all good things whereupon he urgeth us thus expresly to this application If any of you want wisdome let him aske it of God who giveth all men liberally and it shall be given you §. II. What sincerity in prayer is requisite for this effect and what kind of peace is to be expected THese promises of the increated verity delivered by his own mouth being premised together with this conveyed to us by the holy Organ of his Secretary Saint James I may confidently give every one this addresse to the effect of my proposal the asking wisdome of God by sincere and humble apprecations for indeed the soul hath no hand wherewith to reach her sustenance from heaven but prayer and by this hand she offereth her sacrifice of praise and reacheth to her self the exchange of succour for all her necessities wherefore in order to this commerce with God the Apostle Saint Paul adviseth us to pray every where lifting up pure hands Here prayer is assigned the function of the hand to offer up and to bring down to us all returnes from heaven But we must remember this binding clause in the promise of Saint James that our prayer must be without any stammering or hesitation in our faith First we ought to believe steadily Gods providence in all the various contingencies that seem to shake humane reason Next our prayer must not waver between the desire of this wisdome which brings all other good with it and the affectation principally of some peculiar good we designe for our felicity for this is an hesitation in faith when we do positively elect any temporall fruition for our happinesse because therein we tosse and flote between the fear of that privation and the reference of all our proprieties to the course of that providence which wheels about all temporalities Insomuch as this hesitation makes a kind of mentall stammering in our prayer when there is as it were some knot upon our heart that doubles it and keepes it from opening it self freely to this desire of spirituall wisdome And as in this vocall impediment the eagernesse doth rather fasten then untye the tongue so in this implication of our heart in any worldly affection our zeal and fervor in the pursuite of that petition is rather an impediment to the freedome of our mind then any solution to the difficulties of our peace But I desire it may be remembred that the meanes I propose of obtaining happinesse by prayer is not the fervency of the spirit in such petitions as the flesh doth commonly indite namely an attaining either riches honour or the like temporall commodities but in that sincere ardor of the soul towards the impetration of such a fervent love of God as induceth a composure and steadinesse of mind equalling and sizing our wils with our conditions and by that meanes keeping the peace of our mind volubile and concentrick with the motions of Divine providence and this is an effect of that wisdome onely which the Apostle Saint James sayes descends from above and is assigned for all those that ask it without hesitation in faith or duplicity of mind Not that I disswade the negotiants of the world their pursuite of earthly commodities nor the praying for adeption and conservation of temporall blessings but it must not be as they have placed their happinesse on the materiall part of those desires but as the greatest good of them is their being grants and concessions to prayer which when it is sincere refers the will of the suppliant to that of the Soveraign Creator of all wills who doth often as Saint Augustine saies mercifully deny us when we know not what we ask for there may be many events solicicited or deprecated in relation to Gods service by the dim light of our reason which do not stand with the order of Gods providence and so our praying may be acceptable when our prayer is not accordable but this suit of spirituall wisdome whereby to adjust our wills to all the events and orders of Divine providence is not onely assured of acceptation but of concession on the other side there is no temporall project of ours never so Pious wherein we may not be mistaken in the specialty of the way and meanes whereby God hath designed to be glorifyed whether by his justice upon us or his mercy to us wherefore this grace of conformity to all his designations is the onely petition we can be sure hath this reference made to it by Saint Iohn viz That it is made according to the will of God and consequently is accorded to us by his promise of Whatsoever we ask according to his will he heares us Neverthelesse even they who are discharged of any weighty solicitude in this world must not expect such a fixure and steadinesse of their minds as not to feel the motions of our fluent unsteady nature which heaveth and sets a little even in our greatest calmes This is that emotion and unevennesse whereunto Saint Paul saies even those who have the first fruits of the Spirit are subjected viz some swelling and groaning within themselves and Saint Augustine tells us that exemption from combate is properly the Angelicall priviledge and not to be subdued or mastered in the contention is the supremest point of fixure attainable in our mortal nature Wherefore they must not conclude this advice defective who do not attain to such an evennesse of peace by prayer as they figure to themselves resting without any breath of disquiet to shake those leaves of passions which hang upon the stock of our nature but must conclude such agitations of the sensitive part of their soules no lesse naturall then wind in the