy not for a day but to all eternity The highest honour which the Romans bestowed upon their greatest Captains was to grant them a day of triumph and in that permission to wear a Crown of grass or leaves which withered the day following O most honoured vertue of Christians whole triumph shall be eternal and whose never fading Crown is God himself O most happy Diadem of the Just O most precious Garland of the Saints which is of as great worth and value as is God! Sapores King of the Persians was most ambitious of honour and would therefore be called the Brother of the Sun and Moon and Friend to the Planets This vain Prince erected a most glorious Throne which he placed on high and thereon fat in great Majesty having under his feet a certain Globe of glass whereon were artificially represented the motions of the Sun the Moon and Stars and to sit crowned above this phantastical Heaven he esteemed as a great honour What shall be then the honour of the just who truly and really shall sit above the Sun the Moon and Firmament crowned by the hand of God himself If the applause of men and the good opinion which they have from others be esteemed an honour what shall be the applause of Heaven and the good opinion not onely of Saints and Angels but of God himself whose judgements cannot erre David took it for a great honour that the Daughter of his King was judged as a reward of his valour God surpasses this and honours so much the services of his Elect that he pays their merits with no less a reward than himself O happy labour of the victorious and glorious combat of the just against the vices and temptations of the World whose victory deserves so inestimable a Crown Clemens Alexandrinus reports that there were in Persia three Mountains He who came to the first heard as it were a farre off the noise and voice of them who were fighting he who attained at the second heard perfectly the cries and clamours of Souldiers engaged in the fury of a Battail but he who attained unto the third heard nothing but the joyful acclamations of a victory This happens really with the just who are likewise to pass three mystical Mountains which are Reason Grace and Glory He who arrives at the knowledge of Reason gives an alarm unto Vice which he combats and overcomes by Grace and in Glory celebrates his victory with the joy and applause of all the Inhabitants of heaven and is crowned as a Conquerour with such a Crown as we have already spoken of §. 2. Besides this he who is most known and is praised and celebrated for good and vertuous by the greatest multitude is esteemed the most glorious and honourable person But all this World is a solitude in respect of the Citizens of Heaven where innumerable Angels approve and praise the vertuous actions of the Saints and they likewise are nothing and all creatures Men and Angels but as a solitary Wilderness in respect of the Creator What comparison betwixt that honour which may be given by some particular Kingdom or by all Europe and that which shall be heaped upon the just by all the blessed Men and Angels nay even by the damned and Devils in the Day of Judgement What is the approbation of a created understanding in respect of the Divine What man so glorious upon earth whose worth and valour hath been known to all Those who were born before him could not know him no more shall many of those who are to follow him But the Predestinate in heaven shall be known by all past and to come by all the Angels and by the King of Men and Angels Humane fame is founded upon the applause of mortal men who besides being less than Angels may be deceived may lie and are most part of them sinners and wicked How farre then must that honour exceed it which is conferred upon the Just by the holy Angels and by those blessed and pure Souls who cannot be deceived themselves nor will deceive us If we esteem it more to be honoured by the Kings of the Earth by the Great men of the World and by the Learned in Universities than by the barbarous and ignorant Peasants of some poor Village how ought we then to value the honou rwhich shall be bestowed upon us by the Saints in Heaven who are the Kings and Grandees of the Court of God and are all replenished with most perfect and divine wisdom All the honour of men is ridiculous and his ambition no wiser who seeks it then as St. Anselme sayes if one worm should desire to be honoured by another Lib. de Sim. c. 65. All the Earth is but as a Village or rather as some poor Cottage in respect of Heaven Let us not therefore strive for a name upon Earth but that our names may be written in Heaven in comparison whereof it is too much to say that the Earth is a point as Seneca called it Lib. 2. de Consol and therefore Bottius proves that it is less and sayes If from this little particle of Earth you shall take what Seas Lakes and uninhabited places full of wild beasts take up you shall leave unto men but a narrow dwelling Being therefore penn'd up in so small a point of a point how canst thou think to extend thy renown and publish thy name Compare the honour of Heaven with that of Earth and thou shalt find the difference betwixt them to be as great as is their distance Of this incomparable honour in Heaven have
been some revelations of great comfort It was revealed to St. Gertrude that as often as St. Joseph was named here upon Earth all the blessed in Heaven made a low bow What greater honour can be expected what comparison can all the expressions of respect and adorations of all the men in this World have with one onely inclination and reverence expressed by one Saint of Heaven What then shall be a reverence exhibited by them altogether The Church sayes of St. Martin that at his entrance into Heaven he was received with Celestial hymns that is with songs which the blessed sung in praise of his prowess and victory If Saul thought the honour too much which was given to David by the Damsels when they celebrated his Victory in their songs What shall it be to be celebrated by all the Saints and Angels in Celestial responsories Bellar. de aeter felic lib. 4. c. 2. Cardinal Bellarmine conceives that when a Servant of God enters into Heaven he shall be received with such musick all the blessed in Heaven often repeating those words in the Gospel Well done good servant and true because thou hast been faithful in a few things thou shalt be plac'd over much Enter into thy Lords joy which words they shall repeat in Quires This shall be a Song of Victory an honour above all the honours of the Earth conferred by so great so wise so holy and so authentique persons Whereupon St. Austin said Lib. 22. de Civit. c. 30. There shall be the true glory where none shall be praised by the error or flattery of the praiser and there the true honour which shall neither be denyed to the worthy nor granted unto the unworthy § 3. Although the honour and applause which the Just receive in Heaven from the Citizens of that holy City be incomparable yet that honour and respect with which God himself shall treat them is far above it Christ our Redeemer to express it uses no meaner a similitude than that of the honour done by the Servant unto his Lord and therefore sayes that God himself shall as it were serve the Blessed in Heaven at their Table It is much amongst men to be seated at the Table of a Prince but for a King to serve his Vassal as if he himself were his Servant who ever heard it Certainly with much reason David said unto God That his Servants were too much honoured And the same David when he caused Miphiboseth although the Grandchild of a King and the Son of an excellent Prince unto whom David ought his life to sit at his Table he thought he did him a singular honour but this favour never extended to wait on him Aman Esther 6. who was the most proud and ambitious man in the world could not think of a greater honour from King Assuerus than to ride through the Streets mounted upon the Kings own horse and that the greatest man in the Kingdom should lead him by the bridle but that the King himself should perform that service never entred into his imagination The honour which God bestows upon the Just exceeds all humane imagination who not satisfied with crowning all the Blessed with his own divinity giving himself to be possessed and enjoyed by them for all eternity does also honour their victories and heroick actions with new Crowns Lib. 10. Apum Thomas de Cantiprato writes of Alexander brother to St. Matilde and Son to the King of Scots that he appeared unto a certain Monk with two Crowns and being demanded why he had them doubled he answered This which I wear upon my head is common unto me with all the blessed but that which I carry in my hand is given me for renouncing my Kingdom upon Earth But above all the Martyrs Virgins and Doctors shall appear most glorious whom God shall honour with certain particular marks of honour by which they shall be known and distinguished from the rest of the Blessed which seals and marks shall be imprinted in their Souls like the indelible characters of Baptism Confirmation and Priesthood which are to endure for all eternity Of the Doctors the Prophet Daniel sayes They shall shine like the Stars in the Firmament giving us to understand that as the Stars excel the other parts of the Firmament by the advantage of their light so the Doctors shall be known in Heaven by a more glorious splendor which they shall cast from them And if the least Saint in Heaven shall shine seaven times more than the Sun what shall that light be which shall outshine so many Suns Apoc. 21. Of the Martyrs St. John saith That they went cloathed in white carrying palms in their hands in sign of victory For as Kings are honoured by wearing Purple and holding Scepters so Conquerors by their candid Garments and Palms Apoc. 21. The same St. John also sayes of Virgins That the name of Christ and his Father shall be imprinted in their foreheads which shall be as a token to distinguish them from the rest of Saints conformable unto that of the Prophet Isaias who sayes that a more noble and excellent name shall be given to Virgins than unto the rest of the Sons of God by which name St. Augustin sayes is meant some particular Devise which shall distinguish them from the rest as the more eminent men are distinguished from others by their several Titles of honour Besides this those members of the Blessed by which they have more specially served God or suffered for him Aug. 22. de Civit. Dei. shall as St. Austin notes cast forth some particular light and splendour so as every wound which St. Stephen received from his stoning shall cast forth a particular beam of light And with what a Garment of glory shall St. Bartholmew be clad who was flead from head to foot In the like manner St. James Intercisus who was hacked in pieces member by member for the faith of Christ Even the Confessors in those Senses which they have mortified for Christ shall have a particular Enamel of light St. John the Evangelist was shewed to St. Matilde with a particular splendour and glory in his eyes for not daring to lift them up to look upon our Blessed Lady when he lived with her for the great esteem and reverence he bore unto her There is no kind of honour which shall not then be given to the heroical acts of vertue performed by the Saints in this life which shall be to be read in the particular persons of the predestinate so as there shall be no necessity of Histories Annals or Statues to make known or eternize their memories as here in worldly honours which being short transitory and of small endurance have need of something to preserve them in the memory of men For this the Romans erected Statues unto those whom they intended to honour because being mortal there should something remain after death to make their persons and services which they had done
to the Common-wealth known to posterity But in Heaven there is no need of this artifice because those who are there honoured are immortal and shall have in themselves some character engraved as an evident and clear testimony of their noble Victories and Atchievements The honour of the Just in Heaven depends not like that of the Earth upon accidents and reports nor is exposed to dangers or measured by the discourse of others but in it self contains its own glory and dignity Cuiac ad tit de dignit The dignities in the Roma Empire as may be gathered from the Civil Law were four expressed by these four Titles Perfectissimus Clariffimus Spectabilis Illustris most Perfect most Clear Specious and Illustrious These Honours were onely in name and reputation not in substance and truth For He was often called most perfect who was indiscreet foolish passionate and imperfect He most clear who had neither clearness nor serenitity of understanding but was infected with dark and obscure vices Those specious and beautiful from whom a man would flye twenty leagues rather than behold them and those illustrious who were enveloped in the darkness of vice and ignorance without the least light of vertue That we may therefore see the difference betwixt the honours of Heaven and those of the Earth which are as farre distant from one another as truth from falsehood we must know that in Heaven the Blessed are not onely called most Perfect but really are so both in soul and body without the least imperfection or defect are not onely called most Clear but are so each one being adorned with that gift of brightness that they shall cast out beams more clear than the Sun and if the Sun be the most bright thing in nature what shall they be who seaventimes out-shine it Nor shall they be onely said to be spectabilis or specious and worthy to be looked upon but their beauty and comeliness shall be such as shall not onely draw the eyes of all to behold them but shall stirre up their affections to love and admire them In the like manner they shall not be titularly but really Illustrious for every one with his own light shall be sufficient to illustrate and enlighten many Worlds If one onely false title of those which are truely enjoyed by the Blessed were capable of making the Roman Empire to respect and honour the possessor what shall the truth and substance of them all do in Heaven 1 Mac. 2. With reason did Mathathias call the glory of this World dung and filth because all honours and dignities of the Earth in respect of those in Heaven are base vile and despicable What greater honour than to be Friends of God Sons Heirs and Kings in the Realm of Heaven Apoc. 4. St. John in his Apocalyps sets forth this honour of the blessed in the 24 Elders who were placed about the Throne of God and in that Honour and Majesty as every one was seared in his presence and that upon a Throne cloathed in white and lucid Garments in signe of their perpetual joy and crowned with a crown of Gold in respect of their dignities To be covered in the presence of Kings is the greatest honour they conferre upon the chiefest Grandees but God causes his Servants to be crowned and seated upon Thrones before him and our Saviour in the Day of Judgement makes his Disciples his fellow Judges §. 4. Certainly greater honour cannot be imagined than that of the Predestinate For if we look upon him who honours It is God If with what With no less joy than his own Divinity and other most sublime gifts If before whom Before the whole Theater of Heaven now and in the Day of Judgement before Heaven Earth Angels Men and Devils If the continuance For all eternity If the titles which he gives them it is the truth and substance of the things not the empty word and vain name By all this may appear the cause why eternal happiness being a mass and an assembly of all goods imaginable yet is called by way of excellence by the name of Glory because that although it contain all pleasures contents joyes riches and what can be defired yet it seems the Glory and honour which God bestows upon the Just exceeds all the other The honour which God gives in Heaven to glorious Souls may be seen by that which he gives to their worm-eaten bones upon Earth whereof St. Chrysostom speaks these words Where is now the Sepulcher of the great Alexander In 2. ad Corinth Hom. 26. shew it me I beseech thee and tell me the day whereon he died The Sepulchers of the Servants of Christ are so famous that they possess the most Royal and Imperial City of the World and the day whereon they died is known and observed as festival by all The Sepulcher of Alexander is unknown even to his own Countrymen but that of these is known to the very Barbarians Besides the Sepulchers of the Servants of Christ excell in splendor and magnificence the Palaces of Kings not onely in respect of the beauty and sumptuousness of their buildings wherein they also exceed but which is much more in the reverence and joy of those who repair unto them For even he who is clothed in Purple frequents their Tombs and humbly kisses them and laying aside his Majesty and Pomp supplicates their prayers and assistance with God Almighty he who wears the Diadem taking a Fisherman and a Maker of Tents for his Patrons and Protectors What miracles hath not God wrought by the Reliques of his Servants and what prodigies have not been effected by their bodies St. Chrysostome writes of St. Juventius Chrysost in Serm. de Juven Max. Sever. in Ep. ad Socrum and St. Maximus that their bodies after death cast forth such beams of light that the eyes of those who were present were not able to suffer them Sulpicius Severus writes of St. Martin that his dead body remained in a manner glorified that his flesh was pure as Chrystal and white as milk What wonders did God work by the bodies of St. Edward the King and St. Francis Xavier preserving them incorrupted for so many years and if he do those great things with their Bodies who are under the Earth what will he do with their Souls which are above the Heavens and what with them both when their glorious Bodies shall arise and after the Day of Judgement united to their Souls enter in triumph into the holy and eternal City of God CAP. III. Of the Riches of the eternal Kingdom of Heaven THe Riches in Heaven are no less than the Honours though those as hath been said are inestimable There can be no greater riches than to want nothing which is good nor to need any thing which can be desired and in that blessed life no good shall fall nor no desire be unsatisfied And if as the Philosophers say he is not rich who possesseth much
but he who desires nothing There being in Heaven no desire unaccomplished there must needs be great riches It was also a position of the Stoicks That he was not poor who wanted but he who was necessitated Since then in the Celestial Kingdom there is necessity of nothing most rich is he who enters into it By reason of these Divine Riches Christ our Saviour when he speaks in his Parables of the Kingdom of Heaven doth often express it under Names and Enigma's of things that are rich sometimes calling it the Hidden Treasure and sometimes the Precious Pearl and other times the Lost Drachma For if Divine happiness consist in the eternal possession of God what riches may be compared with his who enjoyes him and what inheritance to that of the Kingdom of Heaven What Jewel more precious than the Divinity and what Gold more pure than the Creator of Gold and all things precious who gives himself for a Possession and Riches unto the Saints to the end they should abhorre those Riches which are temporal if by them the eternal are endangered Let not therefore those who are to die to morrow afflict themselves for that which may perish sooner than they Let them not toyl to enjoy that which they are shortly to leave nor let them with more fervour pray for those things which are transitory than those which are eternal preferring the Creature before the Creator not seeking God for what he is but for what he gives Wherefore St. Austin sayes Aug. in Psal 52. God will be served gratis will be beloved without interest that is purely for himself and not for any thing without himself and therefore he who in invokes God to make him rich does not invoke God but that which he desires should come unto him for what is invocation but calling something unto him wherefore when thou shalt say My God give me riches thou dost not desire that God but riches should come unto thee for if thou hadst invoked God he would have come unto thee and been thy riches but thou desiredst to have thy Coffers full and thy heart empty and God fills not Chests but breasts § 2. Besides the possession of God it imports us much to frame a conception of this Kingdom of Heaven which is that of the Just where they shall reign with Christ eternally whose riches must needs be immense since they are to be Kings of so great and ample a Kingdom The place then which the Blessed are to inhabit is called she Kingdom of Heaven because it is a most large Region and much greater than can perhaps fall under the capacity of our understanding And if the Earth compared with Heaven be but a point and yet contain so many Kingdoms what shall that be which is but one Kingdom and yet extended over the whole Heavens How poor and narrow a heart must that Christian have who confines his love to things present sweating and toyling for a small part of the goods of this World which it self is so little why does he content himself with some poor patch of the Earth when he may be Lord of the whole Heavens Although this Kingdom of God be so great and spacious yet it is not dispeopled but as full of Inhabitants of all Nations and conditions as if it were a City or some particular House There as the Apostle said are many thousands of Angels an infinite number of the Just even as many as have died since Abel and thither also shall repair all who are to die unto the end of the World and after judgement shall there remain for ever invested in their glorious bodies There shall inhabit the Angelical Spirits distinguished with great decency into their Nine Orders unto whom shall correspond Nine others of the Saints Patriarchs Prophets Apostles Martyrs Confessors Pastors Doctors Priests and Levites Monks and Hermits Virgins and other holy Women This populous City shall not be inhabited with mean and base People but with Citizens so noble rich just and discreet that all of them shall be most holy and wise Kings How happy shall it be to live with such persons The Queen of Saba onely to see Salomon came from the end of the Earth and to see Titus Livius Nations and Provinces far distant came to Rome To behold a King issue out of his Palace all the People flock together What shall it then be not onely to see but to live and raign with so many Angels and converse with so many eminent and holy Men If onely to see St. Anthony in the Desert men left their Houses and Countries what joy shall it be to discourse and converse with so many Saints in Heaven If there should now descend from thence one of the Prophets or Apostles with what earnestness and admiration would every one strive to see and hear him In the other World we shall hear and see them all St. Romane at the sight of one Angel when he was a Gentile left the world and his life to become a Christian How admirable shall it then be to see thousand of thousands in all their beauty and greatness and so many glorious bodies of Saints in all their lustre If one Sun be sufficient to clear up the whole World here below what joy shall it be to behold those innumerable Sum in that Region of light From this multitude of Inhabitants the place of glory is not only called the Kingdom of Heaven but the City of God It is called a Kingdom for its immense greatness and a City for its great beauty and population It is not like other Kingdoms and Provinces which contain huge Deserts inaccessible Mountains and thick Woods nor is it devided into many Cities and Villages distant one from another but this Kingdom of God although a most spacious Region is all one beautiful City Who would not wonder if all Spain or Italy were but one City and that as beautiful as Rome in the time of Augustus Caesar who found it of Brick and left it of Marble What a sight were that of Chaldaea if it were all a Babylon or that of Syria if all a Jerusalem What shall then be the Celestial City of Saints whose greatness possesses the whole Heavens and is as the holy Scripture describes it to exaggerate the riches of the Saints all of Gold and precious Stones The Gates pf this City were as St. John sayes one entire Pearl and the foundations of the Walls Jasper Saphire Calcedon Emerald Topaz Jacinth Amethist and other most precious Stones The Streets of fine Gold so pure as it seemed Chrystal joyning in one substance the firmness of Gold and transparency of Chryftal and the beauty both of one and the other If all Rome were of Saphire how would it amaze the world how marvelous then will the holy City be which though extended over so many millions of leagues is all of Gold Pearl and precious Stones or to say better of a matter of farre more value
and peopled with such a multitude of beautiful Citizens as are as farre above any imaginable number as the capacity of the City is above any imaginable measure Some famous Mathematicians say of die Empyrial Heaven that it is so great that if God should allow unto every one of the blessed a greater space than the whole Earth yet there would remain as much more to give unto others and that the capaciousness of this Heaven is so great that it contains more than ten thousand and fourteen millions of miles What wonder will it be to see a City so great of so precious matter The Divines confess the capaciousness of this Heaven to be immense but are more willing to admire it than bold to measure it Joan. Gailer in suo Peregrino Howsoever there wants not one who sayes that if God should make each grain of sand upon the Sea-shore as big as the whole Earth they would not fill the Concave of the Empyrial Heaven and yet this Holy City possesseth all that space and is all composed of matter far more beautiful and precious than Gold Pearl and Diamonds For certain our thoughts cannot conceive so great riches and wonders for which we ought to undergoe all the pains and necessities of this World St. Francis of Assisium being afflicted with a grievous pain of his eyes in so much as he could neither sleep Chron. Frat. Min. p. 1. c. 60. nor take any rest and at the same time molested by the Devil who filled his Cell with Rats which with their Careers and noise added much unto his pain with great patience gave thanks unto the Lord that he had so gently chastized him saying My Lord Jesus Christ I deserve greater punishment but thou like a good Shepherd suffer me not to stray from thee Being in this meditation he heard a voice which said unto him Francis if all the Earth were of Gold and all the Rivers of Balsame and all the Rocks of precious Stones wouldest thou not say that this were a great treasure Know that a treasure which exceeds Gold as farre as Gold does Dirt Balsam Water or Precious-stones Pibbles remains as a reward for thy infirmity if thou be content and bear it with patience Rejoyce Francis for this treasure is Celestial glory which is gained by tribulations Certainly we have reason to suffer here all pains and poverty whatsoever since we are to receive in glory so much the greater riches Wherefore we ought to lift up our souls and weaning our hearts from the frail felicity of these temporal goods of the Earth to say with David Glorious things are said of thee City of God So did Fulgentius who entring Rome when it was yet in its lustre and beholding the greatness beauty and marvelous Architecture of it said with admiration O Celestial Jerusalem how beautiful must thou be if Terrestrial Rome be such A shadow of this was shewed unto St. Josaphat whose History is written by St. John Damascen In vita Josaph Barl. St Josaphat being in profound prayer prostrate upon the earth was overtaken with a sweet sleep in which he saw two men of grave demeanour who carried him through many unknown Countries unto a Field full of flowers and plants of rare beauty laden with fruit never before seen The leaves of the trees moved with a soft and gentle wind yielded a pleasant sound and breathed forth a most sweet odour there were placed many Seats of Gold and precious Stones which shined with a new kind of brightness and a little Brook of Chrystal water refreshed the air and pleased the sight with a most agreable variety From thence he was brought into a most beautiful City whose Walls were of transparent Gold the Towers and Battlements were of Stones of inestimable value the Streets and places shone with Celestial beams of light And there passed up and down bright Armies of Angels and Seraphins chanting such songs as were never heard by mortal ears Amongst other he heard a voice which said This is the repose of the Just this the joy of those who have given a good account of their lives unto God But all this is no more than a dream and a shadow in comparison of the truth greatness and riches of that Celestial Court. In regard that all the Blessed together with Christ are to raign in this most rich City and Kingdom how great shall the riches be who was ever so rich as to have at the entrance of his House a massie large piece of Gold two or three yards long What riches will those be of Heaven because all the Kingdom of Heaven is to be of pure Gold all the Streets and all the Houses of that Holy City and not only Gold but more than Gold The holy Scripture to make us on one part understand the riches of this Kingdom of God and on the other part to know that they are of a higher and more excellent nature than those of the Earth expresses them with the similitude of the riches of this World as Gold Pearl and precious Stones because by these names we understand things of great wealth and value but withall sets them forth for such as are not to be found upon earth so as when it speaks of Pearls it sayes they were so great as they served for the Gates of a City when it speaks of Emeralds and Topaz's it makes them to suffice for the foundatian of high Walls and Turrets when of Gold it makes it transparent as Glass or Chrystal All this is to signifie that in Heaven there are not onely greater riches but of a more sublime and high quality than ours upon Earth And with reason is that Holy City called the Kingdom of Heaven to let us know that the same advantage that Heaven hath above Earth the same have Celestial honours riches and joyes above those which are here below If the whole Earth is no more than a point in respect of the Heavens what can those short and corruptible riches be in respect of the eternal § 3. Of those incomparable riches the Blessed are not onely to be Lords but Kings as appears in many places of holy Scripture Neither is the Celestial Treasure â—or this Kingdom of Heaven less or poorer by having so many Lords and Kings It is not like the Kingdoms on Earthy which permit but one King at once and if divided become of less power and Majesty but is of such condition that it is wholly possessed by all in general and by each one in particular like the Sun which warms all and every one and not one less because it warms many The effects of riches are much greater and more noble in Heaven than they can be upon Earth Wealth may serve us here to maintain our power honours and delights but all the Gold in the world cannot free us from weakness infamy and pain The power of a rich King can reach no further than to Command his Vassals and those
of our bodies now to those precious gifts of glory after our resurrection We are now all rottenness unweildiness corruption uncleanness infirmities loathsomness and worms Then all shall be light incorruption splendor purity beauty and immortality Let us compare these together what difference there is betwixt a body sickly weak pale and loathsome or some eight dayes after death full of worms corruption and stench abominable with the same body being now in glory exceeding the Sun far in brightness the Heavens in beauty more odoriferous than the purest Roses or Lillies Neither do the evils or goods temporal bear any comparison with the eternal since as the Apostle sayes That which is momentary and light does cause an eternal weight of glory In the beginning of the Civil Warres with the Senate of Rome carried on against Caius and Fulvius Gracchus Val. l. c. 4. the Consul Opimius by publick Edict promised that whosoever should bring him the head of Caius Gracchus should receive for reward its weight in gold All esteemed this a recompence highly to be valued that one should receive equal weight of that precious mettal to the weight of dead flesh But God's promises far exceed this For a labour or trouble as light as a feather he gives eternal weight of glory The Apostle sayes not that God Almighty doth give onely a great weight for light merits out also adds over and above that it shall be eternal It were a great happiness if according to our penances or voluntary labours we should receive onely equal proportion of bliss yet so as it were eternal because how little soever it were it were to be purchased at a very cheap rate though it were in substance but so much for so much so that the difference were onely such in the duration thereof as if for the toyl of one dayes labour were given a whole year of rest But Almighty God giving much for a little for that which is light massie and heavy for a thing momentary an eternal reward what greater encrease or advantage can we possibly receive Seâ—imuleyus will be a great confusion unto us who hearing the foresaid Proclamation of the Roman Consul stuck not at any toil or danger until he had cut off the head of Gracchus greedy of the equal weight thereof in gold Let us have the like courage the Souldier had to take away the temporal life of a Man to the end we may not bereave our selves of an eternal life And since the purchase of Heaven is so cheap let us procure to augment the gain and let 's not have less desire of goods eternal than Setimuleyus had for temporals who desirous of a great reward filled with melted lead all the hollow places of the head which he had cut off Let us fill our momentary and light works with great affection and love Let us increase our desires and in any work how little soever accompany the same with a great will with a vehement desire to hoard up eternal treasures for temporal pains What an advantagious exchange will it be to buy Heaven for a draught of water for that which is but vile and lasts but a moment that which is of inestimable price and is to last for all eternity What sort of bargain would it be if one could buy a Kingdom for a straw yet so it is For that which is no more worth than a Straw we may purchase the Kingdom of Heaven Certainly all the felicity riches and earthly delights are no more than a straw compared with the glory of Heaven How fond and foolish would he be who having a Basket full of chips would not give one of them for an hundred weight of gold This is the sottishness of men that for earthly goods they will not receive those of Heaven Who is there that having offered him a precious stone for some small sand should not have so much wit as to give a thing so base and abject for a thing so noble and precious Who being offered a rich treasure for an handful of cinders would not admit of so gainful an exchange What hunger-starved man being invited to a full Table of dainty dishes upon condition he should not eat an apple paring would reject the invitation Heaven is offered us for things little and of small estimation Why do not we accept the offer Christ our Saviour called the Kingdom of Heaven a precious Margarite and a hidden Treasure for which we ought to forsake all the goods of the earth by reason they are all but dust and misery in respect of a treasure of Pearls and Diamonds St. Josaph at did very much in leaving an earthly Kingdom for a greater assurance of that of Heaven He did very much according to our deceitful apprehension and false estimation of things But if it be well considered he did very little much less than if he had given one Basketful of Earth for another of Gold a Sack full of Small-coal for a great Treasure and a Nut-shell for a great Banquet Whatever is in the Earth may well be given for the least crum of Heaven because all the greatnesses of this World are but crums nut-shells and trash compared with the least particle of heavenly bliss All the felicity upon Earth hath no substance nor weight if compared with the weight of eternal glory which is prepared for us This David did and convinced by the greatness of heavenly glory said unto our Lord I did eneline my heart to doe thy justifications The heart of man is like a just ballance that inclines that way where is the greatest weight And as in the heart of David the temporal weighed little and the eternal much so inclined by the eternal weight of glory which attends us and moved by the hope of so great a reward the fulfilling of the Law of God prevailed more with him than his own appetite and inclination §. 2. If we shall consider the labours for which eternal glory is promised us as a hire and reward the Apostle spake with great reason that all which we can suffer in the time of this life is no wayes worthy of that glory to come which is to be manifested in us To St. Austin all the torments of Hell seemed not much for the gaining of Celestial glory but for some short time And if we consider the greatness of that joy all the penances of St. Simon Stylites the fasts of St. Romualdus the poverty and nakedness of St. Francis and the scorns and affronts put upon St. Ignatius are no more than the taking up of a straw for the gaining of an earthly Empire All Stories are full for how small matters upon earth men have exposed themselves to great and almost certain dangers Because David caused it to be published in his Army that he that should first set upon the Jebuseans who were the hardiest of all his Enemies should be made General Joab doubted not to expose his life to manifest danger breaking through
