neither canst thou ever perform what thou hast vowed to whom hee replied in the storm Vers 26. Their soul is meltâ—d because of trouble They are even ready to dye at this time Junius understands it of extreme vomiting as if they that used the Seas were casting up their very hearts many times Anacharses for this very cause doubted whether hee should reckon Mariners amongst the living or amongst the dead And another said that any man will go to Sea at first I wonder not but to go a second time thither is little better than madness very softly and silently lest St. Christopher should hear him Hold thy peace thou fool dost thou think that I ever meant it if ever I recover shore the Devil take mee if ever hee gets as much as a small tallow candle of mee or the pairing of my nails Make you the Application 20. Beleeve that all storms that come upon you are of the Lords raising and commissionating I have met with this passage which was found sayes history in a Council above a thousand years ago Si quis credit quod Diabolus tonitrua fulgura tempestates sua authoritate sicut Priscillianus dixit Anathema This Canon was made against such as did simply attribute storms tempests thundrings and lightnings c. to the Devil and not to God as if so be that he should be the causer and the procurer of them whosoever beleeves this said the Council as Priscillianus hath done let him bee an Anathema But without any further wording of it to you I freely bestow this peece of my Nec inter vivos Nec inter mortuos upon you all that use the Seas and beg your acceptance of it The God of Heaven grant it may do you good read it heed it yee need it pray for mee and I shall not bee wanting in my prayers for you that God would bless and prosper you in your imployments and thus hee that takes his ultimum vale of you and the Sea rests Gentlemen Yours to serve you in the service of Christ DANIEL PELL From my Study at my Lady Hungarfords in Hungarford House upon the Strand London May 4. 1659. THE EPISTLE TO THE Christian Readers Whether at Sea or on Land Good Readers I Would very freely invite you had I but that chear that I judge you deservedly worthy of Let this Epistle bee thy Janisary or Pole-star to the perusal of this book The stars that do attend the Artick-pole are the greater and lesser Bear and the least star in the lesser Bears tail is called the Pole-star by reason of its nearness to it and this is the guide of the Mariners as Ovid in his Epistle sings it You great and lesser Bears whose stars do guide Sydonian and Grecian ships that glyde Even you whose Poles do view this c. if you therefore will come to such Fare as hath been provided dished cooked and prepared upon the Sea for you you shall bee freely and heartily welcome and in your coming take this Advertisement along with you or else you had better let it alone Guests that are invited unto some Grandee King Lord or Prince 1. Respect with great desire the hour of his feast and so give their diligent attendance that they may come in a decent seemly and orderly manner 2. That nothing pleaseth the Prince better than to see them feed soundly on the meat dished and prepared for them 3. They are cautelous that they do not speak any thing that may bee in the least offensive to the person that invited them 4. They do not statim by and by depart but stay and sit a while and interchange familiar conference with the Prince 5. At their departure they yeeld a great deal of reverence returning him a thousand humble thanks for the favour vouchsafed them offering themselves ready at his service I question not your wisdome in the applying of what is before you The strongest Arguments that I can lay you down that did put mee upon this laborious business in a restless unquiet and disconsolatory Sea were such as these 1. It was the good pleasure of the Lord to draw and hale mee to undertake it by a strong and an unwithstanding impulsiveness that lay every day upon my heart and spirit till I went about it 2. To reprove that spirit of machless and unknown prophaneness that is amongst many thousands that use the Seas 3. To that end they might bee healed in their souls amended and reformed in their lives and practices 4. Because I never saw any thing writ unto them as suitable to and for their imployment the want of which did the more affectionately lead mee on for the good of their souls 5. Because I bear an extraordinary strong love to the souls of those that go down into the Seas and would as gladly have them saved in the day of the Lord as I would my self 6. Because I would have the world to know a little what perils and hazzards those that use the Seas do run thorow and meet with all in their imployments 7. What Ulysses's commendation was by Homer I shall say of them that use the Seas 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hee knew the Cities and manners of many people They see many brave Cities and Countries that could not bee seen were it not for shipping Our Gentry travel both Sea and Land with much bodily hazzard and with great expence of state and all but to get a little more knowledge of fashions and a gentile behaviour To let the world know what works and wonders of the Lord those do see that go into the Seas and beyond them 8. To that end the world might know what great preservations and deliverances the Lord bestows upon them in their affairs 9. To that end the world might know I made some improvement of my time when at Sea for I never affected the mis-spending of one day all the time I was in it but lived though amongst men as if not amongst them Mihi musis knowing that time is precious and tarries not Vpon a Dialpeece of a Clock in the Colledge Church of Glocester are portrayed four Angels each of them seeming to say something to those that look up to observe the hour of the day which is made up of two old Latine verses 1. An labor an requies 2. Sic transit gloria mundi 3. Praeterit iste dies 4. Nescitur origo secundi Englished Whether you rest or labour work or play The world and glory of it passes away This day is past or near its period grown The next succeeding is to us unknown 10. And lastly To that end all the Lords people would bee mindful of those that use the Seas They are like to a direct North-Dial that hath but morning and evening hours on it They are far from good means on land pray for them and not forget them in their most serious and solemn addresses unto their God They stand in need
than the land is of and not up to an higher When the Psalmist says that the earth is founded upon the Seas It is the judgement of some that the Sea is far higher than the Land And that a ship in the Chanel is as high as Pauls in London It is well known that they that live beyond the line in the West and East Indies that they never see the North-Star in their lives because they live so far below the heighth of it Mount Chego that great Spanish Cranado may bee seen many leagues off in the Sea yet in a little time may it soon bee run out of sight The Alps also those high Italian Mountains and Mount Arrarat may bee seen fifty or an hundred leagues out at Sea say some which are far higher than the cloudy Regions yet soon run out of sight in a little time hee means that the earth is placed above them as it is made a fit and convenient place of habitation And the Learned understand the Hebrew word Gnal in such a sense as signifies above and not below in which sense the waters that it sustaines does not hold it but are holden by it Neither is water so heavy a body as earth is yet heavy enough to descend because it is of no aspiring nature but presses eagerly towards the same center that a stone or any ponderous thing will do and cannot therefore possibly be higher than the earth though in some natural considerations I will not deny but that it is and may for wee have Scriptures speaking after this manner Psal 104. Jer. 5.22 When God gathered the waters hee provided stations and lodging places or receptacles for them lest they should return and cover the earth as they did before both at the Creation of the world and also at that time of the Deluge And this appears by the Hebrew word Kavah the signification of which is to congregate or gather together from whence is that Latin derivative Cavus hollow This is observable that the Mariners sailing beyond the Line or after they have passed some certain hundreds or thousands of leagues beyond England that they run the North-Star which is of such an admirable height with us cleer out of sight and under water Now whether or no is this an ascending or a descending let any one judge and whether this bee not a going down yea or no And so again the more they run Northward the more they advance and raise the Septentrional Pole and decline the Austral And so again the more they sail southward the more they advance the Antartick and disadvance the Artick Again this is a very frequent and common thing to see two ships at some small distance when the Seas are as smooth as a dye and nothing is there to bee seen of them save the very top of their mastes and if by their neer-drawing and advancing on one unto another the top-sails may bee seen when the lower sails and all the Hull seem as if below in the Sea I have laid down some of my thoughts about this word They that go down But Interpreters say that it is to bee understood either from the Midland which was an high and hilly country as that of Judea was unto the Sea side wherein the land is lower or otherwise from the shore Observation 1 That whithersoever a man would go hee must bee furnished with leave and power from God to go thither I am confident that one main reason why we have so many ships castaway either in the Septentrional Oriental Ausiral or Occidental parts of the world year by year is They never sought God in their goings out nor comings back And therefore no wonder though they come to wrack Go not to Sea unless thou wilt 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 make God thy beginning and ending in all thy Voyages Jam. 4.13 14. Go too now yee that say to day or to morrow wee will go into such a City and continue there a year and buy and sell and get gain Whereas yee know not what shall bee on the morrow c. Come says many a graceless wretch I will go into Spain and ere a while into Barbary I will have also one turn in the West-Indies and when that voyage is done I will into the East-Indies I will go to Greenland says one and I will into Holland says another I will go to Norway says one and I will into France and Portugal says another I will to the Berbado says one and I will into New England says another Many Sailors goe hither and go thither but few of them to bee found asking God leave to goe any whither If I could find a man thus doing I would speak highly of him 2. What positively now as to the posture and ingenious order and discipline in their going down 1. That is usually as near as they can with company and in Fleets and herein is no small wisdom for according to the axiom vis unita fortior est If one have two guns and another four one six and another ten when together they are the stronger thereby to encounter their way-lying Pyrats 2. Their order is commendable and admirable if that by day any one in the Fleet discover an enemy he is presently to make report thereof by firing of Guns 3. If any one in a Fleet of ships discover Land Rocks or Sands hee is to make report thereof unto the rest by firing of Guns 4. Every one is to doe his utmost to keep company with the Fleet hee sails in that they may not bee separated if possible from each other and if any in the Fleet bee heavy Sailors and keep much on stern the best Sailors either shorten Sail for them or take them in a Towe 5. If foul weather come upon them in the night every ship usually carries his light and the Admiral one upon his Poop another upon the Main-top and the Fleet follows after him 6. If that stormy weather force them to Try or Hull the Admiral puts out his two lights and the rest one 7. If the Admiral tack in the night when tacking hee usually hangs out his two lights in the Mizzon shrouds of equal height and every ship answers him with one 8. If in case any in a Fleet spring a leak by day or any disaster befall any of them by night whereby they are dis-inabled from the performing of their voyage It is then with the Mariners for one that is in this distress as it is with Bees Sheep of whom it has been said agrotante una lamentantur omnes If one bee sick all the rest will fall a mourning It is with the Mariners one for another as it is with and amongst Sheep as Naturalists say If one of them bee faint the rest of the flock will stand betwixt it the Sun till it be recovered So one ship by another when leaky if weather will permit As Kine which feed on honysuccles and other
Butterfly in the Fable what said to the Owl page 499 Barnacle Geese what page 267 Breezes how they cool the hot parts of the world page 273 Buft page 253 Bear page 252 C. CAto's brave Speech to his Souldiers when they were all discouraged page 400 Commanders reproved in four things page 127 Chego a Spanish Mountain page 130 Charls K. of Naples what called page 166 Cyneas what said of that brave Thessalian Oratour Corrupt men how poysonall round about them page 112 Commanders wished to bee of Livius Drusus's mind page 17 Corpuzants what they are page 270 Camelion what page 259 Cocus Tree page 262 Clove page 263 Cypresse ibid. Cynamond page 265 Cedar ibid. Calvin what said of knowledge page 279 Caesars Host how lived on one kind of Herb for a long time page 303 Cranes and Pygmies how fight in the West Indies page 242 Cahou page 243 Cranes what they doe page 237 Crocodile what page 227 Calvin how hee ran into the fire that began in the State of Geneva to put it out page 187 Claudius Marcellus how fought many Battels page 185 Charls 5. what his embleme was page 519 Cable how feigned to speake when it broke in a great storm page 505 Charls the Great how pious he was page 517 Canaan what bredth and length page 269 Chrysostoms comfortable Speech to the people of Antioch page 402 Chaos of Ovid compared to storms page 407 Courtier of King Cyrus's what hee said when to marry his Daughter page 400 Counsel to the States-men of our Land page 381 Complaint of a Ship when run upon the rocks page 419 Complaint of a Ship when ready to sink page 418 Complaint of a Ship when sinking page 426 Cuckoe how faulters in her note when the sweet Summer fails her page 478 Counsel to States-men to look for storms page 380 Counsel to Sea-men good to look for storms whilst at sea page 378 Congratulatory Speech of Sea-men to all good Harbours page 551 Character of a Sea-port Town page 538 Comfort for the States-men of our Common-wealth page 539 Counsel to our Merchants page 540 Cry of a Ship when cast away within the sight of her Harbour page 547 Cast-away Ships how warnings unto others page 550 Condition of men at Sea like his in the Embleme page 541 Cherub God rides upon over the Seas for the good of those that are in them page 561 Considerations nine serious ones to stirre Sea-men up to thankfulness to their God for their deliverances page 568 Cryes in Sea-port Towns when Ships are lost page 557 Character of many prophane Ships at sea page 465 Considerations five weighty ones to put people that live on land upon prayer for those that goe to sea page 439 Considerations four weighty ones to take off all our Sea-men from the Sin of Drunkenness page 436 Charon in Lucian how served when desired to see heaven page 412 Counsel to those that have a mind to goe to sea page 437 Countries Native sweet to them that have been long out of them page 545 Counsel presented by Xaverius to John the third King of Portugal page 454 Comfortable Epistle of Plutarch to his wife page 398 Calms how devoured at sea page 356 Credit of Sea-men how might be recovered page 16 Commanders should bee men veyd of these five things page 24 Captains Motto what page 26 Cowardliness of a Commander when an Enemy came up with him page 27 Captains should throw out their Trash Stones Thorns Briars and Brambles out of their ships page 33 Characters nineteen worth the observing to man Warlike ships by page 35 Commanders should have an eye and an ear over the gestures c. page 38 Chilo's sentence would doe well upon all ships entring-ladders page 39 Captains should keep up their command in ships page 46 Captains should endeavour the good of Sea-men in five things page 52 Captains should be of Themistocles mind in prize page 53 Captains should stand up many times and reprove their Sea-men page 56 Captains should not be silent when they see and hear evil in their men page 58 Commanders should put out the fire of Swearing every day as well as the Cooks fire page 59 Chrysostoms good Speech to young men page 60 Commanders should practise three things page 63 Captains should live in their Ships as the Sun in the Firmament page 67 Cato a great discourager of evil page 69 Commanders should hold up their dignity ibid. Colossus at Tarentum what page 63 Captains should labour to reclaime their Sea-men page 71 Captains should have a great care of the young that be under them page 73 Captains Cabbins what some of them are page 71 Commanders should have strong desires to have their Sea-men converted page 72 Cowardlinesse to be avoyded when faceing an enemy page 78 Commanders should be as faithful as Pontius Centurio was page 83 Commanders advised how they should deal with their Pursers page 85 Carpenters reproved page 89 Chrysostoms desire to have his Pulpit upon an high Mountain page 101 Commanders should handle Lyars as Artaxerxes did page 105 Cato how he bore his injuries page 108 Calvin how wrongfully slandred page 121 Caesars command commendable page 127 D. DAngers great will make people for to speak page 452 Death comfortable to one sort uncomfortable to another page 458 Drunkennesse what it brought Lot to page 436 Diagoras the Atheist made all the Mariners fare the worse for it in a storm page 344 Devil what sign he dwells at in the world page 468 Dayes travel with Gods decrees page 379 Demosthenes what he said of an Oratour compared to men in storms page 417 Dispute betwixt Doctor Philomusus and Learned Philosophus why Sea-men are the worst sort of people in the world page 487 Doggs that kept Vulcans Temple favoured some and not other some page 377 Death no fit time for Sea-men to make their peace with God in page 389 Demosthenes what he said of a drinking Prince page 99 Directions how to live peaceably on Ship-board be five page 107 Drunken Saylors compared to Tankard-lifting Zeno. page 100 Domitians course the only way to cure all slanderers at sea page 122 Dutches how said to sound the sea page 155 Diogenes how little he set by his money page 168 Diogenes would not bee idle in Athens when besiedged page 181 Deliverances at Sea should be improved for Gods glory page 594 Deliverances should bee eyed in their seasonablenesse page 601 Decree of Theodosius what page 33 Diana's Image in Chios what feigned to doe page 37 Dolphin what said of it page 203 Deer by their out-lying what said of them page 212 Doteril what manner of Bird. page 243 Deliverances of Sea-men fifty one very remarkable page 289 Devices many to kill and fetch off lives page 293 Darius how hard put to it in the Warres page 302 Drunkenness punished to some purpose E. ENglands Navie like to Davids Army page 446 England how it has eleven ill things it that a
English page 435 Prayer how should resemble the stars about the North-pole page 460 Prayer begged at the hands of all the godly and powerful Ministry in England for poor Sea-men page 542 Pliny's expression of Rome given to men that use the Seas page 478 Pliny's judgement what the wind is page 367 Prayer how prevalent with God page 482 Perpetual life-danger of Sea-men page 420 Philostrates's life compared to Sea-men page 392 Prophane Sea-mens Motto ibid. Prayer forced is never ought page 486 Plutarchs report of men dejected what done withall page 401 Paulinus how hee bore his great trial under the savage Goths page 352 Patience an excellent vertue the heathen thought it so when page 353 Praising of God in several directions page 576 Pythagoras scholars what their custome was page 109 Plato how answered Socrates in his rashness page 25 Persons what should not bee taken in into Navy ships page 32 Physiognomer what hee said of an Emperour page 80 Plato's great desire to convert Dionysius page 61 Paul how desirous to have them saved that sailed with him page 52 Pepper-tree how it grows page 263 Pemblico a bird page 242 Q. Question fifteen page 150 R. REasons why Sea-men should bee thankful unto their God for their deliverances are five page 565 Reasons laid down are sixteen why storms arise upon the Seas page 348 Reasons two strong ones why men are so fearful in storms page 455 Righteous man of what worth page 36 Reasons five why young men should bee looked after in the Sea page 73 Roman Ambassadors what said of them page 78 Romans highly esteem of faithfulness page 84 Roman General what a command he bore page 30 Romans cannot indure any without a calling page 166 Rome how once laid down to the ground page 180 Rocks in the Sea what their language is page 322 Richard the first how travelled to the Holy Land page 124 S. SEa compared to Plutarchs Moon page 427 Sea summoned in by the Mariners why it did drown so many of them as it did page 427 Speech objurgatory to the rest less Sea ibid. Speech of Galienus the Emperour when lost all that ever hee had page 402 Sea-men how compared to all high pinacles page 409 Sea-men too confident of going to heaven page 410 Seneca's speech page 401 Sea-men in storms are nearer heaven than any in the world besides page 409 Ships when cast away may bee concluded on that it was when the Mariners were swearing page 487 Several Reasons why Sea-men are the worst people in the world page 488 Sea-mans life and conversation page 393 Sea what it saith to prophane men ibid. Sea-mens lives very uncertain page 388 Ships uncertainty of ever returning whilst at Sea page 383 Sailors Motto what page 417 Sea-mans head what compared to page 416 Ships how rest less in the Sea page 27 Sailors Motto what page 445 Seasons six in which Sea-men are evermore out of their wits page 445 Sea hath four ill things in it page 446 Sea-mans Motto in a storm page 418 Sea-mans night-watching in time of storms page 418 Ship-leak springing how terrible page 426 Sea-mans day labouring in time of storms page 417 Sea-men how seemingly good in time of danger page 484 Shark what said of him page 206 Sea-horses what said of them page 209 Sea-men compared to the Nightingale page 191 Sea-swine what said of them page 222 Sea-calf page 224 Sea-turtle ibid. Stork what said of her page 234 Strange-sheep in Cusko page 249 Sivet-cat what shee is page 251 Scorpion what page 258 Strumbilo how it burns page 273 Sea-men too like the traveller that leaves all things behinde him page 281 Sea like the Sea in Pauten page 301 Ship-masters how reproved and for what page 91 Ship-masters exhorted to imitate Tiberius in his honest minde page 90 Sabbath day how sweetly it is observed at Sea page 95 Swearing complained of and exclaimed against at Sea page 101 Subjects that should bee preached on at Sea laid down page 102 Swearing ships but unhealthful air to breathe in page 103 Sea-men if ever they would bee good and Religious must practise seven things page 111 Socrates how fearful of Alcibiades page 115 Spanish Proverb what page 116 Sea-men prophane how compared to Pharaohs seven ill-favoured Kine page 118 Sun how said to shine and would not shine were it not for the godly page 119 Sea-men must practise six things if ever they would have credit ibid. Sea-men exhorted to practise nine very singular good things page 123 Sea-men counselled in three good things page 125 Sea-men should rather dye than stain their credits ibid. Sea-men prophane too like to those in Luthers time page 126 Ships when miscarry may be said that they never sought God in their going out page 132 Ships what order they observe in their going to Sea in nine things page 133 Sea-men how valiant they should bee when they hear of an enemy page 141 Spaniard in what to bee disgusted page 141 Spaniard how massacred many English page 144 Sea or Land a controversie whether bee greater page 153 Sea-men when come out of the West-Indies how glad they are when they can once see the North star page 154 Sea-water how far it excels Land-water in strength page 156 Seas wonderful beneficial to all Countries in five things page 161 Sea-men exhorted to bee of Themistocles temper page 172 Sea separates many Nations a great mercy page 162 Sorrow and pleasure how they fell out page 598 Sea-men how wished a bottle of Nepenthe in storms page 596 States ships how said to resemble Nebuchadnezzars tree page 589 Ships how said to derive their names from the stout fought Battels in England page 290 Ships what several names they have to perpetuate the memory of Englands Battels page 591 Ships that carry the names of Englands Battels upon them are terrible page 592 Sea what manner of place it is page 4 Ship how shee commended the Pilot that steered her well in a storm page 598 Sea hath no lanes foot-paths nor high-wayes to travel by page 12 Sea-men counselled to bee of Fabritius's minde page 16 Sea-men far more on stern in matters of good than any in the world besides page 18 Scipio how of a brave spirit page 21 Sea-Captains some how compared to Thales page 22 Sin the only of Commanders being hurled out ibid. States how little they set by men at Sea whose carriages are naught page 23 Ships carry famous Titles and wherefore page 26 Sea-men too like the Cypress tree page 29 Sea-men that are prophane should bee cast out of ships page 33 Ships have good names but want of government in them page 30 States ships might prosper wonderfully had they but these men in them page 35 States ships should bee little Churches and Chappels page 42 Sea-man how defined page 46 Sea-men how backward to all good in divers particulars page 48 Sabbath day how sweetly it is observed at Sea page 55 Sea Commanders some too like Harpocrates
Kings and Princes of the Seas and the Conquerours of all the Armadoes in the world that shall dare to meddle with you Inter caetera providentiae divinae opera hoc quoque dignum est admiratione c. Amongst other works of a divine providence this is very admirable that the winds lye upon the Sea for the furtherance of Navigation and that they may all strike and vail to you as forein Nations once did unto the Kings and Princes that were their Conquerors of whom it is said that at what time they sent their Ambassadors to them whom they both had subdued and would have subdued to them they desired of them Terram Aquam and in token of their subjection they sent them both Water and Earth because all command is either by Sea or by Land and all possessions and riches are either gotten out of the Sea or out of the Land And now after all that I have said in the high commendations of you I pray God bestow peace on our Nation both at Sea and Land for that is far better than these dreadful and heart-amazing Wars There is small comfort in it to see Nation rising up against Nation and an imbruing of their hands in one anothers blood It is a very sad sight in these our dayes the Lord amend it to see Nations running one against another like the two Mountains in Pliny of which hee tells Montes duo inter se concurrerunt crepitu maximo assultantes recedentesque inter eos flamma fumoque in Calum exeunte that they ran continually one against the other Plin. cap. 2.83 Nat. Hist from whom nothing but smoke and fire rise up and ascended towards the heavens with a great sonorous and formidable noise they that take delight to see it I wish they may have enough of it Give mee leave to take my leave of you in a few directions which I would have you to look upon as one of the highest expressions of my love and affection that a man can possibly bear you I speak not only unto you altogether that fear the Lord but unto the other prophane crew also shall I commend a word of counsel and this Treatise is one of the greatest Legacies of my love that I either have or know how to bestow upon you and truly I could wish that every Minister that goes in your ships and in the States service would endeavour to shew something of the improvement of his time that it may stand upon record for the good of you that use the Seas and so far would I have any from carping at what I have done that I would wish them to mend it if they can or shew something of their own I had no warm study to sit in nor no place that was free of noyse and tumult when I writ it Sirs You may visibly behold the great love I bear you who hath taken all this pains in the Sea for you What would you have mee to do for you I have gone a begging to all the good Ministers in the land to pray for your preservation conversion and sanctification I have gone a begging to all the Saints and servants of God to pray for you It was somewhat a soure saying of one concerning the viler sort of Sea-men when he said if you see them not in Sea-port Towns in November December January and March which are the windiest Months in the year then you may conclude that they are all gone to Heaven or else they will never come there They mount up to Heaven c. vers 26. I have exhorted all the Sea-ports in England to pray for you and to remember you that go in the turbulent deeps and I will assure you that I will never forget you neither in Pulpit nor in private but pray hard for your prosperity in the Seas and felicity in the life to come My hearts desire is that you may bee saved in the day of the Lord. The Rules I would commend to you that travel are such as these following and I would hand them not onely to every good and honest heart that goes in the Seas but to every prophane wretch whatsoever 1. Let not the irreligion of those places you travel into whether France Spain Italy Barbary or Turky c. breed in you a neglect of divine duties or a disgustion unto the pure and most reformed Religion that is amongst us in England 2. When you meet the Host or Eucharist in the streets through which it is often born to the houses of the sick get out of the way that you kneel not to it which if a stranger neglects hee is lyable to the Inquisitors or one mischief or other 3. Go no further into the Outlandish Churches in the world than the hand of your own Religion and conscience will lead you lest you dash upon the rocks of Atheism and Idolatry 4. Pitty rather than spurn scoffe and scorn at those you see prostrate before a Crucifix or a Saint It hath been matter of pitty unto my soul many and many a time when in forein parts 5. Neglect will sooner kill an injury than revenge If you meet with injuries in forein parts prudently and patiently put them up an ill turn in those parts is far cheaped passed over than revenged the endeavour of which many times is but Gentleman usher to a greater 6. Keep your selves out of all the Mercenary Harlot houses that bee in the Italian French and Spanish Cities or in any other parts of the world you traffick to Prov. 5.8 Remove thy way far from her and come not nigh the door of her house 7. Begin all your voyages with fear and sincere and hearty prayer unto God to go along with you through and over the Seas to carry you well out to return you wel back You go very rashly upon all your designs The Israelites usually asked counsel of God first and then they went The Grecians went to their Oracles Gentlemen and Sea-men in your perusal of this Treatise you will finde me sharply striking at prophaneness in the Sea and to those that are bad I speak to and those that are honest and godly are very silly and simple if they quarrel with it thereby they will bring upon themselves an evil name for let but me hear a man speaking against it and I shall conclude him to bee some Swearer or c. the Persians to their Magi the Egyptians to their Hierophantae the Indians to their Gymnosophista the ancient Gauls and Brittains to their Druides the Romans to their Augures It was not lawful to propound any thing of weight and moment in the Senate Priusquam de coelo observatum est before they had observed from heaven whether God would shine upon their proceedings and enterprises yea or no. 8. Abhor to go to Sea out of any Sea-port Town in England in a drunken posture I would have those that are naught in the Sea to say with