middle region of the ayre for Saint Paul tells us what we find by familiar experience that we have our treasure not in earthen vessels so that to be troubled but not distressed to be vexed and not vitiated is the best establishment of happynesse competent with this state of our Peregrination and this degree of tranquility of spirit is to be attained by petition to him whom the sea and the windes of humane frailtyes obey upon his rebuking them Saint Paul who had learn'd to be equally content in all estates of abundance and abasement did not find this science at the feet of Gamaliel but rather upon his own knees at Damascus when Behold he prayes was alledged for the reason of his relief and by using his own prescription of Pray continually he attained to such a strong habit of mind as preserved his equanimity in all the inequalities of his conditions For when in one day the same hands that would have sacrificed to him as a God did sacrifice him to their own evill spirits he tore his clothes with more emotion of spirit when he was vainly to be Deifi'd then he suffered the tearing of his flesh when he was thus unjustly damnifi'd This patern in one part affords us a fair copie of the mutability
Churches service being set by the hand of that great Master who in this last lesson of his owne voyce did concert this symphony in the musick of the Church and even ingaged his father to preserve this unity and consort by these words Holy Father keepe through thy owne name those whom thou hast given me that they may be one as we are one This cleereth to us the marke of concordancy in faith to be one of the most respondent unto Christs signature on his Church And as one may without arrogating to himselfe much of the science of a Physitian venture to pronounce what is the best temper to be composed of so may I safely affirme that Religion to be of the best constitution which consisteth the most perfectly of these two divine elements well intermixed Zeale and Charity the which may be said to make a good complexion in the face of Religion the first relating to the colour of the blood and the last to the fairnesse of the skin through which the good tincture of zeale is transparent in the works of charity wherefore the well tempering of these two qualities make that beauty in the Spouse of which the Bridegroome saith Behold how faire is my Love there is no spot in her And as the face although it be not an infallible yet is one of the best indications of the bodies health for although there be not any so secure symptomes in it as conclude against all infirmities yet there are some so resolving marks of unhealthfulnesse in the face as cannot mislead a prognostike of some infirmity So may we make a probable judgement of the foundnesse of a Religion by the faire and healthful aspect thereof and by the ill looks and disfigurements of some Religions we may warrantably sentence the unsoundnesse of them for there are some that have such marks of uncleannesse on their skin as not onely the Priest but even the People may discern the Leprosie This considered the most advised judgement touching Religion for the generality of men is the preferrence of that which hath the most promising countenance of this perfect constitution of unity in faith of orderly zeale and of active charity for out of these materials onely that flame is raised which our glorious high Priest came to kindle upon the earth The Fourth Treatise Of Devotion In two Sect. §. I. Devotion regularly defined and some accidents that raise it explicated THere is nothing seems more requisite towards the sincere practice of it then the sound definition of Devotion for it is much easier to copie well then to designe perfectly this worke Neverthelesse it is the familiar presumption of the world to passe themselves Masters by drawing the expressions of their piety by their own imagination rather them to work then by the Churches draughts and patterns and thus many are mistaken in the manner more then in the meaning of their religious duties for devotion consists more of conformity to order in pious applications then in contrivement of them wherefore this prescription of some spirituall director is given by God Obey them that rule over you and submit your selves for they watch for your soules And herein is provided a rest as I may say for our zeale to discharge it selfe upon for when it is shot without that stay it often falls very wide of the right mark which the holy Spirit hath set up to us by the Psalmist in Not unto us O Lord but unto thy Name give glory So that this is the safest principle for all good inclinations to build upon viz. the right notion and understanding of devotion taken from some prudent director for even the steadiest hands draw straighter lines stayed and guided by a rule then left to their own loose motion And I may without presumption undertake to shape a generall good rule by the Model of the Churches doctrine whereby to take the right dimensions of rectified Devotion for this may be done by an unskilfull hand in the practicall part as good instruments may be made by Mechanicks who want the science of using them Devotion is a fervour infused into our soule by Grace which breatheth out continually an alacrity promptitude in regular and ordinate performances of all such religious duties as are ordained by God for the exteriour testimony of the interiour love and reverence we owe him This good habit of the mind is the fierie spiration of the holy Ghost taking in