instead of the burning coals of that eternal fire Neither shall they be Masters so much as of that broken pot wherein to contain a little water if it might be given them Jsai 30. For as Isaias sayes There shall not remain unto them so much as the shread of a broken pot to hold a little water from the pit nor shall there be any found to give it them That rich Glutton in the Gospel accustomed to drink in Cups of Chrystal to eat in Silver and to be cloathed in Silks and curious Linnens can tell us how far this infernal poverty extends when he demanded not wines of Candie but a little cold water and that not in Cups of Gold or Chrystal but upon the fingers end of a Leper This rich and nice Glutton came to such an extremity that he would esteem it a great felicity that they would give him but one drop of water although it were from the filthy and loathsome finger of a Leper and yet this also was wanting unto him Let the rich of the World see to what poverty they are like to come if they trust in ther riches let them know that they shall be condemned to the loss of all which is good Let them reflect upon him who was accustomed to be cloathed in precious Garments to tread upon Carpets to sleep upon Down to dwell in spacious Palaces now naked thrown upon burning coals and packt up in some narrow corner of that infernal Dungeon Let us therefore fear the riches of this World and the poverty of the other §. 4. This poverty or want of all good of the damned is accompanied with a most opprobrious infamy and dishonour when by publick sentence they shall be deprived for their enormous offences of eternal glory and reprehended in the presence of Saints and Angels by the Lord of Heaven and Earth This infamy shall be so great that St. Chrysostom speaks of it in these words A most intolerable thing is Hell Chrys in Math. 24. and most horrible are the torments yet if me should place a thousand Hells before me nothing could be so horrible unto me as to be excluded from the honour of glory to be hated of Christ and to hear from him these words I know you not This infamy we may in some sort declare under the example of a mighty King who having no Heir to succeed him in his Kingdom took up a beautiful Boy at the Church door and nourished him as his Son and in his Testament commanded that if at ripe years his conditions were vertuous and sutable to his calling he should be received as lawful King and seated in his Royal Throne but if he proved vitious and unfit for Government they should punish him with infamy and send him to the Gallies The Kingdom obeyed this Command provided him excellent Masters and Tutors but he became so untoward and ill-inclined that he would learn nothing flung away his books spent his time amongst other Boyes in making houses of dirt and other childish fooleries for which his Governors corrected and chastised him and advised him of what was fitting and most imported him but all did no good onely when they reprehended him he could weep not because he repented but because they hindred his sport and the next day did the same The more he grew in age the worse he became and although they informed him of the Kings Testament and what behooved him all was to no purpose until at last after all possible care and diligence his Tutors and the whole Kingdom weary of his ill conditions in a publick Assembly declared him unworthy to raign dispoiled him of his Royal Ornaments and condemned him with infamy unto the Gallies What greater affront and ignominy can there be than this to lose a Kingdom and to be made a Gally-slave for I do not know which of these things that young man would be more sensible of More ignominious and a more lamentable Tragedy is that of a Christian condemned to Hell who was taken by God from the gates of death adopted his Son with condition that if he kept his Commandments he should raign in Heaven and if not he should be condemned to Hell Yet he forgetting these obligations without respect of his Tutors and Masters who were the holy Angels especially his Angel Guardian who failed not to instill into him holy inspirations and other learned and spiritual men who exhorted him both by their doctrine and example what was fitting for a Child of God But he neither moved by their advices nor the chastisements of Heaven by which God overthrew his vain intentions and thwarted his unlawful pleasures onely lamented his temporal losses and not his offences and at the time of his death was sentenced to be deprived of the Kingdom of Heaven and precipitated into Hell What infamy can be greater than this of the damned Soul for if it be a great infamy to suffer death by Humane Justice for some crimes committed how great an infamy will it be to be condemned by Divine Justice for a Traitor and perfidious Rebel to God Besides this bitterness of pains the damned persons shall also be eternally branded with the infamy of their offences so as they shall be scorned and scoft at by the Devils themselves and not onely Devils but all rational creatures Men and Angels shall detest them as infamous and wicked Traitors to their King God and Redeemer Jsai 13. Facies combustae vultus eorum And as fugitive Slaves are marked and cauterized with burning irons so this infamy by some special mark of ugliness and deformity shall be stamped upon their faces and bodies so as Albertus Magnus sayes so ignominious shall be the body of a Sinner that when his Soul returns to enter it it shall be amazed to behold it so horrible and shall wish it were rather in the same state as when it was half eaten up by worms CAP. IX The Punishment of the Damned from the horribleness of the place into which they are banished from Heaven and made Prisoners in Hell ANother kind of punishment of great discomfort and affliction is that of Exile which the Damned shall suffer in the highest degree For they shall be banished into the profound bowels of the Earth a place most remote from Heaven and the most calamitous of all others where they shall neither see the Sun by day nor the Stars by night where all shall be horror and darkness and therefore it was said of that condemned person Cast him forth into utter darkness forth of the City of God forth of the Heavens forth of this World where he may never more appear into that land which is called in the Book of Job A dark land Job 10. covered with the obscurity of death a land of misery and darkness where the shadow of death and no order but everlasting horror inhabits a land according to Isaias Jsai 34. of sulphur and burning pitch a land of
corruption and by birth a Slave of the Devil and yet he dares offend his Maker An offence against God were most grievous though from another God if it were possible infinite and equal to himself but that his creature should be so audacious against his omnipotent Lord is beyond amazement But What is that which a sinner does when he offends It is according to St. Anselm an endeavour to pluck the Crown from the head of God and place it upon his own It is according to St. Bernard to desire to murther his God It is according to the Apostle St. Paul to kick and spurn against the Son of God It is to crucifie again the Lord of life If any of these things were attempted against a Majesty upon earth it were enough to make the offenders flesh to be pluckt off with pincers to have him torn in pieces with four horses to pull down his house and sow the place with salt and make his whole Linage infamous If such an offence committed by one man against another betwixt whom the difference is not great being both equal in nature be so hainous what shall it deserve being committed against God the Lord and Creator of all whose immense greatness is infinitely distant from the nature of his creature O good God who is able to explicate what a sinner does against thee and himself he despises thy Majesty razes out thy Law from his heart laughs at thy Justice scorns thy threats despises thy promises makes a solemn renunciation of thy glory thou hast promised him and all to bind himself an eternal slave unto Satan desiring rather to please thine enemy than thee who art his Father his Friend and all his good desiring rather to die eternally by displeasing thee than to enjoy heaven for ever by serving thee Let us now see Where and in What place a sinner presumes to sin and be a Traitor unto his God It is even in his own world in his own house and knowing that his Creator looks upon him he offends him If a sin were committed where God could not see it it were yet an enormous fault but to injury his Creator before his face what an unspeakable impudence If he who sins could go into another world where God did not inhabit and there in secret under the earth should sin after such a manner as onely himself should know it yet it were a temerarious boldness but to sin in his own house which is this world what hell doth it not deserve For a man onely to lay his hand upon his sword in the Palace of a King is capital and deserves death For a sinner then by his sins to spurn and crucifie the Son of God in the house of his Father and before his face what understanding can conceive the greatness of such a malice And therefore David with reason dissolved himself into tears because he had sinned in the presence of God and with a grief which pierced his heart cried out I have done evil before thee Besides this we not onely sin against God in his own house but even in his armes whilest we are upheld by his omnipotency If there were a Son so wicked who whilest he was cherished in his Mothers bosom should strike and buffet her and endeavour to kill her with his poniard every one would think that Child some Devil incarnate How then dares man offend God who sustains preserves and hath redeemed him Certainly that Christian ought to be esteemed worse than a Devil The hainousness of this malice in sin is much augmented by the Helpes which a sinner uses to effect it For he turns those very divine benefits which he hath received from God against him who gave them The sense which men usually have of ingratitude is most apprehensive If to forget a benefit be ingratitude to despise it is an injurie but to use it against the Benefactor I know not how to call it This does he who sins making use of those creatures which God created for his service to offend him and convert his divine benefits into arms against God himself What could we say if a King to honour his Souldier should make him a Knight arm him with his own arms and should girt his sword about him with his own hands and that the Souldier so soon as he was possest of the sword should draw it against the King and murther him This wickedness which seems impossible amongst men is ordinary in man towards God who being honoured so many wayes by his Creator and enriched by so many benefits for as much as in him lies bereaves God of his honour and according to St. Bernard desires to bereave him of his life His understanding which he receiv'd from God he uses in finding out a way to execute his sin with his hands he performs it and with all his power offends him who gave them Besides the impudence of man arrives at that height that he makes God himself assist him to sin This is that which our Lord much complains of when he sayes by his Prophet You made me serve you in your wickedness because God concurring to every action and natural motion of man who without his concurrence could neither move hand nor foot nor tongue man disposing his tongue to murmur and his hand to steal makes use of the concourse of God against God himself Who is so pitiless and inhumane to enforce the Father to assist in the murther of his onely Son compelling the Fathers hand to execute the stroke which is to pierce the heart of his onely begotten Equivalent to this is done by a sinner making God to concurre to an action by which man sinning crucifies again the Son of God What cruelty is this in a sinner who for this onely impiety deserves a thousand deaths But if we shall consider Why man does this it is a circumstance which will amaze us at the malice of sin Why does a sinner give this disgust unto his God Wherefore does he despise his Creator Wherefore is he a Traitor unto the Lord of the World Wherefore does he kick and spurn at Jesus Christ Wherefore does he abhorre his Redeemer Wherefore crucifies he the Son of God What reason hath he for so monstrous a wickedness Is it perchance because the world should not be ruin'd Is it perchance because his salvation stands upon it Is it perhaps to make himself a God Is it perhaps in respect or for love of another God No it is none of these but only for a base and filthy pleasure for a foolish fancy of man because he will and no more O horrid insolence O mad fury of men which without a cause so grievously offend their Creator How is it that the Heavens resolve not into thunderbolts and throw a thousand deaths upon them who do and dare by their sins irritate and offend so good and gracious a God The Manner also of our sinning would astonish any who should seriously consider it It
is with so much impudence contempt of God and such a Luciferian pride After having heard so many examples of his chastisements executed upon sinners After having seen that the most beautiful and glorious of all the Angels and with him innumerable others were thrown from Heaven and made firebrands in Hell for one sin and that onely in thought After having seen the first man for one sin of gluttony banisht from the Paradise of pleasure into this valley of tears dispoyled of so many supernatural endowments and condemned to death After having seen the World drowned and the Cities of Pontapolis burnt with fire from Heaven After having seen those seditious against Moyses swallowed by the earth and with their Children Goods and Family sink alive into Hell After having known that so many have been damned for their offences After that the Son of God had suffered upon the Cross for our sins After all this to sin is an impudence never heard of and an intolerable contempt of the Divine Justice Besides what greater scorn and contempt of God than this that God who is worthy of all honour and love and the Devil who is our professed enemy pretending both to our Souls the one to save them the other to torment them in eternal flames yet we adhere to Satan and preferre him before Christ our Saviour and Redeemer and that so much to our prejudice as by the loss of eternal glory and captivating our selves unto eternal torments and slavery No way of injuring can be imagined more injurious than when by the interposing of some other vile and infamous he who is worthy of all love and honour is put by and slighted The manner also of sinning aggravates the sin as the sinner doth by losing thereby eternal goods Though he who sinneth lost nothing yet the offence against God were great and the affront to Reason it self not inconsiderable But well knowing the great damages and punishments likewise that attend sin and the evident hazard he runs and yet to sin is a strange temerity and impudency If we shall likewise consider When it is that we sin we shall sinde this circumstance no less to aggravate our offences than the former Because we now sin When we have seen the Son of God nailed unto the Cross that we should not sin When we have seen God so sweet unto us as to be incarnate for our good humbling himself to be made man and subjecting himself to death even the death of the Cross for our redemption having instituted the holy Sacraments for a remedy against sin especially that of his most holy Body and Blood which was a most immense expression of his love To sin after we had seen God so good unto us so obliging unto us with those not to be imagined favours is a Circumstance which ought much to be pondered in our hearts and might make us forbear the offending of so loving a Lord. And that Christian who sins after all this is to be esteemed worse than a Devil For the Devil never sinned against that God who had shed his blood for him or who had been made an Angel for him or who had pardoned so much as one sin of his When those sinned who were under the law of nature they also had not seen the Son of God die for their salvation as a Christian hath for which as St. Austin sayes There ought a new Hell to be made for him And there is no doubt but Christians will deserve new torments and greater than those who have not had the knowledge of God nor received so many benefits from him This is confirmed by what is written of St. Macarius the Abbot who finding in the Desert a dead mans head and removing it with his staffe out of the way it began to speak which he hearing demanded Who it was It answered I am a Priest of the Gentils which heretofore dwelt in this place and am now together with many of them in the middle of a burning fire so great that the flames encompass us both above and beneath And is there replyed the Saint any place of greater torment Yes said the dead Greater is that which they suffer who are below us For we who knew not God are not so severely dealt with as those who knowing have denied him or not complyed with his holy will These are below us and suffer far greater torments than we These are the Circumstances observed by Tully and are all found to aggravate the guilt of our sins Neither is that added by Aristotle wanting which is About what About what do we offend God About what happens this great presumption but about things which import not but rather endamage us About complying with a sensual gust which in the end bereaves us of health of honour of substance and even of pleasure it self suffering many dayes of grief for a moment of delight About things of the earth which are vile and transitory and about goods of the world which are false short and deceitful What would we say if for a thing of so small value as a straw one man should kill another No more than a straw are all the felicities of the world in respect of those of heaven and for a thing of so small consideration we are Traitors to God and crucifie Christ again and that a thousand times as often as we sin mortally against him Lastly Against whom we offend much aggravates our sins For besides that God is most perfect most wise beautiful immense omnipotent infinite we sin against him who infinitely loves us who suffers us who heaps his benefits and rewards upon us To do evil to those who make much of them even wilde beasts abhorre it What is it then for thee to injure him who loved thee more then himself who hath done thee all good that thou shouldest do no evil Fear then this Lord reverence his Majesty love his goodness and offend him no more This onely consideration To have sinned against so good a God was so grievous unto David that in his penitential Psalms he exclaims with tears and cries out from the bottom of his heart Against thee onely have I sinned For although he had sinned against Vrias and against all Israel by his ill example yet it seemed unto him he had onely sinned against God when he considered the infinity of his being the immenseness of that love which he had so grievously offended Sin then is on all parts most virulent on all parts spits forth venome Behold it on every side it still seems worse for being the chiefest evil it can on no part appear good all is monstrous all poison all detestable all most evil and therefore deserves all evil And it is not much that that should be chastised with eternal torments which opposes it self unto the sweetness of an infinite holiness § 4. Sin is so evil that it is every way evil It is not onely evil as it is an injury to God but it is
evil in it self in its own nature For if there were no God or that God were not offended with it yet it were a most abominable and horrid evil the greatest of all evils and the cause of all In regard of this deformity and filthiness of sin the Philosophers judged it to be abhorred above all things Aristotle said Aristotle 3. Eth. it were better to die than to do any thing against the good of vertue And Seneca and Peregrinus with more resolution said Although I were certain that men should not know it and that God would pardon it yet I would not offend for the very filthiness of sin For this Tully said That nothing could happen unto man more horrible than a fault And even those Philosophers who denied the immortality of the Soul and the providence of God affirmed that nothing should make us to commit it And there hath not wanted some Gentils who have suffered great extremities to avoid a vicious act Plut. in Demetrio Democles as Plutarch writes chose rather to be boiled in scalding water than to consent to a filthy act With reason Hippo is celebrated amongst the Greek Matrons who chose rather to die than offend Neither was that horror less which Verturius conceived against uncleanness who suffered prison whips and rigorous torments rather than he would sin against chastity Equal to this was that of the most beautiful youth Espurina of whom Valerius Maximus and St. Ambrose write Ambl. l. 3. de Virg. That he slashed and wounded his fair face that it should not give occasion to others of offence even by desire All those were Gentils who knew not Christ crucified for man nor saw hell open for the punishment of sinners nor fled from sin because it was an offence unto God but only for the enormity and filthiness it had in it self This made them endure prisons and tortures rather than admit it What then should Christians do who know their Redeemer died to the end they should not sin and how much sin is offensive to God Certainly they ought rather to give a thousand lives and souls than once to injure their Creator by committing an offence which not onely Gentils but even Nature hath in horror which hath planted in brute beasts although they cannot sin yet a natural aversion from that which looks like sin John Marquess of Gratis desired much to have a Foal from a generous Mare which he had by her own Son but could never effect it neither would she ever admit him until deceived by cloathing him in such sort as she knew him not But when he was uncloathed and she discovered the deceit she fell into that sorrow and sadness that after she would never feed but pined her self to death The like is reported by Jovianus Pontanus of a delicate Bitch of his which he could never although he caused her to be held make to couple with her Son So foul and horrible is but the shadow and image of sin even unto brute beasts Why should not men then who are capable of reason and have an obligation unto Gods commandments say and think with St. Anselm Lib. de simil c. 19. If I should see on this part the filthiness of sin and on the other the terrour of hell and it were necessary for me to fall into one of them I would rather cast my self into hell than admit of sin For I had rather enter pure into Hell than to enjoy the Kingdom of Heaven contaminated with sin Whosoever than he be who is infected with that horrible evil of a mortal sin he cannot choose but be most miserable and wretched For as St. Chrysostome sayes Chrysost Tom. 5. Ser. 5. de ie The greatest evil is to be evil And although the Chirurgion do not cut the cankered flesh yet the ulcerated Patient will not be freed from his infirmity So although God should not punish a Sinner yet he would not be free from the evil death misery and abomination of sin And therefore St. Austin sayes Aug. To. 8. in Ps 49. Although we could cause that the day of Judgement should not come yet we ought not to live ill This monstrous deformity of sin our Lord was pleased to express by a visible Monster and that after a most strange manner as is related by Villaveus He writes Villaveus lib. 8. c. 35. that in the year 1298. Cassanus King of the Tartars with an Army of 200000 horse entring Syria made himself Master of it and brought a great terror upon all those neighbouring Countries in so much as the King of Armenia delivered him his Daughter although she were a Christian and he an Infidel to be his Wife Not long after the Queen proved with child and when her time came was delivered not of a Child but of a most horrible and deformed Monster Whereat the barbarous King being astonisht and incensed by the advise of his Council commanded that she should be put to death as an Adulteress The poor Lady grieving to die with the imputation of a sin whereof she was innocent commended her self to our Saviour and by divine inspiration desired that before her death the Thing which she had brought forth might be baptized which was granted and no sooner performed but that Monster became a most beautiful and goodly Boy and the King amazed at the miracle with many other of his Subjects became Christian acknowledging by what had happened the beauty of Grace and the deformity of Sin although that deformity proceeded not from any actual sin either mortal or venial from which the Child was free but onely from Original guilt which without the fault of his proper will descended unto him from his Parents The deformity of sin comes from the contrariety of it to reason which renders a Sinner more foul and ugly than the most horrid Monster and more dead in soul than a putrid and dead Carcase Pliny admires the force of lightning which melts the gold and silver and leaves the Purse which contained it untoucht Such is sin which kills the Soul and leaves the Body sound and entire It is a flash of lightning sent from Hell and worse than Hell it self and such leaves the Soul which it hath blasted What shall I then say of the evils which it causes I will onely say this that though it were the best thing of the world yet for the evil effects which it produces it ought to be avoided more then death It bereaves the soul of grace banishes the holy Ghost deprives it of the right of heaven despoiles man of all his merits makes him unworthy of divine protection and condemns a sinner unto eternal torments in the other world and in this to many disasters for there is neither plague warre famine nor infirmity of body whereof sin hath not been in some sort the occasion and therefore those who weep for their afflictions let them change the object of their tears and weep for the
for himself in the Incarnation and Passion for th◠salvation of man was a high expression of his love but yet it was God who was served and who made use of one of the divine persons for the end which he pretends of his glory but that man should make use of God for his own glorie is beyond what we can think What a wonder is it that Christ should equal himself with Water Oyle and Balsome For as we use Water in Baptisme to justify our selves in Confirmation of Balsom to sanctify and fortify our selves of Oyle in extream Unction to purifie our selves so in this Sacrament we may use Christ for the acquiring of greater grace and increase of holiness A great matter then is the salvation of man since for this purpose God who is his End was content to be his Means I know not how the incomprehensible goodness and charitie of God can extend beyond this Let man therefore reflect how much it imports him to be saved Let him not stick at any thing that may further it Let him leave no stone unremoved let him leave no meanes unattempted since God himself becomes a Means of his salvation and to that end subjects himself to the disposition and will of a Creature Let nothing which is temporal divert him since God was not diverted by what was eternal If therefore to quit thy honours deny thy pleasures distribute thy riches unto the Poor be a means to save thee stick not at it since God stuck not at the greatness of his being which is above all but gave himself for thee The blessed Sacrament was also left us as a Pledge of future glory and eternal happiness For when Christ our Redeemer preached unto the world the contempt of temporal goods for the gaining of the eternal and pronounced that comfortable sentence Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the Kingdom of heaven not saying Theirs shall be but Theirs is giving it them in present It was convenient that since they could not then enter into the possession of those heavenly joyes which they had purchased with all they had upon earth that some equivalent pledge should now be given them in the time of their forbearance This pledge is the most blessed Body of our Redeemer Christ Jesus Son of the living God which is of greater worth and value then the heavens themselves Well may we then despise the fading goods of this life when we receive in hand such a pledge of the eternal Well may we renounce the perishing riches and the pleasures of nature when the treasure of grace is bestowed upon us The blessed Sacrament is also out Viaticum here upon earth Whereby we are given to understand that this life is but a pilgrimage wherein we travel towards eternity and that therefore we are not to stay and rest in what is temporal And because we are neither to enjoy the goods of this temporal life nor yet to enter upon those of the future to the end we may better suffer the renuntiation of the one and sustain the hopes of the other this blessed Sacrament is given us as a Viaticum so as the soul wandring in this valley of tears wherein she is not to please or detain her self in the delights of the world since her journey is for heaven might have somthing to comfort her in this absence from her Celestial Country Let us then consider the value of the End whereunto we travel since the journey is defrayd with so precious a Viaticum and that the pleasures of this world are so prejudicial unto our Salvation that this Pledge is given us from heaven to the end we should not so much as taste them The Israelites in their peregrinaon in the wilderness had Manna for their Viaticum which supplyed all their necessities for it not onely served to sustain their bodies but whilest they fed upon it they were not subject to infirmities neither did their garments decay with wearing insomuch as having it they had all things All this is but a shadow of our Divine Viaticum having which we need nothing and being provided of so Celestial a good may well spare what is temporal §. 2. A most principal end also of the institution of this most admirable Sacrament is to be a memorial of the Passion of the Son of God which being so efficacious a motive unto the contempt of things temporal as we have already said our Saviour hath almost in all the things of nature left us a draught of it For this reason in the holy Shrowd Paleot adm Hist de Christi stigmat Adricom 2. par descr Hiero. n. 44. Lansp hom 19. de Passione Andrad in descrip Terraesanctae Petrus de P. A. Consil Reg. Francis lib. 5. in Const in lib. inscrip Fraustus Annus wherein his wounded body was wrapt when they took him from the Cross there remained miraculously imprinted the signes of his Passion For this when loaden with his Cross the pious Veronica presented him with her Vail he returned it enriched with the Portraicture of his sacred countenance And as Lanspergius notes the fingers of the armed Souldier who gave him the blow were imprinted in the same Vail For this when he fell prostrate in the Garden and in a sweat of blood prayed unto his Father he left ingraved upon the stone whereon he prayed the print of his feet knees and hands And not farr from thence is found another stone where after he was apprehended the Souldiers throwing him down upon the ground he left imprinted the end of his toes his hands and knees which stone as Borcardus notes is so hard as 't is not possible to raze or cut any thing out of it even with iron instruments and this to the end the memory of his ineffable meekness and partience should be perpetual In like manner where he past the brook of Cedron he left another mark of his sacred feet as likewise of the rope wherewith they carried him tied So firmly would our Saviour have the memory of his Passion fixt in our hearts that he hath left the signes of it in the very rocks There hath been also seen an Oriental Jasper accidentally found whereon the dolorous countenance of our Saviour hath been exactly formed And blessed Aloysius de Gonzaga walking upon the Sea-shore found with great content of his spirit a pibble whereon were distinctly figured the five wounds of Christ our Redeemer And not onely in stones but in several other peeces of nature Anast Sinaita in Hexamer as St. Anastatius Sinaita observes he hath left us no obscure remembrances of his Cross and Passion In the flower Granadilla are perfectly represented the Nails Pillar and Crown of thorns In dividing the fruit of the tree Musa appears in some of them the Image of a Cross in others of Christ crucified and in Gant they hold in great esteem the root of a beautiful flower brought from Jerusalem wherein is also lively represented a
it is a kind of impudence to use God as a Medium for the obtaining of that which does or may separate us from him who is our chief and utmost end Guigo Cathusianus sayes Guigo Carthus in Medit. that he who prayes for temporal things uses God Almighty as the Spouse does her Husband when she desires him to bring her with his own hands some vile slave with whom she may adulterate So we desiring temporal goods encrease our affection to the things of the earth which make us forget the love of our Creator and praying for them pray for the instruments and occasions of offending him Let us not commit this treason against our Lord God but let us ask what may redound to his glory and our own profit which is only that which is spiritual and eternal to wit his grace his knowledge the imitation of his Son the contempt of the world and what is conformable to his holy will This we may safely ask and this he will certainly give us because it is for our true good And therefore in the prayer which our Lord himself hath taught us when we have said Thy will be done we proceed in a bolder manner and say in an imparative way Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses having then a kinde of certainty of obtaining when we have first conformed our prayers to the divine will and it is then as Origen notes a singular confidence we have in God to command what we pray for The third error in our petitions for temporal goods is that we pray for things vain without substance or profit for such is all temporal greatness and felicity short vain inconstant transitory and unworthy the heart of man which ought wholly to fix upon the eternal and trample the rest under foot like that mysterious woman in the Apocalyps who was surrounded and penetrated by the Sun which filled the heart and bowels but trod the Moon under her feet the Sun which is perfectly circular being a Symbol of eternity and the Moon which is defective and mutable a figure of the temporal The Sun hath its own proper light the Moon none but what she borrows from the Sun In the same manner the eternal is a good in it self and desirable for it self the temporal hath no good at all but what it acquires by being a means of obtaining the eternal All humane felicity is but vanity smoke thorns deceit and misery With what face can a Christian demand such stuff from God Almighty and such is all humane prosperity in Gods acceptance Chrysos hom 79. in Mat. Out of which consideration St. Chrysostome speaks in this manner A Roman Judge will not understand thy allegations unless thou speak unto him in the Roman tongue In the like manner Christ will not hear thee unless thou speak unto him in his own language and thy mouth be conformable unto his In the language of our Redeemer riches are thorns honours smoke and pleasures vipers and therefore he who prays for things of this nature prayes but for so many evils And as there is no Father that if his Son instead of bread demand a Scorpion will give it him so God to those whom he loves and holds as Children when they ask him temporal goods denies them because he sees they are not good for them For this reason the honour demanded by the Wife of Zebedaeus for her two sons was denyed by our Saviour with this answer That they knew not what they asked demanding that for a good which was not and in room of the honour which they desired in a temporal Kingdom he gave them Martyrdom which they thought not of which conduced to real and eternal happiness Let us learn therefore How and for What to pray that we erre not in a matter of such importance For if the error be so much greater by now much the matter in which it falls is of greater moment an error in matter of prayer must be most great especially having a divine precept and an infallible promiss that if we demand what is necessary for our Salvation in his name we shall not fail of obtaining it Let us not therefore ask that in the name of our Saviour for which he would not die but that which he bought for us with his precious blood and life which is the blessings of heaven and our eternal felicity For this let us sigh for this let us pray and let us reflect how great and faulty a carelesness it is not to pray ever for that which imports us so much as heaven and for which only we have a certain promise to be heard and not for other things which the world esteems and time consumes CAP. VII How happy are those who renounce Temporal goods for the securing of the Eternal IF all which hath been said suffice not to make us despise the goods of the earth for the gaining of those blessings we hope for in heaven and if neither the example nor remonstrances of our Saviour will serve to make us esteem the Eternal and contemn the Temporal but that we will for all this preferre the one though little and base because present before the other though great and immense because to come Yet let our present interest and the word and promise of the Son of God move us which certainly if seriously weighed will not onely perswade us to despise but totally to renounce the goods of the world as many of the Philosophers have done that they might more freely enjoy the pleasures and commodities of this life and many Saints for the hopes they have had of the other Let us here call to mind what was said by the Saviour of the world Mat. 19. Whosoever shall leave father or mother or brothers or sisters or house or land for my sake shall in this life receive a hundred-fold and after death life eternal In which words we are to consider the greatness of the promise and the importance of that for which so great things are promised Without doubt it must be of high concernment to renounce our temporal goods since the Son of God invites us to it with so great promises and if it be convenient to renounce them as things poysonous and hurtful to us we can have no excuse for not despising them or at least if we do not despise them yet we can have no reason to love and prefer them before the eternal Much and extremely much it will concern us to despise that which is convenient for us to leave and as much to pluck from our hearts the affection of those things which are not fit for us to possess Neither is it much to say that it is advantagious for us to renounce these temporal things since St. Bonaventure judged it necessary and therefore according to the Apostle sayes That the root of all evil is avarice from which and from pride which accompanies it all sins have their birth food
France There she taught her Brother how to order a Dairy milk Cows and make Cheeses and after found a way to have him received into a certain Grange of the Cistercians where he performed this office to such satisfaction of the Monks that in a short time he was admitted amongst them a Lay-Brother His Sister Matilda seeing him thus placed said one day unto him Brother certainly a great reward attends us from the Lord for having thus left our Parents and our Country for the love of him But we shall receive a far greater if for the short time of our lives we deprive our selves even of this content of seeing one another and that we so give our selves over to that Divine and Soveraign Majesty that we meet no more until we meet in Heaven where we shall see and converse one with another in true and eternal comfort Here the Brother fell a weeping apprehending this as the greatest difficulty he had hitherto encountred in the whole course of his life But at last he master'd it and they both parted never to see one another more upon earth The holy Virgin went unto a certain Town nine miles distant where she lived retired in a little Cottage and sustained her self wholly by the labour of her hands admitting neither present nor alms Her Bed was the ground or little better she eat upon her knees and in that posture spent many hours in prayer wherein she often was so rapt from her senses that she neither heard the noise of thunder nor perceived the flashes of lightning Alexander was never known whilest he lived But St. Matilda was nine years before her death and therefore attempted often to have left the place but was so strictly watched she could not She wrought many miracles both during her life and after death A certain Monk sick of an Imposthume in his breast offered up his prayers at the Tomb of Alexander and to him the Servant of God appeared more resplendent than the Sun adorned with two most beautiful Crowns The one of which he wore upon his head The other he carried in his hand And being demanded of the Monk what those two Crowns signified he answered This which I bear in my hands is given me for that temporal Kingdom which I forsook upon earth The other of my head is that which is commonly given to all the Saints of Heaven And that thou mayest give credit to what thou hast seen in this Vision thou shalt find thy self according to thy faith cured of thy infirmity In this manner God honours those who humble themselves for his glory CAP. IX The love which we owe unto God ought so to fill our Souls that it leave no place or power to love the Temporal WE have already produced sufficient motives and reasons to breed in us a contempt of the things of this world and to wean our affections from them as well for being in themselves vile transitory mutable little and dangerous as for that the Son of God hath done and suffered so much to the end we should despise them I will onely now add for the conclusion of this matter That though they were of some real worth or value as they are not yet for all this we ought not to love them since so great is that love and affection which is due from us unto God that it ought so fully to fill and possess our hearts that it leave no room for any other affection than it self For if it were commanded in the Law when men had not the obligation which we now have the Son of God not having then died for our redemption that we should love him with all our heart all our soul and all our powers how are we to love him when our debt is so much greater and that we have a further knowledge of his divine goodness If then there ought to be no place for any love but his how can we now turn our eyes unto the creature or set our hearts upon it when a million of hearts are not sufficient for our Creator There is no one Title for which God is amiable but upon that title we owe him a thousand wills a thousand loves and all what we are or can be What do we then owe him for all together Consider his benefits his love his goodness and thou shalt see that though thou hadst as many hearts as there are sands upon the Sea-shore or atoms in the Air all were not capable of that great love which is due unto him How canst thou then divide this one heart which thou hast amongst so many creatures Consider also the multitude and greatness of his divine blessings and deal but with God as one man doth with another If we say of humane benefits that gifts break rocks how comes it that divine benefits do not move a heart of flesh Prov. 22. And if as Salomon sayes Those who give gifts steal the hearts of the receivers how comes it that God robs not thee of thy soul who not onely gives thee gifts but himself for a gift Consider the benefits thou didst receive in thy Creation They were as many as thou hast members of thy body or faculties of thy soul Consider those of thy Conservation Thou hast received as many as there are distinct natures in Heaven and in Earth The Elements Stars and the whole world were created for thy preservation without which thou couldest not subsist Look upon the benefits of thy Redemption They are as many as are the evils of Hell from which they have freed thee Look upon those of thy Justification they are as many as the Sacraments which Christ hath instituted and the examples which he hath left thee Think what thou owest him for having made thee a Christian pardoned thee so often and given thee still fresh grace to renew thee All these and a thousand other benefits and obligations demand and sue for thy love And not onely these benefits from God but even those from men cry out unto thee to love him For there is no benefit which thou receivest from man but comes from God On all parts then and for all things thou art obliged to love God for it is he who does thee good in all and is worth unto thee more than all How comes it then that since he hath done all this for us we yet think not what we are to do for him nor how we shall express our thankfulness for such and so great benefits David was troubled with this care when he said What shall I return unto the Lord for all which he hath given me And yet the Lord had not then given him the Body and blood of his Son nor had his Son then been born or died for him Since then he hath done all this for us why doe we not study how we may be grateful for such infinite and unspeakable mercies But what can we return which we have not received Let us deliver him back our