the German Emperor Let us fight with our faults and not with them that tell as of them How knowest thou but God may meet with thee for that sin before ever thou return again 9. Have a care of entertaining all that doctrin that you hear preached by those that are brought into your ships by your Schismatical Sea-Captains under the notion of Chaplains who never had any true cal to usurp the Ministry Thales sent a golden Tripos which some Fisher-men took up in their Nets and the Oracle commanded that it should bee given to the wisest to Bias Bias to Solon c. when they had but seven wise men If you will but beleeve the times wee live in there are hardly so many fools now to bee found either on Sea or Land and if such a thing were now to bee had wee should all fight for it as the three Goddesses did for the golden Apple Wee are so wise now that wee have our women Politicians women Preachers preaching Souldiers preaching Sea-men and preaching Sea-Captains teaching Trades-men every silly fellow can now square a circle to an hair make perpetual motions finde out the Philosophers stone interpret the Revelation of St. John make new Theoricks new Logick dispute de omni scibili Town City Country Sea and Land are now full of these deified spirits and divine souls God bee merciful to us 10. Bee you respecters both of Ministry and Magistracy in the Land there is no greater nor higher baseness at this day upon Land or Sea than the dis-respecting of them such as live at Sea or live on Land let mee tell them they have a foul name in Scripture hee that is a despiler of these I desire to hear no more of the man for I am satisfied what hee is Jude's Ep. vers 9. Filthy Dreamers despisers of Dominions and speakers of evil against Dignities I would wish that every Seaman would get him one of these books that I have writ and that hee would minde the good wholesome directions that are laid down in it What if thou sparest three or four shillings out of thy wages to purchase it that is no great matter it cost the Author a far greater charge to set it out for the good of thee and every poor soul that goes down into the deeps 11. When you come on shoar into Sea-port Towns where there are week-day Lectures and good preaching hear all the good Sermons you can for you stand need of it and tarry not bezling in an Ale-house when you may have food for your souls 12. When you come into any Parts of this Land or go into the Ports in forein Nations let your outward carriage and deportment bee good and orderly A good name is soon lost else There is a pretty story how that Reputation Love and Death made a Covenant together to travel all the world over and each of them was to go a several way and when they were ready to depart a mutual inquiry was made how that they might meet again Death stood up an said that they might be sure to hear of him in Battels Hospitals and in all parts where either famine or diseases were rife Love bade them hearken after him amongst the children of poor people whose parents had left them nothing at Marriages at Feasts and amongst the professed servants of vertue the only places for him to bee in Reputation stood a long time silent when it came to her turn to speak and being urged to assign them places where they might finde her shee sullenly answered that her nature was such that if once shee departed from any man shee never returned to him again I wish you wise 13. Let your hearts and tongues go alwayes together it is a sad age wee live in they are not relatives neither on Sea nor Land It is well worth your observation of the Peach namely that the Egyptians of all fruits make choice of that principally to consecrate to their goddess and for no other cause but that the fruit thereof was like to ones heart and the leaf to ones tongue 14. Nothing but godliness will bee a target to you against your Aquarum confluges Bee not carried away with the damnable opinions that are in the heads of many of your Sea-men and Commanders There bee many sorry Solecismes amongst them 15. Lay aside all that vain talking that is amongst you in ships A prating Barber asked King Archelaus how hee would bee trimmed the King replyed silently Surely in much prate there cannot but bee much vanity 16. Many Sea-men deal by prayer as the Athenians did with their holy Anchor in time of danger they would throw it out never else whence the Proverb 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i.e. Sacram anchoram solvere dicimur quando ad extremum prasid um confugimus Erasm Use prayer every morning you uprise whether on Sea or Land if you would have God to bless you There are six seasons many Sea-men take up prayer and never else 1. When they are put to it to cut down their Masts by the board 2. When a Cable breaks 3. When the Rudder bands break off and leave them Rudderless in the great and wide Sea 4. When they are thrown irrecoverably upon Rocks and Sands 5. When they are put to it to pump night and day to keep up their ships from sinking 6. When the winds tear all their sails to peeces about their ears And this I like not 17. Get a spirit of meekness and humility detest a high and a proud spirit I wonder why many should bee so proud and surly as they are at Sea certainly if they did but recollect themselves their descent pedigree and lineage together with their imployment they would finde themselves to bee but carried up and down in the Sea by a fart at the best out of Aeolus's breech the god of wind 18. Shake off that rugged and churlish nature that is come onely amongst you and get a more affable and courteous disposition that will bee your interest 19. Pay the Lord all those solemn vows that you make unto him in the Seas when you are in deep distress and dangerous storms Not one of a thousand of you doth this I dare bee bold to speak it Erasmus's Colloquium in naufragio is very much like you In a storm the Mariner promises no less than golden Mountains to be sacrificed it but come safe to land another vows to go on pilgrimage as far as to St. James's of Compostella bare foot and bare headed in a shirt of male next his skin begging all the way a third promises St. Christophers Statue which is mons verius quam statua a Mountain rather than a statue and this is to be seen in one of the great Churches at Paris that hee would give him a wax Candle as big as himself whom one of his contemporaries checked saying if thou shouldest now go and sell all that thou hast thou art not worth so much
of being prayed for Job 9.26 They are called in that place Ships of desire 1. When a man sees a goodly and a stately ship that is then a ship of desire 2. A Merchants longing for his ships good return home is a ship of desire 3. A ship of desire is a swift Pinnace oâ— a Pyrats Bark or Vessel that is made on purpose for the prey to out-sail all others But to proceed Let mee tell thee Good Reader before I take my leave of thee that I can say of and by my going to Sea for which I had as clear a all to as ever man had to any place in this world as a good man once said who had lyon a long time in prison in the primitive times of persecution I have quoth hee got no harm by this No more harm hath all my troubles at Sea done my inward man than a going up to the rops of those mountains hath done them that have made the trial where neither Winds Clouds nor Rain doth over-top them and such as have been upon them do affirm that there is a wonderful clear skye over head though Clouds below pour down rains and break forth in thunder and lightning to the terrour of them that are at the bottome yet at the top there is no such matter Mee thinks I have heard the Seas say unto mee Vide hic mare hic venti hic pericula disce sapere See how ready the Winds and Seas are at Gods beck and wilt not thou fear him If I may tell thee my experiences of Gods doing of my soul good in the Seas then can I tell thee thus much bee it spoken to the praise of that sweet God whom I serve and honour that I have got no harm by going to Sea but a great deal of good both to my soul and also to my understanding and intellectual parts 1. I have learned by my going to Sea to love the world less than I did before Love not the world c. 1 Joh. 2.15 2. I have learned to know men and the world far better than I did before 3. I have learned to prize a life in heaven far before a reeling and staggering life here on earth 4. I have learned to bee far more shye and wary of sin than I was before because I found my self so fearful of death and drowning many times in storms when in the Seas I have read of a young man that lay on his death-bed and all that ever hee spoke whilst hee lived was this I am so sick that I cannot live and I am so sinful that I dare not dye It is good to keep clear of sin 5. I have learned to live upon God and to put my trust in him more than ever I did before so that I can comfortably speak it Psal 7.1 O Lord my God in thee doe I put my trust c. 6. I have seen more of the Creation by my going to Sea than ever I should have done if I had stayed on Land The Lord sets men the bounds of their habitations It is said of Lypsius that he took such delight in reading of a Book I wish that thou mayest as much in this that hee said Pluris faecio quum relego semper novum quum repetivi repetendum The more I read the more I am tilled on to read 7. I have learned to fear God more and to stand in awe of that God who hath the lives of all his creatures under his feet and is able to dispose both of a mans present and also future condition even as pleaseth him than ever I did before 8. I have learned to pray better and to ply the Throne of Grace oftner with my prayers for spiritual blessings than ever I did before 9 I have so learned Christ that I made it my work and businesse all the time I was at Sea to lead my life so as in the continual presence and aspect of the Lord Meer Heathens thought God to be every where as appears by their Jovis omnia plena Quascunque accesseris oraâ— Sub Jove semper eris c. Psal 16.8 I have set the Lord alwayes before me c. and so I lived and have lived both at Sea and also at Land that I shall give both foe and friend and friend and foe their liberty to speak and observe me as much as they can 10 I have learned to love my God more than ever I did before and if I had not I should appear to be a very rebellious Child As Demetrius Phalerius deceived the calamities of his Banishment by the sweetness of his Study so I the troublesome Seas and rude society by mine I know that this poor Peece of mine has in it its 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Naâ—vi its blacks and spots its Human frailties which the good Lord remit yet in it is there truths Divine and things very profitable and worthy to be embraced in respect the Lord has done so much for me to preserve me and mercy me as hee hath done in a cruel Sea which is a place as the Poet sings Luctus ubique pavor plurima mortis imago Good Reader doest thou live in times of trouble and daies of danger then turn over this Book and thou wilt finde that there is a wise and a powerful God in the Heavens that sits at the Helm both of Sea and Land to preserve poor souls in them Wouldst thou hear of those Sights and Wonders of the Lord that those that goe down into the Seas doe see then will I commend this small Treatise to thee what delight fuller thing canst thou read than a Theam or Subject of the Sea and Sea affairs here mayest thou read and peruse this my Nec inter vivos nec inter mortuos which cost me much pains and get some good out of it When Nebuzaradan burnt the rubbish of the Temple hee kept the Gold c. Though in reading thou meetest with Creature-defects which I will assure thee was never writ upon Land but drawn up as I studied it upon water Libentèr omnibus omnes opes concesserim ut mihi liceat vi nulla interpellante isto modo in literis vivere Tully I would freely give all the good in the world that I might sit down in the world live and lead a studying life But it was the Lords will that I should travel in the great and wide Sea yet wilt thou meet with many a savoury truth if thou hast but a gracious heart in the brest of thee Accept of it My sute to you Readers is that upon your perusal of it you would seek the Lord in its behalf that it may doe good to them that use the Seas I begge the prayers of every godly and gracious Minister into whose hands peradventure it may come that he would pray that it may be instrumental to reform these People that goe in the Seas who stand in need of
sweet flowers in the Spring which are not known nor seen by the owners of the Cattel Altamen occultum referunt in lacte Saporem Virg. Georg. 4. So though no eye can behold the Merchant in a foreign Nation what hee trades in yet the benefit of his going out is evermore found at his return such ship or ships is to make report thereof by firing of Guns and if in the night by hanging out of lights and firing of Guns 9. If that the Admiral in a Fleet bee minded and resolve to anchor in the night hee makes sign thereof by hanging out perhaps his two lights in the Mizzen shrouds one above another and when anchors fires a peece of Ordinance and all the rest of the Fleet come to an anchor 3. Their business or occasions and those has respect unto two things 1. Merchandizing 2. Warring and Fighting 1. Merchandizing The Merchant-mans employment lyes wholly in traffiking from Country to Country buying and selling and selling and buying according to that in the Poet Impiger extremos currit Mercator ad Indos He goes down into the Sea to bring into the Land those costly Silks Spices Wines Sugars Stuffs Fruits c. which are in other parts very plentifully to bee had And by these wealthy and vendible commodities is both the City of London and the whole Nation besides both marvellously benefited and inriched What our Nation is destitute of it is fetcht into it out of other Countries that affords it by shipping So that England wants not for those scattered varieties that have their growth and being in other climates but hath a full and sufficient supply of every thing Now the Merchants business is various in respect that it lyes sometimes here and sometimes there sometimes in the Eastern parts of the world and sometimes in the Western sometimes in the Southern and other some times again in the Northern It s an Italian Proverb that the world is theirs that are bold Paradise theirs that are devour and Learning theirs that will but study for it The application is fair enough in view Sometimes for one commodity and other some times for another by which rare calling and imployment hee doth Angliam valde locupletari Hee goes into Countries Omnia copiarum genere abundantes that flow with all manner of varieties The Merchant-ships are continually going and coming and coming and going into England and out of England into the remote parts of the world as Bees out of an Hive in Summer time Vt in prat is ubique apes serenâ floribus infidunt variis As in Summer time every eye may behold the laborious Bee one while in the field and another while in the garden one while bringing home and another while flying out for hony so do our ships take flight upon their Canvass wings and bring home the riches and the wealth that is in other parts These are they that are like to Zebulun the Mariners Tribe who dwelt at the Haven of the Sea Josh 33.19 and sucked of the abundance of the Seas They that go too and again in the Sea may see in one part twenty sail in another forty in one fifty and in another sixty or an hundred going this way and that way Eastward Westward Northward and Southward Sicuti apes omnes circumvolitantes quod est utile domum adducunt As Bees light on every flower so some or other of the Merchants ships upon every Nation and that which is profitable and beneficial they bring with them into the Land Observation 2 That the worlds wealth is not to bee gotten without great pains and diligence whether at Sea or Land That do business in the great waters Many a perilous and rocking storm doth the Merchant-ship go thorow before shee either gets to her journies end into a forein part or from thence unto her home again What one said when hee stood admiring what pains Gentlemen take in hunting of the Hare the same I may say of the Merchant in his hunting out of forein Countries Tanto labore pro uno lepore homines valde torqueri video quos montes ascendunt quas paludes transibunt quas vepres sentesque sine sensu percurrunt modo unum lepusculum Capiant What mountains doth the Hunter climb what waters runs hee thorow and hedges breaks hee over with what toyl and sweat doth hee follow after the Hare Even the like pains takes the Merchant in climbing over the great mountains in the stormy Seas There is scarce any wind that blows but some ships are both going out and coming in or out one harbour or other in England But 2. Warring and fighting I would have our Sailors when they fight an enemy to strive as much for the wind as the Heron doth her endeavour to be above the Falcon that she may wet his wings with her excrements to that end he may flye both heavily and also that his purpose may be made ineffectual Having now spoke something of Merchandizing business it follows that I should descant a little upon that warring and fighting work and business that wee have now in this age to do Shipping business then lyes not altogether in trading but sometimes in fighting and warring upon the Seas when there bee breaches and fallings out betwixt State and State And when the quarrel is once begun betwixt two Nations there is great care taken on both sides who should run down one another by the board first So that if there were not a careful imploying of warlike Fleets both at home and abroad 1 For securing of Merchant-trade And 2. For guarding of the Nation Englands enemies are so many that they would soon put down the Merchandizing of it Ships might either stay in their harbours or otherwise if they went out to Sea without men of War they would come short of their homes How quickly would our cruel and bloody-minded enemies clip their Canvass wings from ever coming into our English Ports again Nay they would not stick to come and visit us with great and dreadful Armadoes threatning to land and break in upon us Besides wee have a cunning and subtil enemy to deal withal which plaies us as notable pranks as the Fowler doth the birds with his Larking-day-net which he spreads out in fair mornings and himself whirling about with his artificial motions thereby not onely the merry Lark and fearful Pidgeon are dazled and drawn into it out of admiration Let me say thus much unto the Hollander which Archidamus once said unto the Aeolians when he saw them intending to aid the Argives against him He writ a letter unto them the substance of which was in this Quietness is far better Take heed of aiding the Spaniard but stouter birds of prey the swift Merlin and towering Hobbie are sometimes inticed to stoop unto it which proves the loss of their lives Our Merchants that are small birds are not onely snapt and taken by the enemy now and then but
all doubt and controversie even take shipping and make trial of it Let the waters saith God bee gathered together and at his word they fled and tarried not for another word of command but away they ran roaring and raging off the Land which they held in their possession till God gave them Commission to give it up to mankinde and the creatures the Lord intended to live in it which were choyser inhabitants and so ever since that word of Command they have continued in those Caves Pits Depths Cells and bottomless receptacles which God out of wisdome digged and delved for them Psal 104.9 Thou hast set a bound that they may not pass over that they turn not again to cover the earth 2. And that in order it will appear that they may well bee called great What Writers say of the Jasper may better be said of the Seas that its easier to admire them than to declare them in and upon a fourfold account 1. For Latitude 2. Longitude 3. Profundity 4. Potency 1. Respectus latitudinis Every string in Davids Harp warbles out the immense latitude of the Seas In Psal 104.25 26. You may behold David as one amazed at the beholding of the great works of God in the deeps So is this great and wide Sea wherein are things creeping innumerable both small and great beasts There go the ships there is that Leviathan whom thou hast made to play therein They are called in this Psalm both great and wide What Policritus writes of a certain water in Sicily the same will I write upon the Superficies of the Seas Quam si quis irgrediatur in latum extenditur into which the deeper a man wades the larger it doth extend in self and the further he goes into it the further he may Some call it into question and debate whether the Sea or the Land be greater and the controversie cannot well be decided By the Maps of the world it is told us that some of the Southern parts in the world are not yet known and discovered which they title at this day by the name of Terra Australis nondum cognita and whether it be Sea or whether it be Land it is not yet known These are two words if but well considered which comprehend such vast dimensions as is not easily demonstrable by reason of that roomy and spatious magnitude that they are of Some wee call the narrow Seas because Lands and Countries are not far distant from each other In the Straights the Sea carries the name of Mediterranean because it parts Europe and Africa which are but a very small run betwixt each other But after one is out of the Straights-mouth or the Mediterranean they may in sailing Westward travel long enough ere they see any land again And after that ships get out of our narrow Seas in England here they may sail many hundreds of Leagues ere they come within the sight of land again The Seas that are betwixt England and France is but a very narrow cut and also betwixt it and Holland and betwixt England and Denmark Norway Jutland and Zealand c. in comparison what other Seas bee both Westward Southward Northward Some to prove that the Earth is far greater than the Sea alledg that in Esd 6.42 that God gathered the waters from off the seventh part of the earth and dried up the six other parts and if this Scripture were Canonical and of authority in the Church of God we might beleeve it But it is not my judgement to think that the Land is greater than the Seas 2. Respect a longitudinis What an unspeakable and almost incredible way may one sail directly end-wayes in the Seas from the East into the West and from the North into the South Of all visible latitudes indeed the East and the West are the largest What a vast longitude is that which our shipping run when they go out of the East into the West the North star and the Septentrional spangles are run down into the Sea out of their sight long before they come within sight of the Indies and at their return back when they come to such an elevation as once to behold the peepings of it forth out of the Sea which doth ask them a long time sailing before they can bring themselves within the sight of it how cheerful are they in their spirits of their advancings England-ward The Mariner makes many a look in his solitary and nocturnal Navigations upon the heavens for the appearance of this Star and when once his eye beholds it his first sight of it is as if it riss out of the water or as the rising of the Sun in a Winter or Summers morning which rises so low to outward appearance as if it had its surrection out of the earth After the same manner doth the North star to them which go far down into the Seas as if it riss out of the waters 3. Respectu profunditatis The salt waters are of such an unfadomable and intangible depth and abyss in many parts that no bottome is to bee found though one would tyre themselves with Line and Lead to make the trial of it I have heard it told again and again by some of the civilest and soberest of Sea-men that they have known of the Dutches who are very great and expert Mariners to have taken with them a small vessels loading of Line to sound the Seas in some of the Southern parts I have read of one that fell almost into an irrecoverable swound at the sight of seeing one sounding of the Seas in the ship he sailed in beholding such an infinite length of Line run thorow his hands he looked like a dead man on it when he apprehended what dangerous depths he sailed over and when he came to himself he cried out Mira profunditas and though they have painfully rafled out all that great and mighty Clew consisting of many thousands of Fathoms insomuch that they have been a whole day in letting down of Line and Lead and haling up yet not touched the bottome of it What truth there may bee in this report I know not But without all controversie the Sea is of an unkennable depth Some that are of the wisest and prudentest of Sea-men are of this judgement that the Seas in some parts are twenty thirty yea forty miles in depth from the very top upon which ships swim unto the very bottome Of such depth are the Seas after our ships get out of the Channel Southward that there is no anchoring for them because the Seas are far deeper than their Cables are in length 4. Respectu potentiae I will follow the Musicioners method in the handling of this for hee that playes upon the Harp strikes not upon one string but upon all and that is it that makes the Musick The great waters then are of such power force and strength when the winds lift them up into swelling Hills and pyramidical Mountains that they
them hearing them telling of the wonderful works of God Nay it is more than probable that they did tell him and inform him of many things that his eyes had never seen otherwise wee had not had such a sweet composed Psalm upon the Mariners most famous art of Navigation and going down into the Seas as is now extant to bee read of by us at this very day I shall adventure to speak it Dabe audaciam verbis and give it out deny it who will and that in laudem Nautarum in the praise and honour of the Sailors and Sea-men both in England and elsewhere that they have the fairest view and the greatest discoveries of the works of God of all the men upon the face of the earth What is there that Travellers do not see whilst others do but read Sea-men have a full sight of the strength riches honors glories and sweetnesses of Countries They see the great Cities the renowned men the magnificent Courts the rich Mines and veines of gold silver the spicy Islands the Chrystal mountains coasts of pearl rocks of Diamond how the earth is paved with her various sweet smelling herbs and glorious flowers how she is decked in forein parts with flourishing trees green woods watered with Seas and Rivers replenished with great Majesty of towns Cities garnished with all manner of fruits spices and furnished with all living creatures Beasts Fowls and Fishes serving for mans necessity use and pleasure They that follow their callings on Land and have no other discoveries but Map-knowledge or Book-knowledge they may read of much but the Navigating Viator carries the bell away Such may say Insulam videmus etiam cum non videmus wee see a fair Island by description when wee see it not but they that go down into the Sea in ships they have a real a full and satisfactory sight of all the sweet and delightful Countries and fruitful Islands whilst others by Maps and Books do but read of or at the best but hear of them Before I go any further I will cut up the words in this following method and set them together again in a Doctrinal composure In the words you may soon espy these two things 1. Persons seeing 2. Things seen 1. The persons seeing They are declared to bee such as go down into the Seas These see the works of the Lord c. 2. The things that are seen They are of two sorts 1. Opera Creationis The works of Creation 2. Opera Conservationis Works of Salvation For the first of these The thing then in hand and that which is inquirable into is what is to bee understood by Works in this place or what those Works of God are that Sea-men or Sailors and Mariners have such a full sight of in their goings down into the Seas To bee short I humbly conceive that they may bee ranked into these five infallible heads under which I shall comprehend what I will and do intend Deo permittente in a rowling and quarrelling Sea the Lord assisting to speak of and herein I shall bee forced to stay you a little till I have broke off the opening of these promised particulars that I may come unto the next verses that I would speak to and infer something from These Works then are 1. Aquatical 2. Terrestrial And under this term I would comprehend 1. Gressile 2. Volatile 3. Reptile Now these are the things when opened that Mariners and Travellers have a very large and ample satisfying sight of That the most or the greatest part of Observ 1 Gods glorious Works and Wonders whether in the deeps or on land The Sea is an Hive wherein the hony of good instruction may be made and gathered are seen by Sea-men These see the Works of the Lord c. I will now leave the point thus collected and stated onely thus much I will say for and in the behalf of it that man hath not now that advantage which Adam primarily had in Paradise before whom all the creatures were summoned in to come and make their personal appearance before him the Lords chief Deputy or Terrestrial Vice-roy that hee might behold their several forms shapes kindes and species It is a question whether the fish in the salt waters or fresh waters were seen by Adam yea or no it is likely hee did not see them because they live in another element and would soon perish if but any while removed out of it Those that were volatile it is probable that they took wing and hastened to present themselves before their Lord and Sovereign and those that were Gressile it is likely and of slow pace and heavy bodies that they paced it unto him and the rest that were Reptile they came crawling and rowling upon the ground with all the speed they could make to shew themselves and acknowledge Adam with the rest as their supreme But it is not thus now these creatures that were thus seen by Adam are wandred up and down into the world some dwell in the East some in the West some in the South and other some in the North. Hee that would behold the various living creatures and the wide world must betake himself to travel or would bee acquainted with the habit modes and fashions laws and actions of Countries these cannot bee seen though may bee known by reading without perambulatory pains and travel Observ 2 That travel is the onely thing to compleat He that would travel the world must take this course 1. He must furnish himself with Out-country language or otherwise it will be but a beggarly thing to live upon borrowing from friends or Interpreters 2 He must have a veil over his eyes a key on his ear and a compass on his lips furnish adorn and perfect any man These see the works of the Lord c. Their eyes behold that by going into the Seas which will finde them matter of discourse and meditation all the dayes of their lives Nay they hear that which they would not for a world but hear and know that which they would not for a world but know Josh 2.1 And Joshua the Son of Nun sent out of Shittim two men to spye secretlie saying Go view the land even Jericho Thus much I would infer from this presented Scripture That it is travel that doth accomplish a man and not sitting at home for hereby he comes to have a copious cognizance of forein parts and of the whole Creation These see the works of the Lord c. I would a little now speak unto and of the excellency of that ocular Organ that God hath bestowed upon man The eye hath the greatest variety of objects to feed on and delight it self in above all the other senses in the body none ranges so much thorow the world nor thorow the Seas by shipping into forein parts and Countries nor none pierces the skies and the fixed stars so much as this ocular and visory sense doth