such sort upon our wills as it raiseth a flaming evidence of our love to God in all our actions and this is properly to be baptized with the Spirit and with fire to have all our affections turned Christian by the accension of that holy fire in our hearts which Christ said he came to cast into the earth and required the kindling and ardencie of it in us so that the activity of this spirituall fire in our soules is that we tearme our devotion which implyes a conformity of our affections in morality and our opinions in religion to the revealed will of God our appetites we conforme in acquiring such habits of virtue as are expresly enjoyned us by God in his commandments and our own conceptions we submit in our conformity to such acts of religious worship as are directed to us by the Church which God hath invested with power of direction by these words of his commission They that heare you heare me and they that despise you despise me promising also the spirit of truth to rectifie all the executions of this power and the residence of that spirit to the end of the World In order to the preservation of that capacity imparted hence is it that there is no zeale or fervour of spirit which may properly passe for Devotion that is not touched at the test of the sanctuary which is obedience to the Churches regulations for many may thinke themselves in Saint Pauls discipline in the ferrour of the spirit when they are neerer Saint Judes commination of perishing in the contradiction of Core for as Saint John sayes The Spirit of Truth and of Errour is discerned by hearing the voyce of the Church not by singing loud in it therefore it is not the straining our notes but the singing in tune that makes the musick of Devotion wherewith God is delighted But supposing the flame of our Devotion to be lighted by a coal from the Altar the higher it riseth the neerer it cometh to Heaven for there must not be only interiour heat but exteriour light in it Saint John Baptist is a perfect image of Devotion in that Character Christ gives of him he was a burning a shining light which signifieth internall sincerity and active exemplarity and our Saviour intimates these two requisitions in our Devotion when he gives us this order Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good workes and glorifie your Father which is in Heaven wherefore
we know the way The first seemed to question onely the truth of Christs affirmation not to intend the being satisfied in his question whereas the other sought to be informed of the readyest accesse to that truth which he believed so they who shall be moved onely by the captiousnesse of the Infidel examinant in this point are like after his manner not to stay long enough upon the inquest to be enlightened in this verity but to such as with the credulity of faithfull Disciples shall make this quaere How shall we know the way to this truth you propose namely a rectifyed understanding and true use of all prosperous and adverse events in this life I may say as the Angel did to the faithfull watchers at the Sepulchre after he had strucken as it were dead the miscreant wayters Fear not you If you seek Jesus for he answereth all sincere inquirers of truth as he did Saint Thomas I am the way and the truth and none commeth to verity but by me yet this me thinks gives a fair hint for such a further demand as Saint Philips was saying Shew us the plain direct way of comming to you Lord Jesus and it will suffice us This question Christ hath also answered by this most evident direction of Ask seek and knock for every one that asketh receiveth and that seeketh findeth and to him that knocketh it shall be opened Prayer is therefore expresly given us for our addresse to Jesus who is truth and in these three proper divisions of petition meditation and perseverance which ought to be concomitant with each of them our asking respecteth the particular suits we make seeking importeth the application of our minds unto Spiritual verityes and knocking referreth to our zeal earnestnesse and perseverance in the acts of prayer and to this sort of prosecution is annexed the promise of asseqution of truth wherefore I may answer my inquirers as Christ did some who distrusted his proposals If any man will do this wil of Jesus he shall understand of the Doctrine whether it be of God or I speak of my self So that considering aright these gratious assignations unto prayer I may say we may obtain the possession of verity even with lesse solicitude then we can neglect it for the seeking asking and knocking in this world upon such applications as divert us from this inquest are the more laborious assignments of our mind May I not therefore boldly reply to all the incredulous and disbelievers of the facility of this medium exhibited Say not in thine heart who shall thus ascend into heaven for the word is nigh thee in thy mouth and in thy heart we onely need but as the Prophet adviseth us return to our own hearts to find that happynesse which while we seek else-where we lose our hearts in that inquest True it is that the great enemy of our nature useth all his arts towards the prejudicating this belief of the alsufficiency of prayer in which designe he doth now impugne our nature by a Machination farre differing from his first slandering it to us now almost as much as he did heretofore flatter it for now to discredit to us our capacity of repairing his first breach he suggesteth the ineptitude of our present state for this perception of truth