falls not under our capacity what it is to he without end We cannot amplifie it or exaggerate it so much but that whatsoever we say we still fall short Bonav de inf c. 49. Wherefore St. Bonaventure pondering with himself in his meditations upon Hell that if a damned person should every hundred years let fall but onely one small tear and those all to be preserved until that after innumerable Centuries of years they came to equal a Sea perhaps so many hundred millions of years may be thought to finish Eternity No it would but then begin Let them turn again and keep the same slow tears of that unfortunate sinner until they have fill'd another Ocean Would Eternity then end No but then begin as fresh and new as the first day Let them repeat the same ten twenty an hundred times until an hundred thousand Seas shall fill and overflow Shall we then find the bottom of Eternity No we have not past the Superficies of it and it shall still remain as deep and unsoundable as at first There are no Numbers no Arithmetick that can comprehend the years of Eternity If the whole Heavens were parchment and fill'd on both sides with Numbers they could not sum up the least part of that which hath no parts at all but is in it self whole entire and indivisible No Sea hath so many drops no Mountain so many grains of sand as will serve to reckon up the years of Eternity To declare this more amply I shall relate what happened unto Archimedes There were some Philosophers of his time who affirmed that the number of the sands of the Sea were infinite others that although they were in themselves finite yet they could not be comprehended under any Number Archimedes that he might confute both opinions composed a most learned and ingenious Book which he dedicated unto King Gelon wherein he proved that although the world were all fill'd with sand and that it were bigger than what it is yet that the multitude of those grains of sands were limited and might also be reduced under Numbers and he himself gave the account to what Number they would arise Since this Philosopher Father Clavius did the like computing how many grains of sand would fill the whole space betwixt the Firmament of the fixed Stars and the Earth making every grain of sand so little and indivisible that he allows 10000 of them unto the bigness of a poppie or mustard-seed and notwithstanding sums up this vast Number within the short space of one line all not surpassing one Unite and 51 Cyphers If then so many millions of millions may be contained in the length of one line what shall we say of the years in Eternity since that not only one line nor one book nor all the paper in the world nor all the world from the Firmament downwards filled with the Figures of Arithmetick were sufficient to contain one little particle of it notwithstanding the multiplication which is made by the adding of every figure Every Cypher which is added makes the number ten times more than it was because a Cypher put after one Unit makes it ten the second Cypher makes it one hundred the third one thousand and in this manner the Numbers goe multiplying to an immense Number in a few Figures Whereby one may conceive that adding one hundred Cyphers it makes the Numbers rise to such a pitch that it far exceeds the capacity of Man's imagination to conceive it What then would it be adding so many Cyphers as could be contained in a parchment as big as the whole Heaven Yet all this innumerable Number does not equal the least particle of Eternity which after so many numberless years past which at length after how long a time soever must meet an end would yet remain as if it did but then begin Let us seriously think how long were that life to be esteemed which should contain an hundred thousand years yet we have thought of nothing in respect of Eternity Let us think of ten times an hundred a thousand times as much still nothing to Eternity neither have we quitted the least part of it which is but then beginning Wherefore Lactantius saith With what years shall we satiate Eternity Lib. 1. de falsae relig c. 12. since it hath no end It is still beginning and nothing but a beginning and therefore may not unsignificantly be thus defined Eternity is a perpetual beginning which still continues without end or diminution Let us abstract from Eternity as many years as there are drops in the Sea atomes in the Air leaves in the Fields grains of sand in the Earth or Stars in the Heavens it will yet continue whole and entire Add as many years unto it it becomes no greater nor is further distant from its end since it admits none but in each point and instant receives a beginning Never never shall it have an end ever ever in beginning Let one imagine that there were a Mountain of sand which should reach from the Earth to Heaven and that an Angel after every thousand years should take from it one onely grain how many thousands of thousands of years and millions of millions would pass before that Mountain became so little that it would no longer remain perceptible Let the best Arithmetician that is cast up the account how many years would pass before that Angel had taken away half of the aforesaid Mountain This seems a thing endless but our understanding is beguiled for it would have an end and time would come when one half and even the whole Mountain would be taken away Finally there would be a time when there would be one only little grain remaining and this also would be removed But never shall we come to the end of Eternity and after the consuming of that whole Mountain of sand nothing would be diminished from Eternity but the Mountain of Eternity would remain as entire after millions of millions of Ages were past as in the beginning This seems to have been signified by that of Abacuch when he said The mountains of Ages are torn in pieces and the hills of the world shall be humbled by the ways of Eternity Because one thousand hills and mountains as big as the whole world may be consumed a thousand times over whilest the Eternity of the punishment of sinners pass over them which Eternity can never make an end of passing so that those miserable Souls who suffer in that devouring fire shall suffer a thousand and a thousand and millions of millions of years without coming neerer to the end than they were the first day § 2. What man would endure to lie upon one side resting before a scorching fire for the space of a whole year But what speak I of lying burning Who could endure to be laid in a soft bed upon one side without being permitted to rise or turn unto the other side for the same space This indeed was a rigorous
we gain those joyes which shall endure without end Yet ought we to make use of this consideration of Euripides and Zeuxis and not only to do good works but to do them seriously and perfectly well since we work not for this life but for Eternity which ought ever to be in our memory The benefit which David reaped by this consideraration was a firm resolution to mend his life and change into a new man animating himself to a greater observance and a more high perfection And so in that Psalm wherein he says That he thought upon the days of old and the years of Eternity he adds immediately the effect of his Meditation saying That he was to begin a new because the change which he found in his heart he perceived was from the most powerful hand of God Wherefore considering that Eternity never ends but still begins and that it is wholly a beginning he determined with such new fervour to give a beginning to a more perfect life that he would never flagg or be dismayed in the prosecution of it willing in this to imitate Eternity the which as it is ever beginning so he would ever begin to deserve it And what great matter is it if that which we are to enjoy or suffer be ever in beginning that we should likewise be ever beginning either to deserve the one or flie the other Our reward is not to fail us and therefore there is no reason why we should fail and grow weary in our service and endeavours Our joy is ever to begin Why should not then our endeavours be ever in beginning The repose we hope for shall never have an end Why should then our deservings ever cease With this considederation St. Arsenius much profited himself making account that although he had served God many years in a most holy life yet that he did but then begin repeating often that Speech of David Now I begin Now I begin We ought never to look back upon our labours past but still to animate our selves to labour anew for God and his Service as did the Apostle St. Paul who says of himself Philip. 3. Vide Masuet in vita St. Pauli That he did forget what was past that he did inlarge his heart and mind extending it for that which was to come the which the Apostle spake in a time when he had suffered much and done such services unto God in the good of Souls as he had already laboured more than all the Apostles After he had entred into the Synagogues of Damasous and publikely preached Jesus Christ with so evident danger of his life that if he had not escaped over the walls of the City he had been cut in a thousand pieces After that in Arabia he had converted many people many in Tarsua and in Antioch After he had been rapt up into the third Heaven After that he had been elected by the Holy Ghost to be an Apostle and wrought great and prodigious Miracles After that he had past over Asia Minor all Greece and the better part of Europe converting innumerable Soules After he had distributed great Alms gathering them with much labour made long journeys and brought them unto the poor in Jerusalem After the suffering of innumerable persecutions After having been thrice stoned and once left for dead After having been often whipt and often apprehended After infinite services performed for the Church Alter all these it seemed unto him that he had suffered nothing done nothing for Christ and he forgot it all as if it had been the first day of his conversion determining still to doe more to suffer more to labour more to begin anew esteeming himself after so many labours and services to be an useless and an unprofitable servant following the counsel of our Saviour when he sayes Luk. 17. After ye have done all what I have commanded you to doe say ye are unprofitable servants and that ye have done what ye ought have done Let a man compare his labours his zeal his preaching his charity with that of the Apostle and he will find that he hath not yet begun If then the Apostle who at that time exceeded the merits of divers Saints who have dyed in great holiness and yet forgot all judging he had done nothing but turned to begin afresh we who have not yet begun wherefore shall we be weary before we begin let us ever begin anew since Eternity which we hope for is ever to be new and ever to begin Let us not glory saith Dionysius Carthusianus in the merits of our life past neither let us esteem our selves for any thing we have already done but let us bestir our selves as freshly and with as much fervour as if we did but that day begin and were that day also to dye CAP. IX How Eternity is without change THe second condition of Eternity is to be immutable and to persevere without change which the Ancients gave us to understand by many most mysterious Symbols Some figured it by painting of a Chair Isaiah 6. conformable unto which the Prophet Isaiah saith That he saw the Lord sitting on high upon a Throne setting forth in this settled posture the immutability and greatness of his Eternity And St. John in his Apocalyps often celebrates the Seat of God as representing his eternal duration More clearly the Prophet Daniel Dan. 7. unto whom God vouchsafed to appear as he was eternal whereupon he calls him the Ancient of dayes and sayes he beheld him with his hair all white and seated upon a Throne From the same consideration the Nasamâ—nes a certain People of Affrick when any amongst them was about to die caused him to sit and in that posture to expire signifying thereby the estate wherein his Soul was prefently to enter And for the same cause they interred their dead sitting giving us thereby to understand that rest and repose were not to be sought for until death when we were to enter the gates of Eternity This life is no place to sit in we are not here to stay the misery which we find in it sufficiently declares that God made it not for that purpose This life is but lent us we are not to abide in it but to walk apace unto the Mountain of Eternity It is so miserable that even it self informs us of another life wherein we shall finde rest since here we cannot meet it In Heaven all our unhappiness all our miseries are to cease there the tears of this valley are to be wiped from our eyes there our troubles are to find ease there the unquietness of our hearts is to have repose In this world no manner of life no sort of estate no condition of man no greatness of dignity no abundance of riches no felicity of fortune can ever give rest unto the possessor For this reason the Romans in the Statues which they erected to their deceased Emperors made them still sitting whereby they would signifie that all the
which must not there happen the Gates on all parts being shut to comfort Hope beguiles us in our evils and in some sort frees us from the sense of suffering There is no labour or toil so great which hope makes not tolerable The most afflicted and wretched persons live and subsist with expectation that one day their miseries will change or end But that ease and comfort is denied the damned whose unhappiness is never to have an end nor their torments alteration They would esteem it for a comfort if a thousand years hence they might be sure of that little drop of water begg'd by the rich glutton But what speak I of a thousand years it after an hundred thousand after a thousand times so many so that some certain time were prefixed and the door but of some small hope set open unto them If all the space which is taken up by the Earth covered by the Water filled with the Air and encompassed by the Heavens were full of grains of Wheat And a damned Soul were told that after all that Wheat were eaten by some small Bird which after every hundred thousand years should come to take one grain and when it should have taken away the last they would give it that drop of water which was demanded by the assistance of Lazarus it would be comforted to see this onely change and so small an ease in the midst of his pains Yet it shall not have this and after so many millions of millions of years the miserable wretch shall be in the same torments raging in the same manner and as much void of all comfort as ever This is it shall burst the hearts of the damned when they shall perceive all remedies to be then impossible which in this life were so easie to be obtained With the crums of bread which fell from his table the rich Glutton might have purchased eternal happiness and now the refreshment of one drop of water is denied him What rancour shall they have against themselves when they shall remember that by the forbearance of one momentary pleasure they might have escaped eternal torments How raging will their very entrails be to consider that that is now past help which was heretofore so easily to be avoided Let therefore a Christian open his eyes and whilest he may remedy that which hereafter when he would will be impossible Now is the time acceptable now is the time of Salvation now is the time of pardon and indulgence now that may be gained in a moment which all Eternity cannot hereafter redeem What other thing was signified unto us by the flames of the Babylonian furnace Dan. 3. which as the Scripture saith mounted unto the height of fourty nine Cubits It doth not say fifty as is usual in other places to give the compleat number although some be wanting And who I pray you approached so near unto that flame which flew and moved up and down in the air that could so punctually measure the height of it to arise just unto fourty nine Cubits and not to reach fifty But herein was the Mystery which we are about to speak off The Number of fifty was the Number of the Jubilee and signified Indulgence and Pardon and by the flames of that Furnace were figured the flames of Hell which how far soever they shall exceed the torments of this life yet shall never attain unto a Jubilee and remission of their pains Now 't is true they may Now every year every moneth every day every hour and every moment is a time of Pardon and Jubilee What would a damned Soul give for one onely quarter of an hour of those whole days and weeks which men mispend in this life for to be able to do penance in Let us not therefore be prodigal of a thing so precious let us not lose time and and with it Eternal Glory The time of this life is so precious that St. Bernardin dares give it this exaggeration saying That time is worth as much as God because by it God is gained Let us not therefore fling away a thing of that value but let us make use of this cheap bargain purchasing with time Eternity and God himself the Lord of Eternity fulfilling that which was said by Ecclesiasticus Eccl. 20. Is there any who for a small price will redeem many things Upon which words Galfridus says Galfrid in Cant. If there be due unto thee eternal bitterness and thou mayst escape it by suffering what is temporal certainly thou hast redeemed great matters for a small price In blessings eternal it is likewise a great comfort to have them free from change so as they can neither end nor diminish and that temporal Goods changing and consuming themselves they remain in the same firm and stable condition for all Eternity Let a Christian compare the brevity and inconstancie of the things of this life with the immutability and eternal duration of those of the other Let him seriously observe the difference betwixt those two words Now and Ever The fools of this world say Let us now rejoyce The wise and vertuous say it is better that we forbear our pleasures now that we may hereafter enjoy eternal happiness The worldlings say Let us now live daintily and fare deliciously The Servants of Christ say Let us dye in the flesh that we may live ever without change The Sinners say Let us now enjoy the world They who fear God say Let us flie from this unstable world that we may for ever enjoy the Coelestial Compare these two and see who are the wiser those who aim only at which endures but this momentary instant Now or those who look after Eternity which lasts for ever those who shall suffer eternally without any profit at all or those who are content to suffer a little in this world for so great a gain as is the Kingdom of Heaven O most miserable and disconsolate life of the damned who are nâ—ither to have end in their torments change in their griefs nor to reap profit by the pains which they suffer Three things onely afford us comfort in the troubles of this life that either they may end or become more supportable by change or at least that we shall be recompensed by some benefit for our sufferance all which will fail in eternal pains in which there is no hope either of end change or profit A fearful mistake to suffer for a whole Eternity without benefit hereafter for not suffering a moment now with so great a reward as is the eternal Glory of God and Kingdom of Heaven CAP. X. How Eternity is without comparison FRom what is already spoken may be collected the third Quality of Eternity which is to be without comparison For as there is no comparison betwixt what is infinite and what is finite so there can be none betwixt what is Eternal and what is Temporal And as the Mountain Olympus or if any greater in the world is
therefore well laid of St. Augustine In Ps 45. That all which hath an end is short A hundred years of penance have an end and are therefore short a thousand years a hundred thousand Millions have their end and are therefore in the appearance of what is immense but little and in respect of Eternity no more then an instant In the same manner we are to look upon a thousand years as upon an hour and for it self a long life is no more to he desired then a short since both in respect of Eternity bear the same bulk And as in respect of a solid body a thousand superficies's bear no more proportion then one all of them together being as incapable of making up the least particle of solidity as one onely so in respect of Eternity one year is not less then a thousand nor a thousand more than one And upon all time although it were a Million of ages we are to look as upon an instant and upon all which is temporal as upon a superficies which hath onely an appearance but nothing of substance neither can all time and all temporal goods together make up one onely good of Eternity If the whole earth be but a point in respect of the Heavens which are notwithstanding of a finite and limited greatness what great matter is it if all time be but as an instant in respect of Eternity which is infinite and without limit Betwixt the Earth nay betwixt the least grain of sand and the highest Heaven there is a proportion both have quantity but betwixt a thousand years and Eternity none at all and are therefore less then a point O blindness of men who are so besotted with time that in life they desire pleasure and in death a memorial and both in death and life a fame and renown for what even for a moment for an instant Wherefore desirest thou pleasure in life which to morrow is to end Wherefore desirest thou a vain memory after death which can endure no longer than the world whose end will not be long deferred And although it should yet last for a million of ages it were but short since those also must conclude and all were but as a moment in resped of Eternity As the Immensity of God is in respect of place so is Eternity in respect of time and as in respect of the immensity of God the whole Sea is no greater than a drop of water nor an atome in the air less than the whole world so in respect of Eternity a hundred thousand years and half a quarter of an hour are the same If God then should bestow upon thee this life onely for a quarter of an hour and that thou knowest likewise that the world within an hour after thy death were to end also wouldest thou spend that short time in ostentation and setting forth thy self whereby to raise a fame that might endure that short time after thy life no certainly thou wouldest busie thy self with other thoughts thou wouldest think of providing to die well and not trouble thy self in leaving a vain fame and memory which were so small a time to over-last thee Know then that thou oughtest to do the same although thou wert certain to live a hundred years and the world to endure a hundred thousand after thee For all which hath an end is short and all time in respect of Eternity is but a day an hour a moment Remember therefore the saying of St. John who said his time was in the last hour of the world although there then wanted many years all which in respect of Eternity were but as one hour So then if thou wouldest not be sollicitous of leaving a Name behind thee if the world were to continue but an hour no more oughtest thou to be now although it were to endure for many ages If thou knewest for certain that thou had'st to live a hundred years and that during that time thou shouldest have nothing to eat or sustain thy self but what thou drewest from the store and treasure of some great King and that too in the small space of an hour wouldest thou spend that hour in walking abroad in vain conversation and entertainments certainly no thou wouldest not cease from labouring and making haste to load thy self with those treasures How art thou then so careless knowing that thy Soul is to live for an eternity and that thou hast nothing to sustain it with hereafter but what thou gainest by thy merits within the space of this short life look how short a time is allowed thee to provide for Eternity How art thou then so negligent as to pass it in vain pleasures how comest thou then to laugh and not to weep rather and tear thy flesh with rigid penance and mortifications More is an hour in respect of a hundred years than a hundred thousand are in respect of Eternity And therefore if in that hour because the time appeared but short thou wouldest not be sloathful in furnishing thy self for a hundred years much less oughtest thou to be slow in those hundred years of life to provide for Eternity Consider also what a hundred years are in respect of a million and a million of years in respect of Eternity If for a hundred years spent in torments thou wert to enjoy a million of years in pleasure and content certainly thou hadst a most advantagious bargain since thou receivest ten thousand times more than thou gavest What a purchase hast thou then if not for a hundred years of pain but for a short hour spent in the mortification of some one vain pleasure thou receivest an Eternity of glory in respect of which a million of years are but as air instant See then how short is the space of this life to gain the eternal see how short is all time to merit Eternity Well did St. Augustin say August in Psal 39. For an eternal rest thou wert in reason to undergoe an eternal labour and for an eternal felicity to endure eternal pains How then can the short labours of this life seem tedious unto thee questionless there is no just Soul in Heaven nor damned in Hell that so often as he casts his eyes upon Eternity is not astonisht that so short a thing as this life should be the Key of so long a happiness in the one or misery in the other See then how cheap thou hast an Eternity of glory the which is an infinite for a finite Weigh a thousand years weigh a thousand millions in counterpoise with Eternity they weigh nothing all is bat smoak and straw there is no comparison betwixt infinite and finite betwixt what is real and what is painted Well did Plotinus say that Time wat the Image of Eternity conformable unto which David said That man passes away in an Image as if he should have said he passes away in time The same which is said of Time may be said of Goods and Evils temporal which pass along
as Lazarus his demanding an alms from him by giving of which he might have redeemed his fins but he let it pass being more inhumane than his dogs who suffered not the poor Leper to depart without first licking of his sores usiug mercy with him with whom their Master used none What will he now say when all things have failed him even one drop of cold water to cool his scorched and inflamed tongue and all for denying so poor an alms as the crums which fell from his Table What madness what spite what despair do now torment him for refusing when time was so easie a means to gain his salvation wherefore although it be true that the whole time of our life is an occasion of obtaining eternal glory yet in the passage of life there are some particular actions and successes upon which our salvation doth more especially depend by which we do either disoblige God Almighty by rejecting them or by embracing them oblige him if I may so say to favour us Such a one was that of holy Joseph who rather than he would offend his Creator fled from his wanton Mistress and left his Garment in her hands This was an excellent act by which he much obliged God Almighty and deserved to receive those favours which were after bestowed upon him In the same manner Susanna layd hold on a great occasion for the saving of her soul when she chose rather to die than to consent to the filthy pleasure whereunto she was invited by those wicked Elders No opportunity ought to pass us without shewing our selves quick and active in laying hold of it greedy of pleasing God Almighty obliging him by some brave and heroical act with which occasion shall present us Wherefore the Wiseman said Be not defrauded of thy good day Eccl. 14. and let no portion of a good gift overslip thee Tully defined occaon to be a part of time fitted for the doing of something Mithridates said it was the Mother of all things which were to be done And Polibius that which ruled all humane affairs And there is no doubt but some conjunctures of times happen which present us with great occasions of merit by working excellent vertues and performing most heroical actions which if made good use of do much assure our salvation Wherefore it is by some placed amongst the signes of predestination to have performed some great and noble action of vertue Let us see what benefit some have made of occasion in temporal businesses that we may not be less careful and sollicitous in matters eternal Rachel with what diligence did she run to hide and cover the Idols which she had stoln from her Father with what diligence did Abigail goe forth to meet David omiting nothing whereby she might appease his fury and certainly it she had protracted never so little time she had run into evident danger of losing the lives of her Self her Husband and Family With what sollicitude did Abrahan pursue the five Kings which carried away Captive his Nephew Loth With what speed did Saul gather together his Army for the relief of Jabes Galaad It behooves us no less to gain Heaven Let us not be more dull and slow in gaining that then they were in getting and procuring things of the earth Let us hear with what diligence and haste the Wise-man advises us to accomplish the promise we have made unto a mortal man Prov. 6. My Son if thou shalt be surety for a friend and hast struck hands with a stranger thou hast ensnared thy self in the words of thy mouth and art taken in thy own speeches Do therefore my son what I say unto thee and deliver thy self because thâ—u art fallen into the hands of thy neighbour Run make haste awake thy friend give no sleep unto thy eyes nor let thy eye-lids slumber rid thy self from his hands as the mountain-goat or the bird from the hand of the hunter Those who are engaged unto the Devil by their sins let them mark with what diligence they ought to free themselves without losing time or occasion and those who are obliged unto God for his infinite benefits and have passed unto him their promises of amendment let them mark how they ought to satisfie them by making use of all means possible of being reconciled unto him let them make haste as the Wise-man sayes let them not be tepid and slow let them not give sleep unto their eyes or close their eye-lids that they may without losing the least occasion escape from hell and the slavery of Satan Pitty it is that any occasion should slip from us without benefit a lamentable misery that our lives should pass away in the things of the earth without seeking after those of heaven mans life being so short and narrow for the meriting of a thing so long and infinite as are the joyes of eternity With reason did the Apostle admonish us This I say unto you bretheren Time is short that which remains is that those who have wives be as if they had them not and those who weep as if they did not weep and those who rejoyce as if they rejoyced not and those who buy as if they possessed not and those which use this world as if they used it not because the figure of this world passes The Apostle considering the great shortness of time wills us so to settle our selves in the matters of our salvation and of the other life that we remain in those of this as strangers using them as if we used them not Let us consider then that if we suffer occasion in the short time of this life to over-slip us that all hope of remedy will fail us in the next It is not void of instruction which is feigned by the Ancients That Jupiter bestowed upon a certain person a Vessel fill'd with all sorts of goods and blessings who overjoyed with the greatness of the gift which contained all that was to be wished for and impatient of enjoying them one by one and every good in his proper time and season would needs have them all at once Whereupon he hastily and undiscreetly opened the Vessel but they were no sooner discovercel but all flew into the air and vanished and for all the diligence and haste he was able to use in shutting it he could retain none but Hope which onely remained behind But far otherwise is it with the occasion of our salvation which although it contains all happiness and blessings yet being suffercd to pass there remains not behind so much as hope but in the place of it repentance despair and eternal sorrow and so much the more in that it happens by our own faults when King Joas smote the ground thrice and was told by the Prophet Elizeus that if he had smitten it six or seaven times he had ruin'd and utterly made an end of the Syrians what grief and affliction did he conceive in his mind that having had an occasion of so
powerful is subject to most impetuous storms whose end is to be sunk and overthrown O how wavering and uncertain is the height of the greatest honours false is the hope of man and vain is all his glory affected with feigned and fawning flatteries O uncertain life due unto perpetual toyl and labour what doth it now profit me to have fired so many stately and lofty buildings to have destroyed so many Cities and their people What doth it now profit me O Brother to have raised so many costly Palaces of Marble when I now die in the open field and in the sight of heaven O how many things doest thou now think of doing not knowing the bitterness of their end Thou beholdest me now dying and know that thou also shalt quickly follow me § 2. But let us forbear to look upon those several kindes of death which are incident to humane nature Let us onely consider that which is esteemed the most happy when we die not suddenly or by violence but by some infirmity which leasurely makes an end of us or by a pure resolution which naturally brings death along with it What greater misery of mans life than this that that death should be accounted happy not that it is so but because it is less miserable than others for what grief and sorrow doth not he pass who dies in this manner how do the accidents of his infirmities afflict him The heat of his Fever which scorches his entrails The thirst of his mouth which suffers him not to speak The pain of his head which hinders his attention The sadness and melancholy of his heart proceeding from the apprehension that he is to die besides other grievous accidents which are usually more in number than a humane body hath members to suffer together with remedies which are commonly no less painful than the evils themselves To this add the grief of leaving those he loves best and above all the uncertainty whither he is to goe to heaven or hell And if onely the memory of death be said to be bitter what shall be the experience Saul who was a man of great courage oncly because it was told him that the next day he was to die fell half dead upon the ground with fear For what news can be more terrible unto a sinner than that he is to die to leave all his pleasure in death and to give an account unto God for his life past If lots were to be cast whether one should have his flesh pluckt off with burning pincers or be made a King with what fear and anxiety of mind would that man expect the issue how then shall he look who in the agony of his death wrastles with Eternity and within two hours space looks for glory or torments without end What life can be counted happy if that be happy which ends with so much misery If we will not believe this let us ask him who is now passing the traunces of death what his opinion is of life Let us now enquire of him when he lies with his breast sticking forth his eyes sunk his feet dead his knees cold his visage pale his pulses without motion his breath short a Crucifix in one hand and a Taper in the other those who assist at his death bidding him say Jesus Jesus and advising him to make an Act of Contrition what will this man say his life was but by how much more prosperous by so much more vain and that all his felicity was false and deceitful since it came to conclude in such a period what would he now take for all the honours of this world Certainly I believe he would part with them at an easie rate Nay if they have been offensive to God Almighty he would give all in his power he had never enjoyed them and would willingly change them all for one Confession well made Philip the third was of this mind and would at that time have exchanged his being Monarch of all Spain and Lord of so many Kingdomes in the four parts of the world for the Porters Keyes of some poor Monastery Death is a great discoverer of truth What thou wouldest then wish to have been be now whilest it is in thy power A fool thou art if thou neglect it now when thou mayst and then wish it when it is too late He who unto the hour of his death hath enjoyed all the delights the world can give him at that hour what remains with him Nothing or if any thing a greater grief And what of all his penances and labours suffered for Christ Certainly if he had endured more than all the Martyrs he shall then feel no pain or grief of them all but much comfort Judge then if it shall not be better for thee to do that now which thou shalt then know to have been the better Consider of how little substance all temporal things will appear when thou shalt be in the light of eternal The honours which they have given thee shall be no more thine the pleasures wherein thou hast delighted can be no more thine thy riches are to be anothers See then whether the happiness of this life which is not so long as life it self be of that value that for it we should part with eternal felicity I beseech thee ponder what is life and what is death Life is the passing of a shadow short troublesome and dangerous a place which God hath given us in time for the deserving of Eternity Consider with thy self why God leads us about in the Circuit of this life when he might at the first instant have placed us in heaven Was it perhaps that we should here mispend our time like beasts and wallow in the base pleasures of our senses and daily invent new Chimera's of vain and frivolous honours No certainly it was not but that by vertuous actions we might gain heaven shew what we owe unto our Creator and in the middest of the troubles and afflictions of this life discover how loyal and faithful we are unto our God For this he placed us in the Lists that we should take his part and defend his honour for this he entred us into this Militia and Warfare for as Job sayes the life of man is a warfare upon earth that here we might fight for him and in the middest of his and our Enemies shew how true and faithful we are unto him Were it fit that a Souldier in the time of Battail should stand disarmed passing away his time at Dice upon a Drum-head and what laughter would that Roman Gladiator cause who entring into the place of Combat should set him down upon the Arena and throw away his Arms This does he who seeks his ease in this life and sets his affections upon the things of the earth not endeavouring those of heaven nor thinking upon death where he is to end A Peregrination is this life and what passenger is so besotted with the pleasures of the way that he forgets