Miscelaneous Observations These stand by themselves like the Quoe genus in the Grammer being deficients or redundants not to bee brought under any rule because the Seas are a debilitating to my spirits onely give me leave to throw you in a few Miscelaneous yet I hope delightful and pleasing Observations and then I question not but that I shall have given you a taste and relish of every thing in order though not in that multiplicity that I might have done 1. They that go down to the Sea in ships Amongst the rest of that amaene bundle of novelty that they have in their travels those sundry and strange kind of sensitive creatures that be in the Indies are some in which God has kindled many kinds of living and going fire walking to and fro in the Earth some creeping under feet some flying over head viz. in the Snake Adder Cockatrice flying Serpents and other strange kind of Flies In the evening if any bee disposed to walk in the Woods Sea-men tell us that there bee great swarms of flies which will keep a very great buzzing and humming about the trees and cost such a light and lustre as if there were sparks of fire or lighted matches hanging upon the boughs which will sting and burn to death Numb 21.4 And the Lord sent fiery Serpents among the people and they bit the people and much people of Israel died 2. Amongst the rest of that eye-delighting and mind-contenting novelty that they have in their travels those great and many Woods that bee in the Indies and elsewhere are some there bee such vast and unknown wilderness-places in the world in which grow such a rankness and thickness of trees that they cannot bee travelled through nor known how great and how far they reach it is not known to the Indians themselves what is on the other side of them and who or what lives beyond them 3. Amongst the rest of that eye-delighting and mind-contenting novelty that they have in their travels the Magellan Straits is very wonderful in respect of those terrible winds that bee frequently in them and upon them which fall with such vehemency as if the very bowels of the earth would set all at liberty or as if the clouds under the Heavens were called together to muster their fury and lay on their force upon that one place the Sea in it self naturally is of a very heavy and ponderous substance History tells us that Ferdinando Megalanus was the first that compassed the world and found out this Southern passage call'd Fretum Magellanieum and after him followed Sr. F. D. yet notwithstanding in this place it is so rowld up with storms that the very roots of rocks are unbar'd so that ones eye may almost behold the bottoms of the deeps the Seas swell run and rage in such monstrous hills and mountaines sometimes there that it is no small terrour to the Mariner when hee is either under sail or at an anchor Anchors are like false friends give way and the wind is so violent as if the mountains would rend and the heavens and the earth would come together 4. Those wonderful cloud-climbing and heaven-aspiring Promontories that bee in many parts of the world many or the most of them lye in the view of the ships that go in the Seas and other some lye-upon the very skirts of the Sea These are Natures bulworks Some writers tell us that the Land of Canaan was but threescore miles in length and twelve score in breadth and that it is exceeding mountainous so the hillier mountainouser any Country is the greater it is in this little land were there 1 Chr. 21.5 A thousand thousand and an hundred thousand men that drew sword and Judah was four hundred threescore and ten thousand men that drew sword cast up as the Spaniard says at God Almighties charge and they call them heaps of rubbish or offals that were left at the Creation of the world and so remain as so many warts or pimples disfiguring the face and beauty of the earth the difficulty of their ascent is admirable the horridness of their craggs is wonderful and an uninhabited wilderness are many of them upon which and in which live nothing else but wild beast The Alpes Mount Ararat Mount Chego and Teneriffe c. are estimated to bee far higher than the clouds Upon these it is no matter of wonderment to see Snow lying all summer long although those parts have a greater heat from the Sun than wee have in England and the reason seems to bee this because that the Sun does leave its work as imperfect and has not that force and power to melt the Snows that bee upon them by reason of those chill aires that bee upon them Nay such an intollerable chilness is there upon some of their snowy and frosty tops Corpus-zant Sometimes Sea-men will aver that there will come down many of these Corpus-zants insomuch that they have seen upon evey yard-arme one as so many blazing lighted candles that they are altogether inhospitable and not to bee endured to breathe in for an hour 5. The Corpus-zant which is so called in the Spanish and Italian Language and in Latin Corpus Sancti which they say it is this is a very strange thing it seldom appears but before the ensuing of some dreadful storm It is like unto the light of a candle and is never seen but in the darkest and windiest nights upon the Sea It most commonly chuses to light upon the Truck of the Antient-staff about which the ships-colours do fly and there it will lye a long time like the light of a candle and what it is or from whence it comes or whither it goes none can well tell Sometimes Sea-men say that they will light in other parts of the ship and when they have endeavoured to touch them they would vanish away The sight of this thing did much admire mee 6. The Male-stream-well Male-stream-well which lies on the back of Norway this well draws water into it during the flood which continues for the space of six hours and twelve minutes with such an avarous indraught and force Mariners call this dreadful Gulph the Navel of the Sea that it makes a very hideous and most dreadful noise the waves tumble in with such a violence one upon the neck of another that would daunt the stoutest heart to hear it and suck up the strongest ships that should dare to come within a league of it and at the Ebb the water returns with the like violence that it went in in the Flood so that should the ponderousest thing that is bee thrown into it the strength of it is such that it would carry it up again 7. The Water-Spouts Water-spouts that bee to bee seen in the Southern parts of the world of which certainly David speaks of Psal 42.7 Deep calleth unto deep at the noise of thy Water-spouts It is observed by those
lines by and out of which hee that has a seeing eye may read profitable and singular Divinity lectures that they are greatly to blame There bee many tender-hearted people on Land that would even melt into tears if they did either see or know but of the one half of what you both see and know But what is it I pray for a man to see nothing but whiteness in the Lilly redness in the Rose purple in the Violet lustre in the Stars or perfuming sweetness in the Musk c. other creatures see this as well as you if you make no better use of these things Plutarch's little Bee when it spoke could say Ex flâ—sculis succum mellis colligere cum alii non delectentur nisi colore odore I could gather hony out of any flower whilst others passed by and would not light upon it 2. Do what ever in you lyes to get a seeing eye for want of which some in their travels are but meer beetles Nycticoracis oculos habéntes or men that carry their eyes in their heels when they should have had them in their heads A seeing eye will affect the heart let a man go where hee will in the World Lament 3.51 Mine eye affecteth my heart I wish that every poor Sea-man in the world were so spiritual Sea-men might gather rare documents from the creatures as the little decimo seâ—tos that be both in the Sea and Land as the small fish that are in the Sea the Dove Aut that are on the Land as well as from the great folios of the Whale and Elephant c. that every thing that hee sees in the Sea or on the Land affected his heart Holy David was so heavenly that hee could lay his eye upon nothing that his heart was not affected with Psal 148.8 9 10. One while his eye was upon Fixe another while upon Hail one while upon Snow and another while upon Vapour one while upon the stormy Wind and another while upon the Mountains Hills Trees Beasts Cattel Creeping-things and flying Foul c. and none of these but his heart was exceedingly affected and taken in the thinking and beholding of them Again says Solomon Prov. 15.30 The light of the eyes rejoyceth the heart Give me leave to speak one concluding word unto you who are so much as it were in the heart and garden of the world as you are you might pluck many a sweet and savoury flower to make nosegays of I may say of the Sea and the forein parts of the world what one once said of the Sacred Bible that there was evermore aliquid revisentibus Something to see again again to serve you to smel on in your hearts all the dayes of your lives A gratious heart will evermore bee drawing out good observations out of the creature and will take an occasion to breathe after God in every strange thing it sees or enjoyes A goodly Ancient being asked by a prophane Philosopher How hee could contemplate high things sith hee had no books wisely answered that hee had the whole world for his book ready open at all times and in all places and that therein hee could read things Divine and Heavenly Bees will suck hony out of flowers that flies cannot do But to proceed 2. The next thing is to insist a little upon those singular and providential preservations and deliverances that Sea-men meet withall in their navigable employments My last work you know was to set before you a Praelibamen or a small parcel of the works of God that they behold in their travels and my next task is to prefix a few of those works which may very properly and pertinently bee called Opera conservationis works of mercy and preservation from and out of those many dreadful dangers and life-hazarding perils that they do run in the stormy and raging Seas And before I begin arenam descendere to enter upon them I will lay this proposition before you Observ 4 That the Sea-man of all the men under the whole Heavens none excepted is one that is both a partaker and a seer of the greatest and remarkablest of temporal deliverances These see the works of the Lord and his wonders in the deep The course that I shall shape and steer in the handling of this doctrine will bee in these following Corollaries that I shall lay down before you the divulging of which unto the world cannot but advance and exalt my Masters name And I hope it will lye as an engagement upon the hearts of the godly as it was upon Davids to love and fear that God the more that bestows such great and so many undeserved preservations upon them that go in the Seas For this reason is it that I do take upon mee to call their deliverances to mind because their dangers and their preservations are not known to every one the major sort of people that live on Land are not acquainted with the things that I shall sing of My Song shall now bee thâ—t of Virgils ab â—ove principium now I will make it my business to present you with some of them though indeed not the one half of what I might and what others who are more knowing in them might tell you of And if you will but give mee that audience and attention that the beasts of the field the fouls of the air gave unto Orpheus's musick that is all I will desire of you It is said of the Beasts of the field and of the Fouls of the aire that they forgot their several appetites who were some of prey some of game and othersome of quarrel some for one thing and some for another insomuch that they stood very peaceably and sociably listning to the Aires Tunes and Accords of the Harp and when the sound ceased or was drowned with some lowder noise then every beast returned to his own nature again To bee short the truth of it is they are very ear-delighting and heart-melting deliverances that I shall speak of and therefore they are both worthy reading and also hearing 1. They that go down to the Sea in ships are many times most dreadfully surprized and bewildered with dangerous and perilous leaks at which water comes gushing into their Vessels as it will out of a cistern or conduit-pipe when once the cock head is but turned about and it may bee when they are thus unexpectedly taken they are many an hundred mile from any port or Land to save their lives I and further to aggravate their misery they are not within the sight of any ship or ships to come and help them which is not onely an heart-akeing discouragement but an heart-casting-down condition Now goes the hand-pump and the chain-pump which they carry in their ships as fast as ever they can turn them about to throw out that water that springs in upon them and when they find the water to flow in upon them far faster than they can throw it
flye upon a ragged one Sea-men Sea-men look for storms it is your usual saying that Pallida luna pluit rubicunda flat alba serenat The Moon looks red and tells us that wee shall have winds You have just occasions many times to look for winds and storms therefore give mee leave to say Delicatus nauta est qui fortunae rabiosas novercantis procellas non expectat that hee is too little a right bred Sea-man that neither would nor doth look for storms the best sort of Sea-men dare not trust the smiling countenance of any one day or night though never so fawning and proffering If he comes to an anchor he sits down and casts about and considers how and what the harbour is and how the winds may turn and change Minus etiam quam luscinia dormit the pleasant Nightingale sleeps more than hee doth because hee is burdened with many cares about his fore-casting of all things for the best It is a great folly for any to think that they may go to Sea and not meet with brushing storms and that man that desires to go to Sea for recreation and not for imployment save onely to see the Seas and sail here and there a little upon them would wish with all his heart that hee was back again when hee sees a storm a coming Alas the Sea is a place where the greatest storms are laid on that ever befell any element whatsoever there are not those gusts and storms to bee found on land that bee upon the Seas neither are the great deeps like the smooth-faced fontes fluvia stagna and lacus's of a land that lyes with never a wrinckle upon their frontlets but they lye in raging froth and fome and by their restlesness give all that come upon them a bitter cup of a plus aloes quam mellis telling them that they shall have more storms than calms 2. Storms as well as calms come from the hands of God For hee commandeth the stormy winds Matth. 8.25 The stormy wind was up for a while in which the Disciples of Christ were most dreadfully rocked and tossed in but afterwards it was rebuked and stilled this is a comfort Nullum violentum est perpetuum things that are violent are not long lasting I would have all Sea-men to bee of that heavenly temper that Job was of when they are in and under perilous storms Job 2.10 What shall wee receive good at the hands of God and shall wee not receive evil It seems evil as well as good happens sometimes for a peoples trial 3. Dayes are evermore seen for to travel with Gods decrees Fair Sun-shine mornings have I seen and known to end in sad and dismal evenings the Proverb is Nescis quid serus vesper vebat Thou knowst not what is in the womb of a big-bellied day The Willow would never bee good if it were not lopt and cut cutting of it makes it spring the better at the root and bear the fairer head The Sailors will never bee ought till they bee cut to peeces I mean laid low upon the bark of affliction if hee say they shall be stormy who can let it and if hee give command that they shall bee tranquil and calm they shall bee so Prov. 27. Boast not thy self of to morrow for thou knowest not what a day may bring forth It may bring forth sickness as well as health storms as well as calms and death as well as life 4. God will humble and correct you and stand you not in very great need of being humbled and corrected Where is the Sailor in the Sea that is so good as may not look for a brushing The Sun is more resplendent after an ecclipse the Sea more calm after a storm and the air much brighter after a shower which made a great Statesman of out Nation to say that storms and tempests contribute to the cleerness of the heavens and the smoothness of the Seas 5. Where there is a looking for smooth and calm Seas the sudden alteration thereof Art thou going to Sea my friend make much of this short word of counsel there is multum in parvo nè quare mollia nè tibi contingant dura wouldst thou have i◠Englished Sailor then this it is Expect not too much favour from the Sea Jactantur oequora ventis He that will sail the great and wide Sea must look for many a roaring gust both hath and doth prove a sad and bitter disappointment to many a mans expectations when Christs Disciples were out at Sea they looked for smooth and calm water and meeting with a rugged and boysterous storm and tempest where they saw themselves greatly endangered they could not bear it Matth. 8.25 Lord save us wee perish Jer. 8.15 Wee looked for peace but no good came and for a time of health and behold trouble They that will go down to the Sea must not look for to have all calms and no storms but oftner storms than calms They that will travel upon the Sea to this and that far and remote Country in the world they must expect to meet with many a sore rub and brushing storm before they shall or can bee transported to them 2. I would have all those that are Grandees and Statesmen of our land to look for storms also my reason is this in respect that your Honours have many brave Golden-stern'd and Golden-headed Sea-boats going to and fro and up and down in the great waters where all the other ships do go and much work you have now in hand for them to do which lies both far and near and I think that it is my judgment that there never was an Age or people called on so much as the English now are both to do and carry on that work and those glorious designs that God has on foot against the Anti-Evangelical and Antichristian powers of the world it is clear to mee that the Lord Jesus Christ who both will and shall rule all Nations with a rod of Iron and in whom is all power and through whom is the guidance of all the affairs that are on foot upon the face of the Earth that you are acted by him against them but that which I aim at is this Right Honourable your gallant ships are now and then rocking and staggering in the waves as well as others and are now and then most dreadfully spending of their Masts and Yards by the board and some again most dangerously are hazarded in their running upon the ground the winds favour them no more than they do the other ships that use the Seas but fall upon them belluino impetu with as much violence as they do upon others The winds take no more notice of the golden gildedst ship than they do of the coarsest Nunc pluit claro nunc Juppiter aethere fulget meanest and plainest stern-painted that goes in the Salt-waters You cannot expect it that the Seas should bee alwaies of a gentile and silver-glistering
bee compared to a man that runs up an high ladder and as soon as ever hee is got up to the highest stave of it down hee goes till hee comes unto the lowest and by and by hee returns unto the highest Solomon tels us Prov. 23.5 that the Eagle taketh wing and flyeth towards heaven but hee does not say that shee flies so high but it denotes that shee is one of the highest flying birds of any of the fouls under the Heavens Christ tels us also Matth. 11.23 that Capernaum was exalted unto Heaven when alas it was not so nor so because it was but an hyperbolical but rather an Ironical expression for Capernaum was so far from Heaven that her feet was rather upon the very threshold of Hell than Heaven as appears by the poynt shee steered by But this elegant Hyperbole of the Psalmists is to set forth the Sea-mans high soaring sursums and his down-falling deorsums They mount up almost as high as that caelestial 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is feigned to be Elemenci quarti nomen how that hee is one while carried upwards upon the swelling billows of the Seas even ad aulam astriferam as high as the starry mansions and bespangled roofs of Heaven and then by and by they are returned down again 2. They go down again to break up this word unto you there is nothing difficult in it onely wee may take notice that their descension in storms is not gradatim or pedetentim but rather in the violentest manner that can bee even as a stone that is hurled up in the air it will not tarry there any longer than the strength of the hand is upon it and then it will down again because it covets to bee at its Center So the weightier any thing is the speedier is and will bee the descent of it I am confident it would produce many a gallon of salt tears from the eyes of the godly that are on Land if there were but a possibility of their seeing of ships how they labour rock and reel ascend and descend in the restless Seas in time of storms for by and by they are to bee seen anon they are not to bee seen but as if they were covered all over in the Seas That Sea-men are the nearest Heaven Observation 1 of any people in the world when they are once got up upon the back of an high-rising water-billow They mount up to Heaven c. These are the onely cloud-climbing lads of the world Sea men are like to the pinnacles that are praefixed upon all high battlements which point upwards to Heaven but poyse downwards to their center Exod. 8.15 Whilst the judgments of God were upon Pharaoh he was some thing conformable but when the storm was over he was as vile as ever and none go so near or are so fair for Heaven as Sea-men are seems the Psalmist to say but let mee add this pray God they ever come there my prayers shall bee for them 1 Sam. 12.23 Moreover as for mee God forbid that I should sin against the Lord in ceasing to pray for you but I will teach you the good and right way Vers 24. Onely fear the Lord and serve him in truth with all your heart for consider how great things hee hath done for you For I fear that many an hundred Sea-man when hee is got up to the top of an high water promontory in the Sea that hee is as near Heaven as ever hee will bee It was once said of one that preached well and lived ill upon a time when in the pulpit some importunate messenger or other came for him to come out of the Church but one of his auditors made answer Oh let him alone for hee is as near Heaven as ever hee will bee So I may say it is a thousand pitties that ever some Sea-men should come off and down from the high-towering waves of the Seas because they are in those stormy times peradventure nearer Heaven than ever they will bee when they come on Land again Observation 2 That all Sea-men generally without all exception whether they bee young or whether they bee old both do and shall assuredly go to heaven They mount up to the heaven Me thinks the Sea-man likes mee well in the laying down of this proposition and the godly on the other hand look very strangely upon it and so consequently conclude I knovv Sea-men are as confident of going to Heaven the Lord help them as the Turks either are or can bee of that lock vvhich they keep upon the top of their crownes that they shall bee dravvn up into Paradise by Pray God Sea-men vvould once forsake their confidence and then there vvould bee some hopes of them that I have no warrant nor ground in Scripture to build it upon To clear up the point unto you I would have you to observe that there are two parts in it 1. That they do go to Heaven 2. That they shall all go thither For the first of these that they do go thither I would have you to understand mee rightly without any misconstruction I will have nothing to doe with their Salvation in this point for that is as doubtful to mee as Solomon's was to Toledo the Arch-Bishop who weighing that much-disputed controversie whether Solomon was saved or damned and not being satisfied with their arguments caused Solomon to bee pictured upon the walls of his Chapel the one half in hell and the other half in heaven There be three Heavens 1. Coelum Aerium 2. Coelum Astriferum 3. Coelum Beatorum It is not the latter novv they go to in storms but the tvvo former But to the point in hand that you may understand my meaning in it take notice that it is stormy and tempestuous weather that Sea-men go to Heaven in even then when the winds lift up the waves of the Seas by which and upon which thay are in this sense transported unto Heaven what they do or whither they go when dead I have nothing to do to judge and therefore whilst they are living wee need not credit that they go into Heaven Sailors are like to Grashoppers in goodness vvho make faint essayes to fly up to Heaven and then presently fall dovvn to the Earth again Sea-men that have their feet as it vvere in stormy vveather upon the battlements of Heaven should look dovvn upon all earthly happiness in the world as both base abject slight and slender waterish and worthless The great Cities of Campaniae seem but small cottages to them that stand on the tops of the Alps. for I never knew any of them so holy Enoch indeed Gen. 5.24 Walked with God and hee was not for God took him There is a vast difference betwixt going to Heaven and into Heaven the Eagle that Solomon speaks of flew towards Heaven but hee doth not say that shee went into it There is a vast disproportion betwixt a mans going to a place and
Virgils Hypotoposis of a storm at Sea is their condition Tollimur in coelum curvato gurgite iidem Subducta ad manes imos descendimus undâ Consider but what a bustling the winds sometimes make and keep in a stormy day upon your Houses and Trees that are in your Orchards insomuch that many times trees are rent up by the roots and out-housing dismounted and thrown down to the very ground Now if the wind have such an influence upon all high things at Land how much more upon the tall spired Masts and shipping that go in the shelterless Seas 5. Word is unto the godly and pretious Ministry that is in great plenty in this Nation Gentlemen you are by your profession 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Rowers 1 Cor. 4. And beleeve it rowing is a very hard labour The Seas are as full of dangers to them that go down into them as Pandoras box was whom the Poet reports of that Prometheus the Father of Deucalion would needs pry â—nto out of which Mille morborum malorum genera â—rumpunt A thousand evils was in it for men in the Thames go with their dublets off all day their living is got by the sweat of their brows But your labour in the Lord 's Vinyard is far greater than theirs many have killed themselves by hard working to get the world and I am sure there lies many a pretious Preacher in the grave that might have lived longer if he had not preached himself to death and prayed himself to death though an unworthy world takes no notice of it I beg of you your publick and your private prayers for those that use the Seas Wee have a great number of ships frequently going to Sea above a thousand sail every year both of Merchants and Men of War and stand not these in need of being prayed for I fear many of them perish and finde it to go harder with them than it otherwise would bee did you but pray more for them Ah they stagger it in the Sea every day more then hee that has a cask a tankard Alas the Sea-mans life is a reeling to fro Nutant nautae vacillaâ—t cerebro pedibus may be their mottâ— or an hogshead of strong liquours in the belly of him And are in daily jeopardy of their lives Good Sirs bestow pulpit prayers study prayers family prayers and field-walking prayers upon them all is little enough to prosper Zebulun's Tribe in their goings forth and commings in But I proceed That God watcheth every opportunity Observ 3 and takes all occasions to do his people good Then hee bringeth them unto their desired Haven Very gladly would God have spared Jerusalem if there had but been one man in it that executed judgement and sought after the truth Jer. 5.1 Run thee to and fro through the streets of Jerusalem c. How compassionatly did the Lord affect any opportunity to cure Babylon Mans heart-daunting extremity is Gods goldenest opportunity Acts 27.23 For there stood by mee this night the Angel of God whose I am and whom I serve They all expected to be drowned but God looked out for them to preserve them The Sea is no delightful place to carry in for it is with them that use it as it is with travellers on Land who speed their pace through fields that afford no novelties though sometimes they bait their beasts rest themselves in places that are fruitful when hee intreated her with the best argumentative Oratory that the Heavens could compose till shee said I will not bee cured Jer. 51.9 How did God watch to spare Sodom for ten mens sakes Gen. 18.32 Ah were but Sea-men godly I durst undertake their safety in their well-going out to Sea and returning back from Sea Insomuch that they might bid defiance to the Seas and say unto them as Luther said of Henry the eighth's letters Agant quicquid possunt Henrici Episcopi atque adeo Turca ipse Satan nos filii sumus Regni So Agant venti freta c. What History sets out Neptune in in a statue of gold holding the two terrours of the Seas in his hands the one called Scilla the other Charybdes I may better say of the Lord and these hee has in chains and is feigned to call out aloud to the Mariners and ships that pass that way Pergite securae perfreta nostra rates Ships securely 〈◊〉 on Through our 〈◊〉 Ocean That when ships have been long out of Observ 4 the Land in forein parts their well coming home is evermore very delightful Italiam Italiam laeto clamore salutat Virg. and inexpressable pleasant to them Then hee brings them to their desired Haven It is said of Marcus Tullius that when hee was brought out of banishment it was with him as if hee had entered into a new world and had gotten Heaven for Earth he broke out into this language I am amazed to see the beautifulness of Italy Oh how fair are the Regions thereof what goodly fields what pleasant fruits what famous Towns what sumptuous Cities what Gardens what pleasures what humanity amongst Citizens and Country people It is said of the Trojans after they had been warring a long time in the Mediterranean Seas the like shall I say of our Warriours that as soon as they spied Land they cried out with exulting joyes Oh Italy Italy It is thus with our Sea-men Abigails bottles of Wine and frayles of Raisins were not more welcome to David in the hungry Wilderness of Paran nor the shady Juniper-tree more delectable to the Prophet when in the parching Sun nor Jacobs sat Kid more acceptable to his grave Father Isaac in his sickness than the Land is to the Mariner when he hath been long out of it when been a long tract of time out at Sea in the East or West Indies Oh England England poor Travellers that have been long out of their w◠〈◊〉 the night time wandring here and 〈◊〉 and ring there in a bewildered condition upon Hills and Mountains in vast and large Forrests far from any house destitute of monies and all comfortable refreshments weather-beaten with rain and wind terrified with thunder and lamentably starved with cold and hunger wearied with labour and almost brought to despair with a multitude of miseries if this man or those Travellers should upon a sudden in the twinckling of an eye I may write Epicharmes 's saying upon the Mariners calling 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 All good things are bought with labour bee fetched and placed in some goodly large and rich Palace that is furnished with all kind of rich accommodations warm fire sweet odours dainty meat downy beds pleasant musick fine apparrel honourable and noble company and al this prepared for them Oh how would they bee transported and over-joyed As great contentment and heart-ravishment as all this is the sight of England to the Mariner after a long voyage Observ 5 That every ships sinking and miscarying in