and seemeth to ask us now by way of derision Shall you be like Gods thus knowing good and evill so that he tempteth us now and often prevaileth upon us even by the disparagement of our nature thus much hath he gained upon us since his first acquaintance when he durst not attempt us by lesse then the promise of a capacity above our nature to wit of knowing like Gods whereas now he presumes to implead our right to that knowledge which is due to us as men that is the discernment of our being qualified for the penetration into truth by the beames of prayer and meditation But the holy Spirit hath left us a good caution against this delusion Resist the Devill and he will flie from you approach to God and he will approach to you This refuteth all suggestions of diffidence in this point of attaining by prayer the effect of my proposition since God promiseth to set forward to meet us as soon as our prayers do but set out towards him which is likewise aver'd by the Psalmist assuring us God is near all such as call upon him in truth Gods mercy hath so much outdone mans mischiefe as he hath not left him either the subtilty of the Devil or the infirmity of his nature to charge with the continuance of his misery there must go an accession of wilfulnesse to our weaknesse for the duration of our unhappynesse For since the Divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godlinesse we have no more colour left to diffide in the meanes of rectifying the enormities of our infirm nature then a Malefactor that were offer'd grace for asking it had reason to fall sick die for fear of his former sentence he who hath blotted out the hand-writing of the Decree against our nature hath given us his hand for such security of obtaining what we solicite by this appointed meanes and method as we can onely indanger the wanting a sufficient provision by our pretending too little by this addresse for surely this rule will hold in our asking little Spirituall light that what we have shall be rather taken away then more confer'd and the contrary disposition will likewise be answered with the more abundance What Saint Gregory conceiveth to be the case of the Saints in heaven in this point of supplicating God may be firly said to be that of us sinners upon earth in our act of petitioning for Spirituall light and verity as the Saints the more ardently they are united to God receive the more fervent impulses from him of asking what they know he is resolved to do and thus drink out of him what they thirst for in him after such a manner the more zealously our prayers are applyed to the pursuite of Spirituall illumination the more fervent desires we attract from the increated verity of begging what we are sure he will give viz the discernment of truth whereby in an admirable sort we draw from Jesus even in this life the hunger in the very food we take of them while our prayer attracting the infusion of truth doth extract conjoyntly out of those verityes fresh desires of the same illuminations May not these considerations justly silence any objection against the facility of this proposed medium of prayer for obtaining from God a sufficient communication of that truth wherein I have stated the happinesse of this life since there is no condition charged upon this grant but the sincere desiring it which is comprised in the direction of Christ prementioned and the Apostle witnesseth to the same tenor re-minding us in this particular the frequent promises of the giver of
society of Parents Brothers and Friends are all savor'd in this celestial Maâ—na of Contemplation insomuch as they seem to taste in the source and spring it self the divers relishes of all those currents of pleasure that flow our of it before they take various infusions from those veins of the earth they run through They taste the joys of Fathers Brothers and Friends in loving him who is every thing to pure love Thus being in the state which the Prophet says shall be raised above the altitudes or elevations of the earth they live in the scent and odour of the blossoms of the Tree of Life of which they are promised to eat the fruit in the Paradice of God For our Supreme beatitude is the contemplation of God ripe and gathered in the maturity of the full vision of his Essence so as one of the sweetest fruits of Glory is a perfect and consummate Contemplation They then who live in this holy Garden of Speculation may be said to be already under the shady leaves of the Tree of Life this state of separation from the world seeming to be in such an order and relation to the supreme beatitude as Adams Paradice was to Heaven as it is in a maner of integrity of â—ase and passeth away out of this life by a kinde of translation to glory They live in the Suburbs of the celestial Jerusalem whose streets are paved with fine gold and these suburbs in proportion are paved with refined silver which is a proportionate purity here to that perfect Charity wherein it terminates within the gates of the City So as we may say of this kinde of separation from the world which is an ascending upon Jacobs Ladder Truly this is no 〈…〉 her but the house of God and the gate of Heaven Of such Souls that live but at this little distance from their home while they are still advancing from vertue to vertue we may say with the Psalmist Blessed are those souls which know this jubilation they shall walk O Lord in the light of thy countenance and in thy Name they shall rejoyce all the day and in thy Righteousness shall they