make the poor Philosopher to forbear his dinner and not to relish one morsel of the Feast with pleasure Thou then who art no more secure of thy life than he how canst thou delight in the pleasures of the world he who every moment expects death ought no moment to delight in life This onely consideration of death according to Ricardus was sufficient to make us distaste all the pleasures of the earth A great danger or fear suffices to take away the sense of lesser joyes and what greater danger then that of Eternity Death is therefore uncertain that thou shouldest be ever certain to despise this life and dispose thy self for the other Thou art every hour in danger of death to the end that thou shouldest be every hour prepared to leave life What is death but the way unto eternity A great journey thou hast to make wherefore doest thou not provide in time and the rather because thou knowest not how soon thou mayest be forced to depart The People of God because they knew not when they were to march were for forty years which they remained in the Wilderness ever in a readiness Be thou then ever in a readiness since thou mayst perhaps depart to day Consider there is much to do in dying prepare thy self whilest thou hast time and do it well For this many years were necessary wherefore since thou knowest not whether thou shalt have one day allowed thee why doest thou not this day begin to dispose thy self If when thou makest a short journey and hast furnished and provided thy self of all things fitting yet thou commonly findest something to be forgotten how comes it to pass that for so long a journey as is the Region of Eternity thou thinkest thy self sufficiently provided when thou hast scarce begun to think of it Who is there who does not desire to have served God faithfully two years before death should take him if then thou art not secure of one why doest thou not begin Trust not in thy health or youth for death steals treacherously upon us when we least look for it for according to the saying of Christ our Redeemer it will come in an hour when it is not thought on And the Apostle said the day of the Lord would come like a theef in the night when none were aware of it and when the Master of the house was in a profound sleep Promise not thy self to morrow for thou knowest not whether death will come to night The day before the Children of Israel went forth of Egypt how many of that Kingdom young Lords and Princes of Families promised themselves to doe great matters the next day or perhaps within a year after yet none of them lived to see the morning Wisely did Messodamus who as Guido Bituricensis writes when one invited him forth the next day to dinner answered My friend why doest thou summon me for to morrow since it is many years that I durst not promise any thing for the day following every hour I look for death there is no trust to be given to strength of Body youthful years much riches or humane hopes Hear what God sayes to the Prophet Amos Amos 8. In that day the Sun shall set at midday and I will over-cast the earth with darkness in the day of light What is the setting of the Sun at midday but when men think they are in the middest of their life in the flower of their age when they hope to live many years to possess great wealth to marry rich wives to shine in the world then death comes and over-shadows the brightness of their day with a cloud of sorrow as it happened in the Story related by Alexander Faya Alex. Faya To. 2. Ladislaus King of Hungary and Bohemia sent a most solemn Embassage unto Charles King of France for the conducting home of that Kings Daughter who was espoused unto the Prince his Son The chief Embassador elected for this journey was Vdabricas Bishop of Passaw for whose Attendants were selected 200 principal men of Hungary 200 of Bohemia and other 200 of Austria all persons of eminent Birth and Nobility so richly clad and in so brave an Equipage that they appeared as so many Princes To these the Bishop added an hundred Gentlemen chosen out of his own Subjects so that they passed through France 700 Gentlemen in company most richly accoutred and for the greater Pomp and Magnificence of the Embassage there went along with them 400 beautiful Ladies in sumptuous habits and adorned with most costly jewels the Coaches which carried them were studded with gold and enchased with stones of value Besides all this were many Gifts and rich Garments of inestimable price which they brought along with them for Presents But the very day that this glorious Embassage entred Paris before they came at the place appointed for their entertainment a Curriere arrived with the news of the death of the espoused Prince Such was the grief that struck the heart of the French King with so unexpected a news as he could neither give an answer to the Embassage nor speak with the Embassadour or those who accompanied him and so they departed most sorrowful from Paris and every one returned unto his own home In this manner God knows by the means of death to fill the earth with darkness and sorrow in the day of greatest brightness as he spake by his Prophet Since then thou knowest not when thou art to dye think thou must dye to day and be ever prepared for that which may ever happen Trust in the mercies of God and imploy them incessantly but presume not to deferre thy conversion for a moment For who knows whether thou shalt ever from hence forward have time to invoke him and having invoked him whether thou shalt deserve to be heard Know that the mercy of God is not promised to those who therefore trust in him that they may sin with hope of pardon but unto those who fearing his Divine Justice cease to offend him wherefore St. Cregory says The mercies of Almighty God forget him Greg. in moral who forgets his Justice nor shall he find him merciful who does not fear him just For this it is so often repeated in Scripture That the mercy of God is for those who fear him And in one part it is said The mercy of the Lord from eternity unto eternity is upon those who fear him And in anothâ—r As the Father hath mercy on his Son so the Lord hath mercy on these who fear him In another According to the height from earth unto heaven he has corroborated his mercy upon those that fear him Finally the very Mother of mercy sayes in her Divine Canticle That the mercy of the Lord is from generation to generation upon those who fear him Thou seest then that the Divine mercy is not promised unto all and that thou shalt remain excluded from it whilest thou presumest and doest not fear his justice And
it in this manner for to conceive it as it is in it self the understanding of Angels were not sufficient Here may be applyed that which antiquity admired in two great and famous Painters Apelles went to Rhodes to see Protogenes and not finding him at home took a Pensil and drew a most subtle line charging the Servants that they should tell their Master that he who drew that line was there to seek him When Protogenes returned they told him what had happened who took the Pensil and drew a stroke of another colour through the middle of that which Apelles had drawn and going about his business commanded his Servants that if he came again they should tell him that he whom he sought for had drawn that line through the middle of his It seemed there could not be imagined a higher favour and Courtship than that of the Eternal Father to have given his onely Son and have delivered him up to death for man but through the middle of this favour the Son drew another of most excessive fineness and subtilty which is the institution of the most blessed Sacrament the which some call an Extension of the Incarnation and is a Representation of the Passion and a Character and Memorial of the Wonders of God Here truely did the Son of God draw the stroke of his infinite love and consummated all the Divine benefits not onely giving himself for our benefit and behoof but entring into our very breasts to solicit our love and affection Anacreon writes That standing at defiance with the God of love and having resisted all his arrows the God at last when he had no more to shoot shot himself and penetrating his heart and entrails compell'd him to yield What other are the benefits of our Lord God than so many arrows of love which Man resists and not rendring himself neither at the benefit of Creation Conservation Incarnation or Passion let him at last render himself at this when God shoots himself into him and enters into his very breast and bowels to solicite his love If he resist this also what judgements expect him Whereupon St. Paul sayes that he who presumes to communicate unworthily eats and drinks the judgement of God that is swallows down the whole weight of Divine justice Consider then how dreadful it shall be unto a Sinner when he shall receive a charge not onely of his own being and his own life but also of the being and life or God of the Incarnation Passion Life and Death of Christ our Redeemer who hath so often given himself unto him in the Sacrament of his Body and Blood The Murtherer who stands charged with the life of a man although it be of some wicked person yet fears to be apprehended and brought to judgement how is it then that he who is charged with the life of God trembles not O how fearful a thing is it when a vile creature shall enter into judgement with his Creatour and shall be demanded an account of the blood of Christ whose value is infinite What account can he give of such a benefit and of all the rest which he hath received even from the greatest unto the least when Christ shall say unto him those words of St. Chrisostome Chrysost hom 24. in Math. I when thou hadst no being gave thee one inspired thee with a Soul and placed thee above all things that are upon the Earth I for thee created Heaven Air Sea Earth and all things and yet am dishonoured by thee and held more vile and base than the Devil himself and yet for all this have not ceased to do thee good and bestowed upon thee innumerable benefits For thy sake being God I was content to make my self a Servant was buffetted spit upon and condemned to a punishment of Slaves and to redeem thee from death suffered the death of the Cross In Heaven I interceded for thee and from thence sent thee the Holy Ghost I invited thee unto the Kingdom of Heaven offered my self to be thy Head thy Spouse thy Garment thy House thy Root thy Food thy Drink thy Shepheard thy Brother I chose thee for the Heir of Heaven and drew thee out of darkness unto light To such excesses of love what have we to answer but to stand astonisht and confounded that we have been so ungrateful and given occasion to the Devil of one of the greatest scorns and injuries which could be put upon our Redeemer when he shall say unto him Thou createdst man for him wast born in poverty livedst in labours and diedst in pain and torments I have done nothing for him but would have drunk his blood and sought to damn him into a thousand hells and yet for all this it is I whom he strives to please and not thee Thou doest prepare for him a Crown of eternal glory I desire to torment him in hell and yet he had rather serve me without interest than thee for thy promise of so great a reward I should have been ashamed to have created and redeemed a wretch so ungrateful unto him from whom he hath received so great benefits but since he loves me better than thee let him be mine unto whom he hath so often given up himself We are not onely to give an account of these general benefits but of those which are more particular of the good examples which we have seen of the instructions which we have heard of the inspirations which have been sent us and the Sacraments which we have received we have much to do to correspond with all these Let us therefore tremble at that strict judgement let us tremble at our selves who are so careless of that for which all the care in the world is not sufficient And if it were not for the blood of Christ what would become of us but the time of benefitting our selves by that will be then past now is the time and if we shall now despise and outrage it in what case shall we be Let us not mispend the time of this life since so severe an account will be demanded of all the benefits which we have received one of which is the Time of this temporal life and the blessings of it Let us take heed what use we make of it let us not lose it since we are to answer for every part of it Sopronin Prato spirituali ca. 59. de Beato Thalilaeo This made holy Thalileus tremble and weep bitterly who being asked the cause of his tears answered This time is bestowed upon us wherein to do penance and a most strict account will be demanded of us if we despise it It is not ours for which we are to answer we are not the Lords of time let us not therefore dispose of it for our own pleasure but for the service of God whose it is This consideration were sufficient to with-draw our affection from the goods of this life and to settle it upon those which are eternal since we are
his neighbours face the image of his own death What fear and horrour shall then possess them when they shall hourly expect the success and dire effects portended by these monstrous prodigies All Commerce shall then cease the Market-places shall be unpeopled and the Tribunals remain solitary and silent none shall be then ambitious of honours none shall seek after pastimes and new invented pleasures nor shall the covetous wretch then busie himself with the care of his treasures none shall frequent the Palaces of Kings and Princes but through fear shall forget even to eat and drink all their care shall be employed how to escape those Deluges Earthquake and lightnings seeking for places of security which they shall not meet with Who will then value his own Descent and Linage who the nobleness of his Arms and atchievements who his Wisdom and Talents who will remember the Beauty he hath once doted upon who the sumptuous Buildings he hath reared who his acute and well-composed Writings who his Discretion and Gravity in his discourse And if we shall forget what we our selves most valued and gloried in how shall we remember that of others what remembrance shall there then be of the acts of that great Alexander Of the Learning of Aristotle and the Endowments of the most renowned men of the world Their Fame shall remain from thence forward for ever buried and shall die with the World for a whole Eternity The Mariners when in some furious Tempest they are upon the point of sinking how are they amazed at the rage of the watry Element how grieved and afflicted with the ruine which threatens them what prayers and vows do they send up to Heaven how disinteressed are they of all worldly matters since they fling their wealth and riches into the Sea for which they have run such hazard In what condition shall be then the Inhabitants of the Earth when not onely the Sea with his raging but Heaven and Earth with a thousand prodigies shall affright them when the Sun shall put on a Robe of mourning and amaze them with the horrour of his darkness when the Moon shall look like blood the Stars fall and the Earth shake them with its unquiet trembling when the Whirlwinds shall throw them off their legs and frequent and thick flashes of Lightning dazle their sight and confound their understanding what shall Sinners then do for whose sake all these fearful wonders shall happen § 2. The fear and astonishment which shall fall upon mankind when the whole power and concourse of Nature shall be armed against Sinners may be perceived by the fear which hath been caused by some particular of those changes which are foretold to happen in the end of the World altogether and every one in great excess Let us therefore by the consideration of the particular judge how dreadful shall be the conjunction of so many and so great calamities And to begin with the Earth the most dull and heavy of all the Elements Cardinal Jacobus Papiensis Jacob. Papiens In Epist writing what happened in his own time reports that in the year 1456 upon the 5th of December three hours before day the whole Kingdom of Naples trembled with that violence that some entire Towns were buried in the earth and a great part of many others were overthrown in which perished 60000 persons part swallowed by the earth and part oppressed by the ruins of buildings what security can men look for in this life when they are not secure of the earth they tread upon What firmness can there be in the World when the onely firm thing in it is unstable From whence may not death assault us if it springs from under our feet Evarg l. 6. c. 8. Vide Niceph lib. 18.3 c. 13. But it is not much that the Earthquake of a whole Kingdom should cause so great a ruine since it hath done as much in one City Evagrius writes that the night in which Mauritius the Emperour was married three hours within night the City of Antioch quaked in that manner that most of the Buildings were overthrown and 60000 persons remained buried in her ruins If the Earth was so cruel in those particular Earthquakes what was it in the time of Tiberius Plin. l. 2. c. 84. when according to Pliny twelve of the most principal Cities of Asia were overthrown and sunk into the earth Sen. nat q. l. 6. And yet more cruel was that related by Nicephorus which happened in the time of the Emperour Theodosius which lasted for 6 moneths without intermission Niceph. l. 4. c. 46. and was so universal that almost the whole circuit of the Earth trembled as extending to the Chersonesus Alexandria Bithinia Antioch Hellespont the two Phrygia's the greatest part of the East and many Nations of the West And that we may also say something of the fury of the Sea even against those who were far distant from the rage of his waves and thought themselves secure in their own houses Most horrible was that Earthquake related by S. Jerome St. Hier in vita St. Hilarion and Ammianus Marcellinus who was an eye-witness of it which happened not long after the death of the Emperour Julian wherein not onely the Earth trembled but the Sea out-past his limits as in another Deluge and turned again to involve the Earth as in the first Chaos Ships floated in Alexandria above the loftiest buildings and in other places above high hills and after that the Sea was calmed and returned into his channel many Vessels in that City as Nicephorus writes remained upon the top of-houses Niceph. l. 10. c. 35. and in other parts upon high rocks as witnesseth St. Jerome But let us hear it related by Ammianus Marcellinus Am. Marcel l. 20. whose words are these which follow Procopius the Tyrant being yet alive the 2◠of July the year wherein Valentinian was first time Consul with his Brother the Elements throughout the whole compass of the Earth suddenly fell unto such distempers and disorders as neither true stories have ever mentioned nor false feigned A little before morning the Heavens being first over-cast with a dark Tempest intermixt with frequent thunders and horrid flashes of lightning the whole body of the Earth moved and the Sea being violently driven back retired in such manner as the most hidden bottom of it was discovered so as many unknown sorts of Fishes were seen stretched out upon the mud Those vast profoundities beholding then the Sun whom Nature from the beginning of the world had hid under so immense a mass of waters many Ships remained upon the Oase or floating in small gullets and Fishes were taken up with mens hands gasping upon the dry sands but in short time the waves of the Sea inraged to see themselves banisht from their natural seats lifted themselves up with great fury against the Islands and far extended Coasts of the Continent and what Cities or Buildings they encountred
flourishing and pleasant Orchards consumed without power either to preserve them or themselves All shall burn and with it the World and all the fame and memory of it shall die and that which mortals thought to be immortal shall then end and perish No more shall Aristotle be cited in the Schools nor Vlpian alleaged in the Tribunals no more shall Plato be read amongst the Learned nor Cicero imitated by the Orators no more shall Seneca be admired by the understanding nor Alexander extolled amongst Captains all fame shall then die and all memory be forgotten O vanity of men whose memorials are as vain as themselves which in few years perish and that which lasts longest can endure no longer than the World What became of that Statue of maslie gold which Gorgias the Leontin placed in Delphos to eternize his Name and that of Gabrion in Rome and that of Borosus with the golden tongue in Athens and innumerable others erected to great Captains in brass or hardest marble certainly many years since they are perished or if not yet they shall perish in this great and general Conflagration Onely vertue no fire can burn Three hundred sixty Statues were erected by the Athenians unto Demetrius Phalareus for having governed their Common-wealth ten years with great vertue and prudence but of so little continuance were these Trophies that those very Emblems which were raised by gratitude were soon after destroyed by envy and he himself who saw his Statues set up in so great a number saw them also pulled down but he still retained this comfort which Christians may learn from him that beholding how they threw his Images unto the ground he could say at least They cannot overthrow those Vertues for which they were erected If they were true Vertues he said well for those neither envy can demolish nor humane power destroy and which is more the divine power will not in this general destruction of the World consume them but will preserve in his eternal memory as many as shall persevere in goodness and die in his holy grace for onely Charity and Christan Vertues shall not end when the World ends The sight of those Triumphs exhibited by Roman Captains when they conquered some mighty and powerful Kings lasted but a while and the memories of the Triumphers not much longer and now there are few who know that Metellus triumphed over King Jugurtha Aquilius over King Aristonicus Atilius over King Antiochus Marcus Antonius over the King of Armenia Pompey over King Mithridates Aristobulus and Hiarbas Emilius over King Perseus and the Emperour Aurelius over Cenâ—bia the Queen of the Palmirens If few know this but dumb Books and dead Paper when those shall end what shall then become of their memories How many Histories hath fire consumed and are now no more known then if they had never been Written neither to doe nor write can make the memory of man immortal Aristarchus wrote more than a thousand Commentaries of several Subjects of which not one line remains at present Chrysippus wrote seaven hundred Volumes and now not one leaf is extant Theophrastus wrote thre hundred and sarce three or four remain Above all is that which is reported of Dionysius Grammaticus that he wrote three thousand five hundred works and now not one sheet appears But yet more is that which Jamlicus testifies of the great Trimegistus that he composed thirty six thousand five hundred twenty five books and all those are as if he had not written a letter for 4 or 5 little and imperfect Treatises which pass under his name are none of his Time even before the end of time leaves no Books nor Libraries By the assistance of Demetrius Phalareus King Ptolomy collected a great Library in Alexandria in which were stored all the Books he could gather from Caldee Greece and Aegypt which amounted to seventy thousand bodies but in the Civil Wars of the Romans it perished by that burning which was caused by Julius Caesar Another famous Library amongst the Greeks of Policrates and Phisistratus was spoyled by Xerxes The Library of Bizantium which contained a hundred and twenty thousand Books was burnt in the time of Basiliscus That of the Roman Capitol was in the time of Commâ—dus turned into ashes by lightning and what have we now of the great Library of Pergamus wherein were two hundred thousand Books Even before the end of the World the most constant things of the World die And what great matter is it if those memorials in paper be burnt since those in brass melt and those of marble perish That prodigious Amphitheater Vide Lips In Amph. which Stability Taurus raised of stone was burnt in the time of Nero the hard marble not being able to defend it self from the soft flames The great riches of Corinth in gold and silver were melted when the Town was fired those precious mettals could neither with their hard-resist nor with their value hire a friend to defend them from those furious flames If this particular burning in the most flourishing time of the World caused so great a ruine what shall that general one which shall make an end of the World and all things with it § 5. Let us now consider as we have already in Earthquakes and Deluges what great astonishment and destruction hath sometime happened by some particular burnings that by them we may conceive the greatness of the horror and ruine which will accompany that general one of the whole world What lamentations were in Rome when it burnt for seven dayes together What shrieks were heard in Troy when it was wholly consumed with flames What howling and astonishment in Pentapolis when those Cities were destroyed with fire from heaven Some say they were ten Cities Strabo thirteen Josephus and Lira five that which of faith is that there were four at least who with all their Inhabitants were consumed What weeping was therein Jerusalem when they beheld the House of God the Glory of their Kingdom the Wonder of the World involved in fire and smoke And that we may draw nearer unto our own times when lightning from Heaven fell upon Stockholme the capital City of Sweden and burnt to death above 1600 persons besides an innumerable multitude of Women and Children who hoping to escape the fire at land fled into the ships at Sea but overcharging them were all drowned Imagin what that people felt when they saw their houses and goods on fire and no possibility of saving them when the Husband heard the shrieks and cries of his dying Wife the Father of his little Children and unawares perceived himself so encompassed with flames that he could neither relieve them nor free himself What grief Albert. Krant Suec l. 5. c. 3. what anguish possest the hearts of those unfortunate creatures when to avoid the fury of the fire they were forced to trust themselves to the no less cruel waves when by their own over-hasty crowdings and indiscretion they saw their Ships
and work stupendious wonders and being of a great and generous spirit confessed his fear saying as we have it from St. Paul Heb. 12. That he was terrified and trembled Let a man now consider how memorable was that day unto the Hebrew Nation wherein they saw such Visions heard such Thunders and felt such Earthquakes as it is no wonder that the great fear which fell upon them in that day of Prodigies made them think they could not live Yet was all this nothing in respect of the terrour of that great day wherein the Lord of Angels is to demand an account of the violation of the Law For after the sending far greater plagues than those of Egypt after burning in that Deluge of fire the Sinners of the world the Saints remaining still alive that that Article of our Faith may be literally fulfill'd From thence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead The Heavens shall open and over the Valley of Josaphat the Redeemer of the World attended by all the Angels of Heaven in visible forms of admirable splendour shall with a Divine Majesty descend to judge it Before the Judge shall be born his Standard Chrys Tom. 3. Serm. de Cruce which St. Chrysostome and divers other Doctors affirm shall be the very Cross on which he suffered Then shall the just such being the force and vigour of their spirits as will elevate their terrene and heavy bodies meet as the Apostle sayes their Redeemer in the Air who at his issuing forth of the Heavens shall with a voice that may be heard of all the world pronounce this his Commandment Arise ye dead and come unto Judgement Which shall be proclaimed by four Angels in the four Quarters of the World with such vehemence that the sound shall pierce unto the infernal Region from whence the Souls of the damned shall issue forth and re-enter their bodies which shall from thenceforward suffer the terrible torments of Hell The Souls also of those who died onely in Original sin shall come and possess again their bodies free from pain or torment and the Souls of the blessed filling their bodies with the four gifts of Glory shall make them more resplendent than the Sun and with the gift of agility shall joyn themselves with those just who remain alive in the Air in their passible bodies which being yet mortal and therefore not able to endure those vehement affections of the heart of joy desire reverence love and admiration of Christ shall then die and in that instant behold the Divine Essence after which their Souls shall be again immediately united to their bodies before they can be corrupted or so much as fall unto the ground and thence forward continue glorious for in the moment wherein they die they shall be purified from those noxious humours and qualities wherewith our bodies are now infected And therefore it was convenient they should first die that being so cleansed from all filth they might by the restitution of their blessed Souls receive the gifts of Glory Considering then the so different conditions of the Souls of men who can express the joy of those happy Souls when they shall take possession of their now glorious and beautiful bodies which were long since eaten by worms or wild beasts some four some five thousand years agoe turned into dust and ashes What thanks shall they give to God who after so long a separation hath restored them to their antient Companions What gratulations shall the Souls of them who lived in austerity and penance give unto their own bodies for the mortifications and rigours which they have suffered for the hair-shirts disciplines and fasts which they have observed To the contrary the Souls of the damned how shall they rage and curse their own flesh since to please and pamper it hath been the occasion of their torments and eternal unhappiness Which miserable wretches wanting the gift of agility and so not able of themselves to go unto the place of Justice shall be hurried against their wills by Devils all trembling and full of fear § 2. The Reprobates being then in the Valley of Josaphat and the Predestinate in the Air the Judge shall appear above Mount Olivet Zach. 1. unto whom the clouds shall serve as a Chariot and his most glorious body shall cast forth rayes of such incomparable splendour as the Sun shall appear but as a coal for even the Predestinate shall shine as the Sun but the light and brightness of Christ shall as far exceed them as the Sun does the least Star The which most admirable sight shall be yet more glorious by those thousand millions of excellent and heavenly spirits which shall attend him who having formed themselves acreal bodies of more or less splendour according to their Hierarchy and Order shall fill the whole space betwixt Heaven and Earth with unspeakable beauty and variety The Saviour of the World shall sit upon a Throne of great Majesty made of a clear and beautiful Cloud his countenance shall be most milde and peaceable towards the good and though the same most terrible unto the bad In the like manner out of his sacred wounds shall issue beams of light towards the just full of love and sweetness but unto sinners full of fire and wrath who shall weep bitterly for the evils which issue from them Psa 109. 1 Cor. 15. Phil. 2. So great shall be the Majesty of Christ that the miserable Damned and the Devils themselves notwithstanding all the hate they bear him shall yet prostrate themselves and adore him and to their greater confusion acknowledge him for their Lord and God And those who have most blasphemed and outraged him shall then bow before him fulfilling the promises of the eternal Father That all things should be subject unto him That he would make his enemies his footstool and That all knees should bend before him Here shall the Jews to their greater confusion behold him whom they have crucified and here shall the evil Christians see him whom they have again crucified with their sins here also shall the Sinners behold him in glory whom they have despised for the base trifles of the earth What an amazement will it be to see him King of so great Majesty who suffered so much ignominy upon the Cross and even from those whom he redeemed with his most precious blood What will they then say who in scorn crowned the sacred temples of the Lord with thorns put a Reed in his hand for a Scepter cloathed him in some old and broken Garment of purple buffeted and spit upon his blessed face And what will they then say unto whose consciences Christ hath so often proposed himself in all his bitter passion and painful death and hath wrought nothing upon them but a continuance of greater sins valuing his precious blood shed for their salvation no more than if it were the blood of a Tyger or their greatest enemy I know not how
so in the World there is no other thing as St. John saith Ep. 1 c. 2. but the Concupiscence of the flesh the Concupiscence of the eyes and the Pride of life that is Lust and exorbitancy in pleasures Covetousness and gaping after riches Ambition and desire of honours Of those three Monsters is composed the Monster of Monsters which we call the World the which hath also his seaven heads and ten horns to wit the Seaven deadly Sins by which are impugned the ten Commandments and the observation of the whole Law of God Let us also consider the mysterious disposition of the parts of this Beast The feet are said to be of a Bear the body of a Leopard and the head of a Lion because all the inventions additions stratagems and designs of the World are founded upon the pleasure and delights of the appetite which are natural and upon this foundation our malice has builded riches and honours which are not natural but humane inventions Riches are the body of the World and upon them is raised Pride as the head of that body Besides Riches are most conveniently placed in the middle between Pleasure and Honours as being necessary for the supportation of both without which neither can be maintained Avarice therefore forms the body of this Beast that it may equally nourish Pleasure and Ambition Let us then propose unto our selves the Image of this World under the form of this Monster and Chimaera as well to demonstrate the confusion and turmoyl of it as to signifie unto us that the whole substance and being of it consists meerly in the imagination and apparence For such a Monster composed of the several parts of divers Beasts which hath no being or foundation in reason but is onely framed by the fancy the Philosophers call a Chimaera and such truly are the things of this World inconstant confused and troubled and have no substance or being in themselves but are onely deceit and apparence Some seem great and are but little others cozen us more appear to be goods and are really evils To understand this better and know the vanity of the World we are to suppose that humane malice hath corrupted and poisoned it by inventing new gusts and pleasures unto which we have added by our imagination what they wanted of being and reality and by diverting things from those proper ends for which they were ordained have made them all vain and the World a Monster of many heads for the head of things is as Philo calls it the end and the things of the World having left their utmost and true end which is one God and disordered themselves by the many ends of particular vices have made that Beast which is said not to have one but many heads which makes it so monstrous and deformed Men follow not in the use of things their proper end which is to please and serve God but aim at the serving of their passions and satisfie their appetites which as they are divers so they have divers ends and respects from whence results the monstrosity of so many heads and faces From the multitude then of ends follows this deformity which includes and is alwayes accompanied with vanity For the world following this vanity of adulterate ends contrary to reason and nature leaves the true and lawful end which is the service of God and that which leaves its proper end becomes useless and vain If you should blind the eyes of some excellent Marks-man his art and skill were lost and his Bow would become unprofitable because he remained deprived of that by which he was to attain his end So all things being created to this end that man by them might serve God this end wanting they became vain and useless By this example may be clearly seen how vain is the World since it doth not direct those things it enjoyes for the service of the universal Creatour but for other vain and imaginary ends by which it becomes wholly it self a vanity The multitude of Gold Silver Plate Jewels precious Furniture and other Ornaments which we glory in are they perhaps for the service of God Let St. Alexius tell us whether he chose them as means to that end and if they be not for the service of the Lord of all what are they all but vanity Abundance of Delights Masques Dances Feasts Entertainments are they perhaps to please God Let St. Bruno tell us and if they be not for that purpose what are they all but vanity Majesty ostentation of Titles and Honours are they perhaps for the service of God Let St. Josaphat tell us who fled from his Temporal Kingdom that he might better apply himself unto the service of the King of Heaven Vain is all the greatness of the Earth if that of Heaven be not gained by it The most precious thing failing which is the right end all besides becomes vain frivolous and of no esteem §. 2. This deviation and wandering of worldly things from their proper and due end is sufficient to declare their vanity and disorder But there is yet another errour in them which makes them appear much more vain which is that they not onely goe astray from their first and great end which is the service of God but also fail and hold no proportion with that second end which humane vices propose unto them here That which our appetite pretends in Riches Pomp and Honours which it hath invented is the felicity of this life and to that they are so little proper as they have rather disposed things for our misery and torment and therefore vain are all our fancies and inventions To maintain and uphold our honour what Lawes Rights and irregular Customs hath the World invented to the great danger of our lives and the hinderance of our pleasures It hath made honour so brittle that with one word whosoever list may take it from us which is the occasion that many live dishonoured and if they will recover it it must cost their lives fortunes or quiet What greater madness than that the thing which they have made of the greatest esteem in the World should be subject to such an inconvenience and of so cursed a condition that it is very easie to lose and most difficult to regain that any one may bereave us of it and he which hath taken it from us cannot restore it that it is in another mans hand to destroy it and not in our own to repair it What law in the World more unjust that if an infamous person give thee the lye thou remainest dishonoured although he lied that gave it and that honour which he by one word hath taken from thee thou canst not recover by another What greater folly than to fight for honour and maintain truth by quarrelling as if he were the most honourable person and spake the truest which were the strongest especially being so prejudicial to the most vertuous for it commonly happens that those who have the