at its appearance filling the air with many loud acclamations 2. That there is a tenderness of heart and spirit in you mourning for and under sin which renders you Elect holy and beloved amongst the Saints that know you I would all the new upstarts in England were of this good old sin-mourning temper Rom. 7.24 Oh wretched man that I am who Acts 24.16 Herein do I exercise my self 3. That you make it your constant care and business to look to your life and conversation and I do know it that it is the desire of you soul that it should bee such and in such a way of holiness as does become the Gospel of Christ Philip. 1.21 4. That it is the great care and desire of your soul that all under you should bee engaged in the daily worship and service of God Joshua 24.15 But as for mee and my house wee will serve the Lord. 5. That you are a discourager of what you apprehend to bee evil in your family Psal 101.2 3 4 5 6 7. Hee that telleth lies shall not tarry in my sight Were all Families so ordered it would bee better both in the City Country and the whole Land than it is at this day Prov. 14.1 Every wise woman buildeth her house 6. That you are exemplary in your Family and truly it is good so to bee if the Mountains overflow with waters the Valleys are the better for it and if the head bee full of ill humours the whole body fares the worse for it Give mee leave now my much Honoured Lady to present a few things to you which may tarry with you when Providence may call mee from you 1. Think of your dying day It is said that there stands a Globe of the world at the one end of the Library in Dublin and a Skeleton of a man at the other it seems they that go into that Library need not stand long to study out a good lesson What if a man were Lord or Lady King or Queen of all the known parts of the world yet must hee dye I like not the Proverb I no more thought of it than I did of my dying day It is written of the Philosophers called Brachmani that they were so much given to think of their latter end that they had their graves alwaies open before their gates that both going out and coming in they might bee mindful of their death There was once a discourse betwixt a Citizen and a Mariner my Ancestours said the Mariner were all Sea-men and all of them died at Sea my Father my grand Father and my great grand Father were all buried in the Sea then sayes the Citizen what great cause have you when you set out to Sea to remember your death I but says the Mariner to the Citizen where I pray did your Father and your grand Father die why saies hee they died all of them in their beds truly then saies the Mariner to the Citizen what a care had you need to have every night when you go to bed to think of your bed as a grave and the clothes that cover you as the earth that must one day bee thrown upon you You are wise and know how to apply it 2. Lay up treasure in Heaven God has done much for you in the bestowing the riches honours dignities and great things of this life upon you by making you taller by the head and shoulders than thousands both in City and Country are Matth. 6.19 20. Is a Scripture I would commend to your leasurable considerations 3. Take heed of the bewitching honors entertainments and the deluding and heart-insinuating great things of this world It was a good saying of Luther I hope your Ladyship will make it yours when offered great things that hee protested to the Lord hee would not bee put off with the things of this life for his portion Psal 17.14 Men of the world have their portion in this life That is all it seems that ever they are like to have The Rubenites Numb 23. having taken a liking of the Country which was first conquered because it was commodious for the feeding of their Cattel though it was far from the Temple where they might have fed their souls to enjoy it they renounced all interests in the Land of Promise It is said of the Locusts that came out of the bottomless pit that they were like unto Horses and on their heads were as it were Crowns of gold and their faces were as the faces of men their hairs as the hair of women their teeth as it were the teeth of Lyons c. Rev. 9.7 8. in which Scripture wee have quasi Horses quasi Crowns quasi faces quasi teeth and quasi hairs of men In part such are all the honours and comforts of this life 4. Bee much in prayer hard and private wrestling with God in your closer for Heaven and Salavation If a man were assured that there were a great purchase in Spain Turkey Italy c. or some other remote parts would hee not run ride sail and adventure the dangers and hazzards of the Sea and of his enemies also if need were that hee might come to the enjoyment and possession thereof Heaven is better than Earth and a life in glory than a life in this sinful World and that you may prefer that above this in this lower world and may also live and bee with the Father and the Lamb in the highest glory when this life is ended for ever more shall bee the hearty prayer of him Madam Who is your Ladyships most humbly devoted DANIEL PELL From my Study in your own most Honourable House and Family London May 6. 1659. To the Right Worshipful Mr. HENRY HUNGARFORD Esquire And one of the Members of the Honourable House of Parliament D. P. Wisheth the grace mercy peace and love of God the Father in this life and eternal bliss and glory in the life to come Reverend and Right Honourable Sir Uno non possum quantum te diligo versu Dicere si satis est distichon ecce duos If I cannot in one verse my mind declare If two will serve the turn lo here they are SO great an honourer and admirer am I of you and the House and Family that you are descended of and belong unto that I cannot praetermit you without the presenting of this small Tract and Treatise which is of no great worth or value but onely an act or an expression of that superlative respect and service I bear you Certainly if I should I should then bee an Adinstar Niciae cujusdam Pictoris of whom it was said tantam in pingendo diligentiam adhibuit ut saepe numero intentus arti cibum sumere oblivisceretur è famulo quaereret LAVINE pransus ne sum a very forgetful person I question not but that you will find some thing in it worth your reading although you have travelled all or the greatest part of all the known parts of the
world in Books and Study Ennius could find and pick out gold out of a Dunghil The laborious Bee will fetch hony out of a flower before shee leaves it And I hope that you will see some thing in this peece worth the relishing I will assure you it was never writ studied nor composed on Land but in a turbulent Sea where there is nothing but a Chaos of hurry and confusion and so I hope you will pardon the weakness of the work for had I been on Land or had I had the time when on Land I would have sent it out into the world more accurrately furnished accomplished But Quid moror istis I cannot but speak of it to your praise and worth that I am very much affected and taken with that good life and conversation that you live and lead in my Ladies family and bless God in my soul many times for that gratious and pious voice of Prayer that I hear daily out of your Chamber into my Study that is adjacent I pray God bless you and bestow the riches of his grace and sweet comfortable Spirit upon you for that is the thing you daily press for Quo pede caepisti progrediare precor This I shall say the more you pray and the more holily and spiritually you live and walk the more serviceable will you bee both to your good God Nation and Country God has many times called you out of the world into a Parliamentary way and that undoubtedly to do your Country all the good you can your Motto and the Motto of the whole House now assembled may and should bee Adinstar Alphonsi Regis Arragonum qui in Symbolo habuit lumen ardens cum lemmate Aliis servio mihi consumor Or if you will Ludovicus's the King of France Qui in Symbolo habuit Pelicanum revocantem ad vitam sanguine proprio pullos emortuos God grant that the affairs of this Land may bee carried on for the peoples good and may resemble Virgils Eccho where all things went well Omnia sonant Hyla Hyla lemma Sanguis meus estis vivite Thus should the whole House bee and do for the Land and Country that has chosen them I would have our Parliament House to resemble that good Bishop Socrates tells of who did when a terrible fire was in Constantinople fastning on a great part of the City and Churches in it go to the Atar and falling down upon his knees would not rise from thence till the fire-blazing in the windows and flashing in every door was vanquished and extinguished Do what in you lies to put out the fire of the sword and the fire of Division that is gone forth and broke out upon us in this Nation I have met with this passage Non sit jam quod clamant 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. O Jupiter pluit calamitates that a certain Rustick having blamed Antigonus while hee lived grew after some tryal had of his succession to recant his errour and to recount his crime and digging one day in the field was questioned what hee did there hee said O Antigonum refodio I seek Antigonus again Oh dig and delve for peace that you may see both order and decency in Church and State restored and the Land left in a blessed frame to the Posterities that are to come after you and betray as not in our good and wholesome Laws but maintain them you certainly see enough of that profane and giddy hair brainedness that has been all along in the heads of the illiterate who have sought to bring the whole Land into confusion and themselves into the saddle Honoured Sir I take my leave of you I present this peece unto you I pray accept of it and the God of Heaven bless you and guide you shall bee the prayer of him who is Sir Yours to serve you in the Service of Christ DANIEL PELL From my Study at my Lady Hungarfords in Hungarford House upon the Strand London April 20. 165◠To the Right Worshipful Mr. GILES HUNGARFORD Esquire D. P. Wisheth all prosperity in this life and felicity in the life to come Reverend and Worthy Sir IT is an usual saying Si musae Latine loquerentur inquit Varro Plantino sermone loquerentur Although I take the boldness to present you with this my Nec inter vivos Nec inter mortuos upon the 107. Psalm which was writ upon a frowning and tempestuous Sea whom I know to bee a person every way so well studied read and accomplished not in the least inferiour to him whom a great University Tutor much boasted of that was a Pupil to him fac periculum c. try him in the Tongues Rhetorick Logick and Philosophy c. in what you will hee is able to answer you I hope you will expect no such high strained stile and phrase from mee which the Muses would delight to speak in and whom it would far better become than mee for the Sea is no place to write and polish books in no more than hard riding is to him that would make a Map or true description of a Country I confess such is the great respect I bear you I speak now ex imis praecordiis that if it were not for that and also for that worth and merit that I clearly see in you together with that sweet mixture of ingenuity wisdome and good nature besides a great many more good things that is possible for to be in a person of your rank and quality I should scarce have adventured to have offered you this peece of my travelling Operam Oleum I beg your acceptance of it and shall assure you that you have a very high room in my thoughts which is indeed reserved for all such as both know and fear the Lord. I freely bestow this peece upon you and give you all the interest in it that possibly can bee bestowed upon you I hope you will both see and also find something in it worth the reading and the while in your perusing Sir You are descended of a very high and honourable Family a Family whom I much honour and respect and that is one of the grand inducements that puts mee upon an appearance unto you and the onely way to heighten your honour still is to grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ I know no one thing this day upon the face of the earth that stamps such a Nobility and eminency upon our Gentry in the land as Piety and Religion doth Nobility by blood as one well said is but a fancy or an imagination but this hath a reality in it and where it is it evermore begets a splendor and a lustre But I will not further the prayers of him shall bee for you and yours who rests Sir Yours to serve you in the Service of Christ DANIEL PELL From my Study at my Lady Hungarfords in Hungardford house upon the Strand London May 4. 1659. TO ALL
as thick as hail about these mens ears they no more regard them than the Leviathan does the throwing of darts Job 41.29 which he counts as stubble and laughs at the shaking of of the spear What Job says in one case of the Leviathan I 'll say in another of the Sailor Job 41.33 Upon earth there is not his like who is made without fear I 'll say of Sailors what Paterculus said of some Caitiffs in his time in Rome quod nequiter ausi fortiter executi that what they wickedly attempted they desperately performed These Blades laugh when broad-sides are poured into their Ships And let me tell you a strange story You are Cousen-Germans to the great Leviathan in the Sea his heart and yours are both of a metal Ver. 24. His heart is as firm as a stone yea as hard as a piece of the nether Milstone It s not the loud Peals of Ordnance and of broad-sides from your Enemies that will dismay or break your hearts Nay when the Sea is on a curded dye of gore blood and runs as freely out of the Skuppers of their Ships as water does down the leaden Pipes of high-tyled houses in a rainy day these Lads have as good a stomach to behold it as ever Hannibal had when he saw a pit of Mans blood and cried out O famosum spectaculum he was so far from swooning at it that he took great delight in it Our Sailors like the Romans are so used not only unto gladiatory fights but great roaring Gun-fights and bloody spectacles and this acquaintance that they have got of Wounds and Blood makes them the lesse fear it in the Wars These are the Lads that make their Guns to roar far louder upon their Enemies than Homers Mars when hurt whom the noise of a thousand men and bells could not drown These are they that do totum concutere Orbem puzzle and amaze the whole world Where ever these go and sail they give every Coast a most dreadfull Alarm And that Immortale nomen that these blades in their late Wars have got is daunting terrible Prope Procul far and near so that they are talked of not onely Lingua Gallica but Italica Turcica Arabica Persica Belgica Hispanica c. and with and by all the Tongues that be in the World and hapned at the Confusion of Babel These Lads These are they that do Tonare armis fulminare cum Bombardis thunder in their arms and lighten the night with their guns who ride in the golden Saddle of their Wooden and Warlike Horses over the great waves and billows of the seas are of the very same metal of that proud prauncing and curvetting Horse in Job 39.19 20 21 22 23 24 25. They are men whose necks are clothed with thunder They with their Frigots go on to meet the armed men They mock at fear and are not affrighted neither turn they back from the Sword or all the Ordnance that 's fired on them They say amongst the Trumpets The glittering Spear and thundering Guns Ha! ha They smell the battel afar off and the thunder of the Ships and Captains They tear the Waves of the Sea in pieces with their fiercenesse And what Job 41.19 speaks of the Leviathans mouth I may say of these mens Gun-mouthes Out of their Gun-mouthes go burning lamps and smoke and sparks of fire leap out of their Gun-nostrils as out of a seething Pot or Cauldron Nay it s wonderful either to see hear or think how cheerfully the Mariners will shout and throw their Caps over-board into the Air and the Sea when they come unto an Engagement and though shot fly as neer their Coats and Caps as the Grecians accent came unto their Greek letter 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they turn but up the nose at it Who will or who can deny but that by this Art Mariners have the fairest and fullest view and delightfullest aspect of the whole Creation above all others whatsoever Who will deny that the Seaman has not the amplest prospect of the great Waters These are the Lads that bark against the Crucifix of Rome It has been a Papal Proverb that never any barkt against the Crucifix but he ever ran mad But see you not how our Sailors keep in their right wits notwithstanding all that These are the Lads that have taken as much pleasure in setting the Hollanders ships on a fire when they engaged them in their three last dreadful Disputes as Alexander did in Persipolis when it was on a burning blaze or as Alcibiades did in seeing that Athenian heap of Scrolls on a fire of which he said with much rejoycing Nunquam vidi ignem clariorem I never saw a better fire in my life and of the Works and Wonders of the Lord in them and upon them whilst others that sit on Land neither see nor hear of What Art or Science is there in the world that outstrips this Let them come forth to match her I have read of one in Aristaemeus Ephemeris by name who did so much admire his Mistrisses beauty that he challenged all tho Beauties both of the East West North and South to compare with her Truly so much an admirer am I of this rare Art of theirs who have by Providence been conversant amongst them little lesse than a full Quatuorennium of time that I am transported to say Let the Wits of the East West North and South come in and compare as much of the flower strength and wit of Man and wisdom of the Creator is centred and apparent in this one Art and is daily demonstrable to those that are but tantum beholders as is sufficient to put the ingeniousest piece that is into a Labyrinthical admiration And this rare Art is Nuper admodum of late within these few years more abundantly advanced and improved than ever and I believe if my judgement fail not grown up into a Superlativer perfection than can or does appear to have had or been in quondam times or ages Was there ever more Merchandizing than there 's now Was there ever more crossing and adventuring upon the Salt-waters in Ships than there 's now Was there ever more busking or ranging the Seas out of England with great and terrible Fleets of the Warlikest Ships that ever were seen in the world before than there 's now Was there ever more going down into the great Waters from Country to Country according to Davids phrase than there 's now Go but to years past and enquire of them and they will tell you We never practised so much in the Art as you in these days do Before the vertue of the Loadstone that pointeth out the North was revealed unto the Mariner it s not to be spoke with what uncertain wandrings men were driven about following doubtful conjectures and fallacious accounts and reckonings indirectly floating here and there rather than sailing the right and direct way When the weather was fair when either Sun Moon
there was a great stink of brimstone and his body presently afterwards taken out of it when as Mr. Luther was alive to confute it They are like to those that vilified pretious Mr. Beza slandering him with this lye that hee run away with another mans wife And brethren to those that aspersed Mr. Calvin when they said that hee was branded on the shoulder for a Rogue I have met with a dreadful story in some readings which I would present to every Sailor in England and if but well paused upon I should think that it should startle them in slandering of the godly There was a vile wretch who had most injuriously abused the godly Martyr James Abbes and after all his base usage of him hee was shortly after taken with a strange fit of phrenzie and cried out James Abbes is saved and I am damned James Abbes is saved and I am damned There is many a precious soul whom you hate and speak evil on ship-board that shall bee saved when thousands of you shall bee damned I am damned may many a Saylor say when such a good man whom I slandered and spoke evil of is saved Sailors rail on many a good man as causelesly as dogs in the street upon passengers unto whom a good man might say what have I done to this Dog that hee follows mee with this angry clamour had I rated him or shaken my staff at him or stooped down to have taken up a stone to have thrown at the head of him I had then justly drawn on this deformed noise but what need I wonder to see this unquiet disposition in a brute creature I would have Sea-Captains to follow Dominitian the Emperour then should they soon find few slanderers in their ships his stomach so riss against them that he could not indure them but banished them out of the City saying That they which do not punish slanderers encourage them Platina when it is no news with the reasonable How is innocency and merit bayed at in the Sea by the quarrelsome and envious Sailor without any just provocation or grounds in the world how do they shew their tongues their heels their teeth but let them rail so I serve but my God 4. You should not lend your ears unto the reports that are made against good and godly men Exod. 23.1 Thou shalt not raise a false report put not thy hand with the wicked to bee an unrighteous witness Prov. 11.13 5. You ought not to blaze abroad the failings and infirmities of the godly should you either hear or know of any Prov. 11.13 A tale-bearer revealeth secrets but hee that is of a faithful spirit concealeth the matter 6. You ought not to amplifie and aggravate mens failings as you do the most in the Seas of all people under the whole heavens again Act. 16.20 Una guttula conscientiae malae totum mare mundani gaudii absorbet One drop of an ill conscience wil swallow up a whole Sea of worldly joy cheerfulness Mr. Perkins mentions a good man who being ready to starve stole a Lamb and being about to eat it with his poor children as his manner was before meat and to crave a blessing durst not do it but fell into a great fear and perplexity of spirit acknowledging his fault to the owner promising payment if ever he should be able These men being Jews do exceedingly trouble our City I have now nine things more in my eye which I would present unto every Captain Master Boatswain Gunner Carpenter Purser and Sailor in any of the States ships of England And after I have lain them down in brief I will pass on in what I further intend 1. Keep daily in thy bosome a good and quiet conscience or otherwise it will when thou comest unto the trial gnaw out all the roots of valour out of thine heart It is said of the Earl of Essex that hee was never fearful of fighting any enemy in the field but when his conscience charged him with guilt for some sin or other I would have all the Sea-Captains Masters Boatswains Gunners Pursers Carpenters and Sea-men to prize a good conscience in one case as Benevolus did in another who said when offered preferment by Justina the Arrian Empress if that hee would but bee an instrument of doing vile service for her What saith hee do you promise mee an higher place for a reward of iniquity nay take this away that I have already with all my heart so that I may keep a good conscience and thereupon threw at her feet his girdle the ensign of his honour Acts and Mon. 2. Bee careful in the avoiding and renouncing of all the sins which the generality of Sea-men are incident unto 3. Evermore count the chief Magistrates and Rulers lawful commands to bee sufficient warrant to ingage and fight a forein and Commonwealths adversary 4. Esteem all hardships easie through hope of victory Julius Caesar is a worthy example for you Sailors William the 2. of England going to imbark at Sea the Master of the ship told him it was rough and there was no passing without eminent danger Tush said he set forward I never yet heard of a King that was drowned therefore fear not the waves This valour would wel become Sailors in all their peâ—illous affairs of whom it is said when forewarned of a Conspiracy that was made against him in the Senate hee boldly answered Mallem mori se quam timere I had rather dye than admit of fear 5. Look through your wages at Gods glory and your Countries good 6. Expose not your selves in a Bravado to needless and incommodious peril King Richard the first of that name who when the rest of the Princes and Gallants that were travelling with him in the Holy land where they then warred were come to the foot of an hill from whence they might clearly view Jerusalem the Holy City then possessed by Saraceus without all hopes of recovery they begun to put spurs to their horses every one in a youthful countenance saying that they would strive who should bee the first at it and have the maiden-head of that goodly prospect but the King more solid and serious than the rest pulled down his Beaver over his eyes and told them that he would not gratify them with a vain pleasure of so sad a spectacle God forbid said hee that I should behold that City or come so neer unto it now though I could which though I would I know not how to rescue The Application is cleer enough 7. There be three things that I would commend unto every Sea-Captain Master Gunner Boatswain Purser Carpenter and Sailor in England 1. To bee holy at Sea 2. Stout-hearted in a fight 3. Sparingly merry when they come on shore Chuse rather to dye ten thousand times than once to stain your credits The Lyon out of state scorns to run whilst any looks upon him I would not have our Sailors to resemble that