be exalted It is easie to say much in exalting this happy state of Solitude all the space between Earth and the empyreal Heaven the seat of the blessed being the scope we have to extend our thoughts upon For no exageration that stays short of the sight of God can go too far in the endearment of this blessed condition as they who have read the lives of many Saints who have lived in this Region will easily confess I must confess my self very unable to say anything in order to direction either how to walk in these Suburbs of Heaven or how to finde the best way to them yet as one may print a good Map of a Countrey or stamp of a City and neither know the streets and passages in it nor the ways in the Countrey that lead to it experience in both being requisite for this capacity So though I am not at all acquainted with the purity of this kinde of Solitude knowing it onely by sight as having seen it in the Images of some Saints I may have taken off this impression handsomly without any practical skill in this Divine Exercise of Contemplation therefore I will onely say of it as a Holy man did of the Apocalypse I admire it in what I do understand and also what I do not understand in honor of what I do For truly the mystery of this Angelical life is like the white Stone promised in the Apocalypse in which a new Name is written which none know but they that receive it So that I can say nothing to inform such as have received this white precious kinde of life onely admire their felicity who like Moses conversing with God see the hinder parts of him in this life and have as it were the earnest given them of that which S. Paul saith Neither eye hath seen nor ear hath heard nor hath it entred into the heart of man the joy I mean of contemplating the Divine Essence face to face in the light of glory What I may presume to say pertinently in order to my design is to desire That all men be very advised in the discernment of their vocation to this excellent kinde of Solitude and to proceed as Samuel did by Eli's advice in answer to the voyce not to presume upon their first interior motions though never so clear but to stay for the iteration and pressure of the same voyce often speaking to them and not to resolve any thing finally but by conformity to some Spiritual direction to the end an acceptation of this excellent course may rather be the perswasion of Humility and Obedience then any promptitude or fervor of our temper and complexion For the voice of God to this vocation may easily be mistaken as the Jews took that which was a voice from Heaven for Thunder onely so many take that for the voyce of God which indeed is but the thunder of their own constitution some Spiritual fervors composed of the vapors of their Nature that lie under the clouds of the world breaking out into some loud discontent which noise of our humors is often taken for the voyce of Grace But this vocation is not so likely to be in the great wind of our first Spiritual impulses or in the flashes of our new fervor as in the gentle ayr and breath which the Prophet found the Spirit of God in that is in a soft and equal temper of Humility and diffidence on the power and vertue of our natural propensions not to trust every Spirit but to try the Spirit is the best advice in this great undertaking and to bring it to the test of a prudent Spiritual Director who may upon due examination testifie to our Spirit that this is the voyce of the eternal Word which pronounceth this Follow me And when we have truly heard this voyce and answered to it by a self-abnegation then the hundred-fold which he assigned even in this life is paid in the relinquishment of all and dissociation from the world by this union with him who is so much above all we leave as he is all we can wish to have This is all I can contribute to the reverential estimation of this best sort of Solitude and since the blessedness of it is much above my report I will leave it with the Queen of Sheâ—a's admiration and praise of the Master of this so well ordered Solitude who is greater then Solomon Happy are thy men and happy are thy servants which stand thus continually before thee and hear thy wisdom The eighteenth Treatise Of a mixt sort or of Neutral Solitude Divided into three Sections §. I. Explaining this term by exhibiting the state of Mans Will in his elections NOw I have as I conceive rather paid my Devotion in this Saintly life of Solitude then contributed any thing by my
allure us May not that be justly then contemned which either afflicteth us for the present or betrayeth us for the future O how admirable is God in this piece of distributive Justice to Mankinde who having by his Providence comparted the conditions in this world into such a diversity of states as cannot admit all to the fruition of secular Delights hath commanded that none should love them by which order the lowest ranks are much compensated in this respect That it is a harder task to forbear loving such things when we enjoy them then it is to contemn them when we know we can neither expect them nor ought to love them If they who use this world must be as though they used it not those who use least of it may be said to be seated the nearest to this performance and certain it is That their state is the most conterminate to that of the true Propriator of the whole world while he was upon the earth who did himself use those things most which we use to love the least and yet alloweth us to enjoy even the most pleasing proporties