should behold by what they are nourished would cause a loathing The Lamprey which was the delicacy of the Romans feeds but upon mud and sluch There is no meat more neat and clean than bread hearbs and water the food of Penitents How narrow is the Sphere of all our pleasures which besides the short time that they endure are mingled with wormwood of many pains and griefs which accompany precede and follow them The Adulterer how many troubles and dangers does he usually pass before he compass his desire in the enjoying what fears and suspicions assault him and when it is past if he think seriously of the sin what remorse and repentance afflict him and oftentimes how many long diseases and sharp pains succeed that which lasted but a moment Let us compare our pleasures with the griefs which follow them and we shall find those far to surpass the other The several sorts of gusts whereof the touch is capable exceed not two or three but the dictinct sorts of pains which afflict it are without number The pain of the Sciatica the Stone the Gout the Tooth-ach the Head-ach besides innumerable other griefs and violences most intense and horrible which follow the tortures invented by Tyrants The greatest pleasure of the sense holds no comparison with the grief endured by the separation of a member or the pain suffered by him who hath the Stone Sciatica or some violent disease in extremity § 3. Well may be seen the poverty and insufficiency of the pleasures of this life in that our appetite still strives to enlarge them by inventing new and artificial entertainments which by their multitude may supply the defects of those which are natural Well may appear the irksome weariness of this life by all our endeavours which aym at nothing more than to give it some ease and relief How many kinds of curious Stuffs have been woven to please us in our Garments what diversitie of easie Beds and Couches have been found out what close Chairs Litters and Coaches have with excessive cost and charges been invented and the invention of them is no sooner known but we pursue it with that pride and haste that they esteem themselves unhappy who enjoy them last although their use be no wayes necessary Fra. Pruden de Sandoval Hist De Car. 5. P. 2. l. 28. See 36. The Bishop of Pampelona Historiographer to Charles the Fift writes that in the year 1546 there were no Coaches in Spain and that much about the same time one being brought thither for the Emperours own person whole Cities ran out to see it and admired it as if it had been a Centaure or some Monster And now what more frequent The invention because easie was so pleasing that in few years people of very ordinary condition began to use them in so much as it was thought fit within a very short time after to prohibit them which is more to be admired in respect of the simple and homely way which a little before was used by the most eminent persons They write of the Duke of Medina Sidonia who for wealth and nobility is one of the greatest in Spain that when he and the Dutchess went to visit our Ladies de Regla a Church of great devotion in Andalusia they went in a Cart drawn with Oxen the which was in the year 1540. Shortly after within five or six years came the Coach into Spain whereof we have spoken and within nine or ten years there was such a multitude of them that by a publick Edict in the year 1577 all Coaches with two horses were forbidden because many of inferiour condition used them both to the destruction of many serviceable horses and to the prejudice of their own wealth and modesty With such haste doth our humane appetite run after what it conceives commodious piecing out with art that which seemed short in nature The same happened as Dio Cassius reports with Litters which were brought into Rome in the time of Julius Caesar but quickly as Suetonius reports it was necessary for the same Julius Caesar to forbid them The same hath and doth pass in costly Apparel which is so equal a disorder that Tully doubts whether is more indecent for the nature of man The use of Coaches or the curiosity of Garments and calls them both impudent and shameless And truely as they are used by many they are no less The same Cicero said that the Roman Souldiers counted their Arms as the members of their bodies because they were no less troubled with the loss of the one than the other The same account many make of their neat and curious garments and are no less sensible if their cloathes chance to be disordered than if they had a member broken or out of joynt Macrobius writes of Quintus Hortensius a Roman Senatour that he was so curious in ordering his Garments by a large Looking-glass made on purpose and disposing the plates of his Gown which he gathered after into a quaint knot after the Roman fashion that being Consul and going into the Forum in all this nice formality accompanied with his Collegue it happened that in a great press and croud of people his fellow Consul chanced to disorder a little the plates of his Gown which he took so hainously that he commenced an action of offence against him which the Romans called de Injuria as if he had broken his arm or some other member What shall I say of Ornaments so costly and so foolish that even the World it self seems to condemn them in regard that being now glutted with the Garnitures of silk and gold it falls to make Embroideries of straw as if it had already learnt and understood that for the use of Garments it is one and the same thing to adorn them with straw as with gold and silver and for this reason Laces and Points made of straw are made use of in lieu of gold and silver But after the divers Inventions of Apparel who can reckon the several wayes invented to please our senses The mixture of several Meats for the taste the confection of Sweet-pasts and Persumes for the smell the melodious Musick of diver Instruments for the hearing the Games Pictures and Shows for the sight which Entertainments have been exhibited even with the spilling of humane blood Witness the Gladiators of Rome and the Bulls of Spain All this variety of pleasures which the appetite hath invented are an evident signe of the poverty and insufficiency of nature since all this multitude of artificial contents doth not satisfie it nor in any sort equal our natural griefs For so sleight a matter is lost a thing so great as is Eternity For these we abolish the Law of God from our hearts and displease our Redeemer who would reward the contempt of those poor and transitory pleasures of the earth with great and special favours from heaven If we will not therefore despise them for what they are in themselves let us
but greater if he live them ill though with content and therefore supposing so many miseries we cannot complain of God for having given us a short life but of our selves for having made it a bad one Ambr. Ser. quadrages Finally as St. Ambrose sayes Our life being compassed with so many miseries as that death seems rather a shelter for evils than a punishment God was pleased that it should be short that the vexations and misfortunes of it which cannot be counterpoised with any joyes of the earth might be more supportable At least if this life with so many miseries do not displease us yet let the eternal with all her felicities content us better and let us not endeavour less for the immortal life of heaven than we doe for this mortal one of earth And therefore as St. Austin sayes Augus trac 5. in Johan hom 57. If thou run a hundred miles for this life how many oughtest thou to run for the eternal and if thou make such speed to obtain a few dayes and uncertain how oughtest thou to run for life eternal CAP. VIII How little is man whilest he is temporal IF we consider the greatest thing in nature which is Man we shall see how little he is whilest he is temporal What is man saith Seneca a frail vessel broken with the least motion a most weak body naked by nature and unarmed necessitous of Mothers help subject to the injuries of fortune impatient of cold and labour composed of things infirm and fluid and those very things without which we cannot live as smell taste watching meat and drink are mortal unto us The wise Solon did not answer more favourably when they demanded of him Anton. in Mel. Stob. Ser. 96. what was Man He is saith he a corruption in his birth a beast in his life and food for worms when he is dead Aristotle being asked the same question answered That Man was an Idea of weakness Dionys Rikel de noviss arti 15. a spoil of time a game of fortune an image of inconstancy a ballance of envy and calamity and the rest is of flegme and choler Secundus the Philosopher being also demanded the same by Adrian the Emperour answered That Man was an incorporated understanding a phantasm of time a looker upon life a slave of death a travelling passenger a guest of place a toyling soul a habitation for a short time And St. Bernard saith That Man in this time of mortality is but a beast of carriage And the same Saint in another place sayes What is Man but a vessel of dung and in his meditations he adds If thou markest what he voids at his mouth and nose and at the other sinks of his body thou hast not in all thy life beheld a more noisome dunghill In the same part he saith Man is no other thing but unclean seed a sack of dung a food for worms Innocen de Contempla mundi lib. 1. c. 1. More fully Innocent the Pope I have considered saith he with tears what Man was made of what he is and what he shall be He was made of earth and conceived in sin and born for punishment He does things evil which are not lawful things filthy which are not decent and things vain which are not expedient He shall be the food of fire meat for worms and a mass of corruption O vile indignity of humane condition O unworthy condition of humane baseness Behold the plants and trees They produce flowers and leaves and fruit and thou nothing but nits lice and worms They furnish us with oyl wine and balsom thou affords nothing but flegme dung and urine Those send forth a fragrant odour and thou abominable stink Such as is the tree such is the fruit A good tree cannot bring forth bad fruit and what is man but a tree reverst This is the saying of this holy Pope And such is man even in his youth and best time But if he reach old age which is esteemed as a felicity the same Innocentius adds His heart is afflicted his head shakes his spirits languish his breath smells his face wrinkles his stature bends his eyes wax dimme his joynts quake his nose runs his hands tremble his hair falls his teeth rot his ears grow deaf Neither is he more changed in body than in mind An old man is easily displeased hardly pacified believes quickly long before disabused is greedy covetous peevish froward still complaining quick in talking slow in hearing admires what 's past contemns what 's present sighs grieves languishes and is alwayes infirm It may also appear what Man is by the stuff whereof he is made The first man God made of Clay mixing together the vilest and grossest Elements The rest of men who have succeeded have been made of a matter more loathsome and unclean and worse is that wherewith they are nourisht in their Mothers wombs and their birth is accompanied with shame grief and pollution which Pliny considering speaks in this manner It is a compassion nay a shame to think of the original of the proudest of living creatures which is man who often is abortive by the smell of a newly extinguisht candle From such beginnings sprung our Tyrants from hence the butcherly minde of those cruel Hangmen Thou which gloriest in the strength of body thou which embracest the gifts of fortune and thinkest not thy self her Servant but her Son and Darling thou who settest thy mind wholly upon victories thou who pufft up with success holdest thy self a God see how thou mightest have perished even before thou wert with so little a thing as a snuff of a candle and mayest yet with a smaller matter prickt with the little tooth of an Adder or like Anacreon the Poet choked with the stone of a grape or like Fabius the Roman Senatour suffocated with a hair in a draught of milk Thus farre Pliny who not onely admired the baseness of the nature of man but the easiness of his end Consider also wherein Man ends Man whilest he lives saith Pope Innocent engenders lice and vermin Lib. 3. c. 1. when he is dead grubs and worms whilest he lives affords nothing but dung and vomits when he is dead stink and rottenness alive he feeds but one man but dead a multitude of worms What thing more noisome than a humane Carcase what more horrible than a dead Man he whose embraces were most acceptable when he was alive even his sight is troublesome when he is dead What do riches banquets or delights profit us they shall not free us from death they shall not defend us from the worms they shall not take away our stink and ill savour He who even now was seated in a glorious Throne is now flung into an obscure Tomb he who lately feasted in a sumptuous Sala is now feasted upon by worms in a dark Sepulcher All this is from this contemplative Pope Bernard c. 3. Meditat. St. Bernard also considering this
undefiled superiour to all grief and pleasure that thou do nothing without a good end nothing feignedly or falsely and that thou regard not what another man does or has to doe Besides that all things which happen thou receive as sent from thence from whence thou thy self art derived Finally that thou attend death with a quiet and temperate minde This is from that great Philosopher CAP. X. The dangers and prejudices of things Temporal THe least evil which we receive from the goods of this world is to deceive and frustrate our hopes and he comes well off whom they forsake onely with a mock For there are many who not onely fail of what they desire but meet with what they abhorre and in place of ease and content meet with trouble and vexation and instead of life finde death and that which they most affect turns often to their destruction Absolon being very beautiful gloried in nothing more than his hair but even those became the instrument of his death and those which he daily combed as if they had been threads of gold served as a halter to hang him upon an Oak To how many have riches which they loved as their life been an occasion of death This is the calamity of the goods of the earth which the Wise-man noted when he said Eccle. 5. Another dangerous evil I beheld under the Sun riches preserved for the destruction of their owner This is the general and incurable infirmity of riches that when they are possessed with affection they turn into the ruine of their possessors either in soul or body and oftentimes in both in so much as we are not to look upon temporal goods as vain and deceitful but as Parricides and our betrayers With much reason the two great Prophets Isaias and Ezechiel compare Egypt by which is signified the world and humane prosperity unto a reed which if you lean upon it breaks and the splinters wound your hands No less brittle than a reed are temporal goods but more dangerous Besides the other faults wherewith they may be charged a very great one is the hurts they doe to life it self for whose good they are desired and are commonly not onely hurtful unto the life eternal but prejudicial even unto the temporal How many for their desire to obtain them have lost the happiness of heaven and the quiet felicity of the earth enduring before death a life of death and by their cares griefs fears troubles labours and afflictions which are caused even by the greatest abundance and felicity before they enter into the hell of the other world suffer a hell in this And therefore St. John writes in his Apocalyps Apoc. 20. that Death and Hell were cast into a lake of fire because the life of sinners of whom he speaks according to the letter is a death and hell and he sayes that this Life and this Hell shall be cast into the other hell and he who places his felicity in the goods of the earth shall pass from one death unto another and from one hell unto another Let us look upon the condition whereunto Aman was brought by his abundance of temporal fortunes into so excessive a pride that because he was denied a respect which was no wayes due unto him he lived a life of death smothering in his breast a hell of rage madness and hatred nothing in this life as he himself confest giving him ease or content What condition more like unto death and hell than this for as in hell there is a privation of all joyes and delights so oftentimes it happens in the greatest felicities upon earth The same which Aman confessed Dionysius felt when he was King of Sicily to wit that he took no content at all in the greatest delights of his Kingdom Tull. in Tuscul q. Boet. l. de consol And therefore Boetius sayes that if we could take away the veil from those who sit in Thrones are clad in Purple and compassed about with Guards of Souldiers we should see the chains in which their Souls are enthralled conformable unto which is that of Plutarch that in name onely they are Princes but in every thing else Slaves A marvelous thing it is that a man compassed about with delights pastimes and pleasures should joy in nothing and in the middest of dancing drinking feasting and dainty fair should find a hell in his heart That in hell amongst so many torments sinners should not finde comfort is no marvail at all but that in this life in the middest of felicity and affluence of all delights he should finde no satisfaction is a great mystery A great mischief than is humane prosperity that amongst all its contents it affords no room for one true one But this is Divine providence that as the Saints who despised what was temporal had in their souls in the very middest of torments a heaven of joy and pleasure as St. Lawrence who in the middest of flames found a Paradice in his heart so the Sinner who neither esteems nor loves any thing besides those of the world should also in the middest of his regalo's and delights finde a life of hell and torments anticipating that whereunto after death he is to enter and be confined So great are the cares and griefs occasioned by the goods of the earth that they oppress those who most enjoy them and shut up the door to all mirth leaving them in a sad night of sorrow This is that which was represented unto the Prophet Zacharias Zach. 5. when before that the Devils came to fetch away the Vessel wherein the woman was enclosed to be carried into a strange Region in the Land of Sanaar there to dwell for ever the mouth of it was stopt up with a talent of Lead and she imprisoned in darkness and obscurity signifying thereby that before a worldling is snatcht away by the Devils to be carried into the mournful land of hell even in this life he is hood-winked and placed in so great a darkness as he sees not one beam of the light of truth so that no content or compleat joy can ever enter into his heart § 2. The reason why the goods of this life are troublesome and incommodious even to life it self is for the many dangers they draw along with them the obligations wherein they engage us the cares which they require the fears which they cause the affronts which they occasion the straights whereunto they put us the troubles which they bring along with them the disordinate desires which accompany them and finally the evil conscience which they commonly have who most esteem them With reason did Christ our Redeemer call riches thorns because they ensnare and wound us with danger losses unquietness and fears Wherefore Job said of the rich man Job 20. Greg. l. 15. Mor. c. 12. When he shall be filled he shall be straightned he shall burn and all manner of grief shall fall upon him The which St.
felicity in pamparing himself here will be tormented hereafter and he who is unjustly flattered and honoured here shall be justly scornd and despised there This was well declared by St. Vincent Ferrer in a comparison of the Faulcon and the Hen. The Hen whilest she lives seeks her food in the dirt and dunghils and at best feeds now and then upon some bran or light corn The Faulcon to the contrary is cherished carried upon his Masters fist and fed with the brains of Birds and Partridges but after death they change their conditions for the Faulcon is flung upon the dunghil and the Hen served to the table of Kings As Jacob changed his hands placing his right hand upon his Grandchild who stood upon his left side and his left hand upon him who stood upon the right preferring the younger before the elder so God uses to change his hands after death and preferre the younger who are the poor and despised in this life For this Christ our Redeemer pronounces so many Woes against the rich of this world Woe be unto you rich who rejoyce in this world yee shall weep in the next Woe be unto you who are now filled you shall hunger hereafter Woe be unto them who have their heaven here it is to be feared a hell will succeed it Let us tremble at what was spoken unto the rich glutton Thou didst receive pleasure in this life and for this eternal evils succeeded thee after death changing hands with poor Lazarus who received evils in this life and after death enjoyed the pleasures of the other The rich man who wanted not abundance of precious wines in this life wanted a drop of water to cool his tongue in the next And Lazarus who here wanted the crums of bread that fell from his table was feasted with the Supper of eternal happiness The Prophet Jeremias writes that Nabuzardan carried a way the rich Captives unto Babylon Jer. 39. and left the poor in Jerusalem because the Devil carries away the slayes and lovers of riches unto Babylon which is the confusion of hell and leaves the poor in spirit in Jerusalem which is the vision of peace that they may there enjoy the clear sight of God The felicity of temporal goods blots out of our memories the greatness of the eternal it makes us forget God and the happiness of the other life it blindes those who possesse them busies them wholly in things of the Earth and gives them that means and opportunities for vices which the poor have not who either work or serve their Masters or pray Wherefore the enjoying of temporal goods is so dangerous 1 Ti. 6. that St. Paul calls Riches the Snare of the Devil And if in ail Snares there be falshood and danger how false and dangerous must be the Snares of Satan Laer. l. 9. c. 4. Even Diogenes was aware of this truth and therefore calls them a Vail of malice and perdition St. Hieron in Algas Ep. 84. St. Jerome says that anciently there were too notable Proverbs in prejudice of the Rich The first That he who was very rich could not be a good man The second That he who was rich had either been a bad man or was the heir of a bad man and admonishes us that the name of Rich in the holy Scripture is most commonly taken in an ill sense and to the contrary in a favourable that of the poore The truth is that the holy Scripture is full of Contumelies against the rich of this world and above all the Son of God who uttered most notable and feareful expressions against those who abound in temporal goods and therefore when he taught the Beatitudes he gave the first of them unto the Poor and in preaching the Woes he gave the first unto the Rich. And upon another occasion said it was impossible for the Rich to enter into the Kingdom of heaven And although he was willing to mitigate so hard a Sentence yet he said it was difficult and so difficult as might make the rich of the world to tremble for he assure us it is easier for a Camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of heaven But with God nothing is impossible From all that which hath been said may be gathered how worthy of contempt and hatred are all temporal goods since they deceive us not onely of our content in this life but of our felicity in the other and even of God himself What implacable hatred would a faithful and honest Spouse conceive against that Traitor who counterfeiting the shape and habit of her Husband should violate her Chastity how would she abhorre him when she knew the injury he had done her in a matter of that importance In the same manner are we betrayed by temporal felicity who appearing unto its in the likeness of the true happiness makes our hearts to adulterate with it and leave our lawful Spouse and true good indeed which is God For certainly there is no perfect felicity but in his service and complyance with his holy will in this life that we may enjoy him eternally in the next and therefore temporal goods which by their deceit cozen us and make us lose the eternal ought not to be loved and followed but hated as a thousand deaths THE FOURTH BOOK OF THE DIFFERENCE BETWIXT THE TEMPORAL and ETERNAL CAP. I. Of the greatness of things Eternal ALthough the littleness and baseness of things temporal be in themselves such as we have already seen yet unto him who shall consider the greatness and Majesty of the eternal whereof we now begin to treat they will appear much less and more contemptible For such is the greatness of that glory that St. Austin falls into these speeches Augus in Man If it were requisite every day to suffer torments or to remain in hell it self for some long time to the end we might behold Christ in his glory and enjoy the company of Saints were it much to suffer what is grievous and painful upon earth that we might be partakers of so great a happiness which speech of St. Austin is not to be taken as an exaggeration as neither that which is attributed to St. Jerome That it is a wonder that the stones under the feet of those who shall be damned convert not into roses as an anticipated solace of those evils which they are to suffer And that to the contrary those under the feet of them who are to be saved turn not into thorns to wound and chastise them for their sins since for so short troubles they are to receive unspeakable joyes This greatness of eternal goodness consists not onely in the eternity of their duration but in their intention also as being supreme and without limit in their excellency And therefore we ought not to think much at the suffering of a thousand years torments if for them we might obtain those blessings but for
one day Whereupon St. Austin sayes Such is the beauty of righteousness Augus de libero arb 3. such the joy of that eternal light of that immutable truth and wisdom that although we were not to continue in it above one day yet for so short a time a thousand years in this life replenished with delights and abundance of all goods temporal were justly to be despised For it was not spoken amiss that Better is one day in thy Courts above a thousand So that whereas it is commonly said that for eternal joyes we ought to leave the temporal and frail goods of the earth which are short and transitory St. Austin sayes that if those of heaven were short and these of earth Eternal yet we ought to forsake these for those This is confirmed by that which is written by Thomas de Cantiprato and others Lib. 2. c. 57. N. 67. That the Devil being demanded by an Exorcist what he would suffer to see God answered That he would suffer all that the damned in hell Men and Devils were to suffer until the day of Judgement onely that he might enjoy the sight of him but for some short time How can we then complain of the short troubles of this life which are to be recompenced with the clear vision of God for ever when his professed Enemy would suffer so much onely to enjoy it for an insant Cato having onely read that discourse of Socrates concerning immortality thought it nothing to part with this life and tear his bowels in pieces that he might enjoy that eternal liberty of the Soul freed from the incumbrances and oppressions of the Body Jo. Herol in Promp Exem Heroldus writes that Frier Jordan General of the holy Order of the preaching Friers exorcizing a possest person the Devil amongst other answers to his demands told him That he had never seen the face of God but onely during the twinkling of an eye and that to see it so much longer he would willingly suffer all the pains of his companions until the day of Judgement Frier Jordan remained astonished at this answer and recalling himself a little he said unto him Thou hast said well But declare me his beauty by some similitude or representation Thou hast moved a foolish question replied the Spirit for there is no expressing of it But to give some satisfaction to thy desire I say that if the beauties of all Creatures Heavens Earth Flowers Pearls and all other things that can give any delight to the sight were all comprised in one onely thing if every one of the Stars yielded as much light as the Sun and the Sun shined as bright as all they together all this united so together would be in respect of the beauty of God Almighty as a dark pitchy night in respect of the clearest and brightest day Where by the way it is to be observed that the Devils never saw God clearly as the Angels in glory now behold him but onely by the excellency of their nature attained to some particular and advantagious knowledge of his beauty and divine perfections and joy which resulted from that knowledge And if to enjoy that once again for so short a time they would endure those torments for so long a space what shall it be to behold him clearly in his glory Certainly to be rosted pluckt in pieces with pincers to be burnt alive for a thousand years were well employed to enjoy that felicity but for a day What shall it be to possess it for an eternity when the joy also of each day shall be equivalent to many years Joh. Major Ex. 14. Ex Coll. Psal 89. Wherefore Johannes Major reports that a certain Monk being at Mattins with the other Religious of his Monastery and coming to that verse of the Psalm where it is said A thousand years in the presence of God are but as yesterday which is already past began to imagine with himself how it might be possible and remaining in the Quire as his manner was after the end of Mattins to perfect his devotions he humbly besought the Lord to grant him the true understanding of that place which he had no sooner done but he perceived a little Bird in the Quire that with flying up and down before him by little and little with her most melodious singing insensibly drew him forth of the Church into a Wood not farre off where pearching her self upon a bough she for some short time as it seem'd to him continued her musick to the unspeakable delight of the Monk and then flew away leaving him by her absence no less sad and pensive But seeing she came no more he returned back thinking he had left his Monastery the same morning immediately after Mattins and that it was now about the third hour but coming to the Convent which was near the Wood he found the Gate by which he was accustomed to enter to be mured up and another opened in some other part where calling upon the Porter he was demanded Who he was From whence he came and What was his business He answered that he was the Sacristan of the Church and that having that morning gone abroad after Mattins he found all things at his return changed The Porter demanded of him the name of the Abbot the Prior the Procurator He named them all and wondered he was neither understood nor permitted to enter and why they feigned not to know those Religious whom he mentioned and desired to be brought to the Abbot but coming into his presence neither the Abbot knew him nor he the Abbot whereat the good Monk being much astonished knew not what to say or do The Abbot asked him his name and that of his Abbot and turning the Annals of the Monastery found it was more than three hundred years since the death of those persons which he named Whereupon the Monk making a relation of what had happened unto him concerning the Psalm they acknowledged him and admitted him as a Brother into their profession where having received the Sacraments of the Church he with much peace ended his dayes in our Lord. If the pleasure of one sense did so ravish the Soul of this Servant of God what shall it be when not onely the hearing but the light smell taste the whole body and soul shall be drowned in joyes proportionable to the senses of the one and power of the other If the musick of a little Bird did so transport him what shall the musick of Angels what shall the clear vision of God what shall God himself doe when he makes oftentation if so may say of his omnipotency For as Assuerus who raigned from India to Aethiopia over 170 Provinces made a great Feast for all his Princes which lasted 181 dayes So shall this King of Heaven and Earth make his great Supper of glory which shall last for all eternity for the setting forth of his Majesty and for the honour and entertainment of his Servants where
who disobey him he may either chastise with imprisonment or death and is therefore fear'd and respected by them But all this power is invalid without the assistance of his Subjects For what will it avail a Prince to command such a City to be defended if the Souldiers within have a minde to deliver it And therefore a certain Jester of Philip the Second King of Spain demanded of him If all should say No unto what your Majesty commands what was to be done giving him to understand that his power depends upon others The power of a Monarch depends not onely upon the will of his Subjects but the Walls of his Fortresses Arms Instruments of Warre and many other things so as the people depend onely upon one man which is the Prince but the Prince upon many men and matters in so much as many rich Kings have been seen without power as Craesus Andronicus and others who were not able to defend themselves with all their riches from their own Vassals Witness Domitian Commodus Heliogabolus and Julius Caesar But the power of the Blessed depends of no other power nor man Ansel de Simil. c. 52. which as St. Anselm sayes shall be so great as no force or resistance shall withstand it It a Saint have a mind to remove a Mountain from one place to another he shall do it with as much ease as we remove our eyes from one part unto another Neither is this a wonder For even the faithful in this life according to the promise of Christ have done it as is written of St. Gregorius Thaumaturgus and some others And if Angels nay Devils have this power the Blessed shall not be denyed it Concerning honour the richest Princes can onely make their Vassals to adore them upon the knee and do them other outward reverence but cannot hinder them from murmuring in their absence or from observing their actions and interpreting them as they please They have many flatterers which praise them with their tongues and scorn them in their hearts and for the most part they are farre fewer who praise than despise them for there are but few who discourse with them but many who discourse of them and therefore few who praise them in presence and many who censure them in absence Concerning pleasures it is true that Princes are not content with ordinary delights and therefore provide themselves of magnificent Shews costly Recreations exquisite Comedies pleasant Gardens Woods for hunting and are all cloathed splendidly But none of those can make a Calenture not to afflict them or that the pains of the head stomack or gout do not molest them or that cares and fears do not break their sleep No gold or money can secure the goods of this World or free them from imperfections This onely is to be had in Heaven where their power is so free from weakness that one onely Angel without Army Guns Swords 4 Reg. 19. or Lance could destroy at once 180000 men with what speed and facility do Saints succour their devotes who invoke them without impediment either from the distance of place or hinderance from the violence of Tyrants How compleat then shall be the honor of the Blessed since even the Devils shall reverence them Nay even now many who despised them living seeing the many miracles which God hath wrought by their intercession have honoured them after death The pleasures also are pure and true without mixture of pain or grief as we shall see in the proper places Besides it is to be considered that the great riches of the Saints are not like those of the Kings of the Earth drawn from the tributes imposed upon their Vassals which though just yet are not free from this ill condition that what enricheth the Prince impoverisheth the Subject The riches in Heaven have no such blemishes they are burthensome to none and what is given to the Servants of Christ who raigns in Heaven is not taken from any CAP. IV. Of the greatness of Eternal Pleasures HOnour Profit and Pleasures are distinct goods upon Earth and are rarely found together Honour is seldom a companion of profit and profit of pleasure And so the sick man drinks his Purge because it is profitable how bitter soever Besides the pleasures or the world are for the most part mixt with some shame and oftentimes with infamy They are costly and expensive we cannot entertain our pleasures without diminishing our wealth It is not so in eternal goods in which to be honest is to be profitable and to be profitable delectable Eternal honours are accompanied with immense riches and they are both attended by pleasures without end All this is signified by the Lord when he received the faithful Servant into glory when he sayes Well done good servant and true because thou hast been faithful in a few things I will place thee over many Enter into the joy of thy Lord. In these words he first honours him commending him for a good and faithful Servant then enriches him delivering many things into his hands and so admits him into the joy and pleasure of his Lord signifying by this manner of expression the greatness of this joy not saying that this joy should enter in to him but that he should enter into joy and into no other but that of his Lord. So great is the joy of that Celestial Paradise that it wholly fills and embraces the blessed Souls which enter into Heaven as into an immense Sea of pleasure and delight The joyes of the Earth enter into the hearts of those who possess them but fill them not because the capacity of mans heart is greater than they can satisfie But the joyes of Heaven receive the Blessed into themselves and fill and overflow them in all parts Their glory is like an Ocean of delights into which the Saints enter as a Sponge into the Sea which filling its whole capacity the water surrounds and compasses it all about Whereupon St. Anselme sayes Ansel ca. 71. de Simil. Joy shall be within and without Joy above and below Joy round about on every side and all parts full of joy The same immensity of joy the Lord signified when he said by Isaias Behold I create Jerusalem an exultation Isai 65. and her people a joy It is much to be noted that he sayes not I create a rejoycing for Jerusalem or in Jerusalem nor a joy in or for its people but by a particular mystery I make Jerusalem that it shall be all an exultation and its people all a joy He speaks in this manner to set forth the greatness of his copious joy with which that holy City and her Inhabitants shall be as it were encompassed and overwhelmed For as a plate of iron in the middle of a Furnace is so wholly inkindled and penetrated by fire that it seems fire it self and contains the full heat of the Furnace So a blessed Soul in Heaven is so replenished with that Celestial joy
that it may not onely be said to be joyful but joy it self The multitude of joyes in Heaven is joyned with their greatness and so great they are that the very least of them sufficient to make us forget the greatest contents of the Earth and so many they are as that though a thousand times shorter yet they would exceed all temporal pleasures though a thousand times longer but joyning the abundance of those eternal joyes with their immense greatness that eternal B iss becoms ineffable Wherefore St. Bernard sayes The reward of Saints is so great that it cannot be measured so numerous that it cannot be counted so copious that it cannot be ended and so precious that it cannot be valued Albert. Mag. in Comp. Theol. l. 7. c. 8. 1 Cor. 2. Isai 64. And Albertus Magnus to the same purpose So great are the joyes of Heaven that all the Arithmaticians of the Earth cannot number them The Geometricians cannot measure them nor the most learned men in the world explicate them because neither eye hath seen nor ear hath heard neither hath it entred into the heart of man what God hath prepared for those who love him The Saints shall rejoyce in what is above them which is the vision of God in what is below them which is the beauty of Heaven and other corporal Creatures in what is within them which is the glorification of their bodies in what is without them which is the company of Angels and men God shall feast all their spiritual senses with an unspeakable delight for he shall be their object and shall also be a mirrour to the sight musick to the ear sweetness to the taste balsam to the smell flowers to the touch There shall be the clear light of Summer the pleasantness of the Spring the abundance of Autumn and the repose of Winter §. 2. The principal joy of the Blessed is in the possession of God whom they behold clearly as he is in himself For as Honourable Profitable and Delectable according to what we have already said are not divided in Heaven so the blessed Souls have three gifts essential and inseparable from that happy state which correspond to those three kinds of blessings which the Divines call Vision Comprehension and Fruition The first consists in the clear and distinct sight of God which is given to the Just as a reward of his merits by which he receives an incomparable honour since his works and vertues are rewarded in the presence of all the Angels with no less a Crown and recompence than is God himself The second is the possession which the Soul hath of God as of his riches and inheritance And the third is the ineffable joy which accompanies this sight and possession The greatness of this joy no tongue can tell and I believe that neither the Blessed themselves who have experience of it nor the Angels of Heaven are able to declare it Yet it will not be amiss if we as much as our ignorance and rudeness is able to attain unto consider and admire it This joy hath two singular qualities by which we may in some sort conceive the immensity of it The first that it is so vigorous and powerful that it excludes all evil pain and grief This onely is so great a good that many of the Philosophers held it for the chief felicity of man Cicero de Fin. 5. Tuscul And therefore Cicero writes that Jeronymus Rhodius a famous Philosopher and a great Master to whom may be joyned Diodorus the Peripatetick speaking of the chief happiness of man taught that it consisted in being free from grief It being the opinion of those Philosophers that not to suffer pain or evil was the greatest and most supreme good But herein was their errour that they judged that to be the good it self which was but an effect and consequent of it For so powerful is that love and joy which springs from the clear vision of God that it is sufficient to convert hell into glory in so much as if to the most tormented Soul in hell were added all the torments of the rest of the Damned both Men and Devils and that God should vouchsafe him but one glympse of his knowledge that only clear vision though in the lowest degree were sufficient to free him from all those evils both of sin and pain So that his Soul being rapt by that ineffable beauty which he beheld would not be sensible of any grief at all O how potent a joy is that which cast into such an abyss of torments converts them all into consolations How mighty were that fire whereof one spark would consume the whole Ocean There is no joy in this World so intense which can suspend the grief we suffer from a finger that is in sawing off Griefs do more easily bereave us of the sense of pleasure than pleasures do of pains Yet such is the greatness of that soveraign joy in Heaven that it alone is sufficient to drown all the griefs and torments both in Earth and Hell and there is no pain in the World able to diminish the least part of it The other stupendious wonder which proceeds from the greatness of this joy is the multitude of those pleasures which as from a most fruitful root spring from it Who would not be astonisht that the happiness of the Soul should cause so many and so marvelous effects in the bodies of the Blessed So excellent is that beatifical vision which with ineffable joy possesses the spirit that it bursts forth into the body with all the evident demonstrations of beauty lustre and the other gifts of glory We see here that the heart is not able so farre to dissemble a great joy conceived as that it appears not by some signe in the body but that joy is so weak and feeble that it extends no further than to express some little chearfulness and mirth in the countenance But the beatifical Vision is so immense a joy that it wholly changes the body making it beautiful as an Angel resplendent as the Sun immortal as a Spirit and impassible as God himself working great miracles and prodigies in the body by the redundancie of that unspeakable comfort which the spirit feels O if one could place before the eyes of the World the body of some blessed Saint enendowed with the four gifts of glory full of clearness splendor and beauty casting forth a fragrancy infinitely more sweet unto the senses than that of Musk and Amber that men might see by this shadow how immense is that light and joy which thus illustrates and beautifies the flesh O mortals why do ye covet other pleasures with loss of Soul and Body and do not rather seek after these with the profit and glory of both O how different are temporal delights from eternal those especially if they be unlawful blemish and destroy the Soul and weaken and corrupt the body but these beautifie and embellish them both