I have read of a young prodigal Londoner who had a great longing to give all his five Senses a pleasure at once and allowed to the delight of every sense a several 100 l. by which and such like practices within the space of three years he wasted an estate of 30000 l. in mony left him by his father besides land plate jewels and houses furnished very richly to a great value I bring but this in as an instance to tell you that he that w ll feast his eye with the sight of the Creation it will both cost him penny and pains by which hee sees his works withall and then I will lay-down the promised particulars of what Mariners do see 1. Very wonderful is the sense of hearing tasteing smelling feeling but far more wonderful is the sense of seeing If it should bee demanded of mee what definition may bee given of the eye and what it is I think it may bee said truly that the eye is a little globe that is very full of visory spirits which do exceedingly resemble the round animatedness of the world The visory spirits have their generation from the Animal which flows from the brain to the eye by the nerve Optic and from those proceed the visible and reflected rayes in the eye as in a glass which will soon form any image that it beholds and so is received into the Chrystalline humour and by the visory spirits through the Nerve Optic is conveyed to the brain the object to bee considered of and by the internal senses as imagination memory and the common sense Observ 3 That good and perfect eye-sight is a singular mercy and special blessing from the Lord. These see the works of the Lord c. If it were not for this comfortable sense that God hath bestowed upon man his works could not bee seen nor discovered and viewed as to this day they are to his everlasting praise glory and honour I would exhort all the Sailors in the Seas now to consider how favourably God hath dealt with them in giving them eyes and perfect sight without which their lives would bee but a burden to them as his was that was brought to our Saviour Christ Mat. 12.22 Then was brought unto him one possessed with a devil blinde and dumb and hee healed him in so much that the blinde and dumb both spake and saw Are you not bound and much engaged to God that hee hath given you eyes to see withall whilst other men wanting sight better deserving it than you are like to go without it and so are forced and must go groping and groveling in the dark all their dayes till they come to lye down in their graves with what suspicion and fear walks the blinde up and down in the world how doth their hands and staves examine their way with what jealousie do they receive every morsel and every draught how do they meet with many a poast and stumble upon many a stone fall into many a ditch and swallow up many a flye to them the world is as if it were not or were all rubs gins snares and miserable downfalls and if any man will lend him an hand hee must trust to him and not to himself Consider but the blinde in the Gospel how they lay in the high wayes and roads that lead unto the City of Jerusalem and also amongst us here in England in every high way Towns end or Bridge and you will finde reason enough of your blessing of the Lord for his goodness unto you more than unto others Mark 10.46 47. And when hee heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth hee began to cry out and say Jesus thou Son of David have mercy on mee 2. The eyes in number are two the better to give direction to us Oculists observe that whereas other creatures have but four muscles to turn their eyes about with which is the main reason that they cannot look upwards but altogether downwards now man hath a fifth whereby he can look upwards into the Caelum Empyraeum Os homini sublime dedit caelumque tucri Oculus ab oculendo I may say as God hath set 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the great world both the Sun and Moon as instruments of light to serve it so hath he most wisely wonderfully placed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in man the little world two eyes in the highest part of the body as Organs to serve him This is the sense by which the Sailor or the Traveller turns over and over that Volumen magnum Creationis Elephantinam And though this be a very quick and nimble sense and one that is never weary of seeing yet is there work enough for it in the Creation to behold and more than it can ever run thorow and range over should it do nothing else but travel the whole Creation over and information unto the internals in figure round and thereby they are the more capable of all objects by their motion Their situation is placed very high above the rest of the senses to direct our motion and to foresee our dangers 3. The necessity of this Organ is very great if wee do but seriously ponderate for the welfare of our outward being and the government of our selves and our affairs without which sense the life of man would but bee a very toylsome and wearisome thing unto him in the world 4. By this Organ man sees and foresees that which is good or evil helpful or hurtful and that at a distance The Mariners Proverb is Praevisa saxa minus feriunt Rocks but seen before-hand will never hurt us The first circumstance then that I will a little run on in is those creatures that are Aquatical live in the element of water which are some of the principal and wonderful works of God which Sea-men or men that go down into the Seas do behold And these I will a little set out in view to the end it may the cleerlier appear that they see most or the greatest part of the works of the Lord in and thoughout the Creation 1. They that go down to the Sea in ships c. They often times have a frequent sight of that strange and prodigious sort or kind of fish called the Flying-fish Flying-fish whom God out of wisdom has given wings unto like a foul for the preservation of its life in the great waters This poor creature is often hunted chased and pursued by the Boneto Porpise and other ravenous fish which follow it with as much violence as the hungry hound does the poor silly and shelterless Hare Insomuch that it is forced one while to fly and another while to swim and although nature has provided for it in giving it two strings for its bow yet is all little enough to carry him cleer of the snatching chaps and jaws that make after him This fish whilst in the water I have observed in the Mediterranean is exceedingly exposed to irrecoverable danger and when
whether they should ever recover their pristine constitution and health again or no 1. Meditation It laid no less than this applicatory truth upon my spirit That it is dangerous handling touching or looking upon any of those prohibited objects the Lord hath writ a Noli me tangere upon Elisha's servant had a very good stomach to finger and digest Naaman the Assyrians silver 2 King 5.22.27 and golden wedges but no sooner were they in his hands but the Leprosie was upon his body Better is a little with right than great revenues without right Prov. 16.8 12. They have a frequent sight of that Water-beast called a Crocodile Crocodile and in respect that hee lives in the water as well as upon the land I will bring him in amongst the rest of these there bee to bee seen both in Egypt and the Indies hee is of a scaly and impenetrable substance tongue-less say some but marvellously cruel toothed It is said of this creature that hee will weep over a man when hee hath devoured him and the reason of it is not out of pity but out of an apprehension of his want of another prey to live upon from whence started that Proverb of Lachrymae Crocodili The sight of this creature did fasten 1. Meditation and fix thus much upon my spirit That it is a very common thing for desperate hasty passionate and hot-spirited men to kill Sailor Sailor Let the life of a man be pretious in thy sight God will have no murthering if thou wilt fulfill thy bloody minde in thy brutish challenges think with thy self that thy life lyes at the staâ—e to answer his whom thou gracelesly goes about to take away Thou art just then going to the Devil when thou art about such work I would all the Murtherers in the world would spend a few hours in serious consideration of these Scriptures Numb 35.30 31 32. 2 King 24.4 Whither go all Murtherers when God will not pardon them but unto the Devil and commit murther in their hot blood but when in their cold it hath cost them many a tear to get the guilt of it washed off Psal 51.14 When Murther was sound in Davids hands hee could take no rest day nor night till hee found a pardon from the hands of the Lord for it Deliver mee from blood-guiltiness O God thou God of my salvation The blood of the murthered stuck upon his stomach and the like it will be and do to every one that bathe their hands in innocent blood 13. They have sometimes a sight of that strange kinde of creature called a Meermaid q. Maris mulier and the Meerman also q. Maris vir which is very admirable Meermaid of these here bee both male and female The Sea-men have a sight of these sometimes in their Voyages into the Indies but their espying of them proves very unfortunate and ominous for when they appear they presage no good to the Mariner Storm and shipwrack often ensues those ships that gets a sight of them I have heard of the honest and soberest of men that frequent the Seas say that they have seen of these sort of creatures but presently after hath the windes rise clouds begin to drop and Seas to rage and swell to their terrour and affrightment as if all were a going to wrack and ruine 14. They have a frequent aspect of that wonderful and impenetrable sort of Beasts which the Mariners call an Alligator Alligator This creature is mostly visible in the Indies and in respect that hee lives in the water as well as upon the land I give him his entity amongst the rest This Beast is of a vast longitude and magnitude some say many yards in length in colour hee is of a dark brown which makes him the more invisible and indiscernable when hee lyes his Trapan in the waters and Sea sides as it were an old liveless tree or as one destitute of motion and his onely subtilty and policy of lying conchant is to get hold of the fat This beast hath his three tyer of teeth in his chaps and so firmly scaled and armed with coat of Male that you may as well shoot or strike upon or at a Rock and Iron at offer to wound him This beast is of a very slow pace and goes jumping leaping and gathering up of his body and had not the wisdome and goodness of God so ordered it he would soon make the Indies uninhabitable for he would kill up all the people and the varieties of Cattel and creatures that be in the Mountains and wilde Cows and Bullocks that bee in those parts in great abundance when they come down out of the woods and mountains to cool themselves in the waters but no sooner are they in the water but hee hath hold of the throat of one or other of them which hee tears to peeces Of such strength is this beast that no creature is able to make his escape from him if hee get but his chaps fastened in them This beast at his pleasure goes into the waters and again unto the land Now lest I should bee too tedious both to you and to my self in a bitter restless and uncomfortable Sea either to write or study in I will take leave of the scaly inhabitants in the salt waters which I might have asserted for indeed I have but spoken of small or very little in comparison of what Sea-men have experience of both as to their kinds and qualities but this I hope will serve for a praelibamen unto any that are either delighted in reading or taking a view of the works of the Lord in the Seas The second circumstance then comes above board to bee discoursed on and that is about Terrestrials under which term I am minded to comprehend and handle some of those creatures that are both 1. Volatile 2. Gressile 3. Reptile And these are objects which none but those that go down into the Seas either do or can behold Pelican 1. Volatile They that go down to the Sea in ships They have a very ordinary and frequent aspect of that most amiable and delectable bird called the Pelican from the Greek word I suppose 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 perfozo to beat or peirce Naturalists say that this bird to recover her young when they are upon a dye King John late King of Portugal to express his tender care and affections to his people and Subjects would bee emblemed by no other kind of creature than the Pelican and wounded by stinging and mordacious Serpents shee will tear her body to give them of her own dear blood to fetch life and health into them again The sight of this creature has not procured little wonderment from mee when I have considered her shape and form which is on this wise shee has a great bag or sachel hanging under her bil which is the likest unto a leathern pouch of any thing that I can resemble it to
which will contain and hold a full gallon of any thing whether liquid or unliquid and upwards 2. Amongst the rest of the works of the Lord Eagle they have a frequent sight of that princely bird called the Eagle and where her dwelling is who is the Supream Rex of all birds and of her do all the rest stand in awe and give her the preheminence as their Soveraign It is observed of this bird that shee is attended with sharpness of sight to discover her prey with swiftness of wing to hasten unto it and with strength of body to seize upon it It is further observed of this bird that shee has many followers both great and small unto whom shee is very candid and courteous in the distribution of the prey shee seizes upon It is observed that there is this noble and magnanimous spirit in the Eagle that when shee is in want and greatly suffers hunger that shee scorns to pout and make a noise and a clamour as other birde will do but rests her self satisfied If I have it not now I shall have it hereafter but if shee toyle long in seeking of it then hunger which is her durum telum puts her upon the falling foul of her followers 3. They have a frequent sight of the fouls in Greenland every year which are aestate ibi hyeme attamen veniente avolantes there for a while in the summer but gone long before the winter When the Nocturnal time of the year draws on which is all night and tenebrousness the birds make a terrible doleful and dreadful howling as conscious or fore-seeing of that dismal time of black night's approaching they then betake themselves to their wings and fly into other Countries leaving that black-nighted part of the world unto it self and to the Involatile creatures that do inhabit in it viz. Deer Wolves Beares c. Which would if winged or able to run out of the land bee gone for they take small pleasure to stay in it but in respect they cannot pass the Seas for want of wings they are constrained to live in that uncomfortable darkness and insufferable cold Meditations 1. That the two great lights of the Sun What an uncomfortable place would England bee if it had not the light of the Sun and Moon both in in the winter and in the summer and Moon are wonderful comfortable profitable pleasurable and delightful both to man birds and beasts and very uncomfortable is their absence either unto the sick the healthful and the unhealthful Eccl. 11.7 Truly the light is sweet and a pleasant thing it is for the eyes to behold the Sun What cause have wee to bless the Lord for the light of the Moon and of the Sun that hee has not denyed us their light and that wee have not our beings in those black and benighted parts of the world that are all winter long without The light of the Sun is a sweet benefit but not prized because common and ordinary Manna was esteemed but a light kind of food because common and lightly come by without any price and mony David beholds the Sun with admiration Psal 8. and not with adoration as an Idol The Sun is a vessel into which the Lord gathered the light which till then lay scattered in the whole body of the Heavens In Hebrew the Sun is called Shemesh to serve because God has made it a servant unto and for the world 2. God might have done by England as hee has done by Greenland But blessed bee his glorious Name hee has dealt better by it and with it 3. It has laid this impression upon my spirit That as birds who by the help of their wings will not tarry in that Nocturnal Land but flye out of it into other Countries where they may have the blessed light of the Sun and of the Moon What would the poor damned and tormented in the pit of Hell give that they might come out of that dark and black excruciating Hell that they do howl and roare in to live in that lightsome and glorious pearl-sparkling and diamond-glistring Heaven where there is no need of Sun by day nor of the Moon by night Luke 16.24 is a dolefull spectacle of one crying out of the burning flames hee lives in 4. They have a frequent aspect of that lovely and amiable bird called the Stork much noted by the Holy Ghost in Scripture Stork As for the Stork the fir-tree is her house Psal 104.17 This bird uses Holland and other places and is very famous for her natural love unto her young and her young unto the aged again Storks when young and able to help their young when decayed helps the aged by feeding of them when they are not able to go abroad to gather their food Her name comes of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Greek in Latine no more but Amor. The Graecians call her Love denoting that shee is the truest emblem of Love of any creature in the world again 5. They have a vulgar aspect in the West-Indies of those various kinds of foul that bee in those parts both smal Upon Sand-hills there is to bee seen in the Summer-time say Sea-men whole bushels of egs that are both of various and wonderful speckled colours and great which are of divers colours some green some blew some red some yellow some white and other-some of a niger colour There they see the Parrat flying in great flocks and droves like to our Pidgeons and Pelicans flying in lines like to wild-geese Such an innumerable number is there of all sorts of fouls that great and broad rivers are covered over from side to side with them 6. They have a very frequent sight of that admirable bird Ostrich called the Ostrich whom some will compound to be both bird and beast because she resembles the Camel in legs and feet in the head and bill a Sparrow This creature is of such an hot digesting stomack that it will swallow great gobbets of Iron I have known some to present them with a two-penny or a three-penny naile which they have taken as greedily as a cock will pick up a barly-corn out of a dunghil Job 39.14 Shee leaves her eggs in the dust of the earth In this now this creature differs very much from all other birds who carefully sit to brood and hatch their eggs and are very desirous to bring them forth yet this creature leaves hers in the sand forgeting that the foot of the wilde beast or the Traveller may come that way and crush them Vers 15 16. Shee is hardened against her young ones as though they were not hers and is it not thus amongst many Parents towards their children Vers 3. What time shee lifteth up her self fixe scorns the horse and the rider This is to bee understood not that shee is of that strength and ability of body to contend with an horse-man in fight but in her wings legs and
they are provided for that are without fuel in Island and elsewhere In this Island there is another very remarkable passage that there bee several waters in it which are of such a vehement ardency that they will boyl both fish foul and beef in And in these waters the people both dress and cook all their victuals and bays which the people take up and reserve for winter Certainly hee that guided the Kine which bare the Ark 1 Sam. 6.12 guides and orders that these parcels of wood faggots or fuel should come unto those that would bee starved if they were not thus helped every year and besides if there were not a visible hand of providence appearing for this people that live in a Country where doubtless wood will not grow or otherwise for firing it has been destroyed these peeces that swim upon the floods of the Seas might go from them and into the middle of the Sea rather than unto them if not directed c. 17. Their aspect of the Sea which is sometimes of such an ignifluous lustre as if it were full of Starrs insomuch that if a peece of wood or any other ponderous thing should be thrown into it at such times in the night it will show it self as if it were full of firesparkles Whence that Proverb As true as the Sea burns 18. The sight of those two burning Islands Hecla and Helga is another these are often times covered over with Snow yet burn within and belch out very terrible and vehement sparks of fire 19. Their viewing and walking up and down in the goodly sumptuous princely and stately Cities that bee in the world viz. Constantinople Grand-Cair Genoa Venice Naples Rome c. 20. A sight of those fearful and unusual Lightnings and Thunderings that bee sometimes in the Occidental and Austral parts of the world which are with such vehemency and dreadfulness that one would think that the Heavens and the Earth would come together I have heard the honestest and godliest of men that use the Seas say that when they have been in the Indies if they did but see a cloud appearing in the bigness of ones hand they need no other warning but that a most dreadful storm would ensue Insomuch that they have been forced to make all the haste they could to get sails furl'd yards peak'd and their ships fitted to endure it as well as they could The Observation was this That the most or the greatest part of Gods glorious and wonderful works are seen by Sea-men The point then will afford us these two uses 1. Of Reproof And 2. Of Exhortation 1. Vse Reproof 1. Is it thus then that you that are Sailors and Sea-men do see most of the Lords works yea more than all the people in the world besides Platonists by the sight of Nature see more yea and will shame thousands of our Sailors for they could say that all that pulchtitude and beauty that shines in the creature was but Splendor quidam summi illius boni pulchrum coelum pulchra terra sed pulchrior qui fecit illa Surely this point looks with a sour look upon you that make no improvement nor application of things unto your selves for better amendment than you do I may say unto you in the words of Job 35.11 who teacheth us more than the beasts of the earth and maketh us wiser than the fowls of heaven that God hath taught us more than the beasts of the field and hath made man wiser than the fowls of heaven therefore God looks for another manner of glory and understanding from you that are men than hee doth from them and more from those that are Christians than from natural and carnal men It is a notable saying of Mr. Calvins Diabolica ist aec scientia said hee quae in natura contemplatione nos retinens a Deo avertit That is a Devillish kinde of knowledge that in the contemplation of nature keeps men in nature and holds them back from God After this manner may I speak unto you that it is a devillish kinde of knowledge that you have of the Seas and of the Creation if that all you see know and hear of keep you still in nature what better art thou than a beast for all thy travel Give mee leave to tell you thus much 1. That there is a seeing eye in the world an eye that is much in Quaelibet herba Deum stella creaturaque and upon Gods works Isa 40.26 Job 26.8 Hee bindeth up the waters in his thick clouds and the cloud is not rent under them A seeing eye looks on nothing that is either in Sea or Land but thinks of God in it I have read of one that was so spiritual and heavenly-minded that when hee was in the world where hee had a full view of many wonderful things hee said there was nothing that ever hee did behold but hee saw God in it When I cast mine eyes upon the Earth I saw that God was every where When I looked upon the Heavens I considered with my self that that was his Throne When I looked into the depths of the Sea I beheld the power and wisdome of God in the creating of them And when I looked upon the many creeping things that were in it they told mee that God was there I looked also into the breathing air with all the inhabitants of it and it told mee that God was there whose proper Attribute is to bee every where I looked up into the Starry sphere and spangled roof of heaven which glisters with innumerable stars from whence I learned that that is a Christians Country who is in Christ and from thence do I look for my Saviour and the longer I do look upon those glorious and burning and shining Tapers of the heavens which are estimated the very least of them to bee bigger than the whole earth I consider that God hath undoubtedly great and just expectations from man that hee will do some work and service for his Maker Most Masters will not allow their servants to sport and idle whilst their candles are burning but if they finde them so doing they will blow them forth Certainly Sea-men you may conclude that God looks for great things from you who see so much of the Creation that others see not Will it not bee tollerabler for the ignorant Indian c. and the miserable heathen that is in the world than it will bee for you who have no other light but the light of nature to walk by I may compare the generality of Sea-men unto a Traveller who doth in his vagaries leave all things behind him in his way he passes by stately Towers and comely Turrets brave buildings both of Marble Brick and hewn stone goodly Cities Towns and Countries comely and beautiful people and other some both black and tawny and these hee beholds for a while and admires them and passeth on and leaveth them afterwards he goes thorow the â—ields
Meadows Vineyards flourishing Pastures upon which hee looks a while with great delight and on he goes again and meets with fruitfull Orchards green Forrests sweet Rivers with silver streams and behaves himself as before and at length he meets with Desarts hard wayes rough and unpleasant soul and overgrown with Bryars and Thorns here he is intangled for a time to stay labouring and sweating with grief to get out of them and after our he neither remembers his toyl nor the objects that he saw yet doth many of them learn out of it and from the creature that there is a God God upbraided Israel for their stupidity and will hee excuse you think you they had before them the Oxe and the Ass which were creatures that they might have learned wisdome enough out of Isa 1.3 The Oxe knoweth his owner and the Ass his Masters crib but Israel doth not know my people doth not consider The word consider comes of con and sydus and so signifies say some not one bare simple stella but a multitude of stars intimating that it is not a bare transient aspect or flash but an abiding and dwelling upon a thing that is to bee pondered and considered of as a Bee will stick upon the flower till shee extract honey out of it God complains again in Jer. 8.7 The Stork in the Heaven knoweth her appointed times and the Turtle and the Crane and the Swallow observe the time of their coming but my people know not the judgement of the Lord. God puts an En ecce exprobrantis upon them for their Caecity and inobservantness of the works of God And will not the Lord say to you one day that go down into the Seas and see his creatures and store-houses that are both in the waters and on the land viz. Fish in the Sea Beasts of the field and Fowls of the air c. that in respect you have made no soul-profiting uses of them they shall bee bitter and tart aggravations of your future condemnation Oh lament lament your blindness and inexcusable stupidity that you can look upon the wonderful works of God and go so boldly and undauntedly and unaffectedly amongst them without wondring at the wisdome of God and reading of Divinity lectures out of them Can you look upon the Leviathan when hee playeth in the Seas or upon the Trunked Behemoth when hee feedeth upon the land and not stand admiring and blessing of the Creator of them Can you look upon the many and strange kinde of Fishes that bee in the Seas of creatures that bee on the land and Fowls that bee in the air and not bee affected and drawn out with new love new fear and new obedience to serve your good God Ah Sea-men Sea-men I will deal plainly with you If I should see the Lord feeding of Sparrows and cloathing Lilies I should bee both stupid and faithless if I learned not that his providence were the same over mee both to cloath mee and to feed mee If that I should look upon the Heavens and see nothing in them but that they are beyond my reach the Horse and the Mâ—â—e would see that as well as I. May not many Sea-men bee painted as the Egyptians were wont to set out an inconsiderate man by To set such an one out in his colours they pictured him with a Globe of the earth before him and his looking-glass behinde him What Solomon sayes in Prou. 17.24 I shall say unto those that travel Wisdome is before him that hath understanding but the eyes of a fool are in the ends of the earth If that thou seest nothing in the earth but a place to walk in or to take thy rest on the Beasts of the earth and Fowls of the air sees that as well as thou If thou canst see nothing in the Sea to admire God for but a place to swim and sail ships in the fowls that daily sit upon the floods see that as well as thou If thou seest nothing in the Bee and Bird but that they are winged other creatures see that as well as thou doest though not to admire them how they sail thorow the vast sea of air that when the Bee is out in the flowry field shee should bee able to steer directly homewards again to her hive and the Bird when abroad to her nest though at never so a geat a distance What shall I say If thou seest nothing in gorgeous apparel but pride the proud Peacock sees that as well as thee Laudatus paevo extendit pennas If of all thy meat and drink that thou livest upon thou knowest nothing but the pleasure and the sweetness that is in them unto thy taste the Hog and the Swine have as great a portion as thou hast If of hearing seeing smelling tasting feeling bee all the delight that thou canst finde in the works of God the dumb creatures do far excel thee in this and thy heart is little better than the heart of a Beast 2 Vse of Exhortation If it bee thus that you that go in the Seas have the fullest and greatest aspect of the Lords works and wonders both in the Sea and Land suffer mee but to leave two things with you and I will pray unto my good God that they may bee profitable unto you and do some good upon you Oculi idcirco dati sunt corpori ut per eos intutamur creaturam ac per hujusmodi mirabilem harmoniam agnoscamus â—pificem 1. Labour for a conscientious eye There is an eye in the world that makes not a little conscience of that glorious sight and Chrystalline humour that God hath put into it for to behold his works with all What a large Book is the Earth that the eye ranges over and how large a Volume is the Sea thorow which you sail certainly you might learn more than you do and bee better scholars in Christs School than you are They that live pind up in one Nation or Country are far from the view of the Creation for they stand but as a man that comes to some great Earl's or Knight's house and stands in the Court now unless hee be invited in hee sees not the sumptuous rooms and places that bee within it onely at a distance hee sees a little of the outward superstructure but they that go into the Sea from Country to Country they see the riches of the Earth the beauties wealth honours and strength of Nations and Kingdoms and truly let mee say thus much that they that see all these things and learn nothing out of them as incentives to love and fear their God Creatio Mundi Scriptura Dei. Vniversus mundus Deus explicatus The whole Creation is nothing else but Gods excellent hand-writing or the Sacred Scripture of the Most high The Heavens the Earth and the waters are his three large Volumes or the three great leaves in which all the creatures are contained and the creatures themselves are as so many