of the earth provided we do not love the world in that relation All secular goods were so unworthy of the love of the God and Man Christ Jesus as they are not allowed the love even of single Mary for all the most precious and glorious things of this world are ordained to serve Man as his slave unto whose offices there can be assigned no love for this wages doth presently invert the two conditions rendring the lover the slave How reasonable then must it be to address unto him all our love who hath by his love to us subjected all these things unto us and hath so disposed it as to maintain our Prerogative there is required no Art but the contemning of what stands thus subjected Whereupon I may well press you in this point as the Apostle doth Let this minde be in you which was also in Christ Jesus his comportment towards the world was intended to give you the same minde Look then upon your Nature in the author and finisher of our Faith and you shall see Mans dominion over the World maintained by contemning it the world was so perfectly crucified to him all his life as he contemned the being crucified by the world despising as the Apostle saith even the greatest shame and confusion of this world And what could this Divine Man do more to imprint in us this aversion to the world then these two acts in not vouchsafeing to enjoy any of those things the cupidities whereof use to vitiate us to leave all them abased and vilified and in not declining the sufferance of such things whereof the terror doth likely subject us to the world to render them easie and acceptable What hath the world then left in it for Motives either of our love or fear of it that even God himself may not be said both to have undervalued and undergone And what we are enjoyned neither to love nor fear cannot seem uneasie for us to despise especially when this advantage is annexed That we gain more by contemning the whole world then we can by enjoying our own divident therein For whereas Fortune keeps many worldlings poor the Contempt of the world keeps Fortune her self wanting and indigent leaving her nothing to give to such a disposition So that in stead of incurring the reproach of the Prophet in setting up a Table to Fortune and offering libaments upon it this habit of minde sacrificeth and destroyeth Fortune upon the Altar of the Holy Spirit and thus even the feathers of Fortune to wit The vanities and levities of this Age when they are incensed and consumed by a holy Contempt of this world may make a sweet Savor in the Temple of God whereupon I may say That these sorts of feathers which while they are burning in the flame of our sensitive passions yield an odour of death unto death when they are consuming in this Sacrifical fire of a zealous Contempt and Renunciation of them afford a savor of life unto life in this act of their destruction in our mindes In the time of the Law when the Commodities of the Earth seemed to be proposed as the Salary of Mans vertue there might be some colour to love this world and so in that state God accepted the Beasts of the Earth for Holocausts But in the Gospel when no less then the enjoying of God himself and all his goods is exhibited for the term of our desires it cannot seem unequal that even the whole World should be required for a Holocaust immolated and consumed by a Religious Annihilation of it in our Mindes to the honor of such a Remunerator §. II. Motives by the property of a Christian to contemn the World VVHen we consider our selves under the notion of Members to such a Head as hath offered up as a Holocaust even the Creator of the whole Universe it seemeth not strange but rather suitable for such Members to Sacrifice the whole World to hold some proportion unto their Head especially since his offering of himself was in order to the enabling us to Sacrifice and destroy this world Doth not this our Head God and Man Christ Jesus say That even in his life the judgement of this world was given it was sentenced to Contempt by his despising it he that did not disdain to own the Infirmities of Man did notwithstanding protest against his being of this world so much hath he left it vilified to us And doth not he say If he were exalted above the earth be would draw all men unto him So that in this exaltation is proclaimed our Duty and capacity of transcending this world and treading on it with Contempt by the attractive Vertue of this our Head raised above all the Heavens And we may remember That the first Members he was pleased to unite unto him upon Earth were instantly elevated to that height of being above the world seated in this abnegation and despection May I not then fitly say with Saint Paul These things were done in a figure of us since what they left to lighten them for this transcendency is an apposite figure of what we are to do in order to this elevation namely To relinquish our Nets in this world which we may understand in two sences that comprise all our directions in this case to wit either as we are actively catching and chasing the Commodities of this Age or as we are passively taken and intangled in the love of what we enjoy In the first of these states we may be said to have our Nets in our hand and in the second to have them in our hearts so that to leave our Nets signifieth to relinquish both our solicitous Cupidities and Passions in point of pursuing the goods of this World and our Inordinate love in case of their possession And this disposition of Minde raiseth us to that exaltation