all living Creatures of so great variety all the Birds so curiously painted the Fishes so monstrous the Mettals so rich all People and Nations farthest remote certainly it would be a sight of wonderful satisfaction But what will it be to see all this whatever there is in the Earth together with all that there is in Heaven and above Heaven Some Philosophers in the discovery of a natural truth or the invention of some rare curiosity have been transported with a greater joy and content than their senses were capable of For this Aristotle spent so many sleepless nights for this Pythagoras travelled into so many strange Nations for this Crates deprived himself of all his wealth and Archimedes as Vitruvius writes never removed his thoughts night nor day from the inquisition of some Mathematical demonstration Such content he took in finding out some truth that when he eat his mind was busie in making lines and angles If he bathed and annointed himself as was the custome of those times his two fingers served him in the room of a compass to make circles in the oyl which was upon his skin He spent many dayes in finding out by his Mathematical rules how much gold would serve to gild a crown of silver that the Goldsmith might not deceive him and having found it as he was bathing in a Vessel of brass not able to contain his joy he fetcht divers skips and cried out I have found it I have found it If then the finding out of so mean a truth could so transport this great Artist what joy shall the Saints receive when the Creatour shall discover unto them those high secrets and above all that sublime mysterie of the Trinity of persons in the unity of essence This with the rest of those Divine knowledges wherewith the most simple of the Just shall be endued shall satiate their Souls with unspeakable joyes O ye wise of the World and ignorant before God why do you weary your selves in vain curiosities busie to understand and forgetful to love intent to know and slow to work Drye and barren speculation is not the way to knowledge but devout affection ardent love mortification of the senses and holy works in the service of God Labour therefore and deserve and you shall receive more knowledge in one instant than the wise of the world have obtained with all their watchings travails and experiences Aristotle for the great love he bore to knowledge held that the chief felicity of man consisted in contemplation If he found so great joy in natural speculations what shall we find in divine and the clear vision of God There shall the Memory also live representing unto us the Divine benefits and rendring eternal thanks unto the Author of all the Soul rejoycing in its own happiness to have received so great mercies for so small merits and remembring the dangers from which it hath been freed by Divine favour it shall sing the verse in the Psalm The snare is broken and we are delivered The remembrance likewise as St. Thomas teaches of the acts of vertue and good works by which Heaven was gained shall be a particular joy unto the Blessed both in respect they were a means of our happiness as also of pleasing so gracious and good a Lord. This joy which results from the memory of things past is so great as Epicurus prescribing a way to be ever joyful and pleasant advises us to preserve in memory and to think often of contents past But in Heaven we shall not onely joy in the memory of those things wherein we have pleased God in complying with his holy will and in ordering and disposing our life in his service but in the troubles also and dangers we have past The memory of a good lost without remedy causes great regret and torment and to the contrary the memory of some great evil avoided and danger escaped is most sweet and delectable The Wise-man said the memory of death was bitter as indeed it is to those who are to die but unto the Saints who have already past it and are secure in Heaven nothing can be more pleasant who now to their unspeakable joy know themselves to be free from death infirmity and danger There also shall live the Will in that true and vital life rejoycing to see all its desires accomplished with the abundance and sweet satiety of so many felicities being necessitated to love so admirable a beauty as the Soul enjoyes and possesses in God Almighty Love makes all things sweet and as it is a torment to be separated from what one loves so it is a great joy and felicity to remain with the beloved And therefore the Blessed loving God more than themselves how unspeakable a comfort must it be to enjoy God and the society of those whom they so much affect The love of the Mother makes her delight more in the sight of her own Son though foul and of worse conditions than in that of her neighbours The love then of Saints one towards another being greater than that of Mothers to their Children and every one of them being so perfect and worthy to be beloved and every one enjoying the sight of the same God how comfortable must be their conversation Sen. Ep. 6. Seneca said That the possession of what good soever was not pleasing without a Partner The possession then of the chief good mus be much more delightful with the society of such excellent companions If a man were to remain alone for many years in some beautiful Palace it would not please him so well as a Desert with company but the City of God is full of most noble Citizens who are all sharers of the same blessedness This conversation also being with wise holy and discreet personages shall much increase their joy For if one of the greatest troubles of humane life be to suffer the ill conditions follies and impertinencies of rude and ill-bred people and the greatest content to converse with sweet pious and learned friends what shall that Divine conversation be in Heaven where there is none ill conditioned none impious none froward but all peace piety love and sweetness in so much as Saint Austin sayes Aug. lib. de Spirittu anima Every one shall there rejoyce as much in the felicity of another as in his own ineffable joy and shall possess as many joyes as he shall find companions There are all things which are either requisite or delightful all riches ease and comfort Where God is nothing is wanting All there know God without errour behold him without end praise him without weariness love him without tediousness and in this love repose full of God Besides all this the Security which the will shall have in the eternal possession of this felicity is an unspeakable joy The fear that the good things which we enjoy are to end or at least may end mingles wormwood with our joyes and pleasures do not relish where there is
danger But this Celestial happiness being eternal neither shall nor can end diminish or be endangered but with this security adds a new joy unto those others of the Saints §. 2. Besides the Powers of the Soul the Senses also shall live nourished with the food of most proportionable and delightful objects The eyes shall ever be recreated with the sight of the most glorious and beautiful Bodies of the Saints One Sun suffices to chear up the whole World What joy then shall one of the Blessed conceive in beholding as many Suns as there are Saints and in seeing himself one of them when his hands feet and the rest of his members shall all forth beams clearer than the Sun at midday how shall he be transported in beholding the Body of the holy Virgin our most blessed Lady more beautiful and resplendent than the light of all the Saints together When Saint Dionysius Arcopagita beheld her in a mortal Body she seemed unto him as if she had been in glory With what joy then and gladness shall we look upon her in Heaven clad with immortality Hester 2. Of Hester the holy Scripture tells us that she was incomparably beautiful and of most rare features ravishing the eyes of all and exceedingly amiable With how fat greater excellency will the Queen of Heaven appear full of all graces and priviledges of beauty in the happy state of glory But above all with what content and admiration shall we behold the glorious Body of Christ our Redeemer in comparison of whose splendor that of all the Saints shall be as darkness from whose wounds shall issue forth raies of a particular brightness The tormented members also of the Martyrs and the mortified parts of the Confessors shall flourish with a singular beauty and splendour Besides all this the glory and greatness of the Empyrial Heaven and the lustre of that Celestial City shall infinitely delight the blessed Citizens The ears shall be fill'd with most harmonious songs and musick as may be gathered from many places of the Apocalyps and if the Harp of David delighted Saul so much as it asswaged the fury of his passions cast forth the Devils and treed him of that melancholy whereof the wicked spirit made use and that the Lyre of Orpheus wrought such wonders both with men and beasts what shall the harmony of Heaven do The devout Virgin Donna Sancha Carillo being sick and ready to die with excessive pain Roa l. 1. c. 10. in ejus vita with the hearing of musick from Heaven was freed from her grief and remained sound and healthy St. Bonaventure writes of St. Francis that whilest an Angel touched his Instrument it seemed unto him that he was already in glory What delight then will it be not onely to hear the voice of one Instrument played upon by an Angel but also the voices of thousands of Angels together with the admirable melody of musical Instruments The singing of one little Bird only ravished an holy Monk for the space of three hundred years when as he perswaded himself they being past that there were no more than three hours past What sweetness will it be to heat so many heavenly Musicians those millions of Angels so many men which will be sounding forth their Alleluja's which holy Tobie mentioned and those Virgins singing a new song which none but they could sing Surius writes in the life of St. Nichalas Tolentine that for fix moneths before his death he heard every night a little before Mattins most melodious musick of Angels in which he had a taste of that sweetness which God had prepared for him in his glory and such joy and comfort he received by hearing it that he was wholly transported desiring nothing more than to be freed from his Body to enjoy it The same desired St. Austin when he said Aug. c. 25. med that all the employments all the entertainments of the Courtiers in Heaven consisted in praises of the Divine Majesty without end without weariness or trouble Happy were I and for ever happy if after death I might deserve to hear the melody of those songs which the Citizens of that Celestial habitation and the squadrons of those blessed spirits sing in praise of the eternal King This is that sweet musick which St. John heard in the Apocalyps when the Inhabitants of Heaven sang Let all the world bless thee O Lord To thee be given all honour and dominion for a world of worlds Amen The smell shall be feasted with the odour which issues from those beautiful Bodies more sweet than Musk or Amber and from the whole Heaven more fragrant than Jesemins or Roses Greg. l. 4. dialog c. 16. Hom. 38. in Evang. Turonen li. 7. histo Fran. St. Gregory the Great writes that Christ our Redeemer appearing unto Tarsilla his Sister cast forth so delicious a smell and fragrancy that it well appeared it could not proceed but from the Author of all sweetness St. Gregory of Tours writing of the holy Abbot St. Sylvius sayes that when he was dead there was so great sadness in the Monastery for the loss of him that our Lord was pleased to command that he should be restored to life again The Saint obeyed though with great resentment of what he left and whither he returned He bewailed his banishment with a fresh and lively memory of that Celestial Country where he had seen himself a little before with so great advantage The Monks pressed him very hard to declare unto them something of of what he had seen He told them I my dear Bretheren mounted up to the land of the living where I had the Sun Moon and Starres for my footstool with greater splendour and beauty than if it had been paved with silver and gold being placed in the seat deputed for me I was replenished with an odour of so singular sweetness that it alone hath been sufficient to banish all appetites or desires of the things of this life in so much that I neither desired to eat nor drink any thing to maintain it Baron To. 9. an 716 Baronius reports of one who raised from death amongst other things recounted That he had seen a most delightful place where an infinite number of most beautiful persons did recreate themselves and that there issued from them a most fragrant and miraculous sweetness and this the Angels told him was the Paradise of the Sons of God Greg. l. 4. Dial. The like is reported also by St. Gregory of a certain Souldier Neither is it much that glorious Bodies should breath out so sweet a smell since even in this valley of misery the Bodies of Saints without life or soul have sent forth a most admirable fragrancy St. Gregory the Great writes that at the instant Greg. 4. Dial. c. 14. when Sr. Servius died all who were present were filled with a most incomparable sweetness St. Jerome reports the like of St. Hilarion that ten moneths after his death
his Body cast forth a most fragrant perfume If this be in corruptible flesh what shall be in the immortal Bodies of the Saints The taste also in that blessed Country shall not want the delight of its proper object For although the Saints shall not there feed which were to necessitate that happy state unto something besides it self yet the tongue and pallat shall be satiated with most pleasant and savoury relishes so as with great decency and cleanliness they shall have the delight of meat without the trouble of eating by reason of the great delicacy of this Celestial taste The glory of the Saints is often signified in holy Scripture under the names of a Supper Banquet Manna Aug. lib. de spiritu vita Laur. Justin de Dis Mon. ca. 23. St. Austin sayes it cannot be explicated how great shall be the delight and sweetness of the taste which shall eternally be found in Heaven And St. Laurentius Justinianus affirms that an admirable sweetness of all that can be delightful to the taste shall satisfie the pallat with a most agreeable satiety If Esau sold his Birthright for a dish of Lentil pottage well may we mortifie our taste here upon earth that we may enjoy that perfect and incomparable one in Heaven The touch also shall there receive a most delightful entertainment All they tread upon shall seem unto the Just to be flowers and the whole disposition of their Bodies shall be ordered with a most sweet and exquisite temperature For as the greatest penances of the Saints were exercised in this sense by the afflictions endured in their Bodies so it is reason that this sense should then receive a particular reward And as the torments of the damned in hell are most expressed in that sense so the Bodies of the Blessed in Heaven are in that sense to receive a special joy and refreshment And as the heat of that infernal fire without light is to penetrate even to the entrals of those miserable persons so the candor and brightness of the celestial light is to penetrate the bodies of the Blessed and fill them with an incomparable delight and sweetness All then what we are to do is to live in that true and perfect life all is to be joy in that eternal happiness Therefore as St. Anselme sayes Ansel de Simil. c. 59. the eyes nose mouth hands even to the bowels and marrow of the bones and all and every part of the body in general and particular shall be sensible of a most admirable pleasure and content Joan. de Tamba Trac de Deliciis sensibilibus Paradisi Et Nich. de Nise de quat Noviss 3. Myst 4. Consi The Humanity of Christ our Redeemer is to be the principal and chief joy of all the Senses and therefore John Tambescensis and Nicholas of Nise say that as the intellectual knowledge of the Divinity of Christ is the joy and essential reward of the Soul so the sensitive knowledge of the Humanity of Christ is the chief good and essential joy of the Senses and the utmost end and felicity whereunto they can aspire This it seems was meant by our Saviour in St. John when speaking unto the Father he said This is life eternal that is essential blessedness as Nicholas de Nise interprets it that they know thee the only true God in which is included the essential glory of the Soul and him whom thou hast sent Jesus Christ in which is noted the essential blessedness of the Senses in so much as onely in the Humanity of our Saviour the appetite of the Senses shall be so perfectly satisfied as they shall have no more to desire but in it shall receive all joy pleasure and fulness of delight for the eyes shall be the sight of him who is above all beauty for the ears one onely word of his shall sound more sweetly than all the harmonious musick of the Celestial spirits for the smell the fragrancy that shall issue from his most holy Body shall exceed the perfume of spices for the taste and touch to kiss his feet and sacred wounds shall be beyond all sweetness It is much also to be noted that the blessed Souls shall be crowned with some particular joyes which the very Angels are not capable of For first it is they onely who are to enjoy the Crowns of Doctors Virgins and Martyrs since no Angel can have the glory to have shed his blood and died for Christ neither to have overcome the flesh and by combats and wrastlings subjected it unto reason Wherefore Saint Bernard said The chastity of men was more glorious than that of Angels Secondly men shall have the glory of their bodies and joy of their senses which the Angels cannot For as they want the enemy of the Spirit which is the Flesh so they must want the glory of the victory Neither shall they have this great joy of mankind in being redeemed by Christ from sin and as many damnations into hell as they have committed mortal sins and to see themselves now freed and secure from that horrid evil and so many enemies of the Soul which they never had which must needs produce a most unspeakable joy Cap. VI. The excellency and perfection of the Bodies of the Saints in the life eternal WE will not forbear also to consider what man shall be when he is eternal when being raised again at the great day he shall enter Soul and Body into Heaven Let us run over if you please all those kinds of goods which expect us in that Land of promise When God promised Abraham the Country of Palestine he commanded him to look upon it and travel and compass it from side to side Gen. 13. Lift up thine eyes saith the Lord and from the place where thou standest look towards the North and towards the South and towards the East and towards the West All the land which thou seest I will give unto thee and thy seed for ever And immediately after Arise and walk the land in length and breadth for I will certainly give it thee We may take these words as spoken unto our selves since they seem to promise us the Kingdom of Heaven for no man shall enter into that which he docs not desire and no man can desire that as he ought to do which he has not walked over in his consideration for that which is not known is hardly desired And therefore we ought often to contemplate the greatness of this Land the length of its eternity and the breadth and largeness of its felicity which is so far extended that it fills not onely the Soul but the Body with happiness and glory that glory of the Soul redounding unto the Body and perfecting it with those four most excellent gifts and replenishing it with all felicity which can be imagined or desired If Moses seeing an Angel in a corporal figure onely upon the back part and but in passage received so great a glory from
the light and beauty which he beheld that his heart not being able to contain it it struck forth into his face with a divine brightness what joy shall the blessed Souls receive from the sight of God himself when they shall behold him as he is face to face not in passage or a moment but for all eternity This joy by reason of their strict union their Souls shall communicate unto their happy Bodies Albert. Mag. in Comp. Theol. l. 7. c. 38. which from thenceforth shall be filled with glory and invested with a light seaven times brighter than that of the Sun as is noted by Albertus Magnus For although it be said in the Gospel that the Just shall shine as the Sun yet Isaias the Prophet sayes that the Sun in these dayes shall shine seaven times more than it now doth This light being the most beautiful and excellent of corporal qualities shall cloath the Just as with a garment of most exceeding lustre and glory What Emperor was ever clad in such a purple what humane Majesty ever cast forth beams of such splendour Joseph l. 19. c. 〈◊〉 Herod upon the day of his greatest magnificence could only cloath himself in a Robe of silver admirably wrought which did not shine of it self but by reflection of the Sun beams which then in his rising cast his raies upon it and yet this little glittering was sufficient to make the people salute him as a God What admiration shall it then cause to behold the glorious Body of a Saint not cloathed in Gold or Purple not adorned with Diamonds or Rubies but more resplendent than the Sun it self Put all the brightest Diamonds together all the fairest Rubies all the most beautiful Carbuncles let an Emperial Robe be embroidered with them all all this will be no more than as coals in respect of a glorious body which shall be all transparent bright and resplendent far more than if it were set with Diamonds O the basenese of worldly riches they all put together could not make a Garment so specious and beautiful If here we account it for a bravery to wear a Diamond Ring upon our fingers and women glory in some Carbuncle dangling at their breasts what shall it be to have our hands feet arid breasts themselves more glorious and resplendent than all the Jewels of the World The Garments which we wear here how rich soever are rather an affront and disgrace unto us than an ornament since they argue an imperfection and a necessity of our bodies which we are forced to supply with something of another mature Besides our cloathes were given as a mark of Adams fall in Paradise and we wear them as a penance enjoyned for his Sin And what fool so impudent and sottish as to bestow precious trimming upon a penitential Garment But such are not the Ornaments of the Saints in Heaven their lustre is their own not borrowed from their Garments not extrinsecal without them but within their very entrails each part of them being more transparent than Chrystal and brighter than the Sun It is recounted in the Apocalyps as a great wonder that a Woman was seen cloathed with the Sun and crowned with twelve Stars This indeed was far more glorious than any Ornament upon Earth where we hold it for a great bravery to be adorned with twelve rich Diamonds and a Carbuncle and what are those in comparison of the Sun and so many Stars Yet this is short of the Ornament of the Saints whose lustre is proper to themselves intrinsecally their own not taken and borrowed from something without them as was that of the Womans The State and Majesty with which this gift of splendor shall adorn the Saints shall be incomparably greater than that of the mightiest Kings It were a great Majesty in a Prince when he issues forth of his Palace by night to be attended by a thousand Pages each having a lighted Torch but were those Torches Stars it were nothing to the state and glory of a Saint in Heaven who carries with him a light equal to that of the Sun seaven times doubled and what greater glory than not to need the Sun which the whole World needs Where the Just is shall be no night for wheresoever he goes he carries the day along with him What greater authority can there be than to shine far brighter than the Sun carrying with him far greater Majesty than all the men of the Earth could be able to conferre upon him if they went accompanying him carrying lighted Torches in their hands St. Paul beholding the gift of Clarity in the humanity of Christ remained for some dayes without sense or motion And St. John onely beholding it in the face of our Saviour fell down as if dead his mortal eyes not being able to endure the lustre of so great a Majesty St. Peter because he saw something of it in the transfiguration of Christ was so transported with the glory of the place that he had a desire to have continued there for ever Neither was this much in Christ since the people of Israel were not able to suffer the beams which issued from the face of Moses though then in a frail and mortal body Caesar lib. 12. mir cap. 54. Caesarius writes of a great Doctor of the University of Paris who being ready to give up his ghost wondered how it could be possible that Almighty God could make his body composed of dust to shine like the Sun But our Lord being pleased to comfort and strengthen him in the belief of the Article of the Resurrection caused so great a splendor to issue forth of the feet of the sick person that his eyes not being able to suffer so great a splendor he was forced to hide them under his Bed-cloathes But much more is it that in bodies already dead this glory should appear The body of St. Margaret Daughter to the King of Hungary sent forth such beams of light that they seemed to be like those of Heaven The splendor also of other dead bodies of the Saints hath been such that mortal eyes were not able to behold them If then this Garment of light do beautifie those dead bodies without souls how shall it illustrate those beautiful and perfect bodies in Heaven who are alive and animated with their glorious spirits for all eternity St. John Damascen said that the light of this inferiour World was the honour and ornament of all things How shall then the immortal light of that eternal glory deck and adorn the Saints for it shall not onely make them shine with that bright candor we have already spoken of but with diversity of colours shall imbellish some particular parts more than others In the Crowns of Virgins it shall be most white in that of Martyrs red in that of Doctors of some particular brightness Neither shall those marks of glory be only in their heads or faces but in the rest of their members And therefore
Cardinal Bellarmine sayes Bellar. conc de Beat. p. 2. that the bodies of St. John Baptist and St. Paul shall shine with a most incredible beauty having their necks as it were adorned with collars of gold What sight more glorious than to behold so many Saints like so many Suns to shine with so incomparable lustre and beauty What light then will that of Heaven be proceeding from so many lights or to speak more properly from so many Suns By how much the number of Torches is greater by so much is also greater the light they produce altogether How great then shall the clarity or that holy City be where many Suns do inhabit And if by the sight of every one in particular their joy shall be more augmented by the sight of a number without number what measure can that joy have which results from so beautiful a spectacle § 2. As all the bodies of Saints are to be wholly filled with light so they are to enjoy the priviledges of light which amongst all material qualities is enobled with this prerogative that it hath no contrary and is therefore impassible And so the glorious bodies of the Saints having nothing that may oppose them are also freed from sufferance Besides nothing is more swift than light and therefore those bodies who have the greatest share of light are also the most swift in motion whereupon there is no Element so nimble and active as fire no nature so swift as that of the Sun and Stars and light it self is so quick that in an instant it illuminates the whole Sphere of its activity In like manner the glorious bodies of the Saints as they are to enjoy more light so they are to move with more speed and agility than the very Stars themselves The light is also so subtle and pure that it stops not in its passage although it meets with some bodies solid and massie The whole Sphere and body of the Air hinders not the. Sun from enlightning us below and Chrystal Diamonds Glass and other heavy bodies are penetrated by light But far greater shall be the subtility and purity of the blessed bodies unto whose passage nothing how gross or opake soever shall be an obstacle For this reason the Saints in holy Scripture are often called by the name of Light and particularly it is said that the wayes of the Just are like a shining light at midday For as the light because impassible makes his way through dirty and unclean places without defiling its purity passes with speed and penetrates other bodies that stand in its way So the Saints endowed with the light which they receive from this gift of Clarity cannot suffer from any thing having an agility to move with speed from place to place and a subtlety to penetrate wheresoever they please The goods resulting from these privileges and endowments of the glorious bodies are more in number than all the evills of this mortal life The onely gift of impassibility frees us from all those miseries which our bodies now suffer the cold of Winter the heat of Summer infirmities griefs tears and the necessity of eating which one necessity includes infinite others Let us but consider what cares and troubles men undergoe onely to sustain their lives The Labourer spends his dayes in plowing sowing and reaping The Shepheard suffers cold and heat in watching of his flock The Servant in obeying anothers will and command The Rich man in cares and fears in preserving what he possesses What dangers are past in all estates onely to be sure to eat from all which the gift of impassibility exempts the Just The care of cloathing troubles us also little less than that of feeding and that of preserving our health much more For as our necessities are doubly encreased by sickness so are our cares from all which he who is impassible is free and not onely from the griefs and pains of this life but if he should enter into hell it would not burn one hair of him The Prerogative also of the gift of agility is most great which easily appears by the troubles and inconveniences of a long journey which howsoever we are accommodated is not performed without much weariness and oftentimes with danger both of health and life A King though he pass in a Coach or Litter after the most easie and commodious way of travelling must pass over rocks hills and rivers and spend much time but with the gift of agility a Saint in the twinkling of an eye will place himself where he pleases and pass millions of leagues with as much ease and in as short a time as a furlong We admire the Story of St. Anthony of Padua who in one day passed from Italy into Portugal to free his Father condemned wrongfully to death and at that of St. Ignatius Patriarch of the Society of Jesus who in a short time transported himself from Rome to Colen and from thence to Rome without being missed less than in two hours space If to the mortal bodies of his Servants God communicates such gifts what shall he do to the glorified bodies of his Saints What an excellency of nature were it to be able in one day to visit all the great Kingdoms of the Earth and see what passed amongst them in an hour to goe to Rome the chief City of the World from thence to pass to Constantinople the head of the Eastern Empire In another hour to the Great Cair and consider there the immense multitude of the Inhabitants In another hour goe to Goa the Court of the East-Indies and behold the Riches thereof in another to Pequin the Seat of the Kings of China and contemplate the vast extent of that prodigious City in another to Meaco the Court of Japonia in another to Manila the head City of the Philippin Islands in another to Ternate in the Maluca's in another to Lima in Peru in another to Mexico in New Spain in another to Lisboa and Madrid in another to London and Paris the principal Seats of Christendom marking at ease what passed in the Courts of those great Monarchs If this were a great priviledge what shall that be of those glorious bodies who in a short space can traverse all the Heavens visit the Earth return unto the Sun and Firmament and there observe what is above the Starrs in the Empyrial Heaven Greg. li. 3. Dial. 36. St. Gregory writes in his Dialogues that a Souldier assaulting a holy personage and having his naked sword lifted up and ready to give the blow the man cried out to his Patron St. John for help who instantly withheld the Souldiers hand that he could not move it How soon did St. John hear him in Heaven who invoked him upon Earth with what speed did he descend to assist him with-holding and drying up the arm of the wicked Souldier the bodies of the Saints are to move hereafter with no less speed than their spirits do now the weight of their bodies shall
no wayes hinder them they shall therefore in the same manner walk or stay upon Water Air Heavens as upon Earth It was miraculous in St. Quirinus Martyr St. Maurus and St. Francis of Paula that they walked upon waters passed rapid rivers and seas without Vessels but the glorious bodies shall not onely be able to traverse the seas mount into the air but enter into flames secure and without hurt It is said of S. Francis of Assisium that in the fervour of his prayers and contemplations he was seen lifted up into the air and the great Servant of God Father Diego Martines of the Society of Jesus was lifted up in prayer above the highest trees and Towers and hanging in the air persisted in his devotion If God vouchsafe so great favours to his servants in this valley of tears what priviledges will he deny to the Citizens of Heaven To this so notable gift of Agility shall be annexed that of Penetration by which their glorious bodies shall have their way free and pervious through all places no impediment shall stop their motion and for them shall be no prison or enclosure They shall with greater ease pass through the middle of a rock than an arrow through the air It shall be the same thing for them to mount unto the Moon where they shall meet no solid body to oppose them as to pierce unto the center through rocks mettals and the gross body of the earth We wonder to hear that the Zahories see those things which are hid under the earth Let us admire that which is certain that the Saints cannot onely see but enter into the profundity of the earth and tell what minerals and other secrets are contained in its entrails Metaphrastes writes that a certain Goth a Souldier of the Garrison of Edessa fell passionately in love with a Maid of the same City and sinding no other way to enjoy her demanded her in marriage but the Mother and Kindred gave no ear to the treaty trusting little to a Barbarian and a Stranger who carrying her into a Country far distant as his was might there use her at his pleasure The Souldier notwithstanding persisting still in his suit with many promises of good entertainment gained at last the consent of the Maid and her Friends onely the Mother would not be satisfied before they had entred all together into the Temple of the holy Martyrs St. Samona Curia and Abiba and that there the Souldier had renewed his promises by solemn oath and called the holy Martyrs as witnesses which done the Maid was delivered unto him whom he not much after carried into his own Country where he was formerly married and had his Wife yet living There better to conceal his wickedness he fell into a greater and like a wild beast without pity enclosed the poor woman alive in a Sepulcher and there left her She thus betrayed had recourse unto the Saints whom she with tears invoked as witnesses of the Souldiers treachery and breach of faith At the instant the holy Martyrs appeared in a glorious equipage and casting her into a gentle sleep conveyed her the Sepulcher still remaining lockt without hurt into her own Country where they left her The Barbarian ignorant of what had happened and perswading himself she was long fince dead returned a second time to Edessa where convinced of the crime he satisfied it with his life If the Saints then have power to make the persons of others pass through distinct bodies much more are they able to make their own to penetrate them without impediment Finally the Servants of Christ shall be there so replenished with all goods both of soul and body that there shall be nothing more for them to desire And every one even during this life hoping for those eternal goods may say with St. Austin What wouldest thou my Body what is' t thou defirest my Soul There ye shall find all which you desire If you are pleased with beauty there the Just shine as the Sun and if with any pure delight there not one but a whole sea of pleasure which God keeps in store for the Blessed shall quench your thirst Let men then raise their desires unto that place where only they can be accomplished Let them not gape after things of the earth which cannot satisfie them but let them look after those in Heaven which are onely great onely eternal and can onely fill the capacity of mans heart CAP. VII How we are to seek after Heaven and to preferre it before all the goods of the Earth LEt a Christian compare the miseries of this life with the felicities of the other the weakness of our nature in this mortal estate with the vigour and priviledges of that immortal which expects us and let him excite and stir up himself to gain a glory eternal by troubles short and temporary Justinus lib. 1. Cyrus when he intended to invade the Medes commanded his Persians upon a certain day to meet him with each one a sharp Hatchet They obeying he willed them to cut down a great Wood which performed with much toyl and diligence he invited them for the next day unto a sumptuous Banquet and in the height of their mirth demanded of them whether they liked better the first dayes labour or that dayes feast The answer was ready all cried out That dayes entertainment With this he engaged them to make warr upon the Medes assuring them that after a short trouble in subduing an effeminate Nation they should enjoy incomparable pleasure and be Masters of inestimable riches This served him to make the Persians follow him and conquer the Kingdom of the Medes If this motive were sufficient to make a barbarous people preferre a doubtful reward before a certain and hazardous labour why should not a certain reward and infinitely greater than the labour suffice us Christians Let us compare that Celestial Supper of the other life with the troubles of this The greatness of the Kingdom of Heaven with the littleness of our services The joyes above with the goods below and our labours will seem feasts our services repose and the felicity of earth misery and baseness What is the honour of this life which is in it self false given by lying men short and limited in respect of that honour the Just receive in Heaven which is true given by God eternal extended through the Heavens and manifested to all that are in them Men and Angels What are the riches of the Earth which often fail are ever full of dingers and cares and never free their owners from necessity in comparison of those which have no end and give all security and abundance What are their short pleasures which prejudice the health consume the substance and make infamous those who seek them in respect of those immense joyes of glory which with delight joyn honour and profit What is this life of misery to that full of blessings and happiness and what those evil qualities