e quovis bibunt fonte Jejunus stomachus raro vulgaria temnit Lapsana called of the Arabians Wilde Colewort and of Physicians Cera with the roots of this herb lived the host of Cesar a long time when far off any refreshments and this was at Dyrrachium from whence came that Proverb Lapsana vivere to live wretchedly and hardly which they cannot come to by reason of their great distance from any land or harbour they are constrained out of an impulsive necessity to lay their lips unto the same water the ship swims in now the water of the Sea wee all know is inutilis potui though good alere pisces servire navigantibus the drinking of which water throws many of them into irrecoverable sicknesses and diseases Again it is the special care of Mariners in these long voyages when grown short of water to hang out all the sail that ever they have that it may bee in readiness to receive all the showers of rain that falls upon the ship and this they will wring out of the Canvass to quench their thirst withall And this is sweet water in their mouthes although it run down the Tarry shrouds and Roaps about the ship which doth exceedingly imbitter it Against Rain Sailors are like Spiders in providence who hang their Nets in windows where they know Flyes do most resort and work most in warm weather because Flyes are then most abroad buzzing and stirring in every corner Prov. 27.7 To the hungry soul every bitter thing is sweet 17. Others are oftentimes most sadly endangered in rugged and violent storms I will write thus much upon this remarkable deliverance Ps 142.4 I looked on my right hand and beheld but there was no man that would know me refuge failed me no man cared for my soâ—â— insomuch that the Rudder is forced off its bands by their being thrown upon ground or sands and then is their case to the eye of reason so impossible of being remedied that they have no more command of the ship than the driver hath of the wilde Ass spoken of in Job 39.7 Who scorneth the multitude of the City c. Now will not neither can the ship bee got to go by the Card at this and that Point as formerly shee would I have known some that have been many dayes in this condition driving too and again upon the Seas Vers 5. I cried unto thee O Lord I said thou art my refuge and my portion in the land of the living not able to help themselves and though they have made great and vast recompencing promises unto ships that have seen them and comm'd by them in this distress yet would they not take them in a tow nor afford them any relief and yet notwithstanding when they have been thus forsaken in all their hopes and no eye hath pittied them nor no help from man hath come unto them yet hath the Lord looked out of the heavens upon their sorrows and beat down the waves of the Seas and the raging winds over their heads and then by weak and poor means they have got themselves safe to land Oh the many Sea-men that are yet living and can tell of this very mercy I may write thus much upon this deliverance In communi rerum acervo plurima videmus saepe inter Scyllam Charydim pofita I may further say of this memorable mercy Psal 34.18 The Lord is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart and saveth such us be of a contrite spirit Vers 15. The eyes of the Lord are upon the righteous and his ears are open unto their cry 18. Some are many times by and through the violence of storm and tempest exceedingly hazzarded in their being overset insomuch that the ships Masts have been seen to lye in the very Sea and the ships decks covered all over with water which is one of the dreadfullest and heart-bleedingest conditions that can bee seen They that fall into this predicament of misery there is small hopes of their recovery or rising up again because when a vessel is or comes once to bee foundered there is no possibility of her being helped up insomuch that where one recovers five goes to the bottome 19. Many times when they are riding at an Anchor they are very dolorously hazzarded by violent gusts and stormy blasts of wind insomuch that Cables oftentimes break and their Anchors give way and so are most dreadfully put upon the drift and that which is the saddest circumstance in this unparalleld misery is the propinquity and nearness of sands upon which they are many times likely to perish I may write upon this remarkable deliverance Tria talia poma quadrante cara sunt Three other such Apples are too dear of a farthing I leave the Application It is with Mariners in this case as it was with the Egyptians when they had the Israelites amongst them Exod. 12 3â— Wee bee all dead men I may say of Sailors as the Spirit of the Lord saith of the Church Lamentat 5.9 Wee get our bread with the peril of our lives if there were not a singular providence stepping betwixt and to prevent the fatal stroak of such like stormy consequences Many through the undeserved kindness of the Lord have escaped when their Cables have broke in storms and others have gone to the bottome Is not this a mercy worth perpetual boxing and recording in the heart 20. It falls out oftentimes in rugged and blustering weather that they are forced both when they are at an Anchor and also when under sail to lay violent hands upon their masting and yarding and cut down all by the Board for the safe-guarding of their lives and vessel Being once in this condition when upon the coast of Norway I observed that there was not a little terrour and affrightment of being cast away among the Sailors for the wind failed us and the current heavâ—d us into the shore and the Rocks lay round about us and the Sea was so deep that there was no anchoring for us so that all hopes of being saved was taken away yet casting our selves upon our God he provided deliverance and sent out his breezes some from the Land and some out of the Sea some on Head and some on Stern making all the haste that ever they could as if they had been resolved to tell us that they strave who should bee the first at us to fill our sails and carry us back from dying upon the Rocks and oftentimes before they can take the leasure to hew them down the strongness of the winds breaks them down now in this most dreadful and heart-affrighting and soul-amazing weather when the Seas run Mountain-high as if resolved to swallow them up alive the Lord doth wonderfully preserve them they live in this hard stormy time and others perish in it 21. Others are oftentimes becalmed in the Seas when that they are in the dangerousest and perillousest of places and when that there
preserve them and to carry them away from the fire for it is a common thing amongst the Mariners in such cases to run away with the boat and leave all the rest to the mercy of the fire yet notwithstanding boats have been sent off from shore with all speed and their lives have been saved 49. Others have been delivered after this miraculous manner when the ship hath sprung a dangerous and an incurable leak which could in no manner art Now have the Sea-men trembled within themselves and their inward desires have been like those of Moses Deut. 3.25 I pray thee let me go over and see the good Land that is beyond Jordan that goodly Mountain and Lebanon The Lord has given them leave to come safe on Land when that they thought that they should have drowned in the Sea and skil bee stopped their lives being greatly hazarded the Lord has sent unto them a fish that has gone into the leak and made it up with its own body as firm and as tite as ever the ship was before to the admiration of all that were in the Vessel insomuch that when they have brought the ship on shore they have found the fish lying in the leak as fast as any planck about the Vessel 50. Others for want of victuals in their long voyages in the Seas have been forced to put into strange and uninhabited places into which they have come thinking to find relief yet could they not see with their eyes neither man beast nor foul yet in some time tarriance there the Lord has to admiration provided for them insomuch that great flocks of fouls have been seen to come out of other parts I may say of this wonderful preservation as it is said of Israels manna Joshua 5.12 Neither had the children of Israel manna any more but they did eat of the fruit of the Land of Canaan that year and light in those inhospitable places where the poor people were like to starve and lay them eggs in great abundance and thus they did for many daies till at such times they got supplies and then the fouls went away and left them but not till then 51. Others have been no less wonderfully delivered when sprung great and dangerous leaks in time of dreadful storms they have been thrown upon the sands and when thinking themselves past all hopes of being saved God has turned all for good by calming of the Seas and winds The sight of this truth appeared to bee no small mercy in my eye Seems not this to be the language of those many Sands that ly up and down in the Seas that sin has filled the great deeps with them and many other unequal shallows by which ships are most dreadfully perplexed and ruined many and many a time If mankind had not sinned nothing should have lain in his way to harm him in the Seas As that curse at mans unhappy fall fell upon the whole world Gen. 3.18 to this day all grounds are cumbred with Thorns and Thistles and so the Sea with thousands of Rocks and Sands and also stoping of the leak and to boot besides both their ship and lives again 52. Others again have wonderfully been preserved when in boats that have been towing at a Friggots stern the ships way being so furious and violent through the Seas the boats bows has been pulled out and all the men thrown into the naked Sea some lying here and some lying there in a most dreadfull condition insomuch that hee that is a spectator of these lamentable accidents would think that never a one of them should bee saved and besides it is a long time ere a ship can bee put upon the stayes when shee has her freshest way 53. Others again have been most wonderfully preserved when storms have come down upon them in the dreadfullest rage that ever was seen or heard insomuch that their cables break and are thereby forced from their anchors and that which ponderates and proves the greatest inconveniency in the circumstance is their propinquity unto Sands being thus put to it in a Moonless and Starless evening This seems also to be the language of all the in-Sea-lying Rocks We know that the Mariner would have us to depart the deeps and lye in the bowels of the Earth with the rest of our fraternity but truly here we are ordered for to lye and to be a trouble unto mankind that he might not have all the sweetnesse safety and security in his trading it is something terrible in respect that they are thrown upon them and at every held the ship has laid her very hatches in the water and the poor men looking at every rowl that the Vessel should overset upon them I have known some in this condition that have lived and got off again both with ship and lives 54. Others have been very admirably preserved when sailing in the Seas without any mistrust or jealousy of Sands or runing on ground yet has it pleased the Lord to put into the hearts of some or other in the ship and given them secret hints to sound the Sea and no sooner have they fadomed their depth but the ship has struck and by a speedy handling of the Helm through the blessing of the Lord they have very narrowly escaped 55. Others again have been wonderfully preserved in this respect when they have unawars come on ground or upon a Sand-bank it has but been upon a smal point of it I cannot look upon any of these prementioned deliverances but my soul tels me that there is the visible finger of the Lord in them Psal 92.6 A brutish man knoweth not neither doth a fool understand this whereas had the ship run directly upon it shee had been lost without all recovery The often sight of this pretious deliverance I hope will lye warm upon my heart as long as I live But to break off what shall I now say of all and after all these remarkable and notable deliverances My thinks I cannot pass by the point that was laid down without one short word or two of use 1. Of Reprehension 2. Of Exhortation Use 1. Of Reprehension If it bee thus That the Sea-man of all the men under the whole heavens none excepted is one that is both a partaker and a seer of the greatest and remarkablest of temporal deliverances How are such to bee checked that out of blinde eyes hard hearts and sottish spirits never look upon these pre-mentioned mercies and deliverances as either mercies or deliverances but hurl them at their heels and value them no more than they do their old shooes The end of my gathering up these your mercies and deliverances is only to stir up your hearts unto thankfulness and to let the people that live on land both see and know what God doth for you in the deeps the truth of it is these are buried mercies that I have been telling of and such mercies as have lyen in the
and the rest of our feral and remote Antagonists 4. It is of wonderful use to the purifying of the air off and from its many infections and contagions the winds are the cleansing engines of the world or the airs sweeping-brooms by which the air is kept both sweet and salubrious and this they do by their oblique and ubiquitary motion which would otherwise corrupt and stench as standing pools Job 37.11 But the wind passeth and cleanseth them Jer. 4.11 This benefit every Land and Country hath of the winds both to fan and sweep the foul corners of the air that are amongst them 5. It is of wonderful use as to the scattering of the clouds here and there in this and in the other Country How are the clouds seen sometimes in a very pendulous manner to hang over the very heads of parched Countries as if unwilling to dilate and part with their watry liquor because of the sinfulness of those Countries Clouds fly and hang over them yet drop no fatness God allows all Countries excepting Egypt which is supplied in a wonderful manner by the River Nilus the benefit of the clouds and of the Heavens hee misses not the smallest of those many Islands that he has lying here and there up and down in the world but remembers them all yea the uninhabitablest place that is in the world both procul prope for the use and benefit and accommodement of mankind by these are the Lords water-pots or cloudy water-bowls of the Heavens shaked and poured down upon the dry and thirsty places of the Earth All Gardens Orchards Corn-fields valleys hils and desarts that bee in the world are watered by them Job 37 11. Hee scattereth his bright cloud The winds are of very considerable and important use as to the conducting and convoying of the aquatical clouds of the Heavens to water the many Islands Territories and Countries of the Lords that bee in and throughout the world It seems that God has a special care of every Country and corner in the world that none of his Gardens and Orchards should parch for want of water and therefore hee has cloudy tankards in the Heavens which flye upon the wings of the wind to fall upon what place hee pleases to supply them 6. It is of wonderful use in its various vertibility and instability Non ita Carpathiae variant Aquilonibus undae The wind is a very varying and turning thing in respect that all parts in the world are served by it one while it serves to carry some Mariners into the North some out of the East into the West and other some again out of the West into the South It stays not long in one quarter but is a meer Camelaeâ—nce mutabilior Eccl. 1.6 The wind goeth toward the South and turneth about unto the North it whirleth about continually and the wind returneth again according to his circuits And hereby is it the more commodious because if it should have its abode any long time either in the Eastern Southern Northern or Western parts of the world then the opposit parts would bee greatly obstructed in their sailing into those parts from whence the wind should blow Great is the Wisdom of our infinite and good God who has ordered and created all things for the good of man in that hee has thus appointed and disposed of the winds to bee one while in one place and another while in another both to fetch Mariners that are far from home and also to carry them out that are desirous and have busines and occupation to do from home 7. It is of wonderful use to alter Seasons it cannot bee gainsaled that the winds have not an altering influence in all Seasons because they bring in our heat and by and by comes in our cold Job 37.17 How thy garments are warm when hee quieteth the Earth by the South wind When the wind comes out of the South how is every one warm and cheerful both in City and in Country although but in a thin and Summers garment but when it comes out of the blustering North or the frigid and mordacious Oriental of the world how is every one then cold within doores and without doors I even in the thickest habit that they can put on Job 37.9 Out of the North cometh forth the cold Now undoubtedly that cold comes upon the wings of the winds out of and from under the Artick and also heat in the same manner from the Antartick of the world When the wind comes out of the North or out of the East how quickly is the heat of the Earth cooled and taken away but as soon as ever it comes out of the South how is the Earth warmed and all the Animals of the world revived Psal 107.43 Who so is wise will observe these things 8. It is of wonderful use to dry up the wetness and dirtiness that is upon the face of the Earth how are all foot-paths and all horse-rodes shoveled and cleansed by the winds It is wonderful to think how an Easterly wind will sweep all the beaten paths and corners that are in the world this wind is called in Scripture a supping wind Hab. 1.9 because it drinks up the moystures that have been laid upon the Earth by the clouds Psal 107.43 Who so is wise will observe these things 9. It is of wonderful use to clear the Heavens for us and to feed us with the light of those glorious lamps and luminaries that are hung up in the Heavens to make the world comfortable to us how would the Sun the Moon the Stars and the face of Heaven bee absconded over-shaddowed and obumbrated to us with clouds fogs mists and ascending vapours that are as so many curtains drawn over those great and glorious Lanterns of the Heavens if the winds did not sweep them and reduce them to an annihilation 10. It is of a wonderfull and most dreadful use in the hand of the Lord to break and ruine the greatest and the strongest ship or ships that ever crossed the salt-waters 2 Chron. 20.37 The ships were broken that they were not able to go to Tarshish And the great Spanish Armado that came against us to invade our Land were broken and scattered by the winds so that they were frustrated in their Dice-games and carried into the bottoms when that they thought they should have had the full possession and enjoyment of this English Island 7. Vse A word of Exhortation and that unto all you that go in the Seas Is it thus indeed that all perilous storms and ship-wracking Tempests are both of the Lords raising sending and impowering give mee leave then to commit three sweet words unto you and I will pray hard both in private and publick that they may be a heart-wining and an heart-perswading word but before I hand them unto you I will lay down a few of those natural symptomes prognosticks and common observations of the approaching of winds and storms only as
argumentative motives to induce you unto the practice of what I intend for you will see the more clearly that there is a great deal of reason for so doing when you have heard all 1. If the body of the Sun it self appears at its first setting of the colour of blood It is Virgils observation in the first of his Georgicks that if the Sun be never so glorious at his rising yet if he set in a cloud at night Quid cogitat humidus Auster Signa dabit It is a sign that foul weather will follow it then presages great and tempestuous winds for many dayes 2. If the Sun when it rises bee encompassed with a circle let wind be expected on that side which the circle opens on 3. If clouds look red at Sun rising they are true prognosticks of wind if at Sun setting of a fair and beautiful day 4. If about the rising of the Sun clouds gather themselves about it it foretokens rough and dolorous storms that day 5. When clouds encompass the Sun the less light they leave it and the lesser the orb of the Sun appears so much the more furious will the tempest bee 6. If circles about the Moon is a common nautical observation bee double or treble they are the prodromus's or the preindicants of a rough and violent tempest 7. The running and shooting of stars in the heavens is a common observation of stormy winds to come from those places from whence they run and shoot 8. If clouds spread abroad like fleeces of wool in the skies here and there this is a most certain evidence of a strong and boysterous wind 9. When the superficies of the Sea is calm is a common observation and smoothe also in the harbour and yet murmures within it self though it doth not swell signifies wind 10. The shores resounding in a calm and the sound of the Sea it self with a clear noise and a certain eccho heard plainer and further than ordinary presages winds 11. If in a calm and smooth Sea there bee water bubbles or froth lying here and there or white circles upon the waters it foretells winds 12. Sounds from the hills and murmurs from the woods growing shriller and lowder presage winds 13. When Water-fowls are seen flying one over another or flocking and flying together but especially the Gulls and the Mews that live upon the Sea when these begin to leave the Sea and to betake themselves to land lakes banks and shores making there a noise and a clutter in their consorting together betokens a most dreadful storm a coming 14. It is an observation also when leaves and straws are seen to play and dance upon the ground without any apparent breath of wind that can bee felt or the down of plants flying about betokens wind at hand 15. Is not this another common observation besides the many more that I might reckon up that you have to fore-tell you of the coming of a storm even the blewness of your Ordnance what spots bee there in them many times which you usually say are fore-runners both of wind and rain your knowledge of these things besides the many more signs that you have of storms should put you upon the fearing of that God who is able to brew you such a cup of liquor in a storm as would be sufficient to run you down by the board into the bottome of the Seas The three words then that I have premised I shall present unto three sorts of men 1. Sea-men 2. States-men 3. Merchants In the first place my speech is to you Sea-men 1. Look for storms You usually say as I have frequently observed and I wish you had no worse phrases amongst you that when you have fair I would have all Sea men to imitate the Nobilities of Rome in one case and also of Arcadia in another of whom Plutarch speaks that they were evermore accustomed to wear half Moons upon their shoos to that end they might alwayes have the mutability of their prosperity before their eyes and hath not the Pope and his Nobles the same occasion now Your calms Sea-men are often turning into storms look for it calm and comfortable weather you shall have heart-aking weather for it ere long looking for these things will prove auxiliary and useful to take away or at least-wise to mitigate the bitterness of them when they do come upon you then will you bee able to bear up your selves in the violency of them and to say this is that wee looked for wee expected no less than to see the Seas runing in mountainous billows and the winds to roar upon us and make our lives both bitter and uncomfortable Licet in modum stagni fusum aequor arrideat licet vix summa jacentis elementi spiritu terga crispetur magnos hic campus montes habet tranquillitas ista tempestas est Look for a storm Sea-man though the smoothe Sea smile upon thee and seem to bee no other than a standing pool I although the top of the water by the wind be not so much as cast into bubbles like the curles of hair trust not the deep the plain thou seest hath many mountains in it for the present calm both may and will end in a very bitter storm I have seen the heavens very fair and lovely to the eye as lovely Paris was in Hectors The Sea resembles the Moon in its mutability which is subsubject to many changes never continuing long in one shape but sometimes horned sometimes half and sometimes again in the full from whence Horace called the Moon Diva triformis and Virgil Trigeminamque Hecaten tria virginis or a Dianae The Sea is full of vicissitudes and its motto may be that dis-joynted verse in Ovid Mihi nulla quies ut lapis aequoreis nudique pulsus aquis I neither have nor can give any quiet unto the ships that go thorow mee I cannot but toss them again described by Homer Il. γ. 45. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Shee had beauty in her face but inconstancy in her breast Presently hath a great change of weather come upon us and the Seas been thrown out of a calm into a frowning raging and rowling storm Were that brave spark and high-fortuned gallant of the world that the Apostle James 2. speaks of who was the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one of the worlds golden fingured Lads at Sea in a storm though hee hath great respect in the world in all tablings banquettings feastings and meetings yet would the Sea favour him no more than the raggedest Sailor that is either in the Merchant or States-service The Seas will not bee brought to any such composition to favour one more than another no further than there is a divine Commission from above for the doing of it they will not bee brought to do that which history tells us of as Hospinian observes that the Dogs that kept Vulcans Temple did as others of the Bohemian Curs would do fawn upon a good suit but
Haec non durabunt aetatem This will not alwayes indure 2. Bear all your storms and Sea-imbitterments with faith and confidence in God for his general and particular presence with you that sweet promise hath quieted my heart within when wee have had nothing but horrour without in the great and wide Sea Isa 43.2 When thou passest thorow the waters I will bee with thee and thorow the rivers they shall not overflow thee when thou walkest thorow the fire thou shalt not bee burnt neither shall the flame kindle upon thee 3. Beg every day at the hands of your God for a submissive frame of heart that you may resign and give up your selves and all that is of worth and value in your eyes to Gods will It was a sweet frame that a Stoick was in I would all our Sailors were of that temper when hee said Quid vult volo quid non vult nolo vult ut vivam vivam vult ut moriar moriar It is good to be of this temper in storms to bee contented either to live or dye svvim or drovvn for his disposal even as hee shall will and please to that end you may bee in a capacity to yeeld to whatsoever God shall do though it bee never so cross and contrary to your own carnal wills and in all your storms and dangers say Fiat voluntas sua the Lords will bee done One of King Cyrus's Courtiers having but little state and being about to marry his daughter one asked him how he vvould do for to give her a portion his ansvver was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cyrus is my friend and thus he casts his care and confidence upon the King and vvill not you do thus in storms 4. Cast all your fears cares and troubles that you meet withall in the Seas upon the Lord and hee will take care of you and for you you have it under hand and seal for so doing if you have but faith to lay hold on the promise Psal 55.22 Cast thy burden upon the Lord and hee shall sustain thee hee shall never suffer the righteous to bee moved The burden of a dreadful storm is too heavy for thee to bear thou hast sufficient warrant and commandement to unload thy self and cast it upon thy God there is many a man and woman in the world might go a great deal lighter both at Sea and Land if they had but the art of laying their cares upon their God hath not many a man had his back broke I and his heart broke because hee evermore bore his burden and had not the wisdome to run to God to desire him for to bear it for him Sailors lay those dreadful burdens that you meet with all in a stormy Sea upon the Lord and hee will bear them I and carry you out safe and alive from them But to proceed 2. It will not bee out of the road if I present this advertising word unto those that sit at the stern with the helm of our Republick in their hands It vvas a brave temper that Cato vvas of of vvhom it vvas said that he bore things so stoutly that no man ever saw him to be changed and though he lived in a time when the Common-wealth was often changing he was a semper idem in every condition even to bear storms stoutly I mean as to the effects of them which oftentimes end in the ruining of many a goodly sail and if so bee that ships bee cast away that are in your employments which are of vast worth cost and charge it cannot bee helped such casualties will bee coming and falling upon them now and then the Seas have a Million of dangers in them 3. I would hand this word unto the Merchants of our Land also that they would bear storms stoutly I have seen people in the world when unexpected losses Our Merchants of late resemble too much the mourning Nightingale of whom it is said that when her young ones are taken from her that shee will tell every bird of it maestis late loca questibus implere fill the woods with her complaints And so you the States eares with your losses and crosses have come upon them fall a weeping and wringing of their hands and cursing with their tongues in the greatest impatiency that ever was seen as if they were utterly undone now there is none that can be or is undone until they bee damned then they are undone indeed and then they may howl and weep where weeping and gnashing of teeth is in course but whilst in the world and in fair hopes for Heaven temporal accidents should not have that impression to breed that disturbance It is a notable speech of Seneca Suppose says hee that a man who having a very fair and goodly House to dwell in and fair Orchards and Gardens planted and plotted round about it with divers other fruitful trees for ornament and profit Plutarch reports of a certain people that to manifest their disliking and disdaining of men over-much dejected by any affliction they condemned them in token of disgrace to wear womens apparel because they so much unmanned themselves what an indiscreet part were it for that man to murmur and repine because the winds rise and blow down some of the leaves of it when as they hang fuller of fruit than leaves God has given your ships many a prosperous voyage and murmur not at it if you lose one or two now and then it is nothing but mercy that you have any left to trade and trafick withall I and moreover it is a great deal more than you deserve Chrysostom when speaking to the people of Antioch like himself who was a man of an invincible spirit against the tyrants of his time delivered himself thus In this should a gratious man differ from thc Godless hee should bear his crosses couragiously and as it were with the wings of Faith out-soar the hight of all humane miseries hee should bee like a Rock incorporated into Jesus Christ inexpugnable and unshaken with the most furious incursions of the waves and storms of the world It was a gallant speech of Galienus the Emperour when tidings came unto him that all Egypt was lost What then quoth the Emperour cannot I live without the flax of Egypt And by and by came tidings to him that the greatest part of his dominions in Asia were gone also What then quoth the Emperour cannot I live without the delicacies of Asia This is a rare example for Merchants when they lose rich-fraughted ships in the Seas either by storm or Pyrat What It was a gallant spirit that Habakkuk was of when he said Chap. 3.17 Although the fig-tree shall not blossom nor fruit upon the Vines nor Herds in the stalls yet will I rejoyce in the Lord I will joy in the God of my salvation Grant now the worst suppose you had not one ship in the Harbour nor one to come safely home is there not
does well in the deeps but a clean heart is far better company Observation 6 That the Sea-man has a very notable head for the Sea but not at all for the Land They mount up to the Heaven c. They go down to the Sea in ships c. It is requisite that they should have very good skil and knowledge The Sea-man will never make good States-man Not one of a thousand of them have the brains for the Land What a Country-man said of a goodly head which hee saw most exquisitly painted I shall say of the Sea-man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 What an excellent skul is here but no brains at all in it So it is admirable to think what excellent Sea-brains those men have that use the Seas but very shallow Land-brains they can very well sit and abide the jumping waves of the Seas even when they are thrown up unto the heavens but no brains for the great affairs of the Republick 3. As to their perturbations Their soul is melted because of trouble The Sailors Motto may be this Cum Homero loqui 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Maror ex marore subit One sorrow follows in the heels of another I have observed that their troubles are infinite at such times some of which I will give you in at this time 1. Vomiting Tempestuous Seas both do and will oftentimes put the stoutest and the strongest stomached Sailor upon the picking up of whatsoever lyes in his stomach Now I conceive it is not the tossing but the stomach that causes their sickness It is choler within and not altogether waves without that doth it And this now is no small trouble that lyes upon some in storms and yet it is comparatively but a pulex culex urtica pungens a meer fly-biting to what they undergo 2. Day-labouring How is the Sea-man now at work running to and fro and up and down into every corner of the ship When Demosthenes was asked what was the first part of an Orator what the second and what the third hee answered Action the same I shall say if any should demand of mee what is the first the second and the third in a Sailor even Action Action in a storm for it is no dallying then one while they are running up to the yards another while they are lashing of their Guns one while they are peaking of their yards another while lowring of their Masts The Sea-mans Motto in a storm should be that of the Emperours Laboremus Let us I beseech you Siâ—â— be doing what ever wee can to save both the vessel and our precious lives Hic labor hoc opus est all hands are then full in a storm whereas before when the Sea was calm they were at their sports and playes of mirth and jovialty perhaps dancing after the musick of the Fiddle or some such recreating game or other But in a storm all this is laid by and every man falls to Circa res arduas exerceri occupari in multis magnis negotiis The Sea-mans otium in the time of storm would end in a doleful and woful naufragium It is reported of a ship that when shee was in great danger of being cast away through the Sea-mens negligence that shee spoke on this wise unto the Master and the Helmsman Aristotle was not more careful of too much sleeping when he held the brazen ball in his hand to keep him waking by its fall into the brazen bason than the Sailor is in time of storms Perge contra tempestatem forti animo ant sax is illis miserrime perirem Bear up good Helmsman against this storm or otherwise I shall fall upon yonder rocks for I am nearer unto them than thou art aware of but the Helmsman and the Master not giving car unto her minded not the cunning of the ship and shortly after shee ran upon them and went downright unto the bottome 3. Night watching As long as the storm lasts there is a careful walking to and fro in the Hold of the ship and that from side to side all night long lest that any leaks should spring and break in upon them for such is the violency of storms that they will make the strongest timber and the thickest ship sides to dis-joynt and open in at which water will flow most dreadfully Now hang the lighted Lanthorns betwixt decks and in the Hold to give them light to watch and work by and if that ships be in a fleet together sailing or at an anchor in such nocturnal tempestuous seasons every one keeps out their light upon their Poops that thereby they may judge of one anothers driving sailing or breaking loose for should one ship light upon another in a storm they would instantly stave themselves and go downrights into the bottome If Elephants go backward in a fight when wounded they tread all under their feet they come near what then will not ships do if they break their cables in a storm All sleeping now is abominable in the eyes and thoughts of every one that is in the ship Jonah 1.6 So the ship-master came to him and said unto him What meanest thou O sleeper It is reported of a ship that shee made this doleful complaint when she was run upon the rocks in a dark blustring night Ego scopulis perii dum naucleri somno sepulti I was ruined when all my Mariners were fast a sleep As if hee were a going to say Is it fitting that thou shouldest sleep when wee and the ship that wee are in are like to perish I have observed some of the skilfullest of the Mariners when dreadful storms have surrounded us insomuch that wee have thought that neither cables nor anchors would hold nor Masts stand before the fury and violency of the winds that they would go out in the night time and look one while upon the East and another while upon the West one while into the North and another while into the South to see if they could espye the rising and appearance of any one Star the sight of which is taken by them for an infallible sign that the storm will not last long but when the stars are all veiled and covered over insomuch that they cannot bee seen that is a sign of a storms long continuance and after long waiting they have got the sight of a star which hath given them as great an occasion of rejoycing as ever Archimedes had when hee found the resolution of the knotty Mathematical question God out of his infinite goodness suffers not the violent Belluas of the air to continue long which are so called oftentimes for their violency because they roar like the roarings of Bulls and beasts or as the roarings and howlings of hell which transported him into such an hilarous fit of mirthsomness that hee broke out into this expression 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I have found it I have found it 4. Perpetual life danger I wonder what day what
of sorrow amongst the Sea-men for they are all at work now in the throwing over-board both Wines Fruits Silks and Spices even any thing that their Vessel may bee lightned they also take the course that some fishes do Lympham ore immissam per branchi as emittere let in water at their mouths but pump it out at their gills 6. Shiprest lesness Inter alia dura The Sea is like Plutarchs Moon never in one shape long vvho desired the Taylor to make her a Petricoat but before the Taylor got it made and brought it home the Moon vvas hopt into another quarter tristia amongst the many other sad and gravaminous troubles this of the Mariners inquiescentialness is none of the inferiour ones If the winds begin once to hollow and to fiddle upon the Sea if there were ten thousand sail of ships they should all of them quickly dance after the musick of it Prophane History speaks of the powerfulness of Orpheus's musick that it was so melodious and ear-charming that the beasts of the field could not stand upon their legs at the audience of it but were most admirably acted and transported beyond the nature of brute creatures to dance after that high strained musick which they heard And truly I may tell you that when ever the Southern Northern Eastern or Western Bagpipes of the world begin to play there is never a ship in the Seas excepting those that bee in their harbours but dance their Galliards and cut their Capers after it Now begins every Sea-man to stand fast to take hold with his hands If that the Wind-timbrel of the East the Vial of the North the Tabret of the South and the Harp or Pipe of the West begin but once to musick it all the ships that be in the Seaâ— have no power to stand still but after it they will dance and cut far higher Capers than ever the conjured body did of whom history tells us that he danced chamber height with the brass pot upon his head or lye flat down upon his belly in the storm or otherwise the ships rowling and bouncing will indanger the beating out of his brains And now begins the Cooks Kettle for to dance in the Cook-room and to terrifie all that come near it for their victuals I have often thought that if the stone bigd houses of the world and also that if the famous Towns and Cities thereof of reeled but as ships do in the Sea the inhabitants thereof would not bee in such deep love with them as they are and so little in love with heaven No they would not take that delight they do in their great inheritances and possessions that they have upon earth if that their earthly mansions staggered but as our wooden transporting and sailing habitations do upon the Seas But hee that puts his foot into the stirrup of a States or Merchants Woodden-horse must look for more jumping leaps and frisking capers before hee gets out of the saddle again than the wildest unbackt or untaught beast in the world can give him The Seas vaunting and out-braving trepidations together with their ascending tumors and raging murmurs have not very seldome exasperated my spirit into this like irascible It is reported that a company of Sea-men did upon a time very strictly summon in the Seas to give them an account why they vvere so restless and vvherefore they svvallovved up so many ships every year as they did and the Seas being at the bar gave them this ansvver That it vvas not in their povver to be quiet because the vvinds above did beat them up into undulating billovvs if they vvould not disturb us your passage would be both smooth and quiet enough but we are thrown into heaps that you may fear that God that is above because your are men that live without the fear of God and therefore are quiekly up in arms to sâ—â—k you and objurgatory speech unto them because they have been so unquiet and restless under us Quousque quousque tandem abutere Neptuni unda patientia nostra quamdiu nos etiam furor iste tuus cludet quem ad finem sese effraenata jactabit audacia nihil ne te quotidianum naut arum praesidium nihil eorum pericli nihil eorum timor nihil eorum maestitia nihil consensus honorum omnium nihil opulentarum navium nihil horum ora vâ—ltusque moverunt Quamdiu inhorrestes subito mare tenebrae multoties conduplicantur noctisque nimborum occaecat nignon flamma inter nubes coruscat Coelum tâ—nitru contremit grandomixta imbriâ—largistuo repante praecipitans cadit undique omnes venti erumpunt saevi existunt turbines fervet aestu pelagus perpetua mortis imago ante omnium oculos oâ—versatur 7. Trouble of conscience Many a Sailor that never knew before what the compunction of conscience meant comes to have a shreud guessing at it when the ship is like to bee lost in the storm then flyes in his face all his whoring swearing lying wronging of men all his drunkenness and his graceless unprofitable living and walking before God in the world and this storm within is ten thousand times more dreadful than the storm without From the foregoing words I would lay down this point of truth Observ 1 That the generality of Sea-men are far more fearful of being drowned in storms than they are of sin or of the second and eternal death Their soul is melted because of trouble Their sorrows and tears are spent upon the likelinesse of their losing of their lives and not for their sins and the great hazzards that their souls are in at such times 1. If our Sea-men were but as much affraid of sin as they are of dangerous sands I am confident that the good people in England would think that there were more Saints at Sea than there are on Land When I consider how I have seen the Mariner for to quake and tremble yea their faces to gather paleness their spirit even ready to run over their lips out of their bodies and their joynts to bee loosed and their very knees to knock upon one another as they did in Belshazzar I have wished that the committing of sin startled them but as much and then there were hopes that they would bee out of conceit with it 2. If our Sea-men were but as much affraid of sin as they are of those known and unknown in Sea-lying rocks that be up and down in the great Ocean wee should have them a very pretious people nay an unparalleld and matchless squadron of souls 3. If our Mariners stood but in the half of that trembling fear which they doe in stormy foggy and Euroclydon daies that come upon them in the Seas in which they are so much be darkned that they have neither the light of the Sun Moon nor Stars I am confident they would bee as much affraid of lying swearing and whoring as ever the burnt childe is of the fire or the
their voice which is not half so clear nor so pleasant as it was at first Nay they are as much down when their lives are at the stake as the Seryphian Frogs were of whom it is said in Observ 13 Scyrum deportatae mutescunt eaedem alio translatae canunt Carry them into Scyrus and you silence them What Pliny said of Rome I may say of the Sailors at Sea that there was never any earthquake in Rome but it was the fore-runner of some great change event and alteration So no appearance of windsly in the Physiognomy of the skies but some change of weather Praecedunt paenas nuntia figna graves There was one that went up and down Jerusalem 80. years before ever the war begun to bee commenced against it crying a voice from the East a voice against Jerusalem and the Temple a voice against all this people Sailors God gives you some warning many times before hee claps his stormy wind upon your backs let all external signs of storms carry you then out to seek your God let them alone in Seryphia and you shall hear them sing and croak That it is and would bee the Sea-mans greatest wisdom and safest course when hee sees a storm a comming to run unto the Lord that hee would become his friend Then they cry c. You see the heavens grow black and many observations and guessings you have from and of the skies what weather is a brewing will you not then prepare to meet the Lord by sending out your prayers as Ambassadours to plead with him in your behalf Amos 4. ult people that are on Land if they see but a Tempest or a shoure of Hail or Snow a coming they will with all the speed that ever they can make betake themselves either to some good sheltering hedg or the nearest neighbouring house that they can get unto How much more should you then fly even as the young Chickens will under the wings of the old ones when the Kite is hovering to fall upon them to the protecting arms of God that you may bee supported in a shelterless Ocean Shal the sight of a warlike ship coming before the wind with all the clew of sail that ever shee can make and spread Top-gallant sails Stay-sails and Boome-sails call upon you I and startle you too to get your ship into her fighting weed and dress Insomuch that you are in such a toss at those times that you cut down Hammoks knock down wooden stanchions hale out your guns keep your matches lighted and your Ordnance primed your chartages filled your shot and powder upon and betwixt decks and all your men in arms some to stand by the great Guns and other some upon deck by your small shot and will you not bee in the like fear when the Heavens frown above you How should you make towards your God at such times Plutarch reports of Athens that when their City was visited and long punished with mortal sickness that they had recourse to the Oracle of Apollo to know what they should do in their extreamity who made them this answer that their onely way was duplare aram to double their Sacrifices The onely way for Sailors to bee delivered in time of storms is to ply God hard both before and when they are come with prayer Nautae sereno coelo non nihil laxant vela cum autem suspicio tempestatis contrahunt In fair weather Mariners will have their Top-gallant sails out but if foresee foul they presently take them in I would have Sea-men to strive who should bee the first at prayer in such times as these as it is said in Zach. 8.21 Let us go speedily to pray before the Lord and to seek the Lord of Hosts I will goe also The Tulipant which our Herbalists call Narcissus because it is an admirandos flos ad radios solis se pandens a flower that will constantly expose it self unto the fulgency of the Sun but when ever it apprehends the Suns setting or a Tempest a coming it hides it self and will not hazzard its tender flower to bee shaken and rent with the wind Learn thus much from this creature as to betake your selves unto your God when you see storms a mustering in the clouds and starry Sphaeres That hee that has a gratious purpose Observ 14 and design in time of storms to honour God in the remainder of his life may the warrantablierly pray for the prolonging of his life Then they cry c. Psal 119.175 Sailors in storms resemble the Frogs in the Countrymans pond of whom it is said that whilst it thundered they were very silent but no sooner was the thunder over but they betook themselves to their croaking and obstreperous notes again whilst storms are upon the Sailors backs they tell God many a fair story which afterwards they leave undischarged Let my soul live and it shall praise thee As if David were a going to say if it were not for that end I would not wish to live a minute nor a moment upon the face of the Earth Sea-men if this bee not your design in your prayers I cannot see how you can have the face to expect audience from your God at such times Tell mee what is thy end Captain in this storm what is thy end Master what is thy end Boatswain Sea-men what are your ends now in this storm where our lives are at the stake are they not to swear to lye to drink and to dishonour God as you have done are they now fixed upon the glory of God and the honour of God and the obedience of your God Fear not then I will joyn with you in prayer for the Lord will never drown us if our hearts have these resolutions in them Psal 119.17 Deal bountifully with thy servant that I may live and keep thy Word Oh that this were the prayer and the very thought of every poor Sea-mans heart when hee is beset both on head and stern with that affrighting enemy pale death I shall say thus much for the encouragement of all those that go in the Seas that are thus gratiously disposed as it was said to the Emperour Marcus Antonius when in Almany with a very great Army and being beset by the enemy in a dry Country where all passages was stopped up and there being no other likelyhood but that both hee and his whole Army should perish and that for want of water the Emperours Lieutenant seeing him so sadly distressed told him that hee had heard that the Christians could obtain any thing of their God by prayer whereupon the Emperour having a Legion of Christians in his Army hee put them all upon prayer both for him and for his Army and shortly after dureing the time that they were at prayer great thunder fell amongst their enemies and abundance of water upon the Romans whereby their thirst was quenched and the enemy routed and overthrown without any fight at all You shall have
before deliverance hath come Masts have broke upon your heads Sails have rent Cables broke and Anchors come home The Patient earnestly desires such and such things under his distemper but the Physitian wants nor will to give them him but resolves to give them him so soon as hee is fit and therefore makes him stay till hee hath purged for till hee bee made fit for it and for such a cordial and such a medicine it may prove very hurtful for him Ships half filled with water or by stress of weather thrown upon sands Psal 107.43 Who so is wise will observe these things 4. Mind how God Sounds the deeps for you in calm and serene weather when you are boldly sailing on in the Seas with a great deal of confidence and security that your depths of water are sufficient to swim your ponderous ships in that even then Qui scrutantur saepe marinas aranas nihil potest illudere They that will but sound the Seas carefully in dubious places cannot bee deceived but they that are overcome with laziness to throw the Lead over-board may quickly for ought I know run the ship on ground at such times God has struck some in the ship with a great fear putting it into their hearts that they were in great danger whereupon they have called for the Lead and made inquiry into the Sea and water has scarce been found to keep up the ship from the very bottom Who so is wise will observe these things 5. Mind how the Lord goes before you sounding of your depths in the darkest foggiest and mistiest weather that you are surprised withall when you are going on with strong confidence that there is no danger even contra improvisum omnem ictum then are you in very great peril It is with Sailors in black dark and foggy weather as the Poet tells us of Virg. Eclog. 3. Dic quibus in lymphis eris mihi magnâ—s Apollo Tres pateat coeli spatium non amplius ulnas There it little of the heavens to bee seen in the Seas at these times The fire that came down from Heaven upon the Altar was miraculous yet when it was kindled they kept it in with wood Sea-men let your deliverances never starve for keeping warm upon your hearts for having neither the benefit of the Sun nor of the Moon nor of the Stars you are so dreadfully bewildred that you know not how near you are to any Land nor how such and such sand-banks bear off you nor what course to shape and steer then does the Lord direct you and when you are near to Sands hee gives some or other amongst you secret and impulsory hints and warnings to make an examination of your depths by which you are many and many a time preserved Who so is wise will observe these things 6. Minde how God informs you when you are not aware of many in-Sea-lying sand-banks which are visible and obvious enough to a seeing and a watchful eye that is but careful to cast about for the preventing of danger yet when you have mindlessly been running on without either wit or fear holding a direct course upon them it has pleased the Lord to put it into the heart of one or other to look out of the ship It was a good saying of one at Sea when espyed a breach and making report of it the Mariners within said that they could not beleeve it and withall asked him where it was Ne quaeramus ubi sit sed quomodo illam fugiamus Let us not make inquiry where it is but let us strive how to avoid it who has cast his eye this way and that way and quickly observed the breaches that the waters make upon the sands by which means they have brought the ship with all the speed that ever in them lay upon the stayes and so gone cleer Who so is wise will observe these things 7. Minde how God directs you in your Navigations when you are not advised of those many in-Sea-lying Rocks that bee up and down in the great Ocean both North and West and South and East Ah how near have you come to these with your ships The Butterfly in the fable asked the Owle how hee should deal with fire which had singed her wings her counsel was this be sure thou never come so near it again nor as much as ever come within the sight of the smoak of it Your are prudent and want not the skil of applying of it many and many a time before you have been aware of them and when you have been steering upon a direct line to the hazzad of both your ships and lives upon them God has providentially put some or other upon the looking out who have seen the Seas breaking over them in most dreadful froth and presently have made report thereof by which means the ship has been stopped and altered in her course Ah Sea-men surely the Lord has a great care of you Who so is wise will observe these things 8. Mind how God does miraculously many times in misty and foggy weather when you are nearer to Land than you do estimate your selves to be One was lost when nearer Land than he was aware of but quoth the Ship-master It is but a fog-bank there is no danger when they came neer unto it it proved the white clifs of the Land there the ship perished in the storm All are not so favoured even pull by the obumbrated curtains that are drawn over the face of the deeps by which providential dispensation you have a cleer vision of the white clifts of the Land and thereby alter your course upon the sight of danger whereas otherwise you might have perished sundry times if God had not haled up the foggy curtains of the air and let you see that if you ran any neerer death would bee the conclude of that undertaking Who so is wise will observe these things 9. Minde how frequently I and what tender care the Lord has of you in the Seas by his often hushing of the winds when they are up in roaring and rampiant hostility against you at such times when you are irrecoverably run upon Sands and cannot get your ships off them again if the Lord did not thus appear for those that go in the deeps who are I fear very slow in the seeing and also in the acknowledging of this singular mercy many an hundred sail had been split to pieces at this day which have been at time and times preserved Do not you often see this favour undeservedly to bee bestowed upon you Theseus was never better guided by Ariadnes's threâ— which shee tyed at the entrance of Daedalus's labyrinth than those ships that fear the Lord are guided by their God from Rocks Shoars and Sands in the great and wide Seas May I not say of this frequent experienced mercy that the eyes of the Lord are as swift as the very shoots or flashes of Lightning
far nimbler for your good than thought it self Who so is wise will observe these things 10. Minde how the Lord does very frequently in the time of dark misty foggy and uncomfortable weather when you are in a labyrinth and know not what way to steer take off and unbare the Sea-buyes by pulling off from their heads those night-caps of dismal squallour that they have been dressed and trimmed up withall by which means you have been enabled to pick out your way and to glean up your praeinformations how the Sands have lain and if the Lord had not thus favoured you you had assuredly perished Who so is wise will observe these things 11. Minde how wonderfully God appears for you at such times Me thinks you should receive these deliverances at Gods hands with more thankfulness to him contentedness with them than ever the Paphos Queen did the golden fruit that was sent her for a present This mercy came to you as the Italian says a buóna luna in a good hour or happy time when both foggy weather and also contrary winds arrest you in the Seas and detain you as their prisoners for many daies together insomuch that you are confounded in your Navigations not kenning where you are wishing continually that you could behold one sail or other that thereby you might bee informed how your way lay and in what propinquity or interval you might bee of Rocks or Sands Has not the Lord now when you have been thus puzzeled many and many a time given you the sight of a Vessel after which you have made and so received directions from them how to set and shape your courses Who so is wise will observe these things 12. Minde how the Lord does oftentimes direct you when you are coming in into Harbours that you are accustomed to and well acquainted withall there commonly arises great debats and various disputes about your steerage into them my heart has often aked to see your contentions and also that diversity of judgment that has been amongst you some protesting this and some that that your course lies by the bringing of such a light house The Graecians being delivered but from bodily servitude by Flaminius the Roman General called him their Saviour and so rang out Saviour Saviour that the very fouls of the air fell down dead with the cry thereof Plutarch What cause have you that are now and then delivered from drowning to bee oftentimes in the high praises of the Lord God gives you hold of an Ariadne's thread to wind you out of the perplexed mazes of the Sea a subtil Daedalus or such an hill or such a mark upon the Land upon such a point and in the midst of all contrary to the minds of many that would have had the ship navigated upon such a point or sailed by such a mark the Lord has established the mind of the Master Pilot or Commander of the ship to sail upon such a point by which means the ship has come safe into the difficultest Harbours Who so is wise will observe these things 13. Minde how Providence is at work for you in the forein parts of the world it may bee that you have good cleer and serene weather all or the most part of your Voyage till your arrival within sight of the Country where your business and Harbours lye and then upon a sudden it grows black cloudy and foggy and also stormy insomuch that you are put to an anxious extremity and dare not approach or advance any nearer either to the Land or the Harbour you would bee at that then upon the fiering of some pieces of Ordnance boats come off that promise to undertake the Pilotage of your Vessels by which means you are freed from abundance of care and trouble Corrupt blood must be drawn forth before the Leech fall off and carnal filthiness parted with in your ships before the storm ends Who so is wise will observe these things 14. Minde Whether the Lord does not bring storms shipwrack terrible and heart-daunting dangers upon you for your good yea or no. Look upon every blast that blows every storm that befalls you in the Sea as a messenger sent from the Lord to humble you Humility is not unlike to the low-lying Land in Holland but pride is like the Hogen and the Mogen in it and to better you This was the method that God walked in of old and also the course that hee took with Israel Deut. 8.16 That hee might humble thee and that hee might prove thee to do thee good at thy latter end This was Davids experience Psal 119.67 71. Before I was afflicted I went astray but now have I kept thy word This was the experience of a well-educated Scholar to his Tutor when upon a dye Istae manus mihi portant ad Paradisum by your correcting and instructing of mee I am now going to Heaven The Walnut-Tree is evermore most fruitful when most beaten and flowers do evermore smell sweetest after a shower I would it were thus with all our Sailors after their storms Good hearts in storms like Vines bear the beter for bleeding 15. Minde whether the Lord does not send tempestuous storms upon you in the Seas to fit prepare and dispose you for mercies calms and peaceable weather Good and comfortable weather will not neither is it valued by you Although I wander now in the America and untravelled parts of truth and experience yet may I if minded prove advantagious to those that use the Seas As soon may I collect the scattered wind into a bag or from the vvatery surface scrape the gilt reflections of the Sun as tell you of all the Lords appearings for you in your inevitable perils till you have been a long time tossed in Neptune's cradle-rocking surges and in the roaring blasts of Boreas then serene weather is valued and highly prized and cried up for a mercy amongst you Who so is wise c. 16. Minde how apparently Gods goodness and infinite Wisdom is visible to any seeing and observing eye in this respect that hee lays not on storms upon some parts of the world and not upon other some and that some harbours are blockt up with them and not other some Storms come not alwaies out of the South nor alwaies out of the West nor alwaies out of the North and East but sometimes they are in one quarter and by and by in another every part of the world that is traded into hath their share as well as another Who so is wise c. 17. Minde whether or no the winds bee not many times unwilling to serve such wicked wretches as you mostly are that use the Seas by reason of their long tarriance in a quite contrary quarter to your courses Are you not oftentimes wind-bound or wind-blockt and fettered Look out for the reason of it some sin or God-provoking iniquity or other is amongst you Who so is wise c.
his glorious Majesty hee is able to do all things that are works of power might and strength and are not things against his own nature or things that imply contradiction Reason 2 Because when things are impossible in mans eye then is it the fittest time for the Lord to appear in It is a common saying and a true one That mans extreamity is Gods opportunity Observ 6 That God in his Judgments upon the Seas often times remembers mercy And hee bringeth them c. God is slow to wrath I wish I may not say of the Lords indulgency to profane wretches in the Sea what Sigismund the Emperour used to say of his enemies Is inimicum occidit qui inimico parcit I am affraid Deus non nunquam parcendo saevit That the Lords long sparing will end in rageing and may I so speak hee is seen walking towards sinners in the shooes of Asher which were of ponderous brass Deut. 33.24 25. Observ 7 That the greatest dangers of the Seas and the proudest waves that ever elevated are and should bee no plea for unbelief And hee brings them c. Matth. 14.30 31. When Peter saw the wind boysterous his heart begun to fail him but was hee not reproved for his distrusting of the Lord Poop-lantern ship-covering and yard-arm-rising waves should not daunt and discourage faith in God Were the Seas in a storm as high as the mountains of Merionethshire in Wales whose hanging and kissing tops come so close together that the shepherds sitting on their several mountains may very audibly stand and discourse together but if they would go to one another they must take the pains to travel many miles Sailors should not bee apalled and terrified Dangers are faiths Element and in them it lives and thrives best Such was the high-raised valour of Luther that when hee was to go to the City of Worms they told him of strange things Faith like the Ivie the Hop the Woodbine which have a natural instinct in them to cling lay hold upon the stronger Trees laies hold on God in time of danger as many will doe fresh-water travellers at Sea but quoth Luther if all the Tiles that bee upon every House in the Town were devils they should not scare mee Sailors should have the like courage in storms which one had when in a great straight Certa mihi spes est quod vitam qui dedit idem Et velit possit suppeditare cibum Good hearts may say to the Sea when in a storm what Luther said to his enemies Impellere possunt sed totum prosternere non possunt crudeliter me tractare possunt sed non extirpare Haec est fides credere quod non vides dentes nudare sed non devorare occidere me possunt sed in totum me perdere non possunt Faith will put your heads into Heaven and your ships into an Harbour when in a storm it will set you on the top of Pisgab with Moses and descry the promised Land when you may come to bee denied the sight of Land in storms 1. Great Faith is seen in this as much as any one thing whatsoever that it both can and will beleeve in God as a man may say with reverence whether God will or no it will beleeve in an angry God in a killing God and in a drowning God Job 15.10 Great Faith is not easily shaken 2. Great Faith is never clearer seen than when in the midst of souzing storms and dangers there is great confidence and strength of heart in the soul at such times Observ 8 That God will have every thing wrested from him by prayer And hee bringeth c. Good Sea-men should play the part of Daedalus Templum Cybelis Deorum matris non manibâ—es sed precibus solummodo aperiebatur The gates of Cybeles Temples could not bee opened by hands but prayer quickly threw them open who when hee could not escape by way upon Earth went by way of Heaven and that is the way of prayer Five Motives to put Sea-men upon Prayer 1. Solemnly consider that in the creature there is nothing but emptiness and helplesness 2. Solemnly consider that you cannot have any hopes of winning ought from God but by prayer The Champions could not wring an apple out of Milo's hand by strong hand but a fair maid by fair means got it presently 3. Solemnly consider of God what hee is whom you serve naturally no other but goodness it self Nothing animated Benhadad so much as this that the Kings of Israel were merciful Kings It was said of Charles the great I would to God I could say so of every Tarpowling that goes in the Salt-waters that hee delighted so much in prayer that Carolus plus cum Deo quam cum hominibus loquitur That hee spake more and oftner to and with God than hee did with men Flectitur iratus voce rogante Deus And nothing encouraged Titus Vespatian the Emperour's Subjects so much as this that hee did nunquam dimittere tristem never send any away sorrowful 4. Solemnly consider how many in the Seas go upon the very same errand that you go on to him and mind how they speed and are carried securely out of all their distresses 5. Solemnly consider what Prayer is to God hee loves it Let mee hear thy voice for it is comly 6. Call to mind your former experiences did you ever pray in a storm but you fared the better by it Consider what cases you have been heard in That servent Prayer will prevail with Observ 9 God in the greatest storms I would all the States Tarpowlings were of James the Just's principle of whom Eusebius tells us Genua ejus in morem cameli obditrata sensum contactus amiserunt That his knees were hardned like the Camels by his frequent kneeling to Prayer Prayer is Optimus dermientium cuslos certissima navigautium salus tutissimum viatoribus scutum The slâ—epers best keeper the Sailors surest safety the Travellers protecting Shield And hee brings them out c. Witness the Mariners calm Jonah 1. and witness Christs disciples deliverance in the storm Impartial fire that comes from above has been often times seen to spare yeelding objects and to melt resisting metal to pass by lower roofs and to strike upon all high-Towered pinnacles I wish that our Sailors were as much given to Prayer as Anna the daughter of Phannel of whom it was said that shee never departed out of the Temple but served God night and day in prayer and fasting I wish it were the resolution of them that use the Seas to do as Ambrose the Bishop of Millain did when news came to him that Justina the mother of Valentinian intended to banish him hee told them that hee would never run away but if they had any purpose to kill him they should at any time find him in the Church praying for himself and for his people 1. Vse of Comfort For
as easie to say who cast away the brave ships that go in the salt waters as it is to say such a man built them every plank that is broken by the dashing waves of the Seas which are many times to bee seen swiming here and floating there hath a tongue to speak and to accuse the villany prophaneness and impiety of the persons so dealt with Mee thinks I see it written in fair legible and visible characters and capital letters upon all the sunk ships and wracks that bee and lye about the shores and Sea-coasts in all Countries whether East or West North or South A fruitful land maketh hee barren for the iniquity of them that dwell therein Many a ship that is well rigged tackled trimmed manned and gunned with her top and Top-gallant and her spread Sails proudly swelling with a full Sail in a fair day hath gone to the pot before the evening Brave Merchant and warlike ships comes to ruine by and through the wickedness of those that live in them Full little did the ship-builders or the owners think that the costly and brave warlike Fabricks should so soon violently end in a desolate rubbish It is not for us to bee high-minded but to fear no ship is so well cauked so well decked or planked but may give way and lay all her passengers in the bottome Surely Gentlemen you that use the Seas may very well say with the Magicians in Scripture when ships are cast away Exod. 8.19 Then the Magicians said unto Pharaoh This is the finger of God Lachrymae ubi vos subtraxistis Lachrymae ubi estis fontes lachrymarum fluite super facies nostras rigate maxillas 7. Bee filled with weeping tears either at the hearing or at your seeing of ships sunk and cast away in the Seas I confess those that dye in the waters are more to bee lamented than those that go to their graves by a timely death at land Lament 4.9 They that bee slain with the sword are better than they that be drowned Homer brings in brave Ulysses in great despair and disgustion of a drowning death when labouring in a dismal tempest I do not much wonder though the Lord knows it pities my heart that ships are cast away many times because it is nothing else but the infinite patience of God that they are kept up above water there bee so many oaths sworn in them which far exceed either the number of the stars in the heavens or of the drops in the Ocean 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 wishing hee had dyed among the Trojans than dye ignobly in the Seas Hee abhorred to dye in the waters Christ wept over Jerusalem when hee fore-saw her desolation and so did hee over Lazarus in his grave Bee affected with the sufferings of those that miscarry in the Seas Can you hear of Gods judgements in the Seas both against others and your selves and not bee affected with it Oh hardness of heart Oh mores Oh tempora Let mee tell you that I have seen a bird that hath got loose from a stone or stick unto which it hath been tyed yet in flying with the string about its heels it hath been intangled in the next bough or branch it may bee thus with you you have escaped in many a storm but take heed that you go not to the pot in the next I have observed it that there is a great deal of tenderness in the hearts of those that live in Sea-ports upon this account in respect there is much weeping and wringing of their hands for the deaths of their friends and acquaintance in such cases John such a one and Thomas such a one was cast away in such a storm I cannot blame them I have read of Achilles that hee took such delight and pleasure in his dear friend Patroclus En triftis rumor nostras pervenit ad aures that upon a time in his long absence he was much dejected because hee feared that hee should never see him more his mother Thetis to drive off his melancholy thoughts brought him an elaborate buckler made by Vulcan Cubans in facie â—ox deinde supinus One while he lay on his back and another while upon his face for grief which had imbost upon it Sun Moon Stars Planets Sea Land Men fighting running riding hills walls Towns Towers Castles Brooks Rivers Trees any thing every thing his heart could desire yet nothing could quiet him for his minde still ran upon his dear friend Patroclus Errat in nulla sede moratur amor may be the Motto of what is spoken of and so it must needs bee with those that live in Sea-ports who sometimes lose dear husbands other sometimes their children sometimes their brethren and other sometimes their kindred 8. Labour for a fruitful and profitable improvement both of your own and also of others sufferings in the Seas humbly intreat the Lord that no storm may blow over without benefit to your souls None sleep so soundly as they who continue sleeping under the greatest joggings Physick if it works not proves hurtful to the Patient If thou art so close nailed and glewed to thy swearing drinking whoring and dabling in sin that storms cannot part thee and them it is a provocation to God to leave thee It was a good saying of one after many storms and dangers upon the Seas I have had sayes her Pedem alterum in Cymba Charontis alterum in ripa Acherontica but I am the better for it It is good to bee sometimes in this life Inter Scyllam Charybdim inter scopulos et arenas Isa 1.5 and an encouragement to Satan that hee shall keep thee God is never more displeased than when hee takes away judgements in judgement than when he punishes you by delivering you out of storms and leaving you to your own hearts Ah Sirs beg of God that the blessed opportunities of shipwracking storms may never leave you as bad as they found you and that no wind may go down till it hath driven you nearer unto your God But I proceed to what remains That God hath power to do what hee Observ 6 will with our ships and ours and hath no Sovereign unto whom hee is Lauda navigantem cum pervenerit ad portum There is much danger to be tugged with all before the ship gets to her Port. or can bee made accountable or responsible for what hee doth Then hee brings c. How far then should every man bee from expecting that he should give them or any other an account of his actions and proceedings It should suffice them that what ever befalls them in the Seas is from the Lord Job 1.21 The Lord gives and the Lord takes blessed bee his name The Lord brings us home and other sometimes hee cuts us short of coming home blessed bee his name That those that fear God in their respective Observ 7 ships at Sea are never unsafe Hee brings them unto
that men would praise the Lord. Psal 105.5 Remember his marvellous works that hee hath done his wonders and the judgments of his mouth A gratious heart files all the Lords dealings with his soul either at Sea or Land in his heart and steers the same course the Sea-man does in the great deeps who makes it his daily business in long Voyages to keep his Quotidian reckonings for every elevation hee makes whereby hee judges of his advancings and deviations Mens memories should bee deep boxes or store-houses to keep their pretious Sea-mercies in and not like hour-glasses which are no sooner full but are a running out Bind all your sea-deliverances and preservations as fast upon your hearts as ever the Heathen bound their Idol Gods in their Cities in the time of wars siedges and common calamities which they evermore bound fast with Iron chaines and strong guards and sentinels lest they should leap over the walls or run out of their Cities from them Ah Sirs look to those things which Satan will bee very prone to steal from you who is like unto a theef that breaks into an house but will not trouble himself with the lumber of earthen or wooden vessels A gratious heart will resolve that the Orient shall sooner shake hands with the West and the Stars decline the azured Skies than he will forget the Lords deliverances out of gloomy stormy tempestuous and heart-daunting Seas Sirs you stand in need to be called upon for your hearts are not unlike to the leads and plummets of a Clock that continually drive downwards and so stand in need of winding up but falls foul on the plate and jewels Hee does and will steal away your hearts from minding the precious jewels of your Sea-deliverances I find in Scripture that the people of God of old were very careful and heedful to preserve the memory of their mercies I wish all the States Tarpowlings were of the like temper 1. By repeating them often over in their own hearts Psal 77.5 6 11. I will remember the works of the Lord surely I will remember thy wonders of old Sea-men should say of their Sea-deliverances as Lypsius once did of the Book he took so much delight in pluris facio quum relego semper novum quum repetivi repetendum The more I read the more I am tilled on to read The more I think of what God hath done for me the more I still delight to think of it Vers 6. I call to remembrance my song in the night Paul when hee was amongst the Mariners writ down all their transactions in the time of their danger Acts 27.7 The wind not suffering us we sailed under Crete over against Salmone Vers 18. And being exceedingly tossed with a Tempest the next day they lightned the ship Vers 27. But when the fourteenth night was come as wee were driven up and down in Adria about midnight the ship-men deemed that they drew near to some Country Vers 28. And sounded and found it twenty faothms c. 2. By composing and inditing of pretious pious and melodious Psalms Remember the time of your inconsolabili dolore oppressi this was Davids practice Psal 38. which hee titles A Psalm of David to bring to remembrance Again in the 70. Psalm Wee have the very same title A Psalm of David to bring to remembrance In our late wars many had such a pretious spirit breathing in them that they have put the victories and battels of England into sweet composed meeter to the end they might bee remembred Ah Sirs call all your deliverances in this and in the other part of the world to remembrance 3. By giving names to persons times and places on purpose to remind them of Gods mercies This was Hannahs course in the 1 Sam. 1.20 And called his name Samuel saying The States ships resemble the tall Tree in Nebuchadnazzar's dream Dan. 4.20 Whose height reached unto the heaven and the sight thereof to all the earth They go into all parts in the world as much admired are they as Venus was by the Gods Who came flocking about her when shee went to heaven because I have asked him of the Lord to that very end shee might for ever perpetuate the Lords goodness towards her Abraham to keep alive the goodnesse of God towards him in the sparing of his Son would call the place where hee should have been sacrificed Jehovah-Iireth i.e. God will provide Gen. 22.14 The Jews that they might keep in remembrance the daies of their deliverance from bloody-minded Haman they titled them Purim i. e. Lots Esth 9.26 in memory of Lots cast by Haman which the Lord disappointed And very commendable is this Scriptural practice amongst us in England for I have observed it and I like it very well that our Military Grandees to perpetuate their dreadful Land and Sea-fights do give their warlike ships and battels such titles To keep alive that great and desperate engagement which our Army had with the Scots in Scotland one of their warlike ships is called the Dunbar Gentlemen Captains and Sea-men many of your Ships derive borrow their names from the stour-charged and fought Battels of the Souldiery in England to that end you may imitate their valour at Sea which they to the life performed on Land Some are called the Treddah some the Naseby and other some the Dunbar some the Plymouth some the Gainsborough and othersome the Massammore c. Be valiant Sirs the Souldiery fought apace when in those Battels To keep up the memory of Naseby great fight they have another ship which they call the Naseby To keep up the memory of Worcester fight they have a brave warlike ship which they call the Worcester To keep up the enemies defeating at Wakefield in Yorkshire they have a gallant warlike ship called the Wakefield To remember the fight at Nantwich they have a warlike ship called the Nantwich To remember their victory at Plymouth against the enemy they have a ship which they call the Plymouth To keep up the memory of that famous bout at Massammore when the three Nations lay at the stake they have a ship called the Massammore To remember that great fight that was fought at Treddah they have a warlike Vessel called the Treddah To perpetuate the memory of that great and hot dispute that was once at Selby in Yorkshire they have a famous ship they call the Selby To keep up the memory of that bout they had with the enemy at Portsmouth they have a warlike ship they call the Portsmouth To keep up the memory of their taking of Gainsborough they have a brave Prince-like ship called the Gainsborough To keep up the Memory of the dispute that they once had at Preston Bee valiant Sirs your ships have their names from valiant Exploits on Land and the States will deal as kindly with you as the Russians do by those they see behave themselves couragiously the Emperour
Heathens were wont to say Mutus sit oportet qui non laudaret Herculem I may say Let that Sea-mans tongue be tyed up forever that is not alwayes blessing of the Lord for his mercies towards him Vivat Dominus vivat regnet in aternum Deus in nobis said Luther say you so Saylors therefore there is great reason that you should live in a far higher way of holiness than you do 7. Consider that you have been made acquainted with many and more precious deliverances than all the people under the whole heavens again and will you bee no better for all and after all 8. Consider that you have many eyes upon you out of the land how you will behave your selves after mercy They expect you should bee good 9. Consider that you have many tryals for faith and alas who more faithless than you 10. Consider that you might grow better for of all the people in the world none are so much cast down as you your spirits are broken many times by storms and you are laid low upon the back of despair 11. Consider that you are put to far harder shifts shorter and barer commons than others are and will not you bee more humble less proud and stomachful consider how ill it becomes you Ah Sirs your lives are too much like to Leâ—â—is 11. of France who did write in a letter to our Edward the 4. Couzen if you will come over to Paris wee will pamper our flesh and you shall have the choysest beauties in the City to sport with Your delights are too strong when you go to Naples Livorno and Genoa 12. Consider that you are generally a people of a very low rise and fortune in the land both as to state and breeding and will not you grow better sirs 13. Consider that none see so much of the Creation as you do nor none so much of the work of the Lord and will you out-top the whole world in prophaneness will you never behave your selves as that the world may no longer proverbialize you 14. Consider that you go oftentimes safely out and come safely back and will you bee no better for all this mercy 15. Consider that you are oftentimes going to fight and at that time your Hamocks are cut down your Chests stowed in the Hold your Guns haled out and your Decks be-decked with all sorts of dismangling bullets and will not you bee a more serious people Holiness would well become you 16. Consider that the deep Seas upon which and through which you sail Ulysses sayes Homer longed much to be near his own Country when been long cut of it Fumum de patriis posse videre focis Hee saw the smoke of his own Country chymneys shall one day as well as the earth surrender up her dead unto the Eternal and Almighty God and as men dye whether Swearers Drunkards or Adulterers so shall they rise it is a folly for any to think if they bee drowned in the Sea God will never finde them out more They whose bones lye in the bottome God will finde out Sirs I am tyred and spent with writing to you in a rowling restless element and therefore being almost at my desired Port When Ovid was and had been a long time travelling of it in the world hee then thought much of home Nescio qua natale solum dulcediue cunctos Ducit immemores non sinit esse suâ— I will strike and lower down my Fore-top-sail for a little sail commonly carries the ship into the Harbour And what Socrates used to say of and to his Scholars I will say to you the States Tarpowlings if I can but provoke you to learn and to fear my God whom I serve which is the desire of my soul that you might that is as much as I desire and as much as I can look for for from you therefore What Pasquillus said of Rome I will say of you and of the Sea Roma vale vidi satis est vidisse revertar Gran-mare vale vidi satis est vidisse revertar Farewel thou angry Sea farewel you Sailors all I have seen both you and it it is enough I will return Qui in peregrinis locis ad patriam aspirant If not I hope I shall bee able to sing with the Poet. Ferre volo cunctos casus patienter acerbos Littora dum patriae lacrymans portusque relinquo FINIS A Table directing to some of the principallest and remarkablest things in this Treatise A. ANselms penitent and humble expression page 357 Ataliba what that Indian Prince said page 349 Antisthenes's brave mind page 396 Aristippus what he said to the Tarpowlings when at sea amongst you page 358 Alexanders Macedonians how they sought the Emperours favour again page 451 Alexanders usual deportment in all Siedges page 405 Answer that the stormy wind gave when demanded why cast away so many ships page 487 Apis an Idol in Aegypt what it did ibid. Ability of God to muster up the Winds to destroy men page 386 Advice to Sea-men good page 385 Advice to Merchants page 383 Africa how dangerous to bee travelled the Seas compared unto it page 428 Athens what it did when the Plague was in it page 480 Achilles how cast down for the loss of his precious friend Patroclus page 557 Advice what to doe when goe to Sea page 394 Advice how to bear storms at Sea in four things page 399 Armies divers that God has on foot page 334 Alphonsus King of Spain what hee said to one page 5 Antonius what good he did in his preaching page 601 Agamemnons brave instructions to his Souldiers before the Battel began page 27 Austin how he begins his Sermon to young men page 44 Athanasius's brave carriage what page 63 Alipius how enticed page 75 Aristippus how willing to be reconciled to his enemie page 81 Aristotles wisdome and patience page 108 Antigonus how he bore with bad tongues ibid. Augustus how studied to overcome his passion page 109 Anger has a bad name amongst the Hebrews page 110 Alexanders Harper how put metal into the Emperour page 143 Aurclianus how careful of losing a day page 166 Augustines judgement why David put off Sauls armour page 176 Auroughscoun what page 250 Assa panick what page 250 Arbor Triste page 66 Asp what page 259 Arabian Spider what page 299 Alexander how kept Homers Iliads page 512 Alligator page 228 B. BErnards good exhortation to his Brother page 389 Bias's counsel to the Mariners when amongst them in a sad storm page 353 Bellerophon when went to Heaven was thrown neck-break out of it page 415 Bernards humble expression page 118 Boat-Swains exhorted to call their men up to prayer page 94 Boat-Swains if irreligious how harmful they are ibid. Boat-Swains how reproved and for what page 89 Bird what sort brest themselves against the Wind. page 3 Bruso Zeno's Servant what page 15 Bernard what said to his friends page 41 Bonosus a Beast how hurtful page 75