the Pikes and Launces to obtain that honour at the price of his own blood Because King Saul published in the Army that he would give his Daughter in Matrimony to him that should overcome the Giant Golias there being none found that durst attempt it David slighted all danger in hopes of obtaining such a recompense What have not men attempted to gain a terrestrial reward Nothing hath seemed much unto them For the gaining then of Heaven all things ought to seem little unto a Christian Seneca wondered at what Souldiers did and suffered for so short and transitory Kingdoms as are those of the Earth and that not for themselves but for another Much more may we wonder that the sufferings and labours of this life by which we are to gain the Kingdom of Heaven not for a stranger but for our selves seem so great and grievous unto us What did not Jesbaam perform for the advancing of the Kingdom of David though he was esteemmed a poor wretch and a dastard 2 Reg. 23. 1. Paralip 11. Vid. Sanctium Tirinum 2 Reg. 23. seeing that the Kingdom of David lay at stake he took such courage that he set upon 800 men and slew them in his first fury and at another occasion he killed 300. For the same Kingdom of David Eleazar Son of Ahostes fought with such constancy and valour that he slew innumerable Philistins continuing the Battel until he was so weary that he was not able to move his arm no longer and it remained so stiff with weariness as if it had been of stone If for a Kingdom of another Man's Dominions these men were so valiant why do not we take courage and procure with great valour to make conquest of the Kingdom of Heaven though we lose all our strength and even our lives in the Conquest since in respect of it all toil and labour is nothing For the advancing then of the Kingdom of David his worthies performed such actions as if they were not authorised by holy Scripture might seem incredible But what speak I of advancing his Kingdom when only to fatisfie a gust of his and perhaps an impertinent one which was to drink of the water in the Cisterns of Bethleem the young men threw themselves into the thickest of the Enemies Squadrons and with their naked swords cutting a passage through the middest of the Army fetcht the desired waters If men undergoe such hazards for the Kingdom nay for the pleasure of another and that momentary what ought we to do for those eternal joyes which are to be our own and for the Kingdom of Heaven wherein we expect such immense honours riches and pleasures Why do we not all take heart and courage It is the Kingdom of Heaven we hope for joyes riches and honours eternal are those which are promised us All is but little what can be suffered in time to obtain the same Semma for the defence of a poor field sowed with lentils durst fight alone against an Army of the Philistians 2 Reg. 23. For the defence then of grace which is the seed of God and to assure our glory which is the fruit of the Passion of Christ it is not much if without shedding of blood we fight against our unruly appetites and conquer our corrupt nature in this life that we may render it more perfect in the other To this purpose the consideration of glory is most powerfull having still before our eyes Heaven which is promised us And let not the eternal reward proposed by Christ be less efficacious than the temporal proposed by Man This was signified by our Lord unto the Prophet Ezechiel in those four living creatures so much different in nature Ezek. 1. but all one in their employment and puesto to wit an Eagle a Lyon an Ox and a Man which he beheld in the middle of the air flying with each one four wings as swift as a flash of lightning What thing could so force the heavy nature of an Ox as to equal the flight of an Eagle or what could associate the fierce nature of a Lyon with the gentleness of a Man The same Prophet declares it saying that they carried Heaven on their heads having the Firmament above them Because if Heaven be in our thoughts it will encourage us to all things It will make material Men equal unto Angels and subject them unto reason who in their customs are brutish as wild beasts so as he who is slow and heavy as an Ox shall flye with four wings and by conquering his own nature become in his flight equal to the birds of the air and he which feeds grovling upon the earth shall elevate himself and quit his short and transitory pleasures for those which are eternal § 3. Neither is this much For so great is the good which we expect that for it to be deprived of all other goods whatsoever ought to be esteemed a happiness and to suffer all torments and afflictions as a pleasure Let us hear what St. Chrysostome sayes Chrysost Tom. 5. Hom. 19. How many labours soever thou shalt pass how many torments soever thou shalt endure all are nothing in respect of those goods to come Let us hear also what St. Vincent Martyr said unto Dacianus the President and with what joy and patience in his torments he confirmed what he had spoken When they hoisted him up on high upon the Rack and the Tyrant in a scoff demanded of him where he then was the Saint smiling and beholding Heaven whither he was going answered I am aloft and from thence can despise thee although insolent and puft up with the power thou hast upon Earth Being after menaced with more cruel torments he said Me-thinks thou dost not threaten but court me Dacianus with what I desire with all the powers and faculties of my Soul And when they tore his flesh with hooks and pincers and burnt him with lighted torches he cried out with great joy In vain thou weariest thy self Dacianus thou canst not imagine torments so horrid which I could not suffer Prison Pincers Burning-plates of iron and Death it self are unto Christians sports and recreations and not torments He who had the joyes of Heaven before his eyes scorned and laughed at the bitterest torments upon Earth Let us consider them also and we shall not shun the sufferance of any thing whereby we may gain Heaven What pity is it that a Christian for some short and sordid pleasure should lose joyes so great and eternal because he will not bear some slight injurie here should be deprived of celestial honour there for not paying what he owes and not restoring what he hath unjustly taken should forfeit the divine riches of Heaven and for one pleasant morsel which the Devil offers him should deprive himself of that great Supper whereunto God invites him Who would choose rather to feed upon bones and craps which fell from the Table than to he a Guest at the
Banquet and feed upon the choicest and most savoury dishes That which the world offers in her best pleasures is but shells offals and parings but that whereunto God invites us is a full Table wherein may be satisfied the most eager hunger of humane appetite With reason it is called in holy Scripture the great Supper and in some places the Nuptial Supper by reason of that satiety which nothing upon earth can give us It is called also a Supper and not a Dinner because after dinner we use to rise and goe about other occasions and employments but after supper there are no more labours all is rest and repose The principal dish which is served in at this great Supper is the clear vision of God and all his Divine perfections after that a thousand joyes of the Soul in all its powers and faculties then a thousand pleasures of the senses with all the endowments of a glorified Body These latter are as it were the Desert of this Divine Banquet And if the Desert be such what shall be the substance of the Feast What comparison then betwixt those great and eternal goods of Heaven and those which the World gives us Certainly they are not worthy to be called so much as the shells of happiness It is much to be reflected on that those who enjoyed not that great Supper which is a figure of glory were not deprived of it by doing any thing which was a sin in it self For one excused himself because he had bought a Farm another because he was to prove his Oxen a third because he was married none of which were sins but for the preferring those things before the Kingdom of Heaven which being an incredible madness and blindness made them not worthy to be admitted And truly all those who are wholly taken up and employed in the things of the Earth do no other than perferre the scraps and parings of a poor and rustick Dinner before the Royal Feast of a powerful King Moreover although God had not invited us most miserable and vile worms unto a Supper of so infinite sweetness but had onely promised us the crums which fell from his Table yet ought we to have preferred them before the contents and commodities of this World Let us fear least even in lawful pleasures there may be danger For as the evils of sin are the cause of damnation so the goods of the world may be the occasion of sin Let us look onely towards Heaven let us open our eyes and consider that those who were called by God to some especial vocation and did not embrace it are introduced by holy Scripture as damned and forsaken by God though their sin is not named as it appears in these three who were invited But much more to our terrour in that young man in the Gospel who having demanded of Christ our Redeemer What he should do to gain eternal life and being answered That he should keep the Commandements of the Law which he replyed he had done from his youth Yet because the Lord called him by a special vocation to a greater perfection which was to leave all and follow him he went his way sorrowful because he had much riches whereupon our Saviour pronounced that memorable and terrible Sentence That it was easier for a Camel to enter the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of Heaven signifying thereby that although he had kept the Commandments yet he was excluded Heaven For those whom our Saviour favours with particular inspirations and callings do not assure their salvation by a desire to keep the Commandments but by endeavouring to observe the Evangelical counsels quitting not onely sins and the occasions of sinning but the impediments of vertue and perfection by which they might not onely more assure Heaven but also obtain more glory and if they do it not may justly fear lest they may so much disoblige God Almighty by despising his vocation that he will not vouchsafe to grant them the efficacious helps of keeping his Commandments Little is all which can be done for the gaining of Heaven little what is suffered little what is forsaken little all the care to obtain it little what caution not to lose it little what impediments are to to be avoided little what austerities of life we undergoe to assure it And if we judge not so in this valley of tears let the Saints judge in Heaven who are of a different opinion from those upon earth D. Mig l. 3. de Vit. Isabel c. 9. St. Teresa of Jesus appearing upon an occasion to that blessed woman Isabella of St. Dominick this most observant religious woman begged pardon of the Saint for a disgust that she perswaded her self she had given her when being Prioress of Pastrana she put up a very narrow Grate where the Nuns were to hear Mass To some it seemed over-streight as also to St. Teresa and she would have taken it away but did not do it because the Prioress Isabella replyed unto her saying It was not convenient that being so nigh to Secular people they might be seen by them But the Saint being now dead and glorious Isabella of St. Dominick was much afflicted to consider that by her replyings she had displeased her holy Mother The Saint answered her saying Some things here do appear unto me far different And doubtless in Heaven things will appear far otherwayes where all care and sollicitude in not offending God will seem little and what ever negligence and hinderance in his service will appear grievous CAP. VIII Of Evils eternal and especially of the great Poverty Dishonour and Ignominy of the Damned WE have not only reason to despise the Goods of the World from the consideration of Heaven but the Evils also from that of Hell in comparison of which all temporal evils are to be esteemed as happiness and blessings and all the happiness and contents of Earth to be abhorred as evils at least if they any wayes dispose to those eternal torments and that perpetual privation of joyes without end And truly such are the two extremes which attend us after life that either of them were sufficient to make us despise all Goods and Evils temporal whatsoever But joynning the privation of the joyes of Heaven with the condemnation unto the torments of Hell 't is admirable how any can delight in the things of this life and not tremble at what may succeed By reason of this danger we ought to abhorre and spit at the pleasures and goods of this life and to admit and embrace if occasion be the greatest evils of it and to contemn both the one and the other neither loving the goods nor fearing the evils Yet certainly the goods of the World are so much more to be despised than the evils as they usually are the greater occasions of sin and so consequently of eternal damnation The holy Scriptures and Writings of Saints are full of menaces against the Rich the
by birth by divine inspiration became a Cistercian Monk He entred upon this course of life and continued with such great courage that he stuck not to challenge the Devil and bid him defiance The Enemy made his Cell the field of battail Here he assaulted him first with whips then upon a certain occasion gave him such blows that the blood burst out at his mouth and nose At the noise the Monks came in and finding him half dead they carried him to his Bed where he lay for the space of three dayes without giving any signes of life In which time in the company of an Angel he descended into a very obscure place where he saw a Man seated in a Chair of fire and certain Women very beautiful thrusting into his mouth burning torches drawing them out at other parts of his body which had been the instruments of his sins The Monk being astonished at this spectacle the Angel told him This miserable wretch was a very powerful man in the world and much given to Women and for this reason the Devils in shape of Women do torment him as thou seest Pasing a little farther he beheld another whom the infernal spirits were fleaing alive and having rubbed all his body over with salt they put him to roast upon a Gridiron This man said the Angel was a great Lord so cruel to his Vassals as the Devils are now to him A little farther they met with other persons of divers states and conditions which were tormented with several kinds of torments Many Religious both men and women whose lives had been contrary to their profession Talkers Censurers of other mens lives Slaves to their bellies defiled with lust and other such like vices To these the Ministers of vengeance in shape of most ugly fellows gave many blows in such sort that they dashed out their brains and made their eyes flye out of their heads because in their works they were blind and without judgement a chastisement Prov. 19. which the Wise-man appoints for such like persons Afterwards he lifted up his eyes and beheld one fastned to a horrible Wheel turning in such a dreadful manner that the Monk here was almost besides himself That thou seest is terrible said the Angel but far more terrible will be what thou shalt now see At the instant the Wheel began to run from alost down to the most profound depths with such horrid joggs and with such noise as if all the World Earth Heaven and all were breaking in pieces At this so sudden and direful accident all the Prisoners and Goalers of Hell brake out into great cries cursing and damning him that came in the Wheel This man said the Angel is Judas the Apostle who betrayed his Master and as long as he shall raign in glory which shall be world without end so long shall this miserable wretch lye thus tormented With these Representations God hath given us to understand the proportion his Justice observes in his chastisements to make us form some lively apprehension of the greatness of those pains they being indeed far greater than what ever we can conceive by all the rigour imaginable exhibited to the senses And in regard what enters by the senses prevails more with us for this reason he represents unto us the torments of the soul sutably to those so horrible to our senses as is to dash out the brains and make the brains flye out of the head For though it be true that this effect is not wrought indeed yet the torments inflicted upon the damned Souls are without companion greater then it would be for a man in this life to be so beaten about the head till his brains and eyes flew out Let us therefore fear the Divine justice and let us understand that in those parts of the body we offend God Almighty with greater delight we shall be sure to be punished with greater torment And here may be given this further instruction that as these and many such like stories related for more variety of discourse in this Treatise oblige us not to a full and absolute belief of them so they desire the favour of so much credit at least as is allowed to Livy Justine or other Chronicle-writers especially the Recorders of these being such as are no less grave and wise and acknowledge moreover a greater obligation of conscience not to wrong the World with lies or empty relations taken up upon the account of frivolous reports especially in matters of such concernment And as we think it not amiss to make use as occasion serves of profane Examples and Authorities in confirmation of what we usually either speak or write so without all doubt the same use of Sacred and Ecclesiastical occurrences may be no less available in such matters as these CAP. XII The fruit which may be drawn front the consideration of Eternal Evils ALl which hath been said of the pains in Hell is far short of that which really they are There is great difference betwixt the knowledge we have by relation and that which we learn by experience The Machabees knew that the Temple of the Lord was already prophaned deserted and destroyed They had heard of it and lamented it but when they saw with their eyes the Sanctuary lye desolate the Altar prophaned and the Gates burnt there was then no measure in their tears They tore their garments cast ashes upon their heads threw themselves upon the ground and their complaints ascended as high as Heaven If then the relation and discourse of the pains of Hell makes us tremble what shall be the sight and experience This notwithstanding the consideration of what hath been said may help us to form some conception of the terrour and horrour of that place of eternal sorrow Let us as St. Bernard sayes descend into Hell whilest we live that we may not descend thither when we are dead Let us draw some fruit from thence during our lives from whence nothing but torment is to be had after death The principal fruits which may be drawn from that consideration are these In the first place an ardent love and sincere gratitude towards our Creator that having so often deserved Hell he hath not yet suffered us to fall into it How many be there now in Hell who for their first mortal sin and onely for that one have been sent thither and we notwithstanding the innumerable sins which we have committed are yet spared What did God find in us that he should use a mercy towards us for so many sins which he did not afford to others for so few Why are we not then more grateful for so many benefits which we have no wayes deserved How grateful would a damned person be if God should free him from those flames wherein he is tormented and place him in the same condition we now are What a life would he lead what penance would he undergoe what austerity would not appear a pleasure unto him and how grateful
it prepares for us are eternal whose greatness though it were not otherwise to be known might in this sufficiently appear that to free us from so many evils and crown us with so many goods it was necessary that he who was eternal should make himself temporal and should execute this great and stupendious work so much to his own loss CAP. IV. The baseness of Temporal goods may likewise appear by the Passion and Death of Christ Jesus THe greatness of eternal goods and evils is by the Incarnation of the Son of God made more apparent unto us then the Sun beams since for the freeing us from the one and gaining for us the other it was necessary so great a work should be performed and that God judged not his whole omnipotency ill imployed that man might gain eternity Yet doth not this great work so forcibly demonstrate unto us the baseness of things temporal and the contempt which is due unto them as the Passion and Death of the Son of God which was another work of his love an other excess of his affection another tenderness of our Creator and a most high expression of his good will towards us wherein we shall see how worthy to be despised are all the goods of the Earth since to the end we might contemn them the Son of God would not onely deprive himself of them but to the contrary embraced all the evils and incommodities this life was capable of Behold then how the Saviour of the world disesteemed temporal things since he calls the best of them and those which men most covet but thorns and to the contrary that which the world most hates and abhorrs he qualifies with the name of blessings favouring so much the Poor who want all things that he calls them blessed and sayes Of them is the Kingdom of heaven And of the Rich who enjoy the goods of the earth he sayes It is harder for them to enter into heaven then for a Camel to pass the eye of a needle And to perswade us yet more he not onely in words but in actions chose the afflictions and despised the prosperity of this life and to that end would suffer in all things as much as could be suffered In honour by being reputed infamous In riches by being despoyled of all even to his proper garments In his pleasures by being a spectacle of sorrow and afflicted in each particular part of his most sacred body This we ought to consider seriously that we may imitate him in that contempt of all things temporal which he principally exprest in his bitter death and passion This he would have us still to keep in memory as conducing much to our spiritual profit as an example which he left us and as a testimony of the love he bore us leaving his life for us and dying for us a publick death full of so many deaths and torments Zcnophon in Cyro lib. 3. Tigranes King of Armenia together with his Queen being prisoners unto Cyrus and one day admited to dine with him Cyrus demanded of Tigranes What he would give for the liberty of his wife to whom Tigranes answered That he would not onely give his Kingdom but his life and blood The woman not long after requited this expression of her husband For being both restored to their former condition One demanded of the Queene What she thought of the Majesty and Greatness of Cyrus to whom she answered Certainly I thought not on him nor fixt mine eyes on any but him who valued me so much as he doubted not to give his life for my ransom If this Lady were so grateful onely for the expression of her husbands affections that she looked upon nothing but him and neither admired nor desired the greatness of the Persians What ought the Spouse of Christ to do who not onely sees the love and affection of the King of Heaven but his deeds not his willingness to die but his actual dying a most horrid and cruel death for her ransom and redemption Certainly she ought not to place her eyes or thoughts upon any thing but Christ crucified for her Sabinus also extolls the loyalty and love of Vlysses to his Wife Penelope in regard that Circe and Calypso promising him immortality upon condition that he should forget Penelope and remain with them he utterly refused it not to be wanting to the love and affection he owed unto his Spouse who did also repay it him with great love and affection Let a Soul consider what great love and duty it owes to its Spouse Christ Jesus who being immortal did not onely become mortal but died also a most ignominious death Let us consider whether it be reasonable it should forget such an excessive love and whether it be fit it should ever be not remembring the same and not thankful for all eternity hazarding to lose the fruits of the passion of its Redeemer and Spouse Christ Jesus Upon this let thy Soul meditate day and night and the spiritual benefits which she will reap from thence will be innumerable Albertus Magnus used to say Lud. de Ponte P. 4. in introduc That the Soul profited more by one holy thought of the Passion of Christ than by reciting every day the whole Psalter by fasting all the year in bread and water or chastizing the Body even to the effusion of blood One day amongst others when Christ appeared unto St. Gertrude to confirm her in that devotion she had to his Passion he said unto her behold Daughter if in a few hours which I hung upon the Cross I so enobled it that the whole world hath ever since had it in reverence how shall I exalt that Soul in whose heart and memory I have continued many years Certainly it cannot be exprest what favour devout Souls obtain from Heaven in thinking often upon God and those pains by which he gained tor us eternal blessings and taught us to despise things temporal and transitory But that we may yet reap more profit by the holy remembrance of our Saviours passion we are to consider that Christ took upon him all our sins and being to satisfy the Father for them would do it by the way of suffering for which it was convenient that there should be a proportion betwixt the greatness of his pains and the greatness of our sins And certainly as our sins were without bound or limit so the pains of his torments were above all comparison shewing us by the greatness of those injuries he received in his passion the greatness of those injuries we did unto God by our inordinate pleasures We may also gather by the greatness of those pains and torments which were inflicted upon him by the Jews and Hangmen the greatness of those which he inflicted upon himself for certainly those pains which he took upon himself were not inferior to those he received from others But who can explicate the pains which our Saviour wounded by the grief he conceived at
thousand three hundred and five And afterwards in time of his Passion he shed from his sacred eyes as Peter Calentinus writes to the number of seaventy two thousand two hundred drops of tears and this for our sins begging the Eternal Father for pardon and our salvation In lib. inscrip Faustus annus Joan. Aquilan Serm. de Pass Lansperg hom 50. de Pass Ansel in Spec. Evan Ser. 1. c. 22. Vide Joan Burg. p. 2. c. 7. p. 3. c. 3. The lashes he received from those barbarous fellows past in number five thousand Some say it was reveal'd to St. Bernard how they amounted to six thousand six hundred seaventy six Lanspergius writes that a Servant of God understood from Heaven that if one for the space of twenty years should every day say an hundred times the Lords prayer in reverence of those stripes our Saviour received for every drop or blood would correspond one prayer and according to this account those drops amount to seaven hundred and thirty thousand five hundred He that has numbred the multitude of the stars the sands of the sea the drops of rain might well keep an account and give also an exact knowledge of the aforesaid numbers as being of more account The Crown of thorns was another Torment very cruel of which St. Anselm says that it pierced his venerable head with a thousand wounds And who can express the unspeakable torment of hanging upon the Cross the whole weight of his body sustained by his nailed hands and feet Finally so strange and horrible were his pains that not only to suffer them but even to imagin them caused St. Lidwine to bewail them even with tears of blood Cantip. l. 1. c. 25. Cantipratensis writes of a devout person who died of meer sorrow upon consideration of the excessive torments undergone by the Son of God And there is no doubt but the blessed Virgin if it had not been for her eminent constancy fortified by divine grace Albert. Mag. super Mis as Albertus Magnus said had expired in those tears of blood she poured forth at the foot of the Cross And if the sword of grief which pierced the heart of the Mother was so sharp what was the grief of the Son The passion of torments was in him real in her but for his sake and certainly the compassion he had of us sinners was greater than the compassion she could have of him And if the grief of the Virgin was so terrible Ansel de Excess Virg. that as St. Anselme sayes all the torments endured by all bodies whatsoever were in comparison of it little or nothing And St. Bernard thinks that her pains were a thousand times double to those of Child-birth Bernard de lament Virg. Bernardin Ser. 61. art 3. ca. 2. And Sr. Bernardine exceeding all this is confidedent that if the grief of the Virgin were divided amongst all the creatures that can suffer all would sodainly die as uncapable of it If such then and so great were the pains of the Virgin what shall be said of those which Christ suffered and felt since no sorrow was as his no pain could stand in competition with his If then in Torment he suffered so much as none but he could suffer in Honour and reputation he suffered no less and in all manners that the fury and envy of his Enemies assisted by the Devils could invent And if he suffered so much by the compassion of his torments he suffered much more by the compassion of our offences Thirdly the grief of his pains was much augmented by the place Where he suffered which was the Court of Judaea a place where he had heretofore been much esteeemed and of late received in triumph as a man come from Heaven And certainly to pass sodainly from one extream to another from the height of honour to the bottom of contempt and scorn increases much our afflictions For he became the most infamous man in the world arraigned and condemned to suffer between two Theeves in a publique place designed for wicked persons and murtherers and in the presence of his Mother which doubled the grief of his heart Fourthly the persons by whom he suffered was a great aggravation unto his grief It was by them of his own Nation such as he had favoured with infinit benefits and finding some compassion in Strangers he found none in his Countrymen The rage and madness wherewith his enemies desired his death being such as the Scripture compares them to Doggs wild Beasts and Unicorns The fifth Circumstance and that which most increaved his sorrow was To see those excessive pains and torments misbestowed foreseeing that the greatest number would not benefit themselves by them For as the hope of profit which is a main end in all our labours is a great comfort unto us so the despair of it as great an affliction And Christ our Redeemer suffering that his merits bloud and passion might profit all men when he knew that the hundredth part would not lay hold of it and that innumerable persons would prove ungrateful for so great a benefit it was a grief which beyond all apprehension pierced his tender and most loving heart Sixthly the Manner of his suffering was most grievous For it was by being generally abandoned of all things not having any thing whatsoever to comfort him His own people procured his death with great injustice the Gentils executed it with as great cruelty and the Priests and the learned in the Law were the leaven that sowred the whole lump The Princes blew the coals and kindled such a flame in the People as could not be quenched with those infinite injuries and affronts which were heaped upon him nor were they satisfied with seeing him hang upon the Cross whom they had so unjustly punished but rent his very bowels with their taunts and scoffs And which was more than all even in his own Disciples which he had bred up in his own School he found little firmness and loyalty Amongst his twelve chosen Apostles One sold him and became the Captain of those who apprehended him Another unto whom he had given the principality over the rest denied him thrice before his face cursing himself if he knew him and the Rest forsook him in the power of his enemies O never to be paralelled example of the inconstancy of humane things and of the constancy which a Christian ought to preserve in all events What felt that blessed heart of our Saviour when he saw himself surrounded by so many enemies and so few friends left him Psal 21. Of him it was truly written My heart became as melted wax in the middest of my bowels True it is that his blessed Mother when she could neither assist or defend him yet forsook him not but alas her presence did not mitigate but encrease his sorrow The eternal Father who could onely help him would not then appear for him but gave him over to suffer with all rigour
Crucifix Neither are the Elements left free from such representations Alfonso the first Portugal beheld in the air an Escucheon with the five wounds And the Emperour Constantine the principal Instrument of the Passion the Cross which hath also divers other times appeared But what more gratious and loving demonstration of the memorie which he desires we should still preserve of his torments then the wounds which he hath imprinted upon the persons of many of his servants Blos li. 15. c. 3. Tritem in Crim. ad an 1500. Surius 14. Aprilis Mosc in vita S. Clarae For besides St. Francis who was marked with the most evident signes of his favour the like were received by St. Gertrude and St. Lucia of Ferrara And what more express memorial of the passion of our Redeemer then the heart of St. Clara of Monte Falco in which was found the Image of Christ crucified the Pillar Whip Lance and other instruments of the Passion We should never make an end if we should recount all those several wayes by which Christ our Saviour hath represented unto us his death and passion to the end we should ever have it present and fixt in our memorie But above all the most blessed Sacrament in which divine mystery the lively representation of his death is as often repeated as his holy body is consecrated in the whole world was a great demonstration of his infinite love towards mankind Wherein he gives us to understand that he desires not onely once but a million of times to die for us and that though he cannot now return again to be crucified by reason of the impassibility of his glorifyed body yet his divine charity hath found a way after an unbloody and impassible manner to repeat the Sacrifice of the Cross and the fruit of our redemption How great a gratitude do we owe our Saviour for so infinite an expression of his good will towards us and how can we be grateful it forgetful of so profitable and advantageous a benefit Let not then his Passion depart from our thoughts but let us rather depart from our pleasures and despise all humane felicity since we behold the Lord of the world in such humility Moreover this most blessed Sacrament is not onely a Memorial of the Passion of Jesus Christ but of the Incarnation and wonderful works of God and not onely brings into our memory what Christ did when he suffered for us but what the Eternal Word did when he became flesh for us that immense God unto whom the whole Globe of the Earth serves but as a footstool descending from Heaven and so far lessening himself as to cover that infinite Majesty under the form of a Servant of which this Divine Sacrament is a most excellent and lively representation For in it also the God of Heaven being already incarnate and made man descends from Heaven and vails himself under the accidents of a little bread and wine and there is as it were annihilated for us and become nothing Besides as in the Eucharist we receive Christ crucified so in it also we receive the Word incarnate insomuch as these two great wonders of God the Passion and Incarnation are not onely represented but as it were multiplied unto us in this blessed Sacrament which was a high thought of God and according to what he said by his Prophet David Psal 39. Thou hast made thy wonders many O Lord And there is none who is like unto thee in thy cogitations Here God made his wonders that is his Passion and Incarnation many repeating and as it were multiplying them in this blessed Sacrament Which was a most high thought of him who is the supreme Wisdom nor could it enter into any understanding but that of the Divinity that that which was so extraordinary and so far above the reach of all created capacities as the Son of God to be sacrificed and the eternal Word to descend from Heaven and be made man should become so ordinary and familiar as we daily see it in the use of this Divine Mysterie But God did not onely here make his wonders many but made them great as the same David cries out How magnified are thy works O Lord Psal 91. Thy cogitations are most profound For although the works of the Passion and Incarnation are so great yet they are as it were enlarged and made greater by this holy Sacrament The greatness of the work of the Incarnation consisted in this that God abased himself and was made man and the greatness of that of the Passion in that he humbled himself unto death But in this Sacrament he abases and humbles himself yet lower becoming food for man which is less than to be man or to die which is natural unto man Besides this the general fruit of the Incarnation and Passion is after a most admirable manner particularly applyed in this blessed Sacrament to every one which receives it worthily The Death and Passion of Christ upon Mount Calvarie was no doubt a great work of God but in this Mysterie we behold the same Death Passion and Sacrifice after an unbloody and impassible manner which is certainly the greater miracle and expresses more the Divine power The Incarnation likewise when the Eternal Word entred into the womb of a Virgin was a great work of God but in this Mysterie it is in a certain manner extended and made greater and is therefore called an extension of the Incarnation our Lord here entring into the breast of every Christian and uniting himself unto him These are the marvails of the Law of Grace concerning which the Prophet Isaias said unto the Lord Isai 64. When thou shalt do wonders we shall not sustain them Thou hast descended and the mountains melted at thy presence From the beginning they have not heard nor understood with their ears neither hath the eye seen O God besides thee what thou hast prepared for those who expect thee The Prophet speaks of those wondrous works which were to be seen at the coming of the Messias which wore to be such as the world had never heard of nor had ever entred into any thought but that of God and therefore the Apostle alleadging this place saith That the eye hath not seen nor the ear hath heard neither hath it entred into the heart of man what God hath prepared for those who love him Since over and above those two stupendious wonders of taking flesh and dying for us he hath given himself as food unto those Souls who remain in his grace and love him which is so great and marvailous a work as onely God could think of it and besides God none And as onely God can truly value it so it is not in the power of man sufficiently to acknowledge it No humane heart being able to support the weight of such an obligation and the greatness of the Divine love which shines forth in this wonder of wonders Tertul. li. de Patien cap.
1. Tertullian said The greatness of some goods were intolerable the which according to the Prophet Isaias is verified in this Divine good and benefit which we were not able to support Wherefore it is called in holy Scripture The good or the good thing of God because it is a good and a benefit which more clearly than the Sun discovers the infinite and ineffable goodness of God to the astonishment and amazement of a humane heart and therefore the Prophet Oseas sayes Osee 3. They shall be astonished at the Lord and at his Good because his Divine benefit amazes and astonishes the Soul of man to see how good the Lord is and how great the good which he communicates unto us All which tends to no other end than to make us despise the goods of the Earth and to esteem onely those of Heaven which we attain unto by this Divine mysterie For this therefore did Christ our Redeemer institute this most blessed Sacrament that by it we might withdraw our hearts from things temporal and settle our affections upon those which are eternal for which it is most particularly efficacious as those who worthily receive it have full experience §. 3. Wherefore let that Soul who goes to communicate consider Who it is that enters into him and Who he is himself who entertains so great a Guest Let him call to mind with what reverence the blessed Virgin received the Eternal Word when he entred into her holy Womb and let him know it is the same Word which a Christian receives into his entrails in this Divine Sacrament Let him therefore endeavour to approach this holy Table with all reverence love and gratitude which ought if possible to be greater than that of the blessed Mother For then the obligation of Mankind was not so great as now it is For neither she nor we were then indebted unto him for his dying upon the Cross Let him consider that he receives the same Christ who sits at the right hand of God the Father That it is he who is the supreme Lord of Heaven and Earth He whom the Angels adore He who created and redeemed us and is to judge the living and the dead He who is of infinite wisdom power beauty and goodness If a Soul should behold him as when St. Paul beheld him and was struck blind with his light and splendour how would he fear and reverence him Let him know that he is not now less glorious in the Host and that he is to approach him with as much reverence as if he saw him in his Throne of glory With much reason did St. Teresa of Jesus say unto a devout Soul unto whom she appeared after death That we upon earth ought to behave our selves unto the blessed Sacrament as the blessed in Heaven do towards the Divine Essence loving and adoring it with all our power and forces Consider also that he who comes in person to thee is that self same Lord that required so much reverence that he struck Oza dead because he did but touch with his hand the Ark of his Testament and slew 50000 Bethshamits for their looking on it And thou not onely seest and touchest but receivest him into thy very bowells See then with what reverence thou oughtest to approach him The Angels and Seraphins tremble before his greatness and the Just are afraid Do thou then tremble fear and adore him S. John standing but near unto an Angel remained without force astonisht at the greatness of his Beauty and Majesty and thou art not to receive an Angel but the Lord of Angels into thy entrails It adds much to the endearment of this great benefit of our Saviour that it is not onely great by the greatness of that which is bestowed but by the meaneness of him who receives it For what art thou but a most vile creature composed of clay and dirt full of misery ignorance weakness and malice If the Centurion held himself unworthy to receive Christ under his roof and St. Peter when our Saviour was in this mortal life deemed himself not worthy to be in his presence saying Depart from me O Lord for I am a sinful man and St. John Baptist thought himself not worthy to unloose the latchet of his shoe How much more oughtest thou to judge thy self unworthy to receive him into thy bowels being now in his glory seated at the right hand of God the Father The Angels in heaven are not pure in his sight What purity shouldest thou have to entertain him in thy breast If a mighty King should visit a poor Beggar in his Cottage what honour what respects would it conferre upon him Behold God who is the King of Kings and Lord of Lords comes to visit thee not in thy house but within thy self Seaven years did Salomon spend in building a Temple wherein to place the Ark of the Testament Why doest thou not spend some time in making thy self a Temple of God himself Noah was a hundred years in preparing a Vessel wherein to save those who were to escape the Deluge Why doest thou not spare some dayes or hours to make thy self a Sacristy for the Saviour of the World Behold thy own unworthiness and what thou goest a-about Moyses when he was to make an Ark for the Tables of the Law not onely made choice of precious wood but covered it all with gold Thou miserable and vile Worm why doest thou not prepare and adorn thy self to receive the Lord of the Law Consider also what is the end for which thy Saviour comes unto thee It is by communicating his grace to make thee partaker of his Divinity He comes to cure thy sores and infirmities he comes to give remedy to thy necessities he comes to unite himself unto thee he comes to Deifie thee Behold then the infinity of his Divine goodness who thus melts himself in communication with his Creatures Behold what is here given thee and for what it is given thee God gives himself unto thee that thou mayest be all divine and nothing left in thee of earth In other benefits God bestows his particular gifts upon thee but here he gives thee himself that thou mightest also give thy self unto him and be wholly his If from the Incarnation of the Son of God we gather the great love he bore unto mankind passing for his sake from that height of greatness unto that depth of humiliation as to inclose himself in the Womb of a Virgin Behold how in this he loves thee since to sustain thee in the life of grace he hath made himself the true food of thy Soul and comes from the right hand of the eternal Father to enclose himself in thy most impure breast Jesus Christ comes also to make thee one body with himself that thou mayest after an admirable manner be united unto him and made partaker not onely of his spirit but of his bloud That which this Consideration ought to work in the breast of a
and increase Whereupon St. Austin calls it the foundation of the City of Babylon This Covetousness is seated in the affections of the soul as in its proper subject but is fed and receives nourishment from those exteriour things which we possess Wherefore wholly to extripate it two things are necessary not onely to quit this interiour thirst and gaping after riches but also that exteriour possession of them The first is to be done by the will and spirit but the second by an actual and effectual execution and forsaking them and it is for this that we are promised in this life a hundred-fold and in the next eternal felicity O how great a distance is there discovered betwixt things temporal and eternal since the onely hope of the eternal bestows more upon us even in this life then we can receive from the dominion and possession of all that is temporal Temporal goods by being enjoyed and possest are not so much as doubled but by being renounced for Christ are multiplyed a hundred-fold and hereafter conferr the Kingdom of Heaven Abundance of temporal goods as hath been already observed hinder and obstruct the pleasures and contents of this life for which we seek them and hereafter throw their possessors into hell flames so as they are not onely the occasion of eternal pain but by anticipation of many temporal inconveniences For I know not how it coms to pass the most rich are not the most contented nor yet the least necessitated It seems their goods diminish in their hands and are of less value amongst them than the poor at least ten is not worth to a rich man so much as one to a poor so as the poor who have renounced their goods for Christ finde them multiplyed a hundred-fold and the rich who forgetting their Redeemer employ themselves wholly in heaping up wealth find them as much diminished and of a hundred enjoy not one Besides the rich are so encumbered with cares dangers fears and perturbations that they know not the true contents of this life and yet run the hazard of eternal damnation in the other But to the contrary those who are poor in spirit and have forsaken their possessions for Christ are in this world filled with joy peace and comfort and in the next enjoy the Kingdom of Heaven O how happy are they who understand this and know how to change earth for heaven O how truly doth Christ call happy the poor in spirit who have left all for his sake and therefore enjoy a double happiness the one present and the other future here a hundred-fold for that which they possess not and hereafter the possession of life eternal O how happy is he who knows with the riches of the earth to purchase the treasure of glory in death and in life to receive them a hundred-fold doubled Cassian Collat. ult c. ult This according to Abbot Abraham is fully verified in religious persons who have quitted all they have upon earth to live in an estate of poverty who for one Father which they have left find a hundred in religion and for one Brother a hundred who embrace them with Christian charity for one possession a hundred possessions and for one house a hundred houses in the multitude of Monasteries founded for their Order so as there is no doubt but this reward is not onely doubled unto them a hundred-fold but multiplied to a farre greater proportion The same may be seen in other servants of God who serve him in voluntary poverty Beda de Nat. Sancti Benedic who by how much as Bede notes they have served God with more affection in renouncing their temporal goods by so much hath God stirred up the affections and liberalities of others to supply and assist them in all their wants So as they are served with the goods of all and as the Apostle sayes having nothing possess all But although this recompence should fail us yet one a hundred-fold greater then this will not fail us which is that noted by St. Jerome Lib. 3. in Math. He who for our Saviours sake leaves carnal things shall receive spirituall which in comparison and value are as if some small number were compared with a hundred We seek the goods of the earth for the ease and content of life But if this may better and with more advantage be acquired by the contempt and leaving them what can we desire more Certainly he who quits all for Christ enjoyes a hundred times more content and pleasure then he who flows in the greatest riches and abundance for according to what hath been said the goods of this life are tedious and troublesome even to life it self so the freedom from those cares and incommodities which accompany them eases the heart and makes our life more sweet and pleasant Whereupon St. Chrysostome notes That as the Children in the middest of the fiery furnace in Babylon were refresht by a cool wind and pleasant dew to those who are in poverty which the holy Scripture calls a furnace are recreated by a gentle aire from heaven and the dew of the holy Spirit and that in so high a manner as St. Bernard speaking of the Monks of Claraval sayes That they drew from their Poverty Fasts and austere Penances such joy and spiritual comfort that they were jealous and afraid least God had given them their whole and compleat reward in this world and it seemed unto them that having their heaven in this life they should lose it in that to come Whereupon it was necessary for St. Bernard to prove unto them in one of his Sermons That he did injure the grace of the holy Spirit who placed grief in what it communicated Certainly the Servants of God are highly rewarded since they receive even in this life such celestial joyes for those temporal trifles which they have quitted If one for a certain weight of Copper were to receive the like in Gold Cassian Sup. I believe he would think he had made a good bargain The like exchange they make who receive those spiritual joyes for the pleasures of the earth In Histor Cistere This is fully verified in that which happened unto Arnulphus the Cistercian who being rich noble and abounding with all which the world esteems moved by the Sermons of St. Bernard became a Monk in the Monastery of Claraval where after a holy life led in much rigour and austerity he at last became very infirm and through the great grief and pains which he suffered would often fall into faintings and sounding trances but still when he recovered from his fits would cry out It is true it is true which thou hast said O blessed Jesus And to some present who thought the extremity of pain did make him rave he would say Brethren I have spoken this in my right judgement and senses for that which our Lord promised in the Gospel That he who for his sake should leave Father Mother or Goods
should receive a hundred fold and hereafter life eternal I now find true by experience For this grief and pain which I feel is so sweet unto me out of the hope I have of eternal happiness that I would not lose these pains and this hope not onely for what I have left already but for a hundred times more And if to me who am so great a sinner those pains which I deserve are a hundred times more sweet than any former power and pleasures in the world What are they to a just man and to the zealous and devout religious By this it evidently appears that spiritual joy though but in hope affords a thousand times more pleasure and content than the possession of all the carnal and temporal delights in the world At what this Servant of God said all who were present remained astonisht that an ignorant man wholly unlettered should understand and speak of so high matters §. 2. The joy of the poor in Christ Jesus who have renounced all for his love springs from two causes First from that content which Poverty it self by its freedom from temporal troubles and the imbroilments of life brings along with it And this even the Gentils confessed And therefore Apuleius called it Merry and and chearful Poverty And Seneca would say That a Turf of earth gave a sounder sleep than Wooll dyed in Tyrian Purple And Anaxagoras taught by experience That he found more content in sleeping upon the Earth and feeding upon Hearbs than in Down Beds and delicious Banquets accompanied with an unquiet mind The second cause of this joy is not the nature of poverty but the particular grace of God who rewards them with the pleasures of heaven who have renounced those of earth and fills with spiritual riches those who have left the temporal For in truth poverty is much beloved and priviledged by Christ and therefore he rewards the poor even in this life with many particular graces and favours Besides this the many and great commodities which this contempt of earthly things brings along with it may serve as a reward equivalent to a hundred yea a thousand-fold For if all the world were given to escape the committing of one sin it were not an equal value and by Evangelical poverty and contempt of the world the sins which we avoid are innumerable For by it we not onely pluck up the root but quit the instruments of sinning Take away abundance and you take away insolence arrogance and pride which spring from it as smoke from fire you take away also the means of committing many other sins which riches feed and nourish Neither is the attaining of many vertues which accompany Poverty as Humility Modesty and Temperance of less value than the avoidance of those sins And therefore it is a great truth Homil. 8. in Ep. ad Hebr. which Saint Chrysostome notes and ponders That in Poverty we possess Vertues more easily Neither is it sleightly to be valued That the state of Poverty assists much toward our satisfaction for those sins we have committed according to what is spoken to the just man by Isaias the Prophet I have chosen thee that is I have purified thee in the furnace of poverty It is likewise a great matter to be free and uninterressed in the base and unprofitable employments of the earth whereby the poor have time to exercise vertue to converse with God and his Angels and contemplate Eternity The honour also and dignity to command these things below which is attained by the poor in spirit may well be valued at a hundred-fold For as it is a great baseness in the rich to be slaves to their avarice and to things so vile as riches So it is a great honour to the poor to exempt themselves from this slavery and servitude and to lord it over all and as the Apostle sayes by contemning all to possess all so as there is no Riches no Kingdom comparable to this of Poverty Kingdoms have their limits and boundeties which they pass not but this Kingdom of Poverty is not straightned by any bounds but for the same reason that it hath nothing hath all things for the heart cannot be said to possess any thing without being Lord of it and it cannot be Lord of it without being superiour unto it and not that unless it subject and subjugate it unto it self So as it is by so much more a possessor by how much it is more Lord and Superiour Now he who desires to be rich must needs love those things without which he cannot be rich nor can he love them without care sollicitude and slavery but he who contemns them is not onely Lord but Possessor of them And for this cause St. John Climacus said very well Grad 17. That the poor religious person who casts all his care upon God is Lord of all the world and all men are his Servants Moreover the true love of poverty doth not basely cleave unto these temporal things for all it hath or can have it respects nothing and if it want any thing it is no more troubled than if it wanted so much dung and dirt But above all rewards is that of God who is possest by poverty In Psal 118. and in St. Ambrose his opinion is that hundred-fold which is received for what we leave For as the Tribe of Levie which had no part in the distribution of the Land of Palestine received this promise from God that he would be their Share and Possession of inheritance So with much reason unto those who voluntarily refuse their parts in the goods of the earth God himself becomes their possession riches and all good even in this world and passes so much further as to give them in the other the Kingdom of Heaven Aug. Ser. 28. de Ver. Apost Whereupon St. Austin speaks in this manner Great happiness and felicity is that of a Christian who with the rich price of poverty purchases the precious reward of glory Wilt thou see how rich and precious it is The poor man buyes and obtains that by poverty which the rich man cannot with all his treasures And it was certainly a most high counsel in our Lord God and an act worthy of his divine understanding to make Poverty the price of his Glory that none might want wherewith to purchase it Wherefore many of the Saints have been so enamoured of Poverty that they have purchased it with more eagerness than the rich have fled from it and have had this advantage over them to be more voluntarily poor than the other could be rich CAP. VIII Many who have despised and renounced all that is Temporal SO evident is the baseness of temporal goods and the mischiefs they occasion in humane life so apparent that many Philosophers without the light of faith or doctrine of the Son of God were not ignorant of it and many so deeply apprehended the importance not onely of contemning but renouncing of
he after proved so excellent a Bishop and so perfect a follower of Christ that he came to give his blood for his holy name joyning to the Crown of a most holy life the Laurel of martyrdom No less wonderful was that contempt of the world in Simeon Sales Evagrius lib. 4. coll 33. who living as it is reported by Leontius and Evagrius in great poverty and contempt covered as much as he could his fasts large hours of prayer which he spent with God And to that end when he was in publique endeavoured so to behave himself as all men might take him for a fool and a distracted mad-man without the appearance of any virtue at all so as he was often seen to enter Taverns and when after his great fasts his hunger caused him to eat he would feed openly in the Streets upon vile and course meats and if any of understanding by chance looked more narrowly into his way of living as suspecting that what he did might be to conceal his vertues so soon as he had the least inkling of it he would presently depart to some other place where he might be free from knowledge or esteem It happened in a certain place where he was that one finding a Maid with child and urging her to confess who had defloured her she to conceal the offender laid it upon Simeon the Fool for so they called him He contradicted it not but was contented for Christs sake to bear the infamy until God was pleased that the true Father of the Child should be discovered and in the mean time had so much charity towards her who had laid that scandal upon him that she being in great necessity and infirm of her child-birth he secretly brought her to eat But our Lord at last made him venerable to the whole world who had made himself a fool to gain the wisdom of Heaven There are many also who to avoid the opinion of Saints and the honour which the people gave them have done things extraordinary and such as in the eyes of men seemed unworthy Gra. 25. §. 1. St. John Climacus writes that blessed Father Simeon understanding that the Governour of the Province came to visit him as a man famous for sanctity took a piece of bread and cheese in his hand and sitting at the door of his Cell eat it in that ravenous and odd manner that he seemed out of his wits and the Governour conceiving him to be so contemned him and returned home There lived also in the inner part of the Desert a Venerable old man unto whom a Disciple had associated himself to learn his sanctity and serve him Upon the fame of his holy life a certain man repaired unto him and with tears in his eyes besought him he would come unto his house and pray for his Son who was grievously sick The Hermite was content to goe along with him but the Father of the Child made haste before that he might in company of his Neighbours return and meet him and so receive him with more honour No sooner did the old man perceive him a farre off in this equipage but presently imagining what the matter meant he stript himself and plunging into a River close by began to bathe himself His Disciple being much ashamed of this light action wished the people to return home For the old man was out of his wits And going to his Master said Father what is it thou hast done all those who saw thee thought thou wert possest To whom the holy man answered It is well It is that which I desired §. 3. Amongst those who with Evangelical poverty have embraced the contempt of the world many have been great Lords Princes Kings and Emperours Amongst the Almanes their Prince Charles is the most famous who being rich and highly esteemed for his glorious actions touched with the desire of heavenly things left all to his Brother Pepin came to Rome built a Monastery upon the Mount St. Silvester and there remained sometime a Monk but being much troubled with the many visits of the City which was at hand and his retirement disquieted he left it and went to Mont-Cassino where he was received by Petronace the Abbot and there lived with great joy and content and profited so much in the exercises of humility that it is written in the Annals of the Monastery that the Abbot appointed him to take care of the Flock which mean office he executed with as great chearfulness as if he had governed a Kingdom as before and one of his Ews by chance falling lame he was seen to carry her home upon his shoulders a King not disdaining so mean a service We know also in our Spain that King Bamba after he had raigned eleven years and performed many brave actions deprived the Pirats of Africa of 200 Ships and taken Paul their King who went against the King of France prisoner The last of his glorious actions was to close himself up in a Monastery where he lived seaven years in great observance of Religion and died the year 674 And was after in 786 imitated by Bermudus King of Castile There is scarce any Province of Christendom wherein some Prince hath not renounced his temporal Kingdom for gaining the eternal instructing us that true greatness consists in humbling our selves for Christ and true riches in being poor both in will and deed But not to enlarge my self too far in recounting the Stories of those many Princes who have known how to exchange their temporal Riches for an eternal Kingdom I will content my self with relating one which includes many examples Cantiprat l. 2. c. 10. p. 2. Hen. Gran. d. 5. Ex. 25. Thomas de Cantiprato witnesses that in his time died St. Matilda Daughter to the King of Scots who had four Brothers The first being a Duke desiring to become poor for Christs sake left his wife and fortunes and forsook his Country The second bidding also farewell unto the world became an Hermite The third was an Arch-Bishop who quitting his Bishoprick entred into the Order of the Cistercians The fourth named Alexander was the youngest of all his Brothers and being now arrived at sixteen years of age his Father would have compelled him to take the Government of the Kingdom upon him Which being understood by his Sister Matilda who was twenty years old she called him aside and spake unto him in this manner My most sweet Brother what is that thou meanest to doe Thy elder Brothers have forsaken the things of the Earth to gain those of Heaven and wilt thou to gain this Temporal Kingdom which they have left lose that which is eternal and thy own Soul Alexander his eyes becoming fountains of tears answered her in this manner Sister what is it you advise me I am ready to execute your commands without varying in the least circumstance The holy Maid glad of his resolution changed her habit and both of them secretly leaving their Country came into
bis life shall lose it and he who hates it in this world shall gain it for ever Hence it comes that we are now no more to look upon our selves as upon a thing of our own but onely Gods depending both in our spiritual and corporal being from that infinite Ocean of being and perfection Hence the Soul finding it self now free and unfetter'd flyes unto God with all its forces and affections not finding any thing to love and please it but in him in whom the beauty and perfections of all creatures are contained with infinite advantages When one hath once arrived unto this estate how dissonant and various soever his works be the end which he pretends is still the same and he ever obtains what he pretends if shutting his eyes to all creatures as if they were not he looks at nothing but God and how to please his Divine goodness and that onely for it self It may be that looking at the particular ends of each work our actions may be in several conditions sometimes they are in beginning sometimes in the middest sometimes in the end and oftentimes by impediments and cross accidents which happen they acquire not what they aim at but look upon the intention of him who works and they are still in their end For in what condition soever the work be he who does it with this intention onely to please God is ever in his end which no bad success or contradiction can hinder According to this which hath been said it is a great matter by Divine light to have arrived at this knowledge That all goods and gifts descend from above and that there is an infinite power goodness wisdom mercy and beauty from whence these properties which are here below participated by the creatures with such limitation are derived It is a great matter to have discovered the Sun by his rayes and guiding our selves by the stream to have arrived at the Fountains head or to have found the Centre where the multiplicity of created perfections meet and unite in one There our love shall rest as having nothing further to seek And this is to love God with all the heart all the soul all the mindâ— and all the powers And as those who arrive at this happy state have no other care no other thought than to doe the will of God here upon earth with the same perfection it is done in heaven So they have no other desires than by leaving earth to enter heaven there by sulfilling wholly the Divine will to supply what was defective upon earth Nothing detains them here but the will of God they have nothing begun which is not ended they are ever prepared all their business is dispatched like those servants who are alwayes expecting their Lord and still ready to open the door when he shall call Let us then prepare our selves by withdrawing our love from all which is temporal and created and placing it upon our Creator who is eternal let us love him not with a delicate and an effeminate love but with a strong and manly affection such a one as will support any weight overcome any difficulty and despise any interest rather than be separated from our beloved break his Laws or offend him though never so lightly Let this Love be strong as death that it may look death in the face and not flye from it which when it suffers it conquers Let thy fire be so enkindled that if whole rivers of tribulations fall upon it they may be but like drops of water falling upon a forge which the flame drinks up and consumes and is not quenched but quickned by them Be above thy self and above all that is below And if the world offer thee all it is Mistress of to despoil thee of this love tread it under thy feet and despise it as nothing To this love it belongs To accommodate ones self to poverty Not to repine at hunger nakedness cold or heat who as companions goe along with it To suffer injuries meekly To bear sickness and infirmities patiently Not to be dismayed in persecutions To endure temptations with longanimity To bear the burthens of our neighbours chearfully Not to be tired with their thwart conditions Not to be angry at their neglects nor overcome by their ingratitude In spiritual drynesses not to leave our ordinary devotions and in consolations and spiritual gusts not to forbear our obligations Finally that we may say with St. Paul Rom. 8. Who shall separate us from the charity of Christ tribulation or distress or famine or nakedness or danger or persecution or the sword I am sure that neither death nor life nor Angels nor Principalities nor Powers neither things present nor things to come neither might nor height nor depth nor any other creature shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. FINIS
where I beseech thee is the fear of his justice when knowing that thou mayest dye to day thou deferrest thy conversion for so many years so as thy vices may be rather said to leave thee than thou them Mark what St. Augustin sayes Repentance in death is very dangerous for in the holy Scripture there is but one onely found to wit the good Theef who had true repentance in his end There is one found that none should despair and but one that none should presume For in a sound man repentance is sound in an infirm man infirm and in a dead man dead Many deal with God as King Dionysius did with the Statue of Apollo from which when he took his Cloak of massie gold he said This Cloak is good neither for Summer nor Winter for Summer it is too heavy for Winter too cold So some can find no time for the service of God Almighty In youth they say It is too early and that we ought to allow that age its time of freedom and pleasure that when they are old they will seriously think of vertue and amendment of life that the vigour of youth is not to he enfeebled with the austerities of penance which renders us infirm and useless the rest of our succeeding lives But arriving at old age if by chance they attain it they have then many excuses and pretend that they want health and strength to perform their penances After this manner they would deceive God Almighty but they remain deceived themselves To the Apostle St. James this manner of speech seemed not well To morrow we will goe to such a City and there we will stay a year because we know not what shall be to morrow If then in temporal things it be not good to say I will do this to morrow what shall it be in procuring the salvation of our Souls to say Ten or twenty years hence when I am old which who knows whether ever shall be I will then serve God and repent to what purpose deferre we that untill tomorrow which imports so much to be done to day especially since it absolutely imports and perhaps will not be to morrow if not to day Aug. Confes In this error was St. Augustine as he himself confesses I felt my self saith he detained and I often repeated these words Miserable man Until when until when To morrow and to morrow And why is there not to day an end of ' my lewd life This I said and wept with most bitter contrition of my heart § 3. To this Uncertainty of death is to be added the Third Condition of being onely one and onely once to be tryed so as the error of dying ill cannot be amended by dying well another time God gave unto Man his senses and other parts of his body doubled he gave him two eyes that if one failed he might serve himself of the other he gave him two ears that if one grew deaf he might supply the defect by the other he gave him two hands that if one were lost yet he might not wholly be disabled but of deaths he gave but one and if that one miscarry all is ruin'd A terrible case that the thing which most imports us which is to dye hath neither tryal experience or remedy it is but onely once to be acted and that in an instant and upon that instant all Eternity depends in which if we fail the error is never to be amended Plutarch writes of Lamachus the Centurion that reprehending a Souldier for some error committed in warre the Souldier promised him he would do so no more Unto whom the discreet Centurion replyed Thou sayest well for in warre the mischief which follows the first error is so great that thou canst not erre twice And if in warre you cannot erre twice in death you ought not to erre once the error being wholly irrepairable If an ignorant Peasant who had never drawn a Bow should be commanded to shoot at at a mark far distant upon condition that if he hit it he should be highly rewarded with many brave and rich gifts but if he mist it and that at the first shoot he should be burnt alive in what streights would this poor man find himself how perplexed that he should be forced upon a thing of that difficulty wherein he had no skill and that the failing should cost him so dear as his life but especially that it was only once to be essayed without possibility of repairing the first fault by a second trial This is our case I know not how we are so jocund We have never dyed we have no experience or skill in a thing of so great difficulty we are onely once to dye and in that all is at stake either eternity of torments in hell or of happiness in heaven how live we then so careless and forgetful of dying well since for it we were born and are but once to try it This action is the most important of all our life the which is to pass in the presence of God and Angels upon it depends all eternity and if mist without repair or amendment Those human actions which may be repeated if one miss the other may hit and that which is lost in one may be regained in another If a rich Merchant has this year a Ship sunk in the Ocean another may arrive the next loaden with such riches as may recompence the loss of the former And if a great Oratour miscarry in his declamation and lose his credit he may with another recover it but if we once fail in death the loss is never to be restored That which is but onely one is worthy of more care and esteem because the loss of it is irrepairable Let us then value the time of this life since there is no other given us wherein to gain Eternity Let us esteem that time wherein we may practice a precious death or to say better both a precious life and death learning in life how to dye It was well said by a pious Doctor If those who are to execute some office or perform some matter of importance or if it be but of pleasure as to dance or play at Tennis yet study first before they come to do it why should we not then study the art of dying which to do well is an action more dfficult and important than all others If a man were obliged to leap some great and desperate leap upon condition that if he performed it well he should be made Master of a wealthy Kingdom but if ill he should be chained to an Oar and made a perpetual Galley-slave Without all doubt this man would use much diligence in preparing himself for so hazardous an undertaking and would often practice before an action of so great consequence from which he expected so different fortunes How far more different are those which we expect from so great a leap as is that from life to death since the Kingdoms of Earth
compared with that of Heaven are trash and rubbish and the tugging at an Oar in the Gallies compared with Hell a Glory When the leap is great and dangerous he who is to leap it uses to fetch his Careere backwards that he may leap further and with greater force We therefore knowing the danger of the leap from life to death that we may perform it better ought to fetch our Careere far back even from the beginning of our short life and from our first use of reason from which we shall know that the life we live is mortal that at the end of it we have a great debt to pay and that we are to discharge both use and principal when we least think of it St. John Eleemosynarius relates that anciently when they crowned an Emperour the principal Architects presented him with some peeces of several sorts of Marble wishing him to make choice of such as best pleased him for his Sepulcher giving him thereby to understand that his Reign was to last so short a time that it was convenient for him immediately to begin his Tomb that it might be finished before his life were ended and that withal he could not govern well his Vassals unless he first governed himself by the memory of death The others present were also admonished by this mystery that so soon as reason began to command and have Dominion in us that it was then time to provide for death and that in the preparation for our end consisted the good government and perfection of life A perfect life saith St. Gregory is the meditation of death Greg. moral 12. and he enjoyes a perfect life who imployes it in the study of death he lives well who learns how to dye well and he that knows not that knows nothing all Sciences besides profit him but little What did all that he had studied and all which he knew profit the great Aristotle nothing which he himself confest being near his death For when his Disciples besought him that having in his life time bestowed upon them so many fair Lessons and wise Sentences he would leave them one at his death This was his answer I entred this life in poverty I lived in misery and dye in ignorance of that which most imports me to know He said well for he had never studied how to dye Many Disciples hath Aristotle in those Sciences which he knew and many which follow his opinions but many more who imitate him in the ignorance he had of death Let us husband Time in which we may gain Eternity which being once lost we shall lose both the Time of this life and the Eternity of the other How many millions are now in Hell who whilest they were in this world dispised time and would now be content to suffer thousands of years all the torments of the damned for the redemption but of one instant in which they might by repentance recover the eternal life of glory which is now lost without remedy and yet thou casts away not onely instants but hours dayes and years Consider what a damned person would give for some part of that time which thou losest and take heed that thou hereafter when there shall be no repair of that time which thou now so lavishly mispendest be not thy self in the same grief and bitterness O fools as many as seek vain etertainments to pass away the time as though time would stand still if they found not divertisements to make it pass The time of this life flyes and over-runs thee and thou layest not up for the other Consider how thou mayest by Time gain Eternity look not then upon the loss of it as upon the loss of Time but of Etenity Time as saith Nazienzen is the Market or Fair of Eternity Endeavour then whilest it lasts to get a good bargain for this life once past there is no more occasion of traffick the time appointed for storing up is but short and the gain and profit is eternal Hear what a Heathen teaches thee who knew not this great good that by Time might be purchased Eternity and yet he sayes in this manner Nature did not bestow Time upon us with such liberality Seneca Epist 118. as that the least particle of it might be cast away Consider how much Time is lost even to the most diligent some part the care of our health takes from us some that of our friends some our necessary occasions some our publick affairs imploy sleep divides life with us Of this then so short and rapid time which remains what doth it profit us to spend the greater part in vain Lib. de brevitate vitae The same Author advises us also that we strive to overcome the swiftness of time with our diligence in well using and imploying it If this be Seneca's counsel who had not the help of faith and was ignorant that in an instant of time might be gained an eternity of Glory what ought we to do who have the light of heaven the knowledge of eternal happiness and the threats of eternal torments Let us live ever dying and let us think every instant to be our last so shall we not lose this time which is so precious and by which we may gain what is eternal Let us call to mind what is said by St. John Climacus Climac gra 6. The present day is not well past unless we esteem it to be the last of our life He is a good man who every hour expects death but he is a Saint that every hour desires it At least let us behave our selves as mortals and let us believe we are so shewing by our works that we know we are to dye Let us ask that of God which was prayed for by David Lord let me know the fewness of my dayes It is apparent that we are to dye it is apparent that we know not when it is apparent that we are dye but once but it is much more available as St. Ambrose notes when God saith it and we discourse it in our selves Let us therefore practically perswade our selves of this truth and let not that time slip from betwixt our hands which once past will never return Let us blush at the counsel of a Heathen Marcus Aurelius the Emperour who advises us to proceed alwayes constantly in vertuous actions Anton. lib. 2. in princip Reflect sayes he upon the end of that time which is assigned thee the which if thou shalt not spend in procuring the peace of thy mind whilest thou livest it will pass away and never return unto thee being dead every hour apply thy mind to mark seriously what thou takest in hand and doe it accurately with fortitude as becomes a Roman with an unfeigned gravity humanity liberality justice and in the mean time withdraw thy mind from all other thoughts which thou shalt easily doe if thou shalt so perform each action without the mixture of vain glory as if it were the last
their Angel guardians shall assist by giving testimony how often they have disswaded them from their evil courses and how rebellious and refractory they have still been to their holy inspirations The Saints also shall accuse them that they have laughed at their good counsels and shall set forth the dangers whereunto they them-themselves have been subject by their ill example The just Judge shall then immediately pronounce Sentence in favour of the good in these words of love and mercy Come you blessed of my Father possess the Kingdom which was prepared for you from the creation of the world O what joy shall then fill the Saints Abul in Mat. Jansen Sot Les l. 13. c. 22. alii Isai 30. and what spight and envy shall burst the hearts of Sinners but more when they shall hear the contrary Sentence pronounced against themselves Christ speaking unto them with that severity which was signified by the Prophet Isaiah when he said His lips were filled with indignation and his tongue was a devouring fire More terrible than fire shall be those words of the Son of God unto those miserable wretches when they shall hear him say Depart from me ye cursed into eternal fire prepared for Satan and his Angels With this Sentence they shall remain for ever overthrown and covered with eternal sorrow and confusion Ananias and Saphira were struck dead only with the hearing the angry voice of St. Peter What shall the Reprobate be in hearing the incensed voice of Christ This may appear by what happened unto St. Catharine of Sienna who being reprehended by St. Paul In vita ejus c. 24. who appeared unto her onely because she did not better employ some little parcel of time said that she had rather be disgraced before the whole World than once more to suffer what she did by that reprehension But what is this in respect of that reprehension of the Son of God in the day of vengeance for if when he was led himself to be judged he with two onely words I am overthrew the astonisht multitude of Souldiers to the ground how shall he speak when he comes to judge In vita PP l. 5. apud Rosul In the book of the lives of the Fathers composed by Severus Sulpitius and Cassianus it is written of a certain young man desirous to become a Monk whom his Mother by many reasons which she alleadged pretended to disswade but all in vain for he would by no means alter his intention defending himself still from her importunity with this answer I will save my soul I will assure my salvation it is that which most imports nic She perceiving that her modest requests prevailed nothing gave him leave to do as he pleased and he according to his resolution entred into Religion but soon began to flag and fall from his fervour and to live with much carelesness and negligence Not long after his Mother died and he himself fell into a grievous infirmity and being one day in a Trance was rapt in spirit before the Judgement Seat of God He there found his Mother and divers others expecting his condemnation She turning her eyes and seeing her Son amongst those who were to be damned seemed to remain astonisht and spake unto him in this manner Why how now Son is all come to end in this where are those words thou saidest unto me I will save nay soul was it for this thou didst enter into Religion The poor man being confounded and amazed knew not what to answer but soon after when he returned unto himself and the Lord was pleased that he recovered and escaped his infirmity and considering that this was a divine admonition he gave so great a turn that the rest of his life was wholly tears and repentance and when many wisht him that he would moderate and remit something of that rigour which might be prejudicial unto his health he would not admit of their advices but still answered I who could not endure the reprehension of my Mother how shall I in the day of judgement endure that of Christ and his Angels Let us often think of this and let not onely the angry voice of our Saviour make us tremble Raph. Columb Ser. 2. Domin in Quadr. but that terrible Sentence which shall separate the wicked from his presence Raphael Columba writes of Philip the second King of Spain that being at Mass he heard two of his Grandees who were near him in discourse about some worldly business which he then took no notice of but Mass being ended he called them with great gravity and said unto them onely these few words You two appear no more in my presence which were of that weight that the one of them died of grief and the other ever after remained stupified and amazed What shall it then be to hear the King of Heaven and Earth say Depart ye cursed and if the words of the Son of God be so much to be feared what shall be his works of justice At that instant the fire of that general burning shall invest those miserable creatures Less l. 13. c. 23. the Earth shall open and Hell shall enlarge his throat to swallow them for all eternity accomplishing the malediction of Christ and of the Psalm which saith Psal 54. Let death come upon them and let them sink alive into hell And in another place Coals of fire shall fall upon them Ps 139. and thou shalt cast them into the fire and they shall not subsist in their miseries And in another Psalm Psal 10. Snares fire and sulphur shall rain upon sinners Finally that shall be executed which was spoken by St. John That the Devil Death and Hell and all Apcc. 20. who were not written in the Book of life were cast into the lake of fire and brimstone where they shall be eternally tormented with Antichrist and his false Prophets And this is the second death bitter and eternal which comprehends both the Souls and the Bodies of them who have died the spiritual death of sin and the corporal death which is the effect of it The Just shall then rejoyce according to David Psal 57. beholding the vengeance which the Divine Justice shall take upon sinners and sing another song like that of Moses Exod. 15. when the Aegyptians were drowned in the red sea and that Song of the Lamb related by St. John Apoc. 15. Great and marvelous are thy works O Lord God omnipotent just and righteous are thy wayes King of all Eternity who will not fear thee O Lord and magnifie thy name With those and thousand other Songs of joy and jubilee they shall ascend above the Stars in a most glorious triumph until they arrive in the Empyrial Heaven where they shall be placed in thrones of glory which they shall enjoy for an eternity of eternities In the mean time the earth which was polluted for having sustained the Bodies of